The trouble began with Young Samuel Vimes (Young Sam, that is, as distinct the older Samuel Vimes who was his father, and whose troubles had begun north of fifty years earlier and could be expected to continue for a good while yet). More specifically, it began with the issue of Young Sam's education.

Young Sam himself was somewhat short of the age of three – traditionally the point where a boy would still be learning the complicated tasks of intermediate muscular coordination, applied use of baby teeth, with the truly advanced student perhaps moving on to the curriculum of coordinating advanced muscle groups to navigate food into the upper regions of his own digestive tract without more than half the contents winding up in unrelated locations. As far as Vimes knew, this was all well and good and something to be proud of.

However, Young Sam's other parent had taken a different view. Since losing the argument that had resulted in them hiring the nursemaid, Sybil Ramkin had gone on to seek out other avenues by which she might fulfil her motherly obligations to give her son the best possible start in life, and she'd done it with the voracity and determination that only a duchess who bred explosive swamp dragons and darned her husband's socks because she felt it was the sort of thing a wife ought to do could muster. She may have left motherhood a little untraditionally late, but by rights, she was going to go about it properly. And somewhere in the midst of all that well-intentioned determination, Sybil had run across several very interesting and refreshingly modern texts hot off the Invisible Press with titles like The Importance of Early Education to the Young Developing Mind And Body. Various pearls of wisdom from these lofty sources had gone on to dominate dinner time conversation over the following weeks.

This may have been the point where the older Sam Vimes had made his crucial mistake. Dinner was the meal he made a great effort to be present for on absolutely any evening when there was no more pressing matter on hand, such as a crime of any serious magnitude happening anywhere in a city of around a million people known for their tendency to hurl a bottle first and sue each other later. If this meant that a proper meal happened at a comfortable chewing pace a bit more than an average of one evening out of two, then it was probably to his credit. However, when inundated by a lot of words like 'crucial developmental stages' and 'windows of opportunity' and with the lingering residual guilt over having won that argument about the nursemaid still being dangled over his head with the crushing subtlety only someone you love very much can ever unleash on your conscience, Vimes (possibly against his better judgement) had opted for the strategy of agreeing with everything she said rather than going through the terrors of listening too closely.

By the time Sybil had gotten to looking into expensive programs involving trained imps who waved series of educational flash cards in your child's face and yelled their names until the poor blighter figured out what to yell back to make them stop (as Vimes had understood it), he'd been forced to return to the conversation properly long enough to put his foot down, but by then the damage was done. No well-meaning father could ever be expected to hold out long when the Intellectual Development of his only son was being bandied about like that. Young Sam was going to have his education. It would be a respectable education and begin as soon as possible, and there would be no further argument on the subject.

Or perhaps the trouble began with Samuel Vimes (Senior) who'd suffered the unfortunate lack of judgement to allow himself to be made a Duke. Vimes' own formal education had happened at Dame Slightly's penny-a-day street school over a nine month period during which his award of the politically controversial title of Blackboard Monitor had been his greatest academic achievement. Vimes' informal education had happened on the street, and had been far more interesting, practical, prolonged and ultimately far more useful. He'd survived it in one piece, which was equivalent to graduating with honours. He'd undoubtedly learned a lot, but nothing that would be remotely appropriate to be taught to even the most academically gifted nearly-three-year-old. No part of Vimes' education was going to be remotely appropriate as a basis for the education of his own son, and Vimes was glad of it.

Class traitor or not, he'd be betraying his family far more if he didn't take full advantage of his wealth to give his son the best possible start in life. But where and how that was going to happen was its own kettle of piranhas.

Traditionally, the first avenue for education of children of Ankh Morpork's more influential families was the Assassin's Guild – usually one of their less intensive courses, with more emphasis on history, culture, looking stylish and backstabbing one's peers only in discreet and socially acceptable ways. Vimes had made it very clear that he would hire a Black Ribboner as a nursemaid before the Guild was allowed to educate any son of his, which was a sure sign that Vimes was very serious. [1] Oh, of course he understood perfectly well that it was all business and that the Guild took pride in being as professional about it all as possible, and he had appreciated the opportunity to keep his reflexes good and sharp by booby-trapping every possible unauthorised entrance way to the very large manor where he lived, but there was a class of people Vimes was not going to hand his son to, and questionably teetotal vampires were not the only members.

