Strandpiel, Book Two

by A.A. Pessimal

The continuation of the saga of interlocking families and friends, spread across at least two continents.

28. Donner en Bliksem

Strandpiel 28

Play Up, Play Up, And Donner The Man V0.1

V.04. Attacking typos I missed discovered by reader "Guest". Thank you.

In which Famke learns new life lessons and Bekki tries to outnumber two full fifteen-a-side teams by one to thirty. Bekki realises that if in the Discworld's "South Africa", rugby football is a religion, she is, by default, a minor priestess. Or at least a senior acolyte in the service.

Bit of "uggh" with FanFiction and a couple of seriously hostile reviews, but I'll get onto that in the end-notes.

Completion and publication delay – due to a death in the family. This had to take priority.

Also had an idea for this year's Hogswatch short. Which will feature the Air Watch. This is in gestation.

---

Ankh-Morpork, Saturday afternoon.

Ampie duPris politely stood up to acknowledge one of his tutors. Famke grinned up through a mouthful of chocolate cake and said "Hi, mum." After a second, she kindly added

"It's a big slice, Ruthie. Grab a fork and dig in."

Johanna sighed. She shook her head.

"Wipe your face, Famke. You've got all chocolate sauce and crumbs on the side of your mouth. For goodness sake, learn to eat elegantly in public."

She smiled at Ampie.

"You've just come from orchestra rehearsal?"

"Ja, Mevrou Dokter." Ampie said, politely. "As we were walking in the same direction after a rehearsal where we both had to pay great attention and focus on the work, I suggested to Famke that I should buy her coffee and cake. And I could talk to her about being in the School Orchestra, and what is required."

Johanna smiled.

"Thank you, Ampie. And as I'm not wearing a teaching sash justnow and we are not at school, it's Johanna. Did you have the necessary talk with her?"

They looked across to where Famke and her sister were industriously clearing a plate of cake. Both seemed absorbed in this to the exclusion of all else.

"Better order more cake." Johanna said, thoughtfully. "And drinks."

She reached for her purse. A waitress came over to take the order. Johana recognised the expression on her face and smiled.

"Despite eppearances, we all speak Morporkian." she assured her, in Morporkian. "Tell me ebout the cake selection today."

"You get this a lot." she remarked to Ampie, in Vondalaans. "They hear you speaking your own language, and assume you're just off the boat at the Docks."

Ampie grinned. "Ja, mevrou dokter." he agreed. "Johanna. Then they start speaking in very slow and careful Morporkian to you. It can be funny sometimes."

An order for more drinks and cakes was taken. Johanna paused before putting her purse away.

"Ampie, what has Famke cost you so far?" she asked. "I should be paying, I think. In a way this is School business."

"Mum!" Famke protested. "How do you know I didn't pay for my own coffee and cake?"

Her mother studied her.

"Because I know you. Because you're only twelve and you will have no money on you. And because Ampie is a decent fellow, and he would have felt obliged."

"Hardly that, mevrou." Ampie said, accepting the couple of dollars Johanna was pressing on him. His own budget wasn't that lavish.

"This is my fourth year as part of the full Orchestra. It is Famke's first. I understand Herr Doctor von Übersetzer needed to be persuaded having her in the School Orchestra family was a good idea."

He gave Famke an apologetic look.

"I thought this might be a good idea. To explain how it works and what she can expect."

Johanna smiled. She felt she could fill in the blanks.

Tying down the loose siege engine. Explaining to her about teamwork and interdependence. Making as sure as I can that she doesn't do anything that embarrasses her teachers. No misbehaviour. Also that this orchestral performance is very important to me, for some very good reasons.

"Thank you, Ampie." she said, sincerely. "I hope she wasn't a bother to you?"

He grinned.

"Hardly. I don't think it was so much me, as the promise of free cake. Also, she saw the benefits of talking with somebody who's done this three times before."

Famke made a "mmmph!" noise, muffled by cake.

"You're not completely utterly boring." she said, through crumbs. "You're okay to talk to."

Johanna caught the unspoken words and the look. She shelved this for consideration later.

"So, your final year at the School." she said. "You do the Final Run in July and graduate. What then?"

Ampie looked thoughtful.

"I'm allowed to defer my Army draft for eight weeks, Johanna." he said. "The expectation is that as I am being educated overseas, it will take six weeks to return Home. I will be allowed a grace period of a fortnight to spend time with my family and travel to the recruit training barracks. And then, twenty-six weeks of recruit training. Commencing in October."

He sighed, heavily. Johanna gave his hand a consoling pat.

"It drags." she said. "I remember how it drags. But we all have to do it. At least it puts you in the same country as Rebecka. Stop giggling, Famke."

He brightened up. "And she can get me there in a lot less time than the allocated six weeks for a sea voyage."

"Ja." Johanna agreed. "Olga Romanoff will know, of course, but she will officially not know if Bekki flies a passenger back to Howondaland. Olga will choose not to be officially aware. You'll be home inside the hour, in fact. Therefore, you win those six weeks."

She smiled, then looked reflective.

"It also gives your family a chance to meet Bekki. Inevitable, really."

Ampie considered this. He brightened.

"It will be good to return, Johanna." he said, earnestly.

"Ja." Johanna said. "After seven years here in Ankh-Morpork. That changes people. My sister Mariella said she could never again look at Home in the same way."

She smiled, sympathetically.

"Living here changed me."

She poured herself a cup of tea. This café offered redbush as an exotic foreign flavour. It was good rooibos tea.

"I spoke to people I know." she said. "You might be interested to know that on the performance night, there will be people from the Embassy attending as part of the invited diplomatic contingent. A junior officer in the military attaché's section is one who has a background in military music. He will know to look out for the principal trumpet player who will be doing the long solo parts."

Ampie realised the significance of this. He smiled.

"I called in a favour." Johanna said. "Also, the choice of the pieces to be played was not random. One of Doctor von Ubersetzer's concerns, as always, is to ensure the very best musicians in the School, the best and the most gifted ones, are showcased. You, for instance. Ethylene Glynnie was also keen for the percussion section to shine and not be relegated to the status of supporting players in the background. Nigel Heggarty was arguing for pieces with strong parts for violins and cellos and the rest. Being in the same Staffroom, I was heartily glad I am not a music teacher."

"So they all fought like cats in a sack?" Famke said, cheerfully.

Johanna looked sternly at her.

"There was debate, certainly." she said. "And what you hear here, meisie, is between myself and Ampie. Unavoidably, you are also present. Do not breathe a word of it."

She glared at Famke to get the point over.

"Also, Lord Vetinari approved the final choice and made constructive suggestions as to the playlist." she said. "For reasons of his own. Apparently foreign nobility and dignitaries will be present. As well as representatives of major orchestras, musical conservatories, and advanced music schools around the Disc. Another good reason to be perfect on the night."

"Talent scouts and job interviews. So, no pressure, then." Ampie remarked.

Johanna grinned and patted his hand.

"Also, this counts as your final course credit and pass in Music." she reminded him. "Not that you haven't already Passed, several times over."

She nodded to Famke.

"Also, you." she said. "Ethylene chose you. So you'd better be note-perfect. Playing with the School Orchestra and not fouling it up means you pass Music for this year with a starred A. Same applies to Thora. It's rare for second year pupils to be accepted for the Orchestra. Reflects well on me, too."

"But why me?" Famke asked. She sounded genuinely puzzled. Her mother smiled.

"Because Ethylene Glynnie thinks you're potentially good. She wants you to have the experience. For you to know what's expected."

Ampie smiled at her.

"As I said, Famke. I started out in the brass section. Supporting player. Other people got the principal parts. Every successive year I got a little more to do. Today I'm the soloist." Ampie said. "Next year, for you, a bit more responsibility. A different instrument, perhaps. And the year after that, who knows?"

"Be told. He's speaking from experience." Johanna said. She wondered about going into the other reasons why Ethylene Glynnie had selected Famke. Ones Johanna had seen the sense of, and had happily agreed to. She smiled, and decided to save these for later. Nearer the time. She noted two senior student Assassins entering the café, and recognised both. She signalled that she would not be opposed to their joining the group.

"Besides, it keeps you usefully occupied and out of trouble." she said, as a final remark to Famke. That had been a reason too.

"Hey, Springbok!" said the newly arrived student. Johanna noted Famke's sudden change of mood and slight redness about the cheekbones. She frowned and stored this for reflection later.

"Hey, Reindeer!" Ampie replied. He half stood and slapped hands with the newcomer. She noted it had the look of two fifteen-a-side players who respected each other's abilities on the field socially recognising each other.

"Had to collect Jenny." he said. "She was upstairs rehearsing with Strings. Favoured people. They get the top-floor studio with the big windows and the daylight. We get the Concussion Bunker. Where they used to keep coal."

Jenny, delicate and blonde, a final year student in Tump House, smiled at Johanna.

"Doctor." she said, in a shy voice.

"Join us." Johanna said. "You too, Mr Kovanäänen."

"Doctor." Mikki Kovanäänen said, politely acknowledging her.

He grinned down the table, recognising Famke.

"Hey, punatukkainen sääski! Alright for you, you could just walk out at the end. I had to put the kettledrums away and believe me, they take some moving! And Jenny plays cello!"

Johanna, aware she was among musicians, an unfamiliar species to her, decided to go with it. She wondered what the affectionate words he was using to describe Famke meant.(1) She also noted Famke had gone a little bit red and uncertain. Johanna cross-referenced this toMikki Kovanäänen of Mykkims House being undeniably well-formed and decidedly good-looking, the sort of pupil who gets a very big vote of approval among his female peers, and decided it might be time for a Talk to Famke later. She sighed. It was bound to happen sooner or later.

"I get spit-valves." Ampie said. "On two instruments. Can't hurry that."

"Easy to carry. One in each hand." Mikki said. Mikki Mykkims, Johanna remembered, to those who just could not get his surname. It had stuck. She also remembered there'd once been a Swommi pilot in the Air Watch and that she'd asked Olga Romanoff, who had experience, about how to handle them. Mikki had been her first and so far only Swommi pupil; it had been a new experience for her. She also recalled Olga had winced and had asked for a large vodka. That had spoken volumes. At least Olga had coached her in pronouncing the name pretty much properly.

"Just allow them a very long lead, Johanna." Olga had said. "Lots of freedom. But be prepared to yank hard on the leash every so often, so they recognise there's a lead there at all. And that you're holding the other end."

It had been sound advice. Mikki, in the meantime, had given respect to a teacher who had actually bothered to get his name right, down to the two umlauted ä's that had come in back-to-back, a sort of dipthong sound that gave the name Kovanäänen six syllables. She reflected that he was a few months away from graduating now and it had all turned out right. Pretty much.

She noted Ruth was excitedly talking music to the two newcomers while Famke had gone a little bit mute. She grinned. Ruth was too young and innocent. She just saw interesting person who plays drums and nice pleasant reserved lady who plays cello.

Famke, on the other hand, seemed to be manifesting the awkward discomfort of being in the presence of seriously cute good-looking guy I've got a bit of a crush on and his stunningly attractive perfect blonde cowbag of a girlfriend.

Johanna wondered if Evvie Glynnie was aware, and decided she probably was. She decided she'd have the Talk later with Famke.

She smiled, noting the yelp from Famke as Ruth said, excited, that if Mummy says you can, why don't you both come round and see the music studio?

"Drop by." Johanna said. "Mikki, Jenny, you're both very welcome. I've no objection to that at all."

Famke can get this first crush out of the way. It's a rite of passage. She's twelve, he's eighteen. Best she realises that "no chance whatsoever" applies, as we all have to. But be understanding. It comes with the turf when you're that age and all the other things are kicking in. Better tell Bekki too.

