Chapter 2 A New Adventure


Samwise was rarely wrong, so his comforting words quelled many a troubled Hobbit mind. The Dwarves short stay stretched into a full two years before the subject was voiced again in the Gamgee household.

It was a full month after Old Rose's funeral and Samwise had taken to his bed, still feeling the terrible wrench from the departure of his beloved wife. Tolman settled to his evening pipe and genteel conversation with his brother Bilbo and brother-in-law Farrimer Took, before the fire, tankards of fine beer at their hands.

"The problem here is that we do so little," he observed in some concern for the old Hobbit. "Everybody sees our Gaffer for advice and don't see us."

The statement had been prompted by old Hamfist Cotton having barged into the hole before dinner, demanding to see Samwise for advice. The advice sought had proven to be of the most trivial sort regarding tending a sapling. Any apprentice gardener of more than two summers could have answered.

"It's because he's travelled," Farrimer observed wisely. "The Thain gets the same."

"Ah. But he expects it," Bilbo asserted. "Our Gaffer don't. He gave up Mayoring 'cause he didn't want people asking what to do. He's fair worn out some days 'cause of all the questions that ordinary Hobbits should know the answers to."

"So what do we do?" Farrimer asked.

"Got to do something," Tolman agreed.

There was silence as they thought, reflective trails of smoke from three Hobbit pipes twisted and tied together forming complicated pictures above them. One of those pictures took Tolman's eye, there was a distinct form of a dragon. It prompted a memory.

"It were all Mr Bilbo Baggins fault," he blurted. "If he hadn't gone looking for that dragon our Gaffer wouldn't have had to go with Mr Frodo."

"Ah!" The others agreed with one voice.

"If somebody else went for an adventure, perhaps people would turn to them instead of the Gaffer?" Bilbo suggested slowly.

"There ain't no adventures left!" Tolman protested. "They went when the Gaffer and Mr Frodo tossed that ring in the Crack of Doom."

"There's them Dwares up Evendim?" Bilbo commented. "There's been stories of smoke over yon hills. Some as says that the upper reach of the Evendwr's gone black?"

There was silence as thoughts delved into minds, looking for a reaction.

It was Tolman that voiced the first. "It would be an adventure," he said slowly. "Perhaps enough to stop folk's running to the Gaffer at every drop o' rain. But who goes. I can't rightly says I want to go all that way. Only been up West March once!"

"We goes together!" Bilbo dove in. Of the seven sons of Samwise, it was he that the magic of his fathers stories had lasted longest. They had lit a fire, that had smouldered for fifty years, without ever having been extinguished, even into adult hobbithood. Now it could be felt stirring.

"It can't do any harm to go and have a look," Farrimer said thoughtfully. "But we can't start immediately. I'll have to see the Thain first and we ought to prepare properly. No sense in getting uncomfortable and I guess the Dwarves will still be there in a week or two."

"Ah! That's good thinking. I'll get Elanor to send a copy of Mister Frodo's map from the Red Book," Bilbo accepted. "Now what else will we need? We got Mister Frodos chain coat and sword in the Mathom House. Can you bring some ponies? It be a good four days ride up there!"

"I'll borrow the Thains mail. It's not as if he'll need it. Besides it's bears the Kings mark, which won't do us any harm," Farrimer agreed. "But we don't have a third set."

"I ain't goin' to do no fighting!" Tolman protested vigourously. "We'll only get in trouble if we go like the dark riders!"

A chill went through the room and Tolman regretted his outburst. The Riders were never mentioned in the Gamgee household, though mothers elsewhere used them to frighten their children to sleep.

"We won't go openly bearing arms," Farrimer promised. "It's just a precaution. Now the important things. The food!"

The rooms warmth returned as Bilbo and Farrimer continued to make the plans, whilst Tolman leant back and let their ever more excited chatter wash over him. He wished he had never brought the discussion up. Unlike his elder brother, he was satisfied being a normal Hobbit, with no more cares than whether the flowers grew, or lunch was plentiful and on time. What they were planning suggested that lunch was going to be lower on the priorities than it ought and gardening not at all. Whilst they were not travelling far from the Hobbit homeland in miles, the moors they would be travelling were a world away from the fertile Shire and avoided by Hobbits for that reason.

"Jus' one thing," Farrimer remarked as their plans accomplished they broke for bed. "Don't tell the Gaffer, or he'll want to come. You hear Tom?"

"Aye," Tolman accepted, still in reflective mood.