The Fifth Elephant

lips nervously as Inigo translated. Poor sod, he thought. He didn’t ask for this. He was probably expecting a quiet day on the gate. But someone gave him some orders.
    Inigo said, “He says he’s very sorry, but those are his instructions, and he quite understands if His Grace wishes to make a complaint at the highest level, mmm, mhm.”
    A guard turned the handle of the coach door. Vimes slammed it shut.
    “Tell him the war will start right now,” he said. “And then it’ll work its way up.”
    “Your Grace!”
    The guards looked at Detritus. It was quite hard to hold the Piecemaker nonchalantly, and he wasn’t even making the attempt.
    Vimes maintained eye contact with the captain of the guard. If the man had any sense, he’d realize that if Detritus fired the thing it’d kill them all, besides sending the coach backward at high speed.
    Please just let him have the sense to know when to fold, he prayed.
    Out of the corner of his ear, he could hear the guards whispering to one another. He caught the word “Wilinus.”
    The captain stepped back and saluted.
    “He apologizes for any inconvenience and hopes you will enjoy your stay in his beautiful city,” said Inigo. “He particularly hopes you will visit the Chocolate Museum in Prince Vodorny Square, where his sister works.”
    Vimes saluted.
    “Tell him I think he is an officer with a great future,” said Vimes. “A future which, I trust, is going to very soon include opening the damn gates.”
    The captain had nodded to the men before Inigo was halfway through the translation. Aha…
    “And ask him his name,” he said. The man was bright enough not to respond until this had been translated.
    “Captain Tantony,” Inigo said.
    “I shall remember it,” said Vimes. “Oh…and tell him he has a fly on his nose.”
    Tantony won a prize. His eyes barely flickered. Vimes grinned.
    As for the town itself…it was just a town. Roofs were steeper than in Ankh-Morpork, some maniac with a fretsaw had been allowed to amuse himself on the wooden architecture, and there was more paint than you saw back home. Not that this told you anything; many a rich man had become rich by, metaphorically, not painting his house.
    The coaches bowled over the cobbles. Not the right sort of cobbles, of course. Vimes knew that.
    The coach stopped again. Vimes stuck his head out of the window. Two rather scruffier guards had barred the road this time.
    “Ah, I recognize this one,” said Vimes grimly. “I reckon that this time we’ve just met Colonesque and Nobbski.”
    He stepped out and walked up to them.
    “Well?”
    The fatter of the two hesitated, and then held out his hand.
    “Pisspot,” he said.
    “Inigo?” said Vimes quietly, without turning his head.
    “Ah,” said Inigo, after some muttered exchanges. “Now the problem seems to be Sergeant Detritus. No trolls are allowed in this part of town during the hours of daylight, apparently, without a passport signed by their…owner. Uh…in Bonk the only trolls allowed are prisoners of war. They have to carry identification.”
    “Detritus is a citizen of Ankh-Morpork and my sergeant,” said Vimes.
    “However, he is a troll. Perhaps in the interests of diplomacy you could write a short—”
    “Do I need a pisspot?”
    “A passport…no, Your Grace.”
    “Then he doesn’t, either.”
    “Nevertheless, Your Grace—”
    “There is no nevertheless.”
    “But it may be advisable to—”
    “There’s no advisable, either.”
    A few other guards had drifted over. Vimes was aware of watching eyes.
    “He could be ejected by force,” said Inigo.
    “Now there’s an experiment I wouldn’t want to miss,” said Vimes.
    Detritus made a rumbling noise. “I don’t mind goin’ back if—”
    “Shut up, Sergeant. You’re a free troll. That’s an order.”
    Vimes permitted himself another brief scan of the growing, silent crowd. And he saw the fear in the eyes of the men with the halberds. They did not want to be doing this, any more than the captain had.
    “I’ll tell you what, Inigo,” he said, “tell the…guards that the Ambassador from Ankh-Morpork commends them for their diligence, congratulates them on their dress sense, and will see that their instruction is obeyed forthwith. That should do it, shouldn’t it?”
    “Certainly, Your Grace.”
    “And now turn the coach around, Detritus. Coming, Inigo?”
    Inigo’s expression changed rapidly.
    “We passed an inn about ten miles back,” Vimes