return

1070 the return of the king
from sight. And all that night Pippin alone and sleepless stood
upon the wall and gazed eastward.
The bells of day had scarcely rung out again, a mockery
in the unlightened dark, when far away he saw fires spring
up, across in the dim spaces where the walls of the Pelennor
stood. The watchmen cried aloud, and all men in the City
stood to arms. Now ever and anon there was a red flash, and
slowly through the heavy air dull rumbles could be heard.
‘They have taken the wall!’ men cried. ‘They are blasting
breaches in it. They are coming!’
‘Where is Faramir?’ cried Beregond in dismay. ‘Say not
that he has fallen!’
It was Gandalf that brought the first tidings. With a handful
of horsemen he came in the middle morning, riding as escort
to a line of wains. They were filled with wounded men, all
that could be saved from the wreck of the Causeway Forts.
At once he went to Denethor. The Lord of the City sat now
in a high chamber above the Hall of the White Tower with
Pippin at his side; and through the dim windows, north and
south and east, he bent his dark eyes, as if to pierce the
shadows of doom that ringed him round. Most to the North
he looked, and would pause at whiles to listen as if by some
ancient art his ears might hear the thunder of hoofs on the
plains far away.
‘Is Faramir come?’ he asked.
‘No,’ said Gandalf. ‘But he still lived when I left him. Yet
he is resolved to stay with the rearguard, lest the retreat over
the Pelennor become a rout. He may, perhaps, hold his men
together long enough, but I doubt it. He is pitted against a
foe too great. For one has come that I feared.’
‘Not – the Dark Lord?’ cried Pippin, forgetting his place
in his terror.
Denethor laughed bitterly. ‘Nay, not yet, Master Peregrin!
He will not come save only to triumph over me when all is
won. He uses others as his weapons. So do all great lords, if
they are wise, Master Halfling. Or why should I sit here in