Feet of Clay (Discworld, #19; City Watch, #3)

by Terry Pratchett

Hmm. Going thin on top. Definitely a receding scalp there. Less hair to comb but, on the other hand, more face to wash .

I AM DEATH, NOT TAXES. I TURN UP ONLY ONCE.

Vimes sighed. Detritus, despite a room-temperature IQ, made a good copper and a damn good sergeant. He had that special type of stupidity that was hard to fool. But the only thing more difficult than getting him to grasp an idea was getting him to let go of it.*

Who was she kidding? It was easy to be a vegetarian by day. It was preventing yourself becoming a humanitarian at night that took the real effort.

“Is dere any trouble?” he said. The crowd backed away. “None at all, officer,” said Mr. Raddley. “You, er, just loomed suddenly, that’s all . . .” “Dis is correct,” said Detritus. “I am a loomer. It often happen suddenly. So dere’s no trouble, den?” “No trouble whatsoever, officer.” “Amazing t’ing, trouble,” rumbled Detritus thoughtfully. “Always I go lookin’ for trouble, an’ when I find it people said it ain’t dere.”

Rumor is information distilled so finely that it can filter through anything. It does not need doors and windows—sometimes it doesn’t even need people. It can exist free and wild, running from ear to ear without ever touching lips.

“I reckon he’s been poisoned, Fred, and that’s the truth of it.” Colon looked horrified. “Ye gods! Do you want me to get a doctor?” “Are you mad? We want him to live!”

“They think they want good government and justice for all, Vimes, yet what is it they really crave, deep in their hearts? Only that things go on as normal and tomorrow is pretty much like today.”

Vimes distrusted charisma. “No more kings, Fred.” “Right you are, sir. By the way, Nobby’s turned up.” “The day gets worse and worse, Fred.”

It seemed to be a chronic disease. It was as if even the most intelligent person had this little blank spot in their heads where someone had written: “Kings. What a good idea.” Whoever had created humanity had left in a major design flaw. It was its tendency to bend at the knees.

There was a knock at the door. It should not be possible for a knock to sound surreptitious, yet this knock achieved it. It had harmonics. They told the hindbrain: the person knocking will, if no one eventually answers, open the door anyway and sidle in, whereupon he will certainly nick any smokes that are lying around, read any correspondence that catches his eye, open a few drawers, take a nip out of such bottles of alcohol as are discovered, but stop short of major crime because he is not criminal in the sense of making a moral decision but in the sense that a weasel is evil—it is built into his very shape. It was a knock with a lot to say for itself. “Come in, Nobby,” said Vimes, wearily.

“He left it to me when he was on his deathbed,” said Nobby. “Well, when I say ‘left it’ . . .”

And, while it was regarded as pretty good evidence of criminality to be living in a slum, for some reason owning a whole street of them merely got you invited to the very best social occasions.

It was easy enough to imagine an enobled Nobbs. Because where Nobby went wrong was in thinking small. He sidled into places and pinched things that weren’t worth much. If only he’d sidled into continents and stolen entire cities, slaughtering many of the inhabitants in the process, he’d have been a pillar of the community.

“Commander Vimes is a bit . . .” Cheery began. “He’s OK when he’s in a good mood. He needs to drink but he doesn’t dare to these days. You know: one drink is too many, two is not enough . . . And that makes him edgy. When he’s in a bad mood he’ll tread on your toes and then shout at you for not standing up straight.”

“And he won’t die?” “Apparently he can be kept merely . . . unwell. The dosage can be varied, I’m told.” “Good. I’d rather have him unwell than dead. I wouldn’t trust Vetinari to stay in a grave.”

“He’s a horse doctor, sir. A damn’ good one. I heard last month he treated Dire Fortune and it didn’t fall over until the last furlong.” “Doesn’t sound helpful, Vimes.” “Oh, I don’t know, sir. The horse had dropped dead coming up to the starting line.”

Still, things were improving. When Carrot had arrived the entire Watch’s petty cash had been kept on a shelf in a tin marked “Stronginthearm’s Armor Polish for Gleaming Cohorts” and, if money was needed for anything, all you had had to do was go and find Nobby and force him to give it back.

Corporal Nobbs looked despondently into his glass. People often did this in the Mended Drum, when the immediate thirst had been slaked and for the first time they could take a good look at what they were drinking.

He really, really needed a drink. The world was distorted enough as it was. When you saw it through the bottom of a glass, it all came back into focus.

Vimes sat gloomily behind a glass of lemonade. He wanted one drink, and understood precisely why he wasn’t going to have one. One drink ended up arriving in a dozen glasses.

Some people were still upright, however. They were the serious drinkers, who drank as if there was no tomorrow and rather hoped this would be the case.

I’m worried and confused, he thought. So the first rule in the book is to spread it around.

“Yer son’s yer son till he takes a wife, but yer daughter’s yer daughter all yer life.”

People said that there was one law for the rich and one law for the poor, but it wasn’t true. There was no law for those who made the law, and no law for the incorrigibly lawless. All the laws and rules were for those people stupid enough to think like Cockbill Street people.

“The big trouble,” he added, “is that everyone wants someone else to read their minds for them and then make the world work properly. Even golems, perhaps.”

I, after hearing evidence from a number of experts, including Mrs. Slipdry the midwife, certify that the balance of probability is that the bearer of this document, C. W. St. John Nobbs, is a human being. Signed, Lord Vetinari

“When we find the man responsible,” he said, “somewhere at the top of the charge sheet is going to be Forcing Commander Vimes to Tip a Whole Bottle of Single Malt on to the Carpet. That’s a hanging offense.” He shuddered. There were some things a man should not have to do.

Only crimes could take place in darkness. Punishment had to be done in the light. That was the job of a good Watchman, Carrot always said. To light a candle in the dark.

“Commander, I always used to consider that you had a definite anti-authoritarian streak in you.” “Sir?” “It seems that you have managed to retain this even though you are Authority.” “Sir?” “That’s practically Zen.”

“You Say To People ‘Throw Off Your Chains’ And They Make New Chains For Themselves?”