The Truth

size you are…you know, all over.”
    She stood up and turned around nervously. There was a chorus of whistles from the crew and a number of untranslatable comments in Dwarfish.
    “You’re pretty close,” said William. “If I could get you a really good dress, could you find someone to make any adjustments you need? It might have to be let out a bit in the, in the, you know…in the top.”
    “What kind of dress?” she said, suspiciously.
    “My sister’s got hundreds of evening dresses and she spends all her time at our place in the country,” said William. “The family never comes back to the city these days. I’ll give you the key to the town house this evening and you can go and help yourself.”
    “Won’t she mind?”
    “She’ll probably never notice. Anyway, I think she’d be shocked to find that anyone could spend as little as forty dollars on a dress. Don’t worry about it.”
    “Town house? Place in the country?” said Sacharissa, displaying an inconveniently journalistic trait of picking on the words you hoped wouldn’t be noticed.
    “My family’s rich,” said William. “I’m not.”
    He glanced at the rooftop opposite when he stepped outside, because something in its outline was different, and saw a spiky head outlined against the afternoon sky.
    It was a gargoyle. William had got used to seeing them everywhere in the city. Sometimes one would stay in the same place for months at a time. You seldom saw them actually moving from one roof to another. But you also seldom saw them at all in districts like this. Gargoyles liked high stone buildings with lots of gutters and fiddly architecture, which attracted pigeons. Even gargoyles have to eat.
    There was also something going on further down the street. Several large carts were outside one of the old warehouses, and crates were being carried inside.
    He spotted several more gargoyles on the way across the bridge to Pseudopolis Yard. Every single one of them turned its head to watch him.

    Sergeant Detritus was on duty at the desk. He looked at William in surprise.
    “By damn, dat was quick. You run all der way?” he said.
    “What are you talking about?”
    “Mister Vimes only sent for you a coupla minutes ago,” said Detritus. “Go on up, I should. Don’t worry, he’s stopped shoutin’.” He gave William a rather-you-than-me look. “But he are not glad about being in a tent, as dey say.”
    “Has he ever been a happy camper?”
    “Not much,” said Detritus, grinning evilly.
    William climbed the stairs and knocked at the door, which swung open.
    Commander Vimes looked up from his desk. His eyes narrowed.
    “Well, well, that was quick,” he said. “Ran all the way, did you?”
    “No, sir, I was coming here hoping to ask you some questions.”
    “That was kind of you,” said Vimes.
    There was a definite feeling that although the little village was quiet at the moment—women hanging out washing, cats sleeping in the sun—soon the volcano was going to explode and hundreds were going to be buried in the ash.
    “So—” William began.
    “ Why did you do this?” said Vimes. William could see the Times on the desk in front of the commander. He could read the headlines from here:
    “Baffled, am I?” said Vimes.

    “If you are telling me that you are not, Commander, I will be happy to make a note of the fa—”
    “Leave that notebook alone!”
    William looked surprised. The notebook was the cheapest kind, made of paper recycled so many times you could use it as a towel, but once again someone was glaring at it as if it were a weapon.
    “I won’t have you doing to me what you did to Slant,” said Vimes.
    “Every word of that story is true, sir.”
    “I’d bet on it. It sounds like his style.”
    “Look, Commander, if there’s something wrong with my story, tell me what it is.”
    Vimes sat back and waved his hands.
    “Are you going to print everything you hear?” said Vimes. “Do you intend to run around my city like some loose…loose siege weapon? You sit there clutching your precious integrity like a teddy bear and you haven’t the faintest idea, have you, not the faintest idea how hard you can make my job?”
    “It’s not against the law to—”
    “Isn’t it? Isn’t it, though? In Ankh-Morpork? Stuff like this? It reads like Behavior Likely to Cause a Breach of the Peace to me! ”
    “It might upset people, but this is important —”
    “And what will you write next, I wonder?”
    “I