Bag End, Halimath 1, 1404 SR
Of the mounds of food, almost nothing was left. Disgruntled though they were about the sudden cancellation of the wedding, the guests apparently saw no reason to waste the excellent food prepared for the occasion. The flowers now lay trampled on the grass. The stage had been dismantled. The tents pulled down and rolled, their stakes laid in neat bundles; they were ready to be packed away in the morning. Nothing remained of the party that took months to plan and hundreds of hands to arrange.
Inside Bag End, the atmosphere was redolent with gloom and resentment. The various families who—due to the long journey it would take them to go home—had no other choice but to stay another night in the huge burrow, grumbled about their lot, holding "that no good, hopeless Baggins" responsible for their wasted time and effort. They had come anticipating nightlong festivities, an endless stream of victuals and nonstop dancing. Instead, they had to contend with a horde of irate Foxburies and various relations, with nothing better in the way of argument but a feeble apology from the missing groom. The Foxburies had departed, still fuming, after dinner, leaving the temporary residents of Bag End to nurse their wounded pride and dignity. It did not help in any way that when Frodo returned from wherever it was he stashed himself in all the afternoon, he obstinately ignored the questions hurled at him by the assorted Brandybucks, Tooks, Boffins and Goodbodies. He locked himself in his study, letting only Sam Gamgee to enter with dinner.
It was now nearly three hours past midnight but Pippin had not slept a wink since his father dismissed him to bed. That was almost six hours ago, when, in the middle of a heated discussion about Frodo's dubious character, Pippin had suddenly piped up, saying, "Has it occurred to you that he also feels miserable about this?"
And there was no one with him, thought Pippin sadly. He bore his wretchedness alone. It wasn't fair. Even if he was at fault—and Pippin personally rejected that idea—it didn't mean that he wasn't hurt by what happened. Everybody talked about how horrible his actions were in regard to Iris. But no one saw the deep anguish in his eyes before he walked away from the bower. No one did but Pippin.
Pippin got out of the bed he shared with a younger cousin, and tiptoed out the room. He strode resolutely to Frodo's study, and was surprised to see the door slightly ajar, a thin band of light stretched out on the darkened corridor outside it. There were voices inside. Pippin crept to the door and peeked in.
Two hobbits were sitting in front of the fireplace, wine bottles on the table between them, a cloud of smoke around them. One was unmistakably Frodo; he still wore the beautiful suit made especially for the wedding. The other, judging by his deep-throated grumbling voice, was Rory Brandybuck, a longstanding Master of the Halls only very recently replaced by his son. His health was failing, but he would not be gainsaid when he announced his wish to be present at his sister-son's wedding. The short trip to Bag End had been hard on his rusty joints and constantly wheezing lungs. He had stayed in his room the entire afternoon following the disastrous wedding. Pippin wondered why the old hobbit was wide-awake this time of night, guzzling wine and chatting amiably with Frodo. Pippin tiptoed nearer, hiding behind the sofa in the middle of the room.
"Oh, yes, my lad," cackled Rory raspingly. "Not even Bilbo could do it better. And I thought that business with Prim was the sloppiest job I've ever seen."
"With Pr… Do you mean my mother, uncle?" asked Frodo, leaning closer. "What business are you talking about?"
"Well, what else? All these love and marriage stuffs," said Rory with exaggerated airiness. "Didn't know your mother and Bilbo went a long way, did you?"
"No," admitted Frodo, sounding surprised. "No one…."
"Aye. Not something we talk about openly in the halls, especially since she married your father, and seemed to settle down quite happily," said Rory. He took a sip from his glass and stared at the fire. "But there was a time, Frodo, when it seemed that Prim had set her heart on another Baggins."
"My mother and Bilbo," whistled Frodo. "Who would've believed it?"
"No one did, at the beginning," laughed Rory. "You know Bilbo, never seemed to live in the here and now, always babbling about the strange creatures he met in the woods…."
Frodo stiffened, and Rory chuckled, patting his hand. "Nothing wrong in that, lad, nothing wrong. We all have our ways. And even though every now and then we have a bit of fun with Bilbo's antics, we love him nevertheless. He was that good with songs, he was always a welcome guest in the Halls."
Rory drew deeply on his pipe. "He was visiting that time, on Mid-year Day. We were having a feast. Now Prim, she had this idea for a play and had been rehearsing it all through the best part of summer. A grand one, it was: warriors and dames, dragons and such like. We had a stage built and she saw to the decorations. You should have seen her then, draped in the black cloth they used as background, shouting instructions, running here and there arranging wooden trees and castles and bridges."
