Snuff

thought for a while, the colonel had written to his old chum ‘Jankers’ Robinson, who always knew a thing or two about this and that and one thing and another and was now some political wallah in the palace. He had made an enquiry, as one might, of his friend whom he had once dragged to safety over the pommel of his saddle before a Klatchian scimitar got him, and had received a little note with nothing more than ‘Yes indeed, under-age, hushed up at great expense’, and after that the colonel had taken great care never to shake the bastard’s hand again.

Blithely unaware of the thoughts of the colonel, the Honourable Ambrose, who always seemed to be slightly bigger than his clothes – said clothes being of a fashion more suited to somebody twenty years his junior – sneered, ‘Frankly, I think we’re doing the world a service. They say that he favours dwarfs and all kinds of low-life. You might expect anything of a man like that!’

Yes, you might, thought the colonel.

And Miss Pickings said, ‘But we haven’t done anything wrong … Have we?’

The colonel turned a page and smoothed it down with military exactitude. He thought, Well, you all condone smuggling when the right people are doing it because they’re chums, and when they aren’t they’re heavily fined. You apply one law for the poor and none for the rich, my dear, because the poor are such a nuisance.

He felt eyes suddenly upon him because marital telepathy is a terrible thing. His wife said, ‘It doesn’t do any harm, everybody does it.’ Her head swung round again as her husband turned the page, his eyes fixedly on the type as he thought, as noiselessly as his brain could contrive: and of course there was the … incident, a few years ago. Not good, that. Not good. Not good when little babies of any sort are taken away from mothers. Not good at all. And you all know it and it worries you, and well it should.

The room was silent for a moment and then Mrs Colonel continued. ‘There will not be any problems. Young Lord Rust has promised me. We have rights, after all.’

‘I blame that wretched blacksmith,’ said Miss Pickings. ‘He keeps bringing it back into people’s memories, him and that damn writing woman.’

Mrs Colonel bridled at this. ‘I have no idea what you’re talking about, Miss Pickings. Legally nothing wrong has happened here.’ Her head swivelled towards her husband. ‘Are you all right, dear?’ she demanded.

For a moment he looked as though he wasn’t and then the colonel said, ‘Oh, yes, dear. Right as rain. Right as rain.’ But his thoughts continued: you have partaken in what is, I strongly suggest, a cynical attempt to ruin the career of a very good man.

‘I heard you coughing.’ It sounded like an accusation.

‘Oh, just a bit of dust or something, dear, right as rain. Right as rain.’ And then he slammed his magazine on to the table. Standing up, he said, ‘When I was nothing but a subaltern, dear, one of the first things I learned was that you never give away your position by frantic firing. I think I know the type of your Commander Vimes. Young Lord Rust may be safe, with his money and contacts, but I doubt very much that you all will be. Who knows what would have happened if you hadn’t been so hasty? What’s a bit of smuggling? You’ve just pulled the dragon’s tail and made him angry!’

When his wife regained control of her tongue, she said, ‘How dare you, Charles!’

‘Oh, quite easily, as it turns out, dear,’ said the colonel, smiling happily. ‘A bit of smuggling might be considered a peccadillo, but not when you’re supposed to be upholding the law. It baffles me that none of you seems to realize that. If you have any sense, ladies and gentlemen, you will explain that whole unfortunate goblin event to his grace right now. After all, your chum Gravid organized it. The only little problem is that you allowed him to do it, as I recall, without so much as a murmur.’

‘But it was not illegal,’ said his wife icily.

Her husband didn’t move, but in some ineffable sense he was suddenly taller. ‘I think things got a bit tangled: you see, you thought about things as being legal or illegal. Well, I’m just a soldier and never was a very good one, but it’s my opinion you were so worried about legal and illegal that you never stopped to think about whether it was right or wrong. And now, if you will excuse me, I’m going down to the pub.’

Automatically, his wife said, ‘No, dear, you know drink doesn’t agree with you.’

The colonel was all smiles. ‘This evening I intend to settle my differences with drink and make it my friend.’

The rest of the magistrates looked at Mrs Colonel, who glared at her husband. ‘I’ll talk to you about this later, Charles,’ she growled.

To her surprise, his smile did not change. ‘Yes, dear, I suspect you will, but I think you’ll find that I won’t be listening. Good evening to you all.’ There was a click as the door shut behind him. There should have been a slam, but some doors never quite understand the situation.

The goblin was already moving quite fast with a dot-and-carry-one gait that was deceptively speedy. Vimes was surprised to find that Feeney made heavy weather of the little jog towards – he was not surprised – Hangman’s Hill. He could hear the boy wheezing slightly. Perhaps you didn’t need to be all that fast to overtake a wayward pig, but you needed to be very fast indeed to catch up with a young troll blizzarded to the eyeballs with Slice and you needed lots of stamina to overtake him and slap the cuffs on him before he came down enough to try to twist your head off. Policing was obviously very different in the country.

In the country, there is always somebody watching you, he thought as they sped along. Well, there was always somebody watching you in the city, too, but that was generally in the hope that you might drop dead and they could run off with your wallet. They were never interested. But here he thought he could feel many eyes on him. Maybe they belonged to squirrels or badgers, or whatever the damn things were that Vimes heard at night-time; gorillas, possibly.

He had no idea what he was going to see, but certainly didn’t expect to find the top of the hill bright with lines of rope, painted yellow. He gave it only a second’s glance, however. With their backs to one of the trees, and looking very apprehensive, were three goblins. One of them stood up, thus bringing its head and therefore its eyes to a level in the vicinity of Vimes’s groin, not a good position to find himself. It held up a wrinkled hand and said, ‘Vimes? Hang!’

Vimes stared down at it and then at Feeney. ‘What does he mean, “Hang”?’

‘Never been quite sure,’ said Feeney. ‘Something like, have a nice day, I think, only in goblin.’

‘Vimes!’ the old goblin continued. ‘It said be, you be Po-leess-maan. It be big po-leess-maan! If po-leess-maan, then just ice! But just ice it be no! And when dark inside dark! Dark moving! Dark must come, Vimes! Dark rises!