Jingo

it?”
    “That reminds me…did I tell you what I said to Lord Rust?” said Sergeant Colon, nervously.
    “Seventeen times so far,” said Angua, watching the women with the feathers. She added, apparently to herself, “‘Come back with your shield or on it.’”
    “I wonder if I can get the lady to give me any more?” said Nobby.
    “What was that?” said Carrot.
    “These feathers,” said Nobby. “They look like real goose. I’ve got a use for a lot more of these—”
    “I meant what was it that Angua said?” said Carrot.
    “What? Oh…it’s just something women used to say when they sent their men off to war. Come back with your shield, or on it.”
    “ On your shield?” said Nobby. “You mean like…sledging, sort of thing?”
    “Like dead,” said Angua. “It meant come back a winner or not at all.”
    “Well, I always came back with my shield,” said Nobby. “No problem there.”
    “Nobby,” sighed Colon, “you used to come back with your shield, everyone else’s shield, a sack of teeth and fifteen pairs of still-warm boots. On a cart.”
    “We-ell, no point in going to war unless you’re on the winning side,” said Nobby, sticking the white feather in his helmet.
    “Nobby, you was always on the winning side, the reason bein’, you used to lurk aroun’ the edges to see who was winning and then pull the right uniform off’f some poor dead sod. I used to hear where the generals kept an eye on what you were wearin’ so they’d know how the battle was going.”
    “Lots of soldiers have served in lots of regiments,” said Nobby.
    “Right, what you say is true. Only not usually during the same battle,” said Sergeant Colon.
    They trooped back into the Watch House. Most of the shift had taken the day off. After all, who was in charge? What were they supposed to be doing today? The only ones left were those who never thought of themselves as off duty, and the new recruits who hadn’t had their keen edge blunted.
    “I’m sure Mr. Vimes’ll think of something,” said Carrot. “Look, I’d better take the Goriffs back to their shop. Mr. Goriff says he’s going to pack up and leave. A lot of Klatchians are leaving. You can’t blame them, either.”

    Dreams rising with him like bubbles, Vimes surfaced from the black fathoms of sleep.
    Normally, these days, he treasured the moment of waking. It was when solutions presented themselves. He assumed bits of his brain came out at night and worked on the problems of the previous day, handing him the result just as he opened his eyes.
    All that arrived now were memories. He winced. Another memory turned up. He groaned. The sound of his badge bouncing on the table replayed itself. He swore.
    He swung his legs off the covers and groped for the bedside table.
    “Bingeley-bingeley beep!”
    “Oh, no …All right, what’s the time?”
    “One o’clock pee em! Hello, Insert Name Here!”
    Vimes looked blearily at the Dis-organizer. One day, he knew, he really would have to try to understand the manual for the damn thing. Either that or drop it off a cliff. *
    “What—” he began, and then groaned again. The twanging sound made by the unwound turban as it took his weight had just come back to haunt him.
    “Sam?” The bedroom door was pushed open and Sybil came in carrying a cup.
    “Yes, dear?”
    “How do you feel?”
    “I’ve got bruises on my brui—” Another memory crawled up from the pit of guilt. “Oh, good grief, did I really call him a long streak of—?”
    “ Yes ,” said his wife. “Fred Colon came round this morning and told me all about it. And a very good description, I’d say. I went out with Ronnie Rust once. Bit of a cold fish.”
    Another recollection burst like a ball of marsh gas in Vimes’s head.
    “Did Fred tell you where he said Rust could put his badge?”
    “Yes. Three times. It seems to be weighing on his mind. Anyway, knowing Ronnie, he’d have to use a hammer.”
    Vimes had long ago got used to the fact that the aristocracy all seemed to know one another by their first name.
    “And did Fred tell you anything else?” he said timidly.
    “Yes. About the shop and the fire and everything. I’m proud of you.” She gave him a kiss.
    “What do I do now?” he said.
    “Drink your tea and have a wash and a shave.”
    “I ought to go down to the Watch House and—”
    “A shave! There’s hot water in the jug.”
    When she had left he hauled himself upright and tottered into his bathroom.