Author's Note: This telling is based on material in The Return of the Shadow.
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...there were murmured hints of creatures more terrible than all these, but they had no name. —The Lord of the Rings, Book One
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Stealing is the shadow in the heart of hobbit-kind. It comes quite naturally to creatures so deft-handed and sharp-eyed, so silent when they wish to be. That shadow was at work the day Déagol the Stoor found the One Ring glinting in the gladden beds near Anduin, and lost it—and his life—to his cousin Sméagol. Years later it sustained Sméagol-Gollum after Ring-lust drove him from the shelter of the Misty Mountains: as the Red Book tells, "The wood was full of the rumour of him...a ghost that drank blood. It climbed trees to find nests; it crept into holes to find the young; it slipped through windows to find cradles." Others of their kind survived the long migration across Eriador by helping themselves to whatever they could find along the way. Once they settled in the fertile Shire this natural gift went underground, but it was never lost. It was Bilbo Baggins's chief—indeed, his only—qualification for the quest of Erebor, at least in the minds of his Dwarven employers. But its clearest manifestation, after a thousand years of settled so-called respectability, was the unceasing pilfering by hobbit teenagers and tweenagers of fruits, nuts, vegetables, eggs, pasties, pies, cakes, and so on.
Therefore it was nothing out of the ordinary when teenage Frodo Baggins began going on solitary marauding raids in the deeps of the night. What was out of the ordinary, at least to the owners of the tongues that wagged about it from Willowbottom to the Hay Gate, was to see poor dead Miss Primula's son grown to be so silent and angry and thin, when he had always been such a cheerful boy and kind too, not a mean bone in his sturdy body.
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Frodo had always felt himself immensely lucky to be growing up in Brandy Hall. It was his world. And when Mum and Dad were alive he was the centre of it, grandmothered with hugs and sweets by Mennie and bounced on Rory's knee like he was Rory's own. If his aunt and uncle now seemed harsh and preoccupied, it was because they were in grief themselves. Saradoc had said so, and therefore it must be true.
But Saradoc had also said that he and Ezzie were coming back to live at the Hall. They never had. After their wedding—which at the last moment, in one of those baffling and devastating changes of mood that often possessed the grownups, Rory and Mennie had refused to let Frodo attend—his favourite cousins were off to the North Moors. There was trouble with outsiders even in that empty country, and the Mayor had sent Saradoc to the aid of its sheepherders and crofters.
Two years went by. Frodo was now big enough to fend for himself. He spent much of his time alone, outdoors; there was some comfort in being under the sky, gazing up through the net of the trees or letting his eyes wander the glittering path of the stars. He supported himself in the time-honoured way, sampling all the produce of western Buckland. He did not go into eastern Buckland, where the graves were. Aunt Mennie had taken him there twice, and both visits had left him mute and withdrawn for weeks.
Nor did he venture over the River anywhere near Bucklebury, where you could only cross by boat or ferry. The accident had left him hating the once-beloved Brandywine, and what was worse, fearing it, a fear that as a Bucklander he knew he must conquer.
It was hard enough the first time he hurried across the Brandywine Bridge alone, on foot, no safe carriage to ride in as the water below went roiling and plashing in its tumbled journey through the great stone arches. The Bridge was wide and solid, as solid as the King of old who had built it, who would (it was said) return one day to rule in equity and peace. This was of very little comfort to Frodo in the present, however. Yet with repeated effort he mastered his fears, and was rewarded with all the fresh plunder of the Bridgefields, the wide lands west of the Bridge.
After a hard winter spent living off the thin hospitality of the Hall, he began to cast his eyes longingly upon the Marish. It was twenty miles by land, by River only a ten-minute crossing. He forced himself to ride the Ferry until the brown water swirling endlessly around him no longer made him think of death. He became skilled at manoeuvering small boats and rafts in the darkness, determined to master the currents that had robbed him of his parents and all his surety in the world.
And now, in his fourteenth summer, the Marish in all its bliss opened up before him. It was a joy to explore: vast, marshy, fragrant with mud and decay; peopled with otters and brocks, cranes and frogs and dragonflies. Its uplands and drained croplands grew the fattest carrots and radishes, turnips and potatoes anywhere. But best of all were the mushrooms.
