When he left the Hall, Frodo went to the stables to collect his pony, which he kept here where the Hall grooms could tend it rather than at the smaller stable on the Crickhollow grounds. The trip to Newbury by the main road, then to Bucklebury by the back way and to the Hall again was approximately a ten-mile circuit; a healthy hobbit could walk it easily in an afternoon, but Frodo knew he would be doing plenty of walking around both towns as well. While his health had improved greatly in this past year, he still tired quickly and he'd already spent a strenuous morning.
He rode to Newbury and first visited the High Hay tavern. The ale-keeper was certain that Mr. Merimas hadn't been in that night. Gentlehobbits from the Hall so rarely came to his establishment--he was certain he would have noticed and remembered, and would've said so when Mr. Baggins and Master Merry had come in before. Nor could Frodo find anyone else in the town who'd seen his cousin alive after he and Merry had.
Frodo next tried Bucklebury, with the same results. Merimas had not been seen. Wherever he called, he made clear to everyone he spoke to that he was looking for people who'd seen Merimas that last night. Once news of his search spread to the manor houses, farms, and cottages beyond the two towns, he hoped that someone might step forward with useful information.
Late in the afternoon, he returned to Brandy Hall to tell Merry of his fruitless inquiries and to have dinner with his family. The dinner was as subdued as lunch had been and, after dinner, the ladies went to the drawing room.
Merry had carried on his father's and grandfather's custom of gathering the male members of the family in the study for a glass or two of wine and a pipe to smoke. For the younger hobbits, being included was a sign that they were now considered grown-up, even though Ilbie had not yet come of age.
Tonight, however, Uncle Merimac said that he wasn't feeling up to it and retired to his room, leaving the young hobbits standing in the front hall outside the study door.
"Poor Uncle Merry. He's been in a black gloom since we heard about Merimas. It reminds him of Berry's death," said Dodi sympathetically. "It's all coming back again, isn't it, and not only for Uncle? It's just the same as it was then."
"Not just the same, if I have anything to say about it," Merry answered, and Dodi took him by the arm.
"Let's not be stodgy old grown-ups tonight, Merry," he said. "Let's be young lads again and go out for a drop of ale. Come out with us too, Frodo."
They went to the Buckle's Notch, the only pub in Bucklebury. Frodo had been there when he'd made his inquiries during the hours after luncheon when the place was not busy. The Notch was quite crowded and noisy now that it was evening. The Brandybuck youths from the Hall were well-known to the proprietor and other patrons, and welcomed with shouts of friendly greeting and condolences as they came in. Ilbie went to the bar to fetch the first round of ales while Merry, Dodi, and Frodo found an empty table near the back of the room.
"I'll wager they've been talking of nothing else all day," said Dodi as he looked at the familiar faces around him. "Merimas, I mean, and how Frodo's investigating his murder. And poor Celie too. It's hard enough for her to lose her husband, without all that old business with Berry being dug up again."
"You told her, didn't you, Frodo?" asked Merry.
"She asked me for the truth, and I thought she ought to know."
"Perhaps it's best she does," agreed Dodi. "Forewarned is forearmed, as they say. We all want to protect her, of course, but she is in the middle of this. It was her husband who was killed. Even though she had nothing to do with it, that won't stop people from saying the most awful things." He lowered his voice to a mumble that Merry and Frodo could hardly hear. "We aren't the only ones who know about their quarrels, you know. The sooner this matter is settled, the better it will be for her in more ways than one, and for the rest of us too."
"I hope you'll be able to help me with that," Frodo replied. "You and Ilbie won't mind if I ask you some questions, will you? You're much more familiar with Merimas's and Celie's married life than I am."
"No, I don't mind," said Dodi. "We knew you'd ask. Celie married too young, that was the trouble."
"But didn't we all?" responded his younger brother as he joined them, carefully setting the four filled mugs down on the table. "Somebody's got to provide an heir to the Hall for Merry, since he won't do it himself. It's up to us. You've fallen behind in your duties, Dodi. You're the eldest, but Celie's already got two little heirs and unless you and Isalda are keeping a secret, 'Stella and I will have our baby before you do. Merry can have his pick for the next Master!"
