Thud!

where we standin’,” mused Chrysophrase, as if talking to the audience of ghostly pork. “An’ who is standin’ next to us.”
    As Vimes headed to the door, the troll added: “Give der coat to your lady, Mister Vimes. Wi’ my compliments.”
    Vimes stopped dead, and looked down at the coat over his shoulders. It was of some silvery fur, beautifully warm, but not as warm as the rage rising within him. He’d nearly walked out wearing it. He’d come that close.
    He shrugged it off and wrapped it into a ball. Quite probably several dozen small rare squeaky things had died to make this, but he could see to it that their deaths were not, in some small way, in vain.
    He threw the bundle high in the air, yelled “Sergeant!” and threw himself on the floor. There was the instant slap of the bow, a sound as of a swarm of maddened bees, the plinkplinkplink of arrow fragments turning a circle of metal roof into a colander, and the smell of burnt hair.
    Vimes got to his feet. What was falling around him was a kind of hairy snow.
    He met Chrysophrase’s gaze.
    “Trying to bribe a Watch officer is a serious offense,” he said.
    The troll winked. “Honest like anyt’ing, I tell ’em. Nice to have dis little talk, Mister Vimes.”
    When they were well outside, Vimes pulled Detritus into an alley, insofar as it was possible to pull a troll anywhere.
    “Okay, what do you know about Slide?” he said.
    The troll’s red eyes gleamed. “I bin hearin’ rumors.”
    “Head to Treacle Mine Road and put a heavy squad together. Go to Turn Again Lane, behind the Scours. There’s a wedding-cake maker up there, I think. You’ve got a nose for drugs. Poke it around, Sergeant.”
    “Right!” said Detritus. “You bin told somethin’, sir?”
    “Let’s just say I think it’s an earnest of good intent, shall we?” said Vimes.
    “Dat’s good, sir,” said the troll. “Ernest who?”
    “Er…someone we know wants to show us what a good citizen he is. Get to it, okay?”
    Detritus slung his crossbow over his shoulder for ease of carriage and knuckled off at high speed. Vimes leaned against the wall. This was going to be a long day. And now he—
    On the wall, just a little above head height, a troll had scored a rough sketch of a cut diamond. You could tell troll graffiti easily—they did it with a fingernail and it was usually an inch deep in the masonry.
    Next to the diamond was scored: SHINE .
    “Ahem,” said a small voice in his pocket. Vimes sighed, and pulled out the Gooseberry, while still staring at the word.
    “Yes?”
    “You said you didn’t want to be interrupted…” said the imp defensively.
    “Well? What have you got to say?”
    “It’s eleven minutes to six, Insert Name Here,” said the imp meekly.
    “Good grief! Why didn’t you tell me!” Vimes looked aghast.
    “Because you said you didn’t want to be interrupted!” the imp quavered.
    “Yes, but not—” Vimes stopped. Eleven minutes. He couldn’t run it, not at this time of day. “Six o’clock is… important ,” he muttered.
    “You didn’t tell me that!” said the imp, holding its head in its hands. “You just said no interruptions! I’m really, really sorry—”
    SHINE forgotten, Vimes looked around desperately at the nearby buildings. There wasn’t much use for clacks towers down here, where the slaughterhouse district met the docks, but he spotted the big semaphore tower atop the dock superintendent’s office.
    “Get up there!” he ordered, opening the box. “Tell them you’ve come from me and this is priority one, right? They’re to tell Pseudopolis Yard where I’m starting from! I’ll cross the river on Misbegot Bridge and head along Prouts! The officers at the Yard will know what this is all about! Go!”
    The imp went from despair to enthusiasm in an instant. It saluted. “Yes indeed, sir. The Bluenose TM Integrated Messenger Service will not let you down, Insert Name Here. I shall interface right away!” It leapt down and became a disappearing blur of very pale green.
    Vimes ran down to the dockside and began to race upriver, past the ships. The docks were always too crowded, and the road was an obstacle course of bales and ropes and piles of crates, with an argument every ten yards. But Vimes was a runner by nature, and knew all the ways to make progress in the city’s crowded streets. He dodged and leapt, jinked and weaved, and, where necessary, barged. A rope tripped him up; he rolled upright. A