The reference is to
The Hunt for the Ring in
Unfinished Tales, where it is written
Quote:
Such was still the power of the Voice of Saruman that even the Lord of the Nazgûl did not question what it said, whether it was false or short of the full truth; but straightway he rode from the Gate and began to hunt for Gandalf in Rohan. Thus it was that on the evening of the next day the Black Riders came upon Gríma Wormtongue as he hastened to bring word to Saruman that Gandalf was come to Edoras, and had warned King Théoden of the treacherous designs of Isengard. In that hour the Wormtongue came near to death by terror; but being inured to treachery he would have told all that he knew under less threat.
'Yea, yea, verily I can tell you, Lord,' he said. 'I have overheard their speech together in Isengard. The land of the Halflings: it was thence that Gandalf came, and desires to return. He seeks now only a horse.
'Spare me! I speak as swiftly as I may. West through the Gap of Rohan yonder, and then north and a little west, until the next great river bars the way; the Greyflood it is called. Thence from the crossing at Tharbad the old road will lead you to the borders. "The Shire", they call it.
'Yea, verily, Saruman knows of it. Goods came to him from that land down the road. Spare me, Lord! Indeed I will say naught of our meeting to any that live.'
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This is a nice passage, in that it demonstrates Wormtongue's utter lack of loyalty even to Saruman. It also tells us that the Nazgûl, and through them Sauron himself, knew all about Saruman's double dealing. When Tolkien says that the Lord of the Nazgûl left Gríma alive "because he saw that the creature was evil and was likely to do great harm yet to Saruman" he is already showing us how the forces of evil are forever working against one another, and this contrasts nicely with the co-operation of the free peoples. What the Nazgûl cannot possibly realise is that in leaving the Wormtongue alive they provide the means by which Gandalf and Aragorn receive the Palantír of Orthanc, with which Aragorn later distracts Sauron so effectively.