A Rope to Hang Himself--opening chapters
At long last, a new story! (My goodness, have I really not posted here since January?)

Codes: Frodo/Sam, Merry/Pippin
Rating: PG13 (some talk of bondage... and perhaps a brief demonstration?)

Summary: A Frodo Investigates! mystery. When a hobbit is found hanged in Uncle Andy's ropeyard, Sam and Frodo are asked to find out who he is, and how his life ended there.

Notes: This story takes place in the spring of 1424 (S.R.).

Disclaimer: The characters and overall storyline are certainly not mine. They belong to J.R.R. Tolkien's estate, and I'm just playing with them to entertain myself and anyone else who likes this kind of thing.

First three chapters:

!~|i|~!

Andwise Gamgee rose before daybreak as usual. His nephew Hamson, hearing the commonplace sounds of the elderly hobbit preparing breakfast in the kitchen of the cottage they shared at the edge of their rope-walking yard, rose from his own bed. They ate their breakfast without unnecessary conversation, and together went out to the ropeyard. Yesterday's work hung stretched out on long trestles, where they'd been left to dry overnight. Fibers of moist jute had been wound together to form three long "yarns," which were then twisted together by means of a large, hooked iron spin-wheel at far the end of the ropeyard that was cranked by hand. This was the only piece of complicated machinery Uncle Andy kept in his yard, but after long years of use it had become an old friend and he trusted it implicitly.

As he walked past the trestles, Ham put out his hand to touch each rope and see that they had dried properly without warping. Then he stopped to count them more carefully. They had wound six ropes yesterday, but this morning there were only five. "Here, Uncle Andy!" he called out. "One of the ropes is gone!"

Ham turned, and saw that his uncle had stopped too a few yards beyond him. Uncle Andy was staring open-mouthed at something that shouldn't have been in the ropeyard at all, something that looked like an oddly-shaped sack dangling at the end of the missing rope from a sturdy bough of one of the trees that bordered the northern edge of their property. This object moved slightly, swinging in the gentle dawn breeze, and Ham saw that it wasn't a sack at all, but something more horrible. "Uncle Andy-!"

Uncle Andy was already heading toward the tree. Ham ran to follow him.

!~|*|~!

"We thought as it must be a suicide, `til we was about to cut 'm down," Ham explained to his brother Sam and to Frodo Baggins four days later; he'd written to Sam that same morning after he and Uncle Andy had discovered the hanged hobbit, and the pair had come immediately from Hobbiton at his urgent summons. "Then I said as we'd best leave the rope as it was. They was no use in trying to get 'm down quick, you see. He was cold dead and there wasn't nothing we could do to help him. He must've been hanging there the better part o' the night. Uncle Andy sent me to fetch our local shirriff, Dondo Punbry, over in Gamwich. It was him who helped me pull that trestle over so we could loosen the loop 'round his neck and lower 'm down as gentle as we could. Dondo and some o' the lads he brought with 'm took the body away to lay it out proper." They'd reached the tree where the hobbit had been found hanging. "You see what I mean--Uncle Andy 'n' me noticed it right away."

Frodo did as well. The rope had been left as Ham and Andy had found it, wrapped around the trunk of the tree three or four times, and the end that hadn't been formed into a noose was tied around the stump of another more slender tree several feet away. The empty noose hung high over their heads, but there was no bough lower than the one the rope had been thrown over. The trestle that Ham and the sherriff had used to take the body down was still beneath the tree, but there was no other chair nor ladder nor sign of anything the dead hobbit might have used to climb up after he'd tied the rope.

"He couldn't have done this by himself," said Frodo, and he crouched to examine the trunk of the tree more closely. "Look here, Sam." The bark beneath the rope was scraped and had even peeled off in some places, suggesting that the rope had been used to haul up its grisly burden, then tied off. "Someone else had to have pulled him up after the noose was around his neck, alive or dead."

"That's right," Ham said. "Even Dondo saw it. I told him I was going to ask you to come, Sam--You and Mr. Baggins both." He gave Frodo a respectful little nod. "Now, Dondo's a good shirriff. He does all right when there's a quarrel at the pub that needs quieting down or a cow's gone wandering, but he doesn't know where he is with this sort of thing. You're the experts on investigating murders. You'll get to the bottom of this, if anybody can."

Sam, who had grown up with his older brothers calling him a "half-baked pudding-head," warmed to this expression of confidence. It showed how far he'd come, that Ham should think of turning to him in a time of trouble. "Who was he, the hobbit that was hanged?" he asked.

"His name was Malbo," answered Ham. "Malbo Glossum."

"Did you know him?"

