Chapter 11: On the Doorstep
The dwarves and the hobbit had finally come to the end of this long sill journey (although there was still quite a few chapters still left to go through), and they were all still surprisingly in one piece, alive, and extremely hungry. Bilbo, who for some reason, decided he was cheerful, and set up camp. Bombur, who was feeling quite happy too, because he got his lovely poster girl back, helped him, and pasted the picture to the side of the mountain. Of course, Bilbo's cheerfulness might have been due to the rumors he heard in Laketown and the wood elves kingdom that Smaug's favorite dish was roasted dwarf. Fili acquired a mischievous grin and went over to Bilbo. He slung his arm around the obnoxious hobbit and said brightly.
"Bilbo, my dear fellow, you are going to go met our dear friend Smaug. You know, dragons live to do species tast testing, and I have heard that hobbits make good eating if properly cooked. I do hope our dear friend Smaug has heard this, too."
Bilbo smiled slightly and shrugged. Bombur kept messing with the campsite and whistling dirty barroom tunes. There was a heck of a lot more dwarves there than there were hobbits. Not to mention, certain hobbits could become invisible. So, he figured that why should a dragon settle for one when he could get thirteen for the same price.
For five days they waited on the doorstep. Several and various drawings of tic-tac-toe games and hangman games were scrawled on the walls. (That should drive the archeologist crazy!) Of course, the many and various games had to take a second seater to the many and various graffiti and the most interesting diagrams that Fili and Kili drew, that depicted Bilbo's untimely demise. The hobbit didn't pay any mind. He, Thorin, and Bombur did some drawings of their own, that would be more than a little entertaining to archeologists of the future, and Bombur left message to Bertha that this was going to be his new residence. She just needed to ring the bell for cave number 47 to get him. They also spent and a goodly amount of time creating new names to call each other over cheating at the said drawn games. They also spent time in retaliating for said names. Fili happily occupied himself by kicking Bilbo off the mountain. He had heard that hobbits bounced, and he wanted to see if it were true. It was.
So, finally, on Wednesday night, their fifth night, something finally happened, and Bilbo felt an icy chill go down his back. (Of course, that could have been due to the margarita that Bifur poured down his back.) He never could get the hang of Wednesdays after he left his hobbit hole. The sun was setting, and a thrush came a knocking. He knocked on each of the dwarves' heads, and then he went to the hobbit's head and kept on knocking. The hobbit chased the bird away with the threat of a roast pheasant (Bilbo didn't know his birds very well), but it came back. There were some really good snails there. Then it suddenly struck him like lightning to his britches. While patting out his smoldering pants, Bilbo heard a distant voice say,
"Strange things are afoot at the Circle K."
The fire blazed harder, as the hobbit failed to realize the cryptic message in this message. "Oops, wrong line," he heard in his head. There was a clearing of a throat and the words flowed, "When the thrush knocks on your head, you will find the keyhole."
Just when Fili decided to kick the hobbit off the side of the mountain yet again, Bilbo jumped up and exclaimed in a loud obnoxious tone (partly because, he just found his sword "Sting" the hard way):
"Get Thorin! The Keyhole!" he exclaimed.
The dwarves looked at each other confused. What did their favorite sleazy magazine shop have to do with this occasion, and how did Bilbo find out about it!
Bilbo grabbed Ori by the ear and forced him to look at the appearing keyhole. The dwarf looked intrigued and decided to take a peek inside, but he didn't see anything of interest inside. There were no bathing female dwarves there! He complained quite loudly about this.
All the commotion brought Thorin over to them. He looked confused at the keyhole, but Bilbo was feeling the strain of his unquenchable undies burning important parts of his anatomy. He yanked the key around the master dwarf's neck and shoved it into the keyhole. The lock clicked and the door swung open. Since there was nothing of interest to see inside, Fili kicked Bilbo off the side of the mountain, but Kili won the bet at how high the hobbit would bounce this time.