**Ah, yes. Napolean. My favorite dictator banned to an island…until Vetinari. The story continues…**
VIII.
The pigeon landed on a chimney at the Ramkin-Vimes House, noticed the man in black just below her and decided to take the dirty way in. She went down the stack, fluttering her wings in distaste at the slightly sooty walls, and emerged in the bedroom.
It was dark and silent. Deep snores came from the four-poster bed.
The bird flew to the top of one of the posts and cooed.
Sam Vimes went from snore to wide awake in a split second, a truncheon gripped in his hand.
The pigeon cooed again.
"Sybil!" whispered Vimes. He shook her. She was a deep sleeper. "Sybil!"
She emerged slowly and snapped awake when she saw him on his knees, which never happened under any circumstances because of the symbolism of it and the fact that his knees weren't what they used to be. She followed his gaze.
"Is it Alice or Reginald?" she asked.
"Are you Reginald?" Vimes asked the bird.
She didn't move.
"Alice?"
She cooed.
"That's our bird." Ex-Corporal Littlebottom had told him Reginald and Alice were the smartest young pigeons on the Watch. "Come on down, then." Vimes held out his arm.
Alice fluttered down and allowed him to unbuckle the burden she'd been carrying on her leg the past thousand miles, over water mostly, with occasional stops on fishing boats and tankers along the way. Sybil got a candle and matches and went into the walk-in wardrobe where there were no windows. Vimes set Alice down and the Ramkins shut themselves up in the closet.
After a few moments, he said, "What the bloody hell is that supposed to be?"
"It's a code, Sam."
"I know it's a code. He knows I don't like codes."
Sybil sighed. "I'll get paper and pencil."
They worked on it for several hours, dropping crumpled paper on the floor of the wardrobe. When they cracked it, knew they'd really got it, they were both stretched out on the floor, suddenly excited after the fatigue of the work. The words were revealed slowly, out of order, so that in the end they had to go back to the start and read it all the way through.
Then they read it again.
Then they looked at each other.
"Is it just me, or does it sound like he's enjoying himself?" said Vimes. "Only he would enjoy himself in exile."
"I do hope Hanna brings that -- What was it called? Bikini -- when she comes back. I would love to see what kind of clothing Havelock would find important enough to mention in a coded message."
"Doesn't sound like there's much to it," murmured Vimes, rolling up the decoded message. He held the original over the candle flame until it curled away in black fragments. "Buggy said he'd show up at nine."
"Ten."
"Right." Vimes started writing on a blank sheet of paper. "Queen Molly is going to love this."
**
The messenger arrived with the supply ship around midday, when Lord Vetinari was in the study working on his political treatise and Hanna was stretched out on the couch attempting to embroider a handkerchief. She wasn't good with a needle and thread despite the name of her guild, but she was willing to learn. The terrace doors were open and a couple of day shift Assassins were reading in the shade, within earshot.
"Erghehem!" coughed the messenger.
They all looked up from their work. The messenger waved a folded letter.
"Message from the Patrician of Ankh-Morpork!" Downey had told him to announce it that way and to observe Vetinari's face at the same time.
It didn't budge. He gave the messenger a long, bland stare.
"Nice house you got here," said the messenger, looking around. The study was blue and had wooden shutters. He liked wooden shutters.
"I'm delighted you like it," said Vetinari. "If you would be so good as to deliver the message." He held out a hand.
The messenger went straight to Hanna.
"I've heard a lot about you, miss. No chance on a courier's pay, but I was thinking some time you should offer, like, discounts. For the middle class. It don't seem right letting the nobs have everything."
"I'll think about it," said Hanna.
The messenger shook a finger at her. "You can't forget where you come from, miss. The middle class, we got to stick together." He shot a glance at Vetinari, leaned over and whispered, "You can only trust your own. And that's a fact." He straightened up, suddenly official again. "Here's your message, miss."
Hanna looked over at Vetinari. He was frowning.
"Good day to you, miss," said the messenger, bowing. "And you too, sir," he said with less enthusiasm. He backed out the door.
Lord Vetinari propped his elbows on the table and pressed his fingers to his lips. Hanna hesitated, then broke the seal and unfolded the paper.
A moment later, she started laughing.