"Not to say 'know.' I seen 'm at the Mousehole inn, a-playing games with the lads, but I never spoke more'n a word or two to him that I remember. I couldn't tell you how he came to hanged up _here_ in our yard."

"You didn't hear anything during the night, did you?" asked Frodo.

Ham shook his head.

"What about Uncle Andy?" asked Sam.

"Him neither. You know his hearing's not what it used to be, Sam, though he won't admit it."

Uncle Andy had been working at the rope-wheel since Sam's and Frodo's arrival, letting Ham show them the tree and explain things. As the trio returned across the yard tooward him, he left his work to greet his visiting nephew. "`Tis good to see you, Sam-lad, and `tis kind o' your gent to come so far with you to see to our trouble." He tugged his cap rather shyly at Frodo. "You don't come out this way often enough, Sam-lad. Come inside for a mug o' tea, and tell us all about the goings-on of the family in Hobbiton--my old brother Ham, and your Missus and the little uns, and how your sisters are. We heard tell as young Marigold's expecting. Will you stop with us here while you're on this detectin' business? We'll make up a bed in the spare room for you."

"That's very kind of you, Mr. Gamgee, but we don't want to be an imposition. We'd planned to take a room at the inn in Gamwich," said Frodo. Gamwich was the nearest town to Tighfield.

Ham shuffled his feet and looked embarrassed, and Frodo realized that the invitation had been for Sam alone.

"I ought to be with Mr. Frodo," Sam said to his uncle apologetically. "It's my place. He'll need me by him while we're looking into this."

Andy accepted this, but shook his head. "You've come up in the world, Sam-lad, going about with the fine folk. It's all very well, but I hope it don't go to your head!"

!~|ii|~!

After they'd had their mugs of tea and Sam delivered his family news, he and Frodo left the ropeyard and went to the Mousehole inn at Gamwich, where they intended to stay during this investigation. This was the same inn where they'd stayed last spring while tracing the whereabouts of Sam's Aunt Lula.

"You could've stayed with your brother and uncle for a night or two," Frodo said as they entered the inn's stableyard. "I'd miss you, but I wouldn't mind."

Sam shook his head. "I meant what I told Uncle Andy--my place is with you, now as always. He didn't mean any disrespect to you, Frodo. More the other way 'round. He's like my Dad. They was brought up to know their place. Uncle Andy'd think it getting above himself to ask a gentlehobbit to stop the night in his house. He doesn't have much to do with fine folk. He's a bit shy of 'em, you might say. There's nobody for miles hereabouts like the Brandybucks or Tooks."

"Nor even the Bagginses?" Frodo said with a smile.

"Not even the Bagginses," Sam agreed. "The best they have are some well-off farmers."

"I'm sure that's how all the best families started out when hobbits first settled the Shire. Some just became more well-off than others," Frodo replied democratically and jumped from his pony's saddle. "I'll engage a room for us," he decided while Sam likewise dismounted and handed his pony's reigns to the young stable-boy who came forward to meet them. "Why don't you go into the taproom and make friends with whoever might be there? Buy them a round or two of ales."

Sam understood his assignment. "And ask `em questions about this Malbo?"

"Yes, please. If there are many hobbits hereabouts like your uncle, shy of gentlefolk, I think this will be more your game than mine. They'll be more likely to talk to you about the hanged hobbit. According to your brother, this was his favorite haunt. They must've known him well."

"They talked to you the last time we was here."

"True, but then I was asking questions about a lady who used to live here ages ago. This time, we'll be asking about a murder. Besides, you're closer to them. Family to some." The Gamgees were originally from this part of the Shire; in addition to his connection to Ham and Uncle Andy, who were well known and liked by their neighbors, Sam had other more distant relatives in and around Gamwich, and he was regarded as something of a local lad even though he'd only been here once before.

They went into the inn. Frodo sought out the innkeeper, Mr. Bloomer, who remembered him from last year's visit. "We've been expecting you, Mr. Baggins. There's been talk that you'd be coming our way again after this terrible business up at old Andy's ropeyard," the innkeeper informed him. "Terrible, I say it is for the Gamgees' sake, but that Malbo's no loss. Oh, yes, we knew him here. You'll be wanting your dinner, after coming such a long way- Maisie!" He turned to shout down the kitchen corridor, and a pretty maid in an apron with her hair under a kerchief emerged. "Maisie love, lay out the table in the private dining-room for Mr. Baggins and his friend."

The girl curtseyed and disappeared back into the kitchen.