"Hush your nonsense, Ilb. Frodo's asked about Celie, and I'm trying to tell him." Dodi resumed the topic at hand. "Now, as I was saying, she married too young. She should've been allowed to have her fun first, before she settled down to being respectable. She didn't have her proper chance. A girl Celie's age likes parties and dances and games. That's only natural. But Merimas didn't approve. You know about our parties at Ivysmial, Frodo? You never come, but you're always welcome to join in."
"Well, I've heard them often enough," Frodo answered.
"I'm surprised you don't come, Merry," said Ilbie. "You always used to enjoy a party."
"I still do," Merry answered. "I wish could join in, but it doesn't do for the Master of the Hall to have that kind of fun. I have to behave myself. I promised Mother."
"Is that why Frodo isn't living at the Hall?" Ilbie asked with a laugh.
"Ilb!"
"Did you think we didn't know? I'm sure everybody's guessed by now, even our Mother. We've wondered about you for quite some time, Frodo. You never played about, not even with Merry like the rest of us, but there was that friend of yours you used to be so attached to. We used to talk about it, didn't we, Dodi? Fatty even asked Merry once."
"And what did Merry tell him?" Frodo asked, looking at Merry.
"He said that whatever Frodo got up to wasn't Fatty's business, unless Frodo wanted to tell him himself," Merry answered.
"Which of course only confirmed his suspicions," said Ilbie. "Fatty's no fool."
"Never mind that--I'm trying to tell them about Celie!" said his brother. "We had a party last week out in the rose garden, since it was a nice day. There was the usual music and singing, and Celie got up to dance on the table. Somebody always does."
"It seems to run in the family," Frodo said. "Merry's famous for getting tipsy and dancing on table-tops in Minas Tirith."
"But Merimas behaved as if she'd done something disgraceful-"
"As if she'd left off her pantalets!" Ilbie interjected.
"He pulled her right down and tried to drag her home," continued Dodi. "I put a stop to that. I won't see him treat her that way. She may be his wife, but she's my sister and has a perfect right to have fun at a party I invited her to. I told him I'd punch his nose for him if he didn't let her go. He let go, but Celie went home not long after he did. He probably scolded her for days afterwards. Wretched brute! I'm sorry he died the way he did, but the truth is that she's better off free of him--though of course I couldn't say that to her now."
"Careful, Dodi!" Ilbie cautioned him. "You'll have Frodo thinking you're the one who broke Merimas's head. He's suspected us of defending Celie's honor once before, remember, when Berry was killed."
"You must admit, your activities on the day Berry died looked extremely suspicious before you gave me the true explanation," Frodo told his cousins.
"And proved we had nothing to do with it," Ilbie finished triumphantly. "Frodo, honestly! As dearly as we love our little sister, we didn't kill her husband for her."
"You're not high on my list of suspects," Frodo assured them, but he noted that, for all their silly, scatter-brained chatter, the three siblings had a staunch loyalty and devotion to each other even within the closely knit Brandybuck family circle. "All the same, I don't suppose you'll tell me where you both were that night when Celie and Merimas had their last quarrel."
"Isalda and I were home at Ivysmial, as a matter of fact," said Dodi. "Yes, we did hear their quarrel. We heard the shouting, at least. I couldn't tell you what precisely they were shouting about."
"And were you at the Hall, Ilbie?" asked Frodo.
"No, I was at Ivysmial too. 'Stella and I were meant to have dinner with Dodi and Isalda, but 'Stel wasn't feeling up to it, so I went to make our apologies and wound up staying for a bit as long as I was there."
"When did you leave?"
