Raising Steam

by Terry Pratchett

  Vimes waved a clacks flimsy and said cheerfully, ‘The idiots! They tried their tricks while they were still on Ankh-Morpork soil. Poor souls … I suppose they thought they were outthinking us, but Cheery and her lads had the measure of them in swift order – Sir Harry’s men too by the sound of it – and now both lots are heading for the Tanty where the dark clerks will be engaging them in important discussions. Let’s hope the news doesn’t get out to the grag command just yet.’

  It was going to be a long haul to Zemphis. And after Zemphis they’d be launching on to the new track, which no passenger train had yet travelled. Time enough to worry about that when they got there, Moist told himself firmly. For now disguise was crucial; he must be the engineer, the lucky man who got to ride the latest Mark II Flyer every day and get paid for it.

  As Moist walked up and down the carriages he began to look at the passengers around him. Amongst the normal mix of Ankh-Morporkians and other folk from the Sto Plains and surrounding areas whom he would expect to see on the regular journey to Zemphis, there were some dwarfs, travelling both together and singly. A few he recognized as part of the Low King’s entourage; others were, if he was any judge, Ankh-Morpork dwarfs. Mind you, there was more than one kind of Ankh-Morpork dwarf: one sort were happy at being Ankh-Morpork citizens, and others seemed to feel grumpy and nervous about their status, not realizing that in Ankh-Morpork nobody paid much attention to what you were – unless you looked wealthy, in which case you would definitely be the centre of attention.

  And then there were the people trying a little too hard to present themselves as harmless members of the public. They always stood out and Moist wondered if they knew how obvious they were to the trained eye of the suspicious scoundrel. They were worried and trying desperately not to look worried and nonchalance, real nonchalance, is very difficult to fake. If you didn’t have the knack it cried out … amateur.

  One dwarf in particular had caught Moist’s eye as he passed, so he came back a short while later and took the seat opposite. As Moist sat rocking with the rhythm of the train, he sensed some discordance. Not fear, exactly, but the pulse of fear squashed down so heavily that it was almost singing, and in the privacy of Moist’s skull the tickertape of suspicion ticked away.

  Moist had been clever so far, not staring and, indeed, trying to look like a person who was not trying not to stare, a professional nonchalant, but the dwarf who was under his eyes was sweating. Sooner or later something was going to break.

  ‘Oh, I know who you are!’ Moist said suddenly, keeping his voice low. ‘You’re one of those train spotters, aren’t you? I never forget an anorak.’

  ‘Oh, yes, I’m a very keen train spotter, sir,’ said the dwarf, keeping his voice level while his beard dripped sweat and his eyes screamed help.

  ‘Excellent. So you’d know the top speed of a Flyer, then, would you? No?’

  Hardly anyone on the train had looked up as he subtly questioned the dwarf, as subtly as a sledgehammer; it had become an extraordinaryfn68 rule of railway etiquette that other passengers’ conduct and conversation remained their private business, however obtrusive it might be. The dwarf had visibly jumped in his seat when Moist first engaged him, but he was still grave-faced and, yes, still sweating, so Moist carried on like a friend who wants to borrow money.

  ‘As I said, I never forget an anorak. Taking the long haul to Zemphis, are we?’

  The dwarf nodded and said simply, ‘Yes.’

  ‘Did you see which engine we’ve got?’ said Moist. ‘I tell you what … I’m hearing some trunnion rattle. Can you feel it? Maybe she’s a new one just out of the yard?’

  ‘Er … yes … I suppose so …’ spluttered the wretched dwarf.

  As he considered his next move, Moist looked around. Ah, there was another dwarf, further away, surreptitiously watching him watch the ersatz train spotter. Thinking furiously, he turned his attention back to the sweating dwarf in front of him.

  ‘Hang on, I’ve seen you before, haven’t I, at the gates of the compound, with your little notebook? We all have our little notebooks, buddy, and mine’s in my luggage over there and yours is the cleanest anorak I’ve ever seen. Real train spotters get covered in muck and smuts … it’s their badge of honour to have a greasy anorak. But you, mister, know nothing about trains or train spotting, do you?’

