Chapter 7. A Busy Morning

Upon her return to the study, Pearl was called upon to help the Mistress from the comfortable chair behind the desk into a wondrous wheeled contraption, a sort of rolling chair.

 ‘I take the air each day about this time,’ Lalia informed her after the Mistress was properly settled, a shawl about her shoulders and a blanket over her knees. Following a constant stream of instructions, Pearl wheeled her from the study and through the corridors of the Great Smials, the steward pacing solemnly by the side of the Mistress as he answered her questions.

Tooks stopped to greet the Mistress; servants bowed or bobbed and continued on their tasks, and Lalia, quite animated, chatted and gesticulated as they proceeded to the Great Door. Adelard moved ahead to pull the Door open, and they looked out on a cool, rainy day.

 ‘Go on, girl!’ Lalia said sharply. ‘Take me up to the Door! I want to feel the fresh breeze on my face!’

 ‘But it’s cool this morning, Mistress; you might take a chill,’ Pearl said, seeing a gratified smile in response to her “fussing”.

 ‘A chill? Nonsense! Right up to the threshold now!’ Lalia said, and Pearl complied, keeping a firm hold on the handles of the rolling chair, though the front wheels stopped when they bumped the low sill.

Cool, rain-scented air swept through the doors and Pearl found herself taking a deep breath along with the Mistress. ‘Smell that air,’ Lalia muttered to herself, and for the first time the girl felt pity for the old harridan. Pearl would make a point of walking after the noontide meal, taking the air, swinging her arms, moving briskly and rejoicing in the soaking rain that boded well for the winter wheat and barley. Lalia, confined to the Great Smials, was cut off from such joy.

For at least a quarter hour the Mistress sat at the threshold, taking the air, peering into the courtyard and the gardens on either side of the steps leading up to the Door, asking questions of the Steward. Pearl realised that the old hobbit did not see as well as she pretended. Perhaps that was the reason for the regard through the eye-glass, and it had not merely been a ploy to discomfit the girl. At last, Lalia took a final breath of the air and declared that it was time to get back to the study and get something accomplished, for goodness sake, and why was Adelard loitering here? Certainly not on her account!

The rest of the morning went swiftly for Pearl, filled as it was with busy-ness on Mistress Lalia’s account. There was tea to brew, the shawl to put on and put off and a lighter shawl to be fetched when the room grew “too warm” for the heavy shawl, messages to deliver, flowers to arrange, food to serve, and all manner of other things. By noontide the girl was more than ready for a rest.

 ‘Your time will be your own until after teatime,’ Mistress Lalia reminded her. ‘I take tea at half-past four, and am finished at half-past five. I expect you at my side as I take my last sip of the cup.’

 ‘Yes’m,’ Pearl said, and though she maintained a serene expression she could not help feeling icy fingers walk down her spine at the curious wording. “Last sip of the cup” was more often used to refer to a hobbit’s death than the end of a meal. From the sharp glance the Mistress gave her, she understood this was another test. Very well then, she’d retain her composure; she smiled and added, ‘Will there be anything more, Mistress?’

 ‘Yes,’ Lalia said. ‘I expect you to appear before me this afternoon properly clad. The head seamstress measured you this morning; she ought to have something altered to fit, at least, when you’ve finished your nooning.’

Maintaining her smile, Pearl gave a graceful courtesy. ‘As you wish, Mistress,’ she said pleasantly.

 ‘Away with you, then,’ Lalia snapped in dismissal, and Pearl smoothly exited the study. Once outside, she brushed her fingers against the warm softness of her best dress, made with skill and love by her mother’s hands. No Smials finery would ever surpass its beauty in her eyes.

 ‘Have you worked up an appetite?’ Merry asked at her elbow, and she started. He apologised.

 ‘I didn’t hear you,’ she said.

 ‘Thinking of home?’ Merry asked as he took her arm and began to walk with her towards the Bucklanders’ quarters. ‘Ready to make your escape?’ When she laughed in reply, he added, ‘That’s better.’

 ‘What’s better?’

Merry glanced at her out of the corner of his eye. ‘Pearlie, are you sure you want to do this? You had a face as long as a rainy day just now, coming out of that old vixen’s den.’

 ‘It is a rainy day,’ Pearl retorted lightly, and that was all Merry was able to get from her until they reached the Master’s suite.

