Chapter 3. In which a young hobbit discovers the delights of forbidden filth

'After them!' Pearl was shouting. 'Mum's best ribbons...!'

Little Ferdi stumbled, hampered by the fancies winding round his legs, and Merry jerked him to his feet. 'Quick!' he hissed. 'Do you want them to capture you and complete their foul designs?'

'No!' Ferdi said. 'But how...?' He didn't have to say that the lasses were bigger, and had longer legs, and didn't have pins in their skirts to hamper them from hiking their garments up to free their legs for running.

Merry, however, had quickly formulated a plan. 'This way!' he shouted. 'They'll never follow us if we...'

'No-o-o-o-o-o!' wailed Pearl and Pimpernel together. 'Not the pigsty, Merry, you wouldn't!'

'Ferdi, stop!' Rosemary shouted, trying to sound coaxing. 'Ferdi, I've a pocketful of sweets! Ferdi!'

Ferdi, to his credit, young as he was, did not slow or alter course at this inducement. Hitching up his "skirts" as best he could he plunged after Merry, ducking between the rails of the fence that contained the pigs in their muddy yard.

'I wouldn't, wouldn't I?' Merry turned to call in triumph, but his feet slipped in the mud and he sat down with an oomph.

'Stand still, Ferdi!' Rosemary said, abruptly slowing to a walk, digging in the pocket tied around her waist and coming up with a handful of sweets that her father spoilt her with on a regular basis. She held them out at an arm's length, as if wooing a wary pony, and her voice became the sing-song of the experienced pony handler. 'Steady, lad... stand still and the nasty pigs won't hurt you, Ferdi.' Her voice shook just a little, for she knew how dangerous a broody sow could be.

Ferdi wasn’t afraid of “nasty pigs”. He thought pigs fascinating creatures, as a matter of fact, and rather envied them into the bargain, for they were allowed to get as dirty as they wished, with no older sisters hauling them off to mother and bath just as the fun was beginning.

‘Merry, get out of there!’ Pearl hissed, easing herself through the fence, while Pimpernel had taken off at a run to fetch one of the hired hobbits, who could be heard whistling on the other side of the barn. ‘Grab Ferdi’s hand, pull him out, but get out, before she sees...’

Too late. The broody sow had seen the interlopers and tensed, and now she was staring menacingly at the young hobbits, her tail wagging furiously.

‘Stand still!’ Rosemary was still saying, and Pearl was telling them to ‘Get out of there!’ and Merry was thoroughly confused and wishing desperately for Frodo.

At that moment, Ferdi cast himself down in the mud. ‘Look!’ he cried, rolling in delight. ‘I’m a dirty piggie!’ He ended on his back, looking up into the blue, blue sky, overjoyed to have finally got just as dirty as he’d ever wanted. The mud was cool and squishy, and soothing to the places where the pins had pricked him, and he lay still now, sighing happily, oblivious to any danger.

Pearl and Rosemary gave wails of distress, speeding the hired hobbit to the pen, for he thought the sow had already savaged the young hobbits, from the sound of it. He grabbed up a hayfork and vaulted the fence, ready for battle. His worst fears were confirmed, seeing the young hobbits motionless in the mud.

‘Here, you!’ he said, brandishing the fork. ‘Come, lasses, get them out of there whilst I hold the old sow off!’

Rosemary ducked through the fence to join Pearl, each lass taking a young hobbit by the hand, but Ferdi wasn’t ready to go, and let himself go limp. In trying to yank him to his feet, Rosemary slipped and fell, sitting down with a howl.

Pearl got Merry up and out of the pen, pushing him through the fence, and bravely turned back to help Rosemary. ‘Get him up!’ she said, hearing an ominous snort from the sow.

‘Hurry!’ the hired hobbit said, making little pushing motions with the fork, to keep the sow distracted. ‘I don’t know how much longer I can hold her off!’

Seeing that Paladin’s prize sow weighed twice as much as the hired hobbit and children put together, it was a real concern. Hobbits, as a rule, didn’t go into the pen when she had new babies, not if they didn’t have to, not until she settled down and her little ones needed less protection, in her opinion.

Rosemary managed to gain her feet, and she and Pearl between them lifted little Ferdi, still defiantly limp, and carried him to the fence.

‘Steady, lass,’ the hired hobbit said, backing to the fence, fork held before him. ‘Steady...’

And in another moment he’d dived to safety, and crisis over, the mother pig ambled back to her little ones.

There was a scream, then, from the kitchen doorway, and in the next moment Stelliana was there, hugging little Ferdi to her bosom, unmindful of noisome mud, and Eglantine was hurrying to join them, demanding an explanation, and in the next breath sending Pimpernel, who’d run to the kitchen next to fetch the mums, off to have one of the hired hobbits ride for the healer, seeing Ferdi so limp and still in his mother's arms.

***

'And so what happened?'

Ferdi sat back and looked to Merry. 'I'm not quite sure,' he admitted. 'I was half-smothered in my mother's embrace, and didn't see much of what happened until the healer pried me away again.'

'And said there was not much wrong with any of us that wouldn't be put right with a bath,' Merry said with a snort. 'Which, of course, you didn't mind at all!'

'Splash, splash, in the bath!' Pippin sang, and Merry nodded at him.

'Exactly,' he said. 'And then there were the scoldings!' He rolled his eyes. 'Such scoldings, I can tell you...'

'Then tell on,' Jack said with a chuckle. 'Tell on.'