Chapter 11: The Abyss Stares Back

Gollum's room had been left all made up for him, with his clothes and his rock collection still in it and everything. Even his notes and scribbles had been left on the table. He had gone and checked that everything was still there so many times- and it all still was! Not even the dead bugs he kept near the rocks had been thrown out. No one had looked under the bed, perhaps.

He was sitting at the table now, wrapped up in the blanket from his bed and holding a mug with some kind of meaty liquid in it. His hair was still damp from being washed. Everyone was looking after him as if nothing had happened, they spoke to him softly, and they'd given him a bath, and insisted he put on clean clothes, and offered food and drink. Some of them had even acted as if they were glad to have him back! He had asked if anyone had been punished for letting him go, thinking that that might be why they wanted him back, but they all insisted that they had not.

Gollum might have thought he was dreaming, but this was not the sort of thing he dreamt about.

A knock came on the door. Gollum jumped and hissed through his teeth. Moving like that jarred his back, and his belly where the mugger had kicked him. The Men had poked at the bruises and said they weren't serious, which was nice to know, but the poking had been unpleasant.

Tepid liquid from the mug had sloshed over the back of his hand when he jumped- he looked at it stupidly for a minute, then began to lick it up- he didn't want to have visible spills on him when someone came into the room.

"Sméagol?" a soft voice called through the door.

That sounded like Frodo. And Sam spoke next: "He might be sleeping."

"He might be but I'd imagine he's too anxious," said Frodo. "Although maybe he doesn't have trouble sleeping on that account..."

"Master?" Gollum called.

"May I come in?" Frodo answered.

"Yes, yes!" Gollum got down onto the floor and, moving stiffly, went to open the door, but the next moment Sam had already opened it and Gollum had to scurry backwards to avoid being hit in the face. The two hobbits entered the room, with painful light spilling in behind them from the hallway. The door closed, and Gollum went forward to place his hand on Frodo's knee.

"Master, it is the master," he said.

"Hello to you," said Frodo. "And how... er... may I ask how you're doing?"

"O, master! I, I have made a terrible mistake, and now I don't know what will happen to Sméagol."

"I have heard of what happened. You don't need to put yourself through the ordeal of telling me again, if you don't wish it. You don't look well."

"O, no," said Gollum. "We don't. All of the Men who saw us in the city thought we was half dead!" Frodo did not seem angry with him... but the nice master was always slow to anger.

"Yes, you are pale and haggard, to most eyes," said Frodo, "but I know you and I think you seem unusually poorly."

"Baggins said the Master was ill," Gollum said, remembering. Frodo looked well enough to him, if a bit tired, perhaps. "Is he?"

"Why, no," said Frodo. "I'm surprised Bilbo would tell you that."

"He said he was- not himself, or something like that- it was something of that sort. Then he is not ill?"

"No," said Frodo. "I'm not. Are you?"

Gollum shook his head. "No, only beaten and bruised, we are. Nice hobbit. Why is the master here?" He went back to the chair he had been sitting in and pulled himself up onto the seat. Frodo and Sam stood back from him at a respectful distance.

"I have been speaking with Aragorn," said Frodo, "and it seems you do not always believe what he says, so I have come to tell you again that you will not be punished for leaving."

"No?" Gollum asked. "The nice Master asked him not?" He had not considered that Frodo was friends with Aragorn and might intervene on his behalf. This was something he believed Frodo to have the power to do, but it would not have occurred to him that Frodo might do it without being asked.

"There was no need to intervene," said Frodo. "Aragorn wasn't angry with you."

"We bit someone. There was blood all over!"

"Yes- you were defending yourself."

Gollum squinted at him. "Of course we was. What does- what does that matter?"

"Well," said Frodo, "I can try to explain it, if you'd like. May I sit?"

"Yes," said Gollum, glancing at the chairs. There were only two and he was perched in one of them. "But there is no chair for Sam." It seemed that whoever had furnished the room had not expected the occupant to have very many visitors.

"Hm," said Frodo. "You're right, I hadn't noticed that there are not enough chairs."

