Jingo

“Now, come on it's not his fault, let's show a little charity.” The speaker cleared his throat. “Good morning, friend,” he said. “May we invite you to share our couscous?”

Sergeant Colon peered at the bowl, and then dipped in a finger and tasted it.

“Hey, this is semolina! You've got semolina! It's just ordinary semol—” He stopped, and coughed. “Yeah, right. Thanks. Got any strawberry jam?”

The host looked at his friends. They shrugged.

“We know not of this ‘strawberry hjam’ of which you speak,” he said carefully, “We prefer it with lamb.” He offered Colon a long wooden skewer.

“Oh, you gotta have strawberry jam,” said Colon, carried away. “When we were kids we'd stir it in and… and…” He looked at their faces, “O' course, that was back in Ur,” he said.

The men nodded at one another. Suddenly it was all clear.

Colon belched loudly.

From the looks he got from everyone else, he was the only one who'd heard of this common Klatchian custom.

“So,” he said, “where's the army these days? Approximately?”

“Why do you ask, o full-of-gas one?”

“Oh, we thought we could make a bit of cash entertaining the troops,” said Colon. He was immensely proud of this idea. “You know… a smile, a song, a lack of exotic dancing. But that means we got to know where they are, see?”

“Excuse me, fat one, but can you understand what I am saying?”

“Yes, it's very tasty,” Colon hazarded.

“Ah. I thought so. So he's a spy. But whose?”

“Really? Who would be so stupid as to use a joke like this as a spy?”

“Ankh-Morpork?”

“Oh, come on! He's pretending to be an Anhk-Morpork spy, perhaps. But they're cunning over there—”

“You think? A people who make curry out of something called curry powder and you think they're clever?”

“I reckon he's from Muntab. They're always watching us.”

“And pretending to be from Ankh-Morpork?”

“Well, if you were trying to look like a joke Morporkian pretending to be Klatchian wouldn't you look like that?”

“But why'd he pretend to be from there?”

“Ah… politics.”

“Let's call the watch, then.”

“Are you mad? We've been talking to him! They will be… inquisitive.”

“Good point. I know…”

Faifal gave Colon a big grin.

“I did hear the entire army has marched away to En al Sams la Laisa,” he said. “But don't tell anyone.”

“Have they?” Colon glanced at the other men. They were watching him with curiously deadpan expressions.

“Sounds like a massive place, with a name like that,” he said.

“Oh, huge,” said his neighbour. One of the other men made a noise that you might think was a suppressed chuckle.

“It's a long way, is it?”

“No, very close. You're practically on top of it,” said Faifal. He nudged a colleague, whose shoulders were shaking.

“Oh, right. Big army, is it?”

“Could easily be very big, yes.”

“Fine. Fine,” said Colon. “Er… anyone got a pencil? I could've sworn I had one when—”

There was a noise outside the tavern. It was the sound of many women laughing, which is always a disquieting noise to men.16 Customers peered suspiciously through the vines.

Colon and the rest of the crowd looked around an urn at the group by the well. An old lady was rolling on the ground, laughing, and various younger ones were leaning against one another for support.

He heard one of them say, “What did he say again?”

“He said, ‘That's funny, it's never done that when I've tried it!’”

“Yeah, that's true!” cackled the old woman. “It never does!”

“‘That's funny, it's never done that when I've tried it’,” Nobby repeated.

Colon groaned. That was the voice and tone of Corporal Nobbs in storytelling mode, when wood could scorch at ten yards.

“'scuse me,” he muttered, and forced his way through the press to the gateway.

“Have you heard the one about the ki… the sultan who was afraid his wife… one of his wives… would be unfaithful to him while he was away?”

“We haven't heard any stories like these, Beti!” Bana gasped.

“Really? Oh, I've got a thousand and one of 'em. Well, anyway, he went and saw the wise old blacksmith, right, and he said—”

“You can't go round telling stories like that, cor– Beti,” Colon panted as he lumbered to a halt.