Feet of Clay

Chapter 17

Colon backed off, and stopped when something nudged him in the back. It was a pig.
It was no Mr Dreadful. This wasn't the little piggy that went to market, or the little piggy that stayed at home. It would be quite hard to imagine what kind of foot would have a piggy like this, but it would probably be the kind that also had hair and scales and toenails like cashew nuts.
This piggy was the size of a pony. This piggy had tusks. And it wasn't pink. It was a blue-black colour and covered with sharp hair but it did have - let's be fair, thought Colon - little red piggy eyes.
This little piggy looked like the little piggy that killed the boarhounds, disembowelled the horse and ate the huntsman.
Colon turned around, and came face-to-face with a bull like a beef cube on legs. It turned its huge head from side to side so that each rolling eye could get a sight of the sergeant, but it was clear that neither of them liked him very much.
It lowered its head. There wasn't room for it to charge, but it could certainly push.
As the animals crowded around him, Colon took the only way of escape possible.
There were men slumped all over the alley.
'Hello, hello, hello, what's all this, then?' said Carrot.
A man who was holding his arm and groaning looked up at him. 'We were viciously attacked!'
'We don't have time for this,' said Vimes.
'We may have,' said Angua. She tapped him on the shoulder and pointed to the wall opposite, on which was written in a familiar script:
NO MASTER...
Carrot hunched down and spoke to the casualty. 'You were attacked by a golem, were you?' he said.
'Right! Vicious bugger! Just walked out of the fog and went for us, you know what they're like!'
Carrot gave the man a cheerful smile. Then his gaze travelled along the man's body to the big hammer lying in the gutter, and moved from that to the other tools strewn around the scene of the fight. Several had their handles broken. There was a long crowbar, bent nearly into a circle.
'It's lucky you were all so well armed, ' he said.
'It turned on us, ' said the man. He tried to snap his fingers. 'Just like that - aargh!'
'You seem to have hurt your fingers...'
'You're right!'
'It's just that I don't understand how it could have turned on you and just walked out of the fog,' said Carrot.
'Everyone knows they're not allowed to fight back!'
' Fight back ,' Carrot repeated.
'It's not right, them walking around the streets like that,' the man muttered, looking away.
There was the sound of running feet behind them and a couple of men in blood-stained aprons caught up with them. 'It went that way!' one yelled. 'You'll be able to catch up with it if you hurry!'
'Come on, don't hang around! What do we pay our taxes for?' said the other.
'It went all round the cattle yards and let everything out. Everything*. You can't move on Pigsty Hill!'
'A golem let all the cattle out?' said Vimes. 'What for?'
'How should I know? It took the yudasgoat out of Sock's slaughterhouse so half the damn things are following it around! And then it went and put old Fosdyke in his sausage machine - '
'What?'
'Oh, it didn't turn the handle. It just shoved a handful of parsley in his mouth, dropped an onion down his trousers, covered him in oatmeal and dropped him in the hopper!'
Angua's shoulders started to shake. Even Vimes grinned.
'And then it went into the poultry merchant's, grabbed Mr Terwillie, and' - the man stopped, aware there was a lady present, even if she was making snorting noises while trying not to laugh, and continued in a mumble - 'made use of some sage and onion. If you know what I mean...'
'You mean he - ?' Vimes began.
'Yes!'
His companion nodded. 'Poor old Terwillie won't be able to look sage and onion in the face again, I reckon.'
'By the sound of it, that's the last thing he'll do,' said Vimes.
Angua had to turn her back.
Tell him about what happened in your pork butcher's,' said the man's companion.
'I don't think you'll need to/ said Vimes. 'I'm seeing a pattern here.'
'Right! And poor young Sid's only an apprentice and didn't deserve what it done to him!'
'Oh, dear,' said Carrot. 'Er...I think I've got an ointment that might be - '
'Will it help with the apple?' the man demanded.
'It shoved an apple in his mouth?'
'Wrong!'
Vimes winced. 'Ouch...'
