Chapter 7 - Tell Me Mr Dandelion

by Llinos
beta Marigold

"Come on now lad," Sam heaved the great scythe with a strength that even surprised young Frodo.

At the tender age of 12, Sam's son had developed a sturdy physique and could normally almost keep up with his hard working father. But today Sam seemed driven with an unprecedented determination. Not since the last Mid-Summer Fair conker tournament final, when young upstart Timotas Burrows had smashed his father's champion thirty-twoer and Sam had retaliated with a virgin conker and reclaimed his title with a single hit, had Frodo seen him so resolute. (The resulting designation of "Supreme Conker Thirty-fourer" was still a Shire record).

"Dad, I don't think there's much chance of us winning now," Frodo leaned on his scythe and pointed to where the steam machine was triumphantly cutting vast swathes of field amidst whoops and cheers and much exuberant whistle tooting from Thain Peregrin, who had at last been allowed back onto the engine, in a non-driving capacity and under strict supervision of Master Brandybuck. "They've just about finished their whole half!"

"Aye well," Sam swung his scythe again with an effort-laden grunt, "there's still a job to be done lad and nothing's decided until it's all finished."

But even as Sam and Frodo set to work with renewed vigour, the great machine began to slow down and the mighty engine spluttered and hissed.

"What's happening now Merry?" Pippin frowned and pulled on the whistle lever once more. A sad squeak was the only result. "I think you might have broken it."

"Me broken it!" Merry spluttered in indignation. "After the devastation you've single-handedly inflicted on this field, to say nothing of the engine, the audience and my nerves!"

"Well you are driving," Pippin reasoned. "So it must be your fault."

"Of course it must," Merry pulled on the brake and began frantically thumbing through the great manual. "Your reasoning is almost as immaculate as your driving ability."

"Thank you," Pippin said, totally missing the point. He had a tendency not to notice irony when he got over excited. "Can you identify the problem?"

"Apart from you?" Merry frowned. "No!"

Matt Hammerstone, the blacksmith, strolled nonchalantly over. He had secretly being dying to get his hands on the great machine as soon as it arrived but he was not assertive by nature and he knew that the rules of the race forbade direct intervention by anyone else.

Matt peered up at the furnace and then walked round the engine placing his finger tentatively on the great tank in various spots. "Erm… I think you might find that the boiler has a reserve reservoir."

"Oh!" Pippin looked at him blankly. "That's good. Is it?"

"Yes! Yes!" Merry's face lit up with sudden recollection. "We have to switch it over. Only the men said it should run for several hours on the main tank."

"Well…" Matt looked up at the Thain with an embarrassed smile. "It probably would if you didn't blow the whistle so much."

"Right!" Pippin, for all his flamboyance, rarely got offended when the errors of his enthusiasm were pointed out, mostly because it never occurred to him he was being criticised. "Less whistle, Merry, remember that. So can you fix it?"

"Yes, because I bothered to read the book!" Merry located the valve, which released the reserve reservoir into the main tank and not a moment too soon, as the empty boiler was building up a heat that would have given Hobbiton a fireworks display to almost equal that of Bilbo Baggins' farewell party. "You pull that handle there, but…"

Pippin seized the handle and gave a triumphant tug.

As the cold water hit the super-heated tank; there was an explosion of steam and a mighty groaning of metal and Merry, who was sitting by the outlet, was enveloped in a cloud of boiling vapour.

"Ow! Ow! Pippin! You nincompoop!" Merry shrieked in anguish, and some considerable pain, as he flapped his arms about trying to cool his steam-heated body. "I was about to say, 'you have to stand well back!'"

"Well I did!" Pippin pointed out. "It was you who didn't!"

"Are you all right Master Merry?" Matt enquired politely. "Fire and water can be a tricky combination."

"Especially when you throw the Thain into the mix!" Merry's face was a delicate shade of beetroot by now, thanks to a combination of steam and Pippin. "Just a little hot under the collar, I'll live – for the time being anyway!" He looked pointedly at Pippin.

