[Primrose Bolger]

Ginger pays Miz Bella a prompted visit . . .

There were shushed whisperings just outside the closed door and scuffling as someone was pushed nearer. ‘G’wan, now,’ someone’s hushed voice urged. ‘Her name’s Belladonna Took . . .And remember . . . ask her where she’s from.’

Ginger knocked softly on the door to Cook’s parlour, hoping she wouldn’t be heard. Miz Bunce had stepped out for a moment to give some instructions to the lads who’d come to bring the benches and tables back into the Common Room. Buttercup, curious, about the stranger Cook had taken in last night, had convinced Ginger this was something she should do. She’d handed the young Hobbit a small stack of books they’d found half hidden under the straw in the wagon, telling her she should give them to the woman.

‘Do come in,’ she heard a clear voice say.

Certain the woman would hear her heart pounding, Ginger pushed the door open carefully and peeked in. The woman gave her an encouraging smile, her eyes twinkling beneath her capped grey curls. My goodness she looks just like my Granny!

Ginger blushed and came a little closer, bobbing a small curtsy as she laid the small stack of books on the table next to the woman’s seat. ‘Your books, Miz Took. The last of them.’ She looked at the other books piled on the table by the sofa. It was more books than she’d seen in all her young years.

‘My gosh!’ Ginger said, forgetting she’d been sent in by Buttercup to ferret out information. She picked up one of the more slender volumes and leafed through it carefully. On one of the pages was an ink drawing of some stern faced man in a winged helm. He held a sword in one hand and seemed to be looking far off . . .

‘Oh, my,’ Ginger said running her finger down the page, ‘who’s this, ma’am? Did you know him’ She turned a curious face to the elder Hobbit. ‘Can you read this to me?’