towers

the window on the west 873
then in peril and was slain, I must fear that all my companions
perished too. And they were my kindred and my friends.
‘Will you not put aside your doubt of me and let me go? I
am weary, and full of grief, and afraid. But I have a deed to
do, or to attempt, before I too am slain. And the more need of
haste, if we two halflings are all that remain of our fellowship.
‘Go back, Faramir, valiant Captain of Gondor, and defend
your city while you may, and let me go where my doom takes
me.’
‘For me there is no comfort in our speech together,’ said
Faramir; ‘but you surely draw from it more dread than need
be. Unless the people of Lórien themselves came to him, who
arrayed Boromir as for a funeral? Not Orcs or servants of the
Nameless. Some of your Company, I guess, live still.
‘But whatever befell on the North March, you, Frodo, I
doubt no longer. If hard days have made me any judge of
Men’s words and faces, then I may make a guess at Halflings!
Though,’ and now he smiled, ‘there is something strange
about you, Frodo, an Elvish air, maybe. But more lies upon
our words together than I thought at first. I should now take
you back to Minas Tirith to answer there to Denethor, and
my life will justly be forfeit, if I now choose a course that
proves ill for my city. So I will not decide in haste what is to
be done. Yet we must move hence without more delay.’
He sprang to his feet and issued some orders. At once the
men who were gathered round him broke up into small
groups, and went off this way and that, vanishing quickly
into the shadows of the rocks and trees. Soon only Mablung
and Damrod remained.
‘Now you, Frodo and Samwise, will come with me and
my guards,’ said Faramir. ‘You cannot go along the road
southwards, if that was your purpose. It will be unsafe for
some days, and always more closely watched after this affray
than it has been yet. And you cannot, I think, go far today in
any case, for you are weary. And so are we. We are going
now to a secret place we have, somewhat less than ten miles
from here. The Orcs and spies of the Enemy have not found