Moving pictures

It was now half-past one. He was ambling back from the Mended Drum, the most determinedly disreputable of the city's taverns.

Victor Tugelbend always gave the impression of ambling, even when he was running.

He was also quite sober and a bit surprised, therefore, to find himself in the Plaza of Broken Moons. He'd been heading for the little alley behind the University and the piece of wall with the conveniently spaced removable bricks where, for hundreds and hundreds of years, student wizards had quietly got around, or more precisely climbed over, Unseen University's curfew restrictions.

The plaza wasn't on the route.

He turned to amble back the way he had come, and then stopped. There was something unusual going on.

Usually there'd be a storyteller there, or some musicians, or an entrepreneur looking for prospective buyers of such surplus Ankh-Morpork landmarks as the Tower of Art or the Brass Bridge.

Now there were just some people putting up a big screen, like a bedsheet stretched between poles.

He sauntered over to them. 'What're you doing?' he said amiably.

'There's going to be a performance.'

'Oh. Acting,' said Victor, without much interest.

He mooched back through the damp darkness, but stopped when he heard a voice coming from the gloom between two buildings.

The voice said 'Help', quite quietly.

Another voice said, 'Just hand it over, right?'

Victor wandered closer, and squinted into the shadows.

'Hallo?' he said. 'Is everything all right?'

There was a pause, and then a low voice said, 'You don't know what's good for you, kid.'

He's got a knife, Victor thought. He's coming at me with a knife. That means I'm either going to get stabbed or I'm going to have to run away, which is a real waste of energy.

People who didn't apply themselves to the facts in hand might have thought that Victor Tugelbend would be fat and unhealthy. In fact, he was undoubtedly the most athletically-inclined student in the University. Having to haul around extra poundage was far too much effort, so he saw to it that he never put it on and he kept himself in trim because doing things with decent muscles was far less effort than trying to achieve things with bags of flab.

So he brought one hand round in a backhanded swipe. It didn't just connect, it lifted the mugger off his feet.

Then he looked for the prospective victim, who was still cowering against the wall.

'I hope you're not hurt,' he said.

'Don't move!'

'I wasn't going to,' said Victor.

The figure advanced from the shadows. It had a package under one arm, and its hands were held in front of its face in an odd gesture, each forefinger and thumb extended at right angles and then fitted together, so that the man's little weaselly eyes appeared to be looking out through a frame.

He's probably warding off the Evil Eye, Victor thought. He looks like a wizard, with all those symbols on his dress.

'Amazing!' said the man, squinting through his fingers. 'Just turn your head slightly, will you? Great! Pity about the nose, but I expect we can do something about that.'

He stepped forward and tried to put his arm round Victor's shoulders. 'It's lucky for you', he