One Last Surprise

Much is written in the annals held at the Great Smials in Tuckborough concerning hobbits. But few accounts are as noteworthy, or as adventurous than those of Master Holman Heathertoes. It has been my very good fortune to uncover a journal in which many fine tales of courage and derring-do are related, of which this story is only a part. Rowana Fairborn Scholar of Important Mathoms One Last Surprise Holman Heathertoes was a young hobbit barely out of his tweens, jovial, good natured and unusually inquisitive. He had already taken after his great grandfather, in his love of the riverbanks and waterways of the Eastfarthing. So much so that he could swim at an early age, which then, as is now was most peculiar. On the coming of his 33rd birthday, which as you know marks the end of the tweens and the coming of age, so to speak, Holman held a great party. There was much food, drinking and merry-making long into the night and on the stroke of midnight a splendid cascade of crimson and gold fireworks lit up the night sky over Woody-end. But there was one last surprise to come, and that would prove to be unwittingly the biggest of all. For down by the stream surrounded by a ring of lanterns there was a boat. But this was no ordinary boat of the sort that sometimes could be seen off the river banks of the Brandywine. Oh no, for this was the finest boat that had ever been seen in the Shire, or since. Many thought it to be of Elven make, though none would say, least of all his grandfather. It was small but perfectly formed in ever way, and like the blade of a wide leaf when it sits on the water it barely broke the surface. It was painted or rather fashioned of dark green timbers, supple and light and upon its side a frieze of delicate carvings had been cunningly worked. Holman was delighted to say the least and scarcely could he be parted from his beloved boat. He took to exploring all the twists and turns of all the rivers that fed into the great Brandywine, and in time he knew every one by heart. It was one morning in late April, just at the first spring rain started to fall in Woody-end that Holman, now in his 34th year left the Shire, pushing his boat silently from the bank and steering her toward the wide and unforgiving stretches of the mighty Brandywine... (To be continued)