The Return of the King (The Lord of the Rings, #3)

by J.R.R. Tolkien

You can’t come in. Can’t you read the notice: No admittance between sundown and sunrise?’ ‘Of course we can’t read the notice in the dark,’ Sam shouted back.

‘And if hobbits of the Shire are to be kept out in the wet on a night like this, I’ll tear down your notice when I find it.’

‘I’m sorry, Master Merry, but we have orders.’ ‘Whose orders?’ ‘The Chief’s up at Bag End.’ ‘Chief? Chief? Do you mean Mr. Lotho?’ said Frodo. ‘I suppose so, Mr. Baggins; but we have to say just “the Chief” nowadays.’

‘Well, I am glad he has dropped the Baggins at any rate. But it is evidently high time that the family dealt with him and put him in his place.’

He sprang from his pony, and seeing the notice in the light of the lanterns, he tore it down and threw it over the gate. The hobbits backed away and made no move to open it. ‘Come on, Pippin!’ said Merry. ‘Two is enough.’

‘Bill Ferny,’ said Merry, ‘if you don’t open that gate in ten seconds, you’ll regret it. I shall set steel to you, if you don’t obey. And when you have opened the gates you will go through them and never return. You are a ruffian and a highway-robber.’

‘What’s the matter with the place?’ said Merry. ‘Has it been a bad year, or what? I thought it had been a fine summer and harvest.’ ‘Well no, the year’s been good enough,’ said Hob.

‘Oh come!’ said Pippin yawning. ‘This is all too tiresome for me tonight. We’ve got food in our bags. Just give us a room to lie down in. It’ll be better than many places I have seen.’

Frodo ordered the gates to be locked again. There was some sense at any rate in keeping a guard, while ruffians were still about.

every wall there was a notice and a list of Rules. Pippin tore them down.

Pippin broke Rule 4 by putting most of next day’s allowance of wood on the fire.

‘You’re arrested for Gatebreaking, and Tearing up of Rules, and Assaulting Gate-keepers, and Trespassing, and Sleeping in Shire-buildings without Leave, and Bribing Guards with Food.’ ‘And what else?’ said Frodo. ‘That’ll do to go on with,’ said the Shirriff-leader. ‘I can add some more, if you’d like it,’ said Sam. ‘Calling your Chief Names, Wishing to punch his Pimply Face, and Thinking you Shirriffs look a lot of Tom-fools.’

‘Don’t be absurd!’ said Frodo. ‘I am going where I please, and in my own time. I happen to be going to Bag End on business, but if you insist on going too, well that is your affair.’

‘But don’t forget I’ve arrested you.’ ‘I won’t,’ said Frodo. ‘Never. But I may forgive you. Now I am not going any further today, so if you’ll kindly escort me to The Floating Log, I’ll be obliged.’

‘We’re not allowed to,’ said Robin. ‘If I hear not allowed much oftener,’ said Sam, ‘I’m going to get angry.’

The Chief wants to see you at once, evidently.’ ‘He won’t be so eager when Mr. Frodo has finished with him,’ said Sam.

Merry made them march in front, while Frodo and his friends rode behind. Merry, Pippin, and Sam sat at their ease laughing and talking and singing, while the Shirriffs stumped along trying to look stern and important. Frodo, however, was silent and looked rather sad and thoughtful.

‘Leader!’ said Merry. ‘Order your fellows back to their places at once, if you don’t want me to deal with them!’

‘We shall break a good many things yet, and not ask you to answer,’ said Pippin. ‘Good luck to you!’

Bywater by its wide pool; and there they had their first really painful shock. This was Frodo and Sam’s own country, and they found out now that they cared about it more than any other place in the world.

It was pouring out black smoke into the evening air.

‘I’m going right on, Mr. Frodo!’ he cried. ‘I’m going to see what’s up. I want to find my gaffer.’

The Dark Tower has fallen, and there is a King in Gondor.

your precious master is a beggar in the wilderness. I passed him on the road. The King’s messengers will ride up the Greenway now, not bullies from Isengard.’

This was too much for Pippin. His thoughts went back to the Field of Cormallen, and here was a squint-eyed rascal calling the Ring-bearer ‘little cock-a-whoop’. He cast back his cloak, flashed out his sword, and the silver and sable of Gondor gleamed on him as he rode forward.

