Part 16 (1/2)

'Well, I hope you will still be laughing this time next year,' said Gandalf.

'And I hope you will, too,' retorted Bilbo.

The new version continues (from 'and he was never seen in Hobbiton again'): He walked briskly back to his hole, and stood listening with a smile for a moment to the sounds of merrymaking going on in various parts of the field. Then he went in. He took off his party clothes, folded up and wrapped in tissue paper his embroidered waistcoat with the silk [> gold] b.u.t.tons and put it away. Then he put on some old and untidy garments,(13) and from a locked bottom drawer (reeking of mothb.a.l.l.s) he got out an old cloak and an old hood that seemed to have been laid up as carefully as if they were very precious, though they were so weatherstained and mended that their original colour (probably dark green) could hardly be guessed. They were rather too big for him. He put a large bulky envelope on the mantelpiece, on which was written BINGO.

He chose his favourite thick stick from the hall stand, and then whistled. Several dwarves appeared from various rooms where they had been busy.

'Is everything ready?' Bilbo asked. 'Everything packed up [added: and labelled]?'

'Everything,' they said.

'Well, let's start then. Lofar, you are stopping behind, of course [added: for Gandalf]: please make sure that Bingo gets the letter on the dining room mantelpiece as soon as he comes in. Nar, Anar, Hannar, are you ready?(14) Right. Off we go.'

He stepped out of the front door. It was a fine clear night, and the black sky was full of stars. He looked up, sniffing the air. 'What fun!' he said. 'What fun to be off again - on the Road with dwarves: this is what I have really been longing-for for years.' He waved his hand to the door: 'Goodbye,' he said. He turned away from the lights and voices in the field and the tents, and followed by his three companions went round to the garden on the west side of Bag-End, and trotted down the long sloping path. They jumped the low place in the hedge at the bottom and took to the meadows, pa.s.sing like a rustle in the gra.s.ses.

At the bottom of the Hill they came to a gate opening on to a narrow lane. As they climbed over, a dark figure in a tall hat rose up from under the hedge.

'Hullo, Gandalf!' cried Bilbo. 'I wondered if you would turn up.

'And I wondered if you would,' replied the wizard; 'or if you would think better of it.(15) I suppose you feel that everything has gone off splendidly, and just as you intended?'

'Yes,' said Bilbo. 'Though that flash was surprising: it quite startled me, let alone the others. A little addition of yours, I suppose? '

'It was,' answered Gandalf. 'You have wisely kept that Ring secret all these years; and it seemed to me necessary to give them all some reason to explain their not noticing your sudden vanishment [> to give them all something they would think explained your sudden vanishment].'

'You are an interfering old busybody,' laughed Bilbo; 'but I expect you know best, as usual.'

'I do,' said Gandalf, 'when I know anything. But I do not feel too sure about the whole affair. Still, it has now come to the final point. You have had your joke, and successfully alarmed or offended all your friends and relations, and given the whole s.h.i.+re something to talk about for nine days (or ninety-nine more likely). Are you going to go any further? '

'Yes, I am,' answered Bilbo.(16) 'I really must get rid of It, Gandalf. Well-preserved, indeed,' he snorted. 'Why, I feel all thin - sort of stretched, if you know what I mean: like string that won't quite go round a parcel, or, or, b.u.t.ter that is sc.r.a.ped over too much bread. And that can't be right.'

'No,' said Gandalf thoughtfully. 'No. I was afraid it might come to that. I dare say your plan is the best, at any rate for you. At least at present I do not feel I know enough to say anything definite against it.'

'What else can I do? I can't destroy the thing, and after what you have told me I am not going to throw it away. Oddly enough I find that impossible to make up my mind to do - I simply put it back in my pocket. I find it very hard even to leave behind! And yet I don't want it, indeed I can't abide it any more. But you did promise to keep an eye on Bingo, didn't you, and to help him if he needs it, later on? Otherwise, of course, I should hardly be able to go. I should have to stop and put up with it.'

'I will do what I can for him,' said Gandalf. 'What have you done with it meanwhile? '

'It is in the envelope with my will and other papers. Lofar is giving it to Bingo as soon as he comes in.'