'What's going to be done, eh?' said the butcher, his face a few inches from Vimes's.
'Well, if you can get a grip on the stem - '
'I'm serious! What are you going to do? I'm a taxpayer and I know my rights!'
He prodded Vimes in the breastplate. Vimes's expression went wooden. He looked down at the finger, and then back up at the man's large red nose.
'In that case,' said Vimes, 'I suggest you take another apple and - '
'Er, excuse me,' said Carrot loudly, 'You're Mr Maxilotte, aren't you? Got a shop in the Shambles?'
'Yes, that's right. What of it?'
'It's just that I don't recall seeing your name on the register of taxpayers, which is very odd because you said you were a taxpayer, but of course you wouldn't lie about a thing like that and anyway when you paid your taxes they would have given you a receipt because that's the law and I'm sure you'd be able to find it if you looked - '
The butcher lowered his finger. 'Er, yes...'
'I could come and help you if you'd like,' said Carrot.
The butcher gave Vimes a despairing look.
'He really does read that stuff,' said Vimes. 'For pleasure. Carrot, why don't you scarp - ? My gods, what the hell is that?
There was a bellow further up the street.
Something big and muddy was approaching at a sort of menacing amble. In the gloom it looked vaguely like a very fat centaur, half-man, half... in fact it was, he realized as it bounced nearer, half-Colon, half-bull.
Sergeant Colon had lost his helmet and had a certain look about him that suggested he had been close to the soil.
As the massive bull cantered past, the sergeant rolled his eyes wildly and said, 'I daren't get off! I daren't get off!'
'How did you get on?' shouted Vimes.
'It wasn't easy, sir! I just grabbed the 'orns, sir, next minute I was on its back!'
'Well, hang on!'
'Yes, sir! Hanging on sir!'
Rogers the bulls were angry and bewildered, which counts as the basic state of mind for full-grown bulls.[16]
But they had a particular reason. Beef cattle have a religion. They are deeply spiritual animals. They believe that good and obedient cattle go to a better place when they die, through a magic door. They don't know what happens next, but they've heard that it involves really good eating and, for some reason, horseradish.
Rogers had been quite looking forward to it. They were getting a bit creaky these days, and cows seemed to run faster than they had done when they were lads. They could just taste that heavenly horseradish...
And instead they'd been herded into a crowded pen for a day and then the gate had been opened and there'd been animals everywhere and this did not look like the Promised Lard.
And someone was on their back. They'd tried to buck him off a few times. In Rogers' heyday the impudent man would by now be a few stringy red stains on the ground, but finally the arthritic bulls had given up until such time as they could find a handy tree on which to scrape him off.
They just wished the wretched man would stop yelling.
Vimes took a few steps after the bull, and then turned.
'Carrot? Angua? You two get down to Carry's tallow works. Just keep an eye on it until we get there, understand? Spy out the place but don't go in, understand? Right? Do not in any circumstances move in. Do I make myself clear? Just remain in the area. Right?'
'Yes, sir,' said Carrot.
'Detritus, let's get Fred off that thing.'
The crowds were melting away ahead of the bull. A ton of pedigree bull does not experience traffic congestion, at least not for any length of time.
'Can't you jump off, Fred?' Vimes yelled, as he ran along behind.
'I do not wish to give that a try, sir!'
'Well, can you steer it?'
'How, sir?'
'Take the bull by the horns, man!'
Colon tentatively reached out and took a horn in each hand. Rogers the bulls turned their head and nearly pulled him off.
'He's a bit stronger than me, sir! Quite a lot stronger actually, sir!'
'I could shoot it through der head wid my bow, Mr Vimes,' said Detritus, flourishing his converted siege weapon.
'This is a crowded street, Sergeant. It might hit an innocent person, even in Ankh-Morpork.'
'Sorry, sir.' Detritus brightened. 'But if it did we could always say they'd bin guilty of somethin', sir?'
'No, that... What's that chicken doing?'
