Thud! (Discworld 34)

"He"s dead, sir. Hamcrusher is dead. The dwarfs are sure

of it.,

Vimes stared at his captain. Then he glanced at Sally and said, "I gave you an order, Lance-Constable Humpeding. Go and get joined up!"

When the girl had hurried out, he said, "I hope you"re sure about it as well, captain . .

"It"s spreading through the dwarfs like, like-" Carrot began. "Alcohol?" Vimes suggested.

"Very fast, anyway," Carrot conceded. "Last night, they say. A troll got into his place in Treacle Street and beat him to death. I heard some of the lads talking about it."

"Carrot, wouldn"t we know if something like that had happened?" said Vimes, but in the theatre of his mind Angua and Fred Colon uttered their cassandraic warnings again. The dwarfs knew something. The dwarfs were worried.

"Don"t we, sir?" said Carrot. "I mean, I"ve just told you."

"I mean, why aren"t his people shouting it in the streets? Political assassination and all that sort of thing? Shouldn"t they be screaming bloody murder? Who told you this?"

"Constable Ironbender and Corporal Ringfounder, sir. They"re steady lads. Ringfounder"s up for sergeant soon. Er ... there was something else, sir. I did ask them why we hadn"t heard officially,

and Ironbender said ... you won"t like this, sir ... he said the Watch

wasn"t to be told." Carrot watched Vimes carefully. It was hard to see

the change of expression on the commander"s face, but certain

small muscles set firmly.

"On whose orders?" said Vimes.

"Someone called Ardent, apparently. He"s Hamcrusher"s ... interpreter, I suppose you could say. He says it"s dwarf business.

"But this is Ankh-Morpork, captain. And murder is Murder." "Yes, sir."

"And we are the City Watch," Vimes went on. "It says so on the

door."

"Actually it mostly says "Copers are Barstuds" on the door at the

moment, but I"ve got someone scrubbing it off," said Carrot. "And

"That means if anyone gets murdered, we"re responsible," said

Vimes.

"I know what you mean, sir," said Carrot carefully. "Does Vetinari know?"

"I can"t imagine that he doesn"t."

"Me neither." Vimes thought for a moment. "What about the

Times? There"s plenty of dwarfs working there.

"I"d be surprised if they passed it on to humans, sir. I only got to

hear about it because I"m a dwarf and Ringfounder really wants

to make sergeant and frankly I overheard them, but I doubt if the