return

1078 the return of the king
overthrown. Grief maybe had wrought it, and remorse. He
saw tears on that once tearless face, more unbearable than
wrath.
‘Do not weep, lord,’ he stammered. ‘Perhaps he will get
well. Have you asked Gandalf ?’
‘Comfort me not with wizards!’ said Denethor. ‘The
fool’s hope has failed. The Enemy has found it, and now his
power waxes; he sees our very thoughts, and all we do is
ruinous.
‘I sent my son forth, unthanked, unblessed, out into needless
peril, and here he lies with poison in his veins. Nay, nay,
whatever may now betide in war, my line too is ending, even
the House of the Stewards has failed. Mean folk shall rule
the last remnant of the Kings of Men, lurking in the hills until
all are hounded out.’
Men came to the door crying for the Lord of the City.
‘Nay, I will not come down,’ he said. ‘I must stay beside my
son. He might still speak before the end. But that is near.
Follow whom you will, even the Grey Fool, though his hope
has failed. Here I stay.’
So it was that Gandalf took command of the last defence
of the City of Gondor. Wherever he came men’s hearts would
lift again, and the winged shadows pass from memory. Tirelessly
he strode from Citadel to Gate, from north to south
about the wall; and with him went the Prince of Dol Amroth
in his shining mail. For he and his knights still held themselves
like lords in whom the race of Númenor ran true. Men that
saw them whispered saying: ‘Belike the old tales speak well;
there is Elvish blood in the veins of that folk, for the people
of Nimrodel dwelt in that land once long ago.’ And then
one would sing amid the gloom some staves of the Lay of
Nimrodel, or other songs of the Vale of Anduin out of
vanished years.
And yet – when they had gone, the shadows closed on
men again, and their hearts went cold, and the valour of
Gondor withered into ash. And so slowly they passed out