"Mother did that?" asked Frodo with a grin.
"Wouldn't believe it, would you, your calm, dignified mother pottering with props?" chuckled Rory. He signaled for Frodo to top up his glass, and Frodo complied, smiling as he did. "Now Bilbo liked his parties, but he much preferred smaller, private ones with only those he knew well. The Hall's Mid-year feasts, with guests coming from as far as Rushey, rattled him. He told me himself that he was considering an escape with a good book, maybe in the Old Forest. But I told him that he would miss the food, and he yielded a little, saying that he would disappear just after dinner. He was thoroughly indifferent about Prim's play and thought the musicians were mediocre."
"That sounds like Bilbo, alright," said Frodo. "Then what happened?"
"Well, with dinner more or less over, the stage was lit up, and the play began," said Rory, a smile wreathing his parched, wrinkled face. "It didn't go very well, let's be fair about that. Prim meant it to be dramatic, but we all doubled over from the very first minute it began. I suppose we hobbits are not accustomed to heroic things. Especially when the villain toppled behind the stage while ducking the hero's sword. And the lady he was trying to save from the wizard's tower was so heavy, she fell from the balcony, bringing the tower down with her…."
Rory started to chuckle and Frodo followed suit. Pippin had to stuff his knuckles into his mouth to stop himself from laughing.
"The noble white horse split into two because the forefeet were swifter than the hind ones. The crescent moon fell from the night sky. The wizard burned his beard stirring his cauldron, his black cat spooked by the fire and climbed the black curtain at the back, and it fell in a heap, revealing half-changed actors behind it."
The two hobbits by the fire shrieked with laughter while Pippin bit his tongue and buried his face at the back of the sofa.
"Oh, it was the best entertainment we had in years, save for the time when Saradoc decided he could mount his pony on his own and decided to take a ride round the orchards facing backwards…."
Frodo and Rory laughed so hard they nearly slid off their chairs. Pippin tried very hard to concentrate on his least favorite food, boiled cabbage.
"But your mother…" gasped Rory after a while, "Prim was…superb. She played both the young hero and the ghost of the poet who roused the villagers to help in ousting the wizard. She was remarkable, brilliant. Maybe that was the reason Bilbo fell for her. After the show, they started talking. Long into the night they chatted, ignoring all invitations to dance and almost all of the food. Bilbo stayed longer that time, we even celebrated his birthday in the Hall, and Prim made another play in honor of the occasion. It was a romantic one, but no less catastrophic. The hero sprained his ankle when carrying his beloved and the plume fell off the peacocks' tails so many times that in the end the chickens were whisked off the stage and…."
His drone was cut off unceremoniously by Frodo's howling laugh. Pippin shut his ears and counted backwards from fifty.
"Bilbo had to leave before Yule, but they wrote everyday to each other so the distance mattered little. They were wildly in love, those two, and it made our parents concerned."
"Why?"
"Well, Bilbo was thirty years older than your mother. She was only eighteen at the time," said Rory, before pausing to take a long pull on his wine. "No doubt Bilbo was more than eligible. But by the time your mother came of age, he would be sixty-three; not a very good age to commit oneself to a young wife with prospects of children ahead. But to their credits, they were persistent. Until the next year, shortly before her nineteenth birthday, Bilbo told me that he was going to formally propose to her. He was willing to wait until she was of the legal age to marry, but he confessed that he couldn't bear thinking that other hobbits may fancy her, not knowing she was spoken for."
Rory handed his pipe to Frodo, who dutifully emptied it into the ashtray before filling it with a generous supply of leaf. After the pipe was lit, Rory sat back, gazing at the dancing blue smoke he had exhaled. "We talked shortly after tea," he said slowly. "Then he went for a walk before dinner. He didn't return until the next morning. Prim was nearly frantic. It was fine, she said, gallivanting in Hobbiton and its surrounding hills. But Buckland bordered on the unknown wild, and wolves were oft seen after dark. When he came back, he was strange and distant. He said he was leaving soon. To me he said that he had changed his mind about asking Prim's hand in marriage. To Prim he said that he feared he would fail to make her happy. That one day he would go somewhere to have some adventures in foreign lands, and wish to have no ties that might burden his mind. Much as he loved her, he wanted to remain free in case opportunity presented itself."
Frodo stared with wide, horrified eyes at Rory. At the last sentence he winced and emitted a small distressed sound.
