It was a pleasant walk down to the lock-up, which turned out to be on a small quay by the river. The area had all the semi-nautical detritus that a man might expect and there was a swing bridge, presumably to allow the bigger boats to pass. The sun shone and nothing was happening, in a slow sort of way. And then there was the much spoken of lock-up. It looked like a giant pepperpot built of stone. A flowering creeper grew up it, and, next to the door and restrained by a chain, there was an enormous pig. When it saw their approach it got on its hind legs, and, tottering somewhat, begged.
‘This is Masher,’ said Feeney. ‘His father was a wild boar, his mother was surprised. See those fangs? No one gives me much trouble when I threaten to let Masher off his lead, do they, Masher?’ He disappeared behind the lock-up and returned immediately with a bucket of swill, into which Masher tried to bury himself, with hugely contented noises – as huge, in fact, as his fangs. Vimes was staring at them when a friendly-looking woman wearing an apron bustled out of a thatched cottage, stopped when she saw Vimes and dropped a curtsy. She looked hopefully at Feeney. ‘Who would this fine gentleman be, son?’
‘It’s Commander Vimes, Mum … You know, the duke.’
There was a pause while the woman clearly wished that she had been wearing a better dress, hairdo, and shoes, and had cleaned the privy, the kitchen, the scullery, and had tidied up the garden, painted the front door and cleaned the inside of the roof.
Vimes prevented her spin from making a hole in the ground by holding out his hand and saying, ‘Sam Vimes, madam, pleased to make your acquaintance,’ but this only caused her to run indoors in a panic.
‘My mum is very keen on the aristocracy,’ Feeney confided as he unlocked the door of the lock-up with an unfeasibly large key.
‘Why?’ said Vimes, mystified. It was reasonably comfortable in the lock-up. Granted, the pigs had left a fragrant memory behind them, but for a boy from Ankh-Morpork this counted as fresh air. Feeney sat down beside him on a well-scrubbed bench. ‘Well, sir, when my granddad was young, Lord Ramkin gave him a whole half-dollar for opening a gate, just to let the hunt go by. According to my dad, he said, “No canting hypocrite going on about the rights of man ever gave me as much as a quarter-farthing so I say here’s to Lord Ramkin, who gave me a whole half-dollar when he was as pissed as a fart, and never asked for it back when he were sober. That’s what I call a gentleman.”’
Vimes squirmed inside, knowing that the supposedly generous old drunkard would have had more money than you could ever imagine, and here was a working man pathetically grateful for a handout from the old piss-artist. He snarled in his soul to a man long dead. But the part of him that had been married to Sybil for years whispered,
‘Is there something wrong, commander?’ said Feeney.
‘Everything,’ said Vimes. ‘For one thing, no policeman swears allegiance to the civil power, he swears allegiance to the law. Oh, politicians can change the law, and if the copper doesn’t like it then he can quit, but while he is in the job it’s up to him to act in accordance with the law as laid down.’ He leaned his back against the stone wall. ‘You do not swear to obey magistrates! I’d like to see what it was that you signed—’ Vimes stopped talking because the little metal plate in the lock-up door slid open to reveal Feeney’s mother, looking very nervous.
‘I’ve made Bang Suck Duck, Feeney, with swede and chips, and there’s enough for the duke as well, if he would be so condescending as to accept it?’
Vimes leaned forward and whispered, ‘Does she know you’ve arrested me?’
Feeney shuddered. ‘No, and, sir, please, please don’t tell her, because I think she’d never let me into the house ever again.’
Vimes walked over to the door and said to the slot, ‘I shall be honoured by your hospitality, Mistress Upshot.’
There was a nervous giggle from the other side of the slot, and Feeney’s mother managed to say, ‘I’m sorry to say we have no silver plates, your highness!’
At home Vimes and Sybil ate off serviceable earthenware, cheap, practical and easy to keep clean. He said aloud, ‘I’m sorry you don’t have any silver plates, too, Mistress Upshot, and I’ll have a set sent to you directly.’
There was something like a scuffle from the other side of the slot, at the same time as Feeney said, ‘I beg your pardon? Have you gone mad, sir?’
Well, that
‘You can’t do that, sir! She gets scared of having valuables in the house!’
‘Do you have much theft hereabouts, chief constable?’ said Vimes, emphasizing the last two words.
Feeney opened the door of the lock-up and picked up his mother, who had apparently been stunned by the possibility of owning silver plates, brushed her down and said over her shoulder, ‘No, sir, the reason being no one has anything to steal. My mum always told me money can’t buy you happiness, sir.’
Yes, Vimes thought, so did my ma, but she was glad enough when I gave her my first wages, because it meant we could have a meal with meat in it, even if we didn’t know what kind of meat it was. That’s happiness, isn’t it? Blimey, the lies we tell ourselves …
When a blushing Mistress Upshot had gone to fetch the meal, Vimes said, ‘Between ourselves, chief constable, do you believe that I’m guilty of murder?’
‘No, sir!’ said Feeney instantly.
‘You said that very quickly, young man. Are you going to say that it’s copper’s instinct? Because I get the impression you ain’t been a copper long and haven’t had much to do. I’m no expert, but I don’t reckon pigs try lying to you very much either.’
Feeney took a deep breath. ‘Well, sir,’ he said calmly, ‘my granddad was a wily old bird and he could read people like books. He used to walk me around the area introducing me to people, sir, and then as they strolled
