Fire and Fleet and Candle-light 1
21 September 1400
Sam stepped out into the bright September morn, a slice of half-eaten bread and dripping in one hand and his besom
clutched tightly in the other. He eyed the prospect before him with weary deliberation, well aware that if anything was
certain at the end of a dry summer it was the blanket of parched leaves on the front path, blown into the garden from the
orchards below Bag End. The Row would be knee deep in red and gold by leaf-fall, but for now the gravel walk at
Number 3 was skinned over with a layer of dull brown.
All the same, and as paltry as the danger was to any hobbit with a lick of sense, if someone stumbled on the slippery
mass and twisted her ankle there'd be no end of shouting; Sam would catch it, sure as sure. He'd best sweep it up
once his breakfast had gone down good and proper, before May appeared with the master's laundry. He hoped she
wouldn't notice if he overlooked a few of the fancier bits and bobs, the ones whose crinkly edges reminded him of
ginger biscuits. Why would trees drop their bounty right at your feet if they didn't mean you to admire it?
Sam leaned on his broom, bent and worn though it was, while he chewed the remains of his bread and watched for the
first glimmer of sunshine to creep round the end of the Widow's garden. He never tired of seeing the dew on the
leaves of grass catch fire as the light struck them, or hearing the blackbird which was perched expectant in the hazel
bush burst into song. He knew, even though his garden lay shadowed and thick with damp, that it would be a fine day.
It had to be. There was a Party on the morrow, and no clouds of whatever kind would dare cast their gloom on Mr.
Bilbo's merriment.
A haze of fog lingered over the White Downs--a common sight as summer turned to autumn--but the air above
Hobbiton was clear and fresh except for the odd patchy drift of chimney-smoke and the grey plume of a fire that marked
where a hobbit had risen early to burn his spent crops. Sam felt a prickle in his throat as the breeze shifted, yet he still
caught, beneath the resinous scent of green fir, the faint sweet fragrance of windfalls from the apple and pear trees
across the way.
He’d recently taken a fancy to pears; they weren’t crisp and tart in his mouth like other fruits he could mention, but they
went down without that twinge of dread that made the hairs stand up on his neck every time he spotted an apple. And
he didn't need to cast a wary glance towards the pips at the pear's heart; they were just pips. You couldn't tell them
apart from apple pips, of course, but somehow--
Ah well, he'd better get to work; he had important business up Hill and the Widow's garden to see to after, bust it. Any
more lollygagging about and the Gaffer would nail a piece of his hide to the potting shed door. He swallowed the last
morsel of bread and brushed the crumbs from his hand, then began to clear the path with a steady determination that
was like to wear his besom to a nubbin.
The trouble was that he'd been visiting over by Tighfield in company with Marigold. While he'd been kicking his heels
with Cousin Anson and learning how to tie a bale sling hitch, the chores and preparations for the birthday had been
piling up at Bag End. No doubt they were high as the roof-tree by now and more than his dad could handle without an
extra pair of hands. He swept a little faster as he thought of the gentlehobbits coming from distant villages and
landholds to take part in the celebrations. It would be a blot on the name of Hamfast Gamgee should the master's
garden look other than perfect, even if the revellers were too tipsy to appreciate the straight line of Bilbo's perennial
border.
He stopped to push the hair from his face and consider the odds of the Gaffer's wine-dark hollyhocks and purple asters
outshining Mr. Frodo this year. It would be a close-run thing. When Frodo had given him the creamy stack of invitations
to post, he'd had a face on him like a wet week. Sam couldn't recall the last time he'd seen Frodo smile as if he meant
it, and without his high spirits and a-dancing of the springle-ring, the Party wouldn't be the same. The old master
would try to make the best of a bad job, but there was only so much you could do at one hundred and ten years of age
without breaking something.
Sam flicked his broom across the step and leaned in through the open door to check for stray leaves in the passage.
There were none, nor any tell-tale sound of nattering that foretold of sisters headed his way. He pulled his bundle from
the corner and placed it by the path, ready to grab once he'd finished. He wasn't as handy with the bread knife as he
was with the besom, but he valued his lunch and wanted it out where he could see it.
He sighed and resumed sweeping, while the sun climbed the smial tops and fell on his bent back, warming the knots
from his shoulders.
Aside from Mr. Frodo's glumness, there'd never been such a splendid summer. After the usual wet spring, with a
thunder and lightning storm that had left Farmer Brockhouse's herd stiff and stark beneath the oak, there'd been nary a
drop of rain for weeks on end, leastways not when Sam was looking.
Now and again, he would rise from his bed at dawn to find the earth black with moisture, but not a cloud in the sky to
show whence it had come. He was thankful, on those days, to have time for more than wielding his old watering can.
Bag End's kitchen garden wanted special attention since he and the Gaffer had laid out the raised beds, the very ones
Mr. Bilbo had planned all those months ago.
They had planted things that were new to Sam--eggapples, sunchokes, and stripey tomatoes. The eggapples looked
like a bull's cods, if cods were the colour of purple petunias. Sam frowned. He was relieved they'd proven to be finicky
things and hadn't fared well despite the warm summer. If the crop had been plentiful, Mr. Bilbo would have sent the
Gaffer home with a barrow full as a show of appreciation for his efforts. Daisy would surely have blushed at sight of
them, cracked a joke unfit for modest ears, then made Sam eat the blasted things. The customary bushel of potatoes
was a better gift and less discomfiting.
The sunchokes were another matter. They had grown so rampant that soon there were more than two hobbits could
ever hope to eat. Sam had been given a few to sample last week, and Daisy had mashed them in with the cream and
taters for their supper. Next day the Gaffer had taken to his bed complaining of wind, adamant that no further untoward
gifts would be making their way to Bagshot Row if he had anything to say about it. Sam hadn't a clue what would
happen to the rest of the crop. He didn't see as how anyone could get through those chokes by winter's end without
blowing the roof off their smial.
Once the Gaffer had risen from his sickbed, he'd waxed eloquent on the subject of odd roots brought from foreign parts
on purpose to do him an injury. Sam, on the other hand, enjoyed a challenge, even if he was no keener than his dad to
consume the fruits of his labours. He loved watching the strange plants make themselves known, from leaf bud, to
flower, to seed-head or pod, and to think that no one in the whole Westfarthing had grown these wonderments afore.
In truth, he had dreams of a garden so vast he could scarce see from one end of it to the other. T'would be crammed
with the queer-looking herbs and trees he'd spied in Mr. Bilbo's books of plant lore -- pineapples and palms, white
poppies and yellow roses. There would be a high stone wall round the garden to shelter it from autumn storms, and a
bench with a seat made from growing things such as thyme or blue forget-me-nots. He and Mr. Frodo would sit and --
"Samwise. There you are. Did you sharpen the shears like I told you?" Sam started and near fell over his besom. The
Gaffer had come down the lane and was leaning on the gatepost to catch his breath, a hard glint in his eye.
"Yes, Da. I'll be on my way up Hill in a jiffy and back afore tea-time to tend the Widow's garden."
The Gaffer grunted.
"You'd best be getting on." He dropped his voice and nodded towards the last smial on the Row. "I've had it with her
nattering. She wants the gentry who ride past to admire her prize mums. Nothing will do but that she must have the
daintiest garden in Hobbiton. Stuff and nonsense!"
"Gentry will need to stand straight in the stirrups and crane their necks if they want to catch a glimpse of summat worth
seeing," Sam answered, knowing full well that Mr. Bilbo's birthday guests would be too busy coaxing their fat Shire
ponies up the steep rise to pay any mind to the Widow's flowerbeds.
"You know it and I know it, but don't let herself hear you say it. Her hedge wants cutting back to the bare wood; it's too
leggy."
Sam furrowed his brow and butted the end of his besom into the angle of the step to tease out a few wayward leaves.
"Aye, well, she won't let me, but I'll do her weeding as soon as may be."
He set the besom by the door, and hoisted his knapsack onto his shoulder. A stone jar of ginger beer, a chunk of
crumbly blue cheese, turnip pickle, and two slices of barley bread were all it contained. And there was a book, too--
small enough to slip into a pocket--on how to plan a winter garden. He'd found it on a market stall last Hevensday,
trapped beneath an old daisy grubber. He would read it while he ate his lunch. There ought to be witchhazel or maybe
a dogwood in the border opposite Mr. Frodo's window, so he'd have something to look at of a frosty morning when he
opened the curtains. The flash of cherry-red and yellow as the sun broke round the corner of the smial would be a
sight to make the breath catch in any hobbit's throat. Pansies would show them off nicely--amber and purple, or yellow
as Proudfoot's butter.
"You're a good lad, Samwise," the Gaffer said, holding the gate open as Sam strode out into the lane with a swing in
his step and a smile on his face for the beauty of the morning.
He had walked this road so often that he fancied his two feet must have worn a special rut in the dirt long since. Every
topstone and bolt hole, every inch of hedgerow between Number 3 and Bag End was a familiar and well-loved
landmark. He might climb the Hill blindfold in a storm, if the need were on him. Nonetheless, there was another
dream, a dream more secret than the first. It occupied each waking moment though he would never make it known.
He longed for a day when the path from home would take him down Hill, when he would sleep safe in one of the
unused bedrooms at Bag End, snug as a pig in pease-straw, and do the work of smial and garden.
He would be content, both in and out of season, to spend his evenings there by the kitchen fire, mending tools in a
silence unbroken by the sound of May's careless gossip or the Gaffer's complaints about the Widow's cabbages. He'd
be nearby, day and night, for whatever wanted doing.
He had made up his mind, when he was old enough to put two and two together, that Mr. Bilbo and Mr. Frodo lived wild
as a pair of vagabonds because they had no one to look out for them. Gentlehobbits needed special attention from
one who had their measure; they were worse than a border of tender perennials that way. Unless they were watered
and fed and pinched out regular they would spread apart and fall over. You'd get no second flowering.
While Mr. Frodo was tough as a hornbeam root and stubborn with it, he'd sooner chase after the shadow of a story than
eat his dinner like normal folk. No wonder he was thin; he lived on naught but tea and biscuits.
Sam had spied him at The Ivy Bush on more than one occasion, tucking into a deep bowl of lamb stew and dumplins
with a thick slice of gooseberry tart for afters. He doubted if Frodo had such hearty fare at home, though Mr. Bilbo was a
fine cook when push came to shove. It generally didn't. Most times, Sam would venture indoors to get his instructions
and find the two of them holed up in the study, long noses deep in their books and surrounded by plates of half-eaten
scones.
It wasn't proper. The Master and his heir deserved better than a char from the village and vittles brought from the Inn
twice weekly. In point of fact, they deserved Sam; they just didn't know it yet.
He was so wrapped up in his daydream he almost stubbed his toes on the milk tankard that was standing by the
verge. He stopped in his tracks and stared around, but there was nobody in sight. The gate off the lane was yawning
on its hinges, wedged open with a rusty hand trowel and a trug filled with papery-skinned cobnuts. On the top bar, the
crumpled edge of a notice, held in place by a horse nail, was barely visible between the gate and the box hedge. He
pulled it about and tried to read the wording upsy-down.
Provisions to be left at the kitchen door.--B. Baggins, Esq.
Sam shook his head. What fool of an errand boy would leave the yat gaping and the party fare piled in the common
way where anyone might stumble over it? There'd be sheep among the primroses next. He lifted the tankard in one
hand--full as it was--and the trug in the other, and set them by the path while he latched the gate. They could bide with
his knapsack in the shade of the lilac until he'd finished his morning chores. It was too early to bring them into the
kitchen without warning.
It was clear, however, as he followed the gravel walk to the far end of the garden, that preparations were well afoot even
if Mr. Frodo still lay in bed with his ears muffled. Things were quiet for the nonce, but there was a load of trestle tables
by the entrance porch and scaffolding ready for the stillage. Firkins of ale would be carted in at sunrise on the morrow
from both The Ivy Bush and The Green Dragon, for although The Dragon's Golden Glory was a finer ale by far than The
Ivy Bush's Thirsty Hobbit, it wouldn't do for the Master to play favourites. Mr. Bilbo was particular when it came to
outward show; he was always smart as a carrot, and knew what he owed to his station.
"Oh, sausages!"
