returnoftheshadow72

by Miguel

  'Brought in?' said Bingo. 'Of course: the last I remember was the rush of water. What happened? Where are the others? Do tell me, Gandalf!'

  'What happened - as far as I can make out from Glorfindel and Trotter (who both have some wits in their different ways) - was this: the pursuers made straight for you (as Glorfindel expected they would). The others might have been trampled down, but Glorfindel made them leap out of the way off the road. Nothing could save you if the white elf-horse could not; so they followed cautiously behind on foot, keeping out of sight as much as they could behind bushes and rocks. When they had got as near to the Ford as they dared go, they made a fire hastily, and rushed out on the Riders with flaming brands, just at the moment when the flood came down. Between the fire and water these pursuers were destroyed - if they can be wholly destroyed by such means - all but two that vanished into the wild.

  'The rest of your party and the elf then crossed the ford, with some difficulty as it is too deep for hobbits and deep even for a horse. But Glorfindel crossed on your pony and regained his horse. They found you lying on your face in the grass at the top of the slope: pale and cold. At first they feared you were dead. They carried you towards Rivendell: a slow business, and I don't know when they would have arrived, if Elrond had not sent some Elves out to help you, at the same time as the water was released.' 'Did Elrond make the flood then?' asked Bingo.

  'No, I did,'(4) said Gandalf. 'It is not very difficult magic, in a stream that comes down from the mountains. The sun has been fairly hot today. But I was surprised to find how well the river responded. The roar and rush was tremendous.'

  'It was,' said Bingo. 'Did you also send Glorfindel?'

  'Yes,' said Gandalf, ' - or rather, I asked Elrond to lend him to me. He is a wise and noble elf. Bilbo is - was - very fond of him. I also sent Rimbedir (5) (as they call him here) - that Trotter fellow. From what Merry tells me I gather he has been useful.'

  'I should think he has,' said Bingo. 'I was very suspicious of him at first - but we should never have got here without him. I have grown very fond of him. I wish indeed that he was going to go on wandering with me as long as I must wander. It is an odd thing, you know, but I keep on feeling that I have seen him somewhere before.'

  'I daresay you do,' said Gandalf. 'I often have that feeling when I look at a hobbit - they all seem to remind me of one another, don't you know. Really they are extraordinarily alike! '

  'Nonsense,' said Bingo. 'Trotter is most peculiar. However I feel extremely hobbit-like myself, and I could wish that I was not doomed to wander. I have now had more than a month of it, and that is about 28 days too much for me.' He fell silent again, and began to doze. 'What did those dreadful pursuers do to me in Weathertop dell?' he said half to himself, on the edge of a shadowy dream.

  'They attempted to pierce you with the sword of the Necromancer,' said Gandalf. 'But by some grace of fortune, or by your own courage (I have heard an account of the fight) and by the confusion caused by the elf-name which you cried, only your shoulder was grazed. But that was dangerous enough - especially with the ring on. For while the ring was on, you yourself were in the wraith-world, and subject to their weapons.(6) They could see you, and you them.'

  'Why can we see their horses?'

  'Because they are real horses. Just as the black robes they wear to give shape to their nothingness are real robes.'

  'Then why, when all other animals - dogs, horses, ponies - are filled with terror of them, do these horses endure them on their backs?'

  'Because they are born and bred under the power of the evil Lord in the dark kingdom. Not all his servants and chattels are wraiths! '

  'It is all very threatening and confusing,' said Bingo sleepily. 'Well, you are quite safe for the present,' said Gandalf, 'and are mending rapidly. I should not worry about anything now, if I were you.'