Johanna smiled and let the conversation flow around music, a subject area of which she had little more than general knowledge. She listened to Mikki and Ampie agreeing that Famke needed a sort of big-brotherly presence in her life while she was part of the orchestral family, and watched her shuffling uncomfortably in her seat.

"Well, we're her big brothers for the next couple of months, Springbok!"

Ampie sighed.

"I suspect I've got her for longer than that." he said, resignedly. He grinned at Famke. "Won't end when we take the bow at the end of the performance. Not that it's completely a bad thing. She sort of grows on you."

"Comes with the turf, I guess." Mikki agreed. "See much of Bekki?"

Johanna smiled. She got the undercurrents and approved. Famke was going to be looked after and steered.

"Can't call her Springbok, though." Mikki said, reflectively. "That's taken. And punatukkainen sääski fits, but it doesn't travel well. Is there a word in your language for her?"

"Could think of a few, but she'd donner me." Ampie said, with mock-seriousness. Maybe rattel. But a rattel eventually gives up."

"Like a wolverine." Johanna explained. "But Howondalandian."

"Veelvrat." Ampie said, thoughtfully.(2)

"Shorter in Swommi." Mikki said. "Unusually. Ahma, to us. Probably because once one's biting you, you can't scream out anything longer."

"Hmmph." Famke said, gathering her dignity. "Any more cake?"

"Pieniahma" Mikki said, looking at Famke. "Like that. Better than sääski."

Ruth and Jenny were discussing the music to be played on the Concert night. Ruth was listening and asking intelligent questions. Ruth was also fascinated to hear the second part of the concert would involve a piano concerto, selected to showcase the School's most gifted pianist. Johanna noted Jenny was being careful with her words. She smiled.

"Jennifer, you can be more open." she said. "I think we all know that politics and social status skewed that decision. Camilla Selachii is, to give her credit, an outstanding pianist. And her father donates a lot to the Music School. Payback."

Johanna smiled. Education also involved bright pupils learning about the way the world actually worked, in real life.

---

The Hendrik Verwoerd Sports and Recreation Fields, Bitterfontein. Saturday.

Bekki settled down on the hard wooden bench in the dug-out, trying to make herself as comfortable as possible as she waited for the match to start. The man with the megaphone was reading out the names of each team by number, with variably loud cheers from the crowd as each player was announced. She let this drift past, as she realised the low wall at the back of the dugout allowed her, with a little shift of position, to watch the crockett match going on in the next sports field along. This was as sedate and as nearly unexciting as she had thought.

She frowned. The man with the megaphone had named the match officials, the referee and the touch-judges. He then added

"The Medical Official for today will be Sister Rebecka Smith-Rhodes, who is present at the Medical Station. If there are any emergencies requiring medical attention to players or spectators, she will be on hand to assist."

Her name got a cheer, on general principles. She shook her head and sighed, aware she had been assigned a nursing qualification that she had no right to, strictly speaking. Bekki wondered if she ought to ask for a correction, but let this pass. It would add to the boffo quotient.

As usual, she attempted to disencrypt the logic of the sport of Crockett. Ampie had tried to explain how it worked as best he could and had given her a few clues. She understood that to many people, it had the same sort of passionate interest, although less exuberantly displayed, as fifteen-a-side. Ampie was certainly addicted.

Fifteen-a-side ran to more easily understood rules, although to the uninitiated it could also have its baffling moments. It was simple enough: get that lemon-shaped ball and drive it down to the other side's goal-line, cross it, and down it for a try. Or else to kick the unpredictably-shaped ball so it passed over the crossbar and between the posts, for a field-goal or a conversion.

On the field in between, thirty okes had the opportunity to get physical and work out a lot of testosterone.

This, she knew, necessitated a Medical Official to be present. She wondered which of those thirty brus would end up coming to her or end up being carried to her. Fifteen-a-side in this country was a game where it was considered that if all thirty guys who'd started at the kick-off were still upright at the end of eighty minutes, nobody had been trying.

Bekki hoped the large equipment bag she'd packed for the day was big enough and that she'd thought of everything.

"Oh. Hello." she said, registering the new arrivals. Two reasonably smartly dressed men carrying a stretcher and buckets of water. She noted that they were black. Which made them stand out in the Hendrik Verwoerd Sports Stadium.

"Please, baas-lady. We are your orderlies for today." the older of the two said. He deferentially held out the rolled stretcher for her inspection. She nodded. This made sense.

"Bring those buckets over here, please. Where I can get to them when they are needed. Dankie." she said, welcoming them. She also wondered, if this was likely to be a regular Saturday duty, if she could get Dertien here. Her regular orderly was shaping up into a competent assistant and uncomplainingly did all the hard work in her surgery. Bekki considered he could learn a few useful things like how to apply bandages correctly, and assist in dressing minor wounds. Besides, whatever pay they got for Saturday work might be a useful extra. She frowned. The black labourers assigned here on a Saturday must get some sort of pay for it, mustn't they? She'd ask.

She watched them going out of the dugout to squat outside, and frowned.

"Wouldn't you be more comfortable sitting in here with me?" she asked. She saw the two, older black men in their thirties, looking at each other and suddenly getting very uncomfortable.

"Please, baas-lady. Not allowed." said the younger man, looking very ill at ease. "This is white people's space?"

She caught the questioning tone.

You are white. You speak Vondalaans. You must know this?

Bekki frowned.

"Let me guess." she said. "Despite appearances, by the way, I am from Ankh-Morpork. A long way away, where the Racial Separation Act and the Zoning Regulations do not apply."

She rummaged in her bag and decided on a minor act of rebellion. Yes, there it was. The standard-issue City Watch sticks of chalk, used on crime scenes to outline bodies or indicate items of interest for the attention of Sergeant Littlebottom and the forensics people. Nobby Nobbs got through a pack a week. She'd never used hers. Till now.

Bekki grinned.

"What are your names?" she asked. "I'm Rebecka. I believe it's acceptable for you to call me Miss Rebecka. You're Benjamin. You're Nemo. Pleased to meet you both. Are you regulars here? Stadium staff?"

Bekki selected black chalk. It would stand out on the white of the walls and the bench.

"Listen to me." she said, as she chalked a vertical line on the dugout wall, across the bench, and then dividing the concrete floor in two. "This is my allocated space. I am in charge here. My Aunt Mariella tells me we are law-abiding people and we should obey the Law in all details."

Bekki, having divided the dugout into two sections with a chalk line, then drew a big prominent letter S on one side of the line, and an equally big letter B on the other side.

"In accordance with the Racial Separation Acts and the lawful practice of apartheid." she said. "Hier. Blanke. Streng vir blankes. En hier. Swartes. Streng vir swartes."

She indicated the area marked with the letter S.

"Please. Sit down like real people. You are working for me. I am giving permission."

The two black men looked at each other and grinned. Then they sat in the dugout. Very scrupulously in the area Bekki had marked as strictly for blacks.

Bekki looked across at the fifteen-a-side field and saw the touch-judge, the Reverend Duidelik, watching bemusedly. He gave her a long appraising look. Then the young priest grinned and nodded. He gave her the thumbs-up. Bekki smiled at him. He's okay, for a priest, she thought. Wonder if Aunt Mariella knows him?

The woman who had been talking to the touch-judge strolled over. Bekki noted she was around forty, and had a world-weary slightly cynical expression. She also had an iconograph around her neck, on a strap, a big clumsy old-fashioned one. Something about her said …

"Roberta Skribelaar." she said, extending a hand. "Bitterfontein Klarion."

"Rebecka Smith-Rhodes." Bekki replied. "Healthcare practitioner."

"Trained in Lancre, I hear?" Roberta asked, with seeming naivity.

Bekki smiled.

"I lived in Lancre." she said, neither confirming or denying. "Picked up a few useful skills there."

The local journalist smiled back.

"A Smith-Rhodes." she said, thoughtfully. "You're Mariella's little sister?"

"Niece." Bekki corrected, automatically. "You know Aunt Mariella?"

"Everybody knows your Aunt Mariella." Roberta said. "She's shaking this town up in her own quiet way. Good for news. Oh. And everybody seems to have got it in their heads that you're her little sister. I wouldn't argue with that, if I were you. It'll help you to get things done."

She nodded to the two black men sitting in the dugout.

"That's a Mariella sort of thing to do." she observed. "Reckon you're learning from her."

"You work for the local paper?" Bekki asked. Roberta laughed. There was an edge to it.

"I am the local paper." she said. "Justnow I'm the sports reporter." She looked out over the field where the final pre-game rituals were seemingly being concluded, the referee inspecting studs on boot soles and ordering at least three players to go to the dressing room and change footwear. Bekki got this: some players tried to get away with longer studs than were allowed; others, of a more cynical frame of mind, would sharpen the metal studs to get an edge on them and pretend innocence if an opponent got a bigger injury in a loose maul or a ruck. Uncle Danie said it happened, but there were ways of dealing with this. The referees were wise to potentially dirty players, and the other okes on the field, who played a tough but fair game, had their own necessary strategies for enforcing acceptable limits.

"Dirty players don't last long, and you hardly see them at the top level." Uncle Danie had said. Bekki hoped so. Even so, one of the Kirstenbosch team, sent to change into acceptable footwear, gave her a chill of something like revulsion. He was huge, looked like a human troll, and had a sort of expression on his face that experienced Watchmen had told her to beware of.

"Bottle covey." she said, to herself.

Roberta looked puzzled. Bekki realised she'd said it in Morporkian, and explained it was a City Watch sort of codeword. You know. Bad guy. That big oke kind of radiated it.

Roberta nodded, understanding.

"Markus Swaart." she said. "A bad lot."

Bekki noted the deformed and mutilated ears. Apparently this was an occupational hazard of the second-row forward in the scrum.

They silently watched him leave the field.

"This sort of thing delays the kick-off." Roberta said. "People can get irritated. Anyway. You're here as nurse?"

Bekki caught the unspoken spill-words. You're pretty young?

"Ja." she said. "Got started out when I was eleven…"

Roberta nodded, understanding.

"Lancre." she said. The one word explained everything. "Or maybe, women from Lancre?"

"Or trained in Lancre. Didn't get to go there till I was fourteen."

"Safest to say healthcare practitioner, your aunt said. I'll go with that in anything I print." Roberta paused, looked world-weary for an instant, and asked "You haven't met Oskar Verdraainer yet?"

Bekki understood. She and the local journalist were on the same side here. The open secret was still safe.

"We go to press on a Tuesday night." Roberta said. "Guess who calls round to check the copy on a Tuesday afternoon?"

Bekki considered this.

"You have an unpaid sub-editor acting in the public interest who makes sure you're printing nothing that alarms people too much?"

Roberta grinned.

"Mariella said you're sharp. Like that."

"Cousin Suki said so." Bekki replied. "Only for her, BOSS are in-house."

Roberta considered this.

"Suki van der Graaf." she said. Her voice had both envy and admiration. "That woman's a legend."

Then she suddenly became more attentive, a journalist on a story. Bekki noted Nemo and Benjamin suddenly seemed ill at ease and were making to stand up. She assessed the situation, and motioned for them to remain seated.

"Sergeant." she said, politely. "Corporal."

She welcomed the two policemen, assessing them. Sergeant van Klaamer, fat, late fifties, generally good-natured, lazy and laid-back.

"And you must be Corporal Elswaar."(3) she said. Some things didn't need figuring out. Not with a police corporal who looked like that.

"Miss." van Klaamer said, respectfully. Bekki smiled pleasantly at him. She'd catered to his feet a couple of weeks previously. And he had to deal with Aunt Mariella, who was on his patrol beat. Bekki also remembered she was now Mariella's little sister, or as good as. This made some things easier.