Sam, although intent upon his task, downed tools when he heard Merry howling, and came to see what was wrong. "Dear oh dear!" Sam exclaimed. "Looks like you've got some nasty burns there. Do you want to call the race off?"

"Of course not!" Pippin used his jacket to fan Merry's face. "He'll be fine in a minute. Won't you? Besides, we've almost won!"

"You'll be having to wait a while before she gets up steam again," Matt knew about such matters. Although he had never encountered a steam engine before, he had heard descriptions from dwarves who had passed through the Shire and occasionally stopped at his forge for repairs and news. He had listened to their instructions on such new machines with great interest. "She'll take a good ten minutes to heat up enough."

"Not to worry," Sam said with a broad grin. He had been keeping an ace up his sleeve, but couldn't resist playing it now. "It'll give you a chance to collect up the cuttings."

"The what?" Merry looked baffled. "You mean the cut grass? Why would we do that? No one will want it."

"It's in the rules," Sam was still grinning. "Field to be left clean and tidy, and all cuttings cleared away. It's all part of mowing you know."

"But, that's silly!" Pippin exclaimed, jumping down from the engine. "Surely you have people to do that?"

"No outside help, remember?" Sam nodded to where Frodo had begun to clear away their own cuttings. It was an efficient process. He hooked a sack onto the hedge, then used the two planks of wood like extensions to his hands to scoop up large wads of grass cuttings at a time and empty them into the sack.

"But it'll take us forever," Pippin scowled. "Besides, we don't have any planks – or sacks for that matter."

"No… no! It's all right!" Merry was always the innovator. "Matt could you fetch us a rake and some sacks? Fetching is allowed, right? We'll tie the sacks onto the back of the engine and rake it up and stuff the grass as she goes along – shouldn't take long at all!"

"Can I drive?" Pippin's face lit up.

"You," Merry growled, "can rake!"

Sam's face however maintained its grin, "then there's the dandelions."

"What?" Merry sighed in exasperation. "What else have you slid into those rules on the quiet Sam?"

"You are supposed to grub the dandelions and weeds out before you mow." Sam's grin had grown to a beam. "Don't see as how you're going to get them out now."

"Well there's no dandelions left on our side," Pippin swept his arm expansively over their half of the field, nearly knocking Merry over in the process. "They're all gone."

"Ah," Sam shook his head with grave solemnity. "They'll be back in a few days. You don't take out the dandelions and this field'll be more dandelions than grass in a month."

"Sam!" Merry tried to look shocked and indignant. "I'm shocked at you! That's very sneaky to put that in the rules without saying. Besides, I like dandelions – they're very pretty."

"Oh, don't you worry," Sam chuckled. "They'll be back! Dandelions won't never go away, no matter how much you pull 'em up."

"Well I object," Pippin folded his arms in defiance. "It's cruelty to dandelions to pull them up, and in any case, how's anyone going to tell the time?"

"Pretty much as they always do," Sam laughed at Pippin's odd logic. "By the sun and the moon or ask someone with a timepiece."

"Well that's not the way the children in Tookland go about it!" Pippin was adamant. "You need dandelion clocks or who knows how many meals you might miss!"

"He's right," Merry nodded enthusiastically, realising that Pippin might have hit on something. "There's a song about it and everything."

"The Dandelion Song? Hmm…" Sam glanced around; the crowd were starting to become restless. They had, after all, come for a day's entertainment and to see the miraculous machine perform, to say nothing of the Thain and the Master, who were always good for a spectacular diversion from the everyday humdrum. "I have a proposition," Sam announced in his best Mayoral tone. "You sing the song – here and now to the crowd and if it's word perfect and they like it well enough, I'll forgo the dandelion clause."

"That seems fair," Matt Hammerstone nodded to the cluster of hobbits that had wandered over to see what the hold up was. "A song from the Master of Buckland would be a rare treat."