"That's alright, I'll stand," Sam grunted.

This annoyed Gollum, although he could not have said why. "He may sits on the bed if he'd like," he said very politely.

"Thanks, but I don't want to sit."

Fine. That was the least of his worries anyway. "What is this about defending ourselfs?" Gollum demanded. "Why does that matter?"

"It is not evil to defend yourself when you're attacked," said Frodo. "Those Men plainly meant to hurt you, or even kill you."

"Yes, wicked cruel things." Gollum frowned and sipped from his mug. "They believes us, then?"

"I believe you," said Frodo, "but in fact, we do not need to take your word, for the Men who attacked you have been caught when they were trying to do other mischief, and they admitted that they went after you when you were doing nothing wrong."

Gollum nodded. "We wasn't," he said, mostly to himself. "We was just looking for pigeons, eh, dirty nasty pigeonses that nobody wants, wasn't stealing nothing."

"You have some notion of justice," said Frodo, "and fairness. I know you must."

Gollum winced.

Frodo continued. "You know it's wrong to attack someone weaker who's doing no harm. You told us so, when first we met, did you not?"

"I suppose," said Gollum. He felt as if he had been caught doing something wrong, somehow.

"Is that not why I spared you?" Frodo asked. "Because you were unarmed, and I had a sword. To strike you down may have been deserved, at that time, but to me it seemed wrong; you were at my mercy. I chose not to harm you."

"Yes..." He remembered that well enough.

"Those Men had the advantage of you in strength, and knew it, and they chose to use their strength to hurt you. You fought them off. Men understand justice too, at least some of them do. Aragorn certainly does, and so do his advisors. He asked me what I thought about the matter- and Sam, too- but he had already decided you had done nothing wrong in this case."

"Sss," Gollum said to himself.

"Do you not agree, Sméagol?" asked Frodo.

"No one ever says 'he is defending himself' about us."

"They are saying it now," said Frodo. "You believe I would say so."

"Yes."

"My friends say so too. I do not make friends of people who do not believe in fairness and mercy. Aragorn and Gandalf have treated you with mercy in the past, haven't they?"

Gollum said nothing. He did not care for being put into Elf-dungeons, although, in hindsight, it was true that Aragorn and Gandalf could have done worse. And he had hardly been cooperative with them. But why should he have been? They'd captured him.

He also wondered if Frodo considered Sméagol a friend, and someone who believed in mercy- Gollum was not sure he did believe in it- he also did not think he was Frodo's friend, theirs was a business relationship of sorts. Gollum didn't think he had any friends, in the usual sense.

He shifted in his seat and grumbled.

"You needn't worry about why you're not being punished," said Frodo, "if you find it hard to understand. All you need to know is that you will not be punished. You will not be imprisoned or cast out. You may be scolded, a bit, because there are those who think it is foolish for you to have gone off by yourself like that."

"I'm one of them that thinks so," said Sam. Of course he was. "What were you about, Sméagol? Look at you, you're all bedraggled and you're the color of a dead fish."

"I said I would do something for your Aragorn and I was going out to do it," said Gollum, wriggling and scowling. "We doesn't get lost normally. We was just finding our ways about the place, that was it- but then those big Men jumped us, they were- they were so big and rough!" His eyes filled with tears. "Couldn't find our way back after."

"They're gone," said Frodo. "No one will come after you here, you are safe here. And you will not be cast out."

"Yes, Master- gollum," he wept. "Master-"

"Yes?"

"Aragorn jumped us once, he did. Caught us by our neck, and all, gollum!"

"Yes. That was different. It was an important matter, and you need to forgive him."

"Yes, yes," said Gollum impatiently. "But it didn't look any different to Sméagol then, did it, eh? We bit him. What if I had killed him? That would be bad, wouldn't it? It would, he is the King! We did not know. It causes, eh, big problems, to kill a King. Lots of problemses."

"It does," said Frodo.

"Can't know who might be a King somewheres before we kills him," said Gollum.

"Perhaps you shouldn't speak about these things so loudly," said Frodo.

