Chapter 12: The World Was Grey

12 Foreyule, S.R. 1311

Thwack!

The log split neatly in two, and Bilbo set up another one. He'd offered to split firewood this morning while his parents went down to Greenbriars to check on Cousin Ruby and the new baby. He knew his mother was very worried by how weak they both still were, though she said thankfully they were getting no worse.

Truthfully Bilbo had wanted to do this. He was feeling so very weary of being kept indoors, and the exercise felt good.

It had snowed again in the night, just enough to put a smooth white layer atop the slushy mess from a few days before. The sky was clear for a change-- the blue was a welcome relief from the grey gloom of the past few weeks.

Thwack!

He hit the log as hard as he could. This one did not split quite so neatly as the last, but it was acceptable. He chucked the two pieces into his growing pile and set up another. He wanted to have it done by luncheon when his parents got home.

Thwack!

He had not really wished to go down this morning. It was so hard to look at poor little Dora and Drogo, who were so hungry. He was hungry, too, but they were so young. He grabbed another piece of wood.

Thwack!

It wasn't fair! It just wasn't fair!

Thwack!

The angrier he got, the faster the wood split. Finally, out of breath, he reached for another piece, and there wasn't one. He had split all that his father had told him to do.

He began to gather it up and stack it near the kitchen door, so that it would be handy to bring in. He was no longer angry. He just felt drained and hungry. He looked at the sky, and realised his parents would soon be home. He finished stacking the wood neatly, and then went indoors, where he divested himself of his hat, his scarf, his coat, his jacket and his leggings. Then he began to prepare lunch so that his parents wouldn't have to when they got home. Truthfully there wasn't a lot to do: heat up the soup left from supper the night before, make a few plain ash cakes on the hearth, and put the teakettle on to boil.

Soon enough he heard the door open and his parents came into the kitchen.

"Oh, thank you, son!" his mother said proudly. "I am so glad you got lunch ready!" She gave him a hug and a kiss on top of his head.

His father glanced out the kitchen door briefly. "You did a good job on the woodpile, too, Bilbo!"

Bilbo flushed with pleasure. "Thank you, Papa!"

The little family sat round the kitchen table with their meagre (by hobbit standards) meal.

"I am glad you didn't come with us today, Bilbo. Dora and Drogo are both down with the sniffles." said Belladonna. "Mrs. Twofoot fears it may be catarrh. She isn't sure, and Mistress Rose can't get up to Greenbriars-- she can't even get into town." Mistress Rose Cotman was the Hobbiton healer, but she and her husband lived at the edge of town, and their smial was snowed in.

"I am going to try and get a group of hobbits together to dig her out. It's not a good thing for our healer to be trapped and unable to see her patients," said Bungo. "But in the meantime, I hope that it is not catarrh and does not spread. That's the last thing we need."

"Well, I won't have Bilbo exposed to it, at any rate." Belladonna stated firmly.

Talk turned to other matters. Little Dudo seemed to be strengthening a little at last, and Cousin Ruby had also begun to rally. No snow today was also a hopeful sign...

17 Foreyule, S.R. 1311

The sunny days had not lasted. Yesterday there had been another snowfall, this one deep enough to snow them in at the front door, though the wind had kept it from piling up at the kitchen door. Bag End seemed quieter than it ever had before, all muffled and silent. The snow outside Bilbo's window came nearly to the top. It was an eerie feeling.

In fact, he could not even hear his parents stirring, or smell the porridge cooking. Was it too early? Or was it too late? He could not tell by the light, nor even by his stomach, for he'd begun to grow used to the feeling of hunger all the time. Perhaps it was much earlier than he thought, yet this time of year the Sun rose late. He rose from his bed and put on his dressing gown, and went out into the passage, where he stopped in front of his parents' door.

He had just started to raise his hand to knock when the door opened. His father stood there in his nightshirt looking weary and haggard, holding an empty teacup. Then there was a sneeze from the bed, where his mother lay, a huddled lump of blankets and no part of her visible.

Bilbo took the teacup from his father and sniffed it. "Willow-bark? Is she all right?"

"She has been sneezing and feverish most of the night, son. I think she may have caught Dora and Drogo's sniffles." Bungo took his own dressing gown down from the peg on the back of the door and wrapped it around himself. "You and I will let her rest today, and have breakfast together."

Bilbo followed his father back down the passage reluctantly. He wanted nothing more than to fly to his mother and be sure she was all right. But his father was right-- she needed her rest.

Bilbo and Bungo each had a small bowl of porridge and some water for breakfast. Afterwards, Bungo made a tray with a cup of real tea and a piece of toast, and took it to Belladonna. Bilbo did the washing up, such as it was, from breakfast and then went to get himself dressed.

