Nothing to it, really 18
Epilogues and afterwords, part one.
In which this part of the ongoing story is wrapped up, for now, but offers further potential beginnings…
Sam Vimes was now dealing with the aftermath of an incident where arrests had been made and some seriously bad people were in detention. This made him slightly more mellow. It was the nearest thing to job satisfaction in a Watchman's life. Carrot had arrived, with as many people as could be rounded up. Spa Lane neighbours were now being kept behind Watch barriers, with a cluster of Assassins courteously assisting.
"We got all four, Carrot." he remarked.
"Yes, sir." Carrot replied. "Igor reckons three of them are going to be fit for trial. Benckel came in with minor injuries. Du Plessis is badly concussed and needs restorative surgery to his face. Igor thinks he can sort out the broken jaw inside a week, though."
Vimes displayed silent understanding.
"Remind me to find out who that bloody enormous troll of a man was who nearly threw him off the roof." He requested. "Although I thought I heard Johanna call him "Daddy" from down here." He hadn't attended Johanna's wedding, citing Watch duties. Lady Sybil and Young Sam had gone, though.
"Her father, sir. Yes." Carrot clarified. "Officer Politek took an interesting deposition from him when she was in Howondaland. Apparently he sent duPlessis to jail for the first time thirty years ago."
Vimes grunted.
"And the other two?"
"Igor and Igorina have done all they can here, sir. Apparently to save de Koenig's life he needs major chest surgery and a new lung. They also tell me Ouistrehaam needs a new arm."
"Can't they just sew the original one back on?" Vimes demanded. "When that fighting-mad little girl chopped his arm off, and Gods, she'll be an Assassin to watch in a few years' time, it must have been a clean cut."
Carrot grimaced slightly.
"The arm landed in among some of Doctor Bellamy's special garden plants, sir. Too much time elapsed before we thought to look for it. Igorina said it was too…"
"Spare the details. Please? There are too many bodies strewn about as it is. How many of the thugs they brought with them are still standing?"
"As far as could tell, sir, they recruited maybe twenty fairly nasty people, largely from places like the Troll's Head. Eleven were killed. Six wounded to varying degrees and the other ones surrendered."
"Should clean up our outstanding crimes list. I take it they were all Known?"
Carrot turned abruptly. He registered the girl with blonde-red hair who was inobtrusively listening and taking notes.
"Miss? Who are you?"
She smiled happily. Good looks and a big engaging smile were something she'd inherited from her mother. She used her genetic legacy ruthlessly in her work.
"Suki van der Graaf." she said, in a Howondalandian accent. "Reporter for de Burger end de Volksraant. Here, I em "Our Correspondent From Rimwards Howondaland" to the Enkh-Morpork Times. You must be Commender Vimes end Ceptain Cerrot. Whet a story!"
Vimes turned round. He also registered Sacharissa Cripslock and that bloody vampire iconographer moving through the aftermath, and talking to people.
"Ye Gods." he muttered. "Not just the local Press, but overseas reporters too!"
Suki had heard whispers from political contacts in Pratoria that there'd been some sort of major incident at the Embassy in Ankh-Morpork. Digging around, she picked up on the story that her father, the Ambassador, had been injured and there was some doubt as to who was covering the job while he was in hospital. One Bureau of Foreign Affairs contact had gloomily speculated that he wouldn't be surprised if your mother was keeping the desk warm, Suki.
"Ja, sounds like Mutti." Suki had said, cheerfully. Inside, she was scheming about how to get to Ankh-Morpork, quickly. Her bank balance couldn't afford a carpet fare. She wondered if her Editor would pay expenses.
Then, when she saw President van Baalsteuwel had cancelled his engagements for a few days, citing no reason, she decided to stake out the political zone of the city and watch the skies. She knew about the Pegasii that flew between Home and Ankh-Morpork. She'd seen them, in the aftermath of the Tobacco Farm battle where she'd reported. She'd seen for herself how quickly they could get her copy from the Tobacco Farm to the Times. After two days of frustrating wait, she had seen one spiralling down from the sky into the gardens of the Presidential Palace. The rider looked like it might be Olga Romanoff, but she was carrying a pillion passenger.
