'Yessir. Er... until you get back, you mean...'

'I shall not be coming back, Fred. I am resigning.'

The Patrician looked at the badge on his desk.

'... and well-trained men,' Carrot was saying, somewhere in front of him. 'After all, a few years ago there were only four of us in the Watch. Now it's functioning just like a machine.'

'Yes, although bits of it do go boing occasionally,' said Lord Vetinari, still staring at the badge. 'Could I invite you to reconsider, captain?'

'I've reconsidered several times, sir. And it's not captain, sir.'

'The Watch needs you, Mister Ironfoundersson.'

'The Watch is bigger than one man, sir,' said Carrot, still looking straight ahead.

'I'm not sure if it's bigger than Sergeant Colon, though.'

'People get mistaken about old Fred, sir. He's a man with a solid bottom to his character.'

'He's got a solid bottom to his bottom, ca— Mister Ironfoundersson.'

'I mean he doesn't flap in an emergency, sir.'

'He doesn't do anything in an emergency,' said the Patrician. 'Except possibly hide. I might go so far as to say that the man appears to consist of an emergency in his own right.'

'My mind is made up, sir.'

Lord Vetinari sighed, sat back and stared up at the ceiling for a moment.

'Then all I can do is thank you for your services, captain, and wish you good luck in your future endeavour. Do you have enough money?'

'I've saved quite a lot, sir.'

'Nevertheless, it is a long way to Uberwald.'

There was silence.

'Sir?'

'Yes?'

'How did you know?'

'Oh, people measured it years ago. Surveyors and so forth.'

'Sir!'

Vetinari sighed. 'I think the term is... deduction. Be that as it may—Captain—I am choosing to believe that you are merely taking an extended leave of absence. I understand that you've never taken a holiday while you've been here. I'm sure you're owed a few weeks.'

Carrot said nothing.

'And if I was you, I'd begin my search for Sergeant Angua at the Shambling Gate,' Vetinari added.

After a while Carrot said quietly: 'Is that as a result of information received, my lord?'

Vetinari smiled a thin little smile. 'No. But Uberwald is going through some troubling times, and of course she is from one of the aristocratic families. I surmise that she has been called away. Beyond that, I cannot be of much help. You will have to follow, as. they say, your nose.'

'No, I think I can find a much more reliable nose than mine,' said Carrot.

'Good.' Lord Vetinari went back to his desk and sat down. 'I wish you well in your search. Nevertheless, I'm sure we'll be seeing you again. A lot of people here depend on you.'

'Yes, sir.'

'Good day to you.'

When Carrot had gone, Lord Vetinari got up and walked across to the other side of the room, where a map of Uberwald was unrolled on a table. It was quite old, but in recent years any mapmakers who had wandered off the beaten track in that country had spent all their time trying to find it again. There were a few rivers, their courses mostly guesswork, and the occasional town or at least the name of a town, probably put in to save the cartographer the embarrassment of filling his chart with, as they said in the trade, MMBU.

The door opened and Vetinari's head clerk, Drumknott, eased his way in with the silence of a feather falling in a cathedral.

'A somewhat unexpected development, my lord,' he said quietly.

'An uncharacteristic one, certainly,' said Vetinari.

'Do you wish me to send a clacks to Vimes, sir? He could be back in a day or so.'

Vetinari was looking intently at the blind, blank map. It was, he felt, very much like the future; a few things were outlined, there were some rough guesses, but everything else was waiting to be created...

'Hmm?' he said.

'Do you wish me to recall Vimes, sir?'

'Good heavens, no. Vimes in Uberwald will be more amusing than an amorous armadillo in a bowling alley. And who else could I send? Only Vimes could go to Uberwald.'

'But surely this is an emergency, sir?'

'Hmm?'

'What else are we to call it, sir, when a young man of such promise throws away his career for the pursuit of a girl?'

The Patrician stroked his beard and smiled at something.

There was a line across the map: the progress of the semaphore towers. It was mathematically straight, a statement of intellect in the crowding darkness of miles and miles of bloody Uberwald.

'Possibly, a bonus,' he said. 'Uberwald has much to teach us. Fetch me the papers on the werewolf clans, will you? Oh, and although I swore I would never ever do this, please prepare a message for Sergeant Colon, too. Promotion, alas, beckons.'

A grubby cloth cap lay on the pavement. On the pavement beside the cap someone had written in damp chalk:

Plese HelP This LiTTle doGGie.

Beside it sat a small dog.

It was not cut out by nature to be a friendly little waggy-tailed dog, but it was making the effort. Whenever someone walked by it sat up on its hind legs and whined pitifully.

Something landed in the cap. It was a washer.

The charitable pedestrian had gone only a few steps further along the road when he heard: 'And I hope your legs fall off, mister.'

The man turned. The dog was watching him intently.

'Woof?' it said.

He looked puzzled, shrugged, and then turned and walked on.

'Yeah, bloody woof woof,' said the strange voice, as he was about to turn the corner.

A hand reached down and picked up the dog by the scruff of its neck. 'Hello, Gaspode. I believe I've solved a little mystery.'

'Oh, no...' the dog moaned.

'That's not being a good dog, Gaspode,' said Carrot, lifting the dog so they could meet eye to eye.

'All right, all right, put me down, will you? This hurts, you know.'

'I need your help, Gaspode.'

'Not me. I don't help the Watch. Nothing personal, but it doesn't do anything for my street cred.'

'I'm not talking about helping the Watch, Gaspode. This is personal. I need your nose.' Carrot lowered the dog to the pavement and rubbed his hand on his shirt. 'Unfortunately, this means I need the rest of you as well, although of course I am aware that under that itchy exterior beats a heart of gold.'

'Really,' said Gaspode. 'Nothing good starts with "I need your help." '

'It's Angua.'

'Oh dear.'

'I want you to track her.'

'Huh, not many dogs could track a werewolf, mister. They're cunning.'

'Go to the best, I always say,' said Carrot.

'Finest nose known to man or beast,' said Gaspode, wrinkling it. 'Where's she gone, then?'

'To Uberwald, I think.'

Carrot moved fast. Gaspode's flight was hindered by the hand gripping his tail.

'That's hundreds of miles away! And dog miles is seven times longer! Not a chance!'

'Oh? All right, then. Silly of me to suggest it,' said Carrot, letting go. 'You're right. It's ridiculous.'

Gaspode turned, suddenly full of suspicion. 'No, I didn't say it was ridiculous,' he said. 'I just said it was hundreds of miles away...'

'Yes, but you said you had no chance.'

'No, I said that you had no chance of getting me to do it.'

'Yes, but winter's coming on and, as you say, a werewolf is very hard to track and on top of that Angua's a copper. She'll work out that I'd use you, so she'll be covering her trail.'

Gaspode whined. 'Look, mister, respect is hard to earn in this dog's town. If I'm not smelled around the lamp-posts for a couple of weeks my stock is definitely in the gutter, right?'

'Yes, yes, I understand. I'll make some other arrangements. Nervous Nigel's still around, isn't he?'