Sam, mindful of his situation, stifled a stronger oath and glared at the lantern hooks as if they were stray cows amidst
the corn. Someone had driven in the metal shepherd's crooks a shade too close to his peony roots; moreover, the
shafts leaned higly pigly and would fall into the hedge once the lanterns were hung. While Sam could sling a bit of
rope round the flower beds to prevent the likes of Old Noakes from ploughing through the daylilies, it was harder to
keep tweens out of the shrubbery. At least one young hobbit with a head full of ale would meet with misfortune and
singed hair in the gloom beyond the grass-border, sure as a louse in bosom. Burning the evergreen boughs was a
common Yuletide custom, but not suited to the Master's birthday revels nohow.
Sam knew there was little use fretting o'ermuch about what couldn't be helped; every year it was the same. By dawn on
the 23rd, the grass would be trodden flat as if a lawn roller had groomed it. There'd be broken crockery beneath the
roses and someone's breeches in the well bucket. The kitchen garden, which was bounded by a good sturdy fence
and gate, would at least be locked for the party, and any young hobbit who undertook to steal the Master's stripey
tomatoes would get a taste of Sam's ire. With any luck, he and the Gaffer could persuade Mr. Bilbo to make proper use
of the field across the way for his hundred and eleventh, to spare Bag End's garden the wear and tear. No, Sam
wouldn't fuss, but before he went home he would see to it that each lantern crook was upright and properly ranked
along the approach from the gate.
He unlatched the potting shed, gathered his tools from their hooks--hedge trimmer, pruners, worn deerskin gloves soft
as lamb's ears--and slung the withy basket over his arm to hold whatever might be garnered from the flagging tomato
vines. Later, he'd clip the hedge so even that Gammer Bunce could set her supper plate on it if she'd a mind. His dad
would be proud of him.
The September sun was hot in the enclosed space of the kitchen garden, the drone of dumbledores rising above the
sound of carts heading to market on the Bywater Road. Sam shrugged off his jacket and hung it from the gatepost,
then rolled his sleeves up until he felt a faint waft of wind lift the hair on his arms. He leaned to test the readiness of
the tomatoes and the heavy, plump fruits--tight to bursting--filled his hands. He laid the ripest ones in his basket each
by each, and when he'd done, he raised his fingers to inhale the scent of the fresh, green stalks.
Perhaps Mr. Frodo was already hunched at his desk, a pot of tea near his elbow, poring over a drift of parchments
covered with hen scratches. Sam had learned his letters under the Master's watchful eye--for the better reading of
seed catalogues and garden manuals--as Mr. Bilbo had explained to a distrustful Gaffer, but those thin, inky lines
scrawled across the pages of elven books baffled Sam's efforts to make them out.
Would Frodo still rise to ease his back, squinting in the glare from the unshaded window as he gazed at Sam going
about his common tasks--adding a sprig of rosemary to the tomatoes and placing the basket by the kitchen entrance,
taking up his trimmer? Would he? Sam smiled as he began to clip, and the silence of the autumn garden pooled at
his feet until he saw only the smooth, straight lines of the privet hedge unfolding to either side like the wings of a great
kite over the hilltop.
He had almost reached the southeasterly corner when he heard the tell-tale snick of the gate, and thinking it must be
the posthobbit on his noon rounds, Sam cleaned the grime from his shears with a shirt-tail and went to get his
knapsack. He had missed elevenses and might very well miss tea if the Widow Rumble held his nose to the
grindstone; he was a mite peckish and thirsty to boot. The hedge could wait until he was comfortably tucked out.
Thus without so much as a backward glance at the smial, he let himself into the lane and set off downhill in search of
shade. As he crossed the stile into the meadow, he had a bird's eye view of the Widow's garden with its yellow mums
bordering the path. Now there was something to make a cat laugh, and Mr. Frodo, too. Sam didn't think he'd tell her
the flowers were best seen from the Hill; she'd have a conniption fit. Besides, it would be dark long before Mr. Bilbo's
party spilled into the meadow, if it ever did, and any gentlehobbit who wandered this far would be too drunk to look
further than the hair on his toes.
Sam settled himself amidst the ancient oak's spreading roots and stretched out his legs. To the west--in the bright
curve where beck flowed into Water, its rapid, glancing measure slowing to a deep green eddy--the elm that marked
the edge of his birch copse stood above the lesser trees, crown studded with an ever shifting discord of rooks. He
might walk that way once he'd finished his chores; Tom would still be in the fields, and Sam would have an hour to
himself before facing the hurly-burly of Number 3.
He lifted the bread, cheese, and pickle from his knapsack, balancing them on his lap while he unstoppered the ginger
beer. It fizzed like one of Mr. Gandalf's sparklers and threatened to foam over the top until Sam put the bottle to his lips
and tilted his head. Light fell through the leaves onto his upturned face; it dappled the harebells and red clover--now
here, now there--as wind stirred the branches. He closed his eyes against it to better savour the tingle of hot ginger on
his tongue and wished for the hundredth time that things weren't so bent out of shape.
His dad was pleased with the changes in Frodo. He's learned to hold himself aloof from hobbits who strive to keep to
their station, was how he'd put it. He'd never stopped to wonder where Mr. Frodo's unnatural silence had come from of
a sudden. It was plain as a pikestaff to the Gaffer that Sam was doing twice the work he'd done in the past, and there
was no reason why the master would want words with the gardener's lad beyond 'hallo, Sam' or 'stow the vegetables
there, Sam'. Nor was there need for long talks over books or eating toast together in the kitchen. And there was no
point in wanting to share the tale of the Widow Rumble's mums because Mr. Frodo would stare right through him and
out t'other side.
A hot posset at bedtime, well-spiced, and a proper breakfast of veal pie with sausage; that was what Frodo lacked. He
was light as a windle-straw from meagre fare at home and lonely rambles in places where Sam feared for his well-
being. If he would let Sam do for him, maybe--
Oh, Samwise, you're daft as a dormouse. Maybe Mr. Frodo spies on you when he's tired of his bookwork and maybe
he doesn't, but one thing's clear--he doesn't want to talk to you noways. If--no, when--Frodo gave him a gift on the
morrow, Sam would need words to thank him that weren't strained and awkward. He couldn't imagine what those
words might be, and it was with a heavy heart that he unwrapped the linen napkin covering his bread and cheese and
began to eat.
~***~
The pickle wasn't sitting well with the ginger beer, that much was certain. He should have taken forty winks to let
things settle, but instead of that he had bolted his meal in a daze then hastened from the meadow to fetch his jacket
before earwigs crawled into the pockets. The remnants of lunch were thrashing about like two pigs in a poke, and it
wasn't till he was nigh on top of it that he spied Mr. Bilbo’s blackthorn stick leaning by the kitchen porch, its metal-shod
tip coated with mud. Sam scowled. There'd be mucky footprints from here to yon if the master had been wandering
through the fields over Hill; he was ever loath to wipe his feet when he knew he'd be off again at any moment. Perhaps
he'd gone and left his stick behind; the door was ajar yet the smial stood silent as if it were empty.
Sam shook out his jacket and carried it into the shed where he collected the rake and barrow, blew his nose, and
tucked a peppermint from the Gaffer's tin box into his cheek. He'd prune the last few feet of the hedge, turn the
compost, and leave the verge-trimming for the morrow. No one would notice if he left early or came back at sunrise to
finish his chores. Doubtless Mr. Frodo had taken his noon meal in the study and was nodding, half-asleep, over the
household accounts.
And so it was that when Sam rounded the corner of the smial an hour later, the barrow piled high with privet stems and
a whistle on his lips, he was stunned into abrupt silence at sight of a slim figure in a green coat sprawled on the seat
in the willow arbour. It was snoring softly, though no wisps of smoke were coming from its nostrils nor was it sleeping
on a mound of gold and jewels. In fact, it--or Mr. Frodo rather, Sam thought, feeling the turnip pickle play at leap-frog in
his belly, was curled on his side with knees drawn up and hands snug beneath his cheek. There was a book on the
ground beside him, its pages held open with a lead pencil and a browning apple core.
While Sam didn't mean to stare--not when he'd spent the summer casting sidelong glances at his master for fear Mr.
Frodo would turn into a boggart--he couldn't help but think that any hobbit with sense in his noddle would have brought
a bolster from the smial for comfort. That bench wasn't meant for napping and Frodo would have a fearsome crick in
his neck when he--
Sam set the wheelbarrow down and shifted uneasily from side to side, suddenly as bewildered as if he'd come upon a
badger in the sitting room. What if Mr. Frodo awoke to find Sam there with his mouth agape and a thin sweat starting
on his brow? What if Mr. Frodo were to gaze at him with eyes as hard as chips of glass? What if he spoke words that
made no sense even after a fellow had mulled over them and wondered what was meant? Sam's fists clenched as he
stood, breathless, a kernel of something akin to dread in his breast.
The Gaffer would call him a ninnyhammer and tell him to get on with his work, but it was the means of getting on that
were causing Sam's lunch to somersault. Should he back off quietlike so as not to create a stir, or nip past with his
barrow and make straight for the heap? He pondered these choices, not liking either of them but caught between two
stools as formerly, with his master on the one side and his own fondness on the other.
Thus he stood for a moment or several, aware of the spicy-sweet smell from the briar roses beyond the garden wall
and the song of the thrush in the near distance, ever hopeful he would make it home without mishap to share that
out-sized tart Daisy had been placing the lid on at breakfast. And while he lingered, trying his best to think of bilberries
instead of Berylla Boffin, Mr. Frodo slept on, thinner than he'd been in the spring but of a very pleasing shape
nonetheless in his new bottle-green coat and matching breeches. The tightness in Sam's chest began to ease as he
looked at the coat, and when a chiffchaff burst from the brambles with an angry wheet, flicking its tail at a hobbit's folly,
Sam shook his head and sighed.
Whisht, Samwise, you're almost a tween yourself, with a job of work to do. Buck up and do it.
He returned his hands to the barrow, but when he leaned to push it past the entrance to the arbour, his shadow
stretched out and fell across the master's face. Frodo's eyes opened on the instant, and if they weren't chips of glass
as Sam had feared, they weren't quite friendly neither. Sam wet his lips.
"You should have summat under your head, sir, begging your pardon. I could get my--" His hands were stuck fast to
the handles or he'd have gestured towards the shed where he'd left his jacket hanging from the door hook.
Frodo yawned and rubbed his cheek.
"No, Sam, don't bother; I must go in. I haven't been holding up my end of the party arrangements. I was waylaid by a
book of verse and a crisp pippin." He glanced at Sam with a spark of amusement that made Sam acutely conscious of
the barrow handles growing slick from his hot, sweaty palms. "But thank you all the same. I know you're busy."
He frowned as if he'd only just grasped that he was in the arbour and not on the settle by the fire. "Perhaps you'd care
to put your barrow down. You'll strain something, standing there like a lemon."
Sam felt the heat rush from his hands straight to the tips of his ears.
"Oh, aye," he said and let go of the barrow, wiping his palms furtively on his twill breeches. Mr. Frodo had spoken no
more than words of bidding to him since the spring. Sam wished he could think of something to say, now that he had
his chance, other than 'aye' or 'naw', but his mind was a blank slate. It didn't help any that Frodo was gawping as if
Sam had sprouted two heads like that calf over by Needlehole.
"Are you all right?" Frodo asked at length. "Would you care for a glass of small beer or a biscuit?"
"No, sir, thankee. That is to say--I had my lunch not an hour since and it's given me a belly-wark. Daisy's pickle--" he
paused to gather his wits before he made an unseemly jest on the subject of neeps. "I was going to ask you the same,
Mr. Frodo; about a drink I mean," he added hastily, though he'd intended no such thing. It had come to him in a flash
that Mr. Frodo might not have been asleep in the first place. He'd have thought it queer, in that case, to see his
undergardener hovering by the arbour with his heart in his mouth. A bad excuse is better than none, as Tom would
say, being less particular than Sam's Gaffer.
But Frodo hadn't noticed anything untoward for, without so much as a nod, he sat up and swung his feet to the ground.
"I saw you walking in the lane earlier," he remarked, the quirk on his lips that might have been a smile not reaching his
eyes. "I'd have followed you, but I didn't expect to be here for longer than it took to eat my apple and read The Lay of the
Fall of Gondolin. It's a fragmentary work, abandoned by the author--" He tossed the apple core into the shrubbery,
and closed his book. "I'll read it to you some time," he said, not sounding as if he meant it; not to Sam's ears anyroad.