After Frodo had seen the baggage sent to their room, he went to join Sam in the taproom and found his friend at the bar. Sam had gathered a small crowd about him. It had been several days since the body had been found at the Gamgees' rope-walking field; the first furor of conversation on the topic had died down, but Sam was able to revive it again with the offer of a round of ales. Everyone was eager to tell him the local news.

"-I diced with 'm once or twice a week," one hobbit-lad was saying as Frodo came in. "We played darts sometimes too. He was good at games."

"Too good, if you ask me!" another observed.

The first hobbit laughed. "You only say that because he won off you so often! If you begrudge every penny you lose, Pandro, you'd best not play at all!"

"I'm not the first to say so, Tully," Pandro replied, and several other hobbits agreed. The imputation of cheating had been made against Malbo Glossum before.

"It was how he made his living," a third hobbit spoke up.

"Didn't he have a regular job?" Sam asked.

"Not to say 'regular,'" said Pandro. "He went out as a farm laborer, and did a bit of heavy work in gardens when called to it. He took whatever job came to hand. He was at our orchard for awhile at the last harvest."

Frodo hadn't intended to interrupt Sam's questioning of the local hobbits, but at this point, the group noticed him at the doorway. A stranger was an unusual sight at the Mousehole, and the conversation stopped.

"We'll be having dinner shortly in the private dining-room, Sam," Frodo said. "Mr. Bloomer's arranging it."

"I'll just finish this ale then," Sam answered, and lifted his half-empty mug.

"Don't you worry, Mr. Baggins," said a hobbit who hadn't spoken before. "We won't keep your friend long." Although he wasn't what Frodo would call a gentlehobbit, he looked like as if he were a social step or two above the working hobbits in the room. Frodo thought he must be one of those well-to-do farmers Sam had spoken of and, in spite of his surprise at being recognized, he bowed.

"Have we met before?" he asked.

"We weren't introduced, Mr. Baggins, but I saw you once, in this same room. You won't remember me." The other hobbit gave him a bow in return. "Silvanus Woodbine, at your service."

Sam took the opportunity to introduce some of his other new friends. "This is Tully Digby, and Pandro Applegrove." He lay a hand on the arm of one of the young hobbits sitting nearest him. "And these lads are Haltred and Haftrey Gamgee, cousins of mine."

Frodo told them all he was pleased to make their acquaintance, and refused the offer of an ale. The large hobbit at the bar glared at him with sullen suspicion.

"We knew you and Sam were coming, Mr. Baggins," Haftrey told him. "Ham's always bragging on how his brother works with the famous detective, and how you 'n' him find all those lost jewels and missing ladies and catch murderers for the fine folk. After Malbo was found hanging in his rope-yard, Ham said as since we had our own murder here, even if it wasn't so fine, you'd come and do the same."

"Who told you it was murder?" asked Frodo. This was the one point that he'd hoped hadn't been made public yet. People would speak more freely about a supposed suicide.

"Ham said so, but we'd heard tell of it afore," said Haftrey. "Sherriff Punbry was talking about it the day it happened. He said as how he saw right away that Malbo couldn't've tied himself up that way with nobody else to give a hand."

"Dondo Punbry was full of himself," added Haltred, "for being so clever as to spot it."

"Ham and Uncle Andy saw it too, before they even called on him," Sam defended his relatives.

"And you wouldn't be here if Malbo hanged himself, would you, Mr. Baggins?" Silvanus concluded.

"No," Frodo conceded.

"I don't know as I'd tell you who did it, if I knew," said Pandro. "Whoever it was, I'd say they did everyone a favor. Malbo wanted hanging."

"Did he now?" asked Sam. "What for?"

But before Pandro could answer, Silvanus Woodbine said, "Hush your prattle, Pan my lad! Don't you know better than to watch your tongue? You'll have Mr. Baggins thinking you're the one who did the hanging."

He spoke as if he were joking, and some of the other hobbits in the room laughed, but there was a sharp undertone of warning in his voice and his eyes darted from Sam to Frodo.

Tully was among those who were laughing. "Yes, that's so!" he said. "Did _you_ have a hand in it, Pandro? Couldn't bear losing another game to Malbo? Best to confess it now."

"If I did do it," said Pandro, "then I wouldn't tell anybody!"

!~|iii|~!

Over dinner, Sam reported the information he'd gained in the taproom. "The dead hobbit, Malbo, wasn't from around these parts. He came to Gamwich at the end of last summer, looking for work. You heard how he worked--farms, gardens, 'n' such."

"And made more money at games, according to your new acquaintances," said Frodo. "Did he have any family hereabouts whom we can speak to?"

"Not that I heard tell of."

"What about friends?"

"Those were his friends, the lads you met."