  As he said this, he saw the other dwarf leave his seat and start to walk nonchalantly to the next carriage.

  ‘You! Wait here!’ Moist barked at the dwarf in front of him as he ran after and jumped on the perambulating dwarf. There were screams of consternation from the other passengers, finally jolted from their careful lack of interest, as Moist rolled off, scrambled to his feet and kicked the dwarf heavily with his plate-layer’s boots, the ones with the metal toecaps; an invitation to lie on the ground in agony, even if you were wearing chainmail.

  Moist reached up and pulled the communication cord,fn69 hardly visible overhead, and as the train slid to a screeching halt, he shouted to the passengers, ‘Nobody gets off this train unless they can fly. We’ll soon have company, ladies and gentlemen. This will be something to tell your grandchildren about.’

  Reinforcements were already coming from both directions: dark clerks from one and City Watch from the other … this particular portion of the City Watch being Commander Vimes, who took one look and said to everyone present, ‘Nothing to worry about, ladies and gentlemen. This gentleman hadn’t bought a ticket for his journey, and that kind of behaviour makes our railway staff very upset …’

  A little later, in the guard’s van, the nervous young dwarf and his saturnine minder were, amazingly, talking to old Stoneface, who was sitting at the guard’s desk and listening intently.

  ‘Now, gentlemen, something is going on here.’

  He held up a large, four-sided knife. The weapon really meant business, not just business, but business with ignominy. The young dwarf was being held between two coppers as the commander spoke to him, smiling like a shark.

  ‘This, sir, is what assassins call a roundel, and I must tell you that even the professional killers don’t use them. I believe they think it’s cruel and has no finesse. Frankly, I think I’ll agree about that. And I’m wondering, sir, why you’re carrying it on this train?’

  Vimes turned to the other dwarf, presently chained to Sergeant Detritus.

  ‘And you, sir. What was your part in all this? We’re on a moving vehicle, travelling through wilderness where anything could happen. And, you know, anything might happen very soon if I don’t get some answers.’

  He turned to an officer and said, ‘Fred. You and Nobby shackle the young one and drag him somewhere where he can be alone with his thoughts and then I’ll continue my little chat with this old feller, who I suspect would very much like to talk to me in a clear, thoughtful, and expansive way, leaving nothing out. You, sir,’ and this was to Moist, ‘I suggest you go back to your seat. I’ll talk to you later.’

  Dismissed, and with nothing better to do, Moist resumed his patrol of the carriages. There were long, long miles to Zemphis ahead of them and in some stretches the landscape was so monotonous that another term would have to be devised. To pass the time, he wandered along to the fabled First Class sleeping compartments. Effie had clearly had a hand in these. Whole families in Ankh-Morpork, including aunts and uncles, grannies and granddads and all the kids and possibly their donkey could have slept well in just one of the delightful part bedroom, part drawing rooms.

  And when Moist came back to the guard’s van after pacing the corridors and gave the not very secret knock, he found the door opened by Nobby Nobbs, a watchman who though technically human (with a certificate to prove it) was so much like a goblin that he had acquired a goblin girlfriend. Adora Belle had met her many times and she had told Moist that Shine of the Rainbow was throwing herself away on Nobby.

  ‘Wotcher, Mister Lipwig. You should have been ’ere when Mister Vimes was interrogating that old suspect. He rolled up his sleev
e and the dwarf went mental, and I mean proper mental. He saw that mark, you know, the one on the commander’s wrist, and went, well, totally mental, promising absolutely everything. Never seen anyone so scared in all my life and Vimesy hadn’t even touched him. He broke, sir, that’s the only way I can put it. He broke. I mean, he’s had a go at me on occasions, you know, about such things as what I found on the street and was hurrying to give back to their owner and suchlike. Nothing important. But that dwarf … it was like he melted, sir. Melted! You wouldn’t know Done It Duncan, not being in the Watch, sir, well, the poor bugger owns up to anything just to get a drink and a place to sleep in the cells and maybe a chat and a ham sandwich. But this lawn ornament, he’s got it worse.’

  Moist looked around. ‘Where are they now?’