Gollum lowered his voice to a whisper. "So Sméagol should not kill anyone? He should go to jail? Yes? Sam? Shouldn't I go to jail? Sam? Sam?"

"I heard you," said Sam. "Why should you go to jail?"

"Because I've done murder," said Gollum, who felt a little bit as if he were losing his mind.

"When you were in the city?"

"No, no no! Before, before Precious went away." He clutched the edge of the table. "And you knows it, you knows it, you always have, you looks at me like I'm a worm." He coughed, which hurt.

"Do I?" Sam grunted. "Sorry. Don't mean to. Aragorn knows about that and he thinks you shouldn't be punished, and he's the King now, and all. And he's not mad that you bit him back when, if that's what you're wondering. Just try not to hurt people if you can help it, though if they jump on you, that's their business."

"Sam jumped on us once," said Gollum.

"I did."

Gollum looked from Sam to Frodo and back again. They were both so calm, looking at him with quiet pity. "So it's good for us to bite Sam?" he said despairingly.

"No," said Frodo.

"Ach! You all look as if it makes sense, it does not, it makes no sense to Sméagol. People doesn't like it when I defend myself. No. But now it is alright? I am so tired."

"You're asking us what right and wrong are, and those are hard questions for everyone who asks them," said Frodo. "Don't feel as if everyone else has all the answers and you have none. We don't, really. We only do the best we can. So do you, and your best is better than you fear it is, or you would not be here."

Gollum whimpered. Sam started roving around the room with his hands in his pockets.

"For myself," said Frodo, "I think it's better not to hurt anyone at all, if that can be managed. But of course you're allowed to try to fight off someone who's attacked you. If that leads you to do harm, that is unfortunate, but if you couldn't avoid it, you shouldn't be punished. It's clear what happened, and you didn't attack those Men. Neither were you stalking them. You were going about completely unrelated business, without even knowing who those Men were or being concerned about them, and they started a fight because they thought you might have something they would like and they wanted to take it away, which is different from Sam starting a fight with you because he was angry that you were following us."

"Following," said Gollum. "Yes. Yes, we was following the hobbits, precious, so then it- it is different?"

"I'd say so," said Sam.

Gollum slumped with his chin resting on the table.

"It's normal to be upset that you had to defend yourself and to wish you hadn't had to hurt anyone," said Frodo. "Do you feel that way?"

"Yes," said Gollum. That was plainly what Frodo would like to hear, and it was not exactly a lie, not really- though the whole truth would have been that he did not know what he felt so horrible about, exactly. But since he didn't know, it might be what Frodo thought. So it wasn't a lie to say that it was.

But it was a bit of a lie...

"What's this a picture of?" Sam asked. He had appeared just next to Gollum and was looking at the papers on the table, pointing to one of them.

Gollum hissed. If Sam could not tell, it must not be a very good drawing- or maybe Sam was too silly to know what it was- or maybe the light of the single candle in the room was not enough for him to see it by. But it was rude of him to point it out. "There was a pool," he said, pulling over the sheet of paper. "It had water coming out of it. Up and out, like this. Sam hasn't seen it, maybe, and then he wouldn't know what it is."

"Oh," said Sam. "I was looking at it sideways. It's a fountain, isn't it?"

"A fountain, precious?"

"Those big statues with the jets coming out, those are fountains. They're nice."

"Yes," said Gollum. "We had a bath in one. The water fell onto our head like tiny waterfalls, it did."

"Here now, Sméagol, I think people get their drinking water from those," said Sam with an odd look. "And water for cooking and all."

"Yes, it was nice water, tasty and cool," said Gollum.

"Hadn't you ever seen a fountain before?"

"Yes, yes, we have, but we could not go up and look at it, had to hide." He looked over the drawing. "There was one in Lake-town, much smaller and plainer, yes, and one like this in... the other city. His city." His voice dropped to a whisper.

"The one that was once Minas Ithil?" Frodo asked.

Gollum nodded.

"I suppose the cities were built to look alike at one time," said Frodo.

