Night Watch

holding a huge quilted workbasket. Out of reflex, Vimes took it, to help her up the steps.
    “Sorry about this, Miss—” he began.
    “Get your hands off that!”
    She snatched the basket back and scrambled into the darkness.
    “Pardon me ,” said Vimes.
    “This is Miss Battye,” said Rosie from the bench inside the wagon. “She’s a seamstress.”
    “Well, I assumed she—”
    “A seamstress , I said,” said Miss Palm. “With needles and thread . Also specializes in crochet.”
    “Er, is that a kind of extra—” Vimes began.
    “It’s a type of knitting,” said Miss Battye from the darkness of the wagon. “Fancy you not knowing that.”
    “You mean she’s a real— ” said Vimes, but Rosie slammed the iron door. “You just drive us on,” she said, “and when I see you again, John Keel, we are going to have words !”
    There was some sniggering from the shadows inside the wagon, and then a yelp. It had been immediately preceded by the noise of a spiky heel being driven into an instep.
    Vimes signed the grubby form presented to him by Fred Colon and handed it back with a solid, fixed expression that made the man feel rather worried.
    “Where to now, Sarge?” said Sam as they pulled away.
    “Cable Street,” said Vimes. There was a murmur of dismay from the crated people behind them.
    “That’s not right,” muttered Sam.
    “We’re playing this by the rules,” said Vimes. “You’re going to have to learn why we have rules, Lance Constable. And don’t you eyeball me. I’ve been eyeballed by experts, and you look as if you’re desperate for the privy.”
    “Yeah, all right, but everyone knows they torture people,” mumbled Sam.
    “Do they?” said Vimes. “Then why doesn’t anyone do anything about it?”
    “’Cos they torture people.”
    Ah, at least I was getting a grasp of basic social dynamics, thought Vimes.
    Sullen silence reigned in the seat behind him as the wagon rumbled through the streets, but he was aware of whispering from the wagon behind him. Slightly louder than the background, he heard Rosie Palm’s voice hiss: “He won’t. I’ll bet anything.”
    A few seconds later, a male voice, slightly the worse for drink and very much the worse for bladder-twisting dread, managed: “Er, Sergeant, we…er…believe the fine is five, er, dollars?”
    “I don’t think it is, sir,” said Vimes, keeping his eyes on the damp streets.
    There was some more frantic whispering, and then the voice said: “Er…I have a very nice gold ring…”
    “Glad to hear it, sir,” said Vimes. “Everyone should have something nice.” He patted his pocket for his silver cigar case, and for a moment felt more anger than despair, and more sorrow than anger. There was a future. There had to be. He remembered it. But it only existed as that memory, and that was as fragile as the reflection on a soap bubble and, maybe, just as easily popped.
    “Er…I could perhaps include—”
    “If you try to offer me a bribe one more time, sir,” said Vimes as the wagon turned into Cable Street, “I shall personally give you a thumping. Be told.”
    “Perhaps there is some other—” Rosie Palm began, as the lights of the Cable Street House came into view.
    “We’re not at home to a tuppenny-upright, either,” said Vimes and heard the gasp. “Shut up, the lot of you.”
    He reined Marilyn to a halt, jumped down, and pulled his clipboard from under the seat.
    “Seven for you,” he said to the guard lounging against the door.
    “Well?” said the guard. “Open it up and let’s be having them, then.”
    “Right,” said Vimes, flicking through the paperwork. “No problem.” He thrust the clipboard forward. “Just sign here.”
    The man recoiled as though Vimes had tried to offer him a snake.
    “What d’ya mean, sign?” he said. “Hand ’em over!”
    “You sign,” said Vimes woodenly. “Them’s the rules. Prisoners moved from one custody to another, you have to sign. More’n my job’s worth, not to get signature.”
    “Your job’s not worth spit,” snarled the man, grabbing the board. He looked at it blankly and Vimes handed him a pencil.
    “If you need any help with the difficult letters, let me know,” he said innocently.
    Growling, the guard scrawled something on the paper and thrust it back.
    “Now open up, pl-ease, ” he said.
    “Certainly,” said Vimes, glancing at the paper. “But now I’d like to see some form of ID, thank you.”
    “What?”
    “It’s