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‘Yes,’ said Pippin sadly, ‘we did. He was a great friend, and he was our guide.’

‘Then I can answer your other questions,’ said Treebeard. ‘I am not going to do anything with you: not if you mean by that “do something to you” without your leave. We might do some things together. I don’t know about sides. I go my own way; but your way may go along with mine for a while. But you speak of Master Gandalf, as if he was in a story that had come to an end.’

‘Yes, we do,’ said Pippin sadly. ‘The story seems to be going on, but I am afraid Gandalf has fallen out of it.’

‘Hoo, come now!’ said Treebeard. ‘Hoom, hm, ah well’ He paused, looking long at the hobbits. ‘Hoom, ah, well I do not know what to say. Come now!’

‘If you would like to hear more,’ said Merry, ‘we will tell you. But it will take some time. Wouldn’t you like to put us down? Couldn’t we sit here together in the sun, while it lasts? You must be getting tired of holding us up.’

‘Hm, tired? No, I am not tired. I do not easily get tired. And I do not sit down. I am not very, hm, bendable. But there, the Sun is going in. Let us leave this – did you say what you call it?’

‘Hill?’ suggested Pippin. ‘Shelf? Step?’ suggested Merry.

Treebeard repeated the words thoughtfully. ‘Hill. Yes, that was it. But it is a hasty word for a thing that has stood here ever since this part of the world was shaped. Never mind. Let us leave it, and go.’

‘Where shall we go?’ asked Merry.

‘To my home, or one of my homes,’ answered Treebeard.

‘Is it far?’

‘I do not know. You might call it far, perhaps. But what does that matter?’

‘Well, you see, we have lost all our belongings,’ said Merry. ‘We have only a little food.’

‘O! Hm! You need not trouble about that,’ said Treebeard. ‘I can give you a drink that will keep you green and growing for a long, long while. And if we decide to part company, I can set you down outside my country at any point you choose. Let us go!’

Holding the hobbits gently but firmly, one in the crook of each arm, Treebeard lifted up first one large foot and then the other, and moved them to the edge of the shelf. The rootlike toes grasped the rocks. Then carefully and solemnly, he stalked down from step to step, and reached the floor of the Forest.

At once he set off with long deliberate strides through the trees, deeper and deeper into the wood, never far from the stream, climbing steadily up towards the slopes of the mountains. Many of the trees seemed asleep, or as unaware of him as of any other creature that merely passed by; but some quivered, and some raised up their branches above his head as he approached. All the while, as he walked, he talked to himself in a long running stream of musical sounds.

The hobbits were silent for some time. They felt, oddly enough, safe and comfortable, and they had a great deal to think and wonder about. At last Pippin ventured to speak again.

‘Please, Treebeard,’ he said, ‘could I ask you something? Why did Celeborn warn us against your forest? He told us not to risk getting entangled in it.’

‘Hmm, did he now?’ rumbled Treebeard. ‘And I might have said much the same, if you had been going the other way. Do not risk getting entangled in the woods of Laurelindórenan! That is what the Elves used to call it, but now they make the name shorter: Lothlórien they call it. Perhaps they are right: maybe it is fading, not growing. Land of the Valley of Singing Gold, that was it, once upon a time. Now it is the Dreamflower. Ah well! But it is a queer place, and not for just anyone to venture in. I am surprised that you ever got out, but much more surprised that you ever got in: that has not happened to strangers for many a year. It is a queer land.

‘And so is this. Folk have come to grief here. Aye, they have, to grief. Laurelindórenan lindelorendor malinornélion ornemalin,’ he hummed to himself. ‘They are falling rather behind the world in there, I guess,’ he said. ‘Neither this country, nor anything else outside the Golden Wood, is what