[Arry]

Andwise chuckled as Derufin returned to the ladder and started his climb back up to the roof. ‘New lady in your life?’ he asked, nodding toward the horse. ‘She the one who gave you the rosemary?’ Derufin laughed, shaking his head “no”. If anything, he’d told the Hobbit that one would have eaten the rosemary had she found it. The two exchanged a few remarks on what they hoped to get done that day; then, Derufin climbed quickly up the ladder and disappeared onto the roof.

As he finished up the cabinetry in the kitchen, Andwise could hear the man thumping about above him as he moved over each new section he has shingling. The swish and scrape of the tarring brush and long-handled trowel on the roof’s surface were periodically interrupted as the man knelt down to tap the wooden shingles securely into place.

The Hobbit was just finishing up putting the hardware on the cabinet doors in preparation for hanging them when he heard Derufin’s voice call down. ‘Would someone send up a sheaf of shingles?’ he asked. ‘I’ll send down a rope to tie them to.’ Andwise stepped out of the kitchen’s door and found a good-sized stack of the cedar shingles. He bound them securely with thick twine, then hauled them over to where the rope had been dropped. A quick tie-up, and Derufin was hauling the stack up to the roof. ‘My thanks!’ he heard the man call out.

Once the holes were drilled in the cabinet frames, Andwise began attaching the doors with flat-head screws. It was not work that required a great deal of thought, or attention. He fell to thinking about Ferdy and what Cook was going to speak with the lad about.

Well, Lily . . . perhaps I should have paid a bit more attention to this. he thought, conjuring up the sweet face of his dear departed wife. But I always relied on you to handle the more ‘sensitive’ parts of raising the boy. How’s a thick-headed old carpenter like me to know what needs saying? Why, I swear, if it hadn’t been for you letting me know quite plain you were interested, I’d probably still be a bachelor today.

Andwise finished hanging the last of the doors and went outside to enjoy a pipeful. The main door to the cottage would be next, and he wanted to settle his mind before he started drawing the design on it he intended to carve. He filled and lit his little clay pipe and sat contentedly on the small wooden bench beneath the Rowan tree. ‘Needs a bit of sanding,’ he thought to himself, running his hand over the surface of the seat. ‘And a bit of paint, too I think.’ He leaned back against the trunk of the tree and surveyed the progress on the cottage. ‘Be done, I think, in two days. The lads have done good work. And Mister Derufin’s a right good worker.’

He fell to wondering about the man . . . where he’d come from, what had brought him here. He was older than Zimzi, though they seemed well suited to each other from what he’d gleaned in conversation and in overheard gossip in the Inn. There was at times a certain sadness he saw briefly in the man’s face and there had been some talk he had fought in a far away place in the War. ‘Best leave those wonderings to yourself, Andwise,’ he could just hear Lily saying. ‘The day is new and brings fresh hope with it. Just wish him the best for what lies ahead.’ The Hobbit chuckled to himself and nodded his head at her counsel.

Pipe finished, he tapped out the ashes into the garden soil, making sure they were covered and well out. Rested, he took up his chalk from his tool box and began to sketch out the simple design he had planned for door.