Jingo. Part 35

Vimes slipped the book into a pocket.

"So, Constable Visit, there's a G.o.d on our side, is there?"

"Certainly, sir."

"But probably also a G.o.d on their their side as well?" side as well?"

"Very likely, sir. There's a G.o.d on every side."

"Let's hope they balance out, then."

The Klatchian ship's boat hit the water with the gentlest of splashes. This was because 71-hour Ahmed was standing by the winches with his sword at the ready, which had the effect of making the men lowering the boat take some trouble over their task.

"When we are away you may take the ship into Gebra," he said to the captain.

The captain trembled. "What shall I tell them, wali wali?"

"Tell them the truth...eventually. The commander of the garrison is a man of no breeding and will torture you a little bit. Save up the truth until you need it. That will make him happy. It will help you to say that I forced you."

"Oh, I will. I will will...tell that lie," the captain added quickly.

Ahmed nodded, slid down the rope into the boat and set it adrift.

The crew watched him row through the surf.

This wasn't a nice beach. It was a wrecking coast. Ribcages of broken ships crumbled into the sand. Bones and driftwood and bleached white seaweed mounded along the high tide line. And beyond, the dunes of the real desert rose. Even down here sand stung the eyes and gritted the teeth.

"There's sudden death on that beach," said the first mate, looking over the rail and trying to blink his eyes clear.

"Yes," said the captain. "He's just got out of the boat."

The figure on the beach pulled the other, rec.u.mbent figure out of the boat and dragged him out of reach of the waves. The mate raised his bow.

"I could kill him from here, master. Just say the word."

"How sure are you? Because you'd better be really really sure. First, if you miss him you're dead and, second, if you hit him, you're sure. First, if you miss him you're dead and, second, if you hit him, you're still still dead. Look up there." dead. Look up there."

On the high distant dunes, dark against the sand-filled sky, there were mounted figures. The mate dropped his bow.

"How did they know we were here?"

"Oh, they watch the sea," said the captain. "D'regs like a good shipwreck as much as anyone else. More, in fact. A lot more."

As they turned away from the rail, something leapt from the hull and entered the water with barely a splash.

Detritus tried to lurk in the shade, but there was not a lot of it about. The heat came off the high desert ahead of them like a blowtorch.

"I'm gonna get fick," he muttered.

There was a shout from the lookout.

"He says someone's climbing the dunes," said Carrot. "Carrying someone else, he says."

"Er...female?"

"Look, sir, I know Angua. She's not the useless type. She doesn't stand there and scream helplessly. She makes other people do that."

"Well...if you're sure..." Vimes turned to Jenkins. "Don't bother to chase the ship, captain. Just keep heading for the sh.o.r.e."

"I don't work like that, mister. For one thing, that's a d.a.m.n difficult sh.o.r.e, the wind's always against you, and there's some very nasty currents. Many an incautious sailorman has left his bones to bleach on those sands. No, we'll stand out a little way and you can lower the-well, if we had a boat any more, you could lower it...and we'll drop the anchor, oh, no, tell a lie, it turned out to be too heavy, didn't it-"

"You just keep straight on," said Vimes.

"We'll all be killed."

"Think of it as the lesser of two evils."

"What's the other one?"

Vimes drew his sword.

"Me."

The Boat squeaked through the mysterious depths of the ocean. Leonard spent a lot of time looking out of the tiny windows, particularly interested in pieces of seaweed which, to Sergeant Colon, looked like pieces of seaweed.

"Do you note the fine strands of Dropley's Etoliated Bladderwrack?" said Leonard. "That's the brown stuff. A marvelous growth which, of course, you will see as significant."

"Could we just a.s.sume for the moment that I have neglected my seaweed studies in recent years?" said the Patrician.

"Really? Oh, the loss is entirely yours, I a.s.sure you. The point is is, of course, that the Etoliated Bladderwrack is never usually found growing above thirty fathoms, and it's only ten here."

"Ah." The Patrician flicked through a stack of Leonard's drawings. "And the hieroglyphs-an alphabet of signs and colors. Colors as a language...what a fascinating idea..."