**
The accountant had been talking for ten minutes without seeming to take a breath.
"…which has called off all trade treaties and imposed prohibitive tariffs on wool, cabbage, corn and wheat, which is likely to cause a food shortage in the city if the situation doesn't change by winter."
The Patrician Lord Downey stared at him, his hands limp on his desk in the Oblong Office. The past weeks had been enlightening. A half dozen countries had protested the calling in of their debts. When shouting didn't work, they sent papers with official looking seals declaring trade treaties cancelled and protective tariffs in force for a wide range of goods. The latest was from the Sto Plains. The accountant was informing Downey that the price of all fresh grains and vegetables had jumped by ten percent as soon as the news broke that morning.
Nobody looked like they were going to pay their debts.
"Klatch has threatened to boycott Morporkian goods," the accountant was saying. "Representatives of several of the leading city manufacturers and the appropriate guild heads are waiting outside to discuss the issue with you, sir."
"Discuss," said Downey.
"There may be shouting, sir."
"I've been shouted at for days!"
"I beg your pardon, sir, but I did advise you against this course."
Downey sighed in frustration. "What other course do I have?"
The accountant removed his glasses and rubbed his eyes. "Taxes, sir."
Vetinari had taxed the citizens, of course, but only as much as they were willing to give. How he'd found the balance was a mystery. The guilds and nobles had close contact with the Guild of Accountants and usually managed to avoid the worst of it. The Assassins had become good at tax evasion. Now Downey was seeing the issue from the other side.
"Call off the debt thing and send the Guards out to collect taxes from any delinquents." He thought a moment. "As long as they're not noble. And not from the major guilds. And we'll impose a new tax. Nothing big…" He leaned back in his chair, staring at the ceiling, thinking. He snapped his fingers. "Milk."
"Sir?"
"Put a few cents tax on milk."
"A wise move, your lordship." Mr. Fisk was careful not to smile.
Downey did. He liked being called wise.
"Five cents per gallon. Pocket change. Nobody will notice."
**
Hanna wiped her eyes with the handkerchief she'd been embroidering, her laughter coming out now in little hiccups. Lord Vetinari's face still hadn't budged. He looked like he expected something unpleasant. The Assassins had set their books aside. The arrival of a messenger was considered entertainment on Khavos.
"Oh dear oh dear oh dear," said Hanna. She slumped in the couch, letting the letter flutter to the floor.
Vetinari watched it fall but said nothing.
"Guess what," she said.
He frowned.
"Go on, guess." She stretched out on her stomach, her cheek propped up on her hand. "All right, I'll tell you. Downey has informed me that my contract was with Havelock Vetinari, Patrician. And seeing as you're not the Patrician anymore, he found it necessary to declare it null and void. Mr. Slant has apparently confirmed the legal argument."
Lord Vetinari didn't react.
"I'm free to go back to Ankh-Morpork or, and this is the really fun part, if I stay, I'm free to offer my services to whomever I wish." She chuckled. "Except for you."
The Assassins on the terrace looked at each other. Each was mentally adding up his accumulated wages from the past month.
Vetinari sat back in his chair.
"It appears you're free at last."
"Free at last." Hanna turned onto her back and laughed at the ceiling. She was finding it hard to stop. Lord Vetinari had coerced her into the contract, and the only way she thought she would get out of it was for one of them to die or to pay the fortune in penalties required to buy out the remaining time. They were just past the halfway point of the contract. And now she was free.
Lord Vetinari got to his feet.
"I assume you will decide to go back," he said. "There is no longer a reason for you to guard your investment."
Hanna tumbled off the couch, caught his hand and held it. "Are you joking, sir? I'm the only seamstress on an island with 18 Assassins; that's a monopoly. The Assassins Guild is our best customer. I'd be a fool to go back."
The Assassins in the terrace doorway grinned at each other. The assignment on the island just got more interesting.
Or should have.
The Assassins who'd listened in on the conversation between Hanna and Vetinari spread the news to the others. Everyone but Kinsey paid a lot more attention to hygiene the first few days afterward. They were especially nice to Hanna, and she was sweet to them. When one of them got up the nerve to ask her what she was charging these days, she named a figure that was out of the reach of even Townsend, the wealthiest of the wealthy night shift Assassins. Her rates were astronomical. She was asked if she was thinking of lowering them to cover the special economic circumstances of the island. Her fan fluttering in her face, she replied, "Who knows?"