"No waters came out of that one," said Gollum. He picked up his pencil. "It was smashed and shattered!" He drew a heavy line down the middle of the fountain, trying to reproduce the jagged outline of rubble.

Now it was a very bad drawing indeed.

Sam glanced over the table. "Those there are spider webs, aren't they?"

Gollum looked up. "Yes. Can't Sam tell? They look just like spider's webs!"

"They do. Why'd you draw so many?"

"I was- trying to get it right, gollum," Gollum stammered. "Get it right."

"Where's the spider?" Sam asked.

"Why? Why?"

"Well, you drew a whole lot of spider webs, so I just wondered if there was a spider on one of these somewhere, and what kind of spider, and what you're doing, and why there are so many."

"No spider, not here, not here." Gollum looked to Frodo. Did he know about Shelob? Did he suspect? Had Sam guessed? He shouldn't have left all of those pages out, perhaps. He had just been thinking about how the dark lines of the pencil against the white paper reminded him of Her web of shadow against the rocks, and he'd wanted to draw it...

"You look tired," said Frodo. He seemed to be avoiding looking at the spiderwebs.

Gollum nodded. "Will we, eh- will we still look for orcses?"

"Do you still want to?"

Gollum hesitated. Not at all, I want to sleep and never leave my room again, he thought, and said: "O yes! We promissed."

"That's up to the Men," said Frodo.

"Yes, master."

"I think you should try to get some sleep if you can," said Frodo. "Try to be at ease. You can try trusting a little more- it won't hurt you, and it will help you. I would have been lost many times over if I wasn't willing to trust others."

Gollum discreetly moved the picture of the fountain to cover some of the spiderwebs. "Aragorn won't punish us, eh?"

"No," said Frodo. "He'll probably come and tell you that himself, when he is able to find the time. He wants to discuss your venture into the city."

"Yes, yes, that. I wish I had not done it..."

"Nothing for it now," said Sam.

"No, there's nothing for any of it now," Gollum grumbled. He put his head in his hands. It came to him, in an impression more than sight or sound or any sense he could name, that Frodo was reaching out to touch him. He thought it would be an insult to withdraw, and he steeled himself not to, but he tensed. 

Frodo withdrew without making contact. "Shall we leave now, Sméagol, or would you prefer not to be alone?"

"We're going to sleep," he said. "Sméagol is weary. The hobbits can stay if they wish, but they would not have very much to do."

"No, I suppose not," said Frodo. "Good night. And- Sméagol-" He broke off, closing his mouth and looking far away.

"Yes?"

"I am sorry," said Frodo abruptly. "I have neglected your upbringing."

"We does like to see the master more often," said Gollum, as he had been given an opening- though he did not know what Frodo meant by 'upbringing'. "He does not visit, no, and he does not always come when we asks for him. But-" He sensed Sam's displeasure. "He is very busy and cannot always see us, that is alright, good Sméagol understands he is not very important, and he has been gone for some days so the master could not see him then, no precious; did the master get our message?"

"What message?" Frodo asked.

"Asked the Man to say the master needn't worry." Frodo looked confused. "Ach," said Gollum, "he didn't pass it on. Men is stupid. We told someone to tell the master he needn't worry. Next time I needs something said I'll get it to you myself, that's what needs doing. Good night, master."

"Good night," said Frodo. "I will meet with you again. I give my word."

"Yes, master," said Gollum rather carelessly, not expecting Frodo to keep his word.

The door closed. Gollum flipped over the drawings of spiderwebs with the intent to hide them, and found, of course, that he had drawn webs on both sides of the page, so flipping them over would not hide them at all.

The hobbits were talking to someone out in the hallway. A Man, with a slightly familiar voice- they sounded strange when heard through walls, so if he sounded familiar at all, Gollum probably knew him well.

"Good evening to you," Sam was saying, rather stiffly. "We were just leaving, sir, if you don't mind letting us past."

"I suppose you're here to see Sméagol," Frodo said. "We have just been to see him. He was weary and said he intended to sleep, he might not want another visitor."

"I've heard he bites when he doesn't want to see someone," said Sam.

Gollum squirmed and frowned.