"An emotional emotional intensifier," said Leonard. "But of course we ourselves use something like it. Red for danger and so on. I never did succeed in translating it, though." intensifier," said Leonard. "But of course we ourselves use something like it. Red for danger and so on. I never did succeed in translating it, though."

"Colors as a language..." murmured Lord Vetinari.

Sergeant Colon cleared his throat. "I know something about seaweed, sir."

"Yes, sergeant?"

"Yessir! If it's wet, sir, it means it's going to rain."

"Well done, sergeant," said Lord Vetinari, without turning his head. "I think it is quite possible that I will never forget you said that."

Sergeant Colon beamed. He had Made A Contribution.

n.o.bby nudged him. "What're we doing down here, sarge? I mean, what's it all about? Poking around, looking at weird marks on the rocks, going in and out of caves...and the smell...well..."

"It's not me," said Sergeant Colon.

"Smells like...sulfur..."

Little bubbles streamed past the window.

"It stunk up on the surface, too," n.o.bby went on.

"Nearly finished, gentlemen," said Lord Vetinari, putting the papers aside. "One last little venture and then we can surface. Very well, Leonard...take us underneath underneath."

"Er...aren't we underneath already, sir?" said Colon.

"Only underneath the sea, sergeant."

"Ah. Right." Colon gave this due consideration. "Is there anything else to be under, then, sir?"

"Yes, sergeant. Now we're going under the land."

The beach was a lot closer now. The watchmen couldn't help noticing that the sailors were all hurrying to the blunt end of the ship and hanging on to any small, lightweight and above all buoyant objects they could find.

"This seems close enough," said Vimes. "Right. Stop here."

"Stop here? How?"

"Don't ask me, I'm no sailor. Aren't there some sort of brakes?"

Jenkins stared at him. "You-you landlubber!"

"I thought you never used the word!"

"I never met one like you before! You even think we call the bows the sharp en-"

It was, the crew agreed later, one of the strangest landings in the history of bad seamanship. The shelving of the beach must have been right and the tide as well, because the ship did not so much hit the beach as sail up it, rising out of the water as the keel debarnacled itself on the sand. Finally the forces of wind, water, impetus and friction all met at the point marked "fall over slowly."

It did so, earning the t.i.tle of "world's most laughable shipwreck."

"Well, that might have been worse," said Vimes, when the splintering noises had died away.

He eased himself out of a tangle of canvas and adjusted his helmet with as much aplomb as he could muster.

He heard a groan from the lopsided hold.

"Is dat you, Cheery?"

"Yes, Detritus."

"Is dis me?"

"No!"

"Sorry."

Carrot eased his way down the sloping deck and jumped on to the damp sand. He saluted.

"All present and lightly bruised, sir. Shall we establish a beachhead?"

"A what?"

"We have to dig in, sir."

Vimes looked both ways along the beach, if such a sunny-sounding word could be applied to the forsaken strand. It was really just a hem to the land. Nothing stirred except the heat haze and, in the distance, one or two carrion birds.

"What for?" he said.

"Establish a defensible position. It's just one of those things soldiers do, sir."

Vimes glanced at the birds. They were approaching with a kind of sidling sideways hop, ready to move in just as soon as anyone had been dead for a few days. Then he flicked through Tacticus Tacticus until the word "beachhead" caught his eye. until the word "beachhead" caught his eye.

"It says here 'If you want your men to spend much time wielding a shovel, encourage them to become farmers,'" he said. "So I think we'll press on. He can't have got very far. We'll be back soon."

Jenkins waded out of the surf. He didn't look angry. He was a man who had pa.s.sed through the fires of anger and was now in some strange peaceful bay beyond them. He pointed a quivering finger at his stricken ship and said "Muh...?"

"Pretty good shape, all things considered," said Vimes.

"Muh?"

"I'm sure you and your salty sailors will be able to float it again."

"Muh..."

Jenkins and his wading crew watched the regiment as it slithered and complained its way up the side of the dune. Eventually the crew went into a huddle and drew lots and the cook, who was always unlucky in games of chance, approached the captain.

"Never mind, captain," he said, "we can probably find some decent balks of timber in all this driftwood, and a few days' work with block and tackle should-"