Thud! (Discworld 34)

"When I say "the story of my life"; obviously I don"t mean the whole story," mumbled Cheery, apparently to herself, as she trailed behind them into a world blessedly without fun.

The Ramkins never threw anything away. There was something worrying about their attics, and it wasn"t just that they had a faint aroma of long-dead pigeon.

The Ramkins labelled things. Vimes had been into the big attics in Scoone Avenue to fetch down the rocking-horse and the cot and a whole box of elderly but much-loved soft toys, smelling of mothballs. Nothing that might ever be useful again was thrown away. It was carefully labelled and put in the attic.

Brushing aside cobwebs with one hand and holding up a lantern with the other, Sybil led the way past boxes of "men"s boots, various; "Risible puppets, string & glove, "Model Theatre and scenery".

Maybe that was the reason for their wealth: they bought things that were built to last, and they seldom, now, had to buy anything at all. Except food, of course, and even then Vimes would not have been surprised to see boxes labelled "apple cores, various, or "leftovers, need eating up".

"Ah, here we are; said Sybil, lifting aside a bundle of fencing foils and lacrosse sticks. She pulled a long, thick tube out into the light.

"I didn"t colour it in, of course, she said as it was manhandled back to the stairs. "That would have taken for ever."

Getting the heavy bundle down to the canteen took some effort and a certain amount of shoving, but eventually it was lifted on to the table and the crackling scroll removed.

While Sir Reynold unrolled the big ten-foot squares and enthused, Vimes pulled out the small-scale copy that Sybil had created. It was just small enough to fit on the table; he weighed down one end with a crusted mug and put a salt cellar on the other.

Rascal"s notes made sad reading. Difficult reading, too, because a lot of them were half burned, and in any case his handwriting was what might have been achieved by a spider on a trampoline during an earthquake.

The man was clearly as mad as a spoon, writing notes that he wanted to keep secret from the chicken; sometimes he"d stop writing in mid-note if he thought the chicken was watching. Apparently he was a very sad sight to see until he picked up a brush, whereupon he would work quite quietly and with a strange glow to his features. And that was his life: one huge oblong of canvas. Methodia Rascal: born, painted famous picture, thought he was a chicken, died.

Given that the man couldn"t touch bottom with a long stick, how

That was a phrase of Sybil"s that got to him. She"d announce at lunch: "We must have the pork tonight, it needs eating up: Vimes never had an actual problem with this, because he"d been raised to eat what was put in front of him, and do it quickly, too, before someone else snatched it away. He was just puzzled at the suggestion that he was there to do the food a favour.

could you make sense out of anything he wrote? The only note that seemed concise, if horrible, was the one generally accepted as his last, since it was found under his slumped body. It read:

Awk! Awk! It comes! IT COMES!

He"d choked with a throat full of feathers. And on the canvas, the last of the paint was still drying.

Vimes"s eye was caught by the message numbered, arbitrarily, #39:1 thought it was a guiding omen, but it screams in the night." An omen of what? And what about #143: "The dark, in the dark, like a star in chains"? Vimes had made a note of that one. He"d made a note of many others, too. But the worst thing about them - or the best, if you were keen on mysteries - was that they could mean anything. You could pick your own theory. The man was half starved and in mortal dread of a chicken that lived in his head. You might as well try to make sense of raindrops.

Vimes pushed them aside and stared at the careful pencil drawing. Even at this size, it was confusing. Up front, faces were so large that you could see the pores on a dwarf"s nose. In the distance, Sybil had meticulously copied figures that were a quarter of an inch high.

Axes and clubs were being waved, spears were being pointed, there were charges and countercharges and single combats. Across the whole length of the picture, dwarfs and trolls were locked in ferocious battle, hacking and smashing

He thought: who"s missing?

"Sir Reynold, could you help me?" he said quietly, lest the nascent thought turn tail and run.

"Yes, commander?" said the curator, hurrying over. "Doesn"t Lady Sybil do the most exquisite-"

"She"s very good, yes," said Vimes. "Tell me ... how did Rascal know all this stuff?"

"There hwere many dwarf songs about it, and some troll stories. Oh, and some humans hwitnessed it."

"So Rascal could have read about it?"

"Oh, yes. Apart from the fact that he put it in the wrong part of the valleah, he got it down quite accurately."

Vimes didn"t take his gaze off the paper battle.

"Does anyone know why he put it in the wrong place, then?" he said.

"There are several theoreahs. One is that he hwas deceived by the fact that the dead dwarfs hwere cremated at that end of the valley, but after the storm that is hwhere many of the bodies ended up. There hwas also a great deal of dead hwood for bonfires. But I believe he chose that end because the view is so much better. The mountains are so dramatic."

Vimes sat down, staring at the sketch, willing it to yield its secret. Everyone will know the secret in a few weeks, Mr Shine had said. Why?