She assessed the two policemen. It was hardly surprising they were here, on Saturday afternoon, having managed to pull an easy beat patrolling the local sports stadium. To spend a few hours walking around, being affable, able to nip behind the grandstand for a sly smoke, and able to watch the game for free and to get paid for it. Exactly where you'd expect a long-time experienced Sergeant to be, alongside his patrol partner.

Some things were universal.

Bekki also wondered if Korporaal Elswaar had boils and when she'd be called upon to minister to them.

Van Klaamer studied the two black men in the dugout, and Bekki remembered this was Rimwards Howondaland. Where an additional set of Laws applied. She stepped in.

"All in order, sergeant." she said, firmly, daring him to argue. She was also aware of Roberta, the local journalist, who had produced a notepad and pen and was now fully equipped to Report. She remembered her Watch training and that time spent on a Saturday afternoon helping to police eleven-a-side games. There had been a Briefing beforehand.

"Ag, Sarge…" Elswaar said, doubtfully. "What do we do about this?"

He looked doubtfully, first at the two orderlies and then at Bekki. Bekki realised he must also at some point have encountered Aunt Mariella. She smiled back.

"Sergeant, corporal." Bekki said. "I've really got no wish to make your working lives more difficult and I know policemen have to interpret the Law."

She smiled at them, aware Roberta still had her pencil poised over the notepad. Assembling her thoughts, she decided to speak slowly and clearly

"And it's true I haven't been in this country very long, and there is still much to learn about life here. My Aunt Mariella has stressed to me we must, as good citizens, be completely law-abiding in all respects. However, in Ankh-Morpork, where I grew up, there is a legal principle, perhaps only an accepted custom, concerning sports events. It is that within the precincts of a sporting ground on the day of a fixture, the police force takes a step back and accepts that maintenance of good order on the premises is down to the management of the arena and its appointed match officials. You are here by invitation, and it is accepted you only step in at very great need."

She smiled again.

"Justnow I was named as a match official. This…" she indicated the medical dugout "… is my professional responsibility. Here, I have authority and here, my decision applies. As you can see, I have obeyed the law of the land to the fullest degree and enforced racial segregation. There is a clearly marked dividing line between the area reserved for white people and that set aside for black people."

She smiled sweetly again.

"She's got a point." van Klaamer agreed. He touched his cap to Bekki and looked relieved. "Everything's in order, miss."

He made to move on, then froze in place. Bekki observed Roberta looked over to her right and was making no move to take notes. She added "There must be rule of law. And in this place, I interpret it.", daring a challenge.

Then, as Sergeant van Klaamer and Korporaal Elswaar leapt to what in Elswaar's case was approximate attention, she looked to her right and saw him.

He was tall, thin, and had the jaundiced look, perhaps, of a vulture that had just eaten a bad carcass. Or perhaps, some sort of predatory carnivorous stork. She reckoned that under the green-trimmed uniform cap, he'd be pretty much almost bald. She also took in the impeccable uniform, also piped in green, and the rank badge of Captain.

He looked at the scene, assessing, taking his time in speaking.

"The young lady is completely right." the Captain said. "There must be a rule of law and complete compliance with the laws and statutes. Or our nation sinks into anarchy and disorder."

He looked at Benjamin and Nemo, who turned away, radiating fright. Both had brought out, and were offering for inspection, their work passes. Sergeant van Klaamer, suddenly eager to be seen as efficient, glanced at them and said "They check, sir. Authority to be here."

The Captain glared at the black men again. He nodded acknowledgement, then ignored them.

It was not a friendly look. Bekki noted, with distaste, the sjaembok whip at his waist. Hardly anyone wore it round here.

"You are Miss Rebecka Smith-Rhodes-Stibbons, I believe?"

Bekki noted he was in no hurry to provide his own name.

"It tends to get shortened to Miss Rebecka Smith-Rhodes." Bekki said, not quite correcting him. "The full name is a bit cumbersome."

"Sixteen years and ten months old." he said, as if reading back summary notes from a file. "As you are under the age of eighteen, you are in the care of your legal guardian, Mrs Mariella Smith-Rhodes-Lensen, of Wes Sandrift. You have, I believe, been informally training in nursing and healthcare since you were eleven years old. Your mother is Doctor Johanna Smith-Rhodes, originally from Piemburg in the Transvaal, who has the status of a national heroine. She is now permanently resident abroad, in Ankh-Morpork."

Bekki got the sub-text and the spill words. Your mother and aunt are also known to us and we maintain extensive files on both. As I see we will have to do on you.

He smiled again, a shark in no hurry to eat.

"Everything is in order here, Miss Smith-Rhodes-Stibbons."

He nodded at her, and at Roberta and the black orderlies, in a way that was outwardly affable. He made to move on. Then he appeared to remember, and turned back to her.

"I am Captain Oskar Verdraainer of the Bureau of State Security." he said, somewhat un-necessarily. "Do give my regards to your commanding officer, Captain Romanoff, when you see her next. Interesting lady. And to your aunt. And as you say, there must be a rule of law in this country. I agree. Outside this stadium, I interpret that law."

He touched his cap, and nodded to the two policemen to accompany him. Bekki breathed out.

"He's got a stomach ulcer." she said, a propos of nothing. "If he comes to me, I can help with that."

Roberta patted her shoulder.

"You've met my volunteer sub-editor, then." she said.

"Ja. I remember Liutnant Verkramp in Ankh-Morpork. He was just ridiculous. That, and nasty. But this man. Nasty and…."

"Dangerous." Roberta agreed. She sighed and shook her head. "I don't know much about healthcare practitioners from Lancre. But your first thought was, he may be a bastard but he's got an ulcer. You were wondering about actually healing him."

"If we didn't think that way we wouldn't be wi… healthcare practitioners." Bekki said. "Doesn't matter if the patient's the biggest bliksem on earth. You still have to do the job that's in front of you."

Roberta assessed her.

"I hear you did something for old Jan van Jaasveld the other week." she said. "Syringed his ears, and rescued his hearing."

Bekki didn't ask how she'd found out. She remembered the conference with Olga and the others.

"Need to ask." she said. "You're the local newspaper. You must keep an archive?"

Roberta snorted. "Big shed. Thirty years worth. Running out of space. Worried about the fire risk."

"There's a need…"

They were interrupted by a huge cheer as Referee van Langhout raised an arm and blew the whistle. The game had begun.

"Got to go." Roberta said. "They're going to want lots of action iconographs in the next edition. And an after-match interview. We'll talk later about the archives…"

She paused, hopefully. "There's a story. Right?"

Bekki nodded, wondering how much to reveal. The City Watch stressed no talking to journalists without a senior officer present. She decided to talk to Olga or Godsmother Irena.

"I'll need to talk to Olga Romanoff first. But potentially, yes. She needs your help."

Roberta brightened up.

"Then there's a story!" she said, cheerfully. She moved off to patrol the line. In the background, the Bitterfontein defence was closing down an attacking move by Kirstenbosch.

"Tell her to come and find me? I'll come back. Oh, if van Djibbler turns up with a tray. Don't eat anything he's selling."

Bekki breathed out deeply and settled back to, for the moment, watch the game. It was full of grunts and a meaty sound reminiscent of slabs of meat being moved around a butcher's shop, or else treated to the butcher's tenderising hammer.

She anticipated her first patient. She sighed, resignedly. Just another day at work for a jobbing healthcare practitioner.

Spa Lane, Ankh-Morpork:

Johanna Smith-Rhodes returned home with a full load in the cab she'd hired. The fact she had a large music studio in her home had caught the imagination of her students; she was happy to bring a generally well-adjusted crowd back with her so they could spend the rest of the afternoon as guests. Besides, they were all in the School Orchestra, so it was a given they were some of the most talented performers in the School, the sort of pupils who were a consolation to Manfred von Ubersetzer, the ones who held his nervous tics at bay.

For those who hadn't seen it before, the mews studio provoked exclamations of excitement and admiration. Ruth, at home in her own space, was showing them around.

"I've got a couple of cellos." Ruth said to Jennifer. "People give me musical instruments they don't need."

"Totally correct." Johanna said. "Ruth's a magnet for that. People call round with things they've discovered in attics and storerooms and say they've heard my daughter collects musical things, and would she like them?"

"I like to restore them." Ruth said, shyly. "Clean them up, renew the veneers and the varnish and put new strings on and things. I think this one's okay for playing, and I've tuned it up properly."

She brought out an orchestral cello and a bow and played a scale. It sounded clear and competent.

"It's not really my instrument." she apologised. "I prefer keyboards. Would you like to play?"

She offered cello and bow to Jennifer.

"My sister Rebecka can play a few pieces on cello." Ruth said. "Although her instrument's the double bass. She's lots better on the bass. She's had private tuition."

"Sort of." Famke agreed. She exchanged a Look with Ruth and their mother. It said "Don't go into details."(4) "Hey, Mikki? We've got drums over here, look!"

Mikki Kovanäänen grinned and went over to the drums, which were sitting in stands occupying space.

"Hey." he breathed. "Not orchestral timpani. Look like military kettledrums. Need a big horse. Cool."

Famke wordlessly handed him some sticks. Everybody else in the studio looked at each other and braced themselves.

Johanna sighed. She waited for the sounds to die.

"Neighbour in the next street was in a cavalry regiment." She explained. "When he died and his wife was clearing out, she asked if Ruth could use them."

"This is just wow." Jennifer said. She had found a chair to sit on and a music stand. She bowed a few lines of cello, from the piece the Orchestra was rehearsing, and then paused, thoughtfully.

"Ruth? Would you like to join our rehearsal group? We've got percussion, we've got a horn player, we've got a cello. You play piano."

"So you have a band." Johanna said. She turned over a possibility in her mind. "I'll have a word with Evvie – Miss Glynnie. If it works out, this could be an extra rehearsal space for you. Good for Ruth, too."

"Juuu…" Mikki agreed. Johana noted how he drew the word out into something sounding like a long all-the-time-in-the-world drawl. Olga had said Swommis did this with their word for "yes."

"Percussion players. Above ground. In daylight. Is the world ready for this?"

Ampie duPris grinned.

"Ag, man." he said, looking at Mikki and Famke. "The trolls of the orchestra."

Johanna watched the musicians sorting themselves out for a practice session, noting Jennifer had brought an orchestral score with her and she was helping Ruth read the music, understanding that Ruth's ability to read music was at the moment not that far advanced. But, Johanna reflected, Ruth was a fast learner. A very fast learner. And Jennifer was a good teacher, something she stored for consideration with regard to careers advice later. Besides, Ruth had learnt to play by ear and was pitch-perfect; when she left, Jennifer had moved on to playing the main themes of the Karenian Suite on the cello, as her youngest daughter adapted and played them back on the piano. Pretty much perfectly.

She went to advise Claude and Dorothea there would be four more for dinner tonight, and to send a clacks to Ethylene Glynnie, asking if she wanted to come over later.

The Hendrik Verwoerd Sports and Recreation Fields, Bitterfontein.

Bekki tried to put her first meeting with the local BOSS secret policeman out of her mind. She suspected he was wary of any sort of public confrontation with a member of the Smith-Rhodes family, and that he'd had to accept she had been in the right and there was no point pursuing it. Not that close to kick-off, anyway. She got that he was human enough and Rimwards Howondalandian enough to want to ease off and enjoy the game, like a normal person.

She also tried to shake it out of her mind that he'd applied some pretty strong intimidation to her. He knew all about her, for one thing. Somebody had briefed him, or else there was a BOSS file on her. People had warned her there would be.

