Chapter Forty Eight - Hearts in Despair

Pippin felt his consciousness rise to the surface of the living world as he felt someone’s warm breath upon his face. He winced in protest, then tried to turn his tired body over. Next, he felt a wee palm against his face. “Just five more minutes,” he groaned.

The real eye-opener came when he felt the owner of the wee palm crawl up against his shoulder, facing the “entryway” of his bed. The attempt to crawl over him was half-hearted, thought Pippin, however, his parental instincts kicked in. His eyes shot open, then shifting his position, he took hold of the young child, sitting her back into the safe recess of his bed. In a firm, but gentle voice, Pippin reprimanded his daughter, “No, Rosebud. You mustn’t leave this bed without papa’s help--understand?” Unfazed, Rosebud sat there sucking her thumb, blinking at him with her green saucers. “Of course you don’t understand me,” Pippin muttered to himself. “You’re only a baby.”

“What time is it?” Pippin sat up, straining his eyes to see the clock on the wall in the dim candle light of his room. “Nearly eight o’clock,” he said with a yawn. Pulling Rosebud into his arms Pippin got up, padding over to the bureau to turn up the lantern. “How long have I been asleep?” he wondered aloud, then looked at Rosebud, “and just how long have you been awake?” He felt her forehead. Still warm, he thought. Carrying his daughter, Pippin meandered out to the sitting room, which was dark, the drapes pulled shut. “Where is everybody?”

Feeling a bit dizzy, Pippin quickly sat down in a chair, holding Rosebud snug in his arms. He sighed to himself, “I feel like I’ve just fallen off a wagon.” Pippin’s head felt heavy, his throat burned, and he felt hot. He’d experienced these sensations many times in years past. He laughed to himself, “and I accused Merry of being sick!”

“You and I are both sick, Muffin. It’s a wonder they don’t quarantine us in here.” He gazed about his empty apartment. “Let’s say we go rescue Uncle Me-mi out of his self-imposed lock-hole.”

“Me-mi,” repeated Rosebud, her congestion bubbling in her throat as she spoke, then coughed for a spell. Pippin waited on pins and needles for his wee lass to stop coughing.

“My sweet Muffin,” said Pippin, comforting her when she finally drew clear breath. She used to cry after such spells, but Pippin noticed increasingly that she now merely laid her head down afterwards. He wiped Rosebud’s eyes, nose and around her mouth then wrapped her in her favorite blanket. “We’re going to get Uncle Me-mi.”

As Pippin approached Merry’s old bedroom, he thought he could detect a song resonating just behind the door, then it all but disappeared as the singer went deeper into the room. Grinning, Pippin knocked. The song ended abruptly.

“Hullo,” said Merry, opening the door. The Brandybuck was still dressed in his breeches with braces relaxed at his side and shirt untucked. The nightshirt Merimas lent his cousin remained slung over the back of the chair, being too small to wear. Merry gasped with lively enthusiasm, “Rosebud!” Finger in her mouth, Rosebud responded with her own smile. Then Merry turned to Pippin, “How is she doing? Is she faring better now?”

Pippin spied his dear cousin’s hands dithering at his side while he spoke. He knew they were itching to hold Rosebud. “No, but here,” said Pippin, shifting the baby in his arms as he offered her to Merry. “You can hold her for a bit. She missed you.”

Merry kissed the smiling baby, “My beautiful niece missed me?”

“Yes. I don’t understand why, though,” Pippin answered with a grin. He waited for his cousin to finish hugging and cuddling his niece. Pippin added, “She is still sick…and…so am I.”

Merry glanced up at Pippin, “You’re sick, too? How do you know?”

“Trust me, I know,” answered Pippin.

“Let me see,” said Merry, reaching out with one arm to test Pippin’s forehead. Merry slowly took his arm back, eyes filled with concern, “How do you feel right now?”

“Like I want to go back to bed,” Pippin replied wearily leaning against the doorjamb, “but I can’t -- not without someone to watch over Rosebud should I fall asleep. She’s tried to crawl over me once already. You’re the first person I thought to search for.”

Pippin’s kind remark wasn’t lost on his closest friend. Merry put his free arm around Pippin’s shoulder, drawing the lad into the warmth of the room. “Come in out of the draft, dear cousin,” he said. “Everyone else is probably eating breakfast in the dining room,” he said, guiding Pippin to sit down in one of the chairs, then set Rosebud in his lap. “Let me gather a few items then we can be on our way back to your apartment.”

“Breakfast? You mean it’s not eight o’clock in the evening?”

Merry laughed, smoothing out his bed linen, “No, silly, it’s morning.” Then he looked at Pippin strangely, “You actually thought it was evening?”

“Yesterday evening apparently,” said Pippin. “I didn’t realize I had slept for so long. No one was in the apartment when I woke up.”