'My dear Bilbo! And with Otho Sackville-Baggins about the place, and that Lobelia wife of his! Really you are getting reckless. And I suppose you left the door unlocked as usual?'

'Yes, I am afraid I did. I rather fancy Bingo will be creeping off home before anyone else.'

'Fancy is not safe enough! But you may be right. He knows about it, of course?'

'He knows that I have, or had, the Ring: he has read my private memoirs,(17) for one thing; and he also has some idea [> he may have an inkling] that it has some other - er - effects than just making you invisible on occasion. But he doesn't, or didn't, know quite what I was beginning to feel about it. But after all, as it cannot be destroyed, and can only be handed on - it had best be handed on to him: I chose him as the best in all the s.h.i.+re: and he is my heir. He knows that I am leaving that to him with all the rest. I don't suppose he would ask to be excused this responsibility, and take only the money.'

'He will miss you pretty badly, you know? '

'Yes, I found it very hard to make up my mind. It is hard on him - but not too hard, I think. The time has come for him to be his own master. After all, if things had been more - er - normal, he would have been losing me soon anyway, if he had not already done so. I am sorry to cheat all my dear people of a grand funeral - how they all did enjoy Old Took's - but there it is.'

'Does he know where you are going?'

'No! I am not sure myself, really. And I think that is just as well for everybody. He might want to follow me.'

'So might I. I hope you will take care of yourself! '

'Take care! I don't care. And don't be unhappy about me: I am as happy as ever I have been, and that is saying a lot. But the time has come. I am being swept off my feet,' he added mysteriously, and then in a low voice as if to himself he sang softly in the darkness.

The Road goes ever on and on Down from the Door where it began.

Now far ahead the Road has gone, And I must follow if I can, Pursuing it arith weary feet, Until it joins some larger may, Where many paths and errands meet.

And whither then? I cannot say.(18) He stopped silent a moment. Then 'Goodbye, Gandalf! ' he cried, and made off into the night. Nar, Anar, and Hannar followed him.(19) Gandalf remained by the gate for a little, and then sprang over it and made his way up the Hill.(20) It will be seen that in this pa.s.sage, far different from that which occupies the same narrative place in FR pp. 40 - 4, my father was thinking about the effect of the Ring on its possessor on very much the same lines as in the chapter on Gollum (the 'foreword'), pp. 79 - 80. Moreover in FR the conversation - and quarrel - between Bilbo and Gandalf takes place in Bag End, so that the elements in the present version of Gandalf's anxiety about the Ring, left unguarded in an envelope at Bag End, and his going up the Hill to find Bingo, do not arise; Gandalf was sitting there waiting for him when he came in.

The clearing up of the party follows the earlier version, of course (FR p. 45); but the end of the chapter exists in two variant forms, marked as such. One of the variants, very much longer than the other and preceding it, is itself heavily modified. To look at this first: the list of presents remains the same, with some further changes in the names.(21) With 'Of course, this was only a selection of the presents' the new text advances very close to the form in FR (pp. 46-7), with the reflections on the cluttered nature of hobbit-holes (on which Bingo had remarked: 'We soon shan't be able to sit down for stools or tell the time for clocks in Bag- End'), and the gifts to Gaffer Gamgee (but Bilbo's collection of magical toys, pp. 33, 38, still remains); the dozen bottles of Old Winyards go to Rory Brandybuck, and are said to come from 'the south s.h.i.+re', not yet the Southfarthing.

From 'not a penny piece or a bra.s.s farthing was given away' there is a rejected text and a replacement, differing from each other chiefly in the arrangement of the elements. As written first, the Sackville-Bagginses are introduced immediately, demanding to see the will - which is given at length;(22) then follows the rumour that the entire contents of Bag End were being distributed, and 'in the middle of the commotion' Bingo finds Lobelia investigating, ejects the three young hobbits, and has a fight with Sancho Proudfoot;(23) and the pa.s.sage concludes with 'The fact is that Bilbo's money had become a legend...' (FR p. 48).