"It's a good thing you stacked the woodpile well, son," Bungo said. "We shan't be going far for the next few days. If it snows more we'll do well to get out the back door. I am going to bring the shovel in from the garden shed and put it in the kitchen. It won't do us much good if we can't get to it in order to use it."

Bilbo nodded, and watched his father bundle up and go carefully out the back door. He poked his head out, and there was the woodpile near to hand. He put his own coat, scarf and hat on, and stepped out into bitter cold. It took several trips, as he could not carry much at one time, but he filled the woodbox in the kitchen and the basket by the hearth in the parlour, and he brought in another couple of armloads so that his father could put them in the bedroom to keep the fire in their room going. They'd been forgoing such fires, but his mother would need the warmth if she were sick!

The day passed slowly. The hole was neat as a pin already, and there was not much to do. Bungo checked on Belladonna frequently, but refused to allow Bilbo to do so-- "There is no point in you getting a cold as well, son," he said.

Lunch consisted of cheese sandwiches. They were already skipping elevenses and tea now. Bilbo made supper: potato soup. There was no milk or butter, but there were plenty of onions and dried herbs, and it seemed a nice change from the vegetable soup they had been having. As a treat, Bungo brought out two of the apples from the cold cellar and baked them in the embers. He and Bilbo divided one, and he took the other to Bella.

Bilbo went back into the parlour where he and his father had been playing draughts much of the afternoon, and sat down with a book. It had always been one of his favorites, an account of one of the Brandybucks' travels in Bree, but it could not hold his interest at all.

After a while his father came back. "I'm sorry, son, but I am very tired and have a headache. I'm going to bed-- don't stay up too late, and remember to bank the fire."

"Yes, Papa."

"Good-night, son," said Bungo. And then he sneezed.

"Good-night, Papa," said Bilbo, and he felt a shiver of fear. What would he do if both of his parents fell ill?

22 Foreyule, S.R. 1311

Bilbo had never been so tired in his life. The first few days of his parents' illness he had brought endless cups of tea and tumblers of water and mugs of broth to them; as for himself, he had made a pot of pease porridge, and that had served him for every meal until this morning. He ate stale bread for breakfast, and decided that he'd make another pot of potato soup for his supper and his parents'.

Between times, he dozed fitfully in the chair beside their bed, or made occasional trips to the woodpile by the back door. They were running short of wood there, and he knew that perhaps in another day he'd have to shovel his way out to the big woodpile and fetch more. He wasn't sure he'd be strong enough to split so much as he had before-- he was so weary!

His mother suddenly was taken with a fit of coughing; it was long and hard and frightened Bilbo very much. She sat up, coughing and struggling to catch her breath. Bilbo turned her pillow, and helped her to settle back against it. She was so feverish! He went to the washstand and wrung out another flannel in cold water to place upon her brow. She turned to Bilbo and held out a shaking hand to him. "I'm so sorry, son...so sorry..."

Bilbo pressed a kiss on the hand and tucked it back under the covers. "It's all right, Mama, it will be all right." And he fought back tears and hoped as hard as he could hope that he was not telling a lie.

Then his father began to cough. His coughing, if anything was harder and worse than that of his mother. Bungo was sweating and shivering and trying to throw off the covers. He did not even seem to know Bilbo, and was muttering under his breath. Finally Bilbo got him settled as well, and his father passed into a fitful and restless sleep. Once he was sure that both of them were finally sleeping soundly, he went to fetch more water. Thank goodness, he thought, that Bag End was a modern smial and had a pump in the kitchen, one which had so far not frozen up.

What was he going to do? Bilbo wondered. The supply of willow-bark powder was dwindling. The pile of soiled linens and handkerchiefs was growing. There was less food. There was more snow. He had not seen anyone but his parents for at least two weeks. He sometimes wondered if they were the last people in the Shire. He tried very hard to shut off the horrid and unthinkable thought that his parents might not survive their illness. What would he do? No! No, he could not, would not think about that.

Yule was supposed to be coming, but Bilbo supposed they would not have any Yule this year. This year could not turn soon enough for him!  

He trudged back to the bedroom with a pail of water, and filled the pitcher by the bed and the ewer on the washstand, and put the remaining half-a-pail next to the hearth. Then he went back to the kitchen to fetch more wood.

Exhausted, he fell back into the armchair by the bed, and tried to get some sleep. He needed to sleep so badly.

Suddenly he heard the last thing he expected to hear: a pounding at the front door of Bag End!