MIss Mundee Baggins


"Frodo, do you think it might be Bennie's cart?" Fatty asked out loud.

"Over here," I waved him over and motioned him to join us.  "I have a cousin just down the road who had a cart and pony taken last night."

The newcomer introduced himself as Marcho Sandheaver of Overhill, and he was on his way to Frogmorton when he found a cart abandoned on the side of the  road, stuck in mud up to the rear axle.  A pony in harness was found nearby, happily munching on some corn growing by the roadside.  Mr. Sandheaver had graciously and not without a certain amount of trouble extracted the cart and brought it and the corn stuffed pony to the closest public stable which happened to be located here, at the Green Dragon.

"There weren't any signs of the pony breakin’ free," he said as he accepted a mug of ale from Folco. “Looks as if someone just unhitched him and expected him to find his way home.” Marcho chuckled.  “‘e was a bit too ‘appy in that corn patch to want to stray far from it.”

(As we were to discover later, the cart had been left at the edge of a piece of property belonging to Carl Longhole. It was his patch of corn that Bennie’s hungry pony had trampled and eaten.  Mr. Longhole was at all pleased about that.)

He took a swig, and then looked me over.  "Tell me what sort o' pony an' cart your cousin is missin' and I'll tell you if it's th' one I found."

"The pony was a bay and the cart was painted black with a canopy and curtains of blue trimmed with grey fringe."

He nodded.  "That's what I found, alright."

"Tell me, Mr. Sandheaver, did there happen to be a painting in the cart?" I asked, hoping against hope.

He shook his head.  "No, no painting.  Why?  Yer cousin missing a picture, too?"

"No, Frodo is," Folco said. And everyone just had to tell the story of the mysterious traveling painting.

Marcho laughed.  "Well, sorry I didn't find yer portrait, Mr. Baggins.  But, whoever left the cart did leave this."  With that, he reached into his vest pocket and handed me a small leather pouch.  " ‘e must like the best of smokes. It's Old Toby."

One whiff confirmed that fact.  Again, that question of whether Merry or Pippin was involved came to mind, as I tried to remember who carried a pipeweed pouch like this one.  "I'm not sure who the pipeweed belongs to, but I shall see that the pony and cart are returned to my Cousin."

I thanked him and rewarded him a half crown for his troubles and headed to the stables to look over the pony and cart.

The stablehands were cleaning the muck from the cart, and the bay was in a stall having been rubbed down.  I paid them for their troubles also, and once the pony and cart were hitched, I took it upon myself to return them to Bennie. It took a lot of talking to convince her that I hadn't found the culprits and even more to prevail upon her the assurance that I couldn't stay for a visit.  She pouted, but managed to get a promise from me to come to dinner one day next week.

As I made my way back home, it occurred to me that I hadn’t laid eyes on Merry or Pippin the entire day.  And when I let myself in the door, there was still no sign of them anywhere in Bag End. My curiosity was changing to minor irritation.  For having come to visit me, they hadn't spent much of their time in my presence.  Nevertheless, I assumed they would turn up soon enough.  

Dinner came and went. And Merry and Pippin still hadn't appeared. It wasn't like them to miss meals.  Especially when they were free. Sam finished his work and left for home. Twilight drifted into evening and I settled down to read a bit by the fire, intent on being awake when my cousins finally decided to return. I must admit, however that I was getting just a trifle worried.  Yet at some point,  I must have dozed off, for the jangling of my doorbell awakened me.  The fire had died down, and it was definitely late.

"It's about time you came back...," I thought to myself, believing it must be Merry and Pippin yanking on the bell rope, until I remembered they never knocked, or rang.  Instead, it was Mundee’s maid, Sally Underhill.

"Sally, whatever is wrong?"  I asked, alarmed that something might have  happened to her Mistress, Mundee. Now I could add that to my list of worries.

"I can't tell you anything 'cept that Miss Mundee needs you right away," The girl said and she ran off down the hill towards home, not waiting for me to join her.

Naturally, I followed close behind, thinking all sorts of terrible things.  As I neared Mundee's hole, I could hear loud noises coming from within.  Sam and the Gaffer beat me to the door, having been summoned by Sally as well.

"Whatever is going on, Sally?" I asked.

Sally's response was to open the door and call out to her Mistress.

"Tell them to hurry!" Mundee yelled back.  "I don’t know how much longer I can keep them in there!"

Without waiting to follow Sally, I sprinted down the hall to the kitchen.  There was Mundee, leaning against the door of her pantry, which also had a heavy chair propped under the handle.  At the sight of me, she flashed me a grin, but remained stationed at her spot against the door.

Obviously, from the commotion coming from the other side of the door, someone was trapped in there... and it sounded as though her cat, Miss Priss, was in there as well, as I could hear an occasional hiss followed by a nervous, “nice kitty!” being said between the pounding on the door.

"Come on, Mundee, let us out!" a voice cajoled, while another voice let out a squeal of pain.  

"Get it off!  Get it off!" it was saying in a high pitch.  The sound of things being bumped, pushed and knocked over could be heard.

"Shall I?" Mundee asked, a look of amusement on her face and made ready to remove the chair.

"Mundee, what are you doing?” I swiftly put out a hand and grabbed her wrist, stopping her just in time.  “Who is in your cellar?"

"You mean to tell me," she said in mock consternation. "that you don't recognize their voices?"

At my puzzled look, she broke into another grin.  As she gently extracted her wrist from my grip, I was vaguely aware of Sally, Sam and his Gaffer piling into the room behind me.   With one deft movement Mundee pushed the chair away and yanked the door open wide.  Out spilled two hobbits and one very irrate cat.