"I don't wish to disturb him," said the Man, "perhaps I should go..."

"Beggin' your pardon," said Sam, "you might let us by first, as we're leaving."

"It's all right, Sam," Frodo said quietly.

Gollum was, indeed, not certain that he wanted a visitor at the moment, but he was now curious what the Man wanted, and why Sam was so uppity about him. He also knew the Man would come back later if he really had business with Gollum, so he took the initiative to slip out into the hallway and see what was going on.

"Why, it is Boromir," he cried at once. Boromir stood at the end of the hall, looking like a large mastiff submissively crouching before two tiny fuzzy kittens. Moving at a cautious pace, mindful of his aching bruises and sore hands and feet, and also keeping an eye on Sam, Gollum crept forward past the hobbits. He placed a hand on Boromir's boot and looked up at him. "Everyone's coming to visit with Sméagol," he said. The hierarchies of Men were confusing to him, but he knew Boromir was important and usually had Gollum brought to him, ergo, this was a special favor of one kind or another. Unless- "Boromir is not angry with us, is he? He has not seen us in some time- no."

"Of course I am not angry," Boromir said.

"No one is angry," said Gollum. "No one at all! Thought we'd be in trouble. Sméagol hardly knows what to do with himself when he's not in trouble."

Sam made a restless motion. Gollum realized that he had sat in a spot where the hobbits were now thoroughly blocked off from going down the hallway and to the stairs, which had already been a point of contention. He had forgotten all about it in his desire to make friendly overtures to Boromir, and had not been intentionally annoying Sam, but he could not have done a better job if he had done it on purpose.

"Come in, come in, then," he said, "we mustn't let the nice Man kick about in the hallway, precious," and carelessly added: "if he comes in Ssam can have his stairs that he wants so much." He beckoned Boromir along, and turned back to his room, with a deferential bob of his head in Frodo's direction as he passed by. Boromir followed.

As the door shut, at once Sam said: "Those are Sméagol's peace-making skills, if you like, Mr. Frodo."

"I suppose so," Frodo said with a laugh. "He's right, you know, the stairs are wide open now. Come along, Sam." Their footfalls were too quiet to be heard through the door, but Frodo's voice was moving away.

"Boromir did something to stick a bone in Sam's throat, did he?" said Gollum with a sideways glance.

Boromir looked sad. "Samwise is the most tenaciously loyal person I've ever met. He will never forget my threat to his master, and he may never forgive it. He has every right not to."

"He may not!" said Gollum, hopping up onto one of his chairs- he had forgotten he was sore, but the impact of his hop reminded him at once. He winced. "Sam is angry about so many things, he is. Doesn't forget, doesn't forgive, doesn't care whether it is your fault or not, does Sam. But then sometimes he seems not to mind at all, and helps, and I never know what he is about or why. He wanted Sméagol dead, but then would not let him die. He is a silly hobbit. Boromir should forget about him." His tone was breezy. He would not have thought he cared about having anything in common with a Man any more than he would care about having something in common with a horse or a wolf, but he felt strangely pleased that Boromir, too, had faced Sam's prickly side. And it was a relief to be able to complain. Frodo, he knew, would never hear a word against Sam, and Gollum ought not even to try it.

"I cannot rightly call him silly. He is correct to think as he does about me," said Boromir.

"No, no," said Gollum, "he is wrong. Wrong. What is it, eh, what is it he thinks?"

"That I claim to protect the innocent and then I attack them."

"Is that what he says? Nassty old noser!"

"He has never said such," said Boromir, quickly, "but-"

"But he looks at you," said Gollum, "and you knows what he thinks. You knows it. Don't you?"

"I have suspected. But if that is what he thinks, why should he not? I told you what I did to Frodo. Is Sam not correct?"

"O no. No no," said Gollum, with much the same air as a parent responding to a child who thinks there is a monster under the bed. (Although Gollum did fit neatly under beds, and enjoyed the darkness and privacy.) "That is not his fault."

"Why not?" Boromir asked.