A small black bantam cock raced up the street, ran between the bull's legs and skidded to a halt just in front of Rogers. A smaller figure jumped off its back, leapt up, caught hold of the ring through the bull's nose, swung up further until it was in the mass of curls on the bull's forehead, and then took firm hold of a lock of hair in each tiny hand.
'It looks like Wee Mad Arthur der ger-nome, sir,' said Detritus. 'He... tryin' to nut der bull...'
There was a noise like a slow woodpecker working on a particularly difficult tree, and it punctuated a litany of complaints from somewhere between the animal's eyes.
'Take that, yer big lump that yez are...'
The bulls stopped. They tried to turn their head so that one or other of the Rogerses could see what the hell it was that was hammering at their foreheads, and might as well have tried looking down their own ears.
They staggered backwards.
'Fred,' Vimes whispered. 'You slip off its back while it's busy.'
With a panicky look, Sergeant Colon swung a leg over the bull's huge back and slid down to the ground. Vimes grabbed him and hustled him into a doorway. Then he hustled him out again. A doorway was far too confined a space in which to be anywhere near Fred Colon.
'Why are you all covered in crap, Fred?'
'Well, sir, you know that creek that you're up without a paddle? It started there and it's got worse,
sir.
'Good grief. Worse than that?'
'Permission to go and have a bath, sir?'
'No, but you could stand back a few more feet. What happened to your helmet?'
'Last time I saw it, it was on a sheep, sir. Sir, I was tied up and shoved in a cellar and heroically broke free, sir! And I was chased by one of them golems, sir!'
'Where was this?'
Colon had hoped he wouldn't be asked that. 'It was a place in the Shambles,' he said. 'It was foggy, so I - '
Vimes grabbed Colon's wrists. 'What's this?'
They tied me up with string, sir! But at great pers'nal risk of life and limb I - '
This doesn't look like string to me,' said Vimes.
'No, sir?'
'No, this looks like... candlewick.'
Colon looked blank.
That a Clue, sir?' he said, hopefully.
There was a splatting noise as Vimes slapped him on the back. 'Well done, Fred,' he said, wiping his hand on his trousers. 'It's certainly a corroboration.'
That's what I thought!' said Colon quickly. This is a corrobolaration and I've got to get it to Commander Vimes as soon as possible regardless of - '
'Why's that gnome nutting that bull, Fred?'
That's Wee Mad Arthur, sir. We owe him a dollar. He was ... of some help, sir.'
Rogers the bulls were on their knees, dazed and bewildered. It wasn't that Wee Mad Arthur was capable of delivering a killing blow, but he just didn't stop. After a while the noise and the thumping got on people's nerves.
'Should we help him?' said Vimes.
'Looks like he's doing all right by himself, sir,' said Colon.
Wee Mad Arthur looked up and grinned. 'One dollar, right?' he shouted. 'No welching or I'll come after yez! One of these buggers trod on me grandpa once!'
'Was he hurt?'
'He got one of his horns twisted right orf!'
Vimes took Sergeant Colon firmly by the arm. 'Come on, Fred, it's all hitting the street now!'
'Right, sir! And most of it's splashing!'
'I say! You there! You're a watchman, aren't you? Come over here!'
Vimes turned. A man had pushed his way through the crowds.
On the whole, Colon reflected, it was just possible that the worst moment of his life hadn't happened yet. Vimes tended to react in a ballistic way to words like 'I say! You there!' when uttered in a certain kind of neighing voice.
The speaker had an aristocratic look about him, and the angry air of a man not accustomed to the rigours of life who has just found one happening to him.
Vimes saluted smartly. 'Yessir! I'm a watchman, sir!'
'Well, just you come along with me and arrest this thing. It's disturbing the workers.'
'What thing, sir?'
'A golem, man! Walked into the factory as bold as you like and started painting on the damn walls!'
'What factory, sir?'
'You come with me, my man. I happen to be a very good friend of your commander and I can't say I like your attitude.'
'Sorry about that, sir,' said Vimes, with a cheerfulness that Sergeant Colon had come to dread.