Impulsively, she ran round the perimeter fence. Luck was with her, as a side-gate was open and a black labourer was trucking out waste to a waiting refuse cart. She slipped in and tried to assess where the Pegasus would land. Forcing herself to walk with confidence and as if she had every right to be there, she tagged onto a bunch of smart suits who were awaiting the President's return. Dressed in a smart business suit herself, nobody noticed.
And then Olga was assisting the familiar old man to earth, helping him divest the cloaks he'd been wearing against the high airs.
People were edging forwards to speak to him. She bustled to the front and caught his eye. She'd only get one chance at this.
"Mr President! What can you tell readers of DeBurgher about your recent trip to Ankh-Morpork? I understand you were in high-level discussions with Lord Vetinari concerning the criminal gang at large there? What do you know about the attack on our Embassy?"
The president scowled darkly. Suki tried to put other people between her and the large unhappy looking Guardsmen who were running towards her. Then van Baalsteuwel waved for the guards to stand back.
"I'll deal with this." he said. He stepped forward and regarded her.
"You know, any other journalist who tried something like this, I'd have them slung out on their guava." he said. "Walk with me, young missie van der Graaf."
The old man smiled.
"I know you've just come back from Ankh-Morpork…" Suki began.
The old man waved her into silence.
"Correct, as it happens, but I can make sure that never gets into print." he said. "Meant to be a closely-guarded secret, so of course the Press finds out. Hmmph."
He pondered the situation.
"Here's the deal." he said. "And it's the only offer you'll get. When Officer Romanoff here chooses to leave and return to Ankh-Morpork, she takes a passenger with her. You."
He smiled diffidently at Olga.
"If that's alright with you, my dear."
"Perfectly". Olga agreed. She looked amused.
"I can justify it as a humanitarian gesture. You're a young girl, just learnt her father took a crossbow bolt through his hip in a dastardly attack, your dear mother is frantic. So you are allowed an emergency exit visa to be at her side and support her, as a good daughter should. See your poor wounded father, who, when I saw him, was sitting up in bed having the time of his life, charming some very pretty nurses. And Gods know, it's not hard to do a favour for Friejda when she needs one. Lovely lady, your mother. Although Gods know where it went wrong with you."
Suki said, dutifully, "Thank you, sir."
Then the president grinned.
"My weak point. Always been a sucker for a pretty face. Ah well. But in return, young missie."
He stopped smiling.
"Whatever story you write is sympathetic. Makes us look as if we've not been sitting on our backsides scratching our arses while a criminal gang, of this nationality, terrorises Ankh-Morpork. Put a positive spin on it. Do you hear?"
"Perfectly, sir."
"Good. Now Olga's not travelling back just yet. I believe there's a young man here she likes spending an afternoon with. I'm not going to get in the way of that. You might want to be here around eleven to midnight tonight? Go off and do something else. I'll inform the gate guard. You will be expected, this time."
"Thank you, sir."
"A good report, miss van der Graaf. A good one."
In the event, Olga did not return till three in the morning. She looked content, happy and faraway.
"Aye, weel." said her navigating Feegle, Wee Mad Arthur. "Yon Eddie's a persuasive swain, aye."
Suki smiled her understanding. She'd met one or two persuasive swains herself. Some things needed no explanation. She cloaked up for the journey, listened to the pre-flight instruction, and was issued the obligatory brown paper bag in case of need. She heard, with interest, that Ankh-Morpork time would be a few hours behind apparent time here. They were leaving well after three am, but might arrive at midnight or slightly earlier in terms of local time.
And as the sun pinked the Howondalandian horizon, they took off. Olga filled her in on what was known about the situation. She listened intently. She closed her eyes against the disorientation of "Feegle Space" as they entered it.
