48. Going to Gondor
~ some months later ~
'Welcome back!' Pippin, standing in front of the entrance to Brandy Hall, cried to the travellers. 'You're just in time for tea – though I must say, we expected you at teatime days ago! It's been quite a trial for the cooks, what with getting ready for the grand "welcome home" celebration and all that, and every day, teatime came and went without you! And think how difficult it has been for Merimas, who's had to eat up all the apple tart they've baked every day to welcome you sluggards! Just because you didn't have the manners to turn up on time...'
'Sluggards!' Estella cried. 'You take that back, Peregrin Took! My beloved is about as far from a sluggard as...'
'My love!' Merry interrupted her.
'Pity,' Pippin said. 'I was waiting on tenterhooks to find out just how far from a sluggard you might be, Merry!'
Despite the broad smile and cheerful tone, Merry thought Pippin looked thinner than when he and Estella had left for Rohan, and he determined to bring up the subject of his cousin's health with Saradoc as soon as possible.
'Do you even know what tenterhooks are?' Estella demanded.
'No,' Pippin said airily. 'But they sound deucedly uncomfortable!'
'Children!' Merry said. 'Stop this bickering before you make us late for tea!'
Laughing, Diamond pulled at Pippin's arm. 'Come along, my love!' And with a wicked twinkle in her eye, she looked to Merry and Estella, who were now dismounting their ponies as stable hobbits arrived to take the reins, and called, 'Last one there is a garden slug!'
And giggling madly, as if they had reverted to childhood or perhaps lost their wits completely from the joy of greeting their beloved cousins, Diamond picked up her skirts, and she and Pippin skipped – actually skipped! – into the Hall and out of sight.
The young master and his missus had actually arrived some two hours before teatime, giving them ample time to greet Merry's parents and then go to their quarters and freshen up, though there might not have been quite enough time for a full bath. As it turned out, Merry's lengthy discussion with his parents threatened to last into – and even beyond – teatime, obliging the two returned travellers to hurry to their apartments for a quick scrub and change of clothes to make themselves presentable before teatime in the great hall began.
For it certainly wouldn't do to miss their welcome-home celebration!
Back in their suite of rooms, Estella hurriedly slipped out of her travelling clothes and washed her face and arms before putting on a fresh frock. Merry simply changed his shirt, waistcoat and jacket and brushed the dust from his breeches. Looking in the mirror, he ran a hand through his curls and grimaced.
'A bath's the thing, I think,' he said, even as he took up a flannel, wet it in the fresh water Estella had poured into the ewer for him after discarding her own, and rubbed at his face and neck. 'But it'll have to wait until after tea.'
'Don't forget to wash behind your ears!' Estella said.
'Yes, Mum!' Merry answered.
'That's wrong,' Estella said.
'Er... what's wrong?' Merry wanted to know.
'You're supposed to be the mum, and I'm the child, remember? At least, that's how it sounded in the courtyard just now!'
'I was being the Papa!' Merry said with dignity. 'Or, if you want to be all Bucklandish about it, the Bah-bah!'
'Bah!' Estella answered cheerily.
'Exactly,' Merry said. 'Now, let us go to the great room lest we put ourselves at risk of actually coming belated!'
As they paused in the arched doorway to Brandy Hall's great room, Merimas came forward to greet them, with Berilac close behind.
'Welcome home, cousins!' 'At last!'
'At last?' Merry said to Berilac.
'We though you might have got lost along the way!' Berilac answered. 'You're...'
'Yes, I know, we have come home a fortnight later than we said we would...'
'But what's a plan for if you cannot change it?' Merimas said breezily.
'I like the way you think, cousin,' Estella said to him. 'I'm always saying such things to Merry, dear, everlastingly-planning hobbit that he is!'
'She keeps me on my toes,' Merry confessed, only to turn as he heard Pippin's voice behind him, to see his beloved cousins entering the great room hand in hand.
Pippin was beaming at Diamond. 'Well, my dear, I must say you make an absolutely lovely garden slug!'
'Thank you, darling,' Diamond answered, lifting Pippin's hand to her lips and dropping a kiss on his knuckles.