Sam considered the privet cuttings in his barrow--their narrow, glossy leaves; smooth stems that would have borne
flowers in the coming year--and felt the burden of what had been left unsaid in the spring settle on his shoulders easy
as an old smock. For all the long summer days he had suffered it, wishing to no purpose that he could withdraw every
word spoken in haste. Mr. Frodo's coolness towards him had troubled Sam's mind, yet it was simpler to tear a hole
than it was to mend it, and he had let the matter rest as the season turned. Now here it was again. If Mr. Frodo had
followed him over the stile Sam could have found a way to show that his master's trust in him had not been misplaced.
"I'm sorry I woke you, sir," he said, shuffling his feet in the grass as if he weren't a hobbit grown who'd been taught to
know his station.
"Not to worry." Frodo stood and tucked the book beneath his arm. "Bilbo will wonder where I am if I don't make haste. I
may walk to Bywater when I've a minute, and if you should happen to be finished for the day we might--" He cocked his
head in something like his old manner and Sam's mouth went dry as a kex.
"The Widow Rumble. I can't--" he managed, before the words got tangled behind the frog in his throat. That morning he
had yearned for nothing better than a private moment to cool his feet in the beck and supper after. The knowledge that
he might have shared a walk with his master, too, brought with it a measure of pain such as he'd not thought to bear on
this birthday eve.
Mr. Frodo looked at him for an instant then nodded as if he understood well what hadn't been said.
"Another day then. I'll take a walk notwithstanding. If I spend the entire afternoon with the old hobbit I shall burst from
want of air."
Sam raised his face toward the smial top and thence to the heavens, where a hawk rose with the wind under it against
a sky of cloudless blue.
"Aye," he said at last. "'Tis warmish in the smial." He lowered his gaze, blinking from the glare and that unforeseen
token of his master's continuing regard.
"So it is." Frodo straightened his weskit and brushed an imaginary speck of dirt from its fine corded silk. "I believe a
turn or two in the garden at bedtime will be the best physic."
"And a hot posset with an egg," Sam added, hoping Mr. Frodo wouldn't think him too bold.
"The very thing. Thank you, my dear Sam." Frodo stepped round the barrow and started down the path to the front
door. "Don't let me keep you from your chores."
"No, sir. I'll get right to them," Sam answered, and trundled his load past the side of the smial, humming 'The
Coney-catcher and the Farmer's Daughter' under his breath.
22 September 1417
Sam stood on tiptoe, hands resting on the top bar of the gate as he strained to catch a glimpse of Frodo in the
lengthening shadows below the hilltop. He had overtaken his master near the crossroads not half an hour since and
yet Frodo had vanished into thin air seemingly, leaving Mr. Bilbo to pace to and fro before the smial door with his hair
standing out like a brush.
Sam had been hurrying up the byway from Number 3 after a measly supper of mince collops when he had spotted
Frodo strolling ahead with his hands in the pockets of his buff-coloured breeches, his weskit unfastened and a sprig of
rosemary in one button-hole. A plume of blue smoke was streaming and curling in his wake. He had given Sam a
friendly nod and a mumbled greeting around the stem of his pipe, then continued on his course at an unruffled pace
without further talk. Sam had forgotten, in his haste, to glance back before he turned in at the gate. He couldn't say
whether Frodo had taken the Overhill road or stopped to perch on the nearest stile for a breather. One thing was
certain, however; if his master didn't nip up smartly he'd be late to his own party. He should have been home and
dressed for merry-making. He hadn't looked very merry when Sam had passed him, but it was hard to tell. Frodo was
a deep one and no mistake.
All things considered, it wouldn't hurt to step into the lane for a tick, maybe slope off to the crossroads and stretch his
legs. He set his hand to the latch.
"Where be you a-going to, Samwise? Master Bilbo needs you here to mind the pony traps and hoist the lanterns into
place. I can't do it; I've got the screws something awful." The familiar voice brought Sam up short faster than a bramble
vine snagged in the seat of his breeches. He froze, fingers gripping cold iron as if he'd been caught out in some
tweener tomfoolery.
"It's early, Da," he answered, turning to meet his doom. "Young Nick says he'll tend the ponies for a spell. I'm--"
The Gaffer's face was sour as verjuice and there was a hitch in his walk as he drew near that bespoke recent
applications to his joints of Mother Knapweed's Strengthening Plaster.
"You're haring off after Mr. Frodo; I knowed it. Well, he clomb the hill a short while ago. If he wants to moon about by
hisself, don't you pester him."
Sam nodded, quelling the urge to stick up for his master since it was plain the Gaffer couldn't see beyond the end of a
dibber where gentlehobbits were concerned.
"Aye, well--." Sam puffed out his chest and planted his feet firmly. "That's as may be, but happen he has more need of
me than Mr. Bilbo does. If he don't then I'll be no worse for the hike."
The Gaffer squinted at Sam with the same look he might have given a potato that had grown a strange knob on the
tuber.
"Such carryings-on," he said, shaking his head. "I've never seen their match. Be quick afore our May gets hold of you
for her donkey work."
Sam went off like one o'clock at mention of his sister's name, and with the Gaffer's dry chuckle loud in his ears he fled
through the half-open gate into the lane. He had crossed the stone stile by the hagcherry and was trudging up the
flattened grass of the hill path before he knew it, the clay tile roofs in the village below flashing red fire under the
westering sun. He moved with a tread light as thistle-down, and though the Hill was neither as high nor as steep as it
had been to a lad of ten summers, nonetheless he lingered for a moment on the well-worn track to watch a flock of
geese swerve across the Water, their wings a blur of silver.
No, not a mountain, he thought from the vantage ground of twenty, but high enough to see what mattered most. He
lifted his eyes to the oak, its leaves fading as the acorns ripened, and thence to the ragged magpie's nest at the tree's
heart and on down until his gaze rested on the one he had come seeking. If there was treasure beyond the written
word hidden deep under hill as some folks said, Sam hadn't come upon it. All he had found was this knotty riddle with
ink-spattered cuffs.
His feet made no more noise on the sward than did the silent whistle on his lips as he crested the hill. He wondered
whether he ought to have called out a cheerful 'halloo' or snapped a twig a-purpose so as not to fright his master, but it
was too late.
Frodo was seated on the brow of the Hill, absent-mindedly twirling a stem of swine’s snout between his palms. Now
and again, a tuft would part from the gossamer ball and Frodo would watch it go until the breeze had blown it beyond
sight. He had taken off his green coat and weskit and there were grass stains on the back of his rumpled linen shirt.
He didn’t have the bearing of a hobbit who was one year from his majority and destined to be Master of Bag End. He
looked younger than he had yesternoon and oddly aloof, as though he neither knew nor cared about his birthday. That
was a shame, if it were so.
The seed-head fell to the ground and Frodo stared at the brown smear on his hands for a long minute, then rubbed his
fingers on the tail of his coat. There was a small packet lying next to him, square and flat and wrapped in a bit of silky
cloth.
“We call the flowers piss-a-beds," Sam said, not knowing how else to begin, " 'cept when they’re going to seed and
then they’re blowballs.”
He bent to gather one, and the quick tug shook a few seeds loose from their moorings.
Frodo glanced round without surprise, as if it was an everyday matter to find Sam at his shoulder.
“And do they?”
“What, sir?”
“Make you piss in your bed.”
Sam grimaced. It was possible that Mr. Frodo had already known the common name and used it often amongst his
cronies, but the words still sounded odd coming from the mouth of a gentlehobbit.
“You’d have to ask my dad," he answered. "The Gaffer drinks swine's snout tea by the flagon and swears his dinner
goes down easier on account of it. The gammers pick the leaves when they’re tender and new, but I don't fancy the
taste myself. Right bitter they are.”
Frodo nodded.
“I’ve seen Nan Goodbody and Gammer Bunce gathering herbs in the lane. They seemed to know what they were
doing.” He plucked another ball and held it to the light. “Bitter or not, they're pretty things.”
“Aye, and the blooms as well, though I wouldn't say it where the Gaffer could hear me. Swine’s snout isn’t wanted in
the border; it has a root like a – " He had almost said 'bull's pizzle' but caught himself in time, hopeful that Mr. Frodo
wouldn't notice the blush colouring his cheeks. "I can hardly shift them once they've settled; they're that stubborn. You'd
never think it to look at them. They ain't showy neither." He gazed at the few blossoms clinging to the hillside and their
taller fellows, gone to seed and ready for flight. "But up here they're fair to see and no one minds if they run wild."
"Yes, all things have their place I suppose," Frodo replied. "Your Gaffer would agree."
Sam didn't answer right off the bat; he didn't want to wear out his welcome by blathering like an idiot till his chaffs hung
loose. As hard as it was to keep silence, it was better by far than having the words tumble from his lips so fast he
feared he would die of shame at any minute. Besides, Mr. Frodo might not be keen to hear more about such trifles as
wayward roots when it was as plain as you please that he still carried something inside him big enough to choke an
oliphaunt. Sam had scant notion what that something could be, but if your master was chary of talk it was best to stay
mum. Even wiser maybe to take yourself away when you weren't wanted.
He studied the grass sprouting between his toes, wishing he didn't feel akin to a pimple on a sow's bum. The swine's
snout dropped from his fingers as he tried to shape words of leave-taking. He was no longer as glib of tongue as that
hobbit who had spent the spring months playing silly buggers with apple pips; that hobbit would have known how to get
out of a pickle.
"My dear Sam, why don't you sit down? I won't bite."
Sam started from his daydream. Frodo had thrown the blowball to the ground and was lying flat on his back with the
wrinkled jacket wedged beneath his head. The sunlight touched his skin and made it gleam pink and white like apple
blow. He was bright as a lily sprung from the earth, yet no maid.
"Are you still there?"
Sam peered at the legs sticking out below his fustian breeches. There was a bruise on his knee from when he'd
cracked it on the barrow handle the day afore. The coney-catcher had just been telling the farmer's daughter how to
skin a rabbit and somehow--
"A sort of," he said, quiet as a mouse in cheese. He supposed he must look the same as every other hobbit
hereabouts, leastways every Gamgee in the North and West Farthings. They had broad cheekbones, square hands,
sturdy builds but weren't over tall with it. Mr. Frodo was different, and though Sam couldn't say how it was, that
difference brought an ache to his heart which muddled him beyond reckoning. If he hadn't spent half the night tossing
on a lumpy mattress worriting about the lantern hooks, he'd have been quicker at making his excuses and taking
himself off before Mr. Frodo decided he was soft in the noggin.
It was too late. There was a rustle in the grass and Sam's head jerked up, all of a quiver. Frodo was looking him full in
the face, his eyes dark as periwinkle flowers under the hedgerow. He had rolled onto his side and was leaning on
one elbow, the collar of his shirt askew.
"Please, Sam?" he said. "I daresay you have chores, but if you could stay...." His voice trailed off and he made a wry
face. "Only for a little while, of course, and then we should go. I don't want Bilbo to think I'm ungrateful."
"I'd be happy to, sir," Sam answered, knowing his duty when he saw it whatever the Gaffer might say about hobnobbing
with your betters. "I thought you wanted a snoozem."
Frodo smiled easily, and shook his head.
"No. I took your advice regarding a hot posset and went to bed early. I was asleep in a trice. However--" and he gazed
at Sam with a twinkle in his eyes that made the skin on Sam's nape prickle in alarm, "you might ensure that I don't nod
in this heat by telling me a tale to pass the time. Shire hobbits never cease to astound me with their hoard of fables
and customs. Your Gaffer is quite remarkable in that respect. The other day he was regaling Cousin Bilbo with a
receipt for a salve against water-blister. It's turn and turn about with those two." The corner of his mouth twitched as
he fiddled with his jacket.
"I don't know many customs, sir," Sam said, doubtful whether he should sit next to Mr. Frodo when he might set that
boggle on Sam's tail again without a caution. "Sowing, planting and growing a straight carrot--that's all I understand.
Tom Cotton--Farmer Tolman Cotton's eldest--knows the old lore better than anyone. His Nan passed it to him when
he was barely breeched, or so he says." He rubbed the back of his neck thoughtfully, while Frodo continued to look at
him sideways.
"Is Tom Cotton the tall, thin lad with the shock of ginger hair who tends his father's stall at market?"
Sam ducked his head.
"That's him right enough. He's fly to what's what, but he can't tell stitchwort from woodruff for all that his Nan was a fine
herbwife."
"Goodness. Well--" Frodo sat and donned his weskit, brushing grass from the nappy cloth and twitching the collar into
place. "If, as you say, your knowledge of village customs is meagre in comparison to young Tom's, I'll not--" He
hesitated, a wistful expression on his face as he looked at the mysterious parcel by his side and then at Sam.
"Sam?"