 ‘Well, well,’ Saradoc said in greeting, taking her hand and drawing her in. ‘Noontide is just on.’ He escorted her to the table, sat her down, and dismissed the servants who accepted their orders with blank faces but shook their heads at the Bucklanders after the door closed behind them. Was the heir to Buckland so ignorant of protocol as not to know he was supposed to be served? With no servants in the room, how was the food to get from platter to plate? They would be even more scandalised upon their return to find the plates scraped and neatly stacked awaiting collection.

Dismissing the servants did make talking easier. The Brandybucks asked questions and listened, made comments and laughed, offered advice and listened still more as the meal continued. Finally, replete and talked out, Esmeralda rose. ‘Come child,’ she said. ‘Though it would be more proper to lie down after that fine meal, to give the food a chance to do its work, I believe you are ordered to the seamstress. I’ll come along, if I may.’

 ‘Thank you, Aunt,’ Pearl answered. Saradoc and Merry had risen as the ladies did, and now both bowed politely.

 ‘We shall take our leave,’ the heir to Buckland said. ‘ ‘Tis a lovely day for a ride, you know, with this gentle misting rain. See you at teatime?’

 ‘Or slightly before,’ Esmeralda said. ‘I had hoped to ask Rosemary to take tea with us, but she will not leave her brother’s side.’

Pearl started. In her busyness she had forgotten Rosemary and Ferdibrand, and tears of self-recrimination came to her eyes. ‘O Aunt!’ she said, her hand tightening on Esmeralda’s arm.

 ‘You’ve had no time before this moment to think of them,’ her aunt soothed.

Merry patted Pearl’s arm awkwardly. ‘We’ll go together, cousin, as soon as Father and I return from our ride,’ he said. Unlike Pearl, he had not forgotten Ferdibrand; he had merely been putting off seeing him. Now the teen forced a smile. ‘Perhaps we can take tea with Rose and Ferdi this day, instead of insisting they come to us.’

 ‘There’s a thought,’ Saradoc said after a momentary hesitation. From all accounts Ferdi had lost his wits. Merry had never encountered such a thing before, the Brandybucks being much more solid and steady than the Tooks. Ah, well, he’d have to face the loss of his friend; there’d be no more racing their ponies across the fields, daring each other to jump without a saddle, wrestling in the mud of Paladin’s barnyard, competing to see who could eat more of Pimpernel’s sweet biscuits… It was better not to put this off, to allow Merry to begin to grieve his friend and eventually to heal.

The head seamstress (“Coriander, Mum, but folk just call me Cori!”) did indeed have an altered dress ready for Pearl. Esmeralda waited while her niece put it on, insisting that some lace be pinned at the neck for appropriate modesty. Pearl’s aunt conspired with the seamstress to insure Pearl’s clothing would be acceptable to the Mistress while still not so fashionable as to embarrass the girl or her family. ‘Her father, Paladin, is a good hobbit, very conservative you know,’ Esmeralda said. ‘He doesn’t hold much with fashions meant for showing off a girl’s figure. He’d rather she knew how to work hard and use her head than show herself off as if she were some sort of prize pony.’

 ‘He sounds quite sensible,’ the seamstress said approvingly. ‘You wouldn’t know the demands these Smials Tooks impose on me and my needleworkers, m’lady, and all in the name of fashion! Frills and feathers and furbelows until it’s a wonder they can walk without falling on their faces. I’ll take good care of the young lady, don’t you worry!’

 ‘I’m sure you will,’ Esmeralda said, for it was clear the two older hobbits understood one another well.

When Esmeralda and Pearl re-entered the suite, Merry and Saradoc had returned from their ride and changed into dry clothing and were just having a warming mug of hot spiced cider. ‘Lovely day for a ride, my dear!’ Saradoc said, kissing his wife’s cheek, and then he dipped up two more mugs of cider from the little kettle over the fire. He surveyed Pearl’s new gown as she sipped and wondered if she had time yet for a walk, and how this elegant dress would fare in the misty rain, even covered by a cloak. Her homespun wool was much more practical.

‘Quite elegant, child,’ her uncle said at last. ‘I particularly like the effect of the lace at the throat.’

 ‘Essential,’ Esmeralda said. ‘The new gowns will not be quite so low-cut, I’ve been assured.’

 ‘I liked the green dress better,’ Merry said softly, and Pearl gave him a grateful smile. She’d laid it gently in a box provided by the seamstress, tucking tissue into the folds, and Cori had put it away in the clothing storage that was protected from moths, to await Pearl’s homegoing.