And then they were over the vast, the intimidatingly vast, city. Olga rummaged in a pocket and brought out the omniscope fragment that served Pegasus pilots for communication with Ground Control. She reported in to a controller at Pseudopolis Yard.
"Roger that." Ground Control said. Peeking over her shoulder, Suki saw the worried face of a young Watchman in the omniscope. "Bit busy here. Big situation on."
"Anything I can assist with? Over."
There was a pause as Ground Control relayed her inquiry. Then the controlling Watchman reappeared and said:
"Howondalandian Gang reported to be in an attack at Eighteen Spa Lane, just off Nap Hill and Pallant…"
"I know where it is." Olga cut him short. She'd been a dinner guest at Johanna's. And the idea Johanna was under attack concerned her.
"Inspector Pessimal recommends you vector over there. An eye in the sky would be useful, he says."
"Eighteen Spa Lane. On the way. Over."
She looked over her shoulder at Suki.
"Looks like I got you a scoop." she said.
Suki's journalistic senses twanged.
Two more Pegasii blinked into real space again, over the hubwards-by-widdershins part of the City. Olga waved acknowledgement to her fellow pilots. Suki noted both had pillion passengers. They looked oddly familiar, but it was hard to tell… then they saw an explosion of fire at ground level erupting from the side of a house. It was spectacular and it was impressive. Olga quietly urged her mount to speed.
Then they landed. Suki had an impression of screams, fighting, of running men and women in black or in Watch armour. She heard a dry grating voice exclaim "Oh, great gods! That's the man we want! And that big bugger's proposing to throw him off the bloody roof?"
She looked up, and saw a giant of a man who was effortlessly holding a limp and unresisting body over his head. He was talking to the man, almost affectionately. Then she recognised her cousin Johanna, looking very heavily pregnant and as if she was in some pain, limp over to talk the giant out of it. He dropped the unresisting man at his feet.
Suki watched some more, then reached for her notebook. Then by some unerring instinct, she encountered Sacharissa Cripslock. Neither woman had actually met, but Sacharissa knew the reputation of Our Correspondent In Rimwards Howondaland. They decided to pool their joint resources and cover the story together…
Andreas Barbarossa Smith-Rhodes accepted use of a ladder to come down off the roof. He introduced himself to Vimes and Carrot. In his heavily accented Morporkian, he asked for the location of this Lady Sybil Hospital the wonderful flying horse was taking his daughter to, as his wife would surely wish to know.
"Was she hurt?" Carrot asked. Barbarossa looked into the wide innocent face, then burst out laughing. He clapped Carrot on the shoulder. He rocked slightly.
"Carrot…." Angua said, doing the face-palm thing.
"Hardly, mister policeman! What hes taken her to hospital is whet should be a heppier event. Now the men who have dogged her life these pest few months are dealt with. My wife, Johanna's dear mother, will wish to know."
"Her waters broke, sir." Angua said, testily. "Which, Carrot, means the baby is imminent."
"And… errr…. That's your wife, sir?" Vimes inquired, diffidently.
Agnetha Smith-Rhodes had disembarked, taken one look at the situation, and marched on and straight into the house. A Watchman who had tried to deter her had been given very short shrift.
"Johanna's mother, ja." Barbarossa said, proudly. "When I realised we hed two of the marvellous flying horses evailable end each could take a pessenger, I left the ferm in the hends of Kurt end my sons. To be honest, I hed been thinking of visiting this place for quite some time."
Vimes nodded. The brief glimpse he'd had of Agnetha had been disconcerting. At first he had wondered if shock had aged Johanna by thirty years. Then he'd noticed no pregnancy bulge, and deduced the woman must be a relative. She'd certainly made young Constable Passmore take a few steps back…
Johanna realised this was her very first flight on a Pegasus. She wished she was in a state to appreciate it more. Contractions were coming harder and faster now. Her father had effortlessly lifted her aboard and told her to hang on tight. Irena had said for the Gods' sake to hold it in, as while she'd done the midwifery stuff as a witch, the back of a Pegasus at two hundred feet was not a place to show off her skills.