Tea was a joyous occasion, what with welcoming far travellers home again after what had been planned as a three-month journey, including a month spent in Edoras, that had stretched to somewhat more than three months. 'Our visit ought to have lasted one month, indeed!' Estella grumbled. 'But that King Éomer, he's a slippery sort!'
'I'd never have guessed that,' Pippin said in astonishment. 'Why, you'd think the Man could not safely sit a horse if that were the case!'
'You know perfectly well what I mean,' Estella said, trying for a severe look but then breaking down and laughing in the face of Pippin's put-on puzzlement.
'I know perfectly well, even if my dear husband does not!' Diamond said stoutly. But then, of course, she softened her stern retort with a wink.
Saradoc was looking a little older and greyer, Merry thought, though his face was relaxed and his eyes were twinkling at the byplay that had been missing from the Hall for the past few months. Of course, if Merry's plan should come to fruition, his father would be missing the cousinly banter for several more months to come... Still, he reminded himself, it's for the best.
The thought was reinforced by his observations as the grand tea proceeded. Though Diamond loaded her husband's plate with good food, Merry noticed that Pippin pushed the food around more than he actually lifted it to his mouth. His impression of Pippin looking thinner had not been mistaken. From the evidence before his eyes, along with the details Saradoc and Esmeralda had so recently provided (not to mention the letters his mother had written to them in Edoras), the wonder was that his cousin had not lost more ground while Merry had been away.
As a matter of fact, he and Estella had been able to break free of the hospitable Rohirrim earlier than Éomer would have preferred, though to do so, they'd had to inform their hosts of Esmeralda's concerns for her nephew. He reminds me of Frodo before he sailed away, her last letter had said. He tires more easily these days, and he's eating less – except when he knows someone is watching closely, and so I've tried to do so, and so has Diamond, of course. But he's slipping, Merry, and I'm afraid he's becoming resigned to not getting better... Merry had found the words chilling, for he, too, remembered Frodo before his beloved older cousin had sailed into the West.
His mother had continued, In past years, the warm, dry summer months brought him healing, or so it seemed to me. By harvest, he'd be so full of energy, the Hall could hardly contain him! But this summer has been different. I don't know if it's the prolonged cold, wet spring we had, or if he might do better if you were here? It's not that the workload is heavy, for Berilac and Merimas, between them, are fulfilling all of your duties and some of Pippin's, along with their regular work.
Esmeralda's writing had changed at the end of the letter, as if she had laid the pages aside and only reluctantly taken up her pen to add the finishing lines. I'm sorry, my dear lad, to ask you to pull yourself away from your lovely holiday. But I don't know if my nephew will manage to build up the strength he needs to endure the cool, damp winter months. Merry could almost see his mother resting the end of her pen against her chin, thinking deeply, considering. Something had blurred the ink on the page... a teardrop? From the subtle change in her handwriting, he thought her hand might have trembled as she wrote the closing line: Please come home.
Merry felt a touch on his hand and looked down to see Estella's hand resting on his. He gave her a grateful smile and nodded, and she picked up a handful of ginger biscuits and deposited them on Merry's plate. 'Hobbits do not live by apple tart alone!' she proclaimed.
Estella had a way of livening up the Hall – as well as Merry's existence. He was glad to have taken her with him, this visit. Seeing Edoras through her eyes had given him a whole new perspective on the Rohirrim. She'd been neither daunted by the largeness of their surroundings nor as deferential to the esteemed King and Queen of Rohan as Merry might have preferred, but everything had turned out well in the end.
For Éomer and Lothíriel had deemed her "refreshing" and invited Estella to "come back any time – and bring your husband!" Estella's rough-and-ready manner had fit well with the forthright Rohirrim who were equally impatient with subtlety and "beating around the bush" (as Estella put it, though she almost always added, 'Poor bush! What did it ever do to deserve such, I ask you?').
Compared to the much more formal manners found in Gondor... But this thought brought Merry to the meat of the matter – the serious topic he and Estella had discussed with his parents on their arrival, using up so much of the time before tea, as it had turned out, that they'd had time only for a quick wash and change.
'Speaking of Gondor...' he said.
