Chapter 9. Day's End

Pearl returned to the Thain’s study to endure another close examination through the eye-glass, revolving slowly to show off the lines of the altered gown. Esmeralda accompanied her niece, just in case she might be needed.

 ‘Hem’s even,’ the Mistress muttered. ‘Fits you well, but...’ Lalia frowned. ‘Stop!’ she ordered, and Pearl came to a stop, only to be examined minutely from head to foot. The eyeglass finally came to rest upon the profusion of lace at the top. ‘Hardly fashionable,’ Lalia said huffily. ‘Whatever does that seamstress think she’s about, spoiling the lines of the gown with all that lace?’

Pearl blushed, thinking how undressed she had felt before the lace had been added.

Esmeralda was ready to come to her niece’s defence when the Thain took his pipe from his mouth and spoke quietly from his comfortable chair by the fire. ‘On the contrary, Mother, I find the effect quite charming.’

 ‘Eh?’ Lalia said irritably. ‘What did you say?’

 ‘The lace calls attention to the girl’s face - such openness of expression! What a lovely complexion, as well... perhaps we ought to bring in more farm girls. They’d put the so-called beauties of the Smials to shame,’ Ferumbras said, leaning back, pipe in hand, to look Pearl up and down. ‘Indeed,’ he said reflectively. ‘I hope that all your gowns are lace-trimmed, my dear. Quite becoming, I assure you.’ His mother gave him a sharp glance, but he merely smiled and resumed his pipe.

 ‘It is the latest fashion at Brandy Hall,’ Esmeralda put in. Well, it would be, as soon as she returned to the Hall. ‘Are the Tooks behind the times? I had thought they liked to lead the way in fashionable dress.’

 ‘Certainly not!’ Lalia snapped. ‘Fashionable dress! Faugh! Foolishness!’

 ‘I beg your pardon, Mistress,’ Esmeralda said with an apologetic courtesy, at the same time giving Pearl the slightest of reassuring nods. No doubt concealing lace would be in great demand in the Smials within days.

 ‘Very well,’ Lalia said abruptly, slipping the eye-glass back into its case. ‘I’ve no time for frippery! There’s work to be done!’

Dismissed, Esmeralda gave another courtesy, squeezed Pearl’s hand, and took her leave.

From talk she’d heard before coming to the Great Smials, Pearl was prepared to endure all the evening and half the night. It was said amongst practical farmers that the great families kept impractical hours, staying up well past sunset and rising as late as dawn. In point of fact, the visiting Brandybucks had sought their beds upon Paladin’s first yawn of an evening—two or three hours after the farm Tooks’ usual bedtime, and probably more than two or three hours before the Brandybucks were accustomed to retire. When on the farm, one must do as the farmer after all. The Brandybucks left the farm after their week-long visit quite rested, indeed, from the early bedtime, whilst Paladin’s family enjoyed catching up on their sleep now that they could once again go to bed with the Sun.

It is true that the Mistress and Thain took their eventides later than Pearl was accustomed, but then tea had been later and heavier as well. Pearl was accustomed to supper between afternoon milking and sunset, followed by washing-up, and then bed. Teatime on the farm occurred halfway between noontide and supper and usually consisted of a few biscuits or at most a scone, but meals in the Great Smials were reversed: a substantial tea, a light eventide, and a late supper halfway between sunset and middle night, when sensible farm folk would already have been asleep.

Pearl found herself with little appetite for eventides, and weary in the bargain, but she sat at table with Mistress and Thain and did her best to attend to the conversation, determinedly stifling her yawns. She wondered what Mistress Lalia would say should her attendant be so clumsy as to fall asleep in her plate! Such a relief it was to hear the Mistress order the servants to clear away and then say, ‘I will require you first thing in the morning, Pearl, remember!’

 ‘Mistress?’ Pearl said stupidly, then realised she was being dismissed. She rose hastily from her chair with a bow of her head. ‘Thank you, Mistress, may you rest well.’

 ‘And you, girl,’ Lalia said with a sniff. ‘Off with you now.’ She waved a shooing hand and Pearl hastened to comply. Other servants would see to helping the Mistress get ready for bed as well as rise, wash and dress in the morning. Pearl’s duty for the day was finished.

 ‘I’ll walk you to your room,’ Ferumbras said, then looked to the Mistresss, ‘if you don’t need me for anything else, Mother.’

 ‘Of course I don’t need you,’ Lalia snapped. ‘I’m off to bed, and I suggest you take yourself off as well. Dawn comes early!’

 ‘Yes’m,’ Ferumbras said with a nod and a smile. ‘Come, lass,’ he added, offering an arm. Pearl took it, and he escorted her through the corridors, but not in the direction of the guest quarters. They stopped before a door and he tapped and waited. At Pearl’s questioning look, he said, ‘Your things have been moved to your own room.’ Ah, of course. The Brandybucks would leave in a few days, and it would not be seemly for Pearl to stay on in the quarters reserved for the Master of Buckland and his representatives.