"Yes, sir?" Sam straightened. He wished there was something he could do with his hands that didn't involve putting
them in his pockets. The Gaffer would take on awful if he heard Sam was slouching on the job, but Mr. Frodo had a
way of steadfastly glooarin' at a fellow that would make even the Gaffer feel like a bare golly. Sam readied himself.
"Sit down. I'm getting a crick in my neck."
"Oh, aye. Sorry, sir."
He bent his knees and settled into the coolth, the grass lush here beneath the oak in spite of the dry summer. He was
glad that his master wasn't being offish, leastways not this even. They could draw their pipes later and talk of Sam's
dreams for the garden--yellow roses on that patch of fallow ground beyond the potting shed for a start or-- . No, best
make no mention of the shed.
Sam frowned, chewing over where the new plantings might go if not there, while far below, someone struck up a tune
on the fiddle and the oak's shadow drew out like taffy and covered the hilltop.
"As I was saying," Frodo continued, abruptly bringing Sam's attention back to the matter at hand. "I'll ask you about
herbs instead. Are there other uses for Swine's Snout? It must do more than loosen a hobbit's bladder; the gammers
harvest it so earnestly."
Sam knew well the merits of Swine's Snout, root, stem and leaf. It strengthened the belly, eased the joints and
increased a hobbit's store of seed, or so they said, though he didn't fancy telling Mr. Frodo of that last merit lest he eye
the Gaffer askance next time he chanced on him in the garden. Besides, he didn't think his master needed such
physic at his age.
"It loosens tongues as well as bladders, I reckon. Nan Goodbody's swine's snout wine is better than middling for that
purpose. And the young lasses--" Sam faltered, aware that he might be treading on boggy ground if he continued.
"They blow the seeds from the ball to find out when they'll be handfasted. There's a wee ditty to sing aforehand."
He cleared his throat and chanted softly:
"Rosy apple, mellow pear,
A crown of flowers he shall wear.
Gold and silver by his side
Tell me when I'll be a bride.
I'll take him by the lily-white hand
Lead him across the water
Give him a kiss and one, two, three..."
Sam broke off.
"That's all there is, though in Tighfield they sing it different as I remember. But a Hobbiton lad with lily-white hands;
whoever heard the like?" Sam hid a grin. "Anyroad, the lass blows on the seeds--one, two, three--" Sam pursed his
lips and demonstrated. "Well, the more puffs it takes to free them, the more years 'twill be till the lass is wed," he
finished.
Frodo tilted his head and raised an eyebrow.
"I see that you do have a custom or two up your sleeve where herbwifery is concerned. Is this a common pastime in
the Westfarthing?"
"Yes, sir."
"Have you done it?"
"No, sir," Sam said scornfully. "T'ain't for lads."
"Ah." Frodo looked away. "You surprise me. Why not?"
Sam knew how many days went to the week and even better did he know his master's ways. It was a short step from
blowballs to apple pips from hereon in.
"Any lad with a morsel of wind in his lights could blow them loose at one go. Many's the time I've seen Nibs and Jolly
do it for a lark."
Frodo picked a large blowball and offered it to Sam, milky-white juice slipping from the broken end to wet his fingers. It
would soon darken to a stubborn brown, and in all likelihood he would go to the party with mucky hands and green
smears on his shirt-sleeves. Mr. Bilbo would be in a taking when he saw him.
"As much as I'd love to be enlightened further about the tongue-loosening qualities of Nan Goodbody's wine, I'd rather
you show me how this is done. If what you say is true, you'll be handfasted within the year, for I'm sure you have a great
deal more wind than Jolly Cotton."
"Not even Daddy Twofoot has more wind than Jolly Cotton," Sam muttered, unable to button his lip. Frodo's mouth
curled in answer and the blowball trembled, threatening to drop its burden of fluff beforetime. Sam reached for it and
his attention was instantly caught--not by the whorl of downy seeds this time but by the depth of sky, the gnarled, waving
branches of the oak tree mirrored in Frodo's eyes. It was a wonder to see how the broad world could fit into a space no
larger than an acorn and a shame, too, that all things clear and bright had a way of being marred, like the blowball's
pale sap as it touched his master's skin.
Sam's hand fell to his lap and he hung his head.
"I'll follow your lead, sir, if you don't mind," he said, somewhat in doubt as to whether the game was worth the candle.
"Oh, very well," answered Frodo, "but I fully intend to stay as I am whatever the swine's snout may say." He puffed out
his cheeks and made a show of giving it his best, but only a seed or two broke free on the first attempt, falling into his
lap and clinging fast to the cloth of his breeches.
Sam clucked his tongue.
“A bedfast gammer could do better. You blew to one side a-purpose."
“Rubbish," said Frodo briskly, tossing the seed-head away and wiping his palms with a hankie. "I'm meant to remain a
crotchety old bachelor with out of twig relatives by the score hanging on my elbow. It's your go."
Sam didn't think the Sackville-Bagginses wanted for anything beyond the key to Mr. Bilbo's front door, although the
Gaffer often remarked that young Lotho had no more brains than a moudiwarp and would come to a bad end. His dad
thought this a fine pun and was wont to repeat it in The Ivy Bush whenever he had the chance, but Sam was unable to
find words for Mr. Frodo's relations that would do them justice. That Angelica Baggins was proud as a rooster at
sunrise even though she was no bigger than a thimble.
"No, thank you, sir. I'll not take a turn," he said, readying himself to leave before he made a rude remark. The wilful look
on Mr. Frodo's face would have cowed a lesser hobbit and might have cowed the Gaffer, but Sam was on his mettle.
"Swine's snout is a dandy herb for those who need tonicking, but only a fool would seek out trouble afore it finds him.
You told me so once and happen you're right."
"As I recall, you didn't agree with me. In fact, you were obdurate."
"Then I was a fool, to be sure," Sam answered shortly, clambering to his feet. "I'd best be on my way, sir; the even's
drawing in. I undertook to set out the supper-tables and May will have my ears if I don't hasten. Folk must eat."
He straightened his party clothes, lest the assembled company think he'd been playing at cockertie-hooie, and was
about to retrace his footsteps when he felt something touch his sleeve. He turned on his heel to find Frodo at his
elbow, the silk-wrapped parcel in his hands.
"If Bilbo or any of the others were to see what I'm giving you they might find it odd," Frodo said, casting his eyes upon
the packet with knitted brows, "but I fancy it will be of more use to you than it has been to me, and so--" He held it out
and Sam took it willy nilly, the slippery cloth cool and damp against his fingers.
His master had given him many birthday gifts--a planting spade, a canister of tea, a bag of bulbs brought special from
Buckland--and every one of them plain and simple as parsley piert. Yet if he read Mr. Frodo's manner aright, this year's
gift was out of the ordinary and would discomfit them both if word of it got out. It wasn't that book on grafting then, the
one he'd seen in the window of Hawkweed's seed shop, though it was likewise square and hard. Whatever it might be,
mayhap it was the true cause of his being keen to follow Mr. Frodo, and with that niggling urgency he'd been at a loss to
explain to the Gaffer.
A trace of puzzlement must have shown on his features, for Frodo said, "Don't worry, Sam. You can put it into your
pocket and no one will be any the wiser. Open it here, if you like."
"I'm not particular, sir. I--" he began, but all he might have said or done made off quicker than a leaf in a whirlwind as
Frodo's heated gaze fell on him and Sam was rooted to the spot by that same unnameable sense of dismay that had
come over him in the garden.
"Sam, do what you will," Frodo murmured, his face crumpling in sudden distress, but Sam willed no more now than to
stretch the taut ribbon over the corners of his gift and unfold the dark blue cloth and feel his heart flutter at sight of what
lay beneath.
"Oh glory," he said, dumbfounded as ever and grateful that he and his master stood on the brim of the hill where none
could spy on them. The Gaffer would bless himself if he saw what Mr. Frodo had given away.
Sam could do naught else but stare, silent and motionless as a goose in a snowstorm, at the flat wooden box nestled
in his hands. It seemed to his misted sight as if the walled garden of his waking dreams had come to life in painted
form, and the golden bird in the centre of the lid, with tail feathers trailing down like the bright plumes on Mistress
Lobelia's best summer hat, was winking its welcome with a shiny round eye. There were daffy-down-dillies there, too,
and pale primroses, common marigolds and daisies, as well as many other things green and growing. Yet best of all
were the full blown roses of deepest blood-red and the cheeky bird perched in their midst.
"This wasn't meant for such as me. It's too fine," he whispered, tracing a finger over the gleaming surface for what
might be the only time, as if by doing so he could fix it in his memory.
"Don't be ridiculous; of course it's meant for you. Who else?" Frodo answered. "It's a mirror case," he went on briskly,
"and a very old one, as you can see. It belonged to my mother, Primula Brandybuck, and to her grandmother, Adaldrida
Bolger. The mirror was broken long ago and I thought--" Frodo coughed. "I thought it would be a safer place for your
mam's mirror than the flannel bag you were tucking it into when I --." He waved his hand towards Bag End. "You
know."
Sam groaned inwardly, afraid that he would prove a sad disappointment to Adaldrida if she could see what sort of
dandiprat her box had come to. He knew it had been too much to hope that Mr. Frodo would have forgotten the
jiggery-pokery in the shed. Sam's meagre dreams and fancies had been laid bare that night because of his own
foolish whims, and Mr. Frodo had shown him a mercy he scarce deserved by walking off without a backward glance
and leaving him untouched, except for the part that ached in a way Sam didn't understand. Now the potting shed with
its narrow window loomed in front of him, and the words of thanks he ought to have spoken froze on his tongue.
Snakes and adders, Samwise Gamgee; get ahold of yourself. He wiped his eyes with the pad of his thumb and
blinked out at the waning day. The late sun had turned the grass to an amber green, and below in the shadowed
garden Mr. Bilbo was passing back and forth, kindling the lanterns which had been hung on their crooks by someone
who saw his duty better than did Sam. Yet whatever the Gaffer might say about hobbits who didn't know which side
their bread was buttered on, here Sam stood for good or ill, the mirror case glimmering in his hands like a promise.
"She'd have loved it, too," he said. "Mr. Frodo, I wish I could--."
"Never mind, my dear." Frodo reached for his jacket and while he was doing so Sam drew the edge of his cuff across
his damp cheeks and longed for a chance to blow his nose. "Let's go, shall we? I should imagine we're wanted,
whether or not we wish to be found. Bilbo will need me for one thing or another and I wouldn't care to be responsible
for you losing your ears." Mr. Frodo's smile was full of mischief and warmer than anything Sam had seen since the
spring. "Thank you."
"Yes, sir. It's past time," Sam replied, sliding the gift into his pocket and closing the flap. He'd fit his mam's mirror
inside the case when his siblings weren't by, then hide it amongst his underlinens wrapped in a fold of silk. Why Mr.
Frodo should thank him was a riddle best left unanswered, for he'd done nought but stand ready and speak when
spoken to. On the other hand, Sam thought, as he followed his master along the beaten track to the stile, maybe a
gentlehobbit needed someone to stand ready more than he needed a host of toadies at his beck and call.
The lane was filled with pony traps and farmers' carts from the Overhill crossroads to the gate at Bag End, and two or
three of the bolder lads were plying the tethered ponies with stolen carrots under the very eyes of Jolly Cotton who, as
they well knew, was lounging half asleep by the garden wall. Sam would gladly have cuffed a few ears, but Mr. Frodo
was turning in at the gate and Sam hurried to catch him up before they were separated for the evening by the hurly-
burly. It was useless to latch the gate and yet he paused for a heartbeat with his thumb on the lever, marking the path
they had taken from the hill and the moon rising wafer-thin beyond it.
The sun would soon pass into the west but for now its glow blanketed the hilltop and the oak, already losing its
summer colours, flared first with sparks of brazen metal then came altogether alight. From his place in the cool, dark
well of the garden Sam gazed upwards to the bright and dying riches of the tree and forgot where he was. He stood in
place as the sun slipped higher in the branches and further off and the tree fell into deepening twilight.
"Sam?" There was a warm hand on his wrist and someone--
"I'm here," he answered, knowing it was Frodo by the feel of their shared silence but when he lowered his eyes to look
at his master, Frodo's hand fell and something nameless flickered across his face.
"Later, Sam, when May's finished with you. I--." But whatever Frodo had been about to say was lost in commotion as a
pair of young lads grabbed him by the elbows and, with a cry of 'here's Frodo, jolly old Frodo,' tugged him away into the
swirling crowd.
