Night Watch

say ‘reach a mutually beneficial agreement.’ We are not very far from your Watch House. I wish you…luck.”
    She nodded toward the door.
    “Such a shame,” she said and sighed.

    Vimes stepped out into the rainy night and shifted his weight from foot to foot, and then took a few experimental steps.
    Corner of Easy and Treacle Mine. A mix of flat-top cobbles and old bricks. Yeah.
    He went home.

    Madam stared at the closed door for a while, and then turned as the candles flickered slightly.
    “You really are very good,” she said. “How long have you been here?”
    Havelock Vetinari stepped out of the shadow in the corner. He wasn’t wearing official Assassin’s black but loose clothes that were…not real color at all, just nondescript shades of gray.
    “I’d been here quite long enough,” he said, sprawling in the chair that Vimes had vacated.
    “Not even the Aunts noticed you?”
    “People look but don’t see. The trick is to help them see nothing. But I think Keel would have seen me if I hadn’t been over here. He stares into shadows. Interesting.”
    “He is a very angry man,” said Madam.
    “You just made him angrier.”
    “I believe you’ll get your diversion,” said Madam.
    “Yes. I believe so, too.”
    Madam leaned over and patted him on the knee.
    “There,” she said, “your auntie thinks of everything…” She stood up. “I’d better go and entertain my guests. I am a very entertaining person. By tomorrow night, Lord Winder will not have many friends.” She drained her mug of champagne. “Doctor Follett is such a charming man, don’t you think? Is that his own hair, do you know?”
    “I have not sought the opportunity to find out,” said Havelock. “Is he trying to get you drunk?”
    “Yes,” said Madam. “You have to admire him.”
    “They say he can play a mean lute,” said Havelock.
    “Fascinating,” said Madam.
    She set her face into a genuine smile of pleasure and opened the big double doors at the other end of the room.
    “Ah, Doctor,” she said, stepping into the haze of smoke. “A little more champagne?”

    Vimes slept in a corner, standing up. It was an old trick, shared by night watchmen and horses. It wasn’t exactly sleep, you’d die if you tried to keep it up for more than a few nights, but it took some of the tiredness away.
    A few of the other men had already mastered the trick. Others made use of tables or benches. No one seemed inclined to go home, even when a sort of dawn suffused the rain and Snouty came in with a cauldron of fearsome porridge.
    Vimes opened his eyes.
    “Mug of tea, Sarge?” said Snouty. “Stewed for a hour and two sugars.”
    “You’re a lifesaver, Snouty,” said Vimes, clasping it like the elixir of life.
    “An’ there some kid outside says he’s got to speak to you, hnah, specially,” Snouty went on. “Shall I give him a clip alongside the head?”
    “What does he smell like?” said Vimes, sipping the scalding, corrosive tea.
    “Bottom of a baboon’s cage, Sarge.”
    “Ah, Nobby Nobbs. I’ll go out and see him. Bring him a big bowl of porridge, will you?”
    Snouty looked uncomfortable about this. “If you’ll, hnah, take my advice, Sarge, it don’t pay to encourage kids like—”
    “See these stripes, Snouty? Well done. A big bowl.”
    Vimes took his tea out into the damp yard, where Nobby was lurking against a wall.
    There were hints that it was going to be a sunny day. That should bring things on, after the overnight rain. The lilacs, for example…
    “What’s happening, Nobby?”
    Nobby waited a moment to see if a coin was forthcoming.
    “Pretty bad everywhere, Sarge,” he said, giving up for now but remaining hopeful. “A constable got killed in Lobbin Clout. Hit by a stone, people say. Someone got their ear cut off ’cos of the fighting in Nap Hill. Cavalry charge, Sarge. Running fights everywhere. All the Watch Houses got hit bad—”
    Vimes listened gloomily to the list. It was the usual bloody business. Angry, frightened people on both sides, all crushed up together. It could only get worse. Nap Hill and Dolly Sisters sounded like war zones already
    … see the little angels rise up high …
    “Anything happen in Cable Street?” he said.
    “Just a few people,” said Nobby. “A bit of shouting and running away, that sort of thing.”
    “Right,” said Vimes. Even a mob wasn’t that stupid. It was still only the kids and the hotheads and the drunks now. It’d get worse.