Night Watch

“I thought you might like to try that again, lad,” said the invisible friend. “We have little tricks here, as you will learn. Just sit up. I know you've been through a lot, but we don't have time for messing about. This is sooner than I'd like, but I thought I'd better get you out of there before it went really runny… Mister Vimes.”

Vimes froze. “Who are you?” he said.

“It's Lu-Tze officially, Mister Vimes. But you can call me Sweeper, since we're friends.”

Vimes sat up carefully and looked around.

The shadowy walls were covered with…writing, it must be writing, he thought, but the Hubland type of writing which is only one step away from being little pictures.

The candle was standing on a saucer. Some way behind it, just visible in the shadows, were two cylinders, each as wide as a man and twice as long, set in massive horizontal bearings, one above the other. Both were turning slowly, and both gave the impression of being a lot bigger than their mere dimensions suggested. Their rumble filled the room. There was a strange violet haze around them.

Two yellow-robed figures tended the cylinders, but Vimes's eye was drawn to the skinny little bald man sitting on an upturned crate by the candle. He was smoking a foul roll-up of the sort favoured by Nobby, and looked like a foreign monk. In fact, he looked exactly the kind Vimes occasionally saw with begging bowls in the street.

“You're looking fit, Mister Vimes,” said Sweeper.

“You were in the Watch House, right?” said Vimes. “Snouty called you Lousy!”

“Yes, Mister Vimes. Lu-Tze. I've been sweeping up there every night for the past ten days. All for two pence and all the kicks I can't dodge. Just waiting for you.”

“And you told Rosie Palm where I'd gone, too? You were the monk on the bridge?”

“Right again. Couldn't be sure she'd catch up.”

“How do you know who I am?”

“Don't get excited, Mister Vimes,” said Sweeper calmly. “I'm here to help you…your grace. And I'm your friend because right now I'm the only person in the world who will probably believe anything you tell me about, oh, thunderstorms and falls, that sort of thing. At least,” he added, “the only sane person.”

He watched Vimes as the man sat quite still for half a minute.

“Good, Mister Vimes,” said Sweeper. “Thinking. I like that in a man.”

“This is magic, right?” said Vimes, at last.

“Something like that, yes,” said Sweeper. “F'rinstance, just now we moved you back in time. Just a few seconds. Just so you wouldn't do anything you'd regret. Can't say I blame you for wanting to have a go at someone after all you've been through, but we don't want any harm to come to you, do we…”

“Hah? I almost had my hands round your throat!”

Sweeper smiled. It was a disarming little smile. “Smoke?” he said. He fumbled in his robe and produced a ragged hand-rolled cigarette.

“Thanks, but I've got my own—” Vimes began automatically. His hand stopped halfway to his pocket.

“Oh, yes,” said Sweeper. “The silver cigar case. Sybil gave it to you as a wedding present, right? Shame about that.”

“I want to go home,” said Vimes. It came out as a whisper. He hadn't been sleeping in the past twelve hours, merely recovering.

This time it was Sweeper who sat in silence, apart from the rumble of the cylinders.

“You're a policeman, Mister Vimes,” he said eventually. “Well, I'd like you to believe, for a while, that I'm a sort of policeman too, all right? Me and my colleagues, we see that…things happen. Or don't happen. Don't ask questions right now. Just nod.”

Vimes shrugged instead.

“Good. And let's say on our patrol we've found you, as it might be, in a metaphorical kind of way, lying in the gutter on a Saturday night singing a rude song about wheelbarrows—”

“I don't know a rude song about wheelbarrows!”

Sweeper sighed. “Hedgehogs? Custard? One-string fiddles? It really doesn't matter. Now, we've found you a long way from where you should be and we'd like to get you home, but it's not as easy as you might think.”

“I've gone back in time, haven't I? It was that bloody Library! Everyone knows the magic in there makes strange things happen!”

“Well, yes. It was mainly that, yes. It's more true to say that you, er, got caught up in a major event.”

“Can anyone get me back? Can you get me back?”

“We-ell…” said Sweeper, looking awkward.

“Wizards can if you can't,” said Vimes. “I'll go back and see them in the morning!”

“Oh, you will, will you? I'd like to be there when you do. These ain't the wizards under decent old Ridcully, you know. You'll be lucky if they only laugh at you. Anyway, even if they wanted to be helpful they'd hit the same problem.”

“And what's that?”

“It can't be done. Not yet.” For the first time in the conversation Sweeper looked ill at ease. “The big problem I'm facing, Mister Vimes, is that I ought to tell you a few things that I'm not, in any circumstances, allowed to tell you. But you're a man who isn't happy until he knows the facts. I respect that. So…if I tell you everything, can you spare me, oh, twenty minutes of your time? It could save your life.”

“All right,” said Vimes. “But what—”

“You've got a bargain,” said Sweeper. “Roll 'em, boys.”

The noise of the big cylinders changed for a moment and Vimes felt a very slight shock, a suggestion that his whole body had just gone plib.

“Twenty minutes,” said Sweeper. “I'll answer every question. And then, Mister Vimes, we'll send you back from twenty minutes in the future to now and you'll tell yourself what you and me agree you ought to know. Which will be most of it, really. You're a man who can keep secrets. Okay?”

“Yes, but—” Vimes began.

The tone of the spinning cylinders changed slightly.

Sam Vimes saw himself standing in the middle of the room. “That's me!”

“Yeah, right,” said Sweeper. “Now listen to the man.”

“Hello, Sam,” said the other Vimes, staring not quite at him. “I can't see you, but they say you can see me. Remember the smell of lilac? You thought about those who died. And then you told Willikins to hose down that kid. And, eh…you've got a pain in your chest you're a bit worried about but you haven't told anyone…That's about enough, I think. You know I'm you. Now, there's some things I can't tell you. I can know 'em because I'm in a—” The speaker stopped and looked away, as if he was taking instruction from someone offstage “—a closed loop. Er, you could say I'm twenty minutes of your life you don't recall. Remember when you had…”

…a sensation that his whole body had just gone plib.

Sweeper stood up. “I hate to do this,” he said, “but we're in the temple and we can pretty much dampen out the paradoxes. On your feet, Mister Vimes. I'm going to tell you everything.”

“You just said you couldn't!”

Sweeper smiled. “Need any help with those handcuffs?”

“What, these old Capstick Mark Ones? No, just give me a nail and a couple of minutes. How come I'm in a temple?”

“I brought you here.”

“You carried me?”

“No. You walked with me. Blindfolded, of course. And then when you were here, I gave you a little drink…”

“I don't remember that!”

“Of course not. That was the purpose of the drink. Not very mystical, but it does the job. We don't want you coming back here, now, do we? This place is supposed to be a secret–”