There was a nondescript factory on the other side of the street. The man strode in.
'Er ... he said golem , sir,' murmured Colon.
Vimes had known Fred Colon a long time. 'Yes, Fred, so it's vitally important for you to stay on guard out here,' he said.
The relief rose off Colon like steam. 'That's right, sir!' he said.
The factory was full of sewing-machines. People were sitting meekly in front of them. It was the sort of thing the guilds hated, but since the Guild of Seamstresses didn't take all that much interest in sewing there was no one to object. Endless belts led up from each machine to pulleys on a long spindle near the roof, which in turn were driven by ... Vimes's eyes followed it down the length of the workshop ... a treadmill, now stationary and somewhat broken. A couple of golems were standing forlornly alongside it, looking lost.
There was a hole in the wall quite close to it and, above it, someone had written in red paint:
WORKERS! NO MASTERS BUT YOURSELVES!
Vimes grinned.
'It smashed its way in, broke the treadmill, pulled my golems out, painted that stupid message on the wall and stamped out again!' said the man behind him.
'Hmm, yes, I see. A lot of people use oxen in their treadmills,' said Vimes mildly.
'What's that got to do with it? Anyway, cattle can't keep going twenty-four hours a day.'
Vimes's gaze worked its way along the rows of workers. Their faces had that worried, Cockbill Street look that you got when you were cursed with pride as well as poverty.
'No, indeed,' he said. 'Most of the clothing workshops are up at Nap Hill, but the wages are cheaper down here, aren't they?'
'People are jolly glad to get the work!'
'Yes,' said Vimes, looking at the faces again. 'Glad.' At the far end of the factory, he noted, the golems were trying to rebuild their treadmill.
'Now you listen to me, what I want you to do is - ' the factory-owner began.
Vimes's hand gripped his collar and dragged him forward until his face was a few inches from Vimes's own.
'No, you listen to me,' hissed Vimes. 'I mix with crooks and thieves and thugs all day and that doesn't worry me at all but after two minutes with you I need a bath. And if I find that damn golem I'll shake its damn hand, you hear me?'
To the surprise of that part of Vimes that wasn't raging, the man found enough courage to say 'How dare you! You're supposed to be the law!'
Vimes's furious finger almost went up the man's nose.
'Where shall I start?' he yelled. He glared at the two golems. 'And why are you clowns repairing the treadmill?' he shouted. 'Good grief, haven't got the sense you were bor -  Haven't you got any sense?'
He stormed out of the building. Sergeant Colon stopped trying to scrape himself clean and ran to catch up with him.
'I heard some people say they saw a golem come out of the other door, sir,' he said. 'It was a red one. You know, red clay. But the one that was after me was white, sir. Are you angry, Sam?'
'Who's that man who owns that place?'
'That's Mr Catterail, sir. You know, he's always writing you letters about there being too many what he calls lesser races in the Watch. You know... trolls and dwarfs...'
The sergeant had to trot to keep up with him.
'Get some zombies,' said Vimes.
'You've always been dead against zombies, excuse my pune,' said Sergeant Colon.
'Any want to join, are there?'
'Oh, yessir. Couple of good lads, sir, and but for the grey skin hangin' off 'em you'd swear they hadn't been buried five minutes.'
'Swear them in tomorrow.'
'Right, sir. Good idea. And of course it's a great saving not having to include them in the pension plan.'
They can patrol up on Kings Down. After all, they're only human.'
'Right, sir.' When Sam is in these moods, Colon thought, you agree with everything. 'You're really getting the hang of this affirmative action stuff, eh sir?'
'Right now I'd swear in a gorgon!'
'There's always Mr Bleakley, sir, he's getting fed up with working in the kosher butcher's and - '
'But no vampires. Never any vampires. Now let's get a move on, Fred.'
Nobby Nobbs ought to have known. That's what he told himself as he scuttled through the streets. All that stuff about kings and stuff- they'd wanted him to ...
It was a terrible thought...
Volunteer.