The secondary preferred education option for families who were slightly less influential or who had a few children too many to be able to afford the expensive Assassin's Guild course for each one was to send their children to some sort of boarding school, preferably far enough away to excuse parents from the chore of making frequent visits where they'd be expected to remember their child's name and face well enough to pick him/her out of a line up without prompting, but close enough to carry the implication that a visit would be very possible if any news of unusual misbehaviour was received. This was, to put it bluntly, not the sort of arrangement a father who was home at six every evening to read his son a well-chewed book called "Where's My Cow?" was ever going to get past the blockade of his conscience.

The only remaining educational institution in the vicinity of Ankh Morpork of a (broadly) respectable nature was the Unseen University. This was less than ideal for its own set of reasons; however, whatever uncomplimentary thoughts Vimes may have had about magic were still decently less uncomplimentary than his equivalent thoughts about an institution that had frequently taken out contracts on his person. Young Sam needed a tutor, and the university would have to provide.

By this stage, that the tutor would be Ponder Stibbons had become more or less inevitable. Vimes had been very definite that if he had to put up with a wizard tutoring his son, then at the very least he would still draw the line at any crotchety old academics who'd accepted their faculty positions on the basis of getting served slightly earlier at mealtimes, somewhere back around the days when the creator had still been laying down all those misleading dinosaur fossils in the Disc's lower crust, and who'd subsequently ignored any parts of the world not on the track between their rooms and the dining hall. Archchancellor Ridicully was equally adamant the post should go to a faculty member in need of a bit of fresh air and a different perspective [2], who could be trusted to show the world that the institution of the university had made it into the Century of the Fruitbat safe and sound. [3] Neither expressed their reasoning to Ponder in full, but he managed to infer as much as he needed to.

Ponder didn't precisely mind being pulled from the comfort and safety of the High Energy Magic Building's varyingly stable halls and tramped halfway across the city twice a week to tutor a small boy who was barely old enough to be trusted with matters of extremely basic hygiene – if by 'didn't mind' you meant 'gave in once it was clear his efforts to change anyone's minds were going to waste'. In face, once he'd redirected his efforts from to convincing himself there had to be an upside, he'd had to admit he agreed with quite a lot of both Vimes and the Archchancellor's reasoning (if not necessarily for the right motives).

A chance to aid in the education of the next generation could be a rewarding challenge, he reasoned. Starting early could make all the difference – Ponder had read The Importance of Early Education to the Young Developing Mind And Body just as thoroughly as Lady Sybil had and believed himself full of insight as to how Ankh Morpork's various education systems might be improved upon. If he could only get some of those impressionable young children familiarised with a few important concepts at an early age – enough that they'd take for granted, say, that beards did not equal authority and the universe was a four dimensional entity suspended in a 7+1 dimensional phase space – why, it could save all manner of the usual misunderstandings in later life. Besides, being directly involved might be the only hope he had to put a spanner in the works of the inevitable chain of events that would otherwise lead to Vimes discovering how much of the very existence of the Invisible Press was his personal fault.

It was fair to say Ponder had at least as much teaching experience as anyone else in the faculty. There were always students around the High Energy Magic building, some of them even with official permission to be there, some even quite promising. HEX attracted them the way a street juggler attracted spectators and the odd thrown bottle, and Ponder did do his best to contribute to their education, largely out of fear that the rest of the faculty would be left to do so if he didn't. They were a very different class of student from the likes of Young Sam though, even if a few of the finer points of hygiene still posed a challenge for some of them. Ponder could remember his university student days with fond and sometimes disturbing clarity. He knew how those sorts of lessons were supposed to work, and even prided himself on his ability to produce a practical demonstration of advanced magical principles complete with full multimedia support with only a few hours to prepare. However, any memories he might still have had of being Young Sam's age were lost in the fog of juvenile embarrassment. Even with the advice of the Invisible Press to help him, figuring out how to convey education to someone of preschool age was going to be a difficult and daunting process.