And then they'd landed in the middle of the Lady Sybil. Nurses and doctors had come running. Johanna had been loaded onto a gurney and moved, with speed, to Maternity.
Agnetha Smith-Rhodes had taken charge inside the house. She snapped at her accepted-as-nephew-even-though-the-family-link-is-slightly-more-distant-than-that, Julian, to go and put some clothes on. He meekly replied "Yes, Aunt Agnetha.", and went upstairs to clean some of the blood off his torso and find a shirt.
Claude, the butler, instantly recognised a powerful force. As Agnetha ignored the destruction and the covered bodies, she busied herself with care of her younger daughter, loudly and insistently saying "No child of MINE goes to hospital in this state! She's filthy and covered in blood! I want her bathed and groomed first. Go find a maid to run a bath!"
"Ja, baas-lady." Claude said meekly, reverting to earlier conditioning. Right now it was safest. He went upstairs to rouse the other servants, to assure them the danger was over but a greater peril had arrived. They'd better present themselves and be prepared to deal with…. He paused. If Johanna was Madam. And Mariella was Young Madam. Their mother would therefore be… He went upstairs to advise the others of the arrival of the terrible and unrelenting Old Madam.
Mariella let herself be bathed, scrubbed and groomed. The filthy nightgown was sent, by her mother, for incineration. Lying there with her bandaged leg draped over one side of the tub, with her hair being meticulously cleaned and groomed by Eve, she got over the shock of her parents' unexpected arrival, and the implications of their wanting to stay for at least a few weeks. Rivka had re-appeared, having retrieved the other throwing axe, and having alerted the Watch to the possibility that the house immediately behind 18 Spa Lane had been their base. (1) Agnetha Smith-Rhodes had taken a look at her, tutted disapproval, and said it appeared there was ANOTHER chimney-sweep's apprentice who needed a verdamte good scrubbing, what exactly do they TEACH you at that expensive school you both attend? Mariella felt very tired and drowsy. It was a good reason for even her mother to concede that she ought to be checked by the doctors. But she was going there CLEAN and in clean underwear, if she, Agnetha Smith-Rhodes, had anything to do with it. They'd think she wasn't a good mother otherwise, and she wasn't having THAT.
The Watch took Mariella to the Lady Sybil in a fast coach. Mariella fell asleep. She smiled at the thought of Rivka meekly submitting to being bathed and cleansed. If she was sensible, she'd give in.
"OK, just before I take formal statements." Angua said. "Ruth, don't you think it would be a good idea to go upstairs and move your things into a different room, and to at least pretend to have slept in the bed? Witness statements tend to circulate, and from your point of view, it may not be a a good idea if a formal document says you and Julian were sleeping in the same room. It gets read out in court."
Angua looked at the expression of alarm on both faces. She grinned tolerantly. She didn't mind fudging inessential details.
"You can say you heard noises in the night, then went to alert Captain Smith-Rhodes in the next room, or something. "Angua prompted her.
Ruth excused herself and went upstairs.
"Oh, Ruth? You might want to put a top on, or something?" Angua prompted her.
Dorothea the cook stood in the middle of the kitchen and folded her arms. She had been roused, assured it was safe to come out, and instructed to open the kitchen to deal with any demands the Old Madam was likely to make. She had found something she half-expected to see, and was in mixed mood about it.
"Listen to me, tiny wall-people." she said, to the empty air. "I will forget this time that you have been in my kitchen without my leave. I will turn my back. I will expect to see ALL my knives returned to the knife-drawer. And I tell you people, I want them clean!"
A procession of sheepish-looking goblins filed in, trying not to catch her eye, and every one of Dorothea's knives and cleavers was eventually returned.
