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When Winter Fell  by Lindelea


Chapter 5. Baa, Baa, Black Sheep

'It must be the hottest day of the year,' Sigismond said, wiping his sleeve across his face. Bilbo followed suit, though he had a perfectly presentable pocket-handkerchief tucked away. It was much more fun to follow his Tookish cousins' lead than to remember the manners his parents insisted on. (It didn't occur to him that his cousins had parents who insisted on manners, too, when they had their children in sight.)

'I thought yesterday was,' he answered. They had made a lovely, long visit to the Great Smials, nearly a month. It was a busy time for his father, and while he attended to business he was glad to leave his wife and son at the Great Smials, rather than lonely at home in Bag End. Bilbo welcomed the change; it was certainly a lively place to be, and instead of often being asked to mind his younger cousin Falco, quite spoilt and with a piercing whine when he didn't get his own way, whilst their mammas took tea and gossip, he could gad about with more interesting cousins. Tooks were scandalously adventurous, which certainly made them more diverting than the staid Bagginses.

The market was certainly a colourful and inviting place to be on this day, at the height of the harvest season. Round, ripe, red tomatoes, green and lush lettuces, long beans, and plump tubers rioted in their various baskets. Siggy grabbed up a carrot and crunched down on it, and at the outraged squawk of the stallholder tossed a ha'penny into the air. The farmwife missed it, and it fell ringing on the stones. Without thinking, Bilbo swooped to catch up the coin and pressed it into the farmwife's hand. 'Sorry!' he gasped, and mollified, she smiled at him. ("Lovely manners, those Bagginses have," as she told her husband later, over supper. "Proper little gentlehobbit, that Baggins laddie.")

Siggy had already turned away and was browsing a table of silver jewellery, of delicate manufacture. He picked up a bracelet of links intricately twined. 'Half a moment, 'Bo, old lad,' he said.

'Nice,' Bilbo said. 'Who's it for?' He smirked. 'Is there a sweetheart we haven't heard of yet? Cousin Laburnum, perhaps?'

Siggy gave a delicate shudder and proceeded to ignore Bilbo. 'How much?' he said to the silversmith.

'A sovereign'll do,' the smith replied. His face was very red from the heat; perhaps that explained the outrageous price. Or perhaps he was all too aware that two grandsons of the Thain stood before him. Or perhaps he suspected that Siggy had stopped merely to plague him, to finger his wares fit to need polishing, and then to go off with a laugh without purchasing anything.

'A sover--' Siggy squawked, dropping the wristlet as if it burned him. 'Why, I wouldn't think it worth half a crown, even!' As a matter of fact, he had half a silver sovereign in his pocket--not nearly so valuable as half a gold sovereign, but a goodly chunk of his pocket money.

'For you, young master,' the silversmith said, measuring the tween with a sceptical eye, 'I'd take half a crown, and call it highway robbery!'

'Are you saying I'm a ruffian?' Siggy said, frowning.

'No, for he can clearly see you're only half a ruffian,' Bilbo said, and turning to the silversmith, he added, 'Name a fair price. Fair, mind you! Money don’t grow on trees, not even up on the Hill above Hobbiton!'

With a little judicious dickering, Bilbo soon secured the bauble, saw it wrapped up, and slipped it into his pocket. 'Thank you, sir,' he said with a bow. 'It is a pleasure to do business with such a fine craftsman.'

'Any time, young master,' the smith said with a bow of his own. 'My pleasure.'

'So, who's the sweetheart? Have you been toying with the affections of my sisters, or some other unsuspecting maidens at the Great Smials? Has one of them captured your heart with a treacherous batting of the eyelashes?'

Completely ridiculous; at Bilbo's age he scarcely noticed the lasses, nor did Sigismond for that matter, being the same age, but that didn't mean they wouldn't joke about the possibility, and torment each other with hints that some sweet lass was casting longing looks in their direction, a fact that, if true, would have horrified them both.

'Indeed,' Bilbo said in the same vein.

'Who is it, pray tell!' Siggy said, clasping his hands together in a pleading manner and batting his own eyelashes, managing to look quite ridiculous.

'Wouldn't you like to know?' Bilbo said smugly.

