Men at Arms

stretching,” he whimpered.
    Angua peered at her hair in the mirror while her night vision lasted.
    “Whatever for?”
    “Does…all that stuff…hurt?”
    “It’s a bit like a whole-body sneeze. You’d think he’d have a comb, wouldn’t you? I mean, a comb ? Everyone’s got a comb…”
    “A really…big…sneeze?”
    “Even a clothes brush would be something.”
    They froze as the door creaked open.
    Carrot walked in. He didn’t notice them in the gloom, but trudged to the table. There was a flare and a reek of sulphur as he lit first a match and then a candle.
    He removed his helmet, and then sagged as if he’d finally allowed a weight to drop on his shoulders.
    They heard him say: “It can’t be right!”
    “What can’t?” said Angua.
    Carrot spun around.
    “What’re you doing here?”
    “Your uniform got stolen while you were spying in the Assassins’ Guild,” Gaspode prompted.
    “My uniform got stolen,” said Angua, “while I was in the Assassins’ Guild. Spying.” Carrot was still staring at her. “There was some old bloke who kept muttering all the time,” she went on desperately.
    “Buggrit? Millennium hand and shrimp?”
    “Yes, that’s right—”
    “Foul Ole Ron.” Carrot sighed. “Probably sold it for a drink. I know where he lives, though. Remind me to go and have a word with him when I’ve got time.”
    “You don’t want to ask her what she was wearing when she was in the Guild,” said Gaspode, who had crept under the bed.
    “Shut up!” said Angua.
    “What?” said Carrot.
    “I found out about the room,” said Angua quickly. “Someone called—”
    “Edward d’Eath?” said Carrot, sitting down on the bed. The ancient springs went groing-groing-grink .
    “How did you know that?”
    “I think d’Eath stole the gonne. I think he killed Beano. But…Assassins killing without being paid? It’s worse than dwarfs and tools. It’s worse than clowns and faces. I hear Cruces is really upset. He’s got Assassins looking for the boy all over the city.”
    “Oh. Well. I’d hate to be in Edward’s shoes when they find him.”
    “I’d hate to be in his shoes now. And I know where they are, you see. They’re on his poor feet. And they’re dead.”
    “The Assassins have found him, then?”
    “No. Someone else did. And then Cuddy and Detritus did. If I’m any judge, he’s been dead for several days. You see? That can’t be right! But I rubbed the Beano make-up off and took off the red nose, and it was definitely him. And the wig’s the right kind of red hair. He must have gone straight to Hammerhock.”
    “But…someone shot at Detritus. And killed the beggar girl.”
    “Yes.”
    Angua sat down beside him.
    “And it couldn’t have been Edward…”
    “Hah!” Carrot undid his breastplate and pulled off his mail shirt.
    “So we’re looking for someone else. A third man.”
    “But there’s no clues! There’s just some man with a gonne! Somewhere in the city! Anywhere! And I’m tired!”
    The springs went glink again as Carrot stood up and staggered over to the chair and table. He sat down, pulled a piece of paper toward him, inspected a pencil, sharpened it on his sword and, after a moment’s thought, began to write.
    Angua watched him in silence. Carrot had a short-sleeved leather vest under his mail. There was a birthmark at the top of his left arm. It was crown-shaped.
    “Are you writing it all down, like Captain Vimes did?” she said, after a while.
    “No.”
    “What are you doing, then?”
    “I’m writing to my mum and dad.”
    “Really?”
    “I always write to my mum and dad. I promised them. Anyway, it helps me think. I always write letters home when I’m thinking. My dad sends me lots of good advice, too.”
    There was a wooden box in front of Carrot. Letters were stacked in it. Carrot’s father had been in the habit of replying to Carrot on the back of Carrot’s own letters, because paper was hard to come by at the bottom of a dwarf mine.
    “What kind of good advice?”
    “About mining, usually. Moving rocks. You know. Propping and shoring. You can’t get things wrong in a mine. You have to do things right.”
    His pencil scritched on the paper.
    The door was still ajar, but there was a tentative tap on it which said, in a kind of metaphorical morse code, that the tapper could see very well that Carrot was in his room with a scantily clad woman and was trying to knock without actually being heard.
    Sergeant Colon