When the Dwarf Came A-Visiting ~Míriel

Chapter 16 ~When Enough Is Enough

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            I studied the pile of dirty handkerchiefs next to Bombur’s bed and shuddered.  How in the Shire was I going to be able to pick these up and take them in the kitchen to be washed?  I had already made soap water to wash them in, but I was not relishing the idea of bringing them into the kitchen.

            “Bibbin?  That you?”  Bombur said faintly.

            “Yes, it’s me.” I said aloud.  “Although I wish that Frodo, or more so Merry, had to clean these.  Ugh.” I finished in my head.

            “Could you get be thome thoup?” 

            I sighed heavily.  “Ask Bilbo,” I offered.

            “Bilbo!”

            Looking about the room, I could think of only one other way to pick up the hankies.  “I’ll be right back,” I told an uncaring Bombur, and ran outside.

            Moments later I was back, but now I was carrying a shovel.  I carefully scooped some handkerchiefs into the shovel and carried them into the kitchen with the shovel held aloft.  I dumped them into the hot, soapy water; then came back for the next batch.

            “Bilbo!” Bombur called again.

            “I’ll be right there, Bombur!” Bilbo replied.  He was in Merry’s room, that was obvious be the fact that you could hear Merry saying “No, you will not be ‘right there!’  You have to get me some hankies, hot tea with lemon, and...”

            I rolled my eyes.  Merry was always a grief when he got sick.

            Four trips later, all of the tissues were in the hot soap water.  I looked upon them for a moment, filled with satisfaction.  Then, I realized with horror that although the tissues were in the water, they still needed to be washed!

            I looked down in disgust at the water.  I was most certainly not putting my hands in there.

            But Bilbo needed the hankies!  I stared out the window in frustration.  What to do, what to do.  Several sheets on the clothesline caught my eye.  Bilbo had washed them Monday morning, never dreaming that he wouldn’t have time to change the sheets on the bed for days.

            I gazed at the sheets for a moment more.  Something pressed at my mind, but I couldn’t put my finger on it.

            Suddenly, it clicked.  I ran out the door to get the sheets off the clothesline.  A moment later, I ran back in, grabbed a stool, and ran back out again.  Once outside, I carefully placed the stool under the clothesline.  Standing on it, I was able to reach the clothespins and take the sheets down.  I then went back inside, arms full of clean, fluffy white sheets. 

            After returning for the stool, I brought it back in and closed the door.  I sidestepped the sheets and went to Bilbo’s study.  I could hear Frodo whining as I walked down the hall.

            “Bilbo, my head hurts.”

            “I’m sorry, Frodo, is there anything I can do?”

            “No, nothing can help me now.  Everything is dark and empty.”

            Frodo had a tendency to be overdramatic.

            I entered Bilbo’s study and went straight to his desk.  Opening it, I found just what I was looking for: a pair of scissors. 

            Tightly clutching my treasure, I went back into the kitchen.  Bilbo was now with Bombur.

            “Bilbo, I’m thying!”

            I could hear Bilbo sigh.  It was one of those sighs that comes straight from the hair on a hobbits toes, a sigh of total defeat.  “Bombur, I shall tell you one more time: you are not dying.  You have a slight cold, nay, a less than slight, merely a case of the sniffles.”

            “But I can’t breathe!” Bombur moaned.

            “Your nose is plugged.  You can’t breathe through your nose when it is plugged.  Your mouth is not plugged.  You can breathe through your mouth.”

            Bombur said nothing for a moment.  Then “But I’m thying, Bilbo!”

            Bilbo began to explain again how Bombur was not dying.

            I was tempted to stay and listen to Bilbo’s frustration, but I needed to get back to my hankies.  Reluctantly, I went into the kitchen.  The sheets were still lying on the floor where I had left them.  I glanced at the other handkerchiefs soaking in the soap water.  Sighing, I reflected upon my own cleverness.  Sometimes I even amazed myself with my ingenuity.

            I cocked my head, listening to make sure that Bilbo was still in the other room.  Then I went to work.  Picking up the scissors, I carefully fitted my fingers in their respective opening.  I experimentally opened and closed them several times just to make sure that they worked; then I picked up a sheet.  I closed one eye and gazed down the surface of it to make sure that I was going to be cutting in a straight line.

            Snip.

            The sound of scissors cutting always made me smile.  This time was no exception.  I smiled the entire time as I cut carefully down the sheet.   I was still smiling when the first strip fell free, and I cut it horizontally into handkerchief-shaped squares. 

            Ten down, and...I mentally calculated how many more I would need.  Furrowing my brow, I realized that the amount needed was probably far more than I could guess. 

            I sat there for quite some time, cutting sheets into hankies.  I didn’t think that Bombur would notice (or care) that the hankies were not hemmed. 

            There was one sheet left.  I grinned at the enormous pile of handkerchiefs surrounding me and picked up the last sheet.  I picked up the scissors and closed them with a soft snip.  Just then, however—

            “Pippin!”

            My head jerked up; I was terrified at the tone of Bilbo’s voice.

            “Tell me that those are not my good sheets!”

            “Um...yes?”

            Bilbo’s face turned white, red, purple, then white again.  Normally I would have been fascinated by this, but now I was too frightened to care.  Whatever had I done?  I should have known better than to have used Bilbo’s good sheets. 

            Bilbo opened his mouth, and I braced myself.  It was a good thing that I did, too, as all that came out was a very long and high-pitched scream.  I just sat there, surrounded by sheet-squares, quaking in terror.

            The screaming ceased, and he stood there panting.  Just then, from the back of Bag End, came the voice that was my salvation.  It was that blessed Meriadoc, yelling that all the fuss was hurting his ears.

            At last, Bilbo’s attention was turned to someone else.  He stormed down the hall to Merry’s room, yelling things such as “Nasty brats!” and “confounded dwarves.”

            Bombur weakly called from the front room that there was a strange noise, and Frodo was in the back of the house complaining that all the noise was making his headache worse.  I headed to the front room.  Maybe, if no one noticed, I could be out the door and on the road in no time at all.  I had heard that Bree was beautiful this time of year.

            I went to the door and opened it.  To my absolute and utter shock, there were two Dwarves standing on the doorstep!  While I rubbed my eyes in shock, they peeked around me at the noise coming from the back of Bag End.

            One nodded at me.  “Bifur, at your...” his voice trailed off as he wandered into the hole.  The other dwarf (who I assumed to be Bofur) followed closely behind.  I shut the door and walked behind them.

            Bilbo had come up the hall shrieking.  He turned around and bumped right into Bofur.  His mouth opened and closed, and he began to shake from head to toe.  Then he resumed screaming, pushed past Bofur, and ran out the front door.

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Author’s Notes: Don’t worry, dear readers, all is not lost.  Bilbo is fine.  In fact, he’s in the other room with his therapist right now.  (Yes, on a little couch and everything.)  He will be just fine...