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The lofty beeches and the gnarled almighty oaks–these are the noblest of the Olvar, the plants: the works of Yavanna who made Arda abundant with green and flowering life. When Melkor strewed death over the young earth, Yavanna countered not with trees even more towering yet, but with the small and secret things of the mould: tiny creatures that devour mortal remains and return them benign and transformed to the soil, lending it fertility, renewing life. Among these, the fungi flourished and developed pale stems and gilled caps that pushed through to the light, their odd-looking forms evoking intense curiosity in Ilúvatar's children. Ever eager to thwart Yavanna, Melkor succeeded in poisoning a few of these, rendering them deadly to the Children. But thanks to Yavanna's ceaseless vigilance he did not corrupt them all. Of those she preserved, one species of the younger world, whose name is not now known, grew large succulent crowns, as rich and toothsome as meat. By some chance the scent and flavour of these "mushrooms" were like strong wine to the Hobbit people: attractive and addictive.
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They grew wild in rare dry corners of the Marish, and Frodo tasted them all, but his nose led him deeper and deeper toward what must be the very centre from which emanated all the mushroomy goodness of Middle-earth. After slogging for mile after mile through tussocks and bogs, with that exhilarating fragrance growing stronger by the moment, he was brought to an abrupt stop. He had arrived at a whitewashed wall, much higher and stouter than normal, that ran ungated for miles in either direction. The meaty scent that wafted from beyond it overpowered his senses. The wall was smooth, deliberately crafted to baffle young fingers and toes, with chinks and fissures too small even for a hobbit's sharp eyes. But it was no match for Frodo, who had recovered all his old burglary skills and more; he would need them once he came of age and was cast penniless upon the world. Groping his way to the top, his fingers met a jagged parapet of broken bottles cruelly embedded in the plaster. These troubled him not at all. He catapulted over them and found himself in an earthly paradise.
As far as he could see there were mushrooms half as tall as he, with stems as thick as a hobbit's arm and caps as big as a hobbit's head. He'd brought an old flour sack pilfered from the granary, and at first he was careful to cull the lovely things from widely separated corners of the field. He thought he was being very clever, that no one would detect his depradations. He did not consider that any farmer worth his salt—and old Maggot was worth a good deal more than that—would have counted each cap more lovingly than the fingers and toes of his newborn children.
When Frodo had filled his bag to bulging he scaled the wall and fled south across country to the outskirts of the village of Rushy, where tall reeds grew right up to the edge of town. A number of the village householders kept butteries at the back of their properties, small round windowless buildings with conical thatched roofs, built right over the cool wetness of the Marish. As you might expect, they were secured with numerous locks and chains, but these were no match for Frodo's keen hearing and clever fingers.
There were cured meats and slabs of butter and wheels of delightful cheese within their damp echoing walls. From one particularly well-stocked buttery he chose several thick rashers of bacon. Then he replaced the locks and fled out across the marshes until he could see no more farm lights in any direction. From his pack he took out the knife, skillet, and tinder he had lifted from the Hall pantries. He coaxed a fire from a few dry twigs and threw the bacon and mushrooms on the skillet. The fat popping and sizzling, and the rich brothy aroma of the mushrooms, carried him to another time and place, and though they deepened his ever-present sadness, they also brought him great comfort. He could close his eyes and relive first breakfasts in the old rooms at Brandy Hall, Mum holding him in her lap while Dad bustled at the stove: three hobbits living in a timeless realm of joy and contentment, unaware of what was to come.
He returned to that field the following night, and the next and the next, until he knew he had long passed the point of concealing his raids, and the farm dogs howled in the distance. The butteries he chose carefully and plundered sparingly, leaving each family more than enough bacon for their breakfasts for weeks to come. There were Rules, even for thieves.
But he showed no mercy to the mushrooms.
For their part they seemed to welcome his attentions. They began calling to him with earthy, crumbly voices, begging him to pluck them and ravish them. They played with his senses and stirred in him desires they had no intention of satisfying, for then he would not keep coming back for them again and again and again....
This could not have gone on for more than a few days. Yet for all he knew it went on for months. So long as the mushrooms had him under their spell, there was no sense of time passing, no thought of the farmer or his dogs, no memory of rightness or wrongness or Rules.
Until the night the spell broke. He had flung his sack over his shoulder and was halfway up the wall when suddenly there was a loud cry of "Hoy!"
His heart seizing painfully, Frodo fell into the mud on his backside. The enchantment was over, and he was in trouble. A ring of slavering, snarling dogs surrounded him. From beyond them four figures, black against the stars, advanced toward him. To Frodo in his terror they seemed ten times bigger than hobbits. The tallest of them broke through the growling ring, and with a sharp gesture brought the dogs to heel. Frodo let out his breath. It was only a hobbit after all, though a hobbit he should not have been trifling with: Maggot, the one farmer in the district who bucked Rory's authority every chance he got.