And of course he knows I'm also Air Watch. He made a point of mentioning Olga…

Bekki thought she ought to mention this when she saw Olga Romanoff next. She tried to think like a BOSS agent. In her head, her mother's voice said Mercenary pilot in the service of Ankh-Morpork. Has citizenship of this country through marriage. But works for Vetinari. Therefore politically unreliable.

She put this out of her mind and noticed, idly, that Bitterfontein was a town that worked on mutual understanding and good old give-and-take. It was a place where Referee van Langhout would blow stoppage time in the fifteen-a-side game, so that a white-clad crocketter from the next field could run on and pick up their red ball, which a very good batsman had knocked over the dividing line between their respective fields of play, thus scoring a six. The crowd would cheer and the fifteen-a-side players would make good-natured humour at the expense of the crocketter.

Then a long misjudged clearance kick from one of the Kirstenbosch backs sent the lemon-shaped ball flying onto the crockett field. She looked over her shoulder, to where the white-clad umpires signalled a stoppage in play so that the fifteen-a-side players could ask for their ball back. (5)

She grinned. Some things about Bitterfontein were okay.

She watched the game, picking out Uncle Horst. He wore the Number fifteen shirt, the full-back, the last line of defence. He was playing a stolid dependable game, patrolling the Bitterfontein back-line, collecting the ball whenever it bounced his way and either passing it along to other players, or else drop-kicking it forwards to force a line-out nearer the Kirstenbosch half of the field, ideally to move the play forward into their half.

She acknowledged he was a good-looking guy, blonde, athletic, well-shaped, his face unmarked, looked good in sports kit. Aunt Mariella had admitted this had been something she had taken into consideration even at a time when she had despised the personality the body enclosed.(6)

Bekki also appreciated an essential skill her uncle must have picked up in the Guild School: he was careful to pass or kick the ball on long before any of the opposing players could reach him for a tackle. Apparently an informal gentleman's rule said that once the ball had moved on, you let that player be. No point. The ball had moved on. She winced at a couple of bruising tackles that involved the man who didhave the ball, and wondered why she'd not had to deal with any injuries yet. The okes just seemed to get up, shake themselves down, and play on, even after being floored.

Then she frowned. She'd picked out Young Jan van Jaasveld, who wore the number twelve shirt for Bitterfontein, centre-back. He seemed to be getting the worst of it from the thug she'd had a bad feeling about, the one Roberta had identified as Markus Swaart. Nothing she could put her finger on, but Swaart appeared to be taking every chance he could to unsettle Jan. Some sort of ridicule? Getting up close and making comment – Bekki could see he was speaking, often from close up to Jan – and whatever it was, it was accompanied by a leering grin and a gloat. Jan looked red-faced, angry and troubled by it.

Uncle Danie had spoken about something called sledging, where players would exchange good-natured friendly abuse, especially to an opposition player who'd just missed a conversion or fumbled a pass, but it was just that – good-natured friendly insult, as between okes and bros. She frowned. Whatever Markus Swaart was up to, it did not seem like good-natured banter. Not at all. He seemed to be singling Jan out for attention, in fact.

She saw Jan pull up short and go a very angry red. He turned to glare angrily at his tormentor. The huge Swaart grinned and said something. It looked as if he was challenging the far smaller man to a fight, or trying to provoke a fight, one Jan had no chance in.

That's what it is. Bullying. Mevrou Hendricka said most of those okes went to the same school. I'm looking at the school bully.

Then Uncle Horst was intervening, shouting something at Swaart. The big man in the number four jersey then squared up to Uncle Horst. Bekki realised that while her uncle was a tall man, he was still a lot smaller than Swaart. And the body language from the big guy said "I'll take you too."

What is it they said in Ankh-Morpork, about a fellow called Andy Shank? I'm looking at the Boer version here. Six foot eight and all muscle… and he's provoking smaller guys into fights they won't win so he can say afterwards that they started it… old-time Watchmen said Andy Shank did that too…

Swaart appeared to say something that made Uncle Horst flush red and stiffen up. Bekki reflected she'd never seen her uncle angry before. She felt fear for him.

Referee van Langhout intervened. Again Bekki felt amazed that such a tiny guy could enforce obedience on such big men. Even Swaart fell back. There was what Uncle Danie had described as "reading the riot act" to the players involved, and a word with both team captains, and the moment passed.

Bekki was left with the feeling that she'd just witnessed something ugly, without knowing the specifics. It had tainted the day, somehow.

Shortly after that she was called to her first casualty. Surprisingly, it was on the crockett field. She heard the shouts of "Miss? Miss? We need a doctor." In Morporkian.

She frowned and grabbed her medical bag. She was pleased Benjamin and Nemo followed, with the stretcher.

One of the crockett players, a fielder, was sitting up at the edge of the field at the boundary rope, looking dazed and swaying slightly. The umpires had signalled a stoppage and other white-clad players were standing around, looking concerned.

"He fumbled the ball, miss." said the man she discovered was the Uniondale captain. He was speaking in Morporkian and she noted his voice was barely accented. She might as well have been at the Lords' Ground in Ankh-Morpork.

"He was going to make a catch, missed it, and the ball clipped him around the head."

"Cost us a four." another crocketter said. "And their fifth-order batsman's still in."

This was somehow more grievous than the fact a player had just been hit on the head by a crockett ball falling at high speed, she noted.

"Can you talk?" she asked, kneeling by the man. She noted the lack of focus and the large contusion on his scalp.

"How many fingers am I holding up? How many hands am I holding up?"

She investigated the contusion. None of the signs of a skull fracture. No give or softness if I gently explore. Just bruising. And mild concussion.

"He comes off." she said, firmly. "Concussion. Can you stand up for me? Good. Now just lean on Benjamin here and he'll help you to the dugout. Dank… thank you."

"I need to keep him under observation." she said, to the team captain and the umpires, who nodded. "He should be okay in a few hours."

"Miss. We'll be in to bat soon. He's not too clever as a fielder, but he's my third order batsman. We need him back."

She glowered at the Uniondale captain.

"Look. You've got a twelfth man, haven't you? For moments like this? Send him on."

The crocketters looked at each other. Bekki followed through.

"As a batsman he's going to see two balls coming at him. What if he hits the wrong one? And besides…"

Bekki took a deep breath.

"You're a bit weak on cover in the gully. That batsman's hitting them long and it looks as if he's left-handed. That's always tricky. You need outfield cover at Cow Corner and Long On. Forget Midwicket and Mid-on, as on a batsman's wicket like this they're hitting them longer. And when the batsmen change ends, you need to move whoever you've got on Backward Point and Fly-Slip to Third Man and Deep Backward Point."

Bekki smiled at them as they looked at each other in consternation. She got the spill. She's female. How does she know this?

"Back in Ankh-Morpork there's a guy. Plays. I don't just make the sandwiches and pour the tea." she said, sweetly.

She knew time spent with Ampie was not wasted time.

"I'd like to meet this guy." the Uniondale captain said, weakly.

"You probably will." Bekki assured him. "Now get your twelfth man on and move your fielders out."

She made her way back to the dugout to supervise the injured crocketter being seated on the bench – in its newly designated whites-only zone – and felt reassured nothing had happened on the fifteen-a-side field that needed her intervention. She guessed maybe fifteen minutes had elapsed since the kick-off.

"You know about crockett, Miss Rebecka?" Benjamin said, deferentially.

"Enough to be able to bluff." she replied, and left it at that. Ampie had explained about all the fielding positions and their time-honoured names. She had a good memory, and being able to use the knowledge with confidence had been good boffo. It had silenced the crocketters, anyway.

"I suspect on one level it's all bluff."

She turned her attention back to the fifteen-a-side, knowing she'd soon get patients from this game. That air of menace from Swaart had guaranteed that.

She studied a scrum going down. The front row forwards tended not to be too tall, but were wide and heavy. The flank forwards and number eight in the third row tended to be tall and heavy. But the core of the scrum, the men who held it together and provided the powerhouse, were the locks in the second row, who tended to be the biggest, widest, strongest, players on the field. And Markus Swaart was a lock-forward. His mangled ears and broken nose were testimony to this. Mangled cauliflower ears, Bekki gathered, were a mark of the lock.

She sighed, resignedly. Ampie had taught her more than the usual general knowledge about crockett. Being around Uncle Danie from a young age had ensured fifteen-a-side seeped in, by osmosis. It was probably inevitable.

And it looked as if Bitterfontein were outclassed in the scrum. Nothing like as heavy and as capable.

She watched as the inevitable happened and a scrum close to the Bitterfontein goal-line led to the inevitable try and conversion. Uncle Horst couldn't do much defending with the scrum so close, but he at least tried. Kirstenbosch were now seven points up.

The game restarted from the centre, but Kirstenbosch had the taste of blood now. Bekki decided, a few minutes later, that she really didn't like Markus Swaart. Not one little bit.

One minute he was delivering more sneering nastiness to Jan van Jaasveld. At one point the Kirstenbosch captain intervened, shouting something indistinct to his lock-forward. Swaart sneered and ignored him. Whatever triumphantly nasty goading he was delivering to Jan must have tipped an edge. Jan van Jaasveld, obviously now in a red mist, charged the big man. Several other nearby players intervened, including Uncle Horst. Then it got bad.

Bekki watched with horror as the game disintegrated, for a few brief seconds, into a confused brawl. Referee van Langhout raced in, blowing his whistle and pointing at people. He reached into his top pocket and pulled out cards.

Bekki could hear his voice over the excited crowd roar.

Blue four! Yellow! Grey fifteen! Yellow! Blue five! Yellow! Grey Six! Yellow!

Then, in a more reluctant voice and with a shake of the head

"Grey Twelve. Yellow."

After that he was really reading the riot act, saving the sharpest words of all for Swaart, who appeared to take it with what looked like mock humility.

And a player was lying motionless on the field. Bekki stood up and grabbed her bag. She glanced back; Benjamin and Nemo were ready with the stretcher and following. The Reverend Duidelik nodded to her and raised his flag, waving it in the air.

"Bad business, miss." he said. "Watch for Swaart. Blue four. He's a bad lot."

Waving his flag, he escorted her onto the field. The referee acknowledged this and blew for a stoppage.

Bekki discovered the man who was down was Young Jan van Jaasveld. He looked in a bad way. She nodded to the stretcher-bearers, after checking there were no serious fractures. Just the sort of bruising that came from hard solid punches. Hard enough to make a mess and to knock a man cold.

"He comes off." she said to Mr van Langhout. He nodded, then made a note in his book alongside a list of names. Then he consulted the touch-judges.

Bekki, kneeling next to the unconscious man, completed her preliminary checks.

"Get him on the stretcher." she said. "I'll patch him up in the dugout."

Somewhere behind her, a sneering voice said "Reckon Horst Lensen's lining up another redhead for himself there. Keeping it in the family! That goes on a lot round here."

There were intakes of breath. Bekki tried not to let herself go too red. The reaction from the other men suggested that another line had been crossed. She heard Mr van Langhout say, warningly "Grey Fifteen. Do not make it a red card. And Blue Four. You will treat the medical officer with respect. Do you hear me?"

Bekki glared at Blue Four on the way out. Markus Swaart. A big sneering bully.

He sneered down at her.

Bekki looked up into the hateful piggy arrogant face and heard her Second Thoughts reminding her that while it might be natural justice to throw a spell back, that would really out her as a Witch and cause more trouble. Besides, she was here to heal.

"Take care, Mister Swaart." she said, simply, and turned back to Jan. She chose to ignore the sneering response of "I always do, meisie. Now get that moffie off the field. You too. This is a man's game. A white man's game."

Bekki nodded to her stretcher bearers. She looked across to Uncle Horst, who was looking ominously still and silent. Restraining fury and holding his ground against Swaart, not stepping back.

