Snuff

‘I shall, of course, mention your cooperation to the authorities and, of course, in the local pub as well, ah, yes.’

And now Mr Flutter was visualizing the result of being seen as some kind of grass, so stupidly he went for, ‘I never told you anything about any tobacco, and you know it, copper!’

At this point Feeney stepped around the corner with his fearsome club raised and a look of almost comical aggression on his face. ‘You want me to give him the old one-two, commander, just say the word, guv!’

Vimes rolled his eyes in mock despair. ‘No need for that, Feeney, no need for that, just when Mister Flutter here is so anxious to talk to us, understand?’

Flutter decided that the way forward was an appeal to Feeney. ‘Look, Feeney, you know me—’

He got that far and no further because Feeney said, ‘It’s Constable Upshot to you, Flutter. My dad had you up before the beaks two dozen times. He used to call you the blue bottle on account of whenever there was a load of shit going down he’d find you flapping about in it. And he told me to watch you, which is what I am doing right now, in fact.’

He glanced at Vimes, who gave him an encouraging nod and then said, ‘You see my problem, Mister Flutter, we’re not here to talk about contraband tobacco, okay? Now, I never saw myself as a revenuer, not a popular profession. I’m a copper pure and simple, right, and in my hand I have this man what is only doing a favour to his employer by storing a few barrels of tobacco in his shed, but on the other hand, well, if I found a murderer in the other hand, why, gods bless you, I might totally forget all about the first hand … Don’t ask me to draw you a picture, Flutter, because my hands are full.’

Flutter looked aghast. ‘This is about that goblin, right? Look, it wasn’t me! Okay, I’m a bit of a naughty boy, I put my hand up to that, but I ain’t like him! I’m a scallywag, not a damn murderer!’

Vimes looked at Feeney. Some people could be said to be as pleased as Punch. Feeney could be said to look as pleased as Punch, Judy, the dog Toby, the crocodile and, above all, the policeman, all rolled in together. Vimes raised his eyebrows in new interrogation, and Feeney said, ‘I believe him, chief. He hasn’t got it in him, I swear. The best he could manage would be knocking over an old lady for her purse, and even then she’d probably have to be blind too.’

‘There, you see!’ said Flutter triumphantly. ‘I’m not really a bad person!’

‘No,’ said Vimes, ‘you’re a veritable choirboy, Mister Flutter, I can see that, and I’m rather religious too, and I like chapter and verse, but are you willing to swear that the individual known as Stratford knifed a goblin girl to death on Hangman’s Hill in the grounds of Ramkin Hall, three nights ago?’

Flutter raised a finger. ‘Can I say that I told him to leave off, and he laughed, and I didn’t know it was a girl neither – I mean, how can you tell?’

Vimes’s face was deadpan. ‘Tell me, Ted, what would you have done if you had known? I’m intrigued.’

Flutter looked down at his feet. ‘Well, I, well, well, I mean … not a girl, I mean … well, not a girl … I mean, that’s not right, know what I mean?’

And you can find someone like this dangerous clown in nearly every neighbourhood, Vimes thought. ‘Clearly chivalry is not dead, Mister Flutter. Okay, Feeney, let’s carry on. Mister Flutter, why were you on Hangman’s Hill on the aforesaid night?’

‘We were just having a walk,’ said Flutter.

Vimes’s face was again deadpan, so deadpan as to be mortified. ‘Of course you were, Mister Flutter. Silly of me to ask the question, really. Constable Upshot, I can see Willikins over there having a smoke.’ He pushed at the open door and dragged Flutter inside. ‘Does this building have a cellar?’

Flutter was one step away from a toilet break, but nevertheless, being the kind of fool to dig himself in deeper, managed to sneer, ‘There might be. So what?’

‘Mister Flutter, I have already told you that I’m a religious man, and since you would test the patience of a saint I need to spend a moment in quiet contemplation, understand? I’m sure you know that there’s always an easy way, and then again, there’s always the hard way. Currently, this is the easy way, but the hard way is also quite easy, in a manner of speaking. Before talking to you again I want to be alone with my thoughts. And it occurs to me, Mister Flutter, that you might have some thoughts about, as it were, legging it, and so my colleague, Chief Constable Upshot, will guard the door and I shall send in my batman, Mister Willikins, to keep you company.’

Before Vimes was even able to tap on the window, the door opened and Willikins, immaculate as ever, stepped into the grubby room, all smart and crisp with shiny shoes and a hint of pomade on his hair. The three men then watched Vimes heave at a likely ring on the floor, which pulled back to reveal the trap door to a dark cellar and a ladder going down.

Vimes said, ‘Constable Upshot, I need a little time to think in the darkness. I won’t be long.’ He went down the ladder and pulled the trap door closed behind him.

The darkness said, ‘Ah, commander, at long last. I suspect that you’re here to take a witness statement.’

This is wrong, Vimes told himself. How can you take testimony from a demon, especially when it’s one of no fixed abode? But on the other hand, who needs a witness statement if you’ve got a confession?

Up above, Ted Flutter’s eyes rolled this way and that as he analysed the situation. Let’s see: we have one young twit who is playing at being a copper, and a snooty butler type, all pink and shiny. I reckon Mrs Flutter’s little boy is out of here. At this point, at this very point, Willikins, without looking at Flutter, reached into his jacket and there was a slap as he laid down a steel comb on the table in front of him. It gleamed. And it gleamed even stronger in Flutter’s imagination. He took one look at Willikins’ expression, and Mrs Flutter’s little boy decided he would sit very still until that nice Commander Vimes came back. Out of another pocket Willikins produced the sharpest-looking knife Flutter had ever seen and, without paying any attention whatsoever to Flutter, began to clean his fingernails.

In fact it was only a matter of seconds before the trap door was heaved back, and Vimes emerged, then nodded to Willikins, who secured the comb and walked out of the room without a word. Vimes regained the chair. ‘Mister Flutter, I have a witness statement that puts you on Hangman’s Hill on the night in question with another man, said man being known as Stratford. The witness tells me that you said to him that you could have got hold of some turkey blood, but he said that there were rabbits all over the place and he never missed with his slingshot. At this point the witness says a young goblin girl came out of the bushes and your companion struck at her as she was begging for her life – and furiously, to the extent that you yourself told him, in your words, to leave off, upon which