(This is for Gryffinjack, who asked me for a "gap-filler for a gap-filler", in my story "A Conspiracy of Hobbits".  She wanted to know what Merry would have told Pippin, after they came to Bag End, and found Frodo in a deep depression over having to leave Bag End with the Sackville-Bagginses.)

Conspiratorial Interlude

Merry and Pippin went inside to find their cousin.

When the two looked into the study from the doorway, they saw complete disarray. Papers and books were piled on every surface; but Frodo was sitting in the middle of the floor, his face as bleak as winter.

Pippin was frightened. He had never seen Frodo look like that before.

Merry had; but not since he was seven years old. Would what worked

then work now?

“Pip, go on back out, and see if Sam can find something for you to do,” he whispered.*

xxxxx

Pippin stepped outside Bag End’s front door and pulled it closed behind him. Taking a deep breath, he tried to calm himself. He had *never* seen such a look on Frodo’s face before. He stood there, stricken and sick at heart. If he had Lotho Sackville-Baggins there in front of him at that moment, he did not think he would be able to answer for what he would do to him.

“Mr. Pippin?”

Pippin gave a start, and glanced down to his right, where Sam knelt in the flower bed. “Sam? Merry said to ask you if I could help you with something?” The tweenager’s voice was forlorn.

Sam’s father would no doubt have sent Pippin off saying that it wouldn’t be proper for him to be helping in the garden, but Sam looked at the lad’s confused face, and nodded. He handed Pippin a pair of snippers. “Aye, Mr. Pippin. Them asters under the windows need dead-heading.”

Pippin took the snippers gratefully, and began clipping off the spent blooms. The two worked quietly for a while; Pippin was uncharacteristically silent, speaking only enough to ask Sam what to do next. And Sam was even more worried about his master than he had been, to see the stricken look on the Took lad’s face. His own face grew stormy as he mentally began to apply some of his Gaffer’s most choice hard words to Lotho Sackville-Baggins.

They were preparing to lay down a barrow-load of mulch when the door opened and Merry stepped out. Sam and Pippin turned sharply, and looked hopefully over at him.

Merry bit his lower lip, and then answered their unspoken questions. “I persuaded him to have a bit of a lie-down. Sam, will you come in and take tea with Pippin and me? We need to have a talk about the Sackville-Bagginses.

Sam nodded. He and Pippin left the spades in the barrow, and followed Merry into the kitchen.

After scrubbing up, Pippin put the kettle on, while Merry and Sam cut some sandwiches, and then they sat down to the kitchen table for a council of war. “For,” said Merry, “as far as I am concerned, that’s what it is. They’ve no right to keep coming round and giving Frodo grief.”

The three of them talked a bit, and then finally Merry said, “So, then, it’s agreed. Sam, the next time those pestiferous S.-B.s show up, you fetch *me* instead of Frodo, and I shall sort them out.”

“Aye, Mr. Merry.” Sam nodded. Perhaps that wasn’t proper, but he was fed up with them coming round and bothering Mr. Frodo. Bad enough they were getting Bag End anyway, in a few days. No need at all of them pestering his master this way. He stood up. “Well, Mr. Merry, Mr. Pippin--I need to be getting myself back down to Number Three. Marigold’s making a shepherd’s pie for our supper tonight.”

“Of course, Sam!” replied Merry. “We’ll see you tomorrow.” Merry averted his eyes. He did not want Sam reading too much into his statement. He had agreed not to pump Sam for any more information, and he did not want the gardener to think he was trying to do that, even by implication. And he didn’t want to raise any questions from Pippin either. He had wondered once or twice if Pippin didn’t suspect something, but he put it down to his own nerves. He *hated* keeping secrets from Pippin. But he couldn’t risk dragging his young cousin into the same danger.

After Sam left the two of them took out their pipes, for a smoke before they did the washing up. They still were not talking much.

Finally, Pippin glanced over at his older cousin. “Merry?”

“Yes, Pip?”

“*Is* Frodo going to be all right?” Tears sprang to the green eyes. “I’ve never seen a look like that on Frodo’s face before. It was like his whole world had ended.”

