Free Thud! by Terry Pratchett Page B

dwarfs. There were no windows; there was nothing outside that a deep-downer could possibly want to see.
    The city dwarfs regarded them with awe, respect, and, it had to be said, a certain amount of embarrassment, like some honored but slightly loopy relative. Because somewhere in the head of every city dwarf there was a little voice that said, You should live in a mine, you should be in the mountains, you shouldn’t walk under open skies, you should be a real dwarf . In other words, you shouldn’t really be working in your uncle’s pigment-and-dye factory in Dolly Sisters. However, since you were , you could at least try to think like a proper dwarf. And part of that meant being guided by the deep-downers, the dwarfs’ dwarfs, who lived in caves miles below the surface and never saw the sun. Somewhere down there in the dark was true dwarfishness. They had the knowing of it, and they could guide you…
    Vimes had no problem with that at all. It made as much sense as what most humans believed, and most dwarfs were model citizens, even at two-thirds scale.
    But deciding that murder could be kept in the family? thought Vimes. Not on my Watch!
    After ten minutes, the door was unlocked and another dwarf stepped inside. He was dressed as what Vimes thought of as “standard city dwarf,” which meant basic helmet, leather, chain mail, and battle-axe/mining pick, but hold the spiky club. He also had a black sash. He looked flustered.
    “Commander Vimes! What can I say? I do apologize for the way you have been treated!”
    I bet you do. Aloud, Vimes said: “And who are you?”
    “Apologies again! I am Helmclever, and I am the…the nearest word is, perhaps, ‘daylight face’? I do those things that have to be done aboveground. Do come into my office, please!” He trotted off, leaving them to follow him.
    The office was downstairs, in the stone-walled basement. It looked quite cozy. Crates and sacks were piled up against one wall. There wasn’t much food in deep caves, after all; the simple life for dwarfs down below happened because of quite complex lives for a lot of dwarfs above. Helmclever looked like little more than a servant, making sure that his masters got fed, although he might have thought the job was rather grander than that. A curtain in the corner probably concealed a bed; dwarfs did not go in for dainty living.
    A desk was covered in paperwork. Beside it, on a small table, was an octagonal board covered in little playing pieces. Vimes sighed. He hated games. They made the world look too simple.
    “Oh, do you play at all, Commander?” said Helmclever with the hungry look of a true enthusiast. Vimes knew the type, too. Show polite interest, and you’ll be there all night.
    “Lord Vetinari does. It’s never interested me,” said Vimes. * “Hemclever’s not a common dwarf name. You’re not related to the Helmclevers in Tallow Lane, are you?”
    He’d meant it as no more than a bit of noncontroversial ice-breaking, but he might as well have cursed. Helmclever looked down and mumbled: “Er, yes…but to a…grag, even a novice, all of dwarfdom is his…family. It would not be…really not be…” He faltered into silence, and then some other part of his brain took over. He looked up, brightly. “Some coffee, perhaps? I shall fetch some.”
    Vimes opened his mouth to say no, but didn’t. Dwarfs made good coffee, and there was a smell of it wafting from the next room. Besides, the nervousness radiating off Helmclever suggested he’d been drinking a lot of it today. No harm in encouraging him to have more. It was something he told his officers: people got worried around coppers if the officer knew his stuff, and jittery people gave too much away.
    While the dwarf was gone, he took in more of the room, and his eye spotted the words The Koom Valley Codex on the spine of a book half-concealed in the paperwork.
    That bloody valley again, with added weirdness this time. Actually, Sybil had bought a copy, along