The door was jerked open by a hobbit matron with a good-natured face. On seeing the Thain, she gathered her skirts and bobbed quickly and efficiently. ‘Good evening, Sir,’ she said. ‘Is this the new girl?’

 ‘Pearl, I’d like you to meet Mrs Sandytoes,’ Ferumbras said. The order of introduction was not lost on the matron; Pearl outranked her in Smials status.

Pearl held out a hand. ‘At your service,’ she said with a nod.

 ‘And your family’s,’ Mrs Sandytoes answered, taking the hand, noting that while it was well-kept, it was also a hand that knew how to work and work hard. She gave the fingers a firm squeeze and released Pearl’s hand. ‘Thank you, Sir,’ she said to the Thain with another bob. ‘I’ll see she’s comfortable.’

 ‘I have every confidence, Mrs Sandytoes,’ Ferumbras said, adding to Pearl, 'Will you be joining the Brandybucks for late supper later?'

 'I..' Pearl said, when another yawn took her by surprise. The two older hobbits chuckled.

 'I will pass your regrets on to the Brandybucks,' Ferumbras said. 'I am sure they will understand.' He inclined his head to both ladies and took his leave.

 ‘Come, child,’ the matron said, taking Pearl’s arm to draw her into a pleasant sitting room with half a dozen doors opening onto it. ‘I’m in the far-left room,’ she said, ‘and you’ll be in the third from the left. I do hope you find all is to your satisfaction.’ She picked up a candle from the table and led Pearl to the third doorway.  The candle cast shadowy light upon a comfortable little room with bed—one bed, barely large enough for one hobbit! — and a dressing table with mirror, stand with pitcher and washbowl, and clothes-press. There were also pegs along one wall for hanging garments.

A lump came to Pearl’s throat when she saw her mother’s piece-work coverlet spread upon the bed. Her own comb and brush were laid out on the dressing table and several frocks she’d never seen before hung from pegs. ‘You’ll find your things nicely put away,’ Mrs Sandytoes said briskly. ‘Just as nice as you had them in the Bucklanders’ suite,’ she said. ‘I hope you don’t mind, but I thought you’d hardly like to be removing from one room to another after a full day attending Herself.’

 ‘Thank you,’ Pearl murmured, ‘but...’

 ‘Yes, miss?’ the matron said.

 ‘Those dresses,’ Pearl said.

 ‘Ah, yes, hardly suitable, being made-over as they were, but you’ll have new-made ones just as soon as can be,’ Mrs Sandytoes said reassuringly.

 ‘But,’ Pearl said. She wasn’t sure how to frame her objection. Would it be insulting to say there were too many? On the farm she’d had three dresses, her “best” for special occasions, her work-a-day dress, and last year’s faded and well-worn work-a-day dress, to be worn on washdays. She blinked. There must be five dresses hanging there, in addition to the one she wore at present.

 ‘Yes, yes, I’m sorry,’ Mrs Sandytoes said. ‘It’s a paltry enough selection, but you’ve enough there to give you some variety. Mind you don’t wear the same dress two days in a row. The Mistress likes her attendants to be decorative as well as useful, and she doesn’t care to have the same view day in and day out.’

Pearl nodded. Folk here at the Smials must change their dresses the way Pearl changed aprons back home. Come to think of it, the only aprons she’d seen here in the Smials were on those serving food or performing other manual tasks. Pearl’s duties didn’t call for aprons. Those she’d brought must be packed away with her dresses.

 ‘Well, I’m sure you’re tired,’ Mrs Sandytoes said. ‘Chamber pot’s under the bed if you need it. Just blow out the candle when you’re ready for bed, and leave your door ajar when you retire. There’ll be a watch-lamp burning in the sitting room, of course, but you won’t need one in your room. Waste of good oil,’ she added, placing the candle on the dressing table.

 ‘Thank you,’ Pearl said.

 ‘Will you be needing anything else, miss?’ Mrs Sandytoes said. ‘I’ll just get to my mending whilst you settle in. The rest of the girls will be in later, when their chores are finished. You’ll meet them in the morning, I’m sure.’

 ‘Rest of the girls?’ Pearl echoed.

 ‘Of course! We do things proper here at the Smials,’ Mrs Sandytoes said. ‘Good night, now.’ She smiled, nodded, and closed the door, leaving Pearl alone in the candle-lit room.

Pearl remembered her aunt’s instruction on life in the great holes. As an unmarried lass away from her family, she’d be one of a group of chicks under the protection of a mother hen. Despite the homesick feeling that haunted her, she smiled at the thought. Mrs Sandytoes certainly reminded her of the speckled hen back home. Slowly she undressed, hanging her frock on an empty peg, pouring water from pitcher into basin, washing herself with the sweet-smelling soap and drying on the soft towel hanging by the washstand. She found her nightdress in the clothes-press and slipped into it. Sitting down at the dressing table, she brushed her hair. When finished, she opened the door a hand-span, blew out the candle, and slipped into bed.

She was asleep before she could weep more than a tear or two, missing home, and did not even hear the other girls come in.