Night Watch

the domestic disputes he'd attended over the years. You knew where you were with strictly-speaking weapons when they came at you. It was the not-strictly-speaking ones that scared the cacky out of a new recruit. It was the meat cleavers tied to poles. It was the long spikes, and the meathooks.

This was, after all, the area of small traders, porters, butchers and longshoremen. And so standing in raggedy lines in front of Vimes were men who, every day, peacefully and legally, handled things with blades and spikes that made a mere sword look like a girl's hatpin.

There were classic weapons, too. Men had come back from wars with their sword or their halberd. Weapons? Gods bless you, sir, no! Them's mementoes. And the sword had probably been used to poke the fire, and the halberd had done duty as a support for one end of the washing line, and their original use had been forgotten…

…until now.

Vimes stared at the metalwork. All this lot would have to do to win a battle would be to stand still. If the enemy charged them hard enough, he'd come out the other side as mince.

“Some of 'em are retired watchmen, sah,” Dickins whispered. “A lot of them have been in the regiments at one time or another, see. There's a few kids wanting to see some action, you know how it is. What d'you think?”

“I'd certainly hate to fight them,” said Vimes. At least a quarter of the men had white hair, and more than a few were using their weapons as a means of support. “Come to that, I'd hate to be responsible for giving them an order. If I said ‘about turn!’ to this lot, it'd be raining limbs.”

“They're resolute, sah.”

“Fair enough. But I don't want a war.”

“Oh, it won't come to that, sah,” said Dickins. “I've seen a few barricades in my time. It generally ends peaceful. The new man takes over, people get bored, everyone goes home, see.”

“But Winder is a nutter,” said Vimes.

“Tell me one that wasn't, sah,” said Dickins.

Sir, thought Vimes. Or “sah”, at least. And he's older than me. Oh well, I might as well be good at it.

“Sergeant,” he said, “I want you to pick twenty of the best, men that have seen action. Men you can trust. And I want them down at the Shambling Gate, and alert.”

Dickins looked puzzled. “But that's barred, sah. And it's right down behind us, it is. I thought maybe —”

“Down at the gate, sergeant,” Vimes insisted. “They're to watch for anyone sneaking up to unbar it. And I want the guard on the bridges to be strengthened. Put down caltrops on the bridge, string wires…I want anyone who tries to come at us over the bridge to have a really bad time, understand?”

“Do you know something, sah?” said Dickins, with his head on one side.

“Let's just say I'm thinking like the enemy, shall we?” said Vimes. He took a step closer and lowered his voice. “You know some history, Dai. No one with an ounce of sense goes up against a barricade. You find the weakness.”

“There's other gates down there, sah,” said Dickins doubtfully.

“Yes, but if they take Shambling they get into Elm Street and have a nice long gallop, right into where we're not expecting them,” said Vimes.

“But…you are expecting them, sah.”

Vimes just gave him a blank look, which sergeants are quite good at deciphering.

“As good as done, sah!” said Dickins happily.

“But I want a decent presence at all the barricades,” said Vimes. “And a couple of patrols that can go wherever there's trouble. Sergeant, you know how to do it.”

“Right, sah.” Dickins saluted smartly, and grinned.

He turned to the assembled citizenry. “All right, you shower!” he yelled. “Some of you has been in a regiment, I know it! How many of you knows ‘All The Little Angels’?”

A few of the more serious class of mementoes rose in the air.

“Very good! Already we has a choir! Now, this is a soldiers' song, see? You don't look like soldiers but by the gods I'll see you sounds like 'em! You'll pick it up as we goes along! Right turn! March! ‘All the little angels rise up, rise up, All the little angels rise up high!’ Sing it, you sons of mothers!”

The marchers picked up the response from those who knew it.

“How do they rise up, rise up, rise up, how do they rise up, rise up high? They rise heads up, heads up, heads up—” sang out Dickins, as they turned the corner.

Vimes listened as the refrain died away.

“That's a nice song,” said young Sam, and Vimes remembered that he was hearing it for the first time.

“It's an old soldiers' song,” he said.

“Really, sarge? But it's about angels.”

Yes, thought Vimes, and it's amazing what bits those angels cause to rise up as the song progresses. It's a real soldiers' song: sentimental, with dirty bits.

“As I recall, they used to sing it after battles,” he said. “I've seen old men cry when they sing it,” he added.

“Why? It sounds cheerful.”

They were remembering who they were not singing it with, thought Vimes. You'll learn. I know you will.

After a while, the patrols came back. Major Mountjoy-Standfast was bright enough not to ask for written reports. They took too long and weren't very well spelled. One by one, the men told the story. Sometimes Captain Wrangle, who was plotting things on the map, would whistle under his breath.

“It's huge, sir. It really is! Nearly a quarter of the city's behind barricades down there!”

The major rubbed his forehead and turned to Trooper Gabitass, the last man in and the one who seemed to have taken pains to get the most information.

“They're all on a sort of line, sir. So I rode up to the one in Heroes Street, with me helmet off and looking off-duty, sort of thing, and I asked what it was all about. A man shouted down that everything was all right, thank you very much, and they'd finished all the barricades for now. I said what about law and order, and they said we've got plenty, thank you.”

“No one fired at you?”

“No, sir. Wish I could say the same about round here. People were throwing stones at me and an old lady emptied a pissp—a utensil all over me from her window. Er…there's something else, sir. Er…”

“Out with it, man.”

“I, er, think I recognized a few people. Up on the barricades. Er…they were some of ours, sir…”

Vimes shut his eyes, in the hope that the world would be a better place. But when he opened them, it was still full of the pink face of only-just Sergeant Colon.

“Fred,” he said, “I wonder if you fully understand the basic idea here? The soldiers—that's the other people, Fred—they stay on the outside of the barricade. If they are on the inside, Fred, we don't, in any real sense, have a bloody barricade. Do you understand?”

“Yes, sir. But—”

“You want to do a spell in a regiment, Fred, and one of the things I think you'll find they're very hot on indeed is knowing who's on your side and who is not, Fred.”

“But, sir, they are—”

“I mean, how long have I known you, Fred?”

“Two or three days, sir.”