"Merry?  Pippin?  What are you...?"  

Pippin stood up and scrambled to help a squealing Merry off the floor  It was all too apparent why Merry was squawking like he was, for it seemed his foot had found one of the rat traps Mundee kept in the pantry.  "Get it off!  Get it off!" he kept saying, as he tried to remove it while hopping about the crowded room.

Between Sam and I, we managed to keep him still long enough for Mundee to remove the trap from his foot.

"That'll teach you to go sneaking in my cellar in the middle of the night." Mundee said, waving the trap under his nose.  "Now, fess up as to what you're up to!"

Merry winced and smiled, albeit with gritted teeth.  "Aw, come on, Mundee!  We were only havin' a little fun."

Sally came over with the cat in her arms. Miss Priss looked anything but ‘prissy’at the moment. Her fur was still standing up a ruffled ridge along her back. "You call sneaking in Miss Mundee's cellar 'fun?’  I'll show you fun!"  With that, she slapped Merry upside the head.

Pippin made as to get between Sally and Merry, but when the cat hissed and swiped at him with claws extended, he quickly changed his mind.  "N-nice kitty!" he said as he backed away.

Meanwhile the Gaffer took a peek into the pantry.  "Well, would ye look-ee 'ere!"  He went inside and after a second or two, he emerged holding nothing less than my missing portrait!

It was my turn to chastise the two.  "I had a sneaking suspicion all along that the two of you were involved.  But I preferred to give you the benefit of the doubt, hoping it would turn out I was wrong.”

“Actually, you should be glad it was us that took it.   It might have come to harm at someone else’s hands.”  Merry rationalized, as he rubbed his throbbing foot.

Whatever possessed the two of you to steal my painting and go gallivanting all over the countryside with it?" I demanded to know.

It turned out that it was Merry that had the idea to borrow the painting, intending to return it in a day or two with nobody the wiser as to who had done the borrowing.  But with all the excitement over the missing painting, they had decided to have a bit of fun having it show up here and there.

"The hardest one, of course," Pippin said, "was nipping it out of Bennie's stables."

"Oi woulda thought it been 'arder gettin' it into Bennie's stables," Sam said as he gave each of them a hard scowl.

"Oh, that was easy!" Merry said.  "I knew how the ponies at home loved to drink cider if we gave some to them.  And I knew that it wouldn't take much to get Naur sauced once he had a taste of it."

"Easy for you to say," Pippin said.  "Seein' as it was me you had feeding it to him while you got the ropes tied to the painting!"

"Well, you can tell us the entire story," Mundee said as she prepared to look at Merry's injury.  “while I tend to your foot, Merry. And don't you go too far, Pippin.  I see Miss Priss left her mark on your hand."

"Oi want t’ know," Sam said. "'ow yer goin' ter return this here picture t' Daffodil."

"Well, that's it, you see...," Merry confessed. "Ow!  Be careful, Mundee!  We hadn't rightly decided how to get it back"

"You didn't 'ave trouble pinchin’ it in the first place. And then spiritin' it all over the countryside," Sam pointed out.

“Yes, but nobody was looking for it where we went," Merry said.  "They were all crowding ‘round where it had last been."

"And Daffodil's place, is pretty popular these days,” said Pippin, “ fairly swarming with hobbits curious about Frodo’s ‘traveling’ portrait. You know,” he added, “ you could say we’ve actually done wonders for Daffodil’s art gallery. In a sense, drummed up business for her.”

“Maybe so, But somehow I don’t think Daffodil would see it that way.” Merry remarked.

"You could just up and confess to your tomfoolery." Mundee stated.

"You wouldn't make us spoil the mystery of how it got around so well?" Quipped Merry.

"You wouldn't want me to break another toe for you, would you?"Mundee teased.

Needless to say, we managed to return the painting without Chesman or Daffodil knowing of it.  It wasn't easy, but with the Gaffer's permission, we borrowed Bell's pony.  Merry was given the duty of riding and holding on to the painting while Sam and I led the pony.  Mundee and the Gaffer followed behind with Pippin.

When we were just out of earshot of the gallery, the Gaffer and Sam held the painting while Merry climbed down and hobbled with Pippin and Mundee to one of the windows.  I was left to keep watch.

After some fiddling by Merry, he and Pippin were able to open the window and Pippin was hoisted inside.  He then helped Mundee through the window.  Once they were inside, Sam handed the painting through the opening to them and they placed it where it would be spotted by Daffodil and Chesman when they entered the shop.

I thought I heard a noise coming from nearby so I signaled the others to hurry up.  Pippin popped out the window, but Mundee seemed to be taking her time.  As I came closer and told them to hurry, she finally appeared and Sam and the Gaffer helped her back out.

We managed to scurry off and were well up the road to the Hill before any lights appeared in the vicinity of Daffodil's gallery.  I could only hope we hadn't been spotted as we broke off and each headed to their own holes, leaving me with Merry and Pippin at Bag End.

It is now just past Second Breakfast and Andy Twofoot has just left here leaving word that my portrait was found back in the Gallery, with no clue other than a big, red sash and a little note attached to it as to who had taken it.

It seems that cousin Mundee left a note from the portrait saying that it had gotten lonely and had hitched a ride with a passerby to see the countryside.  It evidently went on to say that it hoped it hadn't caused too much trouble and that it was tired of traveling and was ready to stay put if Daffodil would let it do so.

I will be going into town with Merry, Pippin and Mundee to see for ourselves.  I only hope we can keep a straight face when we see Daffodil.