Men at Arms (Discworld 15)

'How should I know!'

'Why we chasing him?'

'Because he's running away!'

Cuddy had only been a guard for a few days, but already he had absorbed one important and basic fact: it is almost impossible for anyone to be in a street without breaking the law. There are a whole quiverful of offences available to a policeman who wishes to pass the time of day with a citizen, ranging from Loitering with Intent through Obstruction to Lingering While Being the Wrong Colour/Shape/Species/Sex. It occurred briefly to him that anyone not making a dash for it when they saw Detritus knuckling along at high speed behind them was probably guilty of contravening the Being Bloody Stupid Act of 1581. But it was too late to take that into account. Someone was running, and they were chasing. They were chasing because he was running, and he was running because they were chasing.

Vimes sat down with his coffee and looked at the thing he'd picked up from the rooftop.

It looked like a short set of Pan pipes, provided Pan was restricted to six notes, all of them the same. They were made of steel, welded together. There was a strip of serrated metal along one side, like a flattened-out cogwheel, and the whole thing reeked of fireworks.

He laid it carefully beside his plate.

He read Sergeant Colon's report. Fred Colon had spent some time on it, probably with a dictionary. It went as follows:

'Report of Sgt F. Colon. Approx. 10am today, Auguste 15, I proseeded in the company of Corporal, C. W. St. J. Nobbs, to the Guild of Fools and Joculators in God Street, whereupon we conversed with clown Boffo who said, down Beano, the corpus derelicti, was definitely seen by him, down Boffo, leaving the Guild the previous morning just after the explosion. {This is dead bent in my opinion, the reason being, the stiff was dead at least two days, Cpl C. W. St. J. Nobbs agrees, so someone is telling meat pies, never trust anyone who falls on his arse for a living.} Whereupon Dr Whiteface met us, and, damn near gave us the derriere velocite out of the place. It seemed to us, viz, me and Cpl C. W. St. J. Nobbs, that the Fools are worried that it might have been the Assassins, but we don't know why. Also, clown Boffo went on about us looking for Beano's nose, but he had a nose on when we saw him here, so we said to clown Boffo, did he mean a false nose, he said, no, a real one, bugger off. Whereupon we come back here.'

Vimes worked out what derriere velocite meant. The whole nose business looked like a conundrum wrapped up in an enigma, or at least in Sergeant Colon's handwriting, which was pretty much the same thing. Why be asked to look for a nose that wasn't lost?

He looked at Cuddy's report, written in the careful angular handwriting of someone more used to runes. And sagas.

'Captain Vimes, this herewith is the chronicle of me, Lance-Constable Cvddy. Bright was the morning and high ovr hearts when we proceeded to the Alchemists Gvild, where events eventvated as I shall now sing. These inclvded exploding balls. As to the qvest vpon which we were sent, we were informed that the attached piece of paper [attached] is in the handwriting of Leonard of Qvirm, who vanished in mysteriovs circvmstances. It is how to make a powder called No. 1 powder, which is vsed in fireworks. Mr Silverfish the alchemist says any alchemists knows it. Also, in the margin of the paper, is a drawing of The Gonne, becavse I asked my covsin Grabpot abovt Leonard and he vsed to sell paints to Leonard and he recognized the writing and said Leonard always wrote backwards becavse he was a genivs. I have copied same herewith.'

Vimes laid the papers down and put the piece of metal on top of them.

Then he reached in his pocket and produced a couple of metal pellets.

A stick, the gargoyle had said.

Vimes looked at the sketch. It looked, as Cuddy had noted, like the stock of a crossbow with a pipe on the top of it. There were a few sketches of strange mechanical devices alongside it, and a couple of the little six-pipe things. The whole drawing looked like a doodle. Someone, possibly this Leonard, had been reading a book about fireworks and had scribbled in the margins.

Fireworks.

Well. . . fireworks? But fireworks weren't a weapon. Crackers went bang. Rockets went up, more or less, but all you could be sure of them hitting was the sky.

Hammerhock was noted for his skill with mechanisms. That wasn't a major dwarfish attribute. People thought it was, but it wasn't. They were skilled with metal all right, and they made good swords and jewellery, but they weren't too technical when it came to things like cogwheels and springs. Hammerhock was unusual.

So. . .

Supposing there was a weapon. Supposing there was something about it that was different, strange, terrifying.

No, that couldn't be it. It'd either end up all over the place, or it'd be destroyed. It wouldn't end up in the Assassins' museum. What got put in museums?

Things that hadn't worked, or had got lost, or ought to be remembered . . . so where's the sense in putting our firework on show?

There had been a lot of locks on the door. So . . . not a museum you just wandered into, then. Maybe you had to be a high-up Assassin, and one day one of the Guild leaders'd take you down there at dead, hah, of night, and say . . . and say . . .

For some reason the face of the Patrician loomed up at this point.

Once again Vimes felt the edge of something, some fundamental central thing . . .

'Where'd he go? Where'd he go?'

There was a maze of alleys around the doors. Cuddy leaned against a wall and fought for breath.

'There he go!' shouted Detritus. 'Along Whalebone Lane!'

He lumbered off in pursuit.