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If I had a Hammer  by Grey Wonderer

Part 11

Sam had been very surprised when the Gaffer had told him that Mister Frodo wanted to see him over at Bag End first thing this morning but it was nothing compared to the surprise that he received when he was let into Mister Frodo’s kitchen. Sam’s eyes had immediately widened with shock as he watched Mister Frodo struggle to swallow something rather large that was filling up his entire mouth.

Mister Frodo’s cheeks were puffed out like a chipmunk’s in winter and his eyes were watering. Even more frightening was the fact that Mister Frodo seemed to be drooling. A clear liquid was trailing down Mister Frodo’s chin and onto his fresh, white shirt collar. He was supporting himself by leaning one hand on the table while waving the other at Sam. At first Sam just thought that Mister Frodo was waving him over to a chair but after a minute Sam began to think that Mister Frodo’s waving was for a more alarming reason.

"Mister Frodo? Mister Frodo are you all right?" Sam asked trying not to panic.

Mister Frodo seemed to grimace a bit and nod but the hand kept waving and tears were now streaming down Mister Frodo’s face. Remembering that time when Jolly Cotton had managed to get a piece of walnut lodged in his throat, Sam charged over to Mister Frodo and began to slap him hard between the shoulders. "Don’t worry, Mister Frodo! Cough it all up! You’re going to be just fine!" Sam shouted this as if Mister Frodo’s ears must also be plugged up with whatever it was that he was choking on and continued to slap Mister Frodo on the back.

Sam could remember poor Jolly turning a bit blue in the face and gasping. He didn’t remember Jolly doing any drooling, but then Mister Frodo might be choking on something that caused drooling. Sam pounded harder on Mister Frodo’s back. He didn’t hear any coughing and that was rather worrisome. There should be coughing if whatever Mister Frodo had lodged in his throat was coming back up.

Frodo struggled to swallow the contents of his very full mouth. He wanted to avoid spitting the entire mess onto his nice clean table if at all possible but Sam was not making it easy for him. He groaned as best he was able with a full mouth as Sam hit him between the shoulders for the fourth or fifth time. Sam certainly was strong!

Frodo was pressed against the table. Sam had leaned him over and was alternating between slapping him on the back and shaking him rather hard. This was ridiculous and it was going to be very embarrassing to try to explain if he were ever able to speak again.

"Just cough it all up, Mister Frodo!" Sam said in a cross between encouragement and a desperate plea.

Seeing that he was not going to be able to do otherwise, Frodo shut his eyes tightly and opened his mouth. He began to spit partly chewed grapes and sour juice all over the table while Sam continued to pound on his back. "That’s it, Mister Frodo!"

