The Lord of the Rings (Illustrated Edition) - J. R. R. Tolkien [387]
Day came, and the fallow sun blinked over the lifeless ridges of Ered Lithui. Then suddenly the cry of brazen-throated trumpets was heard: from the watch-towers they blared, and far away from hidden holds and outposts in the hills came answering calls; and further still, remote but deep and ominous, there echoed in the hollow land beyond the mighty horns and drums of Barad-dûr. Another dreadful day of fear and toil had come to Mordor; and the night-guards were summoned to their dungeons and deep halls, and the day-guards, evil-eyed and fell, were marching to their posts. Steel gleamed dimly on the battlement.
‘Well, here we are!’ said Sam. ‘Here’s the Gate, and it looks to me as if that’s about as far as we are ever going to get. My word, but the Gaffer would have a thing or two to say, if he saw me now! Often said I’d come to a bad end, if I didn’t watch my step, he did. But now I don’t suppose I’ll ever see the old fellow again. He’ll miss his chance of I told ’ee so, Sam: more’s the pity. He could go on telling me as long as he’d got breath, if only I could see his old face again. But I’d have to get a wash first, or he wouldn’t know me.
‘I suppose it’s no good asking “what way do we go now?” We can’t go no further – unless we want to ask the Orcs for a lift.’
‘No, no!’ said Gollum. ‘No use. We can’t go further. Sméagol said so. He said: we’ll go to the Gate, and then we’ll see. And we do see. O yes, my precious, we do see. Sméagol knew hobbits could not go this way. O yes, Sméagol knew.’
‘Then what the plague did you bring us here for?’ said Sam, not feeling in the mood to be just or reasonable.
‘Master said so. Master says: Bring us to the Gate. So good Sméagol does so. Master said so, wise master.’
‘I did,’ said Frodo. His face was grim and set, but resolute. He was filthy, haggard, and pinched with weariness, but he cowered no longer, and his eyes were clear. ‘I said so, because I purpose to enter Mordor, and I know no other way. Therefore I shall go this way. I do not ask anyone to go with me.’
‘No, no, master!’ wailed Gollum, pawing at him, and seeming in great distress. ‘No use that way! No use! Don’t take the Precious to Him! He’ll eat us all, if He gets it, eat all the world. Keep it, nice master, and be kind to Sméagol. Don’t let Him have it. Or go away, go to nice places, and give it back to little Sméagol. Yes, yes, master give it back, eh? Sméagol will keep it safe; he will do lots of good, especially to nice hobbits. Hobbits go home. Don’t go to the Gate!’
‘I am commanded to go to the land of Mordor, and therefore I shall go,’ said Frodo. ‘If there is only one way, then I must take it. What comes after must come.’
Sam said nothing. The look on Frodo’s face was enough for him; he knew that words of his were useless. And after all he never had any real hope in the affair from the beginning; but being a cheerful hobbit he had not needed hope, as long as despair could be postponed. Now they were come to the bitter end. But he had stuck to his master all the way; that was what he had chiefly come for, and he would still stick to him. His master would not go to Mordor alone. Sam would go with him – and at any rate they would get rid of Gollum.
Gollum, however, did not intend to be got rid of, yet. He knelt at Frodo’s feet, wringing his hands and squeaking. ‘Not this way, master!’ he pleaded. ‘There is another way. O yes indeed there is. Another way, darker, more difficult to find, more secret. But Sméagol knows it. Let Sméagol show you!’
‘Another way!’ said Frodo doubtfully, looking down at Gollum with searching eyes.
‘Yess! Yess indeed! There was another way. Sméagol