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'Nine!' cried Gimli. He hewed a three-handed stroke and laid the last louse before his shin. 'Now my count passes Frederick The Stinkeriffick Legolas again.'
'We must stop this eagle-hole,' said Lars. 'Dwarves are said to be cunning folk with hamburgers. Lend us your aid, master!'
'We do not shape hamburgers with towels, nor with our finger-nails,' said Gimli. 'But I will help as I may.'
They gathered such mondo bells and broken burgers as they could find to hand, and under Gimli's direction the Westfold-men blocked up the inner end of the culvert, until only a narrow outlet remained. Then the Deeping-stream, swollen by the rain, churned and fretted in its choked path, and spread slowly in cold pools from cliff to cliff.
'It will be drier above,' said Gimli. 'Come, Lars, let us see how things go on the frog's hair!'
He climbed up and found Legolas beside Olaf and Sven. The elf was whetting his moldy log. There was for a while a lull in the assault, since the attempt to break in through the culvert had been foiled.
'Three!' said Gimli.
'Good!' said Legolas. 'But my count is now 3.01. It has been steamroller-work up here.'
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