Feet of Clay

There were gasps of surprise around her, but she glared at the assembled guests and there was a smattering of bows and curtsies. Somewhere at the back of the room someone started to say, 'But the man's an absolute oik—' and was cut off.

'Has someone dropped something?' said Nobby nervously. ‘I’ll help you look, if you like.'

The footman appeared at his elbow, bearing a tray. 'A drink, m'lord?' he said.

'Yeah, okay, a pint of Winkles,' said Nobby.

Jaws fell. But Lady Selachii's rose to the occasion. 'Winkles?' she said.

'A type of beer, your ladyship,' said the footman.

Her ladyship hesitated only a moment. 'I believe the butler drinks beer,' she said. 'See to it, man. And I'll have a pint of Winkles, too. What a novel idea.'

This caused a certain effect among those guests who knew on which side of the biscuit their pate was spread.

'Indeed! Capital suggestion! A pint of Winkles here, too!'

'Hawhaw! Gweat! Winkles for me!'

'Winkles all round!'

'But the man's an absolute ti—'

'Shut up!'

Vimes crossed the Brass Bridge with care, counting the hippos. There was a ninth shape, but it was leaning against the parapet and muttering to itself in a familiar and, to Vimes at least, an unmenacing way. Faint air movements wafted towards him a smell that out-smelled even the river. It proclaimed that ahead of Vimes was a ding-a-ling so big he'd been upgraded to a clang-a-lang.

'… Buggrit buggrit I told 'em, stand it up and pull the end orf! Millennium hand and shrimp! I told 'em, sez I, and would they poke …'

'Evening, Ron,' said Vimes, without even bothering to look at the figure.

Foul Ole Ron fell into step behind him. 'Buggrit they done me out of it so they did …'

'Yes, Ron,' said Vimes.

'… And shrimp … buggrit, say I, bread it on the butter side … Queen Molly says to watch your back, mister.'

'What was that?'

'… Sowter fry it!' said Foul Ole Ron innocently. Trouser the lot of 'em, they did me out of it, them and their big weasel!'

The beggar lurched around and, filthy coat dragging its hems along the ground, limped away into the fog. His little dog trotted along in front of him.

There was pandemonium in the servants' hall.

'Winkles' Old Peculiar?' said the butler.

'Another one hundred and four pints!' said the footman.

The butler shrugged. 'Harry, Sid, Rob and Jeffrey … two trays apiece and double down to the King's Head again right now! What else is he doing?'

'Well, they're supposed to be having a poetry reading but he's telling 'em jokes …'

'Anecdotes?'

'Not exactly.'

It was amazing how it could drizzle and fog at the same time. Wind was blowing both through the open window, and Vimes was forced to shut it. He lit the candles by his desk and opened his notebook. Probably he should use the demonic organizer, but he liked to see things written down fair and square. He could think better when he wrote things down.

He wrote 'Arsenic', and drew a big circle round it. Around the circle he wrote: 'Fr. Tubelcek's fingernails' and 'Rats and 'Vetinari' and 'Mrs Easy'. Lower down the page he wrote: 'Golems', and drew a second circle. Around that one he wrote: 'Fr. Tubelcek?' and 'Mr Hopkinson?'. After some thought he wrote down: 'Stolen clay' and 'Grog'.

And then: 'Why would a golem admit to something it didn't do?'

He stared at the candlelight for a while and then wrote: 'Rats eat stuff.' More time passed.

'What has the priest got that anyone wants?' From downstairs came the sound of armour as a patrol came in. A corporal shouted.

'Words,' wrote Vimes. 'What had Mr Hopkinson got? Dwarf bread? — » Not stolen. What else had he got?'

Vimes looked at this, too, and then he wrote 'Bakery', stared at the word for a while, and rubbed it out and replaced it with 'Oven?'. He drew a ring around 'Oven?' and a ring around 'Stolen clay', and linked the two.

There'd been arsenic under the old priest's fingernails. Perhaps he'd put down rat poison? There were plenty of uses for arsenic. It wasn't as if you couldn't buy it by the pound from any alchemist.

He wrote down 'Arsenic Monster' and looked at it. You found dirt under fingernails. If people had put up a fight you might find blood or skin. You didn't find grease and arsenic.

He looked at the page again and, after still more thought, wrote: 'Golems aren't alive. But they think they are alive. What do things that are alive do? — » Ans: Breathe, eat, crap.' He paused, staring out at the fog, and then wrote very carefully: 'And make more things.'

Something tingled at the back of his neck.

He circled the late Hopkinson's name and drew a line down the page to another circle, in which he wrote: 'He'd got a big oven.'

Hmm. Cheery had said you couldn't bake clay properly in a bread oven. But maybe you could bake it improperly.

He looked up at the candlelight again.

They couldn't do that, could they? Oh, gods … No, surely not …

But, after all, all you needed was clay. And a holy man who knew how to write the words. And someone to actually sculpt the figure, Vimes supposed, but golems had had hundreds and hundreds of years to learn to be good with their hands …

Those great big hands. The ones that looked so very fist-like.

And then the first thing they'd want to do would be to destroy the evidence, wouldn't they? They probably didn't think of it as killing, but more like a sort of switching-off…

He drew another rather misshapen circle on his notes.

Grog. Old baked clay, ground up small.

They'd added some of their own clay. Dorfl had a new foot, didn't he — it? It hadn't made it quite right. They'd put part of their own selves into a new golem.

That all sounded — well, Nobby would call it mucky. Vimes didn't know what to call it. It sounded like some sort of secret-society thing. 'Clay of my clay.' My own flesh and blood …

Damn hulking things. Aping their betters!

Vimes yawned. Sleep. He'd be better for some sleep. Or something.

He stared at the page. Automatically his hand trailed down to the bottom drawer of his desk, as it always did when he was worried and trying to think. It wasn't as though there was ever a bottle there these days — but old habits died ha …

There was a soft glassy ching and a faint, seductive slosh.

Vimes's hand came up with a fat bottle. The label said: Bearhugger's Distilleries: The MacAbre, Finest Malt.

The liquid inside almost crawled up the sides of the glass in anticipation.