Chapter 1. Making Preparations

April the 28th, S.R. 1463

Everard Took straightened from the plans he perused to wipe away the perspiration trickling down the side of his face.

‘Hot enough for you?’ the hobbit in charge of the new diggings in Tookbank said, applying his own kerchief.

‘If it is this hot in April, what’ll August be like?’ Everard answered, putting his handkerchief back in his pocket and taking a swig of lukewarm water from the bottle hanging from his belt.

‘Ah, this is unusually warm weather,’ the forehobbit, Lem Sandybank said. ‘Likely it’ll cool down in a week or two.’

‘Well, dry is good for digging,’ Everard said. ‘We might just get a foothold in these new smials before the spring rains shut us down again. We’ll be that much further when summer comes, fine dry digging weather that ought to be.’

‘Will ye be going back to Tuckborough this day?’ Lem asked.

‘Nay, I’ll stay over here a day or two at least,’ Everard said. ‘If we make enough progress, you can keep on digging even if the rains do start up again.’ He cast an eye at the cloudless sky and shook his head. ‘Much as I love digging, I do hope we’re not in for another drought this year.’

‘Not like the one a few years back,’ Lem agreed. ‘I thought the Shire would blow away in a cloud of dust.’

‘You weren’t the only one,’ Everard said. ‘Well we’d better get to work while we can; three days from now there won’t be work going on anywhere in Tookland, what with the wedding and all.’

‘Thain’s oldest son,’ Lem said, putting his own water bottle back on his belt after a gulp. ‘Quite the grand celebration. Is all of Tookland going to be there?’

‘Undoubtedly,’ Everard replied, ‘along with all of Hobbiton and Bywater as well, and most of Buckland, and everyone from every Farthing who knows the Mayor or the Thain, and a goodly portion of the Westmarch, I don’t wonder. It’ll be bigger than Bilbo’s birthday ever was.’

***

‘Stand still, Goldi!’ Rose scolded, and Goldilocks did her best to comply. It seemed she’d been perched atop this stool for an hour while her mother and sisters worked to pin the hem of her wedding dress.

Rose stepped back to eye the effect. ‘It’s still uneven on that side,’ she said, pointing to the left, and Daisy moved to that side.

‘Too low, or too high?’ she said through the pins protruding from her mouth.

‘Too high,’ Rose said, squinting at the aggravating hemline with a critical eye. The heat didn’t make things any easier, and there was still the sewing to do after the pinning was done, and the wedding only three days away!

She sighed as a breeze stirred the curtains by the open window, bringing with it snatches of song from those working to erect pavilions on the party field below Bag End. Much of the celebration would take place in the open air, of course, weather permitting, but they still needed to provide for shelter from rain, or shade from sun, especially if it continued unusually warm.

‘There, how is it now?’ Daisy asked.

Rose looked hard then walked a compass about Goldi’s stool. ‘That’ll do,’ she said at last, and all three lasses, Goldi, Daisy, and Primrose breathed sighs of relief. ‘Right, then, Goldi, take it off, carefully, mind, and we’ll start stitching on the hem.’

Goldi wobbled as she stepped down, and Daisy nearly swallowed her pins as she caught her sister. ‘Steady, now,’ she said sharply. Rose moved quickly to Goldi’s other side.

‘What’s the matter?’ she asked, helping Daisy ease Goldilocks down until she was seated on the stool.

‘I am well,’ Goldi said, ‘it is just this heat... and standing for so long. I am well, really I am, Mum. A glass of water would set me aright.’

‘We could all do with a glass,’ Rose said, but before she could raise her voice to call Ruby, her youngest daughter appeared in the doorway with a tray.

‘Cold water, fresh from the spring,’ Ruby said with a smile. ‘I figured you might need some by now.’

‘Thank you, lass, that was very thoughtful,’ Rose said, handing the first glass to Goldilocks and taking another for herself. They all sipped the icy water in silence, listening to the singing and laughter on the field below.

‘Everything is ready for Ellie and Rosie-lass and their families, Mum,’ Ruby said, when all had replaced their glasses on the tray and Daisy and Primrose were helping Goldilocks out of her wedding dress.

‘Everything is happening so quickly,’ Goldi said, sounding breathless. ‘After all those years of waiting, that seemed to crawl by... and now,’ she ticked off on her fingers, ‘on the morrow Rosie and Ellie arrive, and the day after that the Bucklanders—they’ll be sleeping by the Water, is that right? -–and the day after that...’ her head spun just to think of it.

‘The wedding!’ her sisters chorused.

Her mother gave her a hug. ‘To think that in three days, you’ll remove to the Great Smials,’ Rose said tearfully. ‘How could I ever have complained of children underfoot? All of a sudden they’re grown and gone...’

‘I’m not gone yet, Mum, not hardly,’ Ruby laughed, ‘and not likely for another year or ten.’

‘Nor I,’ Primrose said. ‘Really, Mum, with a holeful of tweens, you’ve much to complain about. Sometimes Bag End hardly seems to contain us all.’

Daisy didn’t speak. When she turned thirty, her parents had allowed she was old enough to walk out with any hobbit of her fancy that came to call, providing, of course, that he met with their approval. Not a few had paid her their attentions, and there was a certain dark-haired, cheerful young farmer who brought a smile of recollection to her face at this moment.

‘At least it is only fifteen miles or so,’ Goldi said. ‘Why, the Great Smials is a stone’s throw compared to Undertowers. You can drive over whenever you like and arrive in time for tea.’

‘No doubt I will do just that, whenever the hustle and bustle of seven tweens becomes too much for me,’ Rose said dryly. ‘I only hope there’ll be a Bag End to come home to.’ Her daughters’ laughter washed around her, and she basked in the warmth of their joy.