"It had a- a tricksy sense of humor, it could have, it liked it when it could make you do something you said you would never do- the thing you most wanted not to do, which means without it- you would never have done it- never."

"You speak of the Ring?"

Gollum flinched at the word. "Yes- yes, that- Sam may put on airs because he did not want it, that is all well and good for him, he is not normal. Everyone wanted it. Everyone was tearing up the world looking for my Precious." He licked at his blistered fingers. Tearing Sméagol apart, too, when he did not have it, he thought, and now no one will ever have it. I wonder if it hurt Him when the Precious died. He should have left poor Sméagol alone.

"You and Samwise Gamgee have no great love for each other, I have heard," Boromir said tactfully.

"Heard that from Sam? He told us we should hang," said Gollum. "All sorts of other things too, he said. Even if Sméagol deserves it, it is rude to tell him. Isn't it? I did not talk about doing nasty things to him, eh? Not where he could hear it, did I, eh?" He noted Boromir leaning on his cane. "He may sits," said Gollum with an expansive gesture. "Rude not to tell him he may sit. There is a chair, or it may be too low for him, such a tall Man he is. There's bed, too."

Boromir settled himself gingerly on the end of the bed.

"Be patient with Sméagol," said Gollum. "He does not remember his manners, he has not had guests in ever so long." Actually never, unless Bilbo Baggins, who had just barged in one day without a by-your-leave, counted as a guest. Sméagol had never been one for entertaining. If there was anything else he should be doing at this point, he had no idea what it was.

"Naturally," said Boromir. "And in my turn, I am not over-familiar with the customs of your people, as I know only the Shire-folk, and have not had the advantage of knowing them long, so I hope you will be forgiving if I cause offense."

"Offense, never! Such pretty manners he has," said Gollum. "Is he a prince?"

"No. I am the General of the King's armies," said Boromir. "My brother is his Steward."

"Yes, yes." It was possible he had been told this before, and forgotten. It did not matter very much to Gollum, though he did reflect that to his eyes Boromir was not particularly warlike. He would not have fit in in the armies of Mordor. "Didn't know Aragorn was the King, so now Sméagol thinks he has to ask. Anyone might turn out to be a King."

"I may tell you," said Boromir, "I myself was surprised, once upon a time, to discover that Aragorn was the King, though under different circumstances."

"O?" Gollum was not at all sure what to make of this. "He is good at hiding it, then."

"Indeed."

"But why did Boromir come to see us? He isn't here for Sméagol to chat with him about who is a King or not, my precious."

"No, indeed not," said Boromir. "I came in part to see how you were faring, and I am pleased to see you in such high spirits."

"Sméagol is well enough, a bit sore, he is."

"I had heard you were downcast and badly shaken, and I am pleased to see you are not so."

"We thought something bad would happen to us, that we has done something you wouldn't like, but the hobbits said we shouldn't be punished and that the Man we bit was asking for it."

"Of course you won't be punished. Have you not a right to defend yourself? If I had been with you my sword would have done the biting on your behalf."

Gollum said nothing at first. It was still strange to him- he knew he had been somewhere he shouldn't be and had not done anything useful since he'd been taken in here. He had meant it when he had told Frodo that the decision to defend himself was not usually very popular.

During the fight, he had not given it a second thought (or a first thought) - someone was trying to hurt him and he must hurt that person back until he was safe again. Immediately after, with the taste of blood in his mouth, he had felt he had done wrong, and had assumed all of the Men would think so too. Part of him still wondered if he was being subjected to a long practical joke.

"Eh- was there something else?" he asked.

"Why did you slip off alone so? Are you truly so determined to find orcs?"

"I thought- yes- I thought I could- I thought it would be easier to go alone. Thought peoples had forgotten about us and wouldn't take us."

"You are not so easy to forget," said Boromir.

"Too busy for Sméagol, then."

"We were arranging matters. But you were unwilling to wait."

"Didn't know anything was happening. No one would tell us about it," said Gollum.

"Do you still wish to do the task?"

"Yes," said Gollum, glancing sideways at Boromir's eager face.

"The danger still does not daunt you?"

