Guards Guards - Bar

“Do guards come in here?” he demanded.

“Hardly ever,” said the Patrician, waving a chicken leg. “They don't bother about feeding me, you see. The idea is that one should moulder. In fact,” he said, “up 'til recently I used to go to the door and groan a bit every now and then, just to keep them happy.”

“They're bound to come in and check, though?” said Vimes hopefully.

“Oh, I don't think we should tolerate that,” said the Patrician.

"How are you going to prevent them?"

Lord Vetinari gave him a pained look.

“My dear Vimes,” he said, “I thought you were an observant man. Did you look at the door?”

“Of course I did,” said Vimes, and added, "sir. It's bloody massive.''

"Perhaps you should have another look?''

Vimes gaped at him, and then stamped across the floor and glared at the door. It was one of the popular dread portal variety, all bars and bolts and iron spikes and massive hinges. No matter how long he looked at it, it didn't become any less massive. The lock was one of those dwarfish-made buggers that it'd take years to pick. All in all, if you had to have a symbol for something totally immovable, that door was your man. The Patrician appeared alongside him in heart-stopping silence.

“You see,” he said, “it's always the case, is it not, that should a city be overtaken by violent civil unrest the current ruler is thrown into the dungeons? To a certain type of mind that is so much more satisfying than mere execution.”

“Well, okay, but I don't see-” Vimes began. “And you look at this door and what you see is a really strong cell door, yes?”

“Of course. You've only got to look at the bolts and-”

“You know, I'm really rather pleased,” said Lord Vetinari quietly.

Vimes stared at the door until his eyebrows ached. And then, just as random patterns in cloud suddenly, without changing in any way, become a horse's head or a sailing ship, he saw what he'd been looking at all along.

A sense of terrifying admiration overcame him. He wondered what it was like in the Patrician's mind. All cold and shiny, he thought, all blued steel and icicles and little wheels clicking along like a huge clock. The kind of mind that would carefully consider its own downfall and turn it to advantage.

It was a perfectly normal dungeon door, but it all depended on your sense of perspective.

In this dungeon the Patrician could hold off the world.

All that was on the outside was the lock.

All the bolts and bars were on the inside.

***

Guards Guards - p296-298