"Tricky, isn"t it, your grace?" said someone above him. "You"d better come up. Mmm, mmhm."
"Inigo?"
"It"s safe enough, your grace. There"s only me here. Mmm."
"That counts as safe, does it?"
Vimes climbed the ladder. Inigo was sitting at a table, leafing through a stack of papers.
"Where"s the crew?"
"That, your grace," said Inigo, "is one of the mysteries, mmm, mmm."
"And the others are - ?"
Inigo nodded towards the steps leading upwards. "See for yourself."
The controls for the arms had been comprehensively smashed. Laths and bits of wire dangled forlornly from their complex framework.
"Several hours of repair work for skilled men, I"d say," said Inigo, as Vimes returned.
"What happened here, Inigo?"
"I would say the men who lived here were forced to leave, mmph, mmhm. In some disorder."
"But it"s a fortified tower!"
"So? They have to cut firewood. Oh, the company has rules, and then they put three young men in some lonely tower for weeks at a time and they expect them to act like clockwork people. See the trapdoor up to the controls? That should be locked at all times. Now you, your grace, and myself as well, because we are... are - "
"Bastards?" Vimes supplied.
"Well, yes... mmm... we"d have devised a system that meant the clacks couldn"t even be operated unless the trapdoor was shut, wouldn"t we?"
"Something like that, yes."
"And we"d have written into the rules that the presence of any visitor in the tower would, mmhm, be automatically transmitted to the neighbouring towers, too."
"Probably. That"d be a start."
"As it is, I suspect that any harmless-looking visitor with a nice fresh apple pie for the lads would be warmly welcomed," sighed Inigo. "They do two-month shifts. Nothing to look at but trees, mmm."
"No blood, not much sign of a struggle," said Vimes. "Have you checked outside?"
"There should be a horse in the stable. It"s gone. We"re more or less on rock here. There"s wolf tracks, but there"s wolf tracks everywhere around here. And the wind"s blown the snow. They"ve... gone, your grace."
"Are you sure the men let someone in through the door?" Vimes said. "Anyone who could land on the platform could be in one of these windows in an instant."
"A vampire, mmm?"
"It"s a thought, isn"t it?"
"There"s no blood around..."
"It"s a shame to waste good food," said Vimes. "Think of those poor starving children in Muntab. What are these?"
He pulled a box from under the lower bunk. Inside it were several tubes, about a foot long, open at one end.
" "Badger & Normal, Ankh-Morpork"," he read aloud. " "Mortar Flare (Red). Light Fuse. Do Not Place In Mouth." It"s a firework, Mister Skimmer. I"ve seen them on ships."