Snuff (Discworld, #39; City Watch, #8)

by Terry Pratchett

too much of a damn coward to be a coward!

There is no race so wretched that there is not something out there that cares for them,

when incredulous eyes are watching, as the venerable philosopher Ly Tin Weedle says, you have to do something or be considered, in the great scheme of things, a tit.

There was so much water in the air and so little light left that the difference between the river and the shore could only be judged by seeing which one you fell into.

the darkness had been his friend, and Vimes had floated on the face of the darkness, and there he had found enlightenment growing, and understood that fear and rage could be hammered into a sword,

After that, what could be frightening about rescuing goblins and who knew how many other people from a floundering boat on a black and treacherous river in thundering, steaming darkness?

why, in such a decent position, would a man pilot such a valuable boat with a valuable cargo down a river on an evening that promised annihilation around every snake-like bend when no blame would attach to mooring up for a while?

What would he do if a knife was held to the throat of a wife, or a child? What else could he do but sail on, trusting a lifetime of experience to see them all to safety? And it wouldn’t be one unwelcome guest, no, because then you would try to run the boat heavily aground while you, muscles tensed, would rely on the confusion to leap at the fallen man and strangle him with your bare hands, but that would only work if he hadn’t brought along an ally. And so then you stayed at the wheel, hoping and praying, and expecting, at any moment, the rumble of the damn slam.

“Please! Please don’t kill me! I’m just a complicated chicken farmer! I’m not carrying any weapons! I don’t even like killing chickens!”

There are times in the symphony of the world, when its aural kaleidoscope of crashes, thunderbolts, screams and storms suddenly merges into one great hallelujah!

a crowbar is a universal pass key.

I will say to them, po-leess-maan, him big arsehole, okay, but kind arsehole.

“I don’t think all this is for a little voyage to the seaside, do you? There’s more barrels of stinking turkey entrails than this lot of poor devils could possibly get through in a week! Someone was expecting a long journey!

This wasn’t the Summoning Dark, or at least he fervently hoped not. It was just his own human darkness and internal enemy, which knew his every thought, which knew that every time Commander Vimes dragged some vicious and inventive murderer to such mercy or justice as the law in its erratic wisdom determined, there was another Vimes, a ghost Vimes, whose urge to chop that creature into pieces on the spot had to be chained. This, regrettably, was harder every time, and he wondered if one day that darkness would break out and claim its heritage, and he wouldn’t know . . .the brakes and chains and doors and locks in his head would have vanished and he wouldn’t know.

At home, the Watch and his family surrounded Vimes like a wall. Here the good guy was the good guy because he didn’t want anyone to see him being bad. He did not want to be ashamed. He did not want to be the darkness.

You needed to age a bit for the dark to start trickling in, although there were always one or two who were born as darkness on legs, who would kill for a pastime. Was he one?

“If you think you can pull strings, kid, then let me tell you that you’ll run out of gasp before I run out of squeeze.

Personally, sir, I would deem it a favor if you killed every man jack of them, but life can’t be all fun.

although I’d like you to throw him into the river I wouldn’t object if you refused to tie a heavy weight to his leg.”

kicking him smartly in the official police officer method and also the groin.

The country may have the muscle but the city has got the technology,

Yes, you could tell the eyes of a murderer, at least after they had done more than three or so and got away with it. Their eyes held the expression some gods probably had.

“No, constable, you did not do what I would have done, which is fortunate, because if you had, then you would be in front of me on a charge for using brutally excessive force in the execution of your duties. However, you will get a medal and an official commendation for this, constable.

Vimes liked to have his feet on something solid, such as his boots, and he liked his boots to do likewise.

veering between hope, nausea, despair, self-doubt, nausea and the thrill of the chase and nausea,

“There ought to be a law, because there certainly is a crime,

the law was being broken wholesale for the purpose of upholding the law.

Remember a little boy? Little boy open book? And he see evil goblin, and I see nasty little boy! Good for us, little boy, that we were both right!”

“Greed is at the center of this, greed and hellish poisons. They’re both killers and greed is the worst, by a long way.

sometimes you should follow the arrogance . . .You should look for those who can’t believe that the law would ever catch them, who believe that they act out of a right that the rest of us do not have.

He had slept the sleep of the dead except for the bit where bits fall off and you crumble into dust,

Vimes, Vimes realized, knew killers too well for his own peace of mind.

But Nobby was loyal and lucky, and if there is anything that a policeman really needs, it’s luck. Maybe Nobby had got lucky.

an astute publican knows which way the wind is blowing and adjusts his sails accordingly. No one knew better than he that no one knows where rumors come from and how they are spread,

the dreadful truth is that nobody wants to support the losing side.

She may be an ignorant whey-faced bitch who gives herself a title that is not rightfully hers, but there is such a thing as manners, when all is said and done.”

They think that I’m like them! I hate that! They just don’t get it! They’ve got on well for years without ever having to think differently, and now they don’t know how!”

All in all, it’ll wipe the smile off his aristocratic face, at least.”

I say, it’s their business and definitely not ours.”

I was a bit innocent in those days, thought that some people were better than me, tipped me hat to gentry and so on, and then I took over the forge and if that don’t kill you it makes you strong.”

if they could do that to goblins then what might they think they could do to real people, and some said real or not, it wasn’t right!

“You’ve all got weapons. Every man jack of you. Huge, dangerous, deadly weapons. You could have done something. You could have done anything.

One of the things that you could have done was think.

“That is to say King of the River, sir, a little honor that we bestow on those heroes who have taken on Old Treachery and bested him! Allow me to present you with this gold-ish medal, sir. It’s a small token, but show it to any captain on the river and you’ll be carried for free, sir, from the mountains to the sea if you so desire!”

Why will I squeeze him only to unconsciousness, while despising myself for every fragment of breath I begrudge him? I’ll tell you, mister, that what stands between you and sudden death right now is the law you don’t acknowledge.

I’ve pulled more strings than an elephant’s corset.

“You were just opening a way for the law to flow in,

“That’s no reason why one good man shouldn’t use it to justify a good thing.

everything is going to be all right because it ought to be all right.

“Well, I don’t know what he’s going to be,” said Sam Vimes, “but I do know he’ll be good at it.”