She heard Referee van Langhout saying "Grey Fifteen. Step back."

She caught a spill. Don't forget I know where you went to school. I'll be watching.

She sighed. Trouble was brewing.

"Uncle Horst? Nil mortifi sine lucre?"

He looked at Bekki and his expression softened.

"Thank you." he said. Bekki grinned, trying to be nonchalant.

"If it needs it, I'd pay for the contract." she said, in Quirmian, reckoning this was a private word.

Referee van Langhout frowned slightly.

"My Quirmian isn't all that good. But I can go deaf every so often." he said, in Quirmian. "Keep your professional skills off the field, Gris-Quinze."

She was reminded the referee was also a schoolmaster.

She supervised getting Young Jan off the field quickly. She was aware of several players quietly saying "Sorry, miss." to her. They sounded embarrassed, unwilling to meet her eye.

"Bad man." Nemo said, as he grounded his end of the stretcher with care. Both her bearers looked relieved to be off the pitch. Bekki knelt beside the casualty, who was waking up and groaning.

"Stay still. Where does it hurt?" she asked, probing for facial fractures. She hoped she wasn't dealing with a broken jaw. That really needed an Igor. And Young Jan would be carrying the marks for a long time. Those had not been slight blows. One eye closing rapidly, massive contusions, bruising, possible concussion… she called for water. Benjamin brought a bucket over and she cleaned the injuries, noting he'd also taken a kick on the way down. At least one.

"I'm going to give you an injection." she said. "Painkiller."

There was some anaesthetic in the syringe, a heavily diluted dose. Bekki had learnt that this avoided difficult questions about the other things she was going to do, which hopefully would go un-noticed. She focused, and held a damp sponge to the facial injuries purely for the look of the thing. The water would be tainted, afterwards…

After a moment or two, the water in the bucket became warmer and started to agitate. Bekki cleared her mind. At this point in transferring the pain, she had to be absolutely open to the patient. This wasn't just a matter of physical pain to be moved on. She braced herself and caught echoes of recent shameful humiliation, of not being able to do anything about the humiliation being imposed on him, of a sort of knife being inserted by a bigger, stronger, malevolent mind who knew exactly when to twist the blade…

She frowned. The root cause of the shame and humiliation was there, but lurking out of sight, deeply buried.

She noted, with satisfaction, that the swelling had gone down a lot and Young Jan would now be able to at least see out of his left eye. But he was still unable to stand up. Dizzy, concussed.

She turned to her orderlies.

"Benjamin? Best to leave him on the stretcher for justnow. Can you get another one? Dankie. Nemo? I need clean water for patients, and this is now a little bloodied. Could you get another bucket? Dankie."

Bekki noted Nemo had neglected to take the soiled water away for emptying. She sighed, dropped the equally tainted sponge into the bucket, and moved the warm bubbling water to just under the bench where it couldn't be kicked over. She didn't want to tip it on the ground. No obvious drain. Besides, transferred pain stored in water might kill the grass, or create a muddy slipping hazard for the players on an otherwise dry pitch.

Her attention was then taken by the injured crockett player groaning and returning to full consciousness. Reasoning she could add purifying salt to the tainted water later, she went to deal with him.

After a while, she was able to resume watching the games, keeping an eye on her two casualties, noting with satisfaction that the Uniondale crockett team had indeed moved their fielders further out.

Roberta the journalist came over to join her. Bekki made space on the bench.

"Bad lot out there." she said. "Usually it's a tough game with a lot of competitive willy-waving going on. Thirty okes competing as to who's got the biggest balls. But they play fair. They know where the limits are and where the line's drawn. Not this time. Not with Swaart on the field."

"Why do they even let him play?" Bekki asked. Roberta gave her a tolerant look.

"Small town. Small region. Everybody knows each other, grew up together, went to the same schools. That matters. Everyone in the Kirstenbosch side went to the same school. He's got a hold on people. Goes way back. Besides, when he isn't playing dirty, he's a good lock-forward. Have you noticed how their scrum rolls right over ours? That's Swaart. In his way he's the best player there is. They can't afford to drop him. Even if they want to. Or can do."

Bekki got this.

"He must have a criminal record?" she probed. "He must do."

"Ag, it takes eight kêrels toget the bangles on him." Roberta said. "They have to break out the riot-control gear." (7)

They watched the game and saw Bitterfontein slip even further behind, another scrum forced on the Bitterfontein goal-line rolling over for a try. Roberta took a couple of long-range shots of this.

"Should be over there following the action." she said. "If I could be bothered. Did I mention to you there's a couple of pregnant women up in the stands? Word's out you're also a midwife."

Bekki was on her guard.

"How pregnant?"

"Oh, eight months. No biggie. Elsie Ellman reckons it isn't likely to come on today, but she said it was good to know you do birthings. Just in case."

They watched another scrum break down and disintegrate into a maul. The referee blew for a penalty, indicating the Blue side. The ball arced over the Bitterfontein half of the field, Uncle Horst catching it on the bounce and passing it on down the line as several blue-shirted players bore down on him. Two of the blue shirts gave up at this point, but the third, who wore the number four, carried on racing at him.

Bekki watched in quiet horror as her uncle assessed the risk, waiting until the very last moment to leap right as Markus Swaart lunged at him. She could see him stepping to the side and for a moment it looked as if he was contemplating a kick or a punch to the big man's body as he was suddenly off-balance, and then the whistle blew, touch-judges' flags were pointing in, and the referee was trotting up to admonish both players.

"He'll slip up one day." Roberta said. "You only play the man if he's got the ball. Everyone saw he was out to play the man there."

She nodded down to Young Jan.

"He's well out. What did you put in him?" she asked.

Bekki shrugged.

"Mild sedative. Painkiller."

Roberta smiled back in a way that conveyed the idea that she didn't believe a word of it.

"Lancre?" she asked.

Bekki paused for a second, then nodded.

"Healthcare practitioner skills." Roberta said. She grinned. "Hey, relax. We need them round here. Justnow you're covering for Klipdrift Henderson, after all."

Bekki heard more about the local doctor's little problem. She felt surprised that in a town like this, there was only one doctor. She wondered if overwork and doing too much for too long had contributed to his resorting to liquid assistance and perhaps to the contents of his own pharmacy.

"Most people self-medicate." Roberta said. "Homely remedies. Tough it out. Rely on themselves and each other. Up to a point it works. Then you really need somebody who knows what they're doing. Justnow we can't rely on Henderson for that. It's a problem."

Bekki digested this concept.

"Reckon you'll get people coming to you. There's a few hundred people here, maybe a thousand. They'll have seen you doing your thing in public. Twice. Hope you enjoy a busy time."

Bekki sighed. "A busy time" defined a Steading.

Roberta looked down at Young Jan, who was showing signs of waking up.

"A bad business." she said, sympathetically. "Troubled family."

Bekki looked at her, and decided to ask the Question. This was the local news reporter, after all. The sanctioned gossip-dealer. She'd know.

"I got that when I visited." she said. "What sort of troubles?"

Roberta gave her a long look, as if wondering how much to say. Bekki got it again; the intimation of a big shared secret that nobody was overmuch willing to talk openly about. Everybody knew but nobody spoke. A local shame, a local embarrassment?

"Goes back a long way. Like a lot of things locally. The old man is not a nice person to know. But then you'd have got that."

The game faded into the background suddenly and the crowd roar became more muted as Bekki tried not to struggle for spill-words.

"Nothing I could put into the paper." the journalist said. Her voice became more serious. "Not unless it got to court. But I've got three kids myself. Two boys and a girl."

Bekki was almost seeing the shape of the spill-words. She tried not to force them.

Roberta looked sympathetically at Young Jan.

"They didn't have a great time growing up." she said. "None of them. And rumours spread. Even to people like Swaart."

Then she excused herself to go and patrol the touch-lines again with her iconograph at the ready.

"Especially to people like Swaart!" she called.

Bekki sighed. She realised she was still an outsider in a small town and was coming up against the wall of local secrets that everybody knew but she didn't. She'd have to earn that right. Nothing else for it.

"Nichevo." she said, thinking of Olga and Irena. Who will need to know.

This was the platteland. The plate-country. Rural and small-town Howondaland, where everything was out there on the plate but sometimes was hidden among all the other stuff. She was looking for a solitary pea in among all the mealies. Or the gogga hiding in the slaai.

Her attention passed from the crockett player, whose name she realised she did not know yet, to Young Jan, who was sitting up and gingerly exploring his facial injuries with his fingertips.

"How does it feel?" she asked, gently.

Jan looked at her through the purpling bruise around his eye.

"Painful." he admitted. "But I can manage that. When can I go back on?"

Bekki studied him.

"Maybe in the second half." she said, remembering her briefing. "Just now you need to sit it out for a while. And that … man… seems to have it in for you. He's still out there. Do you really want to go back on?"

Jan nodded. She sighed, recognising what in other places might be called the bro code, machismo, a need not to be seen as scared or intimidated and cover it up.

"Listen. Don't hide it if it hurts. I need to know. He's just going to hit you in the same places, isn't he? To make it worse?"

Bekki realised as the words came out that she meant more than physical wounds. She sighed. Sometimes a witch could spill words herself and Jan had got that, going by the way he flinched suddenly. She went for broke.

"Jan, Swaart was going for you. Picking on you. Needling. What was he saying?" she asked. She tried to stop I need to know spilling with the words. But it was there.

From the way young Jan van Jaasveld froze up and refused to speak, she realised she was now up against the thing that bedevilled those who tried to help the victims of bullies. The person on the receiving end would often close up, refuse to talk, refuse to speak about whatever shameful thing the bully was using as a verbal weapon, wanting the horrible thing to be over but not wanting to speak about the shaming thing that was at bottom. Bullies depended on this and would use this silence.

She got a few hastily closed off shreds and sensed doors slamming closed behind them.

"You were at school together." Bekki said. It took no great deductive leap. Small town in the Platteland. And anyway Roberta had already said. "It goes back a long way. Childhood."

This time young Jan really flinched. And closed up even tighter. Bekki realised there was no point probing further. She remembered wisdom from older Witches:

You're a Witch. But there are things people don't talk about even to a Witch if she isn't even seventeen. The deeper things. Not to a teenage girl. Use other ways.

She remembered even Tiffany Aching had run into this.

She sighed. She wondered if this related to the bigger business at Haartebeeste.

"Okay. We can talk later."

She heard the referee blowing for stoppage time and saw Nemo and Benjamin had raced on to assist one of the Kirstenbosch players who was limping awkwardly towards her, his right leg glistening with blood. She reached for her medical bag and went to assess and treat.

"Stings a bit, miss." the player said, stolidly, as she cleansed and checked the wound, wondering if it needed stitches.

Bekki shook her head, wondering what it would take to get a fifteen-a-side player to acknowledge he was feeling pain and discomfort. She diligently applied and secured a dressing, noticing there were just surface scrapes and minor cuts.

"You can go back on." she said, noting the bleeding had stopped. "Just pull your sock right up over the dressing. And before you go. What's the thing with Swaart?"

She looked him in the eye until he blinked. He looked shifty and embarrassed.

"Errr… he's one of the team, miss." He said, as if this explained everything. "A bru. He goes back a long way. Errr…"

She registered the lack of conviction to the words and a reluctance to tell a mere girlie everything. She got the spill words Because he's trouble. He'd be trouble if we didn't. He frightens us.

"Okay." she said. "Go back on."

Then it was half-time, with Bitterfontein trailing Kirstenbosch by three points to seventeen. She watched the players trailing off the field to the dressing room and contemplated the big sneering Swaart. He made a point of nudging a couple of team-mates to observe the fun, then looking her way and leering. He compounded this with a bodily gesture to Young Jan.

