"I do not have ... seniority here," he said.
"Let me talk to your grags. I promise to rub out no words."
"No. They will not talk to you. They do not talk to humans. They are waiting below. They had word of your arrival. They are frightened. They do not trust humans."
Why?
"Because you are not dwarfs," said Ardent. "Because you are ... a sort of dream."
Vimes put his hands on the dwarf"s shoulders. "Then let"s go
downstairs, where you can talk to them about nightmares," he said,
and you can point out which one is me."
There was a long silence until Ardent said, "Very well. This is
under protest, you understand."
"I"ll be happy to make a note of that," said Vimes. "Thank you for
your co-operative attitude."
Ardent stood up and produced a ring of complex keys from his
robes.
Vimes tried to keep track of the journey, but it was hard. There
were twists and turns, in dim tunnels that all seemed alike.
There was not a trace of water anywhere. How far did the tunnels
go? How far down? How far out? Dwarfs mined through granite.
They could probably stroll through river mud.
In fact in most places the dwarfs hadn"t so much mined as cleaned house, taking away the silt, tunnelling from one ancient, dripping room to another. And, somehow, the water went away.
There were things glittering, possibly magical, half seen in dark archways as they passed. And odd chanting. He knew dwarfish, in a "The axe of my aunt is in your head" kind of way, and it didn"t sound like that at all. It sounded like short words rattled out at very high speed.
And with every turn he felt the anger coming back. They were being led in circles, were they? For no other reason than pique. Ardent forged ahead, leaving Vimes to blunder along behind and occasionally bump his head.
His temper was bubbling. This was nothing more than a bloody runaround! The dwarfs didn"t care about the law, about him, about the world up above. They undermine our city and they don"t obey our laws! There"s been a damn murder. He admits it! Why am I putting up with this ... this stupid play-acting!
He was passing yet another tunnel mouth, but this one had a piece of board nailed across it. He pulled out his sword, yelled, "I wonder what"s down here?", smashed the board and set off down the tunnel, with Angua following.
"Is this wise, sir?" she whispered, as they plunged along.
"No. But I"m up to here with Mr Ardent," Vimes growled. "I tell you, another twisty tunnel and I"ll be back here with the heavy mob, politics or not."
"Calm down, sir!"
"Well, everything he says and does is an insult! It makes my blood boil!" said Vimes, striding onwards and ignoring the shouts of Ardent behind him.
"There"s a door ahead, sir!"
"All right, I"m not blind! Just half blind!" Vimes snapped.