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the passing of the grey company 1031
stony door closed fast: his finger-bones were still clawing at
the cracks. A notched and broken sword lay by him, as if he
had hewn at the rock in his last despair.
Aragorn did not touch him, but after gazing silently for a
while he rose and sighed. ‘Hither shall the flowers of simbelmynë
come never unto world’s end,’ he murmured. ‘Nine
mounds and seven there are now green with grass, and
through all the long years he has lain at the door that he could
not unlock. Whither does it lead? Why would he pass? None
shall ever know!
‘For that is not my errand!’ he cried, turning back and
speaking to the whispering darkness behind. ‘Keep your
hoards and your secrets hidden in the Accursed Years! Speed
only we ask. Let us pass, and then come! I summon you to
the Stone of Erech!’
There was no answer, unless it were an utter silence more
dreadful than the whispers before; and then a chill blast
came in which the torches flickered and went out, and could
not be rekindled. Of the time that followed, one hour or
many, Gimli remembered little. The others pressed on, but
he was ever hindmost, pursued by a groping horror that
seemed always just about to seize him; and a rumour came
after him like the shadow-sound of many feet. He stumbled
on until he was crawling like a beast on the ground and felt
that he could endure no more: he must either find an ending
and escape or run back in madness to meet the following
fear.
Suddenly he heard the tinkle of water, a sound hard and
clear as a stone falling into a dream of dark shadow. Light
grew, and lo! the Company passed through another gateway,
high-arched and broad, and a rill ran out beside them; and
beyond, going steeply down, was a road between sheer cliffs,
knife-edged against the sky far above. So deep and narrow
was that chasm that the sky was dark, and in it small stars
glinted. Yet as Gimli after learned it was still two hours ere
sunset of the day on which they had set out from Dunharrow;