She nodded thanks to them. Then set about providing hot drinks for just about everybody. Watchmen soon discovered the kitchen door and the big friendly smiling black cook. Being fair-minded men, they passed a helmet round for small coin to be dropped into by way of acknowledgement. Dorothea was soon making a nice profit, as well as hot buttered toast and light snacks.
"You're not one of mine!" Sam Vimes said. His gaze had fallen on the third Pegasus pilot. She was holding the head reins while Spike placidly grazed the Smith-Rhodes lawn.
"No, sir. I'm not." agreed Princess Esmerelda Margaret Note Spelling of Lancre.
Vimes frowned down at her.
"You're a bit young to be doing this, aren't you?" he asked. Olga Romanoff intervened.
"Work experience girl, you might say, sir." she said. "Apprentice. Flies with us during her school holidays."
"There's a Guild of Pegasus Pilots now?" Vimes demanded.
"Sort of, sir. Just because we've found out how to breed them, doesn't mean just anyone can ride one. They're choosy about who they pick as pilots. So far only Lancre-trained witches can ride them, we've discovered."
Vimes nodded. "So you're in the club."
Nottie smiled back. "We're the only people who can work with the Feegle, sir." she explained.
"Aye, she is that, bigjob." Big Tam said from the mane. Vimes scowled. He didn't get on much with Feegles. He looked at the girl again. Not quite fourteen, unruly slightly tangled straw-blonde hair, and a nose slightly too large for her to be described as beautiful. But self-possession in bucketloads, which he recognised as a character trait in witches. Feegle are needed as navigators, he reminded himself.
"She may be a wee hag, but she's a hag." Big Tam said. "Like her mother afore her, and like the Great Hag, the Hag o'a'' Hags, who gifted her one of her names. Names is power!"
"Margaret Esmerelda, sir." Olga said. "Margaret for her mother. Now Queen of Lancre. Esmerelda for…"
"Mistress Weatherwax." Vimes said. He gave in.
"Nottie is an accident, sir. Long story." the girl said. "It sort of stuck."
Vimes sighed, then grinned. Carrot was thinking about a Police Cadet Service. Like a training arm for people who are underage and wanting a Watch career. Show them the job, under supervision, two nights a week. Keep them off the streets…Vimes thought about this…or something similar. Out of trouble, anyway. We might get a couple of good recruits out of it when the time comes.
"Looks like I might have to swear you in as a Special, young lady." he said. "Just a formality. To legitimise it. We've got everything else in the Watch, so why not a Princess?"
"Or two." Olga reminded him. "Ruth N'Kweze counts. And she's a Special."
Ruth quickly rearranged upstairs to make it look, before the Scene of Crime iconographer got up here, as if she'd been sleeping in a different room. Then she considered, changed into black britches, and wrapped Julian's disregarded Army officer's tunic around her upper half. She collected her borrowed weapons and decided to return them to the wall display. They'd served their purpose.
It was her bad luck to encounter Andreas Smith-Rhodes walking into the house. He saw a Zulu warrior in full regalia coming down the stairs. One who, like the waves of enemy assailing Lawke's Drain, had chosen to wear a trophy, in that place a uniform jacket taken from a dead man at Isandhlwana.
"What the blue, buggering, Hell!" he shouted, and went for his machete.
Julian Smith-Rhodes sensed trouble and saw Ruth going into a defensive crouch with her assegai. He swiftly got between them.
"Uncle Andreas!" he said, urgently. "I know what you're thinking. But this Zulu was fighting on our side. She's a friend. Well, in this time and place, anyway."
"So whose dead body did she get that jacket off, hey?" Barbarossa demanded. Julian reddened slightly.
"Actually… mine, uncle."
Barbarossa looked from one to the other. People made the mistake of thinking a man built like a troll also thought like a troll. But he made a correct deduction very quickly, then threw back his head and roared with laughter.
Tensions relaxed. Agnetha Smith-Rhodes appeared. She looked up disapprovingly at Ruth, who looked sheepish. As well as slightly deafened.