Part 2
Sam stepped out into the bright September morn, a slice of half-eaten bread and dripping in one hand and his besom
clutched tightly in the other. He eyed the prospect before him with weary deliberation, well aware that if anything was
certain at the end of a dry summer it was the blanket of parched leaves on the front path, blown into the garden from the
orchards below Bag End. The Row would be knee deep in red and gold by leaf-fall, but for now the gravel walk at
Number 3 was skinned over with a layer of dull brown.
All the same, and as paltry as the danger was to any hobbit with a lick of sense, if someone stumbled on the slippery
mass and twisted her ankle there'd be no end of shouting; Sam would catch it, sure as sure. He'd best sweep it up
once his breakfast had gone down good and proper, before May appeared with the master's laundry. He hoped she
wouldn't notice if he overlooked a few of the fancier bits and bobs, the ones whose crinkly edges reminded him of
ginger biscuits. Why would trees drop their bounty right at your feet if they didn't mean you to admire it?
Sam leaned on his broom, bent and worn though it was, while he chewed the remains of his bread and watched for the
first glimmer of sunshine to creep round the end of the Widow's garden. He never tired of seeing the dew on the
leaves of grass catch fire as the light struck them, or hearing the blackbird which was perched expectant in the hazel
bush burst into song. He knew, even though his garden lay shadowed and thick with damp, that it would be a fine day.
It had to be. There was a Party on the morrow, and no clouds of whatever kind would dare cast their gloom on Mr.
Bilbo's merriment.
A haze of fog lingered over the White Downs--a common sight as summer turned to autumn--but the air above
Hobbiton was clear and fresh except for the odd patchy drift of chimney-smoke and the grey plume of a fire that marked
where a hobbit had risen early to burn his spent crops. Sam felt a prickle in his throat as the breeze shifted, yet he still
caught, beneath the resinous scent of green fir, the faint sweet fragrance of windfalls from the apple and pear trees
across the way.
He’d recently taken a fancy to pears; they weren’t crisp and tart in his mouth like other fruits he could mention, but they
went down without that twinge of dread that made the hairs stand up on his neck every time he spotted an apple. And
he didn't need to cast a wary glance towards the pips at the pear's heart; they were just pips. You couldn't tell them
apart from apple pips, of course, but somehow--
Ah well, he'd better get to work; he had important business up Hill and the Widow's garden to see to after, bust it. Any
more lollygagging about and the Gaffer would nail a piece of his hide to the potting shed door. He swallowed the last
morsel of bread and brushed the crumbs from his hand, then began to clear the path with a steady determination that
was like to wear his besom to a nubbin.
The trouble was that he'd been visiting over by Tighfield in company with Marigold. While he'd been kicking his heels
with Cousin Anson and learning how to tie a bale sling hitch, the chores and preparations for the birthday had been
piling up at Bag End. No doubt they were high as the roof-tree by now and more than his dad could handle without an
extra pair of hands. He swept a little faster as he thought of the gentlehobbits coming from distant villages and
landholds to take part in the celebrations. It would be a blot on the name of Hamfast Gamgee should the master's
garden look other than perfect, even if the revellers were too tipsy to appreciate the straight line of Bilbo's perennial
border.
He stopped to push the hair from his face and consider the odds of the Gaffer's wine-dark hollyhocks and purple asters
outshining Mr. Frodo this year. It would be a close-run thing. When Frodo had given him the creamy stack of invitations
to post, he'd had a face on him like a wet week. Sam couldn't recall the last time he'd seen Frodo smile as if he meant
it, and without his high spirits and a-dancing of the springle-ring, the Party wouldn't be the same. The old master
would try to make the best of a bad job, but there was only so much you could do at one hundred and ten years of age
without breaking something.
Sam flicked his broom across the step and leaned in through the open door to check for stray leaves in the passage.
There were none, nor any tell-tale sound of nattering that foretold of sisters headed his way. He pulled his bundle from
the corner and placed it by the path, ready to grab once he'd finished. He wasn't as handy with the bread knife as he
was with the besom, but he valued his lunch and wanted it out where he could see it.
He sighed and resumed sweeping, while the sun climbed the smial tops and fell on his bent back, warming the knots
from his shoulders.
Aside from Mr. Frodo's glumness, there'd never been such a splendid summer. After the usual wet spring, with a
thunder and lightning storm that had left Farmer Brockhouse's herd stiff and stark beneath the oak, there'd been nary a
drop of rain for weeks on end, leastways not when Sam was looking.
Now and again, he would rise from his bed at dawn to find the earth black with moisture, but not a cloud in the sky to
show whence it had come. He was thankful, on those days, to have time for more than wielding his old watering can.
Bag End's kitchen garden wanted special attention since he and the Gaffer had laid out the raised beds, the very ones
Mr. Bilbo had planned all those months ago.
They had planted things that were new to Sam--eggapples, sunchokes, and stripey tomatoes. The eggapples looked
like a bull's cods, if cods were the colour of purple petunias. Sam frowned. He was relieved they'd proven to be finicky
things and hadn't fared well despite the warm summer. If the crop had been plentiful, Mr. Bilbo would have sent the
Gaffer home with a barrow full as a show of appreciation for his efforts. Daisy would surely have blushed at sight of
them, cracked a joke unfit for modest ears, then made Sam eat the blasted things. The customary bushel of potatoes
was a better gift and less discomfiting.
The sunchokes were another matter. They had grown so rampant that soon there were more than two hobbits could
ever hope to eat. Sam had been given a few to sample last week, and Daisy had mashed them in with the cream and
taters for their supper. Next day the Gaffer had taken to his bed complaining of wind, adamant that no further untoward
gifts would be making their way to Bagshot Row if he had anything to say about it. Sam hadn't a clue what would
happen to the rest of the crop. He didn't see as how anyone could get through those chokes by winter's end without
blowing the roof off their smial.
Once the Gaffer had risen from his sickbed, he'd waxed eloquent on the subject of odd roots brought from foreign parts
on purpose to do him an injury. Sam, on the other hand, enjoyed a challenge, even if he was no keener than his dad to
consume the fruits of his labours. He loved watching the strange plants make themselves known, from leaf bud, to
flower, to seed-head or pod, and to think that no one in the whole Westfarthing had grown these wonderments afore.
In truth, he had dreams of a garden so vast he could scarce see from one end of it to the other. T'would be crammed
with the queer-looking herbs and trees he'd spied in Mr. Bilbo's books of plant lore -- pineapples and palms, white
poppies and yellow roses. There would be a high stone wall round the garden to shelter it from autumn storms, and a
bench with a seat made from growing things such as thyme or blue forget-me-nots. He and Mr. Frodo would sit and --
"Samwise. There you are. Did you sharpen the shears like I told you?" Sam started and near fell over his besom. The
Gaffer had come down the lane and was leaning on the gatepost to catch his breath, a hard glint in his eye.
"Yes, Da. I'll be on my way up Hill in a jiffy and back afore tea-time to tend the Widow's garden."
The Gaffer grunted.
"You'd best be getting on." He dropped his voice and nodded towards the last smial on the Row. "I've had it with her
nattering. She wants the gentry who ride past to admire her prize mums. Nothing will do but that she must have the
daintiest garden in Hobbiton. Stuff and nonsense!"
"Gentry will need to stand straight in the stirrups and crane their necks if they want to catch a glimpse of summat worth
seeing," Sam answered, knowing full well that Mr. Bilbo's birthday guests would be too busy coaxing their fat Shire
ponies up the steep rise to pay any mind to the Widow's flowerbeds.
"You know it and I know it, but don't let herself hear you say it. Her hedge wants cutting back to the bare wood; it's too
leggy."
Sam furrowed his brow and butted the end of his besom into the angle of the step to tease out a few wayward leaves.
"Aye, well, she won't let me, but I'll do her weeding as soon as may be."
He set the besom by the door, and hoisted his knapsack onto his shoulder. A stone jar of ginger beer, a chunk of
crumbly blue cheese, turnip pickle, and two slices of barley bread were all it contained. And there was a book, too--
small enough to slip into a pocket--on how to plan a winter garden. He'd found it on a market stall last Hevensday,
trapped beneath an old daisy grubber. He would read it while he ate his lunch. There ought to be witchhazel or maybe
a dogwood in the border opposite Mr. Frodo's window, so he'd have something to look at of a frosty morning when he
opened the curtains. The flash of cherry-red and yellow as the sun broke round the corner of the smial would be a
sight to make the breath catch in any hobbit's throat. Pansies would show them off nicely--amber and purple, or yellow
as Proudfoot's butter.
"You're a good lad, Samwise," the Gaffer said, holding the gate open as Sam strode out into the lane with a swing in
his step and a smile on his face for the beauty of the morning.
He had walked this road so often that he fancied his two feet must have worn a special rut in the dirt long since. Every
topstone and bolt hole, every inch of hedgerow between Number 3 and Bag End was a familiar and well-loved
landmark. He might climb the Hill blindfold in a storm, if the need were on him. Nonetheless, there was another
dream, a dream more secret than the first. It occupied each waking moment though he would never make it known.
He longed for a day when the path from home would take him down Hill, when he would sleep safe in one of the
unused bedrooms at Bag End, snug as a pig in pease-straw, and do the work of smial and garden.
He would be content, both in and out of season, to spend his evenings there by the kitchen fire, mending tools in a
silence unbroken by the sound of May's careless gossip or the Gaffer's complaints about the Widow's cabbages. He'd
be nearby, day and night, for whatever wanted doing.
He had made up his mind, when he was old enough to put two and two together, that Mr. Bilbo and Mr. Frodo lived wild
as a pair of vagabonds because they had no one to look out for them. Gentlehobbits needed special attention from
one who had their measure; they were worse than a border of tender perennials that way. Unless they were watered
and fed and pinched out regular they would spread apart and fall over. You'd get no second flowering.
While Mr. Frodo was tough as a hornbeam root and stubborn with it, he'd sooner chase after the shadow of a story than
eat his dinner like normal folk. No wonder he was thin; he lived on naught but tea and biscuits.
Sam had spied him at The Ivy Bush on more than one occasion, tucking into a deep bowl of lamb stew and dumplins
with a thick slice of gooseberry tart for afters. He doubted if Frodo had such hearty fare at home, though Mr. Bilbo was a
fine cook when push came to shove. It generally didn't. Most times, Sam would venture indoors to get his instructions
and find the two of them holed up in the study, long noses deep in their books and surrounded by plates of half-eaten
scones.
It wasn't proper. The Master and his heir deserved better than a char from the village and vittles brought from the Inn
twice weekly. In point of fact, they deserved Sam; they just didn't know it yet.
He was so wrapped up in his daydream he almost stubbed his toes on the milk tankard that was standing by the
verge. He stopped in his tracks and stared around, but there was nobody in sight. The gate off the lane was yawning
on its hinges, wedged open with a rusty hand trowel and a trug filled with papery-skinned cobnuts. On the top bar, the
crumpled edge of a notice, held in place by a horse nail, was barely visible between the gate and the box hedge. He
pulled it about and tried to read the wording upsy-down.
Provisions to be left at the kitchen door.--B. Baggins, Esq.
Sam shook his head. What fool of an errand boy would leave the yat gaping and the party fare piled in the common
way where anyone might stumble over it? There'd be sheep among the primroses next. He lifted the tankard in one
hand--full as it was--and the trug in the other, and set them by the path while he latched the gate. They could bide with
his knapsack in the shade of the lilac until he'd finished his morning chores. It was too early to bring them into the
kitchen without warning.
It was clear, however, as he followed the gravel walk to the far end of the garden, that preparations were well afoot even
if Mr. Frodo still lay in bed with his ears muffled. Things were quiet for the nonce, but there was a load of trestle tables
by the entrance porch and scaffolding ready for the stillage. Firkins of ale would be carted in at sunrise on the morrow
from both The Ivy Bush and The Green Dragon, for although The Dragon's Golden Glory was a finer ale by far than The
Ivy Bush's Thirsty Hobbit, it wouldn't do for the Master to play favourites. Mr. Bilbo was particular when it came to
outward show; he was always smart as a carrot, and knew what he owed to his station.
"Oh, sausages!"
