Peony and Angelica called at Bag End the next morning after second breakfast to discuss the imposter at their aunt's house. "You've seen her now, Frodo. What do you think?" Peony asked anxiously as the two ladies sat down with Frodo in the second-best drawing room.
"It's difficult to tell from simply looking at her," said Frodo. "She might be a relation. If she is, then it's odd that she hasn't tried to introduce herself to us before this. I'll have to try and find out something about her before I can say."
"Ponto and Porto are certain that she's a fraud, but Milo said it was best to wait and be sure before we said anything like it to Auntie. She wouldn't listen anyway, unless we had good proof that it was so. Angelica was the one who said you ought to look into it, both as a detective and for Auntie's sake."
"Cousin or not, I'm sure she's after whatever she can get from Aunt Dora," added Angelica. "Oh, Frodo, you only saw a part of it last night. It's awful to watch Auntie fuss over this woman and make plans for her. Poor Auntie's never doubted for an instant that this so-called Doriella Baggins is her brother's daughter."
"Yes, that's so," said Peony. "From the moment she came to the house, Aunt Dora's treated her like a long-lost daughter of her own. Angelica's right about what that woman's after. You heard Aunt Dora say she means to leave the Old Place to her and to you--you say you don't want it, but Miss Doriella hasn't said otherwise. She only says that Aunt Dora is very kind to think of her. And even if Auntie left it to you, you wouldn't toss us out immediately after the funeral."
"Of course not," Frodo assured her. "As far as I'm concerned, you and Milo are welcome to have the Old Place for as long as you like."
"We certainly couldn't rely on Miss Doriella to make us the same promise! Oh, Milo says we don't need it so desperately now that our fortunes have improved. We could buy a house of our own in Hobbiton or anywhere, but we've lived there for so long, looking after Auntie, we feel that it's our home too as much as hers. Myrtle and Minto don't remember ever living anywhere else." Myrtle and Minto were Peony's youngest children.
"You know how Auntie's been the last few years," said Angelica. "She only gets sillier as she gets older and I don't know what would happen to her if Aunt Peony and Uncle Milo weren't there to keep care of her. It must be terrible, losing your natural wits as you grow old. I hope it never happens to me. Well, we must be Auntie's wits for her and look after her best interests. What do you plan to do, Frodo?"
Frodo explained his intention to travel in search of information about the woman claiming to be Dora's niece. "But before I go anywhere, I need a list of places to go to," he told them. "Has Doriella talked about any of the places she's lived or mentioned where she grew up? Has Aunt Dora's kept some of her brother's letters? Perhaps he wrote about where he was living when his daughter was born. That would be the best place for me to begin--if I know where Uncle Dudo last lived, I might trace what happened to his family after that."
"Auntie will know," Peony responded promptly. "Since this woman's shown up, Uncle Dudo is all she can talk about. We never used to hear his name from one year's end to the next! She's been looking for the letters he wrote her ages ago. She's sure she hasn't thrown them out, and there must be the name of a village or two in there. If we ask, she'll let us read them."
"What about Doriella? What has she told you about herself?"
"She hasn't said much about her past," said Peony. "That was one of the things that made us so suspicious about her from the first. When she first arrived, Aunt Dora asked her what had become of Uncle Dudo--Was he still alive? Why had he stopped writing? That sort of thing. Doriella said that her father had died when she was a child and she didn't remember much about him. And that put an end to that!"
"She's never spoken the name of any town or village where she's lived to me," added Angelica. "But I can guess that she's just come up from the far end of the Southfarthing and has probably lived there most of her life."
Frodo was intrigued by this deduction. "What makes you think that?"
"Her way of speaking," Angelica answered. "She sounds quite common, not like a gentlewoman, but there's also an odd lilt to her voice. And there's her clothing. Surely you noticed, Frodo--her clothes are too light for a northern Shire winter. No woolens. She's not used to this cold."
"That's true," Peony agreed eagerly. "Did you notice how she borrowed one of Auntie's shawls and likes to sit near the fire?"
Frodo had, but he was delighted to see how his cousins, who had helped him in so many investigations, were now acting as detectives themselves. "I know something of the far-south Southfarthing," he said. "It's a large place, with huge plantations and lots of tiny villages. I must have some idea of where to go. Can you try to draw her out in conversation? Ask her about her past. If she's telling the truth about who she is, she shouldn't mind being honest about it, unless she has something else to hide."
"If she is our cousin, what reason would she have to conceal her past?" wondered Angelica.
"Well, even a cousin of ours might have secrets she'd rather not tell."
Peony looked pleasantly scandalized by this remark. "I prefer to believe that if she refuses to tell, then we'll know she's not a Baggins."
"Before I go anywhere, I also want a small picture of Doriella to take with me," said Frodo. "I can't go around telling people I'm trying to trace a woman of about five-and-forty, three-and-half feet tall, buxomy but not stout, with light brown curls, brown eyes, a round face with pink cheeks and a snub nose. There are hundreds of ladies who fit that description! I must have something to show to people when I ask them about her, to be sure I've got the right woman. But I don't how I can quickly get an accurate likeness."
"Lad can do it," responded Angelica.
"Lad?"
"Oh, he's no great portrait-painter. He began by doing sketches of ponies when he had to describe one he was planning to buy or sell and Uncle Milo couldn't come to have a look for himself. Lad was rather good at drawing ponies. Then I asked him if he could do miniatures of the children. He gave them to me as a present for his last birthday." Angelica pulled up the locket that was dangling from a chain about her neck; she opened it to show Frodo two tiny drawings of her son and daughter within. The pictures were recognizable as little Willa and Adalmo, each done in black ink with tints of pink on the lips and cheeks and yellow dabs on their curly heads.
"Why these are quite good," said Frodo, astonished that Lad had any artistic talents. "Can he make one of Doriella? It needn't be fancy--simple pen and ink will do as long as it looks like her."
That same afternoon, Angelica returned bringing two small pencil sketches of Doriella, one full-face and the other a profile. Lad had captured a respectable likeness of his subject. She also told Frodo that Dora had found one of Dudo's letters and Peony had had a look at it.
"Aunt Dora showed her the one Uncle Dudo wrote when he married," she reported. "The place where he was living then was Longbourne."
"I've heard of it," said Frodo. "It's in the valley where the Shirebourne river runs into the Brandywine, near Longbottom. I've never been there, but it isn't far from the pipeweed plantation Lotho used to own. A two-day ride if the weather remains fair.""
Angelica made a face at the memory of the late Lotho Sackville-Baggins. "There's something else that may be of help to you, Frodo," she added. "In his letter, Uncle Dudo mentioned the maiden name of the girl he married. It was Eulilla Downswater. She's probably passed on, but her family had a farm nearby. Some of them might live there still."
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