Rory shrugged. "I know," he said. "It was terrible of him, and poor Prim was well nigh inconsolable. But he did the right thing. The next year he left with the dwarves and the wizard, to his death, people said; and in the autumn Prim met Drogo at a music festival in Bywater. She consented to his courtship merely to spite Bilbo at first, but Drogo had this 'quietly determined sort of sweetness' as Prim put it, and she slowly learned to love him. When news got out that Bilbo was probably dead, she had quite forgiven him."
Frodo sat back and sighed heavily. "Poor Iris," he murmured softly. "I hope she will soon find another love. I can't bear the thought of what suffering and humiliation I have caused her. She's too sweet to be hurt so cruelly."
"It's crueler to leave her when the two of you've tied the knot," muttered Rory.
Frodo chuckled wryly.
"What's so funny?" croaked Rory.
"I let her go," said Frodo bitterly, "in favor of an opportunity to leave the Shire and venture into the outside world. What if such possibility exists only in my imagination? What if I am destined to never leave Hobbiton, let alone the Shire?"
Rory gave Frodo a sidelong glance. "We'll see, Frodo. We'll see."
Frodo heaved a sigh and stared at the fire with his chin resting on his knuckles. "I love her, Rory," he said quietly, the flames dancing scarlet in his eyes.
"I know, lad," said Rory, patting Frodo on the shoulder. "I know."
He finished his last glass of wine and rose with difficulty. "Ah, I'd best be along now. Time to pay homage to the privy, then bed. I'd be lucky if I could get up tomorrow. Excellent wine, though, Frodo. Many thanks."
"Do you need me to come with you?" asked Frodo, rising.
"No, no, no," waved Rory dismissively. "I can still find my way around this tiny smial."
Frodo laughed and strode to open the door for Rory. Pippin moved surreptitiously behind the sofa to avoid exposure.
Alone, or so he thought, in the study, Frodo sat with his eyes closed. Once, not very long after he met Iris, he had sat in that chair and dreamed about what his life would be like with her: sitting on the sofa with her head on his lap, reading to her, while his hand ran through her chestnut hair; listening to her sing as she sat painting in the corner of the study; dancing to the soft hum of her voice while snow drifted outside the window. There would be children, too, someday, and he imagined sitting on the floor playing with them, stealing an occasional kiss from their mother as they romped and laughed merrily.
But the visions were gone now. Frodo stared at his reflection on the swirling claret in his glass. He saw a lone hobbit, in an empty room. Angrily he made to place the glass on the table, but he misjudged the distance, and the glass wobbled on the edge of the table before tumbling down and breaking to pieces as it hit the stone floor. Frodo swore softly as he bent to pick up the shards. He looked up, when suddenly a shadow loomed before him, blocking the light of the fire.
"Here," said Pippin, crouching next to Frodo. "Let me do it."
Frodo frowned at the young hobbit. "Shouldn't you be in bed now, Pip?" he asked, swatting Pippin's well-meaning hand.
"I … I wanted to see if you're alright," said Pippin lamely.
"I'm fine, Pip," said Frodo stiffly, gathering the broken glass into a neat, little pile while avoiding his cousin's eyes. "If you want to help, get the broom and mop from the broom closet, first door on your right from the kitchen."
"Frodo," said Pippin slowly, reaching out to touch Frodo's arm. "It's alright. Don't be sad."
Frodo froze and gazed at Pippin.
"She wouldn't be a good wife for you anyway," furthered Pippin seriously.
Frodo choked back a chuckle and raised his eyebrows. "What makes you think so?"
"I think she will be … big, like her mother, when she's older," Pippin replied earnestly.
Frodo's eyes grew large, his mouth twitching as he fought the mounting urge to laugh. "Pip," he said, trying to sound severe and lecturing, "it's not polite to make such comments on people's figure and I'll not have you speak of Mistress Foxbury like that."
"I was only thinking, Frodo, that the wedding ring won't fit anymore on her finger when she gets that big, so why make such a fuss about it?"
That did it. Frodo collapsed on the floor, laughing, while Pippin stared at him in bemused satisfaction. After a while, wiping his eyes, Frodo reached for Pippin's collar, and pulled the young hobbit closer. Pippin was about to wrap his hands around Frodo when Frodo pushed him to the floor and started to tickle him.
"This, Peregrin Took," he said with a sternness bordering on laughter, "should teach you not to say nasty things about other people's bodies."
***