And that was one of the reasons why the day-shift Assassins huddled together under a clump of palm trees in the terraced garden of the villa instead of doing their jobs. The sun beat down as it had every day the past few long, hot, endless, boring, aching weeks. The men cooked in their dark clothing. The dress code of the day shift had grown consistently lax over time until now most of them didn't bother with jackets, ties, shoes and socks. Kinsey was barefoot. He was wearing a black sleeveless undershirt and had his trousers rolled up to his knees.
"We have to make an appeal to Lord Downey directly, independently of the night team," he said.
"He's going to say no," said one of the others. "He has no idea of the conditions here. This dreadful sun."
"The heat."
"The boredom."
"Miss Stein."
The Assassins groaned. There was something humiliating about being unable to pay for the only seamstress on the island. She was like a fata morgana sunning herself on the sand, always out of reach. Kinsey didn't share this sentiment but otherwise he was in complete agreement with his team. The day shift was the hardest and deserved to be compensated accordingly. There had to be some incentive to get to the end of their six-month assignment on the island.
"I will send a message to Lord Downey with the next ship," he said.
"Will he even listen?" said the pessimist of the group. "Does he and the guild in Ankh-Morpork really represent us or the night shift?"
There were grumbles.
"We're not nobles," he said. "Just you wait. We'll get the short end of the stick like we always do."
Kinsey held up a hand. "I am a noble, and I assure you, Lord Downey will play fair with us."
"You're a poor noble. You need the money as much as we do." The pessimist flipped his thumb toward the guest house where the night shift was. "They all stick together. Nobles." He snorted.
The day shift Assassins stared with narrowed eyes at the guest house. Kinsey was feeling pulled in both directions, which was nothing unusual for him.
No one noticed Vetinari release the pigeon Reginald from the roof of the villa.
**
The night shift wasn't actually sleeping. Townsend had called a meeting. The group lounged on the divans and arm chairs of the living room that faced the sea and drank lemonade served by the housekeeper.
"We're overqualified for this work," said Townsend. "Any commoner from the Palace Guard could do it. We knew that when we took the assignment, but it has become clear that we should receive additional compensation for the conditions here. A standard of living adjustment."
"I haven't had a decent massage in ages, Townsend," said one of the Assassins.
"The cook has no idea how to make a hollandaise," complained another.
"How dare that bloody seamstress price herself out of the market? She wouldn't do it in Ankh-Morpork, I'll tell you that."
There was a chorus of agreement. Hanna post-Vetinari obviously thought a tick too high of herself. She barely spoke with her former employer but that didn't stop him from trying to put his hands on her at every opportunity. It was disgraceful. The old lecher couldn't seem to accept the end of the contract. She was nice enough to the Assassins, but when it came to business, she showed herself to be a greedier littler tart than they thought she'd be.
"Gentlemen!" Townsend held up a hand. "I am in full agreement. It is insulting enough that we must act like guards and servants, fetching and carrying, receiving wages by the day like common workers. That the comforts in life that we deserve are also robbed of us… It's disgraceful." He brandished a cigarette. "And this! This is the first cigarette in my last pack. The supply ship will not arrive for three days. I am to wait? A Townsend? My family has twenty pages in Twurp's Peerage! Does that count for anything on this gods-forsaken island?"
NO! chorused the Assassins.
"Should we have to stand by and watch a scantily-clad seamstress display herself on the beach without the possibility of paying for the amusement we're entitled to?"
NO!
"No, indeed. I'll send a message to Lord Downey explaining the situation." Townsend lit up the first cigarette of his last pack. "I am sure he will understand our predicament and compensate us accordingly."
There were murmurs, slurps of lemonade, self-righteous chewing of cigars. The night shift Assassins were wondering if old Downey would come through. Men got a bit strange when they became Patrician. Vetinari was proof. Since the message from Ankh-Morpork, he'd started taking long, sorrowful walks around the island by himself. Some of the Assassins would have felt sorry for him if they weren't already feeling sorry for themselves.