‘What? You can’t mean… Doughnut Jimmy? He’s a horse doctor!’
'So I understand,’ said Vimes.
'But why?’
'Because many of his patients survive,’ said Vimes.
Terry Pratchett, Feet of Clay
‘What I don’t understand,’ he said, 'is why you fellows mainly try it here or at the office. I mean, I walk around a lot, don’t I? You could shoot me down in the street, couldn’t you?’
'What? Like some common murderer, sir?’
Vimes nodded. It was black and twisted, but the Assassins’ Guild had an honour of a sort.
Terry Pratchett, Feet of Clay
[Angua] knew her boss. He thought war was simply another crime, like murder. He didn’t much like people with titles, and regarded being a duke as a job description rather than a lever to greatness. He had an odd sense of humour. And he had a sense for what she thought of as harbingers, those little straws in the wind that said there was a storm coming.
Terry Pratchett, Monstrous Regiment
Coppers learned to be good at screams. There was to the connoisseur a world of difference between ‘I’m drunk and I’ve just trodden on my fingers and I can’t get up!’ and ‘Look out! He’s got a knife!’
Terry Pratchett, Jingo
‘Do you think there’s such a thing as a criminal mind?’
Carrot almost audibly tried to work this out.
'What … you mean like … Mr. Cut-Me-Own-Throat Dibbler, sir?’
'He’s not a criminal.’
'You have eaten one of his pies, sir?’
'I mean … yes … but … he’s just geographically divergent in the financial hemisphere.’
'Sir?’
'I mean he just disagrees with other people about the position of things. Like money. He thinks it should all be in his pocket.’
Terry Pratchett, Men at Arms
‘You’re humming, Sam,’ said Sybil, after a while. ‘That means something awful is going to happen to somebody.’
Terry Pratchett, The Fifth Elephant
‘I have put my best men on the job, sir.’
Who’s looking worried?
‘Sergeant Colon and Corporal Nobbs.
Who’s looking relieved?
‘Very experienced men. The keystones of the Watch.’
Terry Pratchett, Jingo
‘But you see, your grace, you’re not here as an individual but as Ankh-Morpork. When people look at you, they see the city, mhm, mhm.’
‘They do? Should I stop washing?’
Terry Pratchett, The Fifth Elephant
‘He makes them rubber wallies, sah.’
‘Ah. The preventatives.’
‘Lot of people don’t agree with that sort of thing, sah.’
‘So I understand.’
Colon drew himself up to attention again. ‘Not natural, in my view, sah. Not in favour of unnatural things.’
Vetinari looked perplexed. ‘You mean, you eat your meat raw and sleep in a tree?’
Terry Pratchett, The Fifth Elephant
‘You’re thinking something, sir. Aren’t you?’
‘It is a use to which I occasionally put my brain, captain. Strange as it may seem.’
Terry Pratchett, Jingo