Men at Arms (Discworld #15)(66)

'I can't help it. It's my nearly-dwarfish blood. We just like singing underground. It comes naturally to us.'

'All right, but why him singing? Him ape.'

'He's a people person.'

They'd brought torches. Shadows jumped among the pillars in the big cavern, and fled along the tunnels. Whatever the possible lurking dangers, Carrot was beside himself with the joy of discovery.

'It's amazing! The Via Cloaca is mentioned in some old book I read, but everyone thought it was a lost street! Superb workmanship. Lucky for you the river was so low. It looks as though these are normally full of water.'

'That's what I said,' said Cuddy. 'Full of water, I said.'

He glanced cautiously at the dancing shadows, which made weird and worrying shapes on the far wall -strange biped animals, eldritch underground things . . .

Carrot sighed.

'Stop making shadow pictures, Detritus.'

'Oook.'

'What him say?'-

'He said “Do Deformed Rabbit, it's my favourite”,' Carrot translated.

Rats rustled in the darkness. Cuddy peered around. He kept imagining figures, back there, sighting along some kind of pipe . . .

There were a disturbing few moments when he lost sight of the tracks on the wet stone, but he picked them up again near a mould-hung wall. And then, there was the particular pipe. He'd made a scratch on the stones.

'It's not far along,' he said, handing Carrot the torch.

Carrot disappeared.

They heard his footsteps in the mud, and then a whistle of surprise, and then silence for a while.

Carrot reappeared.

'My word,' he said. 'You two know who this is?'

'It looks like—' Cuddy began.

'It looks like trouble,' said Carrot.

'You see why we didn't bring it back up?' said Cuddy. 'Carrying a human's corpse through the streets right now would not be a good idea, I thought. Especially this one.'

'I thought some of that, too,' Detritus volunteered.

'Right enough,' said Carrot. 'Well done, men. I think we'd better . . . leave it for now, and come back with a sack later on. And . . . don't tell anyone else.'

'Except the sergeant and everyone,' said Cuddy.

'No . . . not even them. If d make everyone very . . . jumpy.'

'Just as you say, Corporal Carrot.'

'We're dealing with a sick mind here, men.'

Underground light dawned on Cuddy.

'Ah,' he said. 'You suspect Corporal Nobbs, sir?'

'This is worse. Come on, let's get back up.' He looked back towards the big pillar-barred cavern. 'Any idea where we are, Cuddy?'

'Could be under the Palace, sir.'

'That's what I reckoned. Of course, the tunnels go everywhere . . .'

Carrot's worried train of thought faltered away on some distant track.

There was water in the sewers, even in this drought. Springs flowed into them, or water filtered down from far above. Everywhere was the drip and splash of water. And cool, cool air.

It would almost be pleasant were it not for the sad, hunched corpse of someone that looked for all the world like Beano the clown.

Vimes dried himself off. Willikins had also laid out a dressing gown with brocade on the sleeves. He put it on, and wandered into his dressing room.

That was another new thing. The rich even had rooms for dressing in, and clothes to wear while you went into the dressing rooms to get dressed.

Fresh clothes had been laid out for him. Tonight there was something dashing in red and yellow . . .

. . . about now he'd be patrolling Treacle Mine Road . . . . . . and a hat. It had a feather in it.

Vimes dressed himself, and even wore the hat. And he seemed quite normal and composed, until you realized that he avoided meeting his own gaze in the mirror.

The Watch sat around the big table in the guardroom and in deep gloom. They were Off Duty. They'd never really been Off Duty before.

'What say we have a game of cards?' said Nobby, brightly. He produced a greasy pack from somewhere in the noisome recesses of his uniform.

'You won everyone's wages off them yesterday,' said Sergeant Colon.

'Now's the chance to win 'em back, then.'

'Yeah, but there were five kings in your hand, Nobby.'

Nobby shuffled the cards.

' 'S'funny, that,' he said, 'there's kings everywhere, when you look.'

'There certainly is if you look up your sleeve.'

'No, I mean, there's Kings Way in Ankh, and kings in cards, and we get the King's Shilling when we join up,' said Nobby. 'We got kings all over the place except on that gold throne in the Palace. I'll tell you . . . there wouldn't be all this trouble around the place if we had a king.'

Carrot was staring at the ceiling, his eyebrows locked in concentration. Detritus was counting on his fingers.

'Oh, yes,' said Sergeant Colon. 'Beer'd be a penny a pint, the trees'd bloom again. Oh, yeah. Every time someone stubs a toe in this town, turns out it wouldn't have happened if there'd been a king. Vimes'd go spare to hear you talk like that.'

'People'd listen to a king, though,' said Nobby.

'Vimes'd say that's the trouble,' said Colon. 'It's like that thing of his about using magic. That stuff makes him angry.'