  'All right,' said Bingo, and fell fast asleep.(7)

  Bingo was now as you know in the Last Homely House west of the Mountains, on the edge of the wild, the house of Elrond: that house was (as Bilbo Baggins had long ago reported) 'a perfect house, whether you like food or sleep or work or story-telling or singing, or just sitting and thinking, best, or a pleasant mixture of them all.' Merely to be there was a cure for weariness and sadness. As evening drew on Bingo woke up and found that he no longer felt like sleep but had a mind for food and drink, story-telling and singing. So he got up, and found his arm already nearly as useful as ever it had been. As soon as he was dressed he went in search of his friends. They were sitting in the porch of the house that faced west: shadows were fallen in the valley, but the light was still upon high eastern faces of the hills far above, and the air was warm. It was seldom cold in the fair valley of Rivendell. The sound of the waterfalls was loud in the stillness. There was a scent of trees and flowers [?in harmony].

  'Hullo,' said Merry, 'here is our noble uncle. Three cheers for Bingo Lord of the Ring! '

  'Hush! ' said Gandalf. 'Evil things do not come into this valley, but nonetheless we should not name them. The Lord of the Ring is not Bingo, but the Lord of the Dark Tower of Mordor,(8) whose power is growing again, and we are here sitting only in a fortress of peace. Outside it is getting dark.'

  'Gandalf has been saying lots of cheerful things like that,' said Odo. 'Just to keep us in order: but it seems impossible somehow to feel gloomy or depressed in Elrond's house. I feel I could sing - if I knew how: only I never was any good at making up words or tunes.'

  'You never were,' said Bingo, 'but I daresay even that could be cured in time, if you stayed here long enough. I feel much the same myself. Though at the moment I feel more hungry than anything else.'

  His hunger was soon cured. For before long they were summoned to the evening meal. The hall was filled with many folk: elves for the most part, though there were a few guests and travellers of various sort. Elrond sat in the high seat, and next to him sat Gandalf. Bingo did not see Trotter or Glorfindel: they were probably at one of the other halls among their friends, but to his surprise he found sitting next to him a dwarf of venerable appearance and rich dress - his beard was white, nearly as white as the snow-white cloth of his garments; he wore a belt of silver and a chain of silver and diamonds.

  'Welcome and well met,' said the dwarf, rising and bowing. 'Gloin at your service!' and he bowed again.

  'Bingo Bolger-Baggins at your service and your family's,' replied Bingo. 'Am I right in imagining that you are the Gloin, one of the twelve companions of the great Thorin?'

  'You are,' said he. 'And I need not ask, since I have already been told that you are the friend and adopted son of our dear friend

  Bilbo Baggins. I wonder much what brings four hobbits so far from their homes. Nothing like it has occurred since Bilbo left Hobbiton. But perhaps I should not ask this; since Elrond and Gandalf do not seem disposed to tell?'

  'I think we will not speak of such things, at any rate yet,' said Bingo politely - he wanted to forget about his troubles for the moment. 'Though I am equally curious to know what brings so important a dwarf so far from the Mountain.'

  Gloin looked at him and laughed - indeed he actually winked. 'I am no spoil-sport,' he said. 'So I will not tell you - yet. But there are many other things to tell.'

  Throughout the meal they talked together. Bingo told news of the Shire, but he listened more than he talked, for Gloin had much to tell of the Dwarf-kingdom under the Mountain, and of Dale. There Dain was still king of the dwarfs,(9) and was now ancient (some 200 years old), venerable, and fabulously rich. Of the ten companions that had survived the battle, seven were still with him: Dwalin, Dori, Nori, Bifur and Bofur and Bombur.(10) But the last was now so fat that he could not move himself from his couch to his chair, and it took four young dwarves to lift him. In Dale the grandson of Bard, Brand son of Bain, was lord.

  My father stopped here, and scribbled down a few notes before at once beginning the chapter anew. The notes at the end of the first draft include the following:

&nb
sp; What of Balin etc. They went to colonize (Ring needed to found colony?) Bilbo must be seen. Who is Trotter?

