The Truth

door.
    “Mr. Tulip, we have business elsewhere,” he said. “Sheesh, take the damn pickle out of your nose, will you? We’re supposed to be professionals!”
    “That’s not a pickle,” said a voice in the dark.
    Mr. Pin was uncharacteristically thankful when the door slammed behind them. To his surprise, he also heard the bolts shoot home.
    “Well, that could have gone better,” he said, brushing dust and hair off his coat.
    “What now?” said Mr. Tulip.
    “Time to think of a plan B,” said Mr. Pin.
    “Why don’t we just —ing hit people until someone tells us where the dog is?” said Mr. Tulip.
    “Tempting,” said Mr. Pin. “But we’ll leave that for plan C—”
    “Bugrit.”
    They both turned.
    “Bent treacle edges, I told ’em,” said Foul Ole Ron, lurching across the street, a wad of Times es under one arm and the string of his nondescript mongrel in his other hand. He caught sight of the New Firm.
    “Harglegarlyurp?” he said. “ Lay arrrB nip! You gents want a paper?”
    It seemed to Mr. Pin that the last sentence, while in pretty much the same voice, had an intrusive, not-quite-right quality. Apart from anything else, it made sense.
    “You got some change?” he said to Mr. Tulip, patting his pockets.
    “You’re going to —ing buy one?” said his partner.
    “There’s a time and a place, Mr. Tulip, a time and a place. Here you are, mister.”
    “Millennium hand and shrimp, bugrit,” said Ron, adding, “Much obliged, gents.”
    Mr. Pin opened the Times . “This thing has got—” He stopped, and looked closer. “‘Have You Seen This Dog?’” he said. “Sheesh…” He stared at Ron.
    “You sell lots of these things?” he said.
    “Qeedle the slops, I told ’em. Yeah, hundreds.”
    There it was again, the slight sensation of two voices.
    “Hundreds,” said Mr. Pin. He looked down at the paper seller’s dog. It looked pretty much like the one in the paper, but all terriers looked alike. Anyway, this one was on a string. “Hundreds,” he said again, and read the short article again.
    He stared.
    “I think we have a plan B,” he said.
    At ground level, the newspaper seller’s dog watched them carefully as they walked away.
    “That was too close for comfort,” it said, when they’d turned the corner.
    Foul Ole Ron put down his papers in a puddle and pulled a cold sausage from the depths of his hulking coat.
    He broke it in three equal pieces.
    William had dithered over that, but the Watch had supplied quite a good drawing and he felt right now a little friendly gesture in that direction would be a good idea. If he found himself in deep trouble, head downwards, he’d need someone to pull him out.

    He’d rewritten the Patrician story, too, adding as much as he was certain of, and there wasn’t much of that. He was, frankly, stuck.
    Sacharissa had penned a story about the opening of the Inquirer . William had hesitated about this, too. But it was news, after all. They couldn’t just ignore it, and it filled some space.
    Besides, he liked the opening line, which began: “A would-be rival to Ankh-Morpork’s old established newspaper, the Times , has opened in Gleam Street…”
    “You’re getting good at this,” he said, looking across the desk.
    “Yes,” she said, “I now know that if I see a naked man I should definitely get his name and address, because—”
    William joined in the chorus: “—names sell newspapers.”
    He sat back and drank the really horrible tea the dwarfs made. Just for a moment there was an unusual feeling of bliss. Strange word, he thought. It’s one of those words that describe something that does not make a noise but, if it did make a noise, would sound just like that. Bliss. It’s like the sound of a soft meringue melting gently on a warm plate.
    Here and now, he was free. The paper was put to bed, tucked up, had its prayers listened to. It was finished. The crew were already filing back in for more copies, cursing and spitting; they’d commandeered a variety of old trolleys and prams to cart their papers out into the streets. Of course, in an hour or so, the mouth of the press would be hungry again and he’d be back pushing the huge rock uphill, just like that character in mythology…what was his name…
    “Who was that hero who was condemned to push a rock up a hill and every time he got it to the top it rolled down again?” he said.
    Sacharissa didn’t look up.
    “Someone who needed a wheelbarrow?” she