  ‘In there. And Mister Vimes took the young ’un off somewhere else with Fred.’ Nobby pointed towards the far end of the guard’s van. ‘Mister Lipwig, you know that great idea you had?’

  Moist hesitated. ‘Help me, Nobby, I have a lot of great ideas.’

  ‘Right, sir – the one about sorting the mail on the train, sir?’

  And Moist thought, oh yes, and it would work. But Nobby carried on. ‘Well, there’s a special carriage on this train. It has shelves and pigeon holes and everything.’

  Inside the mail carriage Moist saw the commander and his new little friend, with Fred Colon. Vimes was talking quite cheerfully to the young dwarf and when he saw Moist he gave a quick gesture indicating that he could listen but shouldn’t disturb the delicate process. There were no signs of fighting or nastiness of any kind and there were two cups of coffee nestling in the wire pigeon holes. The commander, as soothingly as a mother with a new baby, played a theme that put Moist von Lipwig, confidence trickster, liar, cheat, fraud, swindler and king of slyness, the sort that dripped like the venom of a striking cobra, to shame.

  ‘Oh dear, those grags. Tell me now, which one was it? Come on, help me now.’

  ‘I can’t remember.’

  ‘And they did what? Surely not? Oh, it was your chum that we have in the van next door, was it?’

  ‘Well, it might have been, yes.’

  Moist wanted to applaud, but the show – if that’s what it was – kept on going.

  And now, with the strange red snake glistening on his arm, the commander crooned oh so carefully that a grandmother’s tea party would appear to be a smash-and-grab raid in comparison. And it finished with a sigh, as the commander said with magnificently sincere anguish, ‘Of course, if it was up to me … but you see I have to deal with Lord Vetinari and the Low King. I could put in a good word for you, my lad, telling them how helpful you’ve been … Yes, I think I’ll do just that, and I thank you for helping me and I can assure you …’ and here the glowing snake moved as the commander did, ‘I can assure you, young man, that no matter what happens to you, nothing will happen to your family. But I don’t think I’ll be able to persuade people of your innocence if you’re caught like this at any future time or, indeed, if you turn out to be lying to me. And now, if you don’t mind, I need to talk to your colleague again.’

  Moist loved that ‘If you don’t mind’. As if the fool had a choice. And dark clerks whisked the young dwarf away and came back with the older dwarf, when the careful, methodical interrogation continued, but in a louder voice, considering that this dwarf was much older. The words that Vimes used had more menace in them now; but nevertheless he half suggested that everything would get better if the dwarf in front of him told the commander absolutely everything he knew about the grags and delvers and his fellow conspirators who had been duped into being the ones who got caught and thrown to the Low King’s justice.

  ‘You, sir, you’ll be sent for trial before the Low King, but, as I said, I’ll put in a good word for you. At the next station I’ll send a clacks, if your one-time friends haven’t burned down the tower.’ And that made him flinch. Moist had to try hard not to applaud.

  ‘Fred,’ said the commander, ‘please ask them to bring in this gentleman’s accomplice, so that they can enjoy each other’s company for the rest of their journey,’ and when both dwarfs were in the mail coach under the watchful eye of the dark clerks, Vimes continued.

  ‘Okay,’ he said, in the same cheerful tone, ‘I’m sorry about the manacles, but we can’t have you running away now, can we? And the pair of you must remember – especially you, sir, at your age – it could have been so much worse. I’m afraid to say that it might still turn out that way anyway, but as I said, I’ll put in a good word. You’ll be looked after until I can arrange for you to be taken off under guard, and if anything jogs your memory don’t hesitate to tell them, and I’ll see what I can do. But I’m sure you’ll agree that it’ll be for the safety of all parties, especially your own, if in the meantime you are held in this sealed room where nobody can hurt you. I’ll see to it myself that you have regular meals and refreshments.’

  He turned to Moist and said, ‘A word with you, please, outside.’

  Back in the guard’s van the commander pulled a cigar from somewhere and lit it in flagrant defiance of every railway law, sat down on a bench and said, ‘Mister Lipwig, you look quizzical. Feel free to speak.’

  ‘Well, commander, I’m impressed you did such a number on them. They think that you’re their friend, that you want to help them.’

