Chapter 28. In which a private grief is interrupted

And so they bore the nearly departed hobbit back to the Great Smials, accompanied by all the erstwhile mourners—who’d been quite overcome by events. Ferdi they brought back to his bed, where his wife was recovering—she was so overcome that she fainted again, but her joy was so great upon being revived that it didn’t seem to matter. The rest of the hobbits, or most of them anyhow, retired to the great room, to stuff themselves with funereal food and revive themselves with gossip and speculation.

Rosamunda sent for her father, Mardibold—who’d been Woodruff’s first apprentice, and thus had a great deal of healing experience and wisdom. He had not been feeling well. It was the anniversary of his beloved wife’s death, ten years and a day earlier, and he’d not had the heart for feasting, or burying, either.

He went over Ferdibrand’s head with delicacy and care, humming softly to himself all the while, watched breathlessly by Nell and all the children, who would not be shooed from the room, and Regi and Rosamunda, while others hovered in the doorway and trailed down the hall, all the way to the doors of the great room where the unburial feast was being served.

Mardi peeled back Ferdi’s eyelids and looked deeply, he tested Ferdi’s reflexes, he went over the hobbit’s head again, he spoke to Ferdi, but received no answer.

‘He spoke to you, Rosa?’ he said.

‘He did!’ Rosamunda said, remembering how startled she’d been. She’d felt, for a moment, as if she were going to faint—but that wouldn’t have helped matters any, and so she’d taken a firm grip and given herself a stern talking-to.

‘What did he say?’ Mardi asked.

‘He said he had ears,’ Rosa replied, feeling rather stupid.

Mardi nodded, sitting back. ‘He does,’ he agreed.

‘Well?’ Regi said. He had an arm around Pimpernel, and she was quivering with joy, and dread, all in one.

‘Well, he’s had such a knock on his noggin as to send him to the Feast,’ Mardi said, ‘especially considering all the previous abuse his head has taken, what with the Battle of Bywater, and that pony race where he was nearly trampled to death, and...’

‘So he’s going to die anyhow?’ young Rudi said in horror.

‘Well,’ Mardi said slowly, ‘that’s rather up to him. It seems he wasn’t too accommodating when his invitation arrived.’ He shook his head. ‘But it’s a wonder to me that he’s alive, considering the circumstances...’

‘He was already booked up,’ Rosa said, looking to Pimpernel. ‘He has a Naming Day on the morrow, in the diary.’

‘And from what I’ve heard, the little lass hasn’t a name at all, is that right?’ Mardi said. ‘He couldn’t take his leave, and let her go through the rest of her life, nameless!’

Pimpernel gave a sobbing laugh, and fell to her knees beside the bed, seizing Ferdi’s near hand and pressing it to her cheek.

Ferdi stirred slightly, to Mardi’s great surprise. ‘Nell?’ he whispered. ‘My... Nell?’

They had to restrain the children from throwing themselves on the bed, but Nell fervently kissed Ferdi’s hand and quavered, ‘I’m here, my love.’

The injured hobbit smiled briefly, and then he said, ‘Tired, Nell-my-own. So very tired. Think I’ll sleep a bit.’

‘You do that,’ Mardi said, patting Ferdi on the shoulder.

‘Nell?’ Ferdi said. ‘Do you have a cold? You don’t sound like yourself.’

Caught between laughter and tears, Pimpernel rose, placed her hands lightly on either side of Ferdi’s face, and kissed him thoroughly.

When she rose from the kiss, Ferdi slept, it seemed, but there was a smile on his face, indeed.

***

The brawny man hadn’t been expecting to run into a muster of hobbits this far to the South. The ruffians had miscalculated, and badly, that the hobbits would be seeking some way to the North, from where the first note was left, all the way to the Three-Farthing Stone. He was to have terrorised the hobbits of an isolated smial, some way to the South of where the first note was left, to indicate to the Thain and his captains that the ruffians were making their way to the southern bounds of the Shire. Yes, he was to have frightened the hobbits, given them a clear message along with the tokens and the note, and made his escape.

But he hadn’t even reached the smial they’d chosen from the map, when there had been shouts, and galloping ponies, and though he’d flung the packet away and tried to run...

An unlucky arrow had caught him in the calf of the leg, bringing him down. And now he stood before the Thain and a gathering number of grim-faced followers. And for the first time, facing hobbits, he truly knew fear.

He hadn’t been that afraid, at the Battle of Bywater. The hobbits’d had the advantage, there, of numbers, and of surprise, and of tactical position, firing down upon the ruffians. And one cowardly fellow among them, for some reason a leader though the brawny man couldn’t imagine why, had gone about spoiling the aim of those who were shooting the ruffians who’d laid down their weapons to surrender. Since the brawny man had seen early on which way the wind was blowing, he’d not gone mad like those who climbed the walls, murder in their hearts. He’d sat down, when he saw the battle going against them, and the cowardly hobbit had saved him from being skewered.

He’d slunk out of the Shire, tail between his legs, with the rest of them, but not because he feared hobbits.

But now...