"Now wait a minute," Merry was happy to show off his mechanical skills and engineering prowess, but he was not too sure about singing a children's song in front a large crowd in a field in Hobbiton. "This wasn't meant to be a concert, and I'm not some peripatetic player performing for pennies! I don't think…"

"Oh for goodness sake Merry!" Pippin had no such reservations. "I'll sing it. You just go and announce me and make sure everyone is paying attention."

"You don't know all the words," Merry frowned. "You always get stuck halfway through."

"Of course I know the words," Pippin declared adamantly. "Now go and announce me."

As Merry and he walked towards the impatient crowd, Pippin whispered to him, "Half of them don't know the whole thing anyway, I'll make up what I don't remember and say it's a Tookland variation. If Sam can cheat, so can we!"

There was a ripple of anticipation as Merry climbed up onto the gate and clapped to gain everyone's attention. "Friends and loyal supporters," he began. "It has been agreed by Mayor Samwise that he is willing to overlook the dandelion clause in our race contract on condition Thain Peregrin sings, in it's entirety, The Dandelion Song."

"And you like it," added Samwise, who wasn't about to give up his race ace that easily.

There were several cheers; a smattering of applause and a couple of boos, before the hobbits settled down to enjoy whatever tomfoolery would follow. Many had heard the Thain sing before, with varying degrees of tunefulness, depending on the hour and the strength of the ale. Nevertheless, melodious or off-key; sentimental, amusing or just plain bawdy, it had always been entertaining.

Pippin, ever aware of commanding his audience, demanded a stage and a sturdy bench was found. He climbed up, wobbled twice, coughed once and began.

"Tell me Mr Dandelion
What's the time of day?
I've no tick-tock or pocket watch
And the sun has gone away.
 
"Tell me Mr Dandelion,
My tummy's feeling hollow!
There's nowt to eat, but fields of wheat
And that is hard to swallow!
 
"One puff says it's one o'clock,
Two puffs means two instead.
Three puffs, four, or even more;
Don't say it's time for bed!
 
"One puff means it's time for lunch,
Two means lunch is spoiling!
Puff times three, it's time for tea,
Puff four, there's dumplings boiling.
 
"Five puffs means the table's laid,
Six puffs I need to hurry,
Seven or eight, I'm late as late,
Nine puffs, I'll start to worry!
 
"Ten puffs and my supper's missed,
Eleven, twelve, the stars are shining!
So Dandeli'n, without lyin',
What is my chance of dining?"

Pippin concluded with a theatrical bow, which alone gained him enthusiastic applause, especially as it was so ostentatious that he toppled off the bench, hitting the ground headfirst, rolled, gained his feet in one smooth action and repeated his bow more flamboyantly than before.

"I think that's pretty conclusive," Merry slapped Sam on the back. "No dandelions."

"He made half of that up as he went along," Sam frowned. "I don't remember those last two lines for certain."

"Oh come on Sam!" Pippin threw his hands in the air. "You've lost and you know it!"

"Race isn't finished yet anyhow!" Sam pointed out. "We're still going to win – dandelions or no!"

"You want to put money on it?" Merry demanded. "Because our machine can beat any twenty hobbits, even with those damn cuttings."

"A wager!" Sam's teeth were gritted. Things were getting serious now. "I'll lay you ten silver pennies and a barrel of ale, you'll lose!"

A gasp went up from the watching hobbits. Such an enormous sum was an uncomfortably large stake and boded ill for diplomatic relations between Hobbiton, Buckland and The Tooklands.

"Done!" The Master of Buckland spat on his hand and held it out to the Mayor. "In fact I'll raise you twenty silver pennies and two barrels of 1420!"

"Steady on Merry!" Pippin turned slightly green at the prospect of losing such a sum. Even if they won, he would not want to see Sam poorer by that amount. "This is becoming far too ruthless."

"Agreed!" Sam didn't flinch. He slapped his hand into Merry's and clasped it much tighter than was necessary. "Let the real battle commence and may the best hobbits win!"

T. B. C.