Bekki scowled back, hating the man.

She quickly considered taking a risk. With luck, nobody would connect it to her. She focused in a special way then looked at Swaart's feet. With satisfaction, she watched his bootlaces twitching, and then untying. Un-noticed by anyone, for the moment, they became long trailing leads. She was disappointed he merely stumbled and wished Wee Archie was here to do something like tying them together. (8). She had hoped to see Swaart fall flat on his face.

She watched the big man frown, and then look helpless and uncertain for a few moments. He beckoned a team-mate to him, and she realised.

How old is he? Yet he still depends on other people to tie his bootlaces for him?

Bekki stored this as ammunition.

"Yes?" she asked, as several of the players drifted over to her, including the two team captains. They looked deferential.

"Uncle Horst? Come over here, would you? Sit down, I'll do something about those bruises."

She was pleased he didn't argue and sat down next to Young Jan. They nodded at each other.

As Bekki gently explored her uncle's facial bruising with her fingertips, Horst said

"You fit for the second half?"

Jan van Jaasfelt nodded back.

"Depends on the medic."

Bekki got a glimpse of resolution and grim determination.

"Got to say, you took a hammering." the Bitterfontein team captain remarked. "But you don't look as bad as you did at first. Swelling's gone down."

"Bekki's good." Horst remarked. He blinked. His own facial bruising suddenly didn't feel as bad. In a detached sort of way, as Bekki wrung out and soaked a sponge, he was aware the water she was mopping the injury with seemed to feel a few degrees warmer.

"You picked a fight with that human troll." Bekki remarked. "He could have really damaged you."

Her uncle looked rueful.

"Had to do something." he said, laconically. "Swaart has this way. He'll prod and provoke and needle until somebody's had enough and they take a swing. Then he can say he didn't start the fight as the other oke swung first."

"Andy Shank." Bekki said, thoughtfully.

The two team captains looked politely blank.

"Street fighter and eleven-a-side player back in Ankh-Morpork." Uncle Horst explained. "Could have been Swaart's little brother. Same way of starting a fight, half-killing the other fellow, and then looking all innocent afterwards."

The team captains understood this.

Uncle Horst smiled ruefully.

"Had to do something when he picked on Jan." he explained. "Distract him. He'd have killed Jan, otherwise."

Bekki frowned at him.

"So you took some of the punches."

She shook her head. Uncle Horst looked abashed.

"Not so bad. The Guild School gives a good training. Your mother explained how to roll with the punches. You know. Unorthodox Combat lessons."

"I'll tell her." Bekki said. "And speaking of family. Aunt Mariella's going to be annoyed."

Horst sighed as if contemplating something more painful and dangerous than Markus Swaart.

"Ag, picked up a yellow." he said. "That's my clean sheet gone."

"Worth it." said the Bitterfontein captain. "Sometimes a man has to."

Uncle Horst grinned.

"Come on, Bekki. Say the words. You're dying to. It'll make you feel better."

Bekki shook her head, half-understanding.

"No, because that's Mariella's privilege." she said. "She's got the licence to. Besides, I try to keep the swearing for when I'm really annoyed."

Horst grinned.

"Calling me a dummkop bliksem is only going to be the start of it." he remarked. The others laughed.

"I worked it out. It shows that she loves you. Be thankful." Bekki said.

Uncle Horst went very serious.

"Every day I'm thankful." he said. He turned to Jan.

"You come back on, we're looking after you." he said. "Watch the big fellow."

Bekki was on her guard as the mood changed.

"Sorry, miss. You should know. It's going to get busy for you, second half." said the Bitterfontein captain.

She noted the Kirstenbosch team captain suddenly look grim, as if he was accepting an unpleasant reality.

Uncle Horst looked gravely at her.

"You should know. We're calling a ninety-nine. Just to clear the air."

Bekki tried to look as if she understood. She tried to remember something Uncle Danie had said once, about a particularly violent game with lots of ill-feeling and bad blood…

"Got to be done." the Kirstenbosch captain said, mysteriously. He sounded reluctant, somehow.

Then Referee van Langhout trotted over and the moment for explanation was lost.

"He's had the ding-dong check?" he asked, referring to Young Jan. Bekki nodded. At least she knew this bit of fifteen-a-side lore from Uncle Danie.

"He's fit. No concussion. Responding normally." she said.

The referee nodded.

"Okay. He starts the second half."

He turned to the two team captains.

"Seven yellow cards so far, gentlemen. If necessary I can make it thirty. Add your men on the bench, that's up to forty-four. Don't force me to make any into reds."

The knot of players, including young Jan, gave humble acknowledgement, and trotted off to the dressing rooms in a clatter of studs on concrete. Young Jan went with them.

Bekki, waiting for the second half to start, then received another crockett player with an injury. One of the umpires and his team captain came with him. He nodded to the other crockett player on the bench.

"Bearing up, John? Good, good."

He turned to Bekki and looked apologetic.

"Sorry, miss. We never usually have this many injuries. But, well, bad bounce on the wicket, and a touch of unpredictable spin, and all that."

Bekki switched languages, codes and approach. Again, she wondered about being in Rimwards Howondaland and feeling as if she might just as well be in Ankh-Morpork, among people who spoke Morporkian with barely any trace of a local accent and who were playing crockett, a sport she considered was so local and Morporkian it shouldn't have travelled this far. To anywhere. Yet, here she was.

She discovered the bowler, propelling a small hard ball at very great speed, had somehow sent it bouncing straight into the padded and gloved hand that was holding the bat. The result, as she carefully removed the glove, was one finger possibly broken and two others severely bruised, possibly dislocated.

She set herself to pain relief, setting the broken finger, checking the functioning of the ones either side, and then splinting and bandaging. This all took time. In the background, the fifteen-a-side match kicked off again. Bekki barely heeded this, focusing on fingers.

At least this patient was fully conscious; he was watching the fifteen-a-side and commenting on the action, while asking polite questions to Bekki, probably to distract from the pain and the discomfort. She explained that she'd been brought up in Ankh-Morpork and had attended school there, Seven-Handed Sek's, on Itching Crypts, just off Gods Street.

Her patient digested this. He watched the fifteen-a-side intently, noting a scrum had formed.

"Never got the sense of that game." he said. "But the rockspiders seem to enjoy it."

Bekki frowned. She reflected that she was currently speaking Morporkian with an Ankh-Morporkian accent. Her patient had just made an assumption.

"Watch them, miss." he said. "There's some bad feeling out there. That's the thing about the plaasyarpies. Very direct, very simple. Always resolve a fight with fists and feet. You can see it."

She watched and realised there was a sort of tension out there. And it was building. She also remembered that Uniondale was pretty much 100% Morporkians and monoglot Morporkian-speakers, and that old memories about the War of Independence lingered on.

"Rockspiders." she repeated. "Plaasjaarpies. Crunchies. Kerrigians."

She shook her head. This was the first time she, personally, had been on the receiving end of ethnically-based slurs. It was a new thing for her sort of White Howondalandian.

"And the Boers call you rooineckers and Porkkies." she remarked, trying to make it pointed. "Cuts both ways."

She wondered about telling him. Then her Second Thoughts, in her mother's voice, broke in. "Ag, no. Other people will tell him exactly who you are. He will have the "oh, shit!" moment of realising. The delayed reaction will make it more amusing. Bide your time."

The crocketter nodded towards Markus Swaart. Other players, including those on his own side, were pointedly keeping a distance from him.

"That big brute's the cause, miss. Don't like the look or the feel of him."

Bekki was reminded the Morporkians ran their own schools, where they could. This man would not have been to the same school.

"Ag, well." she said. "Hy sal sy gat sien." (9)

The crockett player raised an eyebrow.

Bekki finished dressing the injury.

"You'll be out for at least three weeks." she said. "No hurrying this. You can stay here if you like, or you can go to the pavilion to watch. Tell your captain and the umpires that you're out of the game, and get the twelfth man on."

She looked over the bench to the crockett field. "You might want to mention that putting Agatean on the ball only works on a completely flat wicket. When you get bumps or dips, then that ball's going to go anywhere. Get the groundsmen to really roll that wicket flat."

Bekki noted Roberta the journalist appeared to be following the play more keenly, as if she'd also sensed a change in the air and wanted to get nearer the story.

She spoke to the crocketter again.

"I'm based, most of the week, at the Lensen plaas out at Wes Sandrift. If that plays up, and Doctor Henderson isn't available, come and see me there. Any day except Wednesday or Thursday. You're going to need somebody to change the dressings and check you out after two or three weeks…"

She stopped. Things were happening out on the field. The play had moved deep into the Bitterfontein half where Uncle Horst was last line of defence.

She watched him looking up and getting underneath a long kick that was dropping the ball right down towards him. With a jolt of horror, she realised the nearest player of any team was the loathsome Markus Swaart. Uncle Horst seemed so intent on the catch that he appeared not to have noticed this.

The fear rose as she saw Swaart, with a surprising turn of speed for such a big man, bearing down on her uncle. She willed him to pass the ball on and to get out of the way. He'll pass it, won't he? Or kick it on to force a lineout? He usually does. That's the full-back's job.

Horst Lensen neither passed nor kicked. He seemed to brace himself, as if daring the big man to make a tackle. As Swaart drew closer, Horst Lensen attempted a dodging move to come round on his left, to try to evade…

Swaart delivered a contemptuous open-handed swing of his arm. It appeared to catch her uncle on the side of the head as he dodged. Bekki yelped as he fell and rolled away.

Wait. her Second Thoughts said. Swaart didn't take the ball. It's almost as if Uncle Horst deliberately passed it to him justnow. As if he were a team-mate. What's he doing?

Swaart had almost fumbled the ball as Uncle Horst had released it. Now Bekki realised he was caught between two possible decisions. He had a clear run to the Bitterfontein goal-line and could down it for a try. None of the players converging on him could get close enough to stop that. Any normal player of fifteen-a-side would have done that. But this was Markus Swaart. Malice on legs. He also had a chance to kick Horst Lensen while he was down. And that was even more attractive.

Bekki was willing her uncle to get out of the way as Swaart lumbered up. At the very least, Uncle Horst was going to get trampled on, as the big man in studded boots deliberately ran over him on his way to the line.

Almost at the very last minute, the prone Horst Lensen moved. As the boot came down to impact, Horst grabbed at the ankle, then either pushed or pulled, or perhaps a combination of both. Unbalanced and still clutching the ball, Swaart went down like a stricken troll. Bekki knew it was just imagination, but she really thought the earth had shuddered.

She watched her uncle, who she realised had been feigning semi-consciousness, leaping to his feet.

And she heard a voice on the field calling

"Nege-en-negentig!"

Ninety-nine.

The players converging on Swaart began to reach him. And the maul began. At least, she thought it was a maul. Swaart had gone down holding the ball. And the rules of fifteen-a-side clearly said that in a maul, the player with the ball who was at the bottom of a dogpile of other players, with no limit as to number, could be induced to release it back into play by all and every legitimate means.

Bekki felt both horrified and gleeful in roughly equal amounts. Uncle Danie had said that you tried to avoid being on the bottom of the pile in a maul, or indeed in the maul at all. It was impossible for the referee or the touch-judges to clearly see what was happening and it was the accepted venue for settling scores and grudges, for sorting people out.

She saw a suspicion of boots and fists going in, and realised not all the kicks were coming from Bitterfontein players. Some of Swaart's own team-mates had clearly had enough, too.

She saw Uncle Horst slipping out of the mass of fighting players, getting out of the way on the opposite side from where Referee van Langhout was angrily blowing his whistle. Several smaller fights had broken out between players from both teams, except for where Uncle Horst and an opposite number from Kirstenbosch had raised open palms to each other in a spirit of "we both have yellow cards. Let's not get sent off".

