"And there"s a sir."
"That"s me, too."
"And an excellency."
"fraid so." Vimes narrowed his eyes. "I was blackboard monitor for a while, too."
There was the sound of angry voices from behind a door at the far end of the room.
"What does a blackboard monitor do?" said Dee, raising his voice.
"What? Er, I had to clean the blackboard after lessons."
The dwarf nodded. The voices grew louder, more intense. Dwarfish was such a good language to be annoyed in.
"Erasing the teachings when they were learned!" said Dee, shouting to be heard.
"Er, yes!"
"A task given only to the trustworthy!"
"Could be, yes!"
Dee folded up the letter and handed it back, glancing briefly at Cheery.
"Well, these seem to be in order," he said. "Would you care for a drink before you go?"
"Sorry? I thought I had to present myself to your king." The swearing from the other side of the door was threatening to burn through the woodwork.
"Oh, that won"t be necessary" said Dee. "At the moment he should. not be bothered with - "
" - trivial matters?" said Vimes. "I thought it was how the thing ought to be done. I thought dwarfs always did the thing that ought to be done."
"At the moment it... would not be advisable," said Dee, raising his voice again over the noise. "I"m sure you understand."
"Let"s assume I"m very stupid," said Vimes.
"I assure you, your excellency, that what I see the King sees, and what I hear the King hears."
"That"s certainly true at the moment, isn"t it?"
Dee drummed his fingers on his desk. "Your excellency, I have spent only long enough in your... city to gain a general insight into your ways, but I might feel you are making fun of me."
"May I speak freely?"
"From what I have heard of you, your monitorship, you usually do."
"Have you found the Scone of Stone yet?"
The expression on Dee"s face told Vimes that he had scored. And that, almost certainly, the next thing the dwarf said would be another lie.
"What a strange and untruthful thing to say! There is no possibility that the Scone could have been stolen! This has been firmly declared! This is not a lie we wish to hear repeated!"
"You told me I - " Vimes tried. By the sound of it, there was a fight going on behind the door now.
"The Scone will be seen by all at the coronation! This is not a matter for Ankh-Morpork or anyone else! I protest at this intrusion into our private affairs!"
"I merely - "