This was written for Auntiemeesh, who wanted Frodo and Sam talking about the Conspiracy... 

THE HEART OF THE CONSPIRACY

“Sam?”

“Yes, Mr. Frodo?” They stood at the window of Tom Bombadil’s house, and watched the rain together as it came down upon Goldberry’s garden.

“Why?”

“Why what, Mr. Frodo?” although Sam had more than a good idea of what he meant.

“Why did you agree to spy on me? I wouldn’t have thought it of you, you know.” Frodo’s voice was pensive, and a little disappointed.

“Well, you know, Mr. Frodo, when Mr. Merry asked me to help him, we didn’t know nothing about the Ring. But he was mortal afraid you’d go off and leave him, to find Mr. Bilbo.”

Frodo looked a bit startled. “That was in my mind a good deal last year, before the news of the Ring drove it out. And he would have been quite right--I would never have taken him or Pippin on a jaunt like that. I should not have agreed to take them now.” But with those Black Riders on the prowl, it seemed they might not have been safe even had they remained.

“Well, you know what that Elf, Mr. Gildor said, ‘take them as was willing’. I’m glad you did. And not just for you, but for them. Isn’t a one of us could have borne the Shire without you in it, sir.”

“Oh, Sam!”

But he tried, and failed, to imagine his own life in the Shire without the presence of these three dearest of friends.

Perhaps it had been for the best.