  The second text is a clear manuscript, but it had proceeded no farther than Gandalf's account of the flood in the Bruinen when my father again stopped and started again. This is an intermediate text much nearer to the third than to the first, and need not be considered more closely. The third text, the last in this phase of the work, but again abandoned before its conclusion (going in fact scarcely any farther than the first draft), is very close to 'Many Meetings' in FR, but there are many minor differences (quite apart, of course, from those that are constant at this stage, as Trotter/Strider-Aragorn and the absence of Sam). The opening is now almost identical to that in FR, but the date is October 26, and Gandalf adds, after 'You were beginning to fade', 'Trotter noticed it, to his great alarm - though of course he said nothing.' But after Gandalf s 'It is no small feat...' (FR p. 232) the old narrative goes on:

  '... But I am delighted to have you all here safe. I am really rather to blame. I knew there were some risks - but if I had known more before I left the Shire I should have arranged matters differently. But things are moving fast,' he added in a lower voice as if to himself, 'even faster than I feared. I had to get here quickly. But if I had known the Riders were already out!'

  'Did not you know that?' asked Bingo.

  'No I did not - not until we came to Bree. It was Trotter that told me.(11)' And if I had not known Trotter and trusted him, I should have waited for you there. And as it has turned out, he saved you and brought you through in the end.'

  'We should never have got here without him,' said Bingo. 'I was very suspicious of him at first, but I have grown very fond of him. Though he is rather queer. I wish that he was going to go on wandering with me - as long as I must wander. It is an odd thing, you know, but I keep on feeling that I have seen him somewhere before - that, that I ought to be able to put a name to him, a name different to Trotter.'

  'I dare say you do,' laughed Gandalf. 'I often have that feeling when I look at a hobbit: they all seem to remind me of one another, if you know what I mean. They are wonderfully alike! '

  'Nonsense!' said Bingo, sitting up again in protest. 'Trotter is most peculiar. And he has shoes! However, I am feeling a very ordinary hobbit myself at the moment. I wish now that I need not go any further. I have had more than a month of exile and adventures, and that is about four weeks more than enough for me.'(12)

  The text now becomes very close to that of FR pp. 233 - 4, but there are several differences. As in FR, Bingo cannot understand how he can be out in his reckoning of the date, but in this version Gandalf has told him that it is the 26th of October (not as in FR the 24th), and he calculates that they must have reached the Ford on the 23rd (the 20th in FR). On this question see the Note on Chronology on p. 219. In contrast to the first draft, where Gandalf says that Bingo was brought in to Rivendell 'last night', he has been unconscious for a long time, and the mortal danger of his wound is emphasized. Gandalf calls the weapon that was used 'a deadly blade, the knife of the Necromancer which remains in the wound', not 'a Morgul-knife', and he explains to Bingo that 'You would have become a Ring-wraith (the only hobbit Ring-wraith) and you would have been under the dominion of the Dark Lord. Also they would have got possession of the Ring. And the Dark Lord would have found some way of tormenting you for trying to keep it from him, and of striking at all your friends and kinsfolk through you, if he could.' He says that the Riders wear black robes 'to give shape to their nothingness in our world', and he includes among the servants of the Dark Lord 'orcs and goblins' and 'kings, warriors, and wizards.'

  Gandalf's reply to Bingo's question 'Is Rivendell safe?' is similar to that in FR (pp. 234 - 5), but has some notable features:

  'Yes, I hope so. He has seldom overcome any of the Elves in the past; and all Elves now are his enemies. The Elves of Rivendell are indeed descendants of his chief foes: the Gnomes, the Elvenwise ones, that came out of the Far West, and whom Elbereth Gilthoniel still protects.(13) They fear no Ring-wraiths, for they live at once in both worlds, and each world has only half power over them, while they have double power over both. But such places as Rivendell (or the Shire in its own way) will soon become besieged islands, if things go on as they are going. The Dark Lord is moving again. Dreadful is the power of the Necromancer. Still,' he said, standing suddenly up and sticking out his chin while his beard stuck out like bristling wire, 'the Wise say that he is doomed in the end. We will keep up our courage. You are mending rapidly, and you need not worry about anything at the moment.'