Sam, mindful of his situation, stifled a stronger oath and glared at the lantern hooks as if they were stray cows amidst
the corn. Someone had driven in the metal shepherd's crooks a shade too close to his peony roots; moreover, the
shafts leaned higly pigly and would fall into the hedge once the lanterns were hung. While Sam could sling a bit of
rope round the flower beds to prevent the likes of Old Noakes from ploughing through the daylilies, it was harder to
keep tweens out of the shrubbery. At least one young hobbit with a head full of ale would meet with misfortune and
singed hair in the gloom beyond the grass-border, sure as a louse in bosom. Burning the evergreen boughs was a
common Yuletide custom, but not suited to the Master's birthday revels nohow.
Sam knew there was little use fretting o'ermuch about what couldn't be helped; every year it was the same. By dawn on
the 23rd, the grass would be trodden flat as if a lawn roller had groomed it. There'd be broken crockery beneath the
roses and someone's breeches in the well bucket. The kitchen garden, which was bounded by a good sturdy fence
and gate, would at least be locked for the party, and any young hobbit who undertook to steal the Master's stripey
tomatoes would get a taste of Sam's ire. With any luck, he and the Gaffer could persuade Mr. Bilbo to make proper use
of the field across the way for his hundred and eleventh, to spare Bag End's garden the wear and tear. No, Sam
wouldn't fuss, but before he went home he would see to it that each lantern crook was upright and properly ranked
along the approach from the gate.
He unlatched the potting shed, gathered his tools from their hooks--hedge trimmer, pruners, worn deerskin gloves soft
as lamb's ears--and slung the withy basket over his arm to hold whatever might be garnered from the flagging tomato
vines. Later, he'd clip the hedge so even that Gammer Bunce could set her supper plate on it if she'd a mind. His dad
would be proud of him.
The September sun was hot in the enclosed space of the kitchen garden, the drone of dumbledores rising above the
sound of carts heading to market on the Bywater Road. Sam shrugged off his jacket and hung it from the gatepost,
then rolled his sleeves up until he felt a faint waft of wind lift the hair on his arms. He leaned to test the readiness of
the tomatoes and the heavy, plump fruits--tight to bursting--filled his hands. He laid the ripest ones in his basket each
by each, and when he'd done, he raised his fingers to inhale the scent of the fresh, green stalks.
Perhaps Mr. Frodo was already hunched at his desk, a pot of tea near his elbow, poring over a drift of parchments
covered with hen scratches. Sam had learned his letters under the Master's watchful eye--for the better reading of
seed catalogues and garden manuals--as Mr. Bilbo had explained to a distrustful Gaffer, but those thin, inky lines
scrawled across the pages of elven books baffled Sam's efforts to make them out.
Would Frodo still rise to ease his back, squinting in the glare from the unshaded window as he gazed at Sam going
about his common tasks--adding a sprig of rosemary to the tomatoes and placing the basket by the kitchen entrance,
taking up his trimmer? Would he? Sam smiled as he began to clip, and the silence of the autumn garden pooled at
his feet until he saw only the smooth, straight lines of the privet hedge unfolding to either side like the wings of a great
kite over the hilltop.
He had almost reached the southeasterly corner when he heard the tell-tale snick of the gate, and thinking it must be
the posthobbit on his noon rounds, Sam cleaned the grime from his shears with a shirt-tail and went to get his
knapsack. He had missed elevenses and might very well miss tea if the Widow Rumble held his nose to the
grindstone; he was a mite peckish and thirsty to boot. The hedge could wait until he was comfortably tucked out.
Thus without so much as a backward glance at the smial, he let himself into the lane and set off downhill in search of
shade. As he crossed the stile into the meadow, he had a bird's eye view of the Widow's garden with its yellow mums
bordering the path. Now there was something to make a cat laugh, and Mr. Frodo, too. Sam didn't think he'd tell her
the flowers were best seen from the Hill; she'd have a conniption fit. Besides, it would be dark long before Mr. Bilbo's
party spilled into the meadow, if it ever did, and any gentlehobbit who wandered this far would be too drunk to look
further than the hair on his toes.
Sam settled himself amidst the ancient oak's spreading roots and stretched out his legs. To the west--in the bright
curve where beck flowed into Water, its rapid, glancing measure slowing to a deep green eddy--the elm that marked
the edge of his birch copse stood above the lesser trees, crown studded with an ever shifting discord of rooks. He
might walk that way once he'd finished his chores; Tom would still be in the fields, and Sam would have an hour to
himself before facing the hurly-burly of Number 3.
He lifted the bread, cheese, and pickle from his knapsack, balancing them on his lap while he unstoppered the ginger
beer. It fizzed like one of Mr. Gandalf's sparklers and threatened to foam over the top until Sam put the bottle to his lips
and tilted his head. Light fell through the leaves onto his upturned face; it dappled the harebells and red clover--now
here, now there--as wind stirred the branches. He closed his eyes against it to better savour the tingle of hot ginger on
his tongue and wished for the hundredth time that things weren't so bent out of shape.
His dad was pleased with the changes in Frodo. He's learned to hold himself aloof from hobbits who strive to keep to
their station, was how he'd put it. He'd never stopped to wonder where Mr. Frodo's unnatural silence had come from of
a sudden. It was plain as a pikestaff to the Gaffer that Sam was doing twice the work he'd done in the past, and there
was no reason why the master would want words with the gardener's lad beyond 'hallo, Sam' or 'stow the vegetables
there, Sam'. Nor was there need for long talks over books or eating toast together in the kitchen. And there was no
point in wanting to share the tale of the Widow Rumble's mums because Mr. Frodo would stare right through him and
out t'other side.
A hot posset at bedtime, well-spiced, and a proper breakfast of veal pie with sausage; that was what Frodo lacked. He
was light as a windle-straw from meagre fare at home and lonely rambles in places where Sam feared for his well-
being. If he would let Sam do for him, maybe--
Oh, Samwise, you're daft as a dormouse. Maybe Mr. Frodo spies on you when he's tired of his bookwork and maybe
he doesn't, but one thing's clear--he doesn't want to talk to you noways. If--no, when--Frodo gave him a gift on the
morrow, Sam would need words to thank him that weren't strained and awkward. He couldn't imagine what those
words might be, and it was with a heavy heart that he unwrapped the linen napkin covering his bread and cheese and
began to eat.
~***~
The pickle wasn't sitting well with the ginger beer, that much was certain. He should have taken forty winks to let
things settle, but instead of that he had bolted his meal in a daze then hastened from the meadow to fetch his jacket
before earwigs crawled into the pockets. The remnants of lunch were thrashing about like two pigs in a poke, and it
wasn't till he was nigh on top of it that he spied Mr. Bilbo’s blackthorn stick leaning by the kitchen porch, its metal-shod
tip coated with mud. Sam scowled. There'd be mucky footprints from here to yon if the master had been wandering
through the fields over Hill; he was ever loath to wipe his feet when he knew he'd be off again at any moment. Perhaps
he'd gone and left his stick behind; the door was ajar yet the smial stood silent as if it were empty.
Sam shook out his jacket and carried it into the shed where he collected the rake and barrow, blew his nose, and
tucked a peppermint from the Gaffer's tin box into his cheek. He'd prune the last few feet of the hedge, turn the
compost, and leave the verge-trimming for the morrow. No one would notice if he left early or came back at sunrise to
finish his chores. Doubtless Mr. Frodo had taken his noon meal in the study and was nodding, half-asleep, over the
household accounts.
And so it was that when Sam rounded the corner of the smial an hour later, the barrow piled high with privet stems and
a whistle on his lips, he was stunned into abrupt silence at sight of a slim figure in a green coat sprawled on the seat
in the willow arbour. It was snoring softly, though no wisps of smoke were coming from its nostrils nor was it sleeping
on a mound of gold and jewels. In fact, it--or Mr. Frodo rather, Sam thought, feeling the turnip pickle play at leap-frog in
his belly, was curled on his side with knees drawn up and hands snug beneath his cheek. There was a book on the
ground beside him, its pages held open with a lead pencil and a browning apple core.
While Sam didn't mean to stare--not when he'd spent the summer casting sidelong glances at his master for fear Mr.
Frodo would turn into a boggart--he couldn't help but think that any hobbit with sense in his noddle would have brought
a bolster from the smial for comfort. That bench wasn't meant for napping and Frodo would have a fearsome crick in
his neck when he--
Sam set the wheelbarrow down and shifted uneasily from side to side, suddenly as bewildered as if he'd come upon a
badger in the sitting room. What if Mr. Frodo awoke to find Sam there with his mouth agape and a thin sweat starting
on his brow? What if Mr. Frodo were to gaze at him with eyes as hard as chips of glass? What if he spoke words that
made no sense even after a fellow had mulled over them and wondered what was meant? Sam's fists clenched as he
stood, breathless, a kernel of something akin to dread in his breast.
The Gaffer would call him a ninnyhammer and tell him to get on with his work, but it was the means of getting on that
were causing Sam's lunch to somersault. Should he back off quietlike so as not to create a stir, or nip past with his
barrow and make straight for the heap? He pondered these choices, not liking either of them but caught between two
stools as formerly, with his master on the one side and his own fondness on the other.
Thus he stood for a moment or several, aware of the spicy-sweet smell from the briar roses beyond the garden wall
and the song of the thrush in the near distance, ever hopeful he would make it home without mishap to share that
out-sized tart Daisy had been placing the lid on at breakfast. And while he lingered, trying his best to think of bilberries
instead of Berylla Boffin, Mr. Frodo slept on, thinner than he'd been in the spring but of a very pleasing shape
nonetheless in his new bottle-green coat and matching breeches. The tightness in Sam's chest began to ease as he
looked at the coat, and when a chiffchaff burst from the brambles with an angry wheet, flicking its tail at a hobbit's folly,
Sam shook his head and sighed.
Whisht, Samwise, you're almost a tween yourself, with a job of work to do. Buck up and do it.
He returned his hands to the barrow, but when he leaned to push it past the entrance to the arbour, his shadow
stretched out and fell across the master's face. Frodo's eyes opened on the instant, and if they weren't chips of glass
as Sam had feared, they weren't quite friendly neither. Sam wet his lips.
"You should have summat under your head, sir, begging your pardon. I could get my--" His hands were stuck fast to
the handles or he'd have gestured towards the shed where he'd left his jacket hanging from the door hook.
Frodo yawned and rubbed his cheek.
"No, Sam, don't bother; I must go in. I haven't been holding up my end of the party arrangements. I was waylaid by a
book of verse and a crisp pippin." He glanced at Sam with a spark of amusement that made Sam acutely conscious of
the barrow handles growing slick from his hot, sweaty palms. "But thank you all the same. I know you're busy."
He frowned as if he'd only just grasped that he was in the arbour and not on the settle by the fire. "Perhaps you'd care
to put your barrow down. You'll strain something, standing there like a lemon."
Sam felt the heat rush from his hands straight to the tips of his ears.
"Oh, aye," he said and let go of the barrow, wiping his palms furtively on his twill breeches. Mr. Frodo had spoken no
more than words of bidding to him since the spring. Sam wished he could think of something to say, now that he had
his chance, other than 'aye' or 'naw', but his mind was a blank slate. It didn't help any that Frodo was gawping as if
Sam had sprouted two heads like that calf over by Needlehole.
"Are you all right?" Frodo asked at length. "Would you care for a glass of small beer or a biscuit?"
"No, sir, thankee. That is to say--I had my lunch not an hour since and it's given me a belly-wark. Daisy's pickle--" he
paused to gather his wits before he made an unseemly jest on the subject of neeps. "I was going to ask you the same,
Mr. Frodo; about a drink I mean," he added hastily, though he'd intended no such thing. It had come to him in a flash
that Mr. Frodo might not have been asleep in the first place. He'd have thought it queer, in that case, to see his
undergardener hovering by the arbour with his heart in his mouth. A bad excuse is better than none, as Tom would
say, being less particular than Sam's Gaffer.
But Frodo hadn't noticed anything untoward for, without so much as a nod, he sat up and swung his feet to the ground.
"I saw you walking in the lane earlier," he remarked, the quirk on his lips that might have been a smile not reaching his
eyes. "I'd have followed you, but I didn't expect to be here for longer than it took to eat my apple and read The Lay of the
Fall of Gondolin. It's a fragmentary work, abandoned by the author--" He tossed the apple core into the shrubbery,
and closed his book. "I'll read it to you some time," he said, not sounding as if he meant it; not to Sam's ears anyroad.
