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homeward bound 1305
half expected to see him standing there to greet them as they
went by. But there was no sign of him; and there was a grey
mist on the Barrow-downs southwards, and a deep veil over
the Old Forest far away.
They halted and Frodo looked south wistfully. ‘I should
dearly like to see the old fellow again,’ he said. ‘I wonder how
he is getting on?’
‘As well as ever, you may be sure,’ said Gandalf. ‘Quite
untroubled; and I should guess, not much interested in anything
that we have done or seen, unless perhaps in our visits
to the Ents. There may be a time later for you to go and see
him. But if I were you, I should press on now for home, or
you will not come to the Brandywine Bridge before the gates
are locked.’
‘But there aren’t any gates,’ said Merry, ‘not on the Road;
you know that quite well. There’s the Buckland Gate, of
course; but they’ll let me through that at any time.’
‘There weren’t any gates, you mean,’ said Gandalf. ‘I think
you will find some now. And you might have more trouble
even at the Buckland Gate than you think. But you’ll manage
all right. Good-bye, dear friends! Not for the last time, not
yet. Good-bye!’
He turned Shadowfax off the Road, and the great horse
leaped the green dike that here ran beside it; and then at a
cry from Gandalf he was gone, racing towards the Barrowdowns
like a wind from the North.
‘Well here we are, just the four of us that started out
together,’ said Merry. ‘We have left all the rest behind, one
after another. It seems almost like a dream that has slowly
faded.’
‘Not to me,’ said Frodo. ‘To me it feels more like falling
asleep again.’