For a start, Ponder was vaguely aware that you weren't supposed to talk to young children the way you spoke to another adult – what little he did still recall from his early years had included a great deal of time being treated to patronising inquiries like "Who's a good boy then?" Given the way people had tended to look at him when he gave them perfectly worded replies along the lines of "Actually, I'm quite fine today, thank you," Ponder could only conclude that this was not a usual response.

For related reasons, his own earlier education had been an awkward experience from start to finish. He hadn't just been the smart boy no-one else wanted to play with – he'd been one of those boys so smart that even his teachers had lived in shadow of the suspicion that he probably knew more on a number of subjects than they did, and saw it as their duty to make sure he was corrected of this dangerous notion before he started undermining their authority in class. Things should really have gotten better once Ponder reached the Unseen University where graduation required terrifyingly high achievement including final exam results exceeding 88%. However, the impression that intelligence was something the university actively encouraged was ultimately misleading. As far as the faculty was concerned, the last thing they wanted was students passing on their first try. Young men becoming fully fledged wizards? What was the world coming to! There was something terrifically unsettling about the idea of young students who paid such rapt attention in lectures that they would be able to master the final year curriculum in only that one year, especially when many of the faculty themselves had only passed after several tries (and were even known to inflate the number in the retelling for the sake of the boasting rights it afforded them on the subject of their academic persistence). [4] All that studying could only be the sign of some great lack of proper respect. Education, they felt, was worth more once the body had had the opportunity to ruminate on it for a few years to ensure it was all digested properly. And maybe started on growing a decent beard as well. [5]

No-one believed more fervently than Ponder Stibbons just how badly in need of a shake up the AM education system was.

***

On the first day of his new job, Ponder's employer had taken him aside and explained – with considerable length, detail and a few quite threatening looks – what would be expected of him as an educator in this house. Sam Vimes did not want anyone filling his son's head with a lot of useless knowledge with real life relevance only to people whose careers placed real value on being able to recite the exact date of the fourteenth cabbage famine rebellion of Sto Lat or some such nonsense, he wanted the boy to be taught to think for himself and question everything that called for questioning (short of his mother and father's word, which was a whole different territory). Ponder had found it prudent to contribute only the occasional vague noise of assent, but despite a certain internalised outrage at being told how to educate by an uncommon watchman, he was surprised to find himself agreeing with a startling amount of what Vimes was saying. There was plenty to be said for encouraging students to treat new ideas with a healthy level of skepticism in the name of scientific enquiry. Having made up his mind that this was what Vimes had obviously meant, and incorporating a good deal of advice from the Invisible press plus some early observations about the sort of stimulus his student responded best to, he'd planned his lessons accordingly.

Today's lesson went a bit like this:

Where's my cow?
Perhaps my cow is inside this box
In areas of recent thaumalogical disturbance, the probability the cow is inside the box at any given time may be close to 50%!
Under such conditions, it is impossible to ascertain whether the cow is or is not in the box at any given time!
That is/is not my cow!

Young Sam himself seemed to feel this ending lacked a certain punch.

"Cow!" he protested, hitting Ponder with the toy snake to emphasise his disappointment.

"I don't think you're quite following my point," said Ponder, tiredly.

"Goes mooooo," Sam declared, re-establishing his position as the nursery's foremost cow expert.

The actual cow in this exercise was a small stuffed version with horns made out of chew-safe material, one of which was already missing thanks to the aggressive nature of the love visited upon it by its owner. It had been given to Young Sam to celebrate his second birthday, and been swiftly elevated to the lofty status of Favourite Toy – a title it had retained with tenure unknown to any of its predecessors. It did indeed go 'moo', which was to say that it had been built so that shaking it produced a sort of 'ooogh' sound which Ponder wouldn't personally have phoneticised as 'moo' without context, but he also had a vague idea that real cows (a rare sight to an academic city boy) didn't go 'moo' either so much as they… what was it, grunted? Squeaked? If pressed on the matter, all he could do was admit his own uncertainty on the subject, so he'd avoided bringing it up. Arguing with Young Sam on whether or not cows went moo would be tantamount to suicide for an authority figure.

