Deep gratitude to Elena and Marta at the SOA Yahoo group for some helpful quotes, and many thanks to the anonymous live journal-er who posted Christopher Logue's poem Be Not Too Hard: It inspired me when I needed it, and I wish I had a better memory so I could thank you by name.

Be not too hard - for soon he dies,
Often no wiser than he began;
Be not too hard for life is short
And nothing is given to man. [or hobbit.]

-- Christopher Logue

It was a pleasant enough night, but Lotho would be glad to reach home. The stars were coming out, one by one, over Hobbiton, and the dust of the roadway was cool under his feet. Lotho had spent a jolly day walking about, surveying various properties and collecting rents. That Sharkey fellow had said an important hobbit like himself had ought not to be charged with such a menial task as collecting the rents anymore, and had taken to sending one of his Men round instead, but Lotho did so enjoy walking the farms, fields, and cots, knowing that it was his, all his, down to the last pony, plough, or stick of furniture. It delighted him to watch the goodwives and their lasses rushing to bring him tea and cakes, the husbands and brothers often standing by, sullen and glowering, knowing he could ruin them with the merest snap of his fingers, and one wrong word would see them off to Michel Delving like that meddling old fool Will Whitfoot. Ingrates, the lot of them, too backward and blind to see the real good he was doing for them. True, there was bound to be some unpleasantness before everything he had planned came to pass: A few trees cut down, some families uprooted and their smials dug up, a few of the more fractious hobbits to be punished, as examples. But if the air was a bit less crisp than in earlier years, the skies a bit less clear, well, it was really all for the greater good, in the end. Progress has a price after all, and nothing is given for free.

"Quite right, quite right," Lotho chuckled. He staggered as he jingled the small purse of coin at his belt. The road had developed tricky dips and hollows since he had walked down it that afternoon, and it occurred to him that he was quite possibly just the tiniest bit in his cups. He had fallen in with a lot of Men on the Bywater Road, all gathered around an ale-cask, passing one battered cup from hand to hand. They had been felling the trees, and Lotho had approached them in a fine temper, meaning to order them off: Hadn't Sharkey said that all works and improvements were to be supervised by the Chief? Oh, how the louts had groveled, nudging each other and grinning like wolves, bowing politely and calling him Little Master, then pressing him to drink until his head was spinning, and he left them thinking what capital servants Men were after all.

Now Lotho paused, a bit unsure of his bearings. Before him stood a long, poorly-built barrier of crude lumber higher than his head, bearing a sign: New Diggings-Keep Out. Beyond it stood a sad wasteland, a pit of torn, red earth littered with rubbish, stripped down to gravel and sand. He stood there for some time, fingers clinging to the rough wood, peering through the fence in sodden befuddlement. He knew this place, didn't he? When it had still been Bagshot Row he had used to tarry here during his morning walk to admire the flowerbeds, and often he'd catch a glimpse of Marigold Gamgee. A biddable lass, but with spirit. Such a pity her older brother, his miserable cousin's gardener, had been such a worthless lackwit, always prattling on about Elves, and books and suchlike, when his time would have been better spent bending his back at honest labor. Lotho sighed, his eyes stinging with maudlin tears. Ah, Marigold! Such a sweet young thing with rosy cheeks and long, golden-brown curls, her little brown hands always busy with some task or another. "Common as dirt," his mother said, but Lotho secretly disagreed. Earlier in the year, shortly after Sharkey had arrived, Lotho had even gone behind Lobelia's back and had spoken to her father about the possibility of a courtship.

"Think of it as a sound business arrangement, if you will," Lotho said while standing on the doorstep of Number Three, thumbs hooked into his embroidered waistcoat, and feeling quite sure that old Gamgee would see the advantages of such a match. "Sam's gone off and you're not getting any younger, and it's high time we considered the girl's future. Give me permission to woo her, and in return I shall keep you on as my head gardener after the wedding. I will have to deduct your room and board from your salary, but I'm willing to give you a small raise in a year or two, provided you continue to give satisfaction, of course."

Lotho waited for a response, perhaps an invitation to discuss the matter over luncheon or tea, or whatever sort of crude spread rustic folk might lay out, but the rude old fellow hadn't even invited him in.

"Meaning no offense, Mr. Lotho, but my little lass an't something to be given nor bought," the old hobbit said stiffly, with a light of barely-concealed fury in his eyes that Lotho had never seen before. "And she's right taken with a young fellow what's already fond of her, and to tell you the plain truth-begging your pardon, sir-a feather in a cap don't make a proper Chief Shirrif, and a weskit o' gold on a dog don't make him quality, and I'd sooner see her wed to the Witch-King than courted by the likes o' you. Good day to you, sir."

