Thud

Hold on, though ... sometimes you could. Back in the old days, when he was on nights all the time, he'd known all the shades of darkness. And sometimes you got darkness so thick that you almost felt you had to push your way through it. Those were nights when horses were skittish and dogs whined and down in the slaughterhouse district the animals broke out of their pens. They were inexplicable, just like those nights that were quite light and silvery even though there was no moon in the sky. He'd learned, then, not to use his little watchman's lantern. Light only ruined your vision, it blinded you. You stared into the dark until it blinked. You stared it down.

`Captain, I'm getting a bit lost here,' said Vimes. `I didn't grow up in a mine. Are these signs drawn because dwarfs think bad things are going to happen and want to ward them off, or think the mine deserves the bad things happening, or because they want the bad things to happen?'

`Can be all three at once,' said Carrot, wincing. `It can get really intense when a mine goes bad.'

`Oh, good grief!

'Oh, it can be awful, sir. Believe me. But no one would ever draw the worst of the signs and want it to happen. Just the drawing wouldn't be enough, anyway. You have to want it to happen with your very last breath.'

`And what one is that?

'Oh, you don't want to know, sir.'

`No, I did ask,' said Vimes.

`No. You really don't want to know, sir. Really.'

Vimes was about to start yelling, but he stopped to think for a moment.

`Actually, no, I don't think I do,' he agreed. `This is all about hysteria and mysticism. It's just weird folklore. Dwarfs believe it. I don't. So ... how did you get the vurms to form that sign?'

`Easy, sir. You just smear the wall with a piece of meat. That's a feast for vurms. I wanted to shake Ardent up a bit. Make him nervous, like you taught me. I wanted to show him I knew about signs. I am a dwarf, after all.'

`Captain, this is probably not the time to break it to you, but-'

`Oh, I know people laugh, sir. A six-foot dwarf! But being a human just means being born to human parents. That's easy. Being a dwarf doesn't mean being born to dwarfs, though it's a good start. It's about certain things you do. Certain ceremonies. I've done them. So I'm a human and a dwarf. The deep-downers find it a bit hard to deal with that.'

`It's mystic again, is it?' said Vimes wearily.

`Oh yes, sir.' Carrot coughed. Vimes recognized that particular cough. It meant that bad news was on the captain's mind and he was wondering how to shape it to fit the available not-goingtotally-spare space in Vimes's head.

`Out with it, captain.'

`Er, this little chap turned up,' said Carrot, opening his hand. The Gooseberry imp sat up.

`I ran all the way, Insert Name Here,' it said proudly.

`We spotted it jogging along the gutter,' said Carrot. `It wasn't hard to see, glowing pale green like that.'

Vimes pulled the Gooseberry box out of his pocket and put it on the floor. The imp climbed inside.

`Ooh, that feels so good,' it said. `Don't talk to me about rats and cats!'

`They chased you? But you're a magical creature, aren't you?' said Vimes.

`They don't know that!' said the imp. `Now, what was it ... Oh,

yes. You asked me about the night-soil removal. Over the past three

months the extra honey-wagon load has averaged forty tons a

night.'

`Forty tons? That'd fill a big room! Why didn't we know about it?' `You did, Insert Name Here!' said the imp. `But they were leaving

from every gate, you see, and probably no guard ever spotted more

than one or two extra carts.'

`Yes, but they turned in reports every night! Why didn't we spot

it?'

There was an awkward pause. The imp coughed. `Um, no one

reads the reports, Insert Name Here. They appear to be what we in

the trade call write-only documents.'

`Wasn't anyone supposed to be reading them?' Vimes demanded. There was another thundering silence.

`I rather think you were, dear,' said Sybil, paying attention to her

darning.

`But I'm in charge!' Vimes protested. `Yes, dear. That's the point, really.,

'But I can't spend all my time shuffling bits of paper!' `Then get someone else to do it, dear,' said Sybil. `Can I do that?' said Vimes. `Yes, sir,' said Carrot. `You're in charge.'

Vimes looked at the imp, which gave him a willing grin. `Can you go through all of my in-tray-' `. floor.. :murmured Sybil. `-and tell me what's important?'

`Happy to, Insert Name Here! Only one question, Insert Name

Here. What is important?'

`Well, the fact that the dunnikin divers are carting a whole lot

more muck out of the city is pretty damn important, don't you

think?'

`I wouldn't know, Insert Name Here,' said the imp. `I do not, in

fact, think as such. But I surmise that, if I had drawn your attention to such a fact a month ago you would have told me to stick my head up a duck's bottom.'

`That's true,' said Vimes, nodding. `I probably would. Captain Carrot?'

`Sir!' said Carrot, sitting up straight.

`What's the situation on the street?'