“That was me hitting him,” said Vimes helpfully.

“You broke his arm too?”

“That's right.”

“You made a very neat job of it. Easy to set it and plaster him up. Is there something wrong?”

Vimes was still staring at the instruments. “You use all these?” he said.

“Yes. Some of them are experimental, though,” said Lawn, busying himself at his work table.

“Well, I'd hate you to use this on me,” said Vimes, picking a strange instrument like a couple of paddles tied with string. Lawn sighed.

“Sergeant, there are no circumstances where the things you're holding could possibly be used on you,” he said, his hands working busily. “They are…of a feminine nature.”

“For the seamstresses?” said Vimes, putting the pliers down in a hurry.

“Those things? No, the ladies of the night take pride these days in never requiring that sort of thing. My work with them is more of, shall we say, a preventative nature.”

“Teaching them to use thimbles, that sort of thing?” said Vimes.

“Yes, it's amazing how far you can push a metaphor, isn't it…”

Vimes prodded the paddles again. They were quite alarming.

“You're married, sergeant?” said Lawn. “Was Rosie right?”

“Er…yes. My wife is, er, elsewhere, though.” He picked the things up and dropped them hastily again, with a clatter.

“Well, it's just as well to be aware that giving birth isn't like shelling peas,” said the doctor.

“I should bloody well hope not!”

“Although I have to say the midwives seldom refer anything to me. They say men shouldn't fish around where they don't belong. We might as well be living in caves.”

Lawn looked down at his patient. “In the words of the philosopher Sceptum, the founder of my profession: am I going to get paid for this?”

Vimes investigated the moneybag on the man's belt.

“Will six dollars do it?” he said.

“Why would the Unmentionables attack you, sergeant? You're a policeman.”

“I am, but they aren't. Don't you know about them?”

“I've patched up a few of their guests, yes,” said Lawn, and Vimes noted the caution. It didn't pay to know too much in this town. “People with curious dislocations, hot wax burns…that sort of thing—”

“Well, I had a little brush with Captain Swing last night,” Vimes said, “and he was as polite as hell to me about it, but I'd bet my boots he knows that this lad and his friend came after me. That's his style. He probably wanted to see what I'd do.”

“He's not the only one interested in you,” said Lawn. “I got a message that Rosie Palm wants to see you. Well, I assume she meant you. ‘That ungrateful bastard’ was the actual term she used.”

“I think I owe her some money,” said Vimes, “but I've no idea how much.”

“Don't ask me,” said Lawn, smoothing the plaster with his hand. “She generally names her price up front.”

“I mean the finder's fee, or whatever it was!”

“Yes, I know. Can't help you there, I'm afraid,” said Lawn.

Vimes watched him working for a while, and said, “Know anything about Miss Battye?”

“The seamstress? She hasn't been here long.”

“And she's really a seamstress?”

“For the sake of precision,” said Dr Lawn, “let us say she's a needlewoman. Apparently she heard there was a lot of work for seamstresses in the big city and had one or two amusing misunderstandings before someone told her exactly what was meant. One of them involved me removing a crochet hook from a man's ear last week. Now she just hangs out with the rest of the girls.”

“Why?”

“Because she's making a fortune, that's why,” said the doctor. “Hasn't it ever occurred to you, sergeant, that sometimes people go to a massage parlour for a real massage, for example? There's ladies all over this city with discreet signs up that say things like ‘Trousers repaired while you wait’ and a small but significant number of men make the same mistake as Sandra. There's lots of men work here in the city and leave their wives back home and sometimes, you know, a man feels these…urges. Like, for a sock without holes and a shirt with more than one button. The ladies pass on the work. Apparently it's quite hard to find a really good needlewoman in this city. They don't like being confused with, er, seamstresses.”

“I just wondered why she hangs around street corners after curfew with a big sewing basket…” said Vimes.

Lawn shrugged. “Can't help you there. Right, I've finished with this gentleman. It'd be helpful if he lies still for a while.” He indicated the racks of bottles behind him. “About how long will you want him to lie still for?”

“You can do that?”

“Oh, yes. It's not accepted Ankh-Morpork medical practice, but since Anhk-Morpork medical practice would consist of hitting him on the head with a mallet he's probably getting the best of the deal.”

“No, I meant that you doctors aren't supposed to hurt people, are you?”

“Only in the course of normal incompetence. But I don't mind sending him to sleepy land for another twenty minutes. Of course, if you want to wham him with the mallet I can't stop you. The last guest of Swing I treated had several fingers pointing entirely the wrong way. So if you'd like to give him a few wallops for good luck I could point out some quite sensitive areas—”

“No thanks. I'll just haul him out the back way and drop him in an alley.”

“Is that all?”

“No. Then…I'll sign my name on his damn plaster cast. So he sees it when he wakes up. In bloody big letters so it won't rub off.”

“Now that's what I call a sensitive area,” said Lawn. “You're an interesting man, sergeant. You make enemies like a craftsman.”

“I've never been interested in needlework,” said Vimes, hoisting the man on his shoulder. “But what sort of things would a needlewoman have in her workbasket, do you think?”

“Oh, I don't know. Needles, thread, scissors, wool…that kind of thing,” said Mossy Lawn.

“Not very heavy things, then?” said Vimes.

“Not really. Why d'you ask?”

“Oh, no reason,” said Vimes, making a small mental note. “Just a thought. I'll go and drop off our friend here while I've still got some mist to lurk in.”

“Fine. I'll have breakfast on when you get back. It's liver. Calf's.”

The Beast remembers. This time, Vimes slept soundly.

He had always found it easier to sleep during the day. Twenty-five years on nights had ground their nocturnal groove in his brain. Darkness was easier, somehow. He knew how to stand still, a talent that few possess, and how to merge into the shadows. How to guard, in fact, and see without being seen.

He remembered Findthee Swing. A lot of it was history. The revolt would have happened with Swing or without him but he was, as it were, the tip of the boil.

He'd been trained at the Assassins' School and should never have been allowed to join the Watch. He had too much brain to be a copper. At least, too much of the wrong kind of brain. But Swing had impressed Winder with his theories, had been let in as a sergeant and then was promoted to captain immediately. Vimes had never known why; it was probably because the officers were offended at seeing such a fine genn'lman pounding the streets with the rest of the oiks. Besides, he had a weak chest, or something.

Vimes wasn't against intellect. Anyone with enough savvy to let go of a doorknob could be a street monster in the old days, but to make it above sergeant you needed a grab-bag of guile, cunning and street wisdom that could pass for “intelligence” in a poor light.

Swing, though, started in the wrong place. He didn't look around, and watch and learn, and then say, “This is how people are, how do we deal with it?” No, he sat and thought: “This is how the people ought to be, how do we change them?” And that was a good enough thought for a priest but not for a copper, because Swing's patient, pedantic way of operating had turned policing on its head.