"Who are you?" Maggot growled.
Frodo threw his hands over his head, too frightened to answer.
"You look like Buckland trash. Answer me, boy. Who are you?"
"Frodo Baggins, sir."
"Baggins. The boy whose parents drowned?"
"Yes, sir."
"I see. Well, good thing for you you're an orphan—I'll not beat you to death, not this time, at any rate. But touch my mushrooms ever again and you'll find I've lost all charity! In the meantime, Frodo Baggins, hear me and hear me well. We don't want your kind here. Mr. Rory knows how I feel about the doings at the grange in Bucklebury, which is run to suit his interests and no one else's. Why should I settle for rates that for years he's kept fixed with an iron hand, when there are strangers down in the Southfarthing offering me twice them and more? Times are changing. There's new blood coming into the Shire. Old Rory isn't ready for it and he knows it. So is this how he gets back at me, sending a young relation trampling and pillaging through my fields like a platoon of goblins?"
"No, sir," Frodo said, surprised.
Maggot plucked up Frodo's bag and his pack and handed them off to his sons. He turned to the dogs. "Hoy, lads," he said. The dogs sprang up tense and alert. At a signal from Maggot they formed a circle around Frodo, growling and baring their teeth. At another signal they began advancing on him.
Frodo lay trembling violently, terrified and humiliated. The farmer and his sons regaled him with scornful laughter. When the dogs were within inches, and Frodo could feel their hot breath, Maggot stopped them with a "Stay." He seized Frodo by the scruff, lifted him right off the ground, and held him there with his feet dangling, helpless. "There, lads. Get a good look at him, and get a good scent of him."
When he was satisfied that they had done so, Maggot flung Frodo down, sprawling on his belly in the mud. "Now, lads," he said, "you see him off my land, and if he comes back again you can eat him!"
And they were after him, yelping with malicious glee, nipping at his heels, calves, and buttocks. They chased him down the length of the white wall, through the farm gate and for miles along the road to the causeway. Frodo ran so hard he thought his heart would explode. They ran him all the way to the Ferry before finally backing off.
Exhausted, he flung himself on the dock, too dizzy and nauseated to attempt the crossing.
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He awoke sore and chilled and in grief all over again. Wearily he poled his way through the dawn mist rising from Brandywine, dragged himself up to the Hall and crawled behind the woodpile in the Great Room. All the rest of that day he sat hugging his knees, a ball of anger and misery. "I'm sorry, Mummy," he whispered. He knew better than to steal so greedily and selfishly that it robbed a farmer of his livelihood. Mum never had any patience with gentlehobbits who availed themselves of all the privileges of that position but none of the responsibilities. And he was a gentlehobbit, though penniless: tolerated but unwanted, a burden to the rich relations who allowed him to live off their charity. Poor wretched little chap, Uncle Dodinas had called him; he had no future, no prospects, no joy in anything—except the precious mushrooms. They were more to him than a stolen delicacy. They were the life of love and comfort he had lost.
That night they sang to him in his dreams.
The following morning he raided the pantries for fresh supplies: bag, skillet, tinder, and knife. He added a tall walking stick, which he chose from among the collection in the front vestibule. Fearlessly, in full daylight, he boarded the ferry and set off into the Marish. But he waited until dark to scale Maggot's endless wall with its razor-sharp battlements.
The dogs weren't long in arriving. He was ready for them. Frodo had begun to suspect they were too well-mannered to actually touch him. No one in the Shire kept dogs that killed hobbits. Still, it was best to seize the upper hand and keep it. This time he stood his ground, letting them see no fear. He brandished the stick at them, ferociously swinging it over their heads a time or two. They fell back and allowed him to harvest a brimming bagful, but all the while they growled morosely.
For a day, a week, another timeless interval of mushroom madness, Frodo believed he was winning. The dogs didn't like it. They had a job to do and they had always done it well—until along came this prince of thieves, who forced them to back down again and again, who arrogantly exploited their good manners, who showed no concern for the growing voids in what once had been a crop worth a fortune to their master.
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The mushroom-spirits laughed at them all: at the addled boy, at the brainless dogs, and at the greedy farmer who, idiotic mortal that he was, believed he had cultivated this wondrous crop himself. Rather, it had cultivated him, into a creature willing to dismantle the entire trade balance of his little rat-country if he thought it would make him richer. Melkor's servants had more than one kind of poison at their command.
