Night Watch

me about it, but I’d bet my boots he knows this lad and his friend came after me. That’s his style. He probably wanted to see what I’d do.”
    “He’s not the only one interested in you,” said Lawn. “I got a message that Rosie Palm wants to see you. Well, I assume she meant you. ‘That ungrateful bastard’ was the actual term she used.”
    “I think I owe her some money,” said Vimes, “but I’ve no idea how much.”
    “Don’t ask me,” said Lawn, smoothing the plaster with his hand. “She generally names her price up front.”
    “I mean the finder’s fee, or whatever it was!”
    “Yes, I know. Can’t help you there, I’m afraid,” said Lawn.
    Vimes watched him working for a while, and said, “Know anything about Miss Battye?”
    “The seamstress? She hasn’t been here long.”
    “And she’s really a seamstress?”
    “For the sake of precision,” said Dr. Lawn, “let us say she’s a needlewoman. Apparently she heard there was a lot of work for seamstresses in the big city and had one or two amusing misunderstandings before someone told her exactly what was meant. One of them involved me removing a crochet hook from a man’s ear last week. Now she just hangs out with the rest of the girls.”
    “Why?”
    “Because she’s making a fortune, that’s why. Hasn’t it ever occurred to you, sergeant, that sometimes people go to a massage parlor for a real massage, for example? There’s ladies all over this city with discreet signs up that say things like ‘Trousers repaired while you wait,’ and a small but significant number of men make the same mistake as Sandra. There’s lot of men work here in the city and leave their wives back home and sometimes, you know, a man feels these…urges. Like, for a sock without holes and a shirt with more than one button. The ladies pass on the work. Apparently it’s quite hard to find a really good needlewoman in this city. They don’t like being confused with, er, seamstresses.”
    “I just wondered why she hangs around street corners after curfew with a big sewing basket…”
    Lawn shrugged. “Can’t help you there. Right, I’ve finished with this gentleman. It’d be helpful if he lies still for a while.” He indicated the racks of bottles behind him. “About how long will you want him to lie still for?”
    “You can do that?”
    “Oh, yes. It’s not accepted Ankh-Morpork medical practice, but since Ankh-Morpork medical practice would consist of hitting him on the head with a mallet he’s probably getting the best of the deal.”
    “No, I meant that you doctors aren’t supposed to hurt people, are you?”
    “Only in the course of normal incompetence. But I don’t mind sending him to sleepy land for another twenty minutes. Of course, if you want to wham him with the mallet I can’t stop you. The last guest of Swing I treated had several fingers pointing entirely the wrong way. So if you’d like to give him a few wallops for good luck I could point out some quite sensitive areas—”
    “No thanks. I’ll just haul him out the back way and drop him in an alley.”
    “Is that all?”
    “No. Then …I’ll sign my name on his damn plaster cast. So he sees it when he wakes up. In bloody big letters, so it won’t rub off.”
    “Now that’s what I call a sensitive area,” said Lawn. “You’re an interesting man, Sergeant. You make enemies like a craftsman.”
    “I’ve never been interested in needlework,” said Vimes, hoisting the man on his shoulder. “But what sort of things would a needlewoman have in her workbasket, do you think?”
    “Oh, I don’t know. Needles, thread, scissors, wool…that kind of thing,” said Mossy Lawn.
    “Not very heavy things, then?” said Vimes.
    “Not really. Why’d you ask?”
    “Oh, no reason,” said Vimes, making a small mental note. “Just a thought. I’ll go and drop off our friend here while I’ve still got some mist to lurk in.”
    “Fine. I’ll have breakfast on when you get back. It’s liver. Calf’s.”

    The Beast remembers. This time, Vimes slept soundly.
    He had always found it easier to sleep during the day. Twenty-five years on nights had ground their nocturnal groove in his brain. Darkness was easier, somehow. He knew how to stand still, a talent that few possess, and how to merge into the shadows. How to guard, in fact, and see without being seen.
    He remembered Findthee Swing. A lot of it was history. The revolt would have happened with Swing or