"Get the stretcher ready." Bekki said to her bearers. "Dankie."

One of the last players out of the melee, as the referee restored order, was young Jan van Jaasveld. Bekki felt relieved the referee was too busy to notice. A sending-off was no small thing and attracted a suspension.

The call went out for the medic.

Bekki led her bearers onto the field and was not surprised to discover the prone and unconscious body was Markus Swaart. She steeled herself and checked for fractures. Around her, grey and blue-jerseyed players were now grinning and shaking hands. It was as if normal sporting relations had been resumed after letting off steam and bad feeling.

She wasn't surprised to see Roberta had been taking lots of iconographs of the fight. She was currently on the touchline, replacing the special paper in her iconograph machine and by the look of it, filling up the ink reservoirs.

She shook her head.

"What was it he said about players who can't take a knock and have to go off the pitch?" she said, half to herself. "Ag, well. Let's get this big moffie off the field."

Several players heard this and grinned. As the referee consulted the touch-judges – the consensus appeared to be that so much had happened at once that it was impossible to apportion blame or fault to any individuals – only three more yellow cards could be awarded. Referee van Langhout was launching a blistering prolonged rebuke to both team captains, who stood with heads lowered in front of their old Headmaster.

Bekki had to enlist two big players to assist with the stretcher-bearing, and, a man on each handle, she supervised getting her casualty off the field to where she could begin patching him up. She sighed. This would take time and she had to consider that justnow, the abominable Swaart was a patient to whom she owed the same duty of care as any other patient.

"Broken ribs." she said, manually exploring. "They'll need strapping. That jersey's got to come off."

She considered, then reached for a boot-knife. One of the blue-shirted players who'd helped carry him off winced as she started cutting the jersey away.

"Look, he's too heavy to lift." she said, reasonably.

"He won't like that, miss. Those jerseys cost thirty rand a time."

"Tough." Bekki said. "He can buy a new jersey. He can't buy new ribs."

She carried on cutting.

"Between the third and fourth ribs on the right hand side, miss. That always works." said the other player. Bekki glared at him.

"Sorry, miss. Ex-Army."

She peeled the wreck of the jersey, noting the upper chest and stomach were a mass of overlapping bruises, some boot-shaped with the imprint of studs. However, there was little actual broken flesh.

Do what you can. Take it in order. Clean the surface wounds first before applying dressings.

She reached for surgical alcohol. It would sting. She hoped he would feel it.

"Got a lappie? Dankie."

She cleaned and sterilised, noting the sensitivity and swelling on the left side that suggested cracked ribs. She took care here, noting the thickness of muscle had actually helped: none of the fractures had gone all the way through.

Touch-Judge Duidelik had come over. The game was still suspended as Referee van Langhout was delivering talking-tos to many of the individual players. He shook his head.

"Bad business." he said. "Not that he didn't bring it on himself. Need a hand?"

"Please. I need him turning over – gently – so I can check his back. Then people to hold him upright so I can strap up the broken ribs."

After a while, she added

"He stays off. Another punch or kick in the same place and those ribs break all the way. I don't want a punctured lung. That kind of thing's hard to deal with."

"Reckon he's going to need time to recover? I've got to tell Mr van Langhout."

Bekki considered as she cleaned.

"Four weeks. Well, at least three before he plays again. And these ribs are going to hurt like Hells so he needs to take it easy. What does he actually do?"

She discovered Swaart was a slaughterman. That figured. If you slaughtered farm animals as a profession, it didn't exactly call for heightened sensitivities or great intellect. She heard, with distaste, about suspicions that he took a sort of pleasure in killing animals. Apparently she should ask your older sister, miss. Sorry, your aunt. She refuses to send animals to Swaart and when it was called for, she did her own slaughtering. Well, it's not as if she's not been trained for that sort of thing. Err…

Bekki nodded. She looked at her patient, trying to conceal distaste and revulsion. She called for a bucket of water to clean her lappie out in. She frowned, seeing Nemo pull the disregarded bucket out from under the bench. The one into which she'd transferred young Jan's pain. She wondered, briefly, about asking for a clean bucket. Then she grinned.

"Bring it over." she said. Markus Swaart could absorb Jan's pain. The pain he'd inflicted. With luck, it wouldn't just be the physical pain. And from the point of view of being a Witch, it would be interesting to see what happened next. Dad's a Research Wizard. Look on this as a little experiment.

She looked out over the field. She noted that without Swaart and his ability to hold their scrum together, the Kirstenbosch forwards were crumbling. The reserve player they'd brought on wasn't nearly good enough. Bekki turned back to her work.A little later there was a home-crowd cheer. Bitterfontein had forced a try. They were back in the game.

Swaart began blinking back into consciousness as she completed strapping his ribs up. Bekki looked him in the eye. He groaned.

"Three cracked ribs. Lots of bruising and swelling. You were lucky." she said. "I reckon some of those knocks to your legs mean you'll be hobbling for a few days."

She heard him groan again. She felt something else.

"And carry on touching my leg like that, I'll be happy to reset and splint any broken fingers you've got." she said, pleasantly. The hand was withdrawn.

After a while she asked

"Answer me honestly. Does it hurt?"

He groaned again.

She smiled.

"Reckon I should give you something to take the pain away for a while." she said. She reached into her bag for a stoppered phial and a syringe.

"Oil of guafanesia in a one to one hundred dilution…" she said. She had meant to add normally I'd use this on big farm animals, but I reckon it'll do you no harm. One part in a hundred is okay for actual people. A quarter of the potency for, say, a draught mare.

Bekki paused, needle poised to draw up the sedative. She saw Markus Swaart had an expression of wide-eyed terror on his face. She smiled.

"Mr Swaart, I give injections every day." she said. "I've had loads of practice. There's no risk involved - well, hardly any – and I'd be lying if I were to say it's completely painless…"

She moved towards him. He was trying to move back. She made herself smile reassuringly, and reflected it might be prudent to call for some help here. She nodded to Benjamin and Nemo, then frowned, remembering she was just about to ask black men to lay hands on and restrain a white man. In this country that could be an issue. In the background, she heard an iconograph shutter clicking. She didn't need to ask whose.

"Need a hand, miss?"

She looked back. Most of the reserve players from both teams, normally seated on their respective benches further down the grandstand, had ambled over to watch something that promised to be more fun. She gathered that nobody very much liked Markus Swaart.

"Yes please." she said. "If some of you can grab his arms and shoulders – gently, he has broken ribs – and a couple of you could restrain his legs? Dankie."

A little later, Bekki was smiling down at a feebly struggling Markus Swaart. He was being held down largely by men from his own team.

"You're a big man, Mr Swaart." she said. "I reckon this needle isn't quite big enough."

Bekki recapped the needle point, and returned the syringe to her medical bag. She made a big theatrical point of bringing out a bigger syringe, one she might normally only use for large farm animals. She held it up to Swaart, who was now whimpering in terror, and sterilised the point. Then she drew up sufficient of the sedative, taking care to top it up with distilled sterile water so there was a visible level in the glass syringe. She reflected this was now something like a one in two hundred dilution, but the original drug was so potent an undiluted drop might kill a human. This way it would knock him out for possibly three or four hours.

She then did the thing where you depress the needle and squirt a little into the air. Right in front of his eyes.

"Okay, delivery site. I think, in the gluteus." She said. "big muscle, it'll diffuse it quickly into the body. Gentlemen, can you roll him over? And pull his shorts down? Dankie."

Bekki winked at Roberta Skribelaar. She made a thumbs-up back and moved in to take the iconograph.

"Now this won't hurt a bit, Mr Swaart." Bekki assured him, kneeling on the back of his legs to further immobilise him. She picked her mark, inserted the needle, and depressed the plunger. The big man stiffened and screamed. Shortly afterwards, he subsided into oblivion.

"Thank you" she said, to a circle of grinning fifteen-a-side players. "You can pull his shorts up now."

"He's always been scared of needles, miss." one of the players assured her. "Goes right back to school."

"Ja. School nurse had to stitch his leg up after a fight. We were all six or seven then."

"Izzatso?" Bekki mused. Everybody has a weakness and a fear, her mother's voice said. You found his. And now everybody knows. Or they've been reminded.

The rest of her afternoon passed with only minor incident. She was pleasantly surprised neither of the pregnant women in the stands – wives of players, she learnt – went into labour. It would have been just like life to organise a birthing for her on top of all the other stuff.

Roberta rejoined her in the medical bunker.

"Not complete slaughter, then." she remarked, drily. The current score stood at twenty-one to thirteen. Bitterfontein could only win in the last five minutes by scoring at least one try and a conversion plus penalty, or else with three penalty goals. They agreed this was unlikely.

"Nobody's been killed yet." Bekki agreed.

They looked down to where Markus Swaart's unconscious body had been made comfortable and covered with blankets on a stretcher. Then they looked again.

"Got any iconographic paper left?" Bekki asked.

Roberta grinned.

"I never run out." she said. "And people always like to see their names and pictures in the paper."

The local journalist moved to a good position to take the iconograph.

Markus Swaart, the local bully and terror of the fifteen-a-side field, was lying on his side in the foetal position, deeply asleep, and comfortable. And sucking his thumb.

Roberta took her time in selecting her angles, and took many iconographs.

"He's just a big baby, really." Bekki remarked.

"Ja. That's the trouble. Three year old toddler, in a body that size." she said, drily.

There was a cheer from the field. Later they discovered that Uncle Horst had managed a field-goal to make the score twenty-one to sixteen. A late try in the dying minute (plus injury time) might swing it…

Most of the players coming off the field contrived to come past the medical bunker and to at least grin at the sight of Markus Swaart sucking his thumb. Bekki felt happier about this. She sensed that nothing deflated a bully more than ridicule. If you could laugh at them it broke their power.

But she still found a moment to speak to the Kirstenbosch captain, who promised to get him home, miss, and there is somebody there to look after him.

"There's a Mrs Swaart?" Bekki demanded. "Am I likely to be seeing her with cuts and bruises she'll claim to have got from slipping on the stairs? Even if they live in a bungalow?"

"Errr…" said the team captain. Bekki took this to be a "yes". She sighed and went to her bag.

"Wait there." she said. Using the bench as a worktop, she quickly mixed a phial and a quantity of sterile water in an empty dispensary bottle. She stoppered and shook it, turning it into a milky white opalescence. She quickly wrote a note, ripped it out of her notebook, and secured it to the bottle with a rubber band.

"See this gets to Mrs Swaart." she said. "If the pain gets bad, one teaspoonful. She can put it in a drink if she likes. It'll knock him out for at least six hours. But no more than two in any day. Got that? Important."

She wondered about warning "Give him the whole lot at once and it'll kill him". Then realised she had to think like a Witch. Not like an Assassin contemplating how to creatively remove a client. She didn't want to put ideas into peoples' heads. Besides, a lawcourt might consider that she'd said that as a recommendation, not a warning.

"She can come and see me if she needs more. I'm at the Lensen plaas, Wes Sandrift."

Later on, she and her bearers assisted with getting the unconscious Swaart onto a cart that would take him home. Six or seven of his team-mates helped. She made sure to warn the driver that, however tempted he might be, not to deliberately go over too many ruts or potholes.

There was a last surprise for her. She was packing up to return home when the two team captains, now bathed and in in everyday clothes, came to her.

"For you, miss."

"We took up a collection."

Bekki looked down at the hat full of cash. She really wanted to say "Errr…."

She was a Witch. She'd used some Witching that afternoon even if it had to be disguised as Healthcare Practice. A Witch couldn't accept money for working as a Witch. That was as near to absolute as Witchcraft got.