  This was met by another puff of smoke.

  ‘But of course I’m their friend,’ replied Vimes, straight-faced, ‘and I will continue to be their friend, for now. You are a rascal and I am not. Oh yes, I could make their lives impossible, or even worse. The older one you introduced to the railway boot so adroitly, well, he’s the brains of this particular outfit, and the little one is what they call a catspaw, an idiot, filled to the brim with lies, exciting lies, telling him that he is doing the work of Tak. I mean, he isn’t even a good train spotter.’

  Vimes patted his pocket and said, ‘And now I have names, oh such names, such wonderful names, and when the facts of life are explained to their owners they’ll undoubtedly lead to other names and we shall see the bunny rabbits run. Police work isn’t all about kicking down doors, you know, it’s about getting to the bottom of things, and once you’re right on the bottom you see all the way to the top and the top is what I’m after here! We’ll be stopping for coal and water at a place called Cranbury very soon and there should be a clacks tower.’

  He smiled. ‘I wonder what his lordship will say about my lovely list of names? I reckon he’ll go right past acerbic en route to ironic and end up slap bang in sardonic without even taking a breath.’ He slapped his pocket again. ‘I know some of these, don’t I just, all powerful dwarfs, such stalwart defenders of the Low King on the one hand and dealing happily with the grags on the other. Thank you very much, Mister Lipwig, you’re a loss to crime prevention, but you recognized the process because you recognize yourself – isn’t that right? How useful, so do I. The mark must always think of you as his friend and you yourself must be as a sorrowful yet loving father. The mark’s shield from the dreadful darkness outside.’

  The commander turned and said, ‘Nobby, who’s on duty at Big Cabbage station?’

  ‘Sergeant Willard, Mister Vimes.’

  Vimes said to Moist, ‘That’ll do. He’s an old copper and he’ll have his hurry-up wagon and he’ll get them in front of his lordship in no short order. And with them still in shackles, he won’t have any problems. You know, I almost feel sorry for them. Grags, delvers, whatever they call themselves, the modus operandi is to find some innocent dwarf with the right connections and let it be known to him or her that if they do not toe the line and do what they are told, then perhaps all of their family will simply disappear into the Gap.’

  He smiled and said, ‘Come to think of it, that’s exactly what I do, but I’m a teddy bear by comparison and on the right side.’

  Vimes stood up and waved his arms a bit for the circulation and said, ‘And now I think I need to go and see the King about
my interesting findings. And don’t worry, I’ll put in a good word too. You pay attention to people and that’s a skill in itself.’

  The outside air was permeating the carriages now with the scent of the Sto Plains, which consisted of one scent and that was cabbage or cabbage-like and it was a sad smell, it drooped helplessness. Melancholy. Mind you, the cabbages themselves were excellent, especially the newer varieties.

  The town of Big Cabbage, theoretically the last place any sensible person would want to visit, was nevertheless popular throughout the summer because of the attractions of Brassica World and the Cabbage Research Institute, whose students were the first to get a cabbage to a height of five hundred yards propelled entirely by its own juices. Nobody asked why they felt it was necessary to do this, but that was science for you, and, of course, students.

  As soon as the train arrived at platform two at Big Cabbage several watchmen appeared alongside the guard’s van. Moist looked on as Commander Vimes passed out the captives he had been so awfully kind to, and watched them whisked away under guard in the hurry-up wagon.

  As it disappeared, Vimes said to Moist, ‘We have the names and addresses of their families and they’ll have bodyguards day and night until this damn thing is over. I know Vetinari will huff and puff about the bill but then whenever doesn’t he?’

  Right on schedule, the train pulled away from Big Cabbage, leaving the great dirty distant smog of Ankh-Morpork on the horizon far behind them. Moist had a constant feeling that he was going slightly uphill, which was at least moderately the truth. Things were running as they should, people were settling down for the long haul, and that gave him more time to think. Theoretically, he knew the time to worry was when things were going wrong, but his instinct had a tendency to worry when things were just too good to be true and right now a cumulonimbus of worry was again building over his head; the anvil of the gods was just waiting to drop on him. What had he missed? What had he forgotten? No, everything was going to be all right.