Sam considered the privet cuttings in his barrow--their narrow, glossy leaves; smooth stems that would have borne
flowers in the coming year--and felt the burden of what had been left unsaid in the spring settle on his shoulders easy
as an old smock. For all the long summer days he had suffered it, wishing to no purpose that he could withdraw every
word spoken in haste. Mr. Frodo's coolness towards him had troubled Sam's mind, yet it was simpler to tear a hole
than it was to mend it, and he had let the matter rest as the season turned. Now here it was again. If Mr. Frodo had
followed him over the stile Sam could have found a way to show that his master's trust in him had not been misplaced.
"I'm sorry I woke you, sir," he said, shuffling his feet in the grass as if he weren't a hobbit grown who'd been taught to
know his station.
"Not to worry." Frodo stood and tucked the book beneath his arm. "Bilbo will wonder where I am if I don't make haste. I
may walk to Bywater when I've a minute, and if you should happen to be finished for the day we might--" He cocked his
head in something like his old manner and Sam's mouth went dry as a kex.
"The Widow Rumble. I can't--" he managed, before the words got tangled behind the frog in his throat. That morning he
had yearned for nothing better than a private moment to cool his feet in the beck and supper after. The knowledge that
he might have shared a walk with his master, too, brought with it a measure of pain such as he'd not thought to bear on
this birthday eve.
Mr. Frodo looked at him for an instant then nodded as if he understood well what hadn't been said.
"Another day then. I'll take a walk notwithstanding. If I spend the entire afternoon with the old hobbit I shall burst from
want of air."
Sam raised his face toward the smial top and thence to the heavens, where a hawk rose with the wind under it against
a sky of cloudless blue.
"Aye," he said at last. "'Tis warmish in the smial." He lowered his gaze, blinking from the glare and that unforeseen
token of his master's continuing regard.
"So it is." Frodo straightened his weskit and brushed an imaginary speck of dirt from its fine corded silk. "I believe a
turn or two in the garden at bedtime will be the best physic."
"And a hot posset with an egg," Sam added, hoping Mr. Frodo wouldn't think him too bold.
"The very thing. Thank you, my dear Sam." Frodo stepped round the barrow and started down the path to the front
door. "Don't let me keep you from your chores."
"No, sir. I'll get right to them," Sam answered, and trundled his load past the side of the smial, humming 'The
Coney-catcher and the Farmer's Daughter' under his breath.
22 September 1417
Sam stood on tiptoe, hands resting on the top bar of the gate as he strained to catch a glimpse of Frodo in the
lengthening shadows below the hilltop. He had overtaken his master near the crossroads not half an hour since and
yet Frodo had vanished into thin air seemingly, leaving Mr. Bilbo to pace to and fro before the smial door with his hair
standing out like a brush.
Sam had been hurrying up the byway from Number 3 after a measly supper of mince collops when he had spotted
Frodo strolling ahead with his hands in the pockets of his buff-coloured breeches, his weskit unfastened and a sprig of
rosemary in one button-hole. A plume of blue smoke was streaming and curling in his wake. He had given Sam a
friendly nod and a mumbled greeting around the stem of his pipe, then continued on his course at an unruffled pace
without further talk. Sam had forgotten, in his haste, to glance back before he turned in at the gate. He couldn't say
whether Frodo had taken the Overhill road or stopped to perch on the nearest stile for a breather. One thing was
certain, however; if his master didn't nip up smartly he'd be late to his own party. He should have been home and
dressed for merry-making. He hadn't looked very merry when Sam had passed him, but it was hard to tell. Frodo was
a deep one and no mistake.
All things considered, it wouldn't hurt to step into the lane for a tick, maybe slope off to the crossroads and stretch his
legs. He set his hand to the latch.
"Where be you a-going to, Samwise? Master Bilbo needs you here to mind the pony traps and hoist the lanterns into
place. I can't do it; I've got the screws something awful." The familiar voice brought Sam up short faster than a bramble
vine snagged in the seat of his breeches. He froze, fingers gripping cold iron as if he'd been caught out in some
tweener tomfoolery.
"It's early, Da," he answered, turning to meet his doom. "Young Nick says he'll tend the ponies for a spell. I'm--"
The Gaffer's face was sour as verjuice and there was a hitch in his walk as he drew near that bespoke recent
applications to his joints of Mother Knapweed's Strengthening Plaster.
"You're haring off after Mr. Frodo; I knowed it. Well, he clomb the hill a short while ago. If he wants to moon about by
hisself, don't you pester him."
Sam nodded, quelling the urge to stick up for his master since it was plain the Gaffer couldn't see beyond the end of a
dibber where gentlehobbits were concerned.
"Aye, well--." Sam puffed out his chest and planted his feet firmly. "That's as may be, but happen he has more need of
me than Mr. Bilbo does. If he don't then I'll be no worse for the hike."
The Gaffer squinted at Sam with the same look he might have given a potato that had grown a strange knob on the
tuber.
"Such carryings-on," he said, shaking his head. "I've never seen their match. Be quick afore our May gets hold of you
for her donkey work."
Sam went off like one o'clock at mention of his sister's name, and with the Gaffer's dry chuckle loud in his ears he fled
through the half-open gate into the lane. He had crossed the stone stile by the hagcherry and was trudging up the
flattened grass of the hill path before he knew it, the clay tile roofs in the village below flashing red fire under the
westering sun. He moved with a tread light as thistle-down, and though the Hill was neither as high nor as steep as it
had been to a lad of ten summers, nonetheless he lingered for a moment on the well-worn track to watch a flock of
geese swerve across the Water, their wings a blur of silver.
No, not a mountain, he thought from the vantage ground of twenty, but high enough to see what mattered most. He
lifted his eyes to the oak, its leaves fading as the acorns ripened, and thence to the ragged magpie's nest at the tree's
heart and on down until his gaze rested on the one he had come seeking. If there was treasure beyond the written
word hidden deep under hill as some folks said, Sam hadn't come upon it. All he had found was this knotty riddle with
ink-spattered cuffs.
His feet made no more noise on the sward than did the silent whistle on his lips as he crested the hill. He wondered
whether he ought to have called out a cheerful 'halloo' or snapped a twig a-purpose so as not to fright his master, but it
was too late.
Frodo was seated on the brow of the Hill, absent-mindedly twirling a stem of swine’s snout between his palms. Now
and again, a tuft would part from the gossamer ball and Frodo would watch it go until the breeze had blown it beyond
sight. He had taken off his green coat and weskit and there were grass stains on the back of his rumpled linen shirt.
He didn’t have the bearing of a hobbit who was one year from his majority and destined to be Master of Bag End. He
looked younger than he had yesternoon and oddly aloof, as though he neither knew nor cared about his birthday. That
was a shame, if it were so.
The seed-head fell to the ground and Frodo stared at the brown smear on his hands for a long minute, then rubbed his
fingers on the tail of his coat. There was a small packet lying next to him, square and flat and wrapped in a bit of silky
cloth.
“We call the flowers piss-a-beds," Sam said, not knowing how else to begin, " 'cept when they’re going to seed and
then they’re blowballs.”
He bent to gather one, and the quick tug shook a few seeds loose from their moorings.
Frodo glanced round without surprise, as if it was an everyday matter to find Sam at his shoulder.
“And do they?”
“What, sir?”
“Make you piss in your bed.”
Sam grimaced. It was possible that Mr. Frodo had already known the common name and used it often amongst his
cronies, but the words still sounded odd coming from the mouth of a gentlehobbit.
“You’d have to ask my dad," he answered. "The Gaffer drinks swine's snout tea by the flagon and swears his dinner
goes down easier on account of it. The gammers pick the leaves when they’re tender and new, but I don't fancy the
taste myself. Right bitter they are.”
Frodo nodded.
“I’ve seen Nan Goodbody and Gammer Bunce gathering herbs in the lane. They seemed to know what they were
doing.” He plucked another ball and held it to the light. “Bitter or not, they're pretty things.”
“Aye, and the blooms as well, though I wouldn't say it where the Gaffer could hear me. Swine’s snout isn’t wanted in
the border; it has a root like a – " He had almost said 'bull's pizzle' but caught himself in time, hopeful that Mr. Frodo
wouldn't notice the blush colouring his cheeks. "I can hardly shift them once they've settled; they're that stubborn. You'd
never think it to look at them. They ain't showy neither." He gazed at the few blossoms clinging to the hillside and their
taller fellows, gone to seed and ready for flight. "But up here they're fair to see and no one minds if they run wild."
"Yes, all things have their place I suppose," Frodo replied. "Your Gaffer would agree."
Sam didn't answer right off the bat; he didn't want to wear out his welcome by blathering like an idiot till his chaffs hung
loose. As hard as it was to keep silence, it was better by far than having the words tumble from his lips so fast he
feared he would die of shame at any minute. Besides, Mr. Frodo might not be keen to hear more about such trifles as
wayward roots when it was as plain as you please that he still carried something inside him big enough to choke an
oliphaunt. Sam had scant notion what that something could be, but if your master was chary of talk it was best to stay
mum. Even wiser maybe to take yourself away when you weren't wanted.
He studied the grass sprouting between his toes, wishing he didn't feel akin to a pimple on a sow's bum. The swine's
snout dropped from his fingers as he tried to shape words of leave-taking. He was no longer as glib of tongue as that
hobbit who had spent the spring months playing silly buggers with apple pips; that hobbit would have known how to get
out of a pickle.
"My dear Sam, why don't you sit down? I won't bite."
Sam started from his daydream. Frodo had thrown the blowball to the ground and was lying flat on his back with the
wrinkled jacket wedged beneath his head. The sunlight touched his skin and made it gleam pink and white like apple
blow. He was bright as a lily sprung from the earth, yet no maid.
"Are you still there?"
Sam peered at the legs sticking out below his fustian breeches. There was a bruise on his knee from when he'd
cracked it on the barrow handle the day afore. The coney-catcher had just been telling the farmer's daughter how to
skin a rabbit and somehow--
"A sort of," he said, quiet as a mouse in cheese. He supposed he must look the same as every other hobbit
hereabouts, leastways every Gamgee in the North and West Farthings. They had broad cheekbones, square hands,
sturdy builds but weren't over tall with it. Mr. Frodo was different, and though Sam couldn't say how it was, that
difference brought an ache to his heart which muddled him beyond reckoning. If he hadn't spent half the night tossing
on a lumpy mattress worriting about the lantern hooks, he'd have been quicker at making his excuses and taking
himself off before Mr. Frodo decided he was soft in the noggin.
It was too late. There was a rustle in the grass and Sam's head jerked up, all of a quiver. Frodo was looking him full in
the face, his eyes dark as periwinkle flowers under the hedgerow. He had rolled onto his side and was leaning on
one elbow, the collar of his shirt askew.
"Please, Sam?" he said. "I daresay you have chores, but if you could stay...." His voice trailed off and he made a wry
face. "Only for a little while, of course, and then we should go. I don't want Bilbo to think I'm ungrateful."
"I'd be happy to, sir," Sam answered, knowing his duty when he saw it whatever the Gaffer might say about hobnobbing
with your betters. "I thought you wanted a snoozem."
Frodo smiled easily, and shook his head.
"No. I took your advice regarding a hot posset and went to bed early. I was asleep in a trice. However--" and he gazed
at Sam with a twinkle in his eyes that made the skin on Sam's nape prickle in alarm, "you might ensure that I don't nod
in this heat by telling me a tale to pass the time. Shire hobbits never cease to astound me with their hoard of fables
and customs. Your Gaffer is quite remarkable in that respect. The other day he was regaling Cousin Bilbo with a
receipt for a salve against water-blister. It's turn and turn about with those two." The corner of his mouth twitched as
he fiddled with his jacket.
"I don't know many customs, sir," Sam said, doubtful whether he should sit next to Mr. Frodo when he might set that
boggle on Sam's tail again without a caution. "Sowing, planting and growing a straight carrot--that's all I understand.
Tom Cotton--Farmer Tolman Cotton's eldest--knows the old lore better than anyone. His Nan passed it to him when
he was barely breeched, or so he says." He rubbed the back of his neck thoughtfully, while Frodo continued to look at
him sideways.
"Is Tom Cotton the tall, thin lad with the shock of ginger hair who tends his father's stall at market?"
Sam ducked his head.
"That's him right enough. He's fly to what's what, but he can't tell stitchwort from woodruff for all that his Nan was a fine
herbwife."
"Goodness. Well--" Frodo sat and donned his weskit, brushing grass from the nappy cloth and twitching the collar into
place. "If, as you say, your knowledge of village customs is meagre in comparison to young Tom's, I'll not--" He
hesitated, a wistful expression on his face as he looked at the mysterious parcel by his side and then at Sam.
"Sam?"