Lotho staggered away from the sand-pit as if he'd been burned, breathing hard, his face flushed anew with the memory of that humiliation, the slam of the door still echoing painfully in his ears. The old fool! The wretched, insolent old clod! Well, he had seen to the sacking at once, and no severance or references, either. Impudence must be punished. The diggings had commenced immediately, and he got great satisfaction in watching the old goat wending his way down the hill with his bits of rubbish in a barrow. Marigold had been long gone by then, hidden with the Cotton family he suspected, though his spies reported no sign of her there. Ah well, the gardens of Bag End had not suffered much for old Gamgee’s absence, Lotho told himself. And he did not miss Marigold's bright face at her window, the sweet lilt of her voice singing at dusk. No, not at all.

~~~~~~~~~~

Lotho entered the front gate of Bag End, a slightly more sober hobbit. The aftertaste of ale was sour in his mouth, his stomach ached, and all he wished to do was fall into bed. He would have to endure his dear mother's scolding, but he knew that afterward she would put a cool cloth on his head, and pat his hand, and make him catnip tea to settle his stomach. He hoped that Sharkey had retired for the evening-he wasn't feeling up to any sort of long-winded questioning at the moment, and Sharkey's companion, that oily, stooped creature with the cold eyes, gave him the shivers.

But Bag End was dim and still, and no friendly light shone through the windows, and the door was unlatched. "Mother?" Lotho pushed the door open. "Mother? I'm home."

At the far end of the hall there was a faint rustling, and Sharkey's henchman appeared. "There you are," Lotho said loudly, trying to bluster, though the sight of the sallow face looming up out of the shadows had given him a fearful start. One must be firm with the help. "What do you think you're doing, lurking about? Where's the Mistress?"

Grima smiled. "She is...out."

And Sharkey, too? Lotho's mouth went dry. Lobelia had never hidden her dislike of the old man, but he had always shown her the utmost deference, although it was tainted with an uncomfortable hint of mockery that even Lotho had not been too blind to see. "At this hour? Ridiculous! Be off, and make yourself useful."

Grima bowed and made no move to lay hands on him as he brushed past, but Lotho shuddered at the dry whisper of his garments, as if he had put his hand on a spiderweb in the dark.

Lotho hurried down the hall, calling out and throwing open doors left and right, but no voice answered and he heard only the echo of his own footsteps. At last he stopped, his heart beating uncomfortably fast. He had never been particularly fit, more inclined to sit with a pipe and a pint than to exert himself, and he was not a young hobbit anymore. He turned on Grima and feebly shook his fist "You scoundrel! What have you done with her? Speak!"

"I? Nothing!" Grima said, pretending innocence and honest puzzlement, expressions which did not sit well on his crafty face. Still bent and submissive, he inched closer, his hands hidden in his long sleeves. "My small friend, you are overwrought. Come, let us talk-"

But Lotho's eyes, not so young but still quite sharp, had caught a cruel glint of something concealed among the voluminous robes, and he had a sudden horror of those soft, pale hands and what they meant to do. He quickly backed into the nearest available doorway, darted in and slammed the door behind him, putting all of his weight against it. "I, I don't feel like talking," Lotho shouted through the closed door. "I feel a bit ill, and I think I shall go to bed. Now go away."

Outside, he heard Grima chuckle, low and menacing, and under that mirthless sound the faint ring of steel, as if a blade had been drawn and then returned to its sheath. "Hide then in your hole, Master Ratling. The night is long, and the cat is patient."

Panting, Lotho hurriedly shoved a chest in front of the door, following it up with a heavy chair and a broken footstool. He looked around, realizing that he had cornered himself in one of the lesser guestrooms, one without a window. It was dim and dusty with disuse, cluttered with discarded objects and bits of furniture, and it smelled of mice, but the bed was made and he could lie in it. He backed up slowly, until the back of his knees struck the bed frame, then he sat down.

He would wait. He was a Sackville-Baggins after all, and they had many bitter years of practice at waiting. Lotho wiped his sweaty palms on his knees and then lay down, pressing his face into the musty pillow. The lavender that young Marigold had once tucked into the pillowcase, now long since dried and gone to crumbs, still held the faintest, ghostly smell of departed summer, and he breathed in the scent to slow his racing heart. He would be safe enough here until morning. By then Sharkey's mad creature would surely have tired of his play. And then...

And then what will you do, Lotho? something in him whispered. It was the voice of his good hobbit-sense, and deep down Lotho recognised it, though he had drowned it out for long years with the more musical ring of silver and gold. Now it had returned too late, loud and clear, firm and yet pitying, and unpleasantly similar to the soft voice of that Buckland brat Cousin Bilbo had adopted long ago. The web is woven. The trap is sprung. What you have sown, now you will reap. Nothing is given for free.

the end

************

  Marigold's Challenge this time was to write a story with this starter: It was a pleasant enough night, but _____ would be glad to reach home, and to either mention Marigold Gamgee and the Witch-King in the story, or use them as characters. In spite of my brain coughing up fluffy AU images of Sam's little sister having a pint at the Green Dragon with Khamul, I struggled on and managed to write this unpleasant little ficlet instead;o)