Feet of Clay (Discworld 19)

Vimes remembered himself in time to lower his other foot, and then remembered even more of himself and snatched his helmet off in respect.

Another coffin emerged. It was a lot smaller. It needed only two people to carry it and that was really one too many.

As mourners trooped out behind them, Vimes fumbled in a pocket for the scrap of paper Detritus had given him. The scene was, in its way, funny, like the bit in a circus where the coach stops and a dozen clowns get out of it. Apartment houses round here made up for their limited number of rooms by having a large number of people occupy them.

He found the paper and unfolded it. First Floor Back, 27 Cockbill Street.

And this was it. He'd arrived in time for a funeral. Two funerals.

'Looks like it's a really bad day to be a golem,' said Angua. There was a pottery hand lying in the gutter. 'That's the third one we've seen smashed in the street.'

There was a crash up ahead, and a dwarf came through a window more or less horizontally. His iron helmet struck sparks as he hit the street, but the dwarf was soon up again and plunging back through the adjacent doorway.

He emerged via the window a moment later but was fielded by Carrot, who set him on his feet.

'Hello, Mr Oresmiter! Are you keeping well? And what is happening here?'

'It's that devil Gimlet, Captain Carrot! You should be arresting him!'

'Why, what's he done?'

'He's been poisoning people, that's what!'

Carrot glanced at Angua, then back at Oresmiter. 'Poison?' he said. That's a very serious allegation.'

'You're telling me! I was up all night with Mrs Oresmiter! I didn't think much about it until I came in here this morning and there were other people complaining - '

He tried to struggle out of Carrot's grip. 'You know what?' he said. 'You know what? We looked in his cold room and you know what? You know what? You know what he's been selling as meat?'

'Tell me,' said Carrot.

'Pork and beef!'

'Oh, dear.'

'And lamb!'

'Teh, tch.'

'Hardly any rat at all!'

Carrot shook his head at the duplicity of traders.

'And Snori Glodssonsunclesson said he had Rat Surprise last night and he'll swear there were chicken bones in it!'

Carrot let go of the dwarf. 'You stay here,' he said to Angua and, head bowed, stepped inside Gimlet's Hole Food Delicatessen.

An axe spun towards him. He caught it almost absent-mindedly and tossed it casually aside.

'Ow!'

There was a melee of dwarfs around the counter. The row had already gone well past the stage when it had anything much to do with the subject in hand and, these being dwarfs, now included matters of vital importance such as whose grandfather had stolen whose grandfather's mining claim three hundred years ago and whose axe was at whose throat right now.

But there was something about Carrot's presence. The fighting gradually stopped. The fighters tried to look as if they'd just happened to be standing there. There was a sudden and general 'Axe? What axe? Oh, this axe? I was just showing it to my friend Bjorn here, good old Bjorn' feel to the atmosphere.

'All right,' said Carrot. 'What's all this about poison? Mr Gimlet first.'

'It's a diabolical lie!' shouted Gimlet, from somewhere under the heap. 'I run a wholesome restaurant! My tables are so clean you could eat your dinner off them!'