Frodo coughed and groaned and made a silent wish that all of this was a very embarrassing dream.

~~~~~~~~~

Something had caused Merry to wake up and he wasn’t sure exactly what it might be. He sighed and sat up in his bed. He wondered what time it was and who was making such a racket? Maybe Pippin had got up early in order to begin work on his, on his, well, on whatever it was that he was building out in Frodo's barn.

Merry still found it vastly annoying that Pippin was refusing to tell him what he was building or to allow him to see it. They had spent a lovely afternoon together yesterday once Pippin had come down from that apple tree but Pippin was still intent on keeping his project a secret.

Merry smiled and stretched as he remembered how happy Pippin had been when he had beaten both of his older cousins in the grape contest. Merry chuckled. Frodo had been a bit annoyed at his own failure. Frodo had denied it, but he had been less than pleased when both of his younger cousins managed to stuff more grapes into their mouths than he. Frodo had actually got choked twice. Merry would have to remember to tease Frodo some more about it today when he got the chance.

Whatever the noise had been, it had stopped but Merry was awake all the same. He decided to get up and go down the hall and see if Pippin was awake yet.

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

Sam handed Mister Frodo a damp handkerchief and quickly threw a wash cloth over the mess on the table. He didn’t want Mister Frodo to look at it and get sick all over again. Sam watched as Mister Frodo lowered himself into one of the kitchen chairs and began to wipe his face with the damp handkerchief.

"Don’t you trouble yourself none, Mister Frodo," Sam said. "I’ll clean that up for you. You just sit there and rest up a bit."

Frodo sighed. "Don’t, Sam, it’s my mess and I will see to it in a minute."

"No trouble at all," Sam said with a smile. "I’m just glad that I was in time. You might ‘o choked to death." Sam began to wipe up the mess as he spoke. "If you don’t mind my askin’ Mister Frodo, what was you doin’ with all them grapes in your mouth? I know it’s none o’ my business but I can’t help but wonder if you understand me."

Frodo mumbled something and blushed slightly.

"Is your throat sore?" Sam asked. "Don’t try to talk if it is and I’ll make you some tea after I clean this up."

"No, Sam," Frodo said. "My throat isn’t sore." He could see that there would be no way around explaining this to his friend. He might just as well get it over with. "I was trying to improve my record and when you came in my mouth was so full that I wasn’t able to explain what I was doing. Also, that bunch of grapes was a bit too sour and so it was rather unpleasant."

Sam had finished with the table and was now looking at Mister Frodo and frowning. He was completely confused by this. "You were tryin’ to improve on what record?" he asked his curiosity over-coming his manners.

"Yesterday, Pippin and Merry introduced me to a new contest and it turned out to be more difficult than I had thought that it would be," Frodo said trying to make this whole business sound less inane than it did. "It seems as if Pippin can put a rather large amount of grapes into his mouth at one time without swallowing any of them or causing them to break open."

Sam’s mouth fell open a bit and he quickly closed it. He still wasn’t entirely sure what Mister Frodo was talking about.

"Oh, hang it all, Sam," Frodo blustered. "The idea of the challenge is to put more grapes into your mouth than anyone else. Pippin won every time and Merry came very close to winning on several occasions but I put in a dreadful showing. In fact, I actually managed to get choked a couple of times. It was humiliating for some reason."

Sam was trying not to laugh now. "You mean you weren’t chokin’ when I came in here?"

Frodo blushed and looked away. "No, I wasn’t choking! I was practicing!"

"Well, you should ‘a said somethin’," Sam grinned. "But then I don’t suspect that you could with your mouth stuffed full o’ grapes like that, could you?"

"No, Sam," Frodo sighed his humiliation complete.

"They beat you by much?" Sam asked.

"That isn’t the important thing," Frodo said in irritation. He stood up and went over to the counter to get the tea kettle. "But in order to make them happy, I thought that I should at least try to improve before the rematch."

"You’re plannin’ on tryin’ that stunt again?" Sam asked.

"I may have asked for a rematch last night," Frodo muttered as he filled the kettle with water.  "I don't know exactly why, but I think I suggested that we try again this evening."

"Was this why you wanted to see me, Mister Frodo?" Sam asked.

"What?" Frodo asked. "Oh, no, Sam. I didn’t want to see you about this silly contest, I wanted to talk to you about Pippin." Frodo was relieved for the change of topic. When he turned to face Sam his friend was trying not to smirk.

"That’s probably best, Mister Frodo as I don’t think I’ve ever stuffed grapes into my mouth a’ fore. I probably wouldn’t be no help to you a’ tall."

Frodo scowled.

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

"Pip?" Merry called as he opened the door and stepped into the room. He’d knocked but when Pippin had failed to answer he had decided that his cousin was sleeping too soundly to hear him or ignoring him and so he had opened the door.

"Pip?" Merry called a bit louder. "You awake, Pip?" Merry suddenly gave a slight shudder as that had reminded him of his dream of the other night. Was that what Pippin had kept asking him in that dream? "Are you awake, Merry?" Merry frowned and shook it off. He stepped into the room and was met by an empty bed. Apparently Pippin was already up.