And then a hunter came to the Thain. ‘This is what he threw away,’ he said, proffering a rough-sewn sack of goatskin.

‘Thank you, Raolf,’ the leader said, taking the sack, undoing the knot with cold precision.

The brawny man wanted to protest; he wanted to sink into the earth, let it cover him, he wanted to slink away, but they’d bound him with ropes as the hunters had searched his back trail for what some of the sharp-eyed among the hobbits had seen, as he fled them.

The hobbit leader opened the bag, and was stopped by his closest companion, a hobbit of equal stature. ‘Pip, no. Let me.’

‘He’s my son, Merry.’

And the brawny man realised in that moment that he faced the heroes of Bywater, the hobbits who’d thrown him and his ilk out of the Shire.

The hobbit leader lifted the blood-stained handkerchief out of the bag, and cradling it against his chest, he handed the bag to Merry. ‘There’s a note,’ he said. And then he turned to the cloth he held, undoing the knots that the brawny man had done up only an hour, perhaps less than an hour, earlier.

‘Don’t,’ the brawny man whispered involuntarily, starting forward in his captors’ grip.

The hobbit leader looked up, and the brawny man’s death was in his eyes. ‘You know what this is?’ he grated, and then he shook his head. ‘Of course you do.’

He turned his attention back to the knots, but when he pulled back one of the corners, when he saw the contents, he gave a wail, an eerie, keening sound, flinging the handkerchief and its grisly burden down.

The brawny man had never seen this side of it before. He’d never seen a father receive word of his son. He’d left off plenty of tokens in his day, true, but he’d never waited to see the result.

Merry, having held the bag without looking at the note, bent to pick up the horrid “message”, but Pippin thrust him aside, to snatch it up as quickly as he’d thrown it down.

‘No,’ he said brokenly, and taking the bag from Merry, he gently laid the grisly bundle to rest once more, pulling the drawstring tight, tying a knot, thrusting the whole under his jacket, to rest beside his heart. ‘No,’ he repeated. ‘We’ll collect all that’s to be found, and bury him, as much of him, as they’ve left us... and may his dreams be peaceful ones. I can only hope...’

And then he straightened his shoulders, recalled to the present moment, and lifted his head.

And the brawny man had never known such fear, ever before, in all his life.

***

They entered a cave, Farry thought. With his eyes covered he had to use all his other senses, and strained to exhaustion, it was difficult to concentrate, or even to care. He hadn’t been paying all that much attention as the young ruffian carried him. But he thought they’d entered a cave, for the bright warmth of the sun on his skin was taken away, and he smelled the cool clamminess of earth and stone.

Was he about to die in bright flame and shocking violence? He stiffened in anticipation of the explosion that must come about when the ruffians opened the first cask and bent to see the contents, bringing their torches closer.

And then he smelled pony-smell, and he knew which cave he was in. But wait... perhaps they’d brought the ponies up the hill to the storehole?

He heard Red’s snarl and the fat man’s rumbling answer, but not the brawny man’s voice. That one was gone, already, then.

And then the fat man said, ‘You stay here and watch him. Keep him bound... we don’t want him crawling away, little worm, not, at least, until we’ve crossed the bounds.’

‘Not even then,’ Red whined. ‘You promised to tell me when we don’t need him any more.’

‘I promised, little brother,’ the fat man said, sounding amused, and relaxed, as if he already had his heart’s desire, safe beyond the guardsmen’s reach, and could laugh at his former troubles.

‘After all, things must be done in decent order,’ Red said, imitating the fat man’s ponderous lecturing, and Farry’s hairs stood up on the back of his neck. ‘You said, “no blood trail” and so weren’t able to treat him proper, as he was due, but I intend to make up for all that was lacking, once we’re free...’

The young ruffian’s hand squeezed Farry’s arm in reassurance, and the young hobbit remembered the whispered promises, after the brawny man left them. ‘...and when Red’s on watch, I’ll give you a pinch to let you know, and you’ll creep away, and lose yourself as a hobbit can, for he always falls asleep on watch and he’ll have no one to blame but himself...’

But what good would such plans be, if they were all blown to pieces?

Yet he could not risk telling the young ruffian, not when he could not see... What if Red had come up to them, suddenly and silently, as Farry was being borne along?

But now, Farry had a glimmer of hope. He and the young ruffian were to stay here, in the shelter of the travellers’ rest, while the others took their torches up to the storage hole, where the Thain’s hoard of black powder waited.

And the ponies, too! With growing excitement, Farry heard the fat man order Red to “leave the ponies, until we see what we’re dealing with...”

He reached to grasp the young ruffian’s arm, holding tight.

He heard Red laugh, and realised the terrible ruffian had been watching him, for the man said, ‘That’s right, you cling to your minder, little one! He’ll keep you safe... at least a little longer. And when we win free, perhaps we’ll have him cut off your thumbs, as a reward.’

Farry shrank away from the soft warmth that was the young ruffian, pressing himself against the cold rock of the cave, and heard Red’s derisive laughter.

Laugh, you, he thought coldly, much too coldly for one of his tender years. We’ll see who has the last laugh.