"You'd be one of the Zulu girls." she said. "At that school. Johanna mentioned you in her letters. Andreas, put that sword down! Come down the stairs, girl. But no threatening moves with that assegai. You hear? I'm watching you!"
A little later, Ruth returned weapons and head-dress to the wall display. Barbarossa watched her.
"Your uncle, you say?" he asked. He was now inclined to be friendly, having heard a little of Ruth's association with Johanna. "I remember. Twelve or thirteen years ago. His bloody impi raided across the river. Got the van Rental farm. Johanna was furious. She got a few good men together and went after him. Succeeded, where a whole kommando failed. Man, I was proud of her that day!"
"I hardly knew him." Ruth replied, speaking politely in Vondalaans. "Father never trusted him, though. I suspect he was pleased to see a little problem solved."
"And then they paid her off and exiled her here." Barbarossa shook his head. "She seems to have thrived on it, though."
In what was now a heavily guarded cellar room below Pseudopolis Yard, the Watch Igor and Matron Igorina worked on the nearly-dead de Koenig and the badly injured Ouistrehaam. One was unconscious and near death; the other had been heavily anaesthetised to make their work easier. Igors working in accordance with the Code of the Igors, they worked largely in silence, speaking only to request a particular tool or surgical instrument. Eventually, as a plasma solution drained into each man, to ensure blood pressure was maintained and the heart had something to pump that made up for lost blood, the two Igor shook hands, pleased in a job well done.
"The old lung was thmashed beyond repair. That young lady did a terrifyingly good job with the sthpear." the Watch Igor said. Igorina nodded.
"Lucky for him we had access to a spare, then!" she said, happily.
"And a thspare arm. For the other man." Igor agreed. "Lucky that thtevedore at the Dockth wath carrying an Igor card."
"The man who was crushed underneath a crate full of machine tools. That slipped from the crane while it was being loaded." Igorina mused. "All we could usefully salvage was a right arm, a kidney and a lung."
They looked down at Ouistrehaam together, content in the visible evidence of a job well done.
"The new arm is a match for its opposite, in terms of length, musculature and size." Igorina said, approvingly. "Which is everything that can be expected of us."
But she still took care to ensure the man was strapped down to his bed.
"Don't want him self-rejecting." she said. "Now shall we pick up our guards, and take a look at the other one's face? Jaw broken in two places, fracture of the nasal cartilage, depressed traumatic fracture of the lacrimatic, maxillal process, and the lateral sinistral zygomatic."2
Igorina sighed.
"That's going to really hurt when we reset it."
"Unavoidably so." agreed Igor. "Better make sure he's strapped down."
And an hour or two later, Julian Smith-Rhodes having volunteered to mind the house, a mixed party was sitting in a private waiting room at the Lady Sybil. Every so often, screams rent the air.
Ponder Stibbons sat numbly, events of the past twelve hours racing around and yet to catch up with him. He wasn't waiting alone. There is an iron law that operates whenever a new father is anxiously waiting for news of the happy event. Where a first time father is waiting, there will be more experienced men who will gather round him to offer support and advice. If nothing else, narrative causality dictates this.
There was another scream. Ponder winced. Especially when the scream mutated into
"Aaaargh! Ponder Stibbons, you BESTARD! AAAAArgh! After this, I swear to the Gods we are sleeping in separate beds! Aaaaaaargh!"
Andreas Smith-Rhodes patted his son-in-law on the shoulder, reassuringly.
"I'd like to say I hev got no idea es to how she knows words like thet." he said. "Or where she got them from."
"But, being a honest man…" said Peter Bellamy. Andreas grinned happily.
"Women in my family line are robust." he said. "Daughters of the earth. So I suppose I cennot complain ebout earthy language. Still, my daughter hes en impressive vocabulary."
"Aaaaaaaargh! Make thet separate BEDROOMS, Ponder StibbonsAAAARGH!"