"It was just getting dark when I went home. Things were quiet by then. I didn't see Merimas, but Celie was in the lane by her cottage, just ahead of me. When I caught up with her at her front gate, I asked if she was all right, and she said she was. I would've stopped to talk with her if she'd wanted me to, but she said she would rather be alone--I suppose after all that yelling, she was glad of a little quiet. She went inside, and I walked home. I didn't run up the lane the other way to find Merimas and hit him in the head. There wasn't time. Mother and 'Stella will tell you I was home before seven. Happy, Frodo?"
"Yes, thank you. I didn't like to ask Celie, but can you tell me something about her old boy-friends? It all happened while Merry and I were away the first time, so I've only heard some of the gossip. There were others besides Berry, weren't there?"
"There were some boys she went around with," Dodi answered with a note of reluctance, "but it was just a bit of fun. No harm in it. We saw to that, and we'd have given them a good thump if wasn't so."
"Are these any one of these lads among your friends?" asked Frodo. "If they are, I'd like to meet them."
"We won't be having any parties for awhile, not while this murder is hanging over us and poor Celie's in mourning, but if you want to meet some of our friends, Isalda and I will ask them to Ivysmial after the funeral," Dodi offered. "You can come and be introduced."
"You know some of them already," added Ilbie, and turned to a pair of dark-haired young hobbits with a strong family resemblance who had come in while they were talking and taken a seat at another table nearby. He raised his voice to be heard over the level of chatter around the room. "Marly! El! Join us, won't you?"
At this invitation, the two hobbits rose and came over. "You looked like you were in the middle of an important conference," said the smaller and pudgier of the pair; he was about the same age as Dodi and Ilbie and, like them, had a round, cheerful face and snub nose. "Everyone looked so serious. We didn't dare to interrupt."
"But we were surprised to see you lads here tonight, after this awful business with Merimas," said the other one, who was taller, and a year or two older. "Hullo, Merry old fellow. We don't see much of you anymore. And Frodo--nobody sees you at all!"
They were Marleduc and Eliduc Brandybuck. Frodo had known them from childhood, though he'd seen little of them since his return from Gondor. They were distant cousins; in the last century, when Orgulas Brandybuck had quarreled with his elder brother, Master Gorbadoc, he'd left Brandy Hall to tunnel out a smaller but comfortable smial a half a mile away on the far side of Buck Hill, and founded the village of Bucklebury. While the quarrel had been made up between the two branches of the family long ago, Orgulas's descendants lived in Bucklebury still. Only a few, like Mellisaunte's late husband, Marmadas, had returned to live at the Hall.
The two boys were Merimas's first cousins, and part of that circle of boisterous friends that Celie and her brothers liked to have fun with. Had one or other--or both?--courted Celie before her marriage? If Frodo correctly interpreted Ilbie's remark before inviting them over, at least one had.
"We must come to the Hall and express our condolences to Celie and Aunt Melisaunte," said Marleduc, the elder brother, as he took a seat. "How is the poor dear bearing up?"
"Which one--Ceel or Auntie?" Ilbie teased. "Celie's terribly upset, as you might imagine, but I'm sure she'd be pleased if you and Eli came to call. Aunt Melisaunte's bearing it wonderfully, considering. She's never broken down with weeping, but thrown herself into managing the funeral arrangements."
"Actually, we were just discussing what to do after the funeral," said Dodi. "I was thinking of having a sort of reception, with refreshments, of course, at Ivysmial for some of Celie's close friends. It'll be much more pleasant than cramming ourselves into the Hall drawing room with the older folk. You'll both come, won't you?"
Both Marleduc and Eliduc assured him they would be glad to, and the conversation soon turned to other subjects. When Dodi got up to refill their mugs, he stopped at a few other tables in the room to extend the same invitation to the young hobbits sitting there.
Later that evening, Frodo parted with his cousins outside the pub. The others would return to the Hall, while he would take a footpath that crossed the fields between Bucklebury and the lane to Crickhollow. As they were saying their goodnights, Dodi told him, "It's all been arranged, Frodo. Come to Ivysmial after the funeral, and you can talk with Celie's friends all you like. You'll want to chat with Marly in particular. He wanted to marry her, you know."
No, Frodo hadn't known.
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