Guards! Guards!

don’t think he can cut the mustard.”
    “He can’t?” said Vimes, backing away.
    “It really needs two of you.”
    “It does, doesn’t it,” whispered Vimes, his shoulder blades trying to carve their way out through the fence.
    “Could you oblige?” boomed the thing.
    “What?”
    “Oh, don’t be squeamish, man. You just have to help him up into the air. It’s me who has the tricky part. I know it’s cruel, but if he can’t manage it tonight then he’s for the choppy-chop. Survival of the fittest and all that, don’t you know.”
    Captain Vimes managed to get a grip on himself. He was clearly in the presence of some sex-crazed would-be murderess, insofar as any gender could be determined under the strange lumpy garments. If it wasn’t female, then references to “it’s me who has the tricky part” gave rise to mental images that would haunt him for some time to come. He knew the rich did things differently, but this was going too far.
    “Madam,” he said coldly, “I am an officer of the Watch and I must warn you that the course of action you are suggesting breaks the laws of the city—” and also of several of the more strait-laced gods, he added silently—“and I must advise you that his Lordship should be released unharmed immediately—”
    The figure stared at him in astonishment.
    “Why?” it said. “It’s my bloody dragon.”

    “Have another drink, not-Corporal Nobby?” said Sergeant Colon unsteadily.
    “I do not mind if I do, not-Sgt. Colon,” said Nobby.
    They were taking inconspicuosity seriously. That ruled out most of the taverns on the Morpork side of the river, where they were very well known. Now they were in a rather elegant one in downtown Ankh, where they were being as unobtrusive as they knew how. The other drinkers thought they were some kind of cabaret.
    “I was thinking,” said Sgt. Colon.
    “What?”
    “If we bought a bottle or two, we could go home and then we’d be really inconspicuous.”
    Nobby gave this some thought.
    “But he said we’ve got to keep our ears open,” he said. “We’re supposed to, what he said, detect anything.”
    “We can do that at my house,” said Sgt. Colon. “We could listen all night, really hard.”
    “Tha’s a good point,” said Nobby. In fact, it sounded better and better the more he thought about it.
    “But first,” he announced, “I got to pay a visit.”
    “Me too,” said the sergeant. “This detecting business gets to you after a while, doesn’t it.”
    They stumbled out into the alley behind the tavern. There was a full moon up, but a few rags of scruffy cloud were drifting across it. The pair inconspicuously bumped into one another in the darkness.
    “Is that you, Detector Sergeant Colon?” said Nobby.
    “Tha’s right! Now, can you detect the door to the privy, Detector Corporal Nobbs? We’re looking for a short, dark door of mean appearance, ahahaha.”
    There were a couple of clanks and a muffled swear-word from Nobby as he staggered across the alley, followed by a yowl when one of Ankh-Morpork’s enormous population of feral cats fled between his legs.
    “Who loves you, pussycat?” said Nobby under his breath.
    “Needs must, then,” said Sgt. Colon, and faced a handy corner.
    His private musings were interrupted by a grunt from the corporal.
    “You there, Sgt.?”
    “ Detector Sergeant to you, Nobby,” said Sgt. Colon pleasantly.
    Nobby’s tone was urgent and suddenly very sober. “Don’t piss about, Sergeant, I just saw a dragon fly over!”
    “I’ve seen a horsefly,” said Sgt. Colon, hiccuping gently. “And I’ve seen a housefly. I’ve even seen a greenfly. But I ain’t never seen a dragon fly.”
    “Of course you have, you pillock,” said Nobby urgently. “Look, I’m not messing about! He had wings on him like, like, like great big wings!”
    Sergeant Colon turned majestically. The corporal’s face had gone so white that it showed up in the darkness.
    “Honest, Sergeant!”
    Sgt. Colon turned his eyes to the damp sky and the rain-washed moon.
    “All right,” he said, “show me.”
    There was a slithering noise behind him, and a couple of roof tiles smashed onto the street.
    He turned. And there, on the roof, was the dragon.
    “There’s a dragon on the roof!” he warbled. “Nobby, it’s a dragon on the roof! What shall I do, Nobby? There’s a dragon on the roof! It’s looking right at me, Nobby!”
    “For a start, you could do your trousers up,” said