The box was the simple cardboard variety, selected to be of appropriate toy-cow size (not that this should strictly matter in regions of true thaumic displacement, but Ponder was resigned to take this one lesson at a time). He would have been happier without a box at all in keeping with the true spirit of the exercise, but convincing Young Sam that his beloved cow might or might not be inside a box that wasn't there presented several levels more uncertainty than his student was prepared to acknowledge. Of course, simply replacing the theoretical box with a solid one didn't work either if Young Sam thought he knew where the cow as already when the question was posed. It was no good putting the cow in the box and then inviting Sam to consider the question, because Young Sam would be quite certain he knew the answer. Making his student to close his eyes while Ponder either placed the cow in the box or hid it somewhere in the room only lead to Sam going on spirited and messy cow finding raids that were unnervingly successful. His best success so far had come from placing the cow in the box in Sam's full view, closing it and then using a softly muttered version of Bursenheik's Inertial Derterminer to move it again and hide it somewhere out of the way. This got him Young Sam's full attention – it was now Young Sam's favourite magic trick ever.

But rather than simply learn to appreciate the principle of thaumic uncertainty, Sam wanted to know how the trick was done. Assuring him it was genuine magic did no good; Sam wanted to be able to reproduce the trick himself, or where was the fun in it? The box became an item of utmost suspicion – did it, perhaps, have a secret, cow-concealing compartment in the bottom? Perhaps the bottom had been open when Ponder had first placed the cow inside, cunningly allowing the cow to drop right through! Young Sam liked the latter theory so much he put it to himself to test it out for his tutor's entertainment. It might almost have been convincing too, had the flaps at the bottom of the box not been quite so obviously open from Ponder's angle, and had the cow itself not made so loud a giveaway mooing noise when it fell cleanly through the bottom and landed on his feet.

Young Sam Vimes was not to be so easily discouraged. That box held some kind of secret, and by rights, he was going to find out what! Ponder could barely put it down for a moment anymore without it being grabbed, held as evidence, and subjected to detailed forensic inquiry, sometimes involving chewing. Last time Lady Rankin had sprung a surprise visit on him in the middle of a lesson, the box had been on Young Sam's head, and explaining how any part of the situation constituted 'education' had taken a lot of quick thinking on Ponder's part.

Convincing his student that the box itself wasn't important was depressingly futile. Replacing the box produced no better results. Ponder had a feeling that if the only outcome of his lessons was to give Young Sam a suspicion of cardboard boxes, Vimes was not going to be impressed.

Today, at least, the box was in safe hands (his own) and Ponder was doggedly persisting with the task of getting the lesson across.

"Look, we'll try this again," he said, in a voice he hoped sounded firm and tutorly. "Where's…"

Young Sam leapt out with one arm outstretched and delivered the box a solid thump. From within came a definite 'ooo' noise.

"That's my cow!" Sam declared, clapping his hands.

Ponder mopped his brow and quietly despaired at the state of modern education.

"Right. Wonderful. Perhaps we'll leave it there for today."

[1] Technically even this was the censored version. The uncensored version had been repeated only far from the ears of Lady Sybil Rankin, and involved some much stronger language, graphic gestures and the even clearer conclusion that Vimes was very, very serious about what he was saying.

[2] This could equally have been anyone on the faculty, actually, it was only Ponder's uncomfortable characteristic of being the youngest that singled him out.

[3] Being the century which had just ended to make way for the exciting new world of the Century of the Anchovy. Which only went to show just how badly overdue this all was.

[4] Ponder was one of very few wizards ever to pass with a perfect score, one of only three who ever did so by genuinely accidental methods unrelated to their mastery of examinable material, and quite definitely the only one who might very well have gotten his perfect score anyway. He was also very much the only one who never dared to boast about it, in case anyone went and found out exactly how that perfect score had really come about.

[5] Besides, wizards were also notoriously lazy about going to all the effort of writing new exam questions, instead circulating only a few different exam papers on a rotation schedule that looped every few years. Any sufficiently diligent student who retook his exams more than a few years running really would have seen it all.