***

‘I cannot believe it! Little Farry getting married!’ Meriadoc, Master of Buckland mused aloud.

‘Not so little anymore,’ Berilac, his steward replied with a laugh. ‘He’s taller than I am!’

‘And before you know it, Pip will be a grandfather,’ Merry added.

‘I cannot imagine it,’ Berilac said with a shake of his head.

‘Nor can I,’ Merry said, ‘but then, my own little ones are not so little anymore.’ He gazed out the window on the bright day and blessed the thick walls that kept out the heat. ‘Is today as hot as yesterday was?’

‘Perhaps a little warmer, as a matter of fact,’ Berilac said.

‘Is it another drought, do you think?’ Merry asked soberly.

‘Too early to tell,’ the steward answered. ‘We can hope for rain. At least the crops have a good start already, with all the rains we had earlier in the year.’

‘Still, April should be a rainy month,’ Merry said uneasily. ‘This kind of heat, this early in the year...’

‘It is teatime!’ caroled his wife, entering with a tray. ‘No more worries for the day.’

‘You’re just in time, Estella,’ Berilac said, rising out of respect for the Mistress of Buckland. ‘Your husband was working up a fine suit of worries just now.’

‘I wasn’t,’ Merry defended himself. ‘I was just commenting on the weather.’

‘Worrying about it, I warrant,’ Estella said, crossing to drop a kiss on top of his head. ‘I swear, if gold began to fall from the sky, you’d worry.’

‘Indeed I would,’ Merry said stoutly. ‘Such a thing would be completely unnatural.’

‘Well, no more worries this day, you promised me you’d only worry up until teatime,’ Estella said briskly, pouring a cup and fixing it to her husband’s taste.

Merry threw up his hands in surrender. ‘No more worry!’ he promised. With his next breath, he asked, ‘Is everything ready for the journey on the morrow?’ Berilac snorted and Merry defended himself. ‘It’s an honest question! I am not worried!’

‘Everything is ready, beloved,’ Estella said. ‘We could leave today, as a matter of fact, if we had a mind to.’

‘I am sure the Gamgees are up to their ears in preparations already,’ Merry said. ‘Let us be faithful to our word and arrive the day after tomorrow, as planned.’

‘You are as faithful as the day is long in the summertime,’ Estella murmured, perching on the arm of his chair and ruffling his hair with her fingertips.

Berilac picked up his walking stick from the desk, saying, ‘My own family awaits me.’

‘Your children are not taking tea in the nursery this day?’ Merry asked.

‘No, we are to picnic by the River,’ Berilac answered as he slowly made his way to the door with the aid of the stick. ‘We are taking advantage of the fine weather while it lasts. Undoubtedly the rains will return again in a week, perhaps less.’

‘Undoubtedly,’ Merry said, one arm stealing around his wife while he offered her a sip from his teacup. ‘Have a lovely picnic.’

‘You too,’ Berilac said with a grin, and firmly shut the door of the Master’s study behind him.

***

Ferdibrand Took sat so still at his desk that Pippin and Reginard stared, for Ferdi was almost never still. ‘Ferdi, is something amiss?’ the Thain asked.

‘No... no,’ the chancellor replied absently. ‘All is well, I think,’ but his tone was uncertain.

‘Is it your head again?’ Regi asked quietly.

‘My head? Nonsense!’ Ferdi snapped. ‘My head is fine!’ He was lying, of course, they could see it in the lines of pain around his eyes, but naturally they were too polite to say so. The chancellor, blinded in an encounter with ruffians more than a decade earlier, had been plagued by head pains of late, and not just during changes in weather as had been usual for him for years, but nearly every day now, whether fine or stormy.

‘What is it, then?’ Pippin said.

‘You didn’t feel it?’ Ferdi asked.

‘What?’ Pippin replied.

Ferdi shook his head. ‘Just a moment of unsteadiness, as if my chair were moving ever so slightly,’ he answered. ‘A mere fancy, brought on by the ale no doubt.’ They’d drunk a toast to the upcoming nuptials with a commission of merchants from Tuckborough a little earlier.

‘No doubt,’ Pippin answered mildly, exchanging a glance with Reginard. This had gone on for long enough. No matter how Ferdibrand felt about healers, the Thain was going to set Healer Mardibold on his chancellor on the morrow. Once Mardi got his teeth into a problem, he wouldn’t let go, no matter how impatient his patients might wax.

‘And how are preparations for the wedding coming?’ Ferdi said, changing the subject. ‘Has Farry shown any signs of running off, or breaking under the strain?’

‘No, but he did ask if we could have the wedding today and get it over with,’ Pippin said. The others chuckled.

‘How well I remember,’ Ferdi said and Reginard nodded agreement.

‘That’s the last paper for today,’ Pippin said, affixing his signature with a flourish, dripping wax onto the document and sealing it with his ring. ‘And we’re in good time for tea.’

‘Good,’ Ferdi said, rising from his desk. ‘It has been a long day.’ He felt his way around the desk, started for the doorway, but misjudged his course and missed for the first time in years. Pippin started up from his desk but Regi waved him back to his seat, though he himself was frowning with concern.

‘Did someone move the door?’ Ferdi asked in annoyance, feeling to one side and then the other.

‘Further to your right,’ Regi said quietly. ‘Would you like an escort?’

‘Whatever would I want an escort for?’ Ferdi said irritably. ‘Honestly, Reginard, you act as if I cannot find my way out of a... a...’ He put a hand to his head, at a loss for words.

‘Ferdi,’ Pippin said, starting up again, but Ferdi put his hand out to forestall him.

‘I am well, cousin,’ he said, finality in his tone. ‘Nothing that a spot of tea won’t fix.’

Pippin rather doubted that, but he held his peace as Ferdi found the door and exited the study.