Vimes took a handful of cards. Some of them had gold edging.

'Dem diplomatics all want you to come for drinky-poos an' stories about chickens,' the troll added helpfully.

'Cocktails, I think you'll find,' said Vimes, reading through the pasteboards. 'Hmm, Klatch... Muntab... Genua... Lancre... Lancre? It's a kingdom you could spit across! They've got an embassy here?'

'No, sir, mostly dey've got a letterbox.'

'Will we all fit in?'

'Dey've rented a house for der coronation, sir.'

Vimes dropped the invitations back on to the table.

'I don't think I can face any of this stuff,' he said. 'A man can only drink so much fruit juice and listen to so many bad jokes. Where's the nearest clacks tower, Detritus?'

'About fifteen miles Hubwards, sir.'

'I'd like to find out what's going on back home. I think that this afternoon Lady Sybil and I will have a nice quiet ride in the country. It'll take her mind off things.'

And then he thought, I'll wait until midnight, see?

And it's still only lunchtime.

In the end Vimes took Igor as driver and guide, and the guards Tantony and the one he would forever think of as Colonesque. Skimmer still hadn't returned from whatever nefarious expedition was occupying his time, and Vimes was damned if he'd leave the embassy unguarded.

Yet another word for diplomat, Vimes mused, was 'spy'. The only difference was that the host government knew who you were. The game was to outwit them, presumably.

The sun was warm, the breeze was cold, the mountain air made every peak look as if Vimes could reach out and touch it. Outside the town snow-covered vineyards and farms clung to slopes that in Ankh-Morpork would be called walls, but after a while the pine forests closed in. Here and there, at a curve in the road, the river was visible far below.

Up on the box Igor was crooning a lament.

'He told me Igors heal very fast,' said Lady Sybil.

'They'd have to.'

'Mister Skimmer said they're very gifted surgeons, Sam.'

'Except cosmetically, perhaps.'

The coach slowed.

'Do you come up here a lot, Igor?' said Vimes.

'Mithter Thleep uthed to have me drive over onthe a week to collect methageth, marthter.'

'I'd have thought it'd be easier to have a pickup tower in Bonk.'

'The counthil are dead againtht it, thur.'

'And you?'

'I am very modern in my outlook, thur.'

The tower loomed quite close now. The first twenty feet or so were of stone with narrow, barred windows. Then there was a broad platform from which the main tower grew. It was a sensible arrangement. An enemy would find it hard to break in or set fire to it, there was enough storage room inside to see out a siege, and the enemy would be aware that the lads inside would have signalled for help thirty seconds after the attack began. The company had money. They were like the coaching agents in that respect. If a tower went out of action, someone would be along to ask expensive questions. There was no law here; the kind of people who'd turn up would be inclined to leave a message to the world that towers were not to be touched.

Everyone should know this, and therefore it was odd to see that the big signal arms were stationary.

The hairs rose on Vimes's neck. 'Stay in the carriage, Sybil,' he said.

'Is there something wrong?'

'I'm not sure,' said Vimes, who was sure. He stepped down and nodded to Igor.

'I'm going to have a look inside,' he said. 'If there is any... trouble, you're to get Lady Sybil back to the embassy, all right?'

Vimes leaned back into the coach and, trying not to look at Sybil, lifted up one of the seats and pulled out the sword he had hidden there.

'Sam!' she said accusingly.

'Sorry, dear. I thought I ought to carry a spare.'

There was a bellpull by the door of the tower. Vimes tugged at it and heard a clang somewhere above.

When nothing else happened he tried the door. It swung open.

'Hello?'

There was silence.

'This is the Wa—' Vimes stopped. It wasn't the Watch, was it? Not out here. The badge didn't work. He was just an inquisitive trespassing bastard.

'Anyone there?'

The room was piled high with sacks, boxes and barrels. A wooden stairway led up to the next floor. Vimes climbed up into a combined bedroom and mess room; there were only two bunks, their covers pulled back.

A chair was on the floor. A meal was on the table, knife and fork laid down carefully. On the stove something had boiled dry in an iron pot. Vimes opened the firebox door, and there was a whoomph as the inrushing air rekindled the charred wood.

And, from above, the chink of metal.

He looked at the ladder and trapdoor to the next floor. Anyone climbing it would be presenting their head at a convenient height for a blade or a boot

'Tricky, isn't it, your grace?' said someone above him. 'You'd better come up. Mmm, mmhm.'

'Inigo?'

'It's safe enough, your grace. There's only me here. Mmm.'

'That counts as safe, does it?'

Vimes climbed the ladder. Inigo was sitting at a table, leafing through a stack of papers.

'Where's the crew?'

'That, your grace,' said Inigo, 'is one of the mysteries, mmm, mmm.'

'And the others are—?'

Inigo nodded towards the steps leading upwards. 'See for yourself.'

The controls for the arms had been comprehensively smashed. Laths and bits of wire dangled forlornly from their complex framework.

'Several hours of repair work for skilled men, I'd say,' said Inigo, as Vimes returned.

'What happened here, Inigo?'

'I would say the men who lived here were forced to leave, mmph, mmhm. In some disorder.'

'But it's a fortified tower!'

'So? They have to cut firewood. Oh, the company has rules, and then they put three young men in some lonely tower for weeks at a time and they expect them to act like clockwork people. See the trapdoor up to the controls? That should be locked at all times. Now you, your grace, and myself as well, because we are... are—'

'Bastards?' Vimes supplied.

'Well, yes... mmm... we'd have devised a system that meant the clacks couldn't even be operated unless the trapdoor was shut, wouldn't we?'

'Something like that, yes.'

'And we'd have written into the rules that the presence of any visitor in the tower would, mmhm, be automatically transmitted to the neighbouring towers, too.'

'Probably. That'd be a start.'

'As it is, I suspect that any harmless-looking visitor with a nice fresh apple pie for the lads would be warmly welcomed,' sighed Inigo. 'They do two-month shifts. Nothing to look at but trees, mmm.'

'No blood, not much sign of a struggle,' said Vimes. 'Have you checked outside?'

'There should be a horse in the stable. It's gone. We're more or less on rock here. There's wolf tracks, but there's wolf tracks everywhere around here. And the wind's blown the snow. They've... gone, your grace.'

'Are you sure the men let someone in through the door?' Vimes said. 'Anyone who could land on the platform could be in one of these windows in an instant.'

'A vampire, mmm?'

'It's a thought, isn't it?'

'There's no blood around...'

'It's a shame to waste good food,' said Vimes. 'Think of those poor starving children in Muntab. What are these?'

He pulled a box from under the lower bunk. Inside it were several tubes, about a foot long, open at one end.

' "Badger & Normal, Ankh-Morpork",' he read aloud. ' "Mortar Flare (Red). Light Fuse. Do Not Place In Mouth." It's a firework, Mister Skimmer. I've seen them on ships.'

'Ah, there was something...' Inigo leafed through the book on the table. 'They could send up an emergency flare if there was a big problem. Yes, the tower nearest Ankh-Morpork will send out a couple of men, and a bigger squad comes up from the depot down on the plains. They take a downed tower very seriously.'