“I should have been there,” said Merry, without so much as looking up.

“You couldn’t help it, Merry. Merimas and I thought you were sick. Which reminds me -- you don’t sound like you’re sick anymore,” Pippin observed.

Merry smiled regretfully as he tucked in his shirt. “I knew from the first that I wasn’t,” he said, adjusting his braces. “You know as well as I that I’ve had sneezing fits since I was a child. However,” Merry paused, looking at Pippin, “I did want to give you peace of mind--for Rosebud’s sake.”

“Thank you for the trouble you took,” said Pippin.

“Was no trouble at all, Pip,” Merry replied kindly. Picking up the last of his things, he scanned the room one last time, “Well, lets get you two back to your apartment and into bed.”

Having returned to Pippin’s apartment, Merry began putting his things away in his room when he heard the baby crying. He walked through the sitting room to his cousin’s bedroom. “Do you need any help with Rosebud?” he asked, standing in the doorway. When Merry saw Pippin, he was sitting upon the bed holding Rosebud, his face gaping in shock. “What’s wrong, Pip?” asked Merry. He crossed the distance between him and his cousin, kneeling at Pippin’s feet. “What is it?” he asked again.

Pippin choked back a cry, “I tried to lay Rosebud down to change her, but her face went white as a sheet--no sound came from her mouth. A few moments later, her face went red as if she couldn’t breathe. I instantly picked her up…and then she gasped for air. I’ll never forget the sound of it as long as I live.”

Merry swallowed hard, “I’m going to find Merimas.”

* * *

“Pippin.”

Pippin’s eyes snapped open. He looked around for the person who called his name. Pippin was a little disoriented, but observing the familiar portraits of Rosebud hanging on the wall, he understood that he was lying on the couch in his own sitting room. He could hear soft whispers of other voices all about him.

After Merimas arrived, Pippin had been waiting on the couch for the healer to finish examining Rosebud. After a while, his head and eyelids grew heavy; he didn’t mean to fall asleep.

“Pippin, I’m sorry to awaken you,” whispered the voice, “however, I must speak with you.”

The tween looked up, seeing it was Merimas. Pippin’s head felt hot, stuffy, and not quite attached to the rest of his body. Feeling a chill, he reached for a the lap quilt that was lying on the back of the couch. “I --” Pippin’s hand immediately went to his throat. It felt dry and scratchy. “I didn’t mean to fall asleep,” he whispered hoarsely. “How’s Rosebud?”

“She’s resting at the moment,” said Merimas.

“Which medicine did you try first?” asked Pippin, referring to the ingredients they had purchased the day before at the market. “The ointment or the tea?”

“She um…,” he began, “she vomited the tea.”

Pippin felt his head clouding over. He leaned back against the couch, “So you’re going to try the ointment now?”

Merimas nodded. “Yes, I’m going to attempt that path next, but Pippin,” he paused, “if this doesn’t work, I don’t…I don’t know what else…” Merimas took in a calming breath. “She’s a very sick little baby,” he ended.

“Just how sick?” Pippin demanded. His anxiety began to rise.

“More than I first anticipated.”

Pippin quickly threw off the quilt and stood up. Then the room began to spin; he felt Merimas catch him. “Easy, Pip. You’re not exactly hale yourself.”

“My daughter comes first,” said Pippin through clenched teeth. He was trembling as Merimas set him back down on the couch. Pippin shivered as he continued his query. “I thought you said you could help her!”

“I said we could try a few remedies,” Merimas stated.

Pippin stood up again, more carefully this time. “Where’s Donnabelle?” he shouted to anyone listening within the room.

Merimas offered, “If you want someone else--”

The tween turned on him, “What I want is for someone to heal my daughter!”

“That’s what I’m trying to do--”

Ignoring Merimas, Pippin yelled again, “Somebody find Donnabelle!” He then overheard his sister Pimpernel give a young servant orders to fetch the Smials’ healer. Pippin yelled after the lad, “Tell her that the Thain’s son requires her presence at once!”

Merimas understood his brother-in-law’s anger to be that of a desperate father, yet Pippin’s reaction bothered him nonetheless. “I understand,” he said softly, then sat down in one of the chairs.

“Peregrin Took!” Eglantine reproached her son. She started to speak further then stopped short when she felt her husband touch her arm. Paladin leaned in, whispering into her ear, “Let him be, love--he’s upset. I’ll talk to Merimas.”

Paladin was unruffled by his son’s outburst. “Sit down, Pippin,” he said calmly.

“I will not,” Pippin shot back to his father. “I stood by while my wife died a year ago. I will not stand idly by and watch my daughter perish as well!”