In the replacement text the structure in FR (pp.47-8) is reached, with the sole important difference that Merry's role is taken by the dwarf Lofar, who had stayed behind after Bilbo's departure (p. 238); and the only minor differences from FR are that Otho Sackville-Baggins is still a lawyer, the date of Bingo's entry into his inheritance is stated (midnight on 22 September), the witnessing of the will was by three hobbits of more than 33 years old, according to the custom, and the Sackville-Bagginses 'more than hinted that he or the wizard (or the pair of them together) were at the bottom of the whole business.' The exchange between Frodo and Merry on the subject of Lobelia's calling Frodo a Brandybuck is of course not present - Bingo merely 'shut the door behind her with a grimace.'

The short variant is very short, and was not adopted. The large crowd who arrived at Bag End on the morning after the party does no more than go away again when they see a notice on the gate saying: 'Mr Bilbo Baggins has gone away. There is no further news. Unless your business is urgent, please do not knock or ring. Bingo Baggins.' The Sackville- Bagginses 'thought that their business was urgent. They knocked and rang several times.' Admitted by Lofar the Dwarf, the remainder of the pa.s.sage is the same as in the (revised) long variant and FR - the interview between Bingo and the Sackville-Bagginses in the study, ending with Bingo's telling Lofar not to open the front door even against battering- rams (and omitting the mopping-up operations against the three young hobbits and Sancho Proudfoot). Thus the entire 'business' of the presents, and the invasion of Bag End, was in this variant removed. For my father's intention here see p.276.

The reappearance of Gandalf at Bag End now enters the story, and begins pretty well exactly as in FR (p.48), but soon significant differences enter the conversation, from the point where Gandalf says to Bingo 'What do you know already?' (FR p.49): 'Only Bilbo's tale of how he got it,(24) from that Gollum creature, and how he used it afterwards, on his journey I mean. I don't think he used it much after he came home; though he used to disappear (or not be findable) rather mysteriously sometimes, if things were a bit inconvenient. We saw the Sackville-Bagginses coming when we were out walking one day, and he disappeared, and came out from behind a hedge after they had gone by.(25) Being invisible has its advantages.'

'But it also has its disadvantages. It does not do much harm as a joke, nor even to avoid ”inconveniences” - but even these things . have to be paid for. Also making you invisible, when you wish, is not the only property of the Ring.'

'I know what you mean,' said Bingo; 'Bilbo did not seem to change much. They called him well-preserved. But I must say that also seems to me to have its advantages. I cannot make out why the dear old thing left the Ring behind.'

'No, I expect you cannot yet. But you may find out the disadvantages of that as well, in time. For instance, Bilbo seemed a bit restless of late years, didn't he?'

'Yes, for quite a long time,' 'Well, I think that was a symptom too. I don't want to alarm you, but I want you to be careful. Take care of the Ring, and take care of yourself, and watch yourself. Don't use the Ring,(26) or let it get any more, er, power over you than you can help. Keep it secret, and let me know, if you hear, see, or feel anything at all odd.' 'All right. But what is all this about?'

'I am not quite sure. I begin to guess, and I don't like the guesses. But I am now going off to find out as much as I can.

Before I have done so, I am not going to say any more, except to warn you, and to promise you what help I can give.'

'But you say you are going off?'

'Yes, for a bit. But you'll be safe for a year or two, in any case. Don't worry. I shall come and see you again as soon as I can - quietly, you know. I don't think I shall be visiting the s.h.i.+re openly again very much. I find I have become rather unpopular: they say I am a nuisance and a disturber of the peace; and some people are accusing me of spiriting Bilbo away. It is supposed to be a little plot between me and you (if you want to know).'

'That sounds like Otho and Lobelia.(27) How outrageous! I only wish I knew why and where old Bilbo has gone. Do you? Do you think I could catch him up or find him if I went off at once? I would give Bag-end and everything in it to the Sackville-Bagginses if I could do that.'

'I don't think I should try. Let poor Bilbo get rid of the Ring - which he could only do (reluctantly) by handing it on to you, for a bit.(28) Do what he wished and hoped you would.'

'What is that?'

'Live on here; keep up Bag-end; guard the Ring - and wait.'