Nobby had spent a lifetime in one uniform or another. And one of the most basic lessons he'd learned was that men with red faces and plummy voices never ever gave cushy numbers to the likes of Nobby. They'd ask for volunteers to do something 'big and clean' and you'd end up scrubbing some damn great drawbridge; they'd say, 'Anyone here like good food?' and you'd be peeling potatoes for a week. You never ever volunteered. Not even if a sergeant stood there and said, 'We need someone to drink alcohol, bottles of, and make love, passionate, to women, for the use of.' There was always a snag. If a choir of angels asked for volunteers for Paradise to step forward, Nobby knew enough to take one smart pace to the rear.
When the call came for Corporal Nobbs, it would not find him wanting. It would not find him at all.
Nobby avoided a herd of pigs in the middle of the street.
Even Mr Vimes never expected him to volunteer. He respected Nobby's pride.
Nobby's head ached. It must've been the quail's eggs, he was sure. They couldn't be healthy birds to lay titchy eggs like that.
He sidled past a cow that had got its head stuck in someone's window.
Nobby as king? Oh, yes. No one ever gave a Nobbs anything except maybe a skin disease or sixty lashes. It was a dog-eat-Nobbs world, right enough. If there were to be a world competition for losers, a Nobbs would come firs -  last.
He stopped running and went to earth in a doorway. In its welcome shadows he extracted a very short cigarette end from behind his ear and lit it.
Now that he felt safe enough to think about more than flight he wondered about all the animals that seemed to be on the streets. Unlike the family tree that had borne Fred Colon as its fruit, the creeping vine of the Nobbses had flourished only within city walls. Nobby was vaguely aware of animals as being food in a primary stage and left it at that. But he was pretty sure they weren't supposed to be wandering around untidily like this.
Gangs of men were trying to round them up. Since they were tired and working at cross-purposes, and the animals were hungry and bewildered, all that was happening was that the streets were getting a lot muddier.
Nobby became aware that he was not alone in the doorway.
He looked down.
Also lurking in the shadows was a goat. It was unkempt and smelly, but it turned its head and gave Nobby the most knowing look he'd ever seen on the face of an animal. Unexpectedly, and most uncharacteristically, Nobby was struck by a surge of fellow-rfeeling.
He pinched out the end of his cigarette and passed it down to the goat, which ate it.
'You and me both,' said Nobby.
Miscellaneous livestock scattered madly as Carrot, Angua and Cheri made their way down the Shambles. They especially tried to keep away from Angua. It seemed to Cheri that an invisible barrier was advancing in front of them. Some animals tried to climb walls or scattered madly into side alleys.
'Why are they so scared?' said Cheri.
'Can't imagine,' said Angua.
A few maddened sheep ran away from them as they walked around the candle-factory. Light from its high windows indicated that candlemaking continued all night.
They make nearly half a million candles every twenty-four hours,' said Carrot. 'I heard they've got very advanced machinery. It sounds very interesting. I'd love to see it.'
At the rear of the premises light blazed out into the fog. Crates of candles were being manhandled on to a succession of carts.
'Looks normal enough,' said Carrot, as they eased themselves into a conveniently shadowy doorway. 'Busy, though.'
'I don't see what good this is going to do,' said Angua. 'As soon as they see us they can destroy any evidence. And, even if we find arsenic, so what? There's no crime in owning arsenic, is there?'
'Er ... is there a crime in owning that? whispered Cheri.
A golem was walking slowly up the alley. It was quite unlike any other golem they had seen. The others were ancient and had repaired themselves so many times they were as shapeless as a gingerbread man, but this one looked like a human, or at least like humans wished they could look. It resembled a statue made of white clay. Around its head, part of the very design, was a crown.
'I was right,' murmured Carrot. 'They did make themselves a golem. The poor devils. They thought a king would make them free.'
'Look at its legs,' said Angua.
As the golem walked, lines of red light appeared and disappeared all over its legs, and across its body and arms.
'It's cracking,' she said.