Pippin blinked in honest confusion, as compared with his pretended puzzlement earlier. 'Gondor?' he said. 'Were we speaking of Gondor? I was sure we were talking about Rohan just now!'
'Unless I missed something, that's what we were talking about,' Diamond confirmed. 'Here now, have another slice of apple tart before your cousin eats it all!'
'You don't miss much,' Estella said to her friend, and they shared a grin before Diamond contradicted her.
'O yes I do! I've missed you terribly! And all summer long! And you were only supposed to be gone three months at most! Not half a year!'
'We were not gone for half a year...' Merry began in his most reasonable tone.
'All but,' Diamond countered.
'My dear,' Pippin said under his breath, but Estella was having none of her husband's – and their cousin's – attempts to minimise the problem.
'And our visit might well have stretched past six months!' she said. 'It took a concerted effort – on both our parts! – to break free as soon as we did!'
'Of course, visits to Gondor are much more straightforward,' Merry said.
Pippin looked at his cousin in surprise. Gondor, again? 'Are you planning on leaving for Gondor next?' he asked.
'No, but you are,' Merry said, and quickly amended his statement. 'I mean, you ought.'
'I ought to go to Gondor?' Pippin said. 'Are you trying to get rid of me? I could always go back to the Tookland...' And then he laughed at Merry's shocked expression and added, 'I could always take Estella along with me. We could leave you and Diamond in relative peace... until you grow so bored from the quiet and peace of our absence that you beg my father to send us back to Buckland!'
'And by that time, I'm sure the two of you would have stirred up so much mischief, Paladin would be happy to do so!' Diamond said with a wink for Estella. 'Without my calming influence, and Merry's, the two of you together are a volatile combination!'
'I doubt we'll burn any buildings down,' Pippin pretended to muse.
'I'm sure we could if we put our minds to it,' Estella countered.
The Brandybucks surrounding them were laughing by this point, and Merimas said, 'Perhaps we ought to send the Steward, at least, off on a holiday! It sounds as if he's getting quite restless!'
'Not to mention,' Estella pouted, 'he is such a bad influence! Why, he's already mentioned setting fire to buildings!' She turned to Merry. 'I think we really ought to send him off to Gondor, just as he suggested a few moments ago! Our cousin is badly in need of a holiday!'
'I suggested going to Gondor?' Pippin said, nonplussed.
'Well!' Estella said archly, turning back to him. 'At least you've admitted it now, though you certainly took your time in doing so.'
'I never—' Pippin countered.
'Don't change the subject!' Estella snapped, and turning to Merry, she laid her hand on his arm and said in quite a different tone, 'I can see clearly now why the Master thinks the Steward needs a holiday...'
'Hoi!' Saradoc said, startled, but Esmeralda had the presence of mind to nudge him, reminding him of the talk they'd had with Merry little more than an hour ago, and he cleared his throat. 'Ah. Yes,' he said. 'In need of a holiday. Why, just the other day, I was saying...'
'Then Diamond and I can go off to Long Cleeve for a week or three,' Pippin said, 'I mean, if you all are really so determined to send us off! I'm sure the north-Tooks would welcome a long visit with their grandson...'
'But I thought you had your heart set on going to Gondor!' Estella protested.
'I did?' Pippin said.
'Why, yes!' Estella maintained. 'I remember, before we left, you said something to the effect of how you wished you could go along with us to Rohan, but that the Master could not spare both his son and his Steward at the same time.'
'Did I?' Pippin said.
'You did,' Diamond said, and her husband shot her an astonished look.
'Not you too!' he said.
'O yes, I too!' Diamond said. 'You're not going off to Gondor without me this time!'
'And Farry,' Estella put in.
'O' course, and Farry!' Diamond confirmed.
'I'm going to Gondor?' Pippin said, perplexed.
'No, my dear, I think we've established that we're going to Gondor,' Diamond said, adding a few more tea sandwiches to her husband's plate. 'Eat those up, now. You're falling behind!'
'I certainly am,' Pippin muttered, but whether he was referring to teacakes or travel plans, even the young Steward himself wasn't sure at this point.
***