Snuff

your measly carcass to come under the caress of a large number of versatile axes, and by Lady Margolotta of Uberwald, who trusts very few people, and by Lord Vetinari of Ankh-Morpork, who doesn’t trust anybody at all. Got that? Don’t nod! And you, my little man, have the damn nerve to doubt his word. I’m an easygoing sort of fellow, but that sort of thing leaves me right out of sorts, I don’t mind telling you. You understand? I said, do you understand? Oh, all right, you can nod now. Incidentally, young man, be careful who you call a lackey, all right? Some people might take violent exception to that sort of thing. A word to the wise, lad: I know the commander, and you thought about your old mum and what might happen to her and I reckon that is why I won’t be seeing you in lavender, because he is a sensitive soul at heart.’
    Willikins’ knife disappeared as quickly as it had come, and with the other hand the gentleman’s gentleman produced a small brush and tidied the blacksmith’s collar.
    ‘Willikins,’ said Vimes from the distance, ‘will you go for a little walk now, please?’
    When his manservant was loitering under a tree a little way further up the lane, Vimes said, ‘Sorry about that, but every man has his pride. I bear that in mind. So should you. I’m a copper, a policeman, and something here is calling to me. It seems to me that you have something you’d like me to know and it’s not just about who sits in the high castle, am I right? Something bad has happened, you are practically sweating it. Well?’
    Jethro leaned towards him and said, ‘Dead Man’s Copse, on the hill. Midnight. I won’t wait.’
    The blacksmith then turned round and walked away without a glance behind.
    Vimes lit a fresh cigar and strolled towards the tree where Willikins was appearing to enjoy the landscape. He straightened up when he saw Vimes. ‘We’d better get a move on, sir. Dinner is at eight o’clock and her ladyship would like you to be smart. She sets a lot of store by your being smartly turned out, sir.’
    Vimes groaned. ‘Not the official tights?’
    ‘Happily not, sir, not in the country, but her ladyship was very specific about my bringing the plum-coloured evening dress, sir.’
    ‘She says it makes me look dashing,’ said Vimes morosely. ‘Do you think it makes me look dashing? Am I a dashing kind of person, would you say?’ The birds started singing from a low branch of the tree.
    ‘I’d put you down as more the sprinting sort, sir,’ said Willikins.
    They set off home, in silence for a while, which is to say that neither man spoke while wildlife sang, buzzed and screeched, eventually causing Vimes to say, ‘I wish I knew what the hell all those things are.’
    Willikins put his head on one side for a moment, then said, ‘Parkinson’s warbler, the deep-throated frog-eater and the common creed-waggler, sir.’
    ‘You know?’
    ‘Oh, yes, sir. I frequent the music halls, sir, and there’s always a bird or animal impersonator on the bill. It tends to stick. I also know seventy-three farmyard noises, my favourite of which is the sound of a farmer who has had one boot sucked from his foot by the muck he’s trying to avoid and has nowhere else to put his stockinged foot but in the said muck. Hugely amusing, sir.’
    They had reached the long drive to the Hall now, and gravel crunched beneath their boots. Under his breath, Vimes said, ‘I’ve arranged to meet young Mister Jefferson at midnight in the copse on Hangman’s Hill. He wishes to tell me something important. Remind me, Willikins, what is a copse, exactly?’
    ‘Anything between a clump of trees and a small wood. Technically, sir, the one at the top of Hangman’s Hill is a beech hanger. That just means, well, a small beech wood on top of a hill. You remember Mad Jack Ramkin? The bloke that got it made thirty feet higher at great expense? He had the beech trees planted on the top.’
    Vimes liked the crunching of the gravel; it would mask the sound of their conversation. ‘I talked to the blacksmith with, I would swear, no one else in earshot. But this is the country, yes, Willikins?’
    ‘There was a man setting rabbit snares in the hedge behind you,’ said Willikins. ‘Perfectly normal activity, although to my mind he took too long over it.’
    They crunched onwards for a while, and Vimes said, ‘Tell me, Willikins. If a man had arranged to meet another man at midnight in a place with a name like Dead Man’s