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

"You want me to be Master Pippin’s carpentry teacher?" Sam asked. He could hardly believe what he was hearing.

"I most certainly do, Sam," Frodo said placing a cup of tea into the young gardener’s hands. "Pippin has done so very well since you began giving him lessons and I would be grateful if you would continue."

"I ain’t exactly a carpenter, Mister Frodo," Sam said a bit hesitantly. "I’ve just been givin’ Master Pippin a few pointers is all. I never worked as no carpenter a’fore and I’ve never done no teachin’."

"I suspect that you have done plenty of teaching, Sam," Frodo smiled. "Didn’t you tell me that you had taught your nephew to read last summer?"

"Well, I did do that, but he’s my brother’s lad after all and it’s a might different helpin’ him to read than it is helpin’ Master Pippin with carpentry," Sam said.

"It will be different in one way, Sam," Frodo agreed. "I want to hire you for the job. I don’t want you to continue to do this as a favor to me or to anyone else. I would like to pay you what Paladin was paying Mister Tunnely."

Sam nearly fell over at that announcement. "Oh, Mister Frodo, I couldn’t let you do that," he said nervously. "I ain’t even a real carpenter. I couldn’t take Mister Took’s money nor yours neither."

"Sam, Pippin has learned a great deal from you in a very short time," Frodo said. "Even more important, Pippin is actually enjoying his lessons. Why even I can’t seem to make him enjoy the lessons that I am charged with giving him." Frodo smiled. "I love Pippin dearly but he can be very difficult to motivate. He will take advantage of any opportunity to get out of his lessons that he can find. He will change the subject, he will feign sleepiness, he will complain, and with the wrong instructor he will actually manage to get out of doing his work. I’ve seen it happen." Frodo looked at Sam and said, "Now, I will understand if you don’t want to take this on. I know it is an additional responsibility during a very busy time of the year for you. In fact, I assured the Gaffer that I would see to it that Pippin’s lessons did not keep you from your regular duties."

"What was his feelin’ on it?" Sam asked.

"He said that I could offer you the job, but that the decision was yours and I agree completely with that," Frodo said. "Don’t feel as if I will be upset if you do not want to do this. Also, I have not mentioned it to Pippin. If you turn it down, there will be no reason for me to tell him anything about it. My reasons for offering it to you are simply this; you have done a wonderful job and Pippin responds well to you. He pays attention to what you say and he is learning something which is the entire point of it all."

"He’s a good lad, Mister Frodo," Sam said. "He just gets a might distracted from time to time. If you stay on him, he listens and he’s quick to pick up what he’s interested in."

"And equally quick to ignore the things that he isn’t interested in," Frodo smiled. "He wasn’t interested in carpentry until you began to work with him. He was just frustrated by it."

"Don’t none o’ the family want to help him?" Sam asked still feeling a bit uncomfortable with the offer.

"I would love to help him, Sam," Frodo said. "But we both know that I can barely identify a hammer and I certainly can’t use one. Merry would do it, but I don’t think that is a good idea just now. Merry and Pippin have patched up their differences but I don’t think their relationship could tolerate Merry giving carpentry lessons to Pippin just now. Pippin feels a bit too competitive with his older cousin for that to go well."

Sam nodded. "Mister Frodo?"

"Yes, Sam?"

"Well, beggin’ your pardon but I was wonderin’ why you have all them tools out in the barn?" Sam asked.

"I don’t believe I understand what you are asking me, Sam," Frodo said.

"Well, I know for a fact that old Mister Bilbo couldn’t build nothin’ a’tall and you, well, you don’t do much o’ that sort o’ work yourself so," Sam let the sentence hang there and waited.

"No, I don’t do any building, Sam," Frodo smiled. "I might have actually been more knowledgeable about such things than Bilbo was. The tools were Bilbo’s but only because he inherited them."

"Oh, so Mister Bilbo’s father was a carpenter then?" Sam asked.

Frodo smiled. "Actually, the tools belonged to Bilbo’s mother, Belladonna Took Baggins. She was, from all I have heard, a gifted woodworker. She learned from one of the carpenters at the Great Smials when she was only a lass. In fact, it was Belladonna who made Bilbo’s writing desk."

Sam was completely surprised by this news. "You mean that Mister Bilbo’s mother owned them tools?"

"She did indeed," Frodo smiled. "She was an excellent hand with building furniture but unfortunately, Bilbo did not have her gift for it and neither do I."

"Well, don’t that beat all," Sam said shaking his head.

"If you’d like a chance to think about my offer before you decide?" Frodo asked.

"No, I don’t need to think on it none," Sam grinned. "I’ll be happy to do it for you, Mister Frodo but I don’t think you need to be payin’ me for it."

"I won’t allow you to do it unless I can pay you," Frodo said firmly. "I am very sure that Paladin Took would not want to take charity from anyone. The Tooks are proud that way, Sam. If you are going to do this, then you will have to agree to be paid for it."

"Well, I understand about not wantin’ any charity," Sam said. "I guess it will help out this winter when the garden work slows down and since the Gaffer did agree to it....I’ll do it." He extended his hand and they shook on it just as Merry walked into the kitchen.

"Hullo, Sam," Merry smiled. He then looked around the kitchen. "Where’s Pip?" 





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