"Yes, sir?" Sam straightened. He wished there was something he could do with his hands that didn't involve putting
them in his pockets. The Gaffer would take on awful if he heard Sam was slouching on the job, but Mr. Frodo had a
way of steadfastly glooarin' at a fellow that would make even the Gaffer feel like a bare golly. Sam readied himself.
"Sit down. I'm getting a crick in my neck."
"Oh, aye. Sorry, sir."
He bent his knees and settled into the coolth, the grass lush here beneath the oak in spite of the dry summer. He was
glad that his master wasn't being offish, leastways not this even. They could draw their pipes later and talk of Sam's
dreams for the garden--yellow roses on that patch of fallow ground beyond the potting shed for a start or-- . No, best
make no mention of the shed.
Sam frowned, chewing over where the new plantings might go if not there, while far below, someone struck up a tune
on the fiddle and the oak's shadow drew out like taffy and covered the hilltop.
"As I was saying," Frodo continued, abruptly bringing Sam's attention back to the matter at hand. "I'll ask you about
herbs instead. Are there other uses for Swine's Snout? It must do more than loosen a hobbit's bladder; the gammers
harvest it so earnestly."
Sam knew well the merits of Swine's Snout, root, stem and leaf. It strengthened the belly, eased the joints and
increased a hobbit's store of seed, or so they said, though he didn't fancy telling Mr. Frodo of that last merit lest he eye
the Gaffer askance next time he chanced on him in the garden. Besides, he didn't think his master needed such
physic at his age.
"It loosens tongues as well as bladders, I reckon. Nan Goodbody's swine's snout wine is better than middling for that
purpose. And the young lasses--" Sam faltered, aware that he might be treading on boggy ground if he continued.
"They blow the seeds from the ball to find out when they'll be handfasted. There's a wee ditty to sing aforehand."
He cleared his throat and chanted softly:
"Rosy apple, mellow pear,
A crown of flowers he shall wear.
Gold and silver by his side
Tell me when I'll be a bride.
I'll take him by the lily-white hand
Lead him across the water
Give him a kiss and one, two, three..."
Sam broke off.
"That's all there is, though in Tighfield they sing it different as I remember. But a Hobbiton lad with lily-white hands;
whoever heard the like?" Sam hid a grin. "Anyroad, the lass blows on the seeds--one, two, three--" Sam pursed his
lips and demonstrated. "Well, the more puffs it takes to free them, the more years 'twill be till the lass is wed," he
finished.
Frodo tilted his head and raised an eyebrow.
"I see that you do have a custom or two up your sleeve where herbwifery is concerned. Is this a common pastime in
the Westfarthing?"
"Yes, sir."
"Have you done it?"
"No, sir," Sam said scornfully. "T'ain't for lads."
"Ah." Frodo looked away. "You surprise me. Why not?"
Sam knew how many days went to the week and even better did he know his master's ways. It was a short step from
blowballs to apple pips from hereon in.
"Any lad with a morsel of wind in his lights could blow them loose at one go. Many's the time I've seen Nibs and Jolly
do it for a lark."
Frodo picked a large blowball and offered it to Sam, milky-white juice slipping from the broken end to wet his fingers. It
would soon darken to a stubborn brown, and in all likelihood he would go to the party with mucky hands and green
smears on his shirt-sleeves. Mr. Bilbo would be in a taking when he saw him.
"As much as I'd love to be enlightened further about the tongue-loosening qualities of Nan Goodbody's wine, I'd rather
you show me how this is done. If what you say is true, you'll be handfasted within the year, for I'm sure you have a great
deal more wind than Jolly Cotton."
"Not even Daddy Twofoot has more wind than Jolly Cotton," Sam muttered, unable to button his lip. Frodo's mouth
curled in answer and the blowball trembled, threatening to drop its burden of fluff beforetime. Sam reached for it and
his attention was instantly caught--not by the whorl of downy seeds this time but by the depth of sky, the gnarled, waving
branches of the oak tree mirrored in Frodo's eyes. It was a wonder to see how the broad world could fit into a space no
larger than an acorn and a shame, too, that all things clear and bright had a way of being marred, like the blowball's
pale sap as it touched his master's skin.
Sam's hand fell to his lap and he hung his head.
"I'll follow your lead, sir, if you don't mind," he said, somewhat in doubt as to whether the game was worth the candle.
"Oh, very well," answered Frodo, "but I fully intend to stay as I am whatever the swine's snout may say." He puffed out
his cheeks and made a show of giving it his best, but only a seed or two broke free on the first attempt, falling into his
lap and clinging fast to the cloth of his breeches.
Sam clucked his tongue.
“A bedfast gammer could do better. You blew to one side a-purpose."
“Rubbish," said Frodo briskly, tossing the seed-head away and wiping his palms with a hankie. "I'm meant to remain a
crotchety old bachelor with out of twig relatives by the score hanging on my elbow. It's your go."
Sam didn't think the Sackville-Bagginses wanted for anything beyond the key to Mr. Bilbo's front door, although the
Gaffer often remarked that young Lotho had no more brains than a moudiwarp and would come to a bad end. His dad
thought this a fine pun and was wont to repeat it in The Ivy Bush whenever he had the chance, but Sam was unable to
find words for Mr. Frodo's relations that would do them justice. That Angelica Baggins was proud as a rooster at
sunrise even though she was no bigger than a thimble.
"No, thank you, sir. I'll not take a turn," he said, readying himself to leave before he made a rude remark. The wilful look
on Mr. Frodo's face would have cowed a lesser hobbit and might have cowed the Gaffer, but Sam was on his mettle.
"Swine's snout is a dandy herb for those who need tonicking, but only a fool would seek out trouble afore it finds him.
You told me so once and happen you're right."
"As I recall, you didn't agree with me. In fact, you were obdurate."
"Then I was a fool, to be sure," Sam answered shortly, clambering to his feet. "I'd best be on my way, sir; the even's
drawing in. I undertook to set out the supper-tables and May will have my ears if I don't hasten. Folk must eat."
He straightened his party clothes, lest the assembled company think he'd been playing at cockertie-hooie, and was
about to retrace his footsteps when he felt something touch his sleeve. He turned on his heel to find Frodo at his
elbow, the silk-wrapped parcel in his hands.
"If Bilbo or any of the others were to see what I'm giving you they might find it odd," Frodo said, casting his eyes upon
the packet with knitted brows, "but I fancy it will be of more use to you than it has been to me, and so--" He held it out
and Sam took it willy nilly, the slippery cloth cool and damp against his fingers.
His master had given him many birthday gifts--a planting spade, a canister of tea, a bag of bulbs brought special from
Buckland--and every one of them plain and simple as parsley piert. Yet if he read Mr. Frodo's manner aright, this year's
gift was out of the ordinary and would discomfit them both if word of it got out. It wasn't that book on grafting then, the
one he'd seen in the window of Hawkweed's seed shop, though it was likewise square and hard. Whatever it might be,
mayhap it was the true cause of his being keen to follow Mr. Frodo, and with that niggling urgency he'd been at a loss to
explain to the Gaffer.
A trace of puzzlement must have shown on his features, for Frodo said, "Don't worry, Sam. You can put it into your
pocket and no one will be any the wiser. Open it here, if you like."
"I'm not particular, sir. I--" he began, but all he might have said or done made off quicker than a leaf in a whirlwind as
Frodo's heated gaze fell on him and Sam was rooted to the spot by that same unnameable sense of dismay that had
come over him in the garden.
"Sam, do what you will," Frodo murmured, his face crumpling in sudden distress, but Sam willed no more now than to
stretch the taut ribbon over the corners of his gift and unfold the dark blue cloth and feel his heart flutter at sight of what
lay beneath.
"Oh glory," he said, dumbfounded as ever and grateful that he and his master stood on the brim of the hill where none
could spy on them. The Gaffer would bless himself if he saw what Mr. Frodo had given away.
Sam could do naught else but stare, silent and motionless as a goose in a snowstorm, at the flat wooden box nestled
in his hands. It seemed to his misted sight as if the walled garden of his waking dreams had come to life in painted
form, and the golden bird in the centre of the lid, with tail feathers trailing down like the bright plumes on Mistress
Lobelia's best summer hat, was winking its welcome with a shiny round eye. There were daffy-down-dillies there, too,
and pale primroses, common marigolds and daisies, as well as many other things green and growing. Yet best of all
were the full blown roses of deepest blood-red and the cheeky bird perched in their midst.
"This wasn't meant for such as me. It's too fine," he whispered, tracing a finger over the gleaming surface for what
might be the only time, as if by doing so he could fix it in his memory.
"Don't be ridiculous; of course it's meant for you. Who else?" Frodo answered. "It's a mirror case," he went on briskly,
"and a very old one, as you can see. It belonged to my mother, Primula Brandybuck, and to her grandmother, Adaldrida
Bolger. The mirror was broken long ago and I thought--" Frodo coughed. "I thought it would be a safer place for your
mam's mirror than the flannel bag you were tucking it into when I --." He waved his hand towards Bag End. "You
know."
Sam groaned inwardly, afraid that he would prove a sad disappointment to Adaldrida if she could see what sort of
dandiprat her box had come to. He knew it had been too much to hope that Mr. Frodo would have forgotten the
jiggery-pokery in the shed. Sam's meagre dreams and fancies had been laid bare that night because of his own
foolish whims, and Mr. Frodo had shown him a mercy he scarce deserved by walking off without a backward glance
and leaving him untouched, except for the part that ached in a way Sam didn't understand. Now the potting shed with
its narrow window loomed in front of him, and the words of thanks he ought to have spoken froze on his tongue.
Snakes and adders, Samwise Gamgee; get ahold of yourself. He wiped his eyes with the pad of his thumb and
blinked out at the waning day. The late sun had turned the grass to an amber green, and below in the shadowed
garden Mr. Bilbo was passing back and forth, kindling the lanterns which had been hung on their crooks by someone
who saw his duty better than did Sam. Yet whatever the Gaffer might say about hobbits who didn't know which side
their bread was buttered on, here Sam stood for good or ill, the mirror case glimmering in his hands like a promise.
"She'd have loved it, too," he said. "Mr. Frodo, I wish I could--."
"Never mind, my dear." Frodo reached for his jacket and while he was doing so Sam drew the edge of his cuff across
his damp cheeks and longed for a chance to blow his nose. "Let's go, shall we? I should imagine we're wanted,
whether or not we wish to be found. Bilbo will need me for one thing or another and I wouldn't care to be responsible
for you losing your ears." Mr. Frodo's smile was full of mischief and warmer than anything Sam had seen since the
spring. "Thank you."
"Yes, sir. It's past time," Sam replied, sliding the gift into his pocket and closing the flap. He'd fit his mam's mirror
inside the case when his siblings weren't by, then hide it amongst his underlinens wrapped in a fold of silk. Why Mr.
Frodo should thank him was a riddle best left unanswered, for he'd done nought but stand ready and speak when
spoken to. On the other hand, Sam thought, as he followed his master along the beaten track to the stile, maybe a
gentlehobbit needed someone to stand ready more than he needed a host of toadies at his beck and call.
The lane was filled with pony traps and farmers' carts from the Overhill crossroads to the gate at Bag End, and two or
three of the bolder lads were plying the tethered ponies with stolen carrots under the very eyes of Jolly Cotton who, as
they well knew, was lounging half asleep by the garden wall. Sam would gladly have cuffed a few ears, but Mr. Frodo
was turning in at the gate and Sam hurried to catch him up before they were separated for the evening by the hurly-
burly. It was useless to latch the gate and yet he paused for a heartbeat with his thumb on the lever, marking the path
they had taken from the hill and the moon rising wafer-thin beyond it.
The sun would soon pass into the west but for now its glow blanketed the hilltop and the oak, already losing its
summer colours, flared first with sparks of brazen metal then came altogether alight. From his place in the cool, dark
well of the garden Sam gazed upwards to the bright and dying riches of the tree and forgot where he was. He stood in
place as the sun slipped higher in the branches and further off and the tree fell into deepening twilight.
"Sam?" There was a warm hand on his wrist and someone--
"I'm here," he answered, knowing it was Frodo by the feel of their shared silence but when he lowered his eyes to look
at his master, Frodo's hand fell and something nameless flickered across his face.
"Later, Sam, when May's finished with you. I--." But whatever Frodo had been about to say was lost in commotion as a
pair of young lads grabbed him by the elbows and, with a cry of 'here's Frodo, jolly old Frodo,' tugged him away into the
swirling crowd.
Part 2
