"Er...perhaps a sherry?" she said.

"Certainly. You may leave us, Igor. Isn't he a treasure?" she added, as Igor retired.

"He certainly looks as though he's just been dug up," said Vimes. This was not going according to his mental script.

"Oh, all Igors look like that. He's been in the family for almost two hundred years. Most of him, anyvay."

"Really...?"

"Extremely popular with the young ladies, for some reason. All Igors are. I've found it best not to speculate vhy." Lady Margolotta gave Vimes a bright smile. "Vell, here's to your stay, Sir Samuel."

"You know a lot about me," said Vimes weakly.

"Most of it good, I a.s.sure you," she said. "Although you're inclined to forget your papervork, you get exasperated easily, you are far too sentimental, you regret your own lack of education and distrust erudition in others, you are immensely proud of your city and you vonder if you may be a cla.s.s traitor. My...friends in Ankh-Morpork were unable to find out anything very bad and, believe me, they are pretty good at that sort of thing. And you loathe vampires."

"I-"

"Quite understandable. Ve're dreadful people, by and large."

"But you you-"

"I try to look on the bright side," said Lady Margolotta. "But, anyvay-how did you like the king?"

"He's very...quiet," said Vimes the diplomat.

"Try cunning. He vill have found out a lot more about you than you did about him, I'm sure. Vould you like a biscuit? I don't eat them myself, of course, but there's a little man down in the town that does vonderful chocolate...Igor?"

"Yes, mithtreth," said Igor. Vimes nearly sprayed his lemonade across the room.

"He was out of the room!" he said. "I saw him go! I heard the door shut!"

"Igor has strange vays. Do give Sir Samuel a napkin, Igor."

"You said the king was cunning," said Vimes, mopping lemonade off his breeches. Igor put down a plate of biscuits and shuffled out of the room.

"Did I? No, I don't think I could possibly have said that. It's not the diplomatic thing to say," said Lady Margolotta smoothly. "I'm sure ve all support the new Low King, the choice of dvarfdom in general, even if they thought they vere getting a traditionalist and got an unknown quant.i.ty."

"Did you just say that last bit?" said Vimes, awash on a sea of diplomacy and damp trousers.

"Absolutely not. You know their Scone of Stone has been stolen?"

"They say it hasn't," said Vimes.

"Do you believe them?"

"No."

"The coronation cannot go ahead without it, did you know that?"

"We'll have to wait until they bake another one?" said Vimes.

"No. There will be no more Low Kings," said Lady Margolotta. "Legitimacy, you see. The Scone represents continuity all the vay to B'hrian Bloodaxe. They say he sat on it vhile it vas still soft and left his impression, as it vere."

"You mean kingship has pa.s.sed from bu-backside to backside?"

"Humans believe in crowns, don't they?"

"Yes, but at least they're at the other end!"

"Thrones, then." Lady Margolotta sighed. "People set such store by strange things. Crowns. Relics. Garlic...Anyvay...there will be a civil var over the leadership which Albrecht vill surely vin, and he'll cease all trading with Ankh-Morpork. Did you know that? He thinks the place is evil."

"I know know it is," said Vimes. "And I it is," said Vimes. "And I live live there." there."

"I've heard that he plans to declare all dvarfs there d'hrarak d'hrarak," the vampire went on.

Vimes heard Cheery gasp. "It means 'not dwarfs.'"

"That's very big of him," said Vimes. "I shouldn't think our lads'll worry about that."

"Um," said Cheery.

"Quite so. The young lady looks vorried, and you'd do vell to listen to her, Sir Samuel."

"Excuse me," said Vimes, "But what is all this to you?"

"You really don't drink at all, Sir Samuel?"

"No."

"Not even vun?"

"No," said Vimes, more sharply. "You'd know that, if you knew anything about-"

"Yet you keep half a bottle in your bottom drawer as a sort of permanent test," said Lady Margolotta. "Now that, Sir Samuel, suggests a man who vears his hair shirts on the inside."

"I want to know who's been saying all this!"