"They didn't have very much good to say about him from what I overheard," Frodo observed.

"No, nor before you came in to hear," Sam agreed. "Aside from the cheating, they say he was the type to borrow money and not pay it back. He'd let you stand a round of ales, but hardly ever stood one in his turn even when he'd just won his game. He was good for a laugh or a bit of fun, but he won't be missed."

"He sounds like a thoroughly bad lot, but could he have 'wanted hanging,' as Mr. Applegrove said? It's rather extreme to see such an old saying put into practice. Malbo Glossum might've been a doubtful character, to be sure, but he must've stirred up some very hard feelings for someone to take so much trouble in getting rid of him." Frodo considered the matter while he finished his soup. "They aren't telling us all they know, Sam," he said at last. "It's because we are who we are--the Famous Detective and his friend, the Chief Sherriff of Bywater. Sometimes, I think we did better at this sort of thing before we were so well known for it. Everybody knows what we're up to when we ask questions these days. They're willing to talk to us, but only up to a point. Then they shut up tight."

"You think they know who did it?" asked Sam.

"_They_ think they do. Pandro Applegrove might, if that talk of his wasn't mere bluster. Mr. Woodbine surely does. Whether or not they're right remains to be seen. We'll have to find out what they're keeping secret, somehow. It might be worthwhile to try them again, Sam, one at a time instead of in a group. They might be inspired to confide. And Merry and Pippin can try when they get here. They aren't known in this part of the Shire, and may have more success in prying among strangers."

Sam was alert at these last remarks. "Are Master Merry and Pippin coming?"

"I thought they'd welcome an adventure after a quiet winter," Frodo answered. "I wrote them at Brandy Hall before we left Bag End. I don't know if Pippin's there--he's been back and forth between Crickhollow and his family at Tuckborough so often lately that I've lost track of him. If Pip's at home, and if Merry isn't too bound by his duties to Buckland to leave it for a week or two, he'll pick up him along the way. Or else, if Merry isn't free, I hope he'll forward my letter and Pippin will come alone." As he tore a piece of bread off the loaf and crumbled it between his fingers into his soup bowl, Frodo made some calculations. "Depending on how fast they ride, it'll take them two or three days to reach us here. They won't write and reply. You know how they are. I suppose they'll just show up. Sam..." He looked up from his bread-crumbling to meet Sam's eyes and ventured cautiously, "you aren't going to be jealous and make a fuss while Merry's here, the way you did at Long Cleeve, are you?" The last thing he wanted was to repeat that emotional fiasco in the middle of an investigation.

"Not if Master Merry behaves himself," Sam promised.

"From the letters he's sent me, he and Pippin seem happy enough with their present arrangement. As long as that's so, Merry has no reason to go astray and come flirting after me. And _I_ won't go chasing after him, so you've no need for concern." A small smile twitched at the corner of Frodo's mouth. "If we are too tempted by each other's proximity and can't restrain ourselves, you'll have to do the restraining, dear Sam. You can tie me to our bed every night to make sure I don't leave it to go sneaking down the hall to Merry's room."

Frodo was joking, but Sam went red and became flustered. They'd discussed this kind of thing before, more seriously, and he was never comfortable with it.

Before they could engage in a conversation on the subject now, the maid came in with their main course. "The sherriff's here to see you," she announced as she set a large platter of mutton and new potatoes down on the table between them. "Dad's told 'm you're at your supper, but he asks to come in as soon as it's convenient."

"I think we can spare a minute," said Frodo. "If he hasn't had his dinner yet, we've plenty to share. Show him in, please... Maisie, was it?"

"That's right, sir. Maisie Bloomer." She bobbed, then went out to fetch the shirriff.

From the description of the Gamwich shirriff from the hobbits in the taproom, Frodo expected him to be a pompous and self-important character; to the contrary, Dondo Punbry seemed overawed and somewhat intimidated once he was in the presence of the famous detective. Where some sherriffs were jealous of Frodo's infringement on their jurisdiction as local peacekeepers, Dondo immediately professed himself ready to hand things over and provide whatever assistance he could.

"I only did the littlest bit o' investigating after that Malbo was found hanging at the Gamgees' yard, Mr. Baggins," he told Frodo deferentially, twisting his red-feathered cap in his hands as he spoke. "I stopped as soon as I heard that Ham was writing to his brother, Chief Gamgee here, and asking you to come. There's no Chief Shirriff in these parts nearer'n Nobottle. It seemed more fitting I leave it to you."

"What did you find?" asked Frodo. Sam invited the sherriff to sit down and join them.

