Thud! (Discworld 34)

"Hmm," said Vimes. "If you can say that without smiling you might make a copper after all. Welcome to the job, lance-constable. I hope you have-"

The door slammed. Captain Carrot took two steps into the room, saw Sally and hesitated.

"Lance- Constable von Humpeding has just joined us, captain," said Vimes.

"Er ... fine ... hello, miss," said Carrot quickly, and turned to Vimes. "Sir, someone"s killed Hamcrusher!"

Ankh-Morpork"s Finest strolled back down towards the Yard. "What I"d do, said Nobby, "is cut the painting up into little bits, like, oh, a few inches across?"

"That"s diamonds, Nobby. It"s how you get rid of stolen diamonds."

"All right, then, how about this one? You cut the muriel up into bits the size of ordinary paintings, okay? Then you paint a painting on the other side of each one, an" put "em in frames, an" leave "em around the place. No one will notice extra paintings, right? An" then you can go an" pinch "em when the fuss has died down."

"And how do you get them out, Nobby?"

"Well, first you get some glue, and a really long stick, and-" Fred Colon shook his head. "Can"t see it happening, Nobby."

"All right, then, you get some paint that"s the same colour as the

walls, and you glue the painting to the wall somewhere it"ll fit, and

you paint over it with your wall paint so it looks just like wall." "Got a convenient bit of wall in mind, then?" "How about inside the frame that"s there already, sarge?"

"Bloody hell, Nobby, that"s clever," said Fred, stopping dead. "Thank you, sarge. That means a lot, coming from you." "But you"ve still got to get it out, Nobby."

"Remember all those dust sheets, sarge? I bet in a few weeks" time

a couple of blokes in overalls will be able to walk out of the place

with a big white roll under their arms and no one"d think twice

about it, "cos they"d, like, be thinkin" the muriel had been pinched

weeks before."

There were a few moments of silence before Sergeant Colon said,

in a hushed voice: "That"s a very dangerous mind you got there,

Nobby. Very dangerous indeed. How"d you get the new paint off,

though?"

"Oh, that"s easy," said Nobby. "And I know where to get some

painters" aprons, too.

"Nobby!" said Fred, shocked.

"All right, sarge. You can"t blame a man for dreaming, though." "This could be a feather in our caps, Nobby. And we could do with one now."

"Your water playing up again, sarge?"

"You may laugh, Nobby, but you"ve only got to look around," said

Fred gloomily. "It"s just gang fights now, but it"s going to get worse,

you mark my words. All this scrapping over something that