Lady Margolotta sighed. Vimes got the impression that he'd failed another test. "I am rich, Sir Samuel. Vampires tend to be. Didn't you know? Lord Vetinari, I know, believes that information is currency. But everyone everyone knows that currency has knows that currency has alvays alvays been information. Money doesn't need to talk, it merely has to listen." been information. Money doesn't need to talk, it merely has to listen."

She stopped and sat watching Vimes, as if she'd suddenly decided to listen. Vimes moved uncomfortably under the steady gaze.

"How is Havelock Vetinari?" she said.

"The Patrician? Oh...fine."

"He must be quite old now."

"I've never really been certain how old he is," said Vimes. "About my age, I suppose."

Then she stood up suddenly. "This has has been an interesting meeting, Sir Samuel. I trust Lady Sybil is vell?" been an interesting meeting, Sir Samuel. I trust Lady Sybil is vell?"

"Er...yes."

"Good. I am so glad. Ve vill meet again, I am sure. Igor vill see you out. My regards to the baron, vhen you see him. Pat him on the head for me."

"What the h.e.l.l was that all about, Cheery?" said Vimes, as the coach set off down the hill again.

"Which bit, sir?"

"Practically all of it, really. Why should Ankh-Morpork dwarfs object if someone says they're not dwarfs? They know know they're dwarfs." they're dwarfs."

"They won't be subject to dwarf law, sir."

"I didn't know they were."

"I mean...it's like...how you live your life, sir. Marriages, burials...that sort of thing. Marriages won't be legal. Old dwarfs won't be allowed to be buried back home. And that'd be terrible. Every dwarf dreams of going back home when he's old and starting up a little mine."

"Every dwarf? Even the ones who were born born in Ankh-Morpork?" in Ankh-Morpork?"

"Home can mean all sorts of things, sir," said Cheery. "There's other things, too. Contracts won't be valid. Dwarfs like good solid rules, sir."

"We've got laws in Ankh-Morpork, too. More or less."

"Between themselves dwarfs prefer to use their own, sir."

"I bet the Copperhead dwarfs won't like it if that happens."

"Yes, sir. There'll be a split. And another war." She sighed.

"But why was she going on about drink?"

"I don't know, sir."

"I don't like 'em. Never have, never will."

"Yes, sir."

"Did you see that rat?"

"Yes, sir."

"I think she was laughing at me."

The coach rolled through the streets of Bonk once more.

"How big a war?"

"Probably a worse one than the one fifty years ago, I expect," said Cheery.

"I don't recall people talking about that one," said Vimes.

"Most humans didn't know about it," said Cheery. "It mostly took place underground. Under mining pa.s.sages and digging invasion tunnels and so on. Perhaps a few houses fell into mysterious holes and people didn't get their coal, but that was about it."

"You mean dwarfs just try to collapse mines on other dwarfs?"

"Oh yes."

"I thought you were all law-abiding?"

"Oh yes, sir. Very law-abiding. Just not very merciful."

Ye G.o.ds, thought Vimes, as the coach rolled over the bridge on the center of the town, I haven't been sent to a coronation. I've been sent to a war that hasn't started yet.

He glanced up. Tantony was watching him intently, but looked away quickly.

Lady Margolotta watched the coach until it reached the gates of the town. She stood back a little from the window. There was a slight overcast, but habits of preservation died hard.

"What a very angry angry man, Igor." man, Igor."

"Yeth, mithtreth."

"You can see it piling up behind his patience. I vonder how far he can be pushed?"

"I've brought the hearthe around, mithreth."

"Oh, is it that late? Ve had better be going, then. Everyone feels despondent if I miss a meeting, you know."

The castle on the other side of the valley was much more rugged than Lady Margolotta's confectionery item. Even so, the gates were wide open and didn't look as though they were often closed.

The main door was tall and heavy-looking. The only thing that suggested it hadn't been ordered for the standard castle catalog was the smaller, narrow door, a few feet high, set into it.

"What's that for?" said Vimes. "Even a dwarf would b.u.mp their head."

"I suppose it depends on what shape you are when you go in," said Cheery darkly.

The main door opened as soon as Vimes had laid his hand on the wolf's-head knocker. But he was ready this time.

"Good morning, Igor," he said.

"Good day, Your Exthelency," said Igor, bowing.