“I think it has, Pip,” said Merry softly. “I’ve seen that look on his face before, though not for a long time. I guess the last time was when he came to visit in Buckland, that first fall after he had moved here.” Merry blew out a stream of smoke, and looked thoughtful.

“You never knew Frodo before he came to live at Bag End,” he continued.

Pippin twitched a rueful smile. “Well, I can scarcely help not having been born yet,” he said, with a feeble attempt at lightness.

Merry nodded, his own tiny smile acknowledging Pippin’s effort. “That’s true. The thing is, Pippin, Frodo could fall into a black melancholy then. He sorely missed his parents--he still does, as a matter of fact--and then, well, he was still grieving. Everywhere in Buckland there were reminders to him of them. One day that fall, just before he had to leave and return to Bilbo, we went for a little stroll. We were just enjoying ourselves, and not paying much attention to where we were. We came out of a copse of trees--you know the one, about a half mile south of the Ferry, near a sharp bend in the River--”

Pippin nodded.

“Well, Frodo took one look at where we were, and he made this little noise like someone had struck him. And his face looked just like it did this afternoon.”

“Why, Merry?”

“I didn’t know why then, just that it had something to do with the River and that place, though I knew enough to guess it had something to do with his parents’ drowning. I didn’t find out, actually until I had come of age and was supervising the work on the Ferry that spring. That was the spot where they had raised Primula’s and Drogo’s bodies from the water, and Frodo had seen it happen.”

“Oh.” Pippin’s voice was soft and filled with sorrow, thinking of how dreadful such a thing must have been for poor Frodo.

“But I think he mostly managed to get away from the dreadful memories once he came here to Bag End, and once he had Bilbo. Bilbo really seemed to understand Frodo, in ways I don’t think my parents could, though they love him very much.” Now there was a hint of tears in Merry’s own eyes. He stopped talking for a moment.

Pippin swallowed, and put a sympathetic hand on Merry’s arm. This was something that Pippin knew about Merry--Frodo’s leaving Buckland had been one of the most painful events of his cousin’s childhood.

Merry couldn’t help but think--he was about to put Pippin through a far more painful separation--he and Frodo both would be leaving. Leaving without even a proper farewell.

“And now Frodo has to leave Bag End,” said Pippin.

“That’s right,” replied Merry, “not only leave it” (maybe forever, he thought) “but he’s leaving it in the hands of the very hobbits that he *knows* Bilbo would never have wanted to have it. He feels as though he is betraying Bilbo and Bag End,” (and us, he thought, by leaving us behind) “and he knows, too, that they will make all sorts of unwelcome changes, just for the sake of spiting him.”

“Lobelia and Lotho.” Pippin’s voice was very flat. Those two were probably the only hobbits in the Shire that Pippin had no use for.

“Yes, and Lotho knows it, and he’s just twisting the knife in the wound with all these petty little calls on Frodo to ‘check on his property’.” Merry’s face looked grim. “But I won’t have it. He doesn’t own Bag End until the day the contract calls for him to take possession, and he has no business coming over here all the time and pestering Frodo!”

Pippin nodded. “I’m with you all the way, cousin!” How he wished that he could tell Merry that he meant that for more than just stopping the S.-B.s from bothering Frodo: that he meant to be in the party that left the Shire; that he knew all about that evil Ring and would be coming along on the journey to take it to Rivendell.

But it was too soon to let Merry know that he knew.

Merry studied Pippin’s determined face. His younger cousin looked determined, and older than his years. For a moment, Merry was tempted to confide in him, to let him know this secret that had been weighing on his heart since spring. But no, he couldn’t. He couldn’t take the chance on Pippin following them into danger.

Instead, he gave a pat to the hand that still lay on his arm, and said briskly “Well, we should see to the washing up now. Frodo won’t thank us if we leave dirty dishes laying about.”

And Pippin blinked back his tears, and nodded. “You wash; I’ll dry.”

xxxxx

* From my story “A Conspiracy of Hobbits” Chapter 13