Night Watch - Terry Pratchett [78]
Sadie raised her head, revealing a pale oval of a face in the depths of her bonnet.
“Good morning, kind sir,” she said.
“Good morning, Sadie,” said Vimes wearily. “To what do I owe this pleasure?”
“Madam wants to see you, kind sir.”
“If you mean Rosie, I’ve been a bit busy—”
Dotsie’s handbag hit him on the back of the head.
“Madam doesn’t like waiting, dearie” were the last words he heard before night closed in all the way.
The Aunts were experts. Probably not even Mossy Lawn could turn someone off with such precision.
Vimes drifted awake. He was in an armchair. It was extremely comfortable. And someone was shaking him.
It was Sandra the Real Seamstress. She stared at him and then said, “He looks okay…” Then she stepped back, sat down in another chair, and aimed a crossbow at Vimes.
“You know,” said Vimes—it really was a comfortable chair, and reminded him of the softness that had gone from his life in the past few days; it hadn’t been all bad—“if someone wants to talk to me, they only have to bloody well ask.”
“Sadie said you’d only be out for ten minutes, but then you started to snore, so we thought we’d let you sleep for a while,” said Rosie Palm, stepping into view. She was wearing a red, off-the-shoulder evening dress, an impressively large wig, and quite a lot of jewelry.
“Yes, it costs a lot of money to look as cheap as this, sergeant,” she said, catching his expression. “I can’t stop, I must go and talk to people. Now, if you—”
“Snapcase has promised you ladies that you’ll be allowed to form a guild, right?” said Vimes. It was another cheating move, but he was fed up with waking up in odd places. “Yes, I thought so. And you believe him? It’s not going to happen. When he’s the Patrician, he’ll look right through you.”
He’ll end up looking through everyone, he added to himself. Mad Lord Snapcase. Just another Winder, but with fancier waistcoats and more chins. Same cronyism, same piggy ways, same stupid arrogance, one more leech in a line of leeches that’d make Vetinari seem like a breath of clean air. Ha…Vetinari. Yes, he’d be around here somewhere too, no doubt, learning that little expression he had, which never, ever gave you a clue what he was thinking…But he’ll give you the Guild you want so much.
“Don’t expect anything from Snapcase,” he said aloud. “Remember, there were people who thought Winder was the future, too.”
He derived some minor pleasure from seeing the look on Rosie Palm’s face. At last she said: “Give him a drink, Sandra. If he moves, shoot an eye out. I’ll let Madam know.”
“Do you expect me to believe that she’ll fire that?” said Vimes.
“Sandra has a very useful streak of belligerence,” said Rosie. “A gentleman was being…impolite yesterday, and she came running in and…you’d be surprised at what she did with her mushroom.”
Vimes eyed the crossbow. The girl had a very steady hand.
“I don’t think I quite under—” he began.
“It’s a wooden thing to make it easier to darn socks,” said Sandra. “I hit him behind the ear with it.”
Vimes gave her a blank look for a while and then said: “Fine. Fine. I’m sitting very still, believe me.”
“Good,” said Rosie.
She swept out, and it was a real sweep, the dress brushing the ground. There were big, expensive double doors. When she opened them, the noise of a meeting filled the room. There was conversation, the smell of cigar smoke and alcohol, and a voice said “—to change the dominant episteme—” before the doors breathed shut.
Vimes stayed seated. He was getting attached to the chair, and on current showing someone was likely to hit him again soon.
Sandra, still holding the bow, placed a very large glass of whiskey beside him.
“You know,” he said, “in times to come people will wonder how all those weapons got smuggled around the city.”
“I’m sure I don’t know what you’re talking about.”
“And it’s because the lads in the Watch never bother about the seamstresses, curfew or no curfew,” said Vimes, staring at the whiskey. “Or posh coaches,” he added. “A watchman can get into real trouble if he tries that.” He could