Dondo reported as he helped himself to a thick slice of the mutton. "Malbo was last seen here the night afore he died. He'd been playing at dice, winning they say, and was drinking more'n he should. `Twas a wonder he could stay on his feet long enough to get out the door, they say."

"Who says?" Sam asked him.

"The usual lot." Dondo waved a hand in the direction of the taproom.

"The same lads who're here tonight?"

"More or less. It's the same crowd as comes in nearly every night, regular-like. Gamwich isn't so big a town, and there aren't many places a lad can go for his drop of ale and some fun after a day's work."

"Do you know where he was going?"

"Home, I guess."

"Where was that?"

"Malbo had a room at Mr. Holeman's down the lane."

"Did anyone leave the inn with him that night?" asked Frodo.

"No, he went out alone, Mr. Baggins," answered Dondo. "Pocket full o' coins, wobbling on his feet. If he'd been robbed and left lying in a ditch with his head busted in, it'd be no surprise. But to find him a-hanging! The money was still in his trouser pockets when Ham 'n' me took him down."

Frodo had to agree that this was remarkable.

"And none of the regular lads, or anybody else here, went out just after he did, or just before?" Sam asked.

"Not as I've heard tell," said Dondo, more cautiously than before. "Here-" he looked from Sam to Frodo and back again with concern. "You're not saying it's one of those lads?"

"It's too early to say who it might be, Sherriff Punbry," Frodo explained. "But that's the sort of question we must ask if we're to find out what happened. You do understand?" Dondo nodded. "Good. You won't mind telling us a bit about them, will you?"

"No," Dondo answered reluctantly.

"What about Pandro Applegrove?"

"The Applegroves is a respectable family," said Dondo. "They own the largest orchard in these parts. Mr. Sandro Applegrove, Pandro's dad, runs it. Pandro's the only son."

"Silvanus Woodbine?"

"Now Mr. Silvanus's a newcomer hereabouts. That is, his dad, old Mr. Woodbine, bought a piece of farmland off the Applegroves and came here to live with Mr. Silvanus when he was just a little lad. A widower, old Mr. Woodbine was, and come from up north, so they say. Old Mr. Woodbine passed on last year and Mr. Silvanus runs his little bit of a farm himself now. We've come to think of him as old Gamwicher, same as anybody who was born here. You can't say it was him or Mr. Pandro, Mr. Baggins. They was here half an hour or more after Malbo left that night and went out together--they said so themselves when I asked, and Mr. Bloomer says so too. He saw them to say goodnight."

Frodo accepted this, and went on to the next name. "Tully Digby?"

"Oh, Tully's all right!" Dondo assured him. "He's a friend o' mine. Him and his dad have a little farm to the south of town. They aren't so well off as Mr. Silvanus and the Applegroves, but they do all right. He's kin to the Gamgees," he added for Sam's benefit. "Lots o' folk hereabouts are. Mrs. Gamgee, as is mother to the two Gamgee lads you met tonight, was born a Digby and is Tully's dad's sister."

"And what about those Gamgee lads?" asked Sam.

"You're not suspecting your own kin, Mr. Gamgee!"

"Remember what I told you, Sherriff," Frodo chided him. "We have to ask. It doesn't necessarily mean we suspect anyone yet."

Appeased, Dondo answered, "They got a good-sized farm on the road half-way to Tighfield, and a good-sized family to look after it--mother and dad, grand-dad, uncle and aunt, and cousins with little-uns. They're good lads, if they an't quite settled down yet. You'll find them here most days, earlier'n they should be."

"When did they leave the Mousehole on the night Malbo died?" asked Frodo.

"Near an hour afore Malbo left, but they've got a long walk home."

"And Tully?"

"He didn't come in that night at all, Mr. Baggins."

"Thank you, Sherriff Punbry," said Frodo. "Tell us now: had there been a brawl here that night? Any sort of quarrel?"

"Not that night, no. Oh, there was fights before, on other nights. You know how such lads can be when they've had a drop too much and take their playing too seriously. Whenever it happened, I'd go in and break it up, unless I was there already, off my duty."

"_You_ weren't here?"

Dondo shook his head. "But there wasn't no quarrel. I'd swear to it. Somebody've told me."

This line of inquiry exhausted, Frodo tried another. "You mentioned a Mr. Holeman. Can you tell us where he lives? I'd also like the names of some of the other people Malbo Glossum worked for after he came to Gamwich last year. I understand from the- ah- usual lot that he didn't have a regular job."

The shirriff was glad to give them all the names he could recall. Sam took a small memoranda book and slate pencil from his coat pocket, and diligently wrote them down.

!~|*|~!

More later this week...