Snuff

treated with respect, potted shrimps might turn out to be my bosom chums.’
    The colonel held out his hand and Vimes took it, shook it and said, ‘Bon appétit.’
    Afterwards, there were several explanations about why the Quirm wagon containing a very important prisoner overturned in the middle of the night and rolled down a very steep hill, coming to bits as it did so. You could blame the dark, you could blame the fog, you could blame its speed and above all you could blame the express mail coach from Ankh-Morpork that ran straight into it on the corner.
    By the time the wounded were in any state to comprehend what had happened they were minus one prisoner, who appeared to have picked the lock of his shackles, and plus one guard whose throat had been cut.
    It was dark, it was cold, it was foggy and, hunched together, the survivors waited until dawn. After all, how could you find a man in darkness?
    Stratford was good at speed. Speed was always useful, and he stayed on the road that was just visible in the murk. It didn’t really matter where he went; after all, he knew no one had ever given a description of him that helped. It was a gift to be indescribable.
    After a while, however, he was surprised and delighted to hear a horse trotting along the road behind him. Some brave traveller, he thought, and smiled in the fog and waited. To his further surprise, the horse was reined to a halt a little way from him and the rider slid off. Stratford could barely make out a shape in the shimmering, water-laden air.
    ‘My word! The famous Mister Stratford,’ said a voice cheerfully, as the stranger strolled towards him. ‘And let me tell you right now, if you make any kind of move you’ll be so dead that the graveyards would have to run backwards.’
    ‘I know you! Vimes sent you , after me ?’
    ‘Oh, dear me no, sir,’ said Willikins. ‘The commander doesn’t know I’m here at all, sir, and nor will he ever. That is a certainty. No, sir, I’m here, as it might be, out of a matter of professional pride. By the way, sir, if you’re thinking of killing me and taking my horse I’d be most grateful if you’d try that right now.’
    Stratford hesitated. There was something about the voice that induced hesitation. It was calm, friendly, and … worrying.
    Willikins strolled a little closer and there was a chuckle in his voice. ‘My word, sir, I’m a bit of a fighter myself, and when I heard about you chopping up that girl and that, I thought, goodness me, I thought. And so the other day, when I had my day off in lieu – very important your day off in lieu, if you’re a working man – I took a trip up to Overhang and learned a few things about you, and, my word, did I learn a few things. You really scare people, eh?’
    Stratford still hesitated. This didn’t sound right. The man had a straightforward and cheerful voice, like a man you didn’t know very well having a companionable chat in the pub, and Stratford was used to people being very nervous when they spoke to him.
    ‘Now, me,’ said Willikins, ‘I was raised by the street as a fighter and I fight dirty, you can depend on that, and I’ll fight anybody, but I never punched a girl … oh, except Kinky Elsie, who was always game for that sort of thing and had me by the I’m-not-going-to-mentions at the time and my hands were tied, in more ways than one, as it were, and so I had to give her a sharp nudge with my foot. Happy days. But you? You’re just a killer. Worthless. A bully. I fight because I might get killed and the other bloke might win, or maybe we’d both end up in the gutter, too weak to throw another punch, when, quite likely, we’d prop each other up and go to the pub for a drink and a wash.’
    He took another step closer. Stratford took a step back. ‘And you, Mister Stratford, set out to kill Commander Vimes’s little lad, or worse. And do you know what is even worser? I reckon that if you’d done so, the commander would have arrested you and dragged you to the nearest police station. But inside he’d be cutting himself up with razorblades from top to bottom. And he’d be doing that because the poor bugger is scared that he could be as bad as you.’ Willikins laughed. ‘Truth is, Mister Stratford, from where I sit he’s a choirboy, he really is, but there has to be some justice in the world, you see, not necessarily law justice, but justice justice, and that’s why I am going to kill you. Although, because I’m a fair