Monstrous Regiment

she said, producing a key and turning it in the lock. “I’ll go back and chat with the others. Come and find me when you’re ready…”
    Polly stepped inside, heart pounding, and there was Paul. And there was a buzzard, on a perch by the open window.
    And on the wall, where Paul was working so intensely that his tongue was sticking out of the corner of his mouth and he hadn’t even noticed the door opening, was another buzzard, flying in the heart of the sunrise.
    Right now, Polly could forgive Ankh-Morpork anything. Someone had found Paul a box of colored chalks.

    What was a long day began to get longer…
    She had a kind of power. They all did. People gave them space, watched them. The fighting had stopped and they were the cause and no one knew exactly why.
    There were lighter moments. They might have power, but General Froc gave the orders. And General Froc might give the orders, but it was permissible to suppose that it was Sergeant Major Jackrum who anticipated them.
    And perhaps that was why Shufti asked Polly and Tonker to go with her, and they were ushered into a room where a couple of guards stood on either side of a sheepish young man called Johnny who had fair hair and blue eyes and a gold earring and his trousers round his knees in case Shufti wanted to check his other distinguishing feature.
    He also had a black eye.
    “This the one?” said Major Clogston, who was leaning against the wall eating an apple. “The general has asked me to tell you that there will be a dowry of five hundred crowns, with the army’s compliments.”
    Johnny brightened up slightly when he heard that.
    Shufti gave him a long and careful look.
    “No,” she said at last, turning away. “That’s not him.”
    Johnny opened his mouth, and Polly snapped: “No one asked you to speak, Private!” And such was the nature of the day that he shut up.
    “Oh, dear. I’m afraid he’s the only candidate,” said Clogston. “We’ve got any amount of earrings, heads of fair hair, blue eyes, Johnnies, and, surprisingly, a fair number of carbuncles. But he’s the only one with everything. Are you sure?”
    “Positive,” said Shufti, still staring at the boy. “My Johnny must have been killed.”
    Clogston walked over and lowered her voice.
    “In that case, uh, the general did say, informally, that a marriage certificate, a ring, and a widow’s pension could be arranged,” she said.
    “Can she do that?” whispered Polly.
    “For one of you? Today? You’ll be amazed what can be done,” said Clogston. “Don’t think too badly of her. She means well. She’s a very practical man.”
    “No,” said Shufti. “I…it’s…well, no. Thank you, but no.”
    “Are you sure?” said Polly.
    “Positive,” said Shufti, looking defiant. Since she was not naturally a defying kind of person, it was not quite the look that she thought it was and ought to have been, having overtones of hemorrhoid sufferer, but the effort was there.
    Clogston stepped back. “Well, if you’re certain, Private? Fair enough, then. Take that man away, Sergeant.”
    “Just a moment,” said Shufti. She walked over to the bewildered Johnny, stood in front of him, held out her hand and said: “Before they take you away again I want my sixpence back, you son of a bitch!”
    Polly held out her hand to Clogston, who shook it and smiled. There had been another little victory, of sorts. If the landslide is big enough, even square pebbles will roll.

    Polly headed back to the rather larger cell that had been made available as the women’s barracks, or at least the barracks for the official women. Men, grown men, had fallen over themselves to put cushions in there, and bring in wood for the fire. It was all very strange. Polly felt they were being treated as something dangerous and fragile, like, say, a huge and wonderful jar full of poison.
    She turned the corner into the big courtyard and there was de Worde, with Mr. Chriek. There was no escaping them. They were definitely people looking for someone. The man was dragging out his notebook even as he came toward her, and gave her a look in which reproach was mingled with hope.
    “Er…so you’re women, then?” he said.
    “Er, yes,” said Polly. That seemed to cover it.
    “But you didn’t tell me when we met before,” said de Worde, as if this was some dereliction of manners.
    “Sorry. But we didn’t tell you we were men, either.”
    De Worde, a man who wrote things down, found a nice new page