'I knew you couldn't bake pottery in an old bread oven!' said Cheri. 'It's not the right shapel'
The golem pushed open a door and disappeared into the factory.
'Let's go,' said Carrot.
'Commander Vimes told us to wait for him,' said Angua.
'Yes, but we don't know what might be going on in there,' said Carrot. 'Besides, he likes us to use our initiative. We can't just hang around now.'
He darted across the alley and opened the door.
There were crates piled inside, with a narrow passageway between them. From all around them, but slightly muffled by the crates, came the clicking and rattling of the factory. The air smelled of hot wax.
Cheri was aware of a whispered conversation going on several feet above her little round helmet.
'I wish Mr Vimes hadn't wanted us to bring her. Supposing something happens to her?'
'What are you talking about?'
'Well... you know... she's a girl.'
'So what? There's at least three female dwarfs in the Watch already and you don't worry about them.'
'Oh, come on ... name one.'
'Lars Skulldrinker,for a start.'
'No! Really?'
'Are you calling this nose a liar?'
'But he broke up a fight in the Miner's Arms single-handedly last week!'
' Well? Why do you assume females are weaker? You wouldn't worry about me taking on a vicious bar crowd by myself.'
'I'd give aid where necessary.'
' To me or to them?'
'That's unfair!'
'Is it?'
'I wouldn't help them unless you got really rough.'
'Ah, so? And they say chivalry is dead...'
'Anyway, Cheri is...a bit different. I'm sure he... she's good at alchemy, but we'd better watch her back in a fight. Hold on...'
They'd stepped out into the factory.
Candles whirled overhead - hundreds of them, thousands of them - dangling by their wicks from an endless belt of complex wooden links that switch-backed its way up and down the long hall.
'I heard about this,' said Carrot. 'It's called a producing line. It's a way of making thousands of things that are all the same. But look at the speed! I'm amazed the treadmill can - '
Angua pointed. There was a treadmill creaking around beside her, but there was nothing inside it.
'Something's got to be powering all this,' said Angua.
Carrot pointed. Further up the hall the switchbacks of the line converged in a complicated knot. There was a figure somewhere in the middle, arms moving in a blur.
Just beside Carrot the line ended at a big wooden hopper. Candles cascaded into it. No one had been emptying it, and they were tumbling over the pile and rolling on to the floor.
'Cheri,' said Carrot. 'Do you know how to use any kind of weapon?'
'Er... no, Captain Carrot.' 'Right. You just wait in the alley, then. I don't want any harm coming to you.' She scuttled off, looking relieved. Angua sniffed the air. 'There's been a vampire here,' she said.
'I think we'd - ' Carrot began. 'I knew you'd find out! I wish I'd never bought the damned thing! I've got a bow! I warn you, I've got a crossbow!'
They turned. 'Ah, Mr Carry,' said Carrot cheerfully. He produced his badge. 'Captain Carrot, Ankh-Morpork City Watch - '
'I know who you are! I know who you are! And what you are, too! I knew you'd come! I've got a bow and I'm not afraid to use it!' The crossbow's point moved uncertainly, proving him a liar. 'Really?' said Angua. 'What we are?' 'I didn't even want to get involved!' said Carry. 'It killed those old men, didn't it?'
'Yes,' said Carrot.
'Why? I didn't tell it to!'
'Because they helped make it, I think,' said Carrot. 'It knew who to blame.'
The golems sold it to me!' said Carry. 'I thought it'd help build up the business but the damned thing won't stop - '
He glanced up at the line of candles whirring overhead, but jerked his head back before Angua could move.
'Works hard, does it?'
'Hah!' But Carry didn't look like a man enjoying a joke. He looked like a man in private torment. 'I've laid off everyone except the girls in the packing department, and they're on three shifts and overtime! I've got four men out looking for tallow, two negotiating for wicks and three trying to buy more storage space!'
'Then get it to stop making candles,' said Carrot.
'It goes off into the streets when we run out of tallow! You want it walking around looking for something to do? Hey, you two stay together!' Carry added urgently, waving the crossbow,