But a solution arose in her mind. It would be ungracious to refuse and she couldn't exactly explain why.

"There has to be about forty rand in there." she said, looking at the coins and notes.

"You earned it, miss." the Kirstenbosch team captain said. "And some of the okes put more in because you had to deal with Markus. You deserved something for putting out for us this afternoon. Err."

Bekki graciously thanked them and accepted the cash.

"Miss?" the Bitterfontein team captain said. "The okes were talking. They want you to be our team medic. They like the way you do things. Would you come back? You know, for home matches? With you being Mev'Mariella's little sister, and everything."

Bekki accepted. It would only be every other Saturday during the season, after all.

After they left, she thanked Nemo and Benjamin, and asked them to wait while she counted the cash from the whip-round. Forty-two rand and a few odd cents.

"Listen. You two are both married with kids, yesno? I don't need this money. I've got…." She looked for the words "…an independent income. You've both got families. I want you to split this between you. As a thank you. And it looks like I'm seeing you both again in a fortnight. You don't mind me bringing an assistant of my own? I'm training him for this sort of work. Good for him."

She hoped she could get Dertien in here. She'd speak to Mr van Langhout.

Much later, she was back at Wes Sandrift, enjoying a late drink with Aunt Mariella, explaining how she'd discovered her aunt was really her big sister.

"And as you can imagine, that came as a bit of a surpise to me."

Mariella considered this.

"Maybe you should drop the "Aunt" and just call me Mariella." she suggested. "Makes me feel old, and besides, I was barely thirteen when you came along. If you think about it, for those first few years I was your big sister."

She grinned.

"Now tell me how the day went. I heard a few stories."

To be continued

Sorry this took so long to get out!

Got to get this out – it's been a while, I know – more to come!

---

(1) I know enough about Finland to know midges and other biting insects are a small and persistent irritation in Finland in summer. I got that sääski is a word for them. Firing blind on Google Translate, I played with words and structures and got punatukkainen sääski as an attempt at "red midge" or "red mosquito", in the sense of a small red-haired girl who is a potential biting irritation. Finnish readers, if you know better, and I'm sure you do… Kovanäänen had come from playing with Finnish words for "makes a loud noise". Again, do any Finnish readers know better and could tell me "Perkele, that's not right?"

(2) I know the Afrikaans for "wolverine" is something like "wolvryn"; the Dutch word just sounds better. "Ahma" in Finnish is a short and meaningful word. You can imagine somebody in a Finnish forest whose last words are "AHHHH! Ma!" "Pieni ahma" – little wolverine.

(3) I know "elswaar" doesn't really seem to mean anything veery much in Afrikaans. I wanted a name for the local Nobby Nobbs analogue that suggested "elsewhere" in English, as in "Things are getting heavy and I wish I was somewhere else." Also to evoke the loathsome Konstabel Els in Tom Sharpe's novels of the Piemburg Police Force, who can be viewed as a South African take on Nobby but without any of the virtues. I now need to retcon the name in a previous chapter.

(4) Bekki's tuition on the orchestral bass involved the intervention of a long-dead maestro, who was allowed to conditionally possess her body for an hour or so at a time. See Book One for how a musically-inclined Witch gets to learn music.

(5) Morpork Crockett Club Rules Section 5. 3. 4. 1(iii) specifically mentions what to do if a fifteen-a-side ball lands on the field of play.

(6) to my tale Gap Year Adventures.

(7) Again, Afrikaans goes back to Dutch and has shared roots with English. Kêrels for "coppers" links to (Old) English "carls", originally "men-at-arms", as in the City Watch. It also links to "churls" as in "lowly people, unpleasant people" as in modern English "churlish". Language is great. Or "groot". Or "groete".

(8) Wee Archie and Grindguts had been asked not to accompany Bekki into the town, at least not justnow. Aunt Mariella had pointed out that a stealth Witch and healthcare practitioner might not be so discreet if accompanied by recognisable Familiars. It might just give the game away.

(9) "He'll get what's coming to him" – literally "he's going to see his own arse"

The Ninety-Nine Call originated in the 1974 British Lions tour of South Africa. As with any tour by a British side, South Africa viewed a match as a replay of the Boer War and things could get more physical than usual. Lions captain Willie-John McBride got tired of partisan refereeing, or perceived as so, that was allowing the Springboks to get away with blatantly dirty play. At the Test Match played at Ellis Park, the British team decided on the Call 99. When this went up, every Lions player on the field would run at the nearest South African and get a punch in. The theory was that if everybody did this at once all over the field and it became a sudden massive fist-fight, the referee would be overwhelmed, and not know who to book or send off. The Battlle of Ellis Park is now renowned in rugby history as a footnote to the Boer Wars.

Notes Dump

The reserve bench for Players Sixteen to Twenty-Two, in the fifteen-a-side field of fiction writing, awaiting their call to come on if a first-fifteen idea gets donnered

An idea came from FB originated by the delightful Katya Morris. She said:

When I grow up I want to be a cross between Miriam Margolyes and Willie Rushton.

I answered:

You may look even cuter with the Rushton beard and the Margolyes physique, like a young Dwarf who will surely be marked in Ankh-Morpork as destined for great things.

Half-seriously: Willie Rushton combined with Miriam Margolyes is such a great depictor for a lady dwarf that I have to use this in my Discworld fic. May I buy your idea with the payment of a name-check at the end of the story?

The Japanese name for a personalised anthropomorphic Death: Shinigami. This is a character in Japanese folklore and mythology.. Got to use this somewhere.

Also, a reply to a PM from reader KsandraMallan, who, a percussionist herself, kindly provided extra info and anecdotes about orchestral percussion. Thank you.

Hi! Sorry I haven't responded sooner - long knackering time at work - but thank you so much for the notes about orchestral rehearsal and anecdotes from the hooligans at the back in the percussion section! (with the caveat, noted somewhere before in the tales, that a truly delinquent harp player is capable of making anyone else in the orchestra look angelic by comparison).

is the slapstick also known as the claves, or is that different?

You might have worked out from context which instrument Famke will be soloist in. (I like to think I've dropped enough clues to identify the piece and, at least on Roundworld, the composer and his nationality). There will be an accompanying piece, a sort of National Hymn, in which Famke will also be absolutely required to sit up straight, do nothing, be attentive, and not miss her cue when it finally appears. Miss Glynnie - and Famke's mother - are doing this quite deliberately so as to teach her about self-discipline, sitting still, and doing nothing whatsoever until she is called upon to be absolutely on-cue.

It's also what tvtropes might describe as an "acceptible break from reality" - as in a real orchestra, the percussionist doing the lesser bit-parts on pitched instruments will be covering three or four of them, not just one. Famke, a couple of months shy of her thirteenth birthday and one of the younger members of the School Orchestra, is just getting the one. (over the years there will be more responsibility)

The theme of the night will be The Classical Music Of The Hubland States - I'm mindful that the two pieces I've referenced so far are only twenty minutes tops, I've added in what will be the Discworld's version of Greig's Piano Concerto (Nothingfjord/Norway). I am also interested by Hans-Christian Lumbye (Denmark/The Skaggeraks, on Discworld) and his piece "Champagne Gallop". In which the percussion section is augmented by the uncorking of champagne bottles. Is there an instrument for this or are real champagne bottles used? Still trying to work out where my OC country creations Hubsvensska (Sweden) and perhaps Island (Iceland) might fit in on a celebration night of Hubbish music.

Thanks for the info!

From tvtropes – a useful article on how to avoid doing Russia and Russians wrong, even when Taking It Up To Eleven:

/Main/GloriousMotherRussia

"This article will list some of the more common ways for foreigners to get all things Russian wrong. In Russia proper, they are called razvesistaya klukva (blooming cranberry) or just klukva (cranberry) and are a source of much humour."

Also, here: /Main/GratuitousRussian

And especially, this, on getting Russian right in fiction: /Analysis/GratuitousRussian

Also, a controversy. In all the time I've been writing South African characters and settings, I'd only ever had one outright critical review, and that was a polite assessment concerning how I could be doing it better – that author advised me to go outside "Afrikaners" and look at the interplay with the "Englishmen", and then to face the challenge of realistically depicting Black Africans – she was concerned I appeared to be ignoring the other colours of the Rainbow Nation and while my motives were good, the depiction was incomplete. Good advice.

Nothing negative for some years, and in November 2021… This.

Two interesting reviews on Strandpiel 1. Apparently I'm an old-time Afrikaaner racist pining for the good old days.

Review one from reader "Disa", who left no reply open:

Oh, I like how you clearly delete all comments calling you out on your white supremacist drivel. Too bad, Verwoerd is DEAD, rockspider.

Review two from reader "Guest", who I am wondering is the same thing as "Disa" – just a hunch here….

Gross! Sticking a racial slur into the title of a fic! Really, you are just disgusting and gross.
And just to make sure, you go to all the trouble of explaining the etymology of the slur so there can be no giving you the benefit of the doubt.
And to top it off, you've named your character after two of the most vicious white-supremacist scumbags ever to dip their claws in African blood.
I have zero interest in reading this obvious white supremacist screed - more of the same WhiteMan'sBurdenMasterRace Leni Riefenstahl Triomf tosh I grew up with. Verwoerd is dead, oupa, go back to your Brakpan hole.
Did you notice at all that Terry Pratchett himself was ENGLISH? That's right, oupa, the same country whose derogatory slur you named your whole fic after. He would roll in his grave to hear he'd been taken up by white nationalist Afrikaner scum like you.
NO Love!

Thought hard before posting a reply…

Ye gods... usually the advantage of getting reviews is that I get feedback on the story and especially the reader's opinion as to which bits they liked and which bits weren't quite so good and which can be improved. That is gold; that I appreciate.

But... I'm just sorry the (possibly) two reviewers "Disa" and "Guest" left no way of replying as I'd really like to open a dialogue on their opinions. I got the impression they don't like the story very much. that's fine; everybody's entitled to their opinion.

All the other stuff, however. I don't delete reviews. I really do not. Everything's valid in its way. Even these two reviewers - that is, if they are two different persons, and not the same person with two accounts. I did wonder about this.

I'm also struggling to see what is racist about chapter one - both reviewers appear to have read no further. I'm also assuming "die Boeman" is the chapter heading they think is racist - both said (or implied) they read no further than this chapter - and I'm struggling here. It just means "the bogeyman". Nothing more. If this has ever been used as a racist slur on black Africans then I was unaware of this - I also suspect it might have come up and been flagged in my background reading into SA. This is from Dutch. And means bogeyman. I know enough to know that "die boesman" is an Afrikaans word for the San natives that can have racially insensitive connotations. (calling them "Bushmen" is on a par with a white North American referring to "injuns". Casually careless.) But "die boeman" is not that word and is not from Afrikaans.

And (sighs, heavily) if that's what you want to believe, I'm a racist. I write about people who are "white South Africans", therefore I must be. I use a political system that no longer exists in the modern South Africa as a setting for the stories because it's malevolently crazy enough to have existed on the Discworld, and it adds narrative bite. I also hope I'm dealing with it as Terry Pratchett would have dealt with it. This does not mean I think it's a good idea. Sorry two of my readers missed the point completely.

And especially about a character called "Smith-Rhodes". I'm really glad you got where the character name may have come from. Full marks. But I didn't come up with the name. Terry Pratchett did. I'm just rolling with the character.

I doubt either of you will be back here anytime justnow. But when you're done with the righteous indignation, talk to me. Shame you didn't carry on reading. You might have found out just what a dyed-in-the-wool verkramp-Afrikaner racialist ABB Eugene de Terreblanche fan I really am.

Ag, man. Onnoselheid is universele. Onnoselheid dra alle velkleure.