  The passage in which Gandalf looked closely at Frodo, and then spoke to himself, is lacking; but his story of the events at the Ford is in all essentials the same as in FR, with a few features still retained from the first draft - most important, Gandalf still says that two of the Riders escaped into the wild. The difficult passage of the deep ford is still described, as in the first draft, and Gandalf still says 'I was surprised to find how well the river responded to a little simple magic.' But Elrond's power over the river, and Gandalf's waves like white horses with white riders, now enter. The end of Bingo's talk with Gandalf, however, has differences:

  '... I thought I was drowning - and all my friends and enemies together. It is wonderful that Elrond and Glorfindel and such great people should take all this trouble over me - not to mention Trotter.'

  'Well - there are many reasons for that. I am one good reason. You may discover others.(14) For one thing they are - were - very fond of Bilbo Baggins.'

  'What do you mean - "are fond of Bilbo"?' said Bingo sleepily.

  'Did I say that? Just a slip of the tongue,' answered Gandalf. 'I thought I said "were".'

  'I wish old Bilbo could have been here and heard all about this,' murmured Bingo. 'I could have made him laugh. The cow jumped over the moon. Hullo William!' he said. 'Poor old troll!' and then he fell asleep.

  The next section of the narrative follows the first draft (p.208) pretty closely, but Bingo's discovery of green garments laid out for him now enters the story, with a further addition that only survived in part in FR:

  He put on his own best waistcoat with the gold buttons (which he had brought in his luggage as his only remaining treasure). But it seemed very loose. Looking in a little mirror he was startled to see a very much thinner reflection of Bingo than he had seen for a long while. It looked remarkably like the young nephew of Bilbo that used to go tramping with his uncle in the Shire, though it was a bit pale in the face. 'And I feel like it,' he said, slapping his chest and tightening his waistcoat strap. Then he went in search of his friends.

  There is nothing corresponding to Sam's entering Frodo's room.

  The feast in Elrond's house moves far to the final text. The descriptions of Elrond, Gandalf, and Glorfindel now appear (they were written on an inserted slip, but it seems to belong to the same time) and in almost the same words as in FR (p. 239) - but there is mention of Elrond's smile, 'like the summer sun', and his laughter. There is no mention of Arwen. Bingo 'could not see Trotter, nor his nephews. They had been led to other tables.'

  The conversation with Gloin proceeds as in the first draft, with some touches and phrases that move it to the final text (FR p.240). Gloin is now described as 'a dwarf of solemn dignity and rich dress', but he still winks (as he does not in FR).

  At the point where the first draft ends (p. 210) my father only added a further couple of lines before again stopping:

  In Dale the grandson of Bard the Bowman ruled, Brand son of Bain son of Bard, and he was become a strong king whose realm included Esgaroth, and much land to the south of the great falls.(15)

  On the reverse of the sheet the conversation continues in a different script and a different ink: Gloin gives an account of Balin's history (his return to Moria) - but it is Frodo, not Bingo, that he is speaking with, and this side of the page belongs to a later phase in the writing of the book (see pp. 369, 391).

  A passage on a detached slip, form
ing part of Gandalf's conversation with Bingo, seems to belong to the time of the third draft of this chapter. There is no direction for its insertion into the text, and there is no echo of it in FR.

  Things work out oddly. But for that 'short cut' you would not have met old Bombadil, nor had the one kind of sword the Riders fear.(16)

  Why did not I think of Bombadil before! If only he was not so far away, I would go straight back now and consult him. We have never had much to do with one another up till now. I don't think he quite approves of me somehow. He belongs to a much older generation, and my ways are not his. He keeps himself to himself and does not believe in travel. But I fancy somehow that we shall all need his help in the end - and that he may have to take an interest in things outside his own country.

  Among my father's earliest ideas for this part of the story (p. 126) appears: 'Gandalf astonished to hear about Tom.' - Another brief passage on the same slip of paper was struck out at the time of writing:

  Not to mention courage - and also swords and a strange and ancient name. Later on I must be told about that curious sword of yours, and how you knew the name of Elbereth.'

  'I thought you knew everything.'

  'No,' said Gandalf. 'You