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Old 04-04-2008, 03:32 PM   #66
littlemanpoet
Itinerant Songster
 
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Join Date: Jan 2002
Location: The Edge of Faerie
Posts: 7,072
littlemanpoet is battling Black Riders on Weathertop.littlemanpoet is battling Black Riders on Weathertop.
All of a sudden Gaffer Hugo was in a dark, closed in place, and he wished he was back outside where he could breathe free. Everybody and their neighbor were crowding around, their faces all full of concern, and it made him feel like he was being smothered.

"Are you hurt?" "Are you all right?" "What happened?"

"Give me some air!" he cried. "And some vittles and drink! I fell off my cart and twisted my ankle is all. I'll be all right, you can be sure, just let me be for a bit!"

Mercifully, Rudy and Burt helped him to a table by a big round window that looked out on the River.

"My but his ankle's swollen something fierce!" "He looks a little white in the face if you ask me." "Someone at his age unattended. Humph!"

Someone gave him a pillow to prop his foot on, and up came Snatch looking as worried as any of the busybodies looking on; but also looking hungry and ready to be fed regardless of the state of his master's ankle.

"Now you be a good boy," Hugo said, "and just lie there next to me so's I can get at my food an' give you a bite now and then."

"Are you sure you're okay?" "Do you need anything else, Gaffer?" "Are you feeling dizzy?"

Before long, food and drink were brought, and Hugo began to feel more himself, though his hip opposite the twisted ankle felt a little wrenched too, but he wasn't about to say anything an' give all these meddlesome folk yet another thing to worry at. Ever since he had sat down, the lightheadedness had dissipated, which helped. He set to with a will on his vittles, and just wished everyone would let be. "Unattended at my age," mumbled, "had better be the way it stays if I have anything to say about it, ain't that so Snatch?"
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