'Not at all,' Sigismond said, taking another tack by turning away as if he'd lost all interest.

'It's his birthday next month; have you forgotten?' Flambard said from behind them. He was with Fortinbras, the two walking arm-in-arm for they were great friends. 'I'd imagine he bought that sweet little trinket as a "thank you" for his mother. Siggy, I saw you handling those wares. Don't you remember Grandfather's rule? If you have no intention of buying, then look with your eyes, not with your hands!'

'Who asked you to be my minder?' Sigismond said, his eyes flashing.

Flambard's response was interrupted by a song, sung on key in a loud and tuneful voice. The bustle of the market died somewhat in its advent.

Siggy swore under his breath and grabbed Bilbo's hand, yanking him into the shadow of one of the stalls. 'Come on, cousin! Don't look now but the ghost of Uncle Isengar is haunting the market square!'

Bilbo made a face and dove after Sigismond. He'd spend much of the month trying to avoid Isengar, and for the most part had succeeded. Especially with the weather so fair, he didn't want to feel his uncle's hand clapped upon his shoulder--he didn't want to be shut up in the dusty library and forced to read any more books! (He hadn't even read much more in his great-grandfather's diary, truth be told, for there was too much diversion to be had with his Tookish cousins--picnics and pranks, fun and frolics, walking parties and pony races and all the other delights of youth.) 'Who let him out?' he whispered in disgust.

The life of a sailor's the life for me!
Give me a deck on a rolling sea!
Mountains of waves rising o'er my head,
And they rock me to sleep in my hammocky bed!
O great Sea, O wide Sea, upon thy bosom lay me!
I  know ye'll not betray me, but carry me away--hee!
O vast Sea, my beau-ty! Forever I will love thee...

There were murmurs of "poor mad Took" all around them, and Bilbo's cheeks burned with embarrassment. He wanted nothing to do with this horrible relative who stalked through the corridors like a ghost and scandalised proper hobbits with songs of the... it was really too awful... the Sea!

Forever I will... Isengar sang, throwing his good arm out to the side for emphasis and knocking down a neat pile of cabbages, so that they rolled off the table and onto the stones. Siggy groaned beside Bilbo, and the tweens' eyes met to share a glance of complete mortification.

Isengar stared in astonishment at the cabbages rolling at his feet. 'Hoi, shipmates!' he shouted. 'Seems to be a gale blowing up out of the nor'eastern quarter! It's hailing cabbages!'

'Is it now?' Fortinbras said, digging in his pocket as he moved to intercept his uncle. 'Well then, we had better get in out of the weather, wouldn't you say, Uncle?' Coming up with a handful of coins, he pressed them into the hand of the sputtering farmer with a nod of tacit apology, and then he took Isen's elbow. 'Come, Uncle,' he said firmly. 'If we lean into the wind, and keep close together, we shan't be swept from the deck.'

At a swift glance from Fortinbras, Flambard stepped up to Isengar's other side. 'Yes, Uncle,' he said. 'Let us get in, out of the weather...'

'Batten down the hatches!' Isengar roared, and Bilbo winced at the scandalous sea-talk. In the Great Smials there was usually a bustle when Isengar got started in a crowd, and he'd be quickly hushed up and hustled out of the room.

'Turn her into the wind!' Fortinbras responded.

'Aye, lad, you have the right of it!' Isengar said with an approving nod. 'She won't founder in the waves, not with the Captain at the wheel!'

'Hurrah!' Flambard said, for want of anything better, and between them, Fortinbras and Flambard escorted their uncle from the marketplace, leading him firmly back towards the Great Smials, and not a moment too soon, so far as Bilbo and Sigismond were concerned.

An old man in grey--a Man, mind, for he was not one of the Shire-folk--who was sitting on his rolled-up cloak on the floor to put the table at a convenient height, turned away from the window of the Spotted Duck, having watched the entire scene with a great deal of interest, and not a little sorrow, and lifted his mug to signal for more of the fine ale to be found at that establishment. He'd have another mug, before he went to visit his friend, the Old Took, and allow the lads to bring Isengar safely back to the Great Smials before he made his appearance. He had only all too clear an idea of the scene poor Isengar would make, and it was better that it happen inside the Great Smials, than in the open square.





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