"I shouldn't worry, old son." Peter said. "you should have heard Vinnie when she was having our first. She was threatening to slip something in my tea to kill the urge. That was a little bit worrying."
"End she did not, of course." Andreas said, politely.
"Well, then we had two more. With a third on the way in the next few weeks. So I wouldn't worry, Ponder. She needs somebody to vent at right now."
"Her mother is with her." Andreas said. "Which is gut. I do not much care for this new-fengled way of thinking, thet the husband should be there during the birth. Leave it for the women, is whet I say! We were all there for the conception. Ag, thet should be enough for eny man!"
Ponder forced a smile. Then heavy feet approached. The door opened.
"Thanking you kindly, Matron." said a familiar voice. Then Mustrum Ridcully entered, looking anxious.
"Am I too late, lad?" he asked. Then his face spread into a wide grin.
"Barbarossa, you old devil!" he roared.
"Mustrum!" bellowed Andreas, leaping up.
The two big men shook hands vigorously, in a room that suddenly seemed too small to contain both. Then Ridcully eyed the table speculatively and began rolling up a sleeve.
"Stands at one-all, as I recall." he said. "Somethin' to do while we're waitin'."
Barbarossa grinned.
Then the fearsome matron was in the doorway again.
"There is to be strictly no arm-wrestling in this hospital!" she announced. "We take a very dim view of destruction of hospital property!"
Ridcully and Barbarossa both sighed. The matron nodded. "Mrs Smith-Rhodes was wise to warn me." she said. "Her exact words were, tell my husband not to roll his sleeves up in the waiting room. Or she will get to know about it."
With one last stern glare, she turned and left. The door closed behind her. in the near distance, Johanna was heard, in between fresh screams, likening Ponder to something very unpleasant indeed to be found on the Veldt.
"I really don't know where she gets it from." her father said, pretending innocence. "Good phrase, though. Never heard thet one before."
"Don't worry, Ponder." Peter Bellamy reassured him. "She needs to shout and cuss and swear at you now. But when she's got the baby, it'll all be forgiven. You see."
Ridcully took his pointy hat off and unscrewed the tip. He offered the brandy flask to Barbarossa, who took it.
"The ection of a gentleman, Mustrum. Thenk you."
Ponder refused a nip. His father-in-law looked at him benevolently.
"Very wise, my boy. You do not want your child's first impression of his father being the smell of strong drink." He took another nip. "But his grandfather, now. Different thing entirely."
"Anyone with her apart from her mother?" Ridcully inquired.
"Irena. The Watchwoman who got her here. Apparently Johanna insisted. She thought a Lancre-trained witch was a good insurance policy. And, er, Irena did the midwifery thing with Mrs Ogg. Er." Ponder said.
Ridcully smiled.
"Clever girl. Somebody who got her midwifing from Nanny Ogg. Sound idea. By the way, lad, learnt what you did tonight. Have to say I'm impressed. All the old classics. Magical fire, hey? Hope the ash outside yer study window has got some human in it! And the boots with the smoke curlin' up out of them. There's no magic like the old magic, for all yer high-falutin' stuff in the High Energy Magic buildin'. And it sends out a clear message. Attack a wizard in his own home, you are smoke and ashes, no mercy. Well done, lad!"
Peter Bellamy was listening intently. He drew their attention to the fact the screaming had stopped. And then the Matron was back. This time she smiled.
"Professor Stibbons. You have a daughter. Come this way, please?"
Ponder followed her, in a daze.
(1) Carrot had grasped the point immediately and sent a foot patrol to check out Five Shallow Valley. After speaking to neighbours, Sergeant Flint had smashed the door in, and they'd discovered the Jennerson family tied up in the cellar. It still didn't get Rivka out of a bath and a good scrubbing, though.
(2) Depressed fracture of the cheekbone and eye socket. A tricky one even for Igors and very painful for the recipient. It apparently takes a lot pf prodding, poking and pulling to reset the bones.