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One day the dogs appeared with a new gleam in their eyes and a new strut in their tails. They circled Frodo as they always did, ominously yet harmlessly. His bag was more than full, but he plucked still another crown just to spite them, then turned to mount the wall. Usually they made one final frustrated, impotent charge at his feet. Today they hung back, their tails switching smugly, as though anticipating a surprise they had spent days in preparing for him. When it appeared they cowered and fell back submissively, their ranks dividing.
It was yellow-eyed, grey and shaggy, dog-like in form yet bigger than any dog Frodo had ever seen. There was something in the slitted pupils of its eyes—a blackness, an emptiness—that filled him with sudden terror. This was no tame Shire-dog, ferocious in its devotion to duty but by breeding and training incapable of harming a hobbit. Had the farmer recruited some wild wolf of the north to rid his fields of the thief once and for all?
He realized that Maggot's charity had come to an end. He realized that this creature was going to kill him. He hoped that before the final darkness fell it would not hurt too dreadfully. He felt no other regret or fear. He felt nothing at all, other than a sort of sad relief.
But his hobbit-instincts refused to let him die without a fight. He took his stand with his back to the wall, holding the stick out level before him at the ready. The wolf seized it in its jaws and effortlessly shattered it. Then it drew back, cocking its head, licking its chops. It toyed with him like this again and again: approaching him, growling and sniffing, eyeing him appraisingly, then retreating. Each time it approached it seemed to loom huger, darker, its breath like a slaughter-house, its eyes dead.
He realized that this was no wolf. It was a nursery-story bogey come to life, a monster.
Vulnerable and terrified though he was, it angered him that Maggot would use such a thing in his service; it was a far worse violation of The Rules than anything Frodo had done. He made himself as tall as he could and met the creature's eye, all the while scanning the ground with the edge of his sight. Not far from his right foot, a large flat stone the size of a slab of bacon lay half-embedded in the mud.
With a sudden swift motion he plucked it up. Maggot's dogs backed off warily; they knew what it meant when a hobbit stooped to pick up a stone. But the monster, an outsider, had no fear of these small fangless halflings. It mistook Frodo's motion for the doomed struggles of its prey, for which it had further sport in store: a few sudden lunges, a few playful bites to the neck—not breaking the skin, just driving the twitching little thing into a delicious-smelling state of sweat and terror before the kill.
It lunged. With a twist of its wrist the hobbit hurled the stone. Bone met rock with a hideous crack.
For a moment Frodo, blinded by shock, was not certain who had killed whom. When his eyes finally cleared, he could make no sense of what he saw. The creature's body lay on the ground writhing and convulsing, but its head wasn't there.
At first he thought he had smashed its skull so utterly there was nothing left. As he watched in horror, a foul-smelling black steam began rising from the corpse. Bit by bit the monster faded and dissolved, leaving only a dark greasy swath upon the earth. Frodo felt sick. Of course he had meant to kill the thing if he had to; otherwise it would have killed him. But to have really done it, even in the greatest need, was unthinkable. He had killed. Maggot came. He saw the stolen mushrooms. He saw the remains of the wolf-dog. He saw Frodo Baggins, and his rage was boundless.
The blows fell, driving Frodo first to his knees, then face-down in the mud. Still they kept falling, heavy and hard. The dark portal of death loomed before him. He yearned to cross it and have an end to his pain and despair, but for all his struggles it grew no closer. And the blows continued, on and on in a timeless unending series, until at last his thought flickered, sputtered, and blissfully went dark.
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NOTES on Chapter 4
"They were more to him than a stolen delicacy. They were the life of love and comfort he had lost." —Credit is due Angelica, a member of the lost lamented discussion boards at Imladris.net, for first giving the author the idea that Frodo was acting out his grief by raiding Maggot's mushrooms.
"Of course he had meant to kill the thing if he had to; otherwise it would have killed him." —From The Return of the Shadow, Chapter XVII, "A Short Cut to Mushrooms:" "I used to trespass on his land when I was a youngster at Bucklebury. His fields used to grow the best mushrooms. I killed one of his dogs once. I broke its head with a heavy stone. A lucky shot, for I was terrified, and I believe it would have mauled me. He beat me, and told me he would kill me next time I put a foot over his boundaries: 'I'd kill you now,' he said, 'if you were not Mr. Rory's nephew, more's the pity and shame to the Brandybucks.'"
