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Bound for Gondor  by Lindelea

Chapter 3. Weather Fit for a Duck

The deluge let up suddenly, and the wind dropped to nothing in the same moment, leaving an eerie stillness that was somehow worse than the rain had been. Sam lifted his head to gaze at the blackening sky, more like dusk than not quite noontide. The odd greenish hue to the swirling clouds decided him, and all at once he was pounding his hand against the waggon and shouting. 'Out! Everybody out! Now!'

Bodies poured out from under the canvas cover, brothers jumping down and reaching up to help down their sisters, even as Sam grabbed at Rose's hand to urge her down.

'Sam? What in the world...?' Rose was saying, but he shoved her towards the Spotted Duck, just ahead.

'Get inside!' he cried, his sense of dread rising as the hair prickled on the back of his neck.

'But...' she protested, turning back to him.

He was too busy with the harness—difficult enough when the ponies stood calmly, and near impossible now as they fought him—to deal with her, so not taking his eyes from his furiously working fingers he shouted, 'Go! Get the children inside!'

He'd hoped that would take her to safety, but no, she merely made a shooing motion at the children, huddled staring in the doorway of the public house, and stumbled to the ponies' heads, grabbing at their reins and pulling their noses down by virtue of hanging her full weight upon her hands.

With the ponies stilled, or at least quieter than they'd been, Sam was able to unbuckle the harness, and by the time the first of the large hailstones began to fall, he'd joined Rose. Together they pulled the ponies free of the waggon.

Rose was rather at a loss, but Sam knew exactly what he was about, dragging the frightened beasts straight to the Duck's door, and—despite the proprietor's protests—straight through into the common room.

'What'cher doin', bringin' ponies in here?' ...but the outraged bellow was nearly drowned in the thunder of hailstones bouncing on the street outside, against the shutters, and then the rain poured down once again, and lightning flashed outside.

Sam was breathing hard, and Rose was soothing the younger children, who were crying in confusion, and the hobbits huddled in the common room stared at the enormous white hailstones pummelling the street and lonely waggon, larger than golf balls (perhaps nearly so large as orc heads, as one of the gaffers would venture later over a brimming mug, as in the battle where the game of golf was invented). The proprietor's protest died away in the face of the wild weather, but Sam felt obliged to answer him anyhow.

'I'm that sorry,' he said, stroking the nearest trembling pony. 'I never would have... I hope you know I wouldn't, but...'

'No, no,' said the blinking hobbit, reluctant to take his eyes from the amazing sight outside his door, hailstones bouncing with skull-cracking force, mounting up in the street until all was white and cold. 'It's no trouble at all...' he said, in complete reversal of his mood but a moment earlier, but then he was bewildered by all the sudden developments.

His more practical wife, however, shoved the door closed against the rising wind, and they were left there in the common room, in semi-darkness with the light of the fire on the great stone hearth and half the lamps lit, though the room brightened as the serving lasses got around to light the rest.

An old gaffer moved slowly over to Sam, patting each of the ponies in turn and talking soothing nonsense. 'Well, Mr. Mayor,' he said at last. 'Perhaps I can stand you to a beer? Mighty fine beer they have here at the Duck, I'll say.' He waved a hand to the proprietor. 'Wink! Two beers!'

'Thankee,' Sam said faintly. 'Don't mind if I do.' He was rather half bewildered himself, now that he'd got his family and the two ponies safe under cover. He could scarcely believe he'd had the nerve to bring ponies into the Duck, but then what else could he have done?

The proprietor's wife was fussing around the children, muttering about “wet to the skin” and “chilled to the bone” and raising her voice to order hot drinks for the Mayor's family.

'We'll be going on to the Smials, just as soon as this lets up,' Rose said, trying to forestall her. She was heartily embarrassed at their situation. Ponies in the Duck! 'Wouldn't want to put you out...'

The proprietor's wife laughed heartily. 'Put us out!' she said. 'Wouldn't want to put anyone out in this! It's not fit weather for hobbit nor beast!'

'You can say that again, Lila!' the gaffer agreed, slapping Sam on the back. 'Trust our Mayor to be one for quick thinking... '

'I can see why we made you Mayor,' Wink agreed, with an appropriate grimace, before putting a mug into Sam's hand.

***

It was all greatly unreal, Hodge Sandyman thought, as he and the miller stared at the rain and hail, and the racing, rapidly rising Water. They'd hurried to disengage the mill wheel, and just in time, before serious damage was done.

A gust of wind rattled hail against the shutters, and Hodge started. 'Bag End!' he exclaimed. 'The windows!' He was responsible for the smial, with the Gamgees away on a visit to the Thain.

The miller grabbed him by his braces before he could dart out the door. 'Close that door, lad,' he said. 'You're going nowhere, not so long as that hail's pouring down.'

'But Master Bankstone,' Hodge said, 'the Mayor left me in charge...!'

'Ah, and he left you in my charge, in the absence o' your father, young Sandyman, and I mean to uphold my duty, and not let you go out to be pounded to pulp! If any windows is going to break, I'd say they're broke already, and no use going and putting the shutters on now...'

And so the two stared glumly out the door, while Hodge hoped desperately that perhaps the weather wasn't quite so dramatic up the Hill, at Bag End and its environs. If only he'd known, he would have fastened the shutters before coming down the Hill to begin the morning's milling.

'Not the usual weather for this time o' year, praise be,' said the miller. 'Most unusual, I'd say. Why, I'd almost think that dratted wizard had some hand in it, if he hadn't sailed away all those years back. Unusual, wouldn't you say?'

'Unusual,' Hodge agreed, and sighed. He didn't look forward to the clearing up he'd be doing, that was for sure.

***

'Unusual weather we're having,' the gaffer said, sipping at his beer. 'Now go on, drink up! Don't let that beer go flat.'

It was all greatly unreal, Sam thought, with the pounding outside, nearly as loud as the falls of Rauros, and the ponies standing quiet now, steaming in the warmth of the common room, hobbits toasting their four-footed health and a serving maid feeding them handfuls of carrots she'd hurried to bring from the kitchen.

But the beer was certainly good.





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