‘I am a messenger of the King,’ he said. ‘You are speaking to the King’s friend, and one of the most renowned in all the lands of the West.

Merry and Sam drew their swords also and rode up to support Pippin; but Frodo did not move.

Fearless hobbits with bright swords and grim faces were a great surprise. And there was a note in the voices of these newcomers that they had not heard before. It chilled them with fear.

No hobbit has ever killed another on purpose in the Shire, and it is not to begin now. And nobody is to be killed at all, if it can be helped. Keep your tempers and hold your hands to the last possible moment!’

You won’t rescue Lotho, or the Shire, just by being shocked and sad, my dear Frodo.’

‘Raise the Shire!’ said Merry. ‘Now! Wake all our people! They hate all this, you can see: all of them except perhaps one or two rascals, and a few fools that want to be important, but don’t at all understand what is really going on.

But Shire-folk have been so comfortable so long they don’t know what to do. They just want a match, though, and they’ll go up in fire. The Chief’s Men must know that. They’ll try to stamp on us and put us out quick. We’ve only got a very short time.

Come on! I am going to blow the horn of Rohan, and give them all some music they have never heard before.’

‘Who are you, and what’s all this to-do?’ ‘It’s Sam, Sam Gamgee. I’ve come back.’ Farmer Cotton came up close and stared at him in the twilight. ‘Well!’ he exclaimed.

We feared you were dead.’ ‘That I ain’t!’ said Sam. ‘Nor Mr. Frodo. He’s here and his friends. And that’s the to-do. They’re raising the Shire.

‘So it’s begun at last! I’ve been itching for trouble all this year, but folks wouldn’t help.

‘If you’ve been looking after Mr. Frodo all this while, what d’you want to leave him for, as soon as things look dangerous?’ This was too much for Sam. It needed a week’s answer, or none.

Pippin rode off with half a dozen lads on ponies. ‘See you soon!’ he cried. ‘It’s only fourteen miles or so over the fields. I’ll bring you back an army of Tooks in the morning.’ Merry blew a horn-call after them as they rode off into the gathering night. The people cheered.

They were surrounded. In the dark on the edge of the firelight stood a ring of hobbits that had crept up out of the shadows. There was nearly two hundred of them, all holding some weapon.

Merry stepped forward. ‘We have met before,’ he said to the leader, ‘and I warned you not to come back here. I warn you again: you are standing in the light and you are covered by archers. If you lay a finger on this farmer, or on anyone else, you will be shot at once. Lay down any weapons that you have!’

He aimed a savage blow at Merry who stood in his way. He fell dead with four arrows in him.

There wasn’t no smoke left, save for the Men; and the Chief didn’t hold with beer, save for his Men, and closed all the inns; and everything except Rules got shorter and shorter, unless one could hide a bit of one’s own when the ruffians went round gathering stuff up “for fair distribution”: which meant they got it and we didn’t, except for the leavings which you could have at the Shirriff-houses, if you could stomach them.

If they want to make the Shire into a desert, they’re going the right way about it. I don’t believe that fool of a Pimple’s behind all this. It’s Sharkey, I say.’

‘Good evening, Mr. Baggins!’ he said. ‘Glad indeed I am to see you safe back.

‘But now I’ve come back, I’ll do my best to make amends.’ ‘Well, you can’t say fairer than that,’ said the Gaffer.

‘Mr. Frodo Baggins is a real gentlehobbit, I always have said, whatever you may think of some others of the name, begging your pardon. And I hope my Sam’s behaved hisself and given satisfaction?’ ‘Perfect satisfaction, Mr. Gamgee,’ said Frodo.

‘Indeed, if you will believe it, he’s now one of the most famous people in all the lands, and they are making songs about his deeds from here to the Sea and beyond the Great River.’ Sam blushed, but he looked gratefully at Fro...

But however grim they might be, they seemed to have no leader among them who understood warfare. They came on without any precautions. Merry laid his plans quickly.

Merry himself slew the leader, a great squint-eyed brute like a huge orc.

it. So ended the Battle of Bywater, 1419, the last battle fought in the Shire, and the only battle since the Greenfields, 1147, away up in the Northfarthing.