Guards! Guards! (Discworld 8)

“Sorry?”

“Oh, my father had property all over the city,” she said. “Quite useless to me, really. So I told my agent to give Sergeant Colon the keys to the old house in Pseudopolis Yard. It'll do it good to be aired.”

“But that area-I mean, there's real cobbles on the streets-the rent alone, I mean, Lord Vetinari won't-”

“Don't you worry about it,” she said, giving him a friendly pat. “Now, you really ought to get some sleep.”

Vimes lay in bed, his mind racing. Pseudopolis Yard was on the Ankh side of the river, in quite a high-rent district. The sight of Nobby or Sergeant Colon walking down the street in daylight would probably have the same effect on the area as the opening of a plague hospital.

He dozed, gliding in and out of a sleep where giant dragons pursued him waving jars of ointment . . .

And awoke to the sound of a mob.

...

Lady Ramkin drawing herself up haughtily was not a sight to forget, although you could try. It was like watching continental drift in reverse as various subcontinents and islands pulled themselves together to form one massive, angry protowoman.

The broken door of the dragon house swung on its hinges. The inmates, already as highly strung as a harp on amphetamines, were going mad. Little gouts of flame burst against the metal plates as they stampeded back and forth in their pens. “Hwhat,” she said, “is the meaning of this?” If a Ramkin had ever been given to introspection she'd have admitted that it wasn't a very original line.

But it was handy. It did the job. The reason that cliches become cliches is that they are the hammers and screwdrivers in the toolbox of communication.

The mob filled the broken doorway. Some of it was waving various sharp implements with the up-and-down motion proper to rioters.

“Worl,” said the leader, “it's the dragon, innit?”

There was a chorus of muttered agreement.

“Hwhat about it?” said Lady Ramkin.

“Worl. It's been burning the city. They don't fly far. You got dragons here. Could be one of them, couldn't it?”

“Yeah.”

“S'right.”

“QED. ”[15]

“So what we're going to do is, we're going to put 'em down.”

“S'right.”

“Yeah.”

“Pro bono publico. ”

Lady Ramkin's bosom rose and fell like an empire. She reached out and grabbed the dunging fork from its hook on the wall.

“One step nearer, I warn you, and you'll be sorry,” she said.

The leader looked beyond her to the frantic dragons.

“Yeah?” he said, nastily. “And what'll you do, eh?”

Her mouth opened and shut once or twice. “I shall summon the Watch!” she said at last.

The threat did not have the effect she had expected. Lady Ramkin had never paid much attention to those bits of the city that didn't have scales on.

“Well, that's too bad,” said the leader. “That's really worrying, you know that? Makes me go all weak at the knees, that does.”