A Pearl Beyond Price: Epilogue/Those Who Wait

Bag End, 1421

The moon was full and silver in the night sky. The orb's pale light streamed through a window in Bag End and illuminated the sleeping form of Frodo Baggins. Pearl looked at her cousin, asleep on the couch in front of the fire, which was now only glowing red embers. She clasped the little blue book in her lap and remembered how they found it so many years ago.

All of them had gone from the Great Smials the next morning, without telling Ferumbras what they now knew of his mother. Frodo, Esmeralda, and Merry went to Brandy Hall. Pearl and Pippin returned home to Whitwell. When she got home, she again felt the effects of the deprivation and stress of her time as Lalia's servant. She never again fainted but she became more susceptible to illness. She never married for, despite Lalia's death being an accident and the knowledge that the Terror of Tuckborough had been a murderer, Pearl still felt tainted and, after all, her father and siblings needed her. Now she was too old, her life was half-way over.

She thought that there was too much sorrow in this world. Belladonna's book proved that. The Old Took's daughter wrote of such tragic subjects as the fate of two of her brothers, outliving her husband, and her own demise. However, there was some joy too. Belladonna also got to ride on Shadowfax with the Gandalf the Wizard and meet the Elves. She had a good, loving husband who built her this magnificent smial. She also had a clever son with her eyes. She mused that all things end and endings are always sad.

Now her brother and cousins had long since returned from their own adventures, which had been even more perilous than Belladonna's. Her little brother, so tall and with a bright sword and fine raiment but quiet and so unlike the carefree lad he had been. Merry was the same and he had that scar on his forehead and clutched his right arm in bad weather. They were heroes, those two, but she grieved for the boys they had been.

She looked at the wan face of her cousin, tense with pain even in sleep. She knew he was more of a hero than the others, despite their swords and ponies, and she knew he had born a terrible burden. She was glad she had come to visit because she sensed he would be leaving soon. The near-emptiness of Bag Eng, once so full of all Old Bilbo's things, testified to this. The entire dwelling screamed leave-taking, even if she had not had one of her flashes of "knowing," which had become fewer and fewer over the years. She hoped she had given him some comfort by reading him what Belladonna had written about the antics of Bilbo as a child as he drowsed by the fire.

Pearl was beginning to drift off to sleep herself when Frodo, newly awake gently called her name and said, "You should be in bed, Pearl. I hope you did not stay up on my account or find the mattress in the guestroom uncomfortable."

She smiled and said, "Do not think of it, dearest Frodo. I was just watching the fire die down and thinking. Belladonna had adventures. You, Sam, Merry, and Pippin had adventures that changed the world. What have I done? I am a simple spinster. You, Frodo, you could have had a wife and family. You would have been a good husband. If anyone had to be sacrificed, it should have been me but I would probably have failed anyway."

Frodo smiled weakly, took her hand, and said, "Pearl, do not say that. You have as much strength as me but I would never wish for another, especially such a sweet lass as yourself, to endure what I have endured."

"I just feel so useless," she said quietly.

"Oh, Pearl," Frodo remonstrated gently, "you are not useless. You have been an excellent friend to me. Where would Paladin, Pippin, and the girls be without you? Those who wait for us and stand by us are very important and you have done that."

"You are leaving," she said simply and gestured around the room, vacant except for the couch.

"Yes," he replied, "but please do not tell anyone just yet. Pearl?"

"Yes," she asked, "I will not tell anyone. What is it?"

"Be a friend to Rosemary," he pleaded.

"You did not even have to ask," she responded solemnly

Both hobbits went to their rooms. Pearl close her eyes and let all thoughts of her cousin's departure, her ailing father, her changed brother, her missed chances fall from her like the golden and russet leaves. She dreamed of childhood and of flying and of Belladonna's white roses.