“You may not have a choice in the matter,” Paladin spoke softly but firmly to the tween. He recalled the many times when Pippin was an ill child. For all the times that he indeed was hopeful, Paladin understood the pendulum could have swung in the other direction. “Donnabelle may not be able to do any more than what Merimas has already done. What will you do then? She has two young apprentices, other than that, the next healer is in Tuckborough.”

“I’ll search through the Westfarthing--the whole Shire if need be,” Pippin spat back.

“Pippin,” Paladin sat wearily on the couch, indicating for his son to sit next to him. Pippin hesitated, but he sat down next to his father. Paladin re-wrapped the quilt around Pippin’s trembling shoulders, then continued. “The healers can only do what they have been trained to do. Help them if you must, but do not hinder them. If your mother and I did not trust the healers to do their best when you were a babe, then you would not be alive today. You must trust them.”

Physically and emotionally spent, Pippin burst into miserable tears. “She’s my daughter, papa,” he cried softly, wiping the tears from his eyes. “She’s my little lass--my only child. I love her…it tears at me to see her suffering like this.”

“I know, son,” Paladin spoke tenderly, putting his arm around the tween. “And you’re still my laddie.” The elder hobbit reached into the pocket of his waistcoat, giving Pippin a handkerchief. “Merimas,” Paladin spoke to his son-in-law, “when Donnabelle arrives, please give her a full report of your examination of Rosebud. I believe it is in my granddaughter’s best interest if you both work together to heal her. Will you do this for me?”

Merimas looked up, silently nodding.

“Very good,” answered Paladin. “The next order of business is for you, Pippin--to look in on your daughter then come back here and lie down. That is, unless you are a healer--and I don’t remember you accepting an apprenticeship with anyone. There is nothing for you to do except to be near Rosebud for when she wants her papa. Are we agreed?” Pippin sniffed, wiped away more tears then nodded.

* * *

Sick, tired, and dragging his feet, Pippin went into his bedroom. He stood in the doorway, leaning and resting his head against the jamb. He watched as Merry paced the room with Rosebud in his arms. She was awake, though sluggish, sucking her thumb while her favorite uncle rubbed her back, humming the same song to her that he had been singing to himself earlier in his old room. When Merry turned around, he saw Pippin, then stopped singing. He went red from head to toe.

“Why did you stop?” asked Pippin wearily. “Rosebud likes for us to sing to her, and that is her favorite song -- the lullaby from the music box you gave her at Yule.”

“I know, but…well,” Merry stammered. “If you must know--I sometimes fancy that she’s my daughter. I was doing that when you walked into the room.”

Pippin was tired, yet smiled warmly at his friend. “That’s nothing to be embarrassed about, cousin.”

“It isn’t something that I go round confessing at every turn,” Merry replied, then gave Pippin a faint, but relieved smile in return. Merry continued, “Someday, when Stella and I have children…I should want a daughter like Rosebud. She’s a bright and beautiful lass, Pip.”

Pippin walked fully into his room to stand next to Merry. He gently combed his daughter’s curls then kissed her forehead. Rosebud instantly held forth her arms towards Pippin, uttering “baba,” then coughed a bit. Pippin took the child into his arms, cradling Rosebud as he settled himself in the rocking chair. The baby quietly dozed while Pippin rocked her, continuing the lullaby where Merry had left off.

Taking an extra blanket from inside Pippin’s wardrobe, Merry laid it across the tween’s lap. “I’ll be just outside the door if you need anything,” he whispered, then tenderly kissed the top of Pippin’s curls before he left.

Merry stood Just out of the doorway, listening to snips of Pippin softly singing the lullaby to Rosebud. He gazed about the sitting room, watching his cousin Merimas speak in whispers to Donnabelle; probably discussing which course of action to take next with the baby. His Uncle Paladin, Aunt Tina, and Pimpernel talked among themselves, no doubt in concern over Rosebud and her young father.

Forgotten for the moment, Merry took in a deep breath to calm the growing fear within. Only two weeks ago, Rosebud babbled up a storm and wriggle in his arms when he minded her, however, Just minutes ago, she barely moved or fussed the entire time that he held her. Apparently, it had been a gradual process. Rosebud had been ill many times, yet quickly recovered after a few days. She had never been this ill before, though, and for so long. Would this child be as lucky as her father when he was an infant? The growing fear began to spread throughout his being--the same fear that used to ravage him when Pippin was a small lad in bed with a devastating illness.

Unnoticed by the others, Merry crept towards the empty corner near the window that held little light from the main part of the sitting room. The young hobbit stood alone in the shadows, partially hidden by the drapes as despair overwhelmed him. Leaning against the wall, Merry’s knees weakened under the weight of cares upon his shoulders, tears falling as he himself slipped down on his haunches in the nook of the corner…where he quietly wept.

TBC