The Beginning of a Dangerous Business
by Orangeblossom Took
Hobbiton, 2941 (Shire Reckoning)
“It's a dangerous business, Frodo, going out your door. You step onto
the road, and if you don’t keep your feet, there's no knowing where you
might be swept off to.” – Bilbo Baggins
A comfortable-looking hobbit sat in front of his green door in the
bright sunshine. The door was attached to a most splendid smial for he
was not an ordinary hobbit, although he was not himself aware that that
he enjoyed any special distinction, aside from greater than usual
wealth and possession of the most beautiful hobbit hole in the entire
Shire. There were inherited assets and he himself had done little in
his life. This was not unusual for a hobbit of his station and means
but he had not even married and had produced no family to pass along
his wealth to, although he had long since come of age.
Bilbo did not know why this was the case or, if he was to be truthful
with himself, he did. There were lasses he fancied and there had
certainly been lasses who fancied him, the only child of a Took-Baggins
union. Oh, he knew he had an amiable way about him and typical,
not-unattractive hobbit looks which were enhanced by the addition of
the sharp, intelligent black eyes he inherited from his mother. She
often said that he was her little Took in Baggins clothing. Those eyes
were startling, residing as they did in a pink-cheeked face under a mop
of brown curls. This intrigued some lasses almost as much as his money.
Bilbo sighed. Maybe that was the crux of the problem. Most girls were
more interested in his money than himself. He had danced and conversed
with many lasses at parties and festivals but he never felt the desire
to pursue one, even though he had “walked out” with a couple in earlier
days. The lasses grew tired of his good-natured indifference eventually
and moved on to more pliant targets. Any pretenses he made towards
courting had become scarce in recent years. At this point in his life,
that suited the Master of Bag End. He was still young enough to start a
family, especially for one of Took blood, but he was comfortable by
himself and liked being alone in his big, comfortable smial with his
books.
He would find some younger relation to leave it all to when, on what
was probably some distant day, he expired. It was his and he loved it
but it had not been built for him, had it? His father had built it for
his mother and she was gone. She died at eighty, a respectable age but
somewhat young for a Took. Of course, sometimes Tooks left on
adventures at a young age and never returned. His mother told him about
some of the adventures of her relations but had been evasive about her
own, which Bilbo sensed had taken a toll on her.
“Yes,” Bilbo thought, “Adventures are nasty things.”
Yet, why as he sitting here smoking his pipe and gazing at the road?
Surely it was not to hear Mrs. Proudfoot screeching at her husband. He
did not want to be bound to a wife and children but was he really
content to spend solitary days that blended into each other?
Bilbo contemplated his perfect smoke ring as it floated away to
dissipate in the azure sky. Why did he feel as if he was waiting for
something important?
He grumbled and muttered to himself, “I am too old for foolishness and
too young for senility. It is nothing and I should go inside for
elevenses, at least until Mrs. Proudfoot ceases her harangue.”
He had barely finished this thought when he saw a tall figure garbed in
grey walking towards him. It would be some time before he would realize
how completely that day, which started in such an ordinary fashion,
would alter the course of his life and the lives of so many others as
well.