"No," said Gollum. "We knows orcs better than we knows Men. Won't be caught like that by orcs. Everyone in the city was being nice to Sméagol, and the King said they had to, and when they talked to us I went right up to them like a stray dog, like a fool-" Gollum caught himself. He had said more than he had meant to.

"I am sorry."

"I don't know how to stay hidden in this city, either," said Gollum, "I doesn't know it well enough. If there was rocks, trees that were not shaped, good cool water, no one in your City would have known Sméagol was there at all."

"Naturally."

"I let people see me too," said Gollum, wondering now at his own daring. "The King said they couldn't hurt us so I talked to them where they could see me and they didn't do anything. They gave us food and water, precious. Their own food and water, like they was hobbits."

"I am pleased to hear it. It is what I would expect of the people of Gondor- what I would require of them, if I could. I find it shameful that anyone hurt you."

Gollum rubbed his fingers together and said nothing. Things had gotten so far out of his understanding that he no longer had an opinion on them.

"I have a brother, whom I hold in high regard," said Boromir, leaning forward. "I would like you to speak to him."

"Why?"

"He has a rare ability to tell whether others are truthful. I believe you are trustworthy, but his opinion would be even more convincing to others than mine. Would you speak with him?"

"There are some who thinks we shouldn't have bitten the Man in the city, then?" Gollum asked, with a funny deflating feeling.

"No, no," said Boromir earnestly, "that is not in question in the slightest. No, there are some who are uncertain what to think about your offers to help me."

"Ach. Is that it," said Gollum, displeased, but not surprised- he had after all said he was going to do the job and had come back without doing it. Seems as if things goes worse if we says we want to help than if we just sits in here and lets them feed us, he thought. Sméagol should have left well enough alone, he should. Too late now.

"And," Boromir added, "I myself cannot help but feel that it is unwise to allow you to do something so dangerous, and I would like him to see you and give me his opinion on that account. Will you speak to my brother?"

Gollum spent a moment licking his injured fingers before he replied. "Now?"

"No, later."

"Later? Then we will, yes, yes! We wants to help, we will talk to anyone, only Sméagol is tired, just now... doesn't want to meet anyone new right this minute."

"Of course," said Boromir, "you need not- though you have met him once before, in fact."

"We may not remember," said Gollum. "We may not know him when we sees him- if he met us when we was sick we won't remember at all. We do not know Man-faces very easy, not always." In fact, there had been a few occasions when he'd recognized Boromir by the cane.

Boromir seemed to be thinking things over for quite a while before he replied. "You met him under circumstances that you found unpleasant. I am not sure whether to say more, it is not my story to tell. Perhaps you will know him, after all, when you see him. He is a good Man, and will treat you fairly. He is stronger and better than I."

"That is well, then," said Gollum, trying to sound careless. Unpleasant circumstances?

Likely we really will not remember, he thought. In any case he had already promised.

Boromir sighed and got to his feet. "But now all my business is settled. I must take my leave, I ought to let you rest."

"We can rest while he's here, we don't mind it, but he has better things to do than watch us sleeps, I suppose," said Gollum, and yawned. 

"Better things to do? I am not sure," said Boromir, "I have an appointment with my father that I am going to from here, but that is not your affair."

"Good nights, then... or day... I have forgotten which it is, and it is hard to tell from inside a room, and I do not care."

"Good night, or day," said Boromir, heading for the door. He paused. "In fact I do have one more small question, if it is not too much trouble."

"Ask, ask," said Gollum.

"You speak from authority when you say the Ring makes you do the very thing you do not want to do- did it do that to you?"

Gollum said nothing.

"I apologize," said Boromir. "I chose of my own free will to share my weaknesses with you, you are not obligated to do the same."

Gollum did not want to answer that question because he could not think of any moral stand he had ever taken that the Ring had reversed or tricked him into going against. In fact, he was fairly certain that he had no morals. "I can't remember," he said vaguely. He was now not sure why he'd said all of that at all. "Maybe I will remember, when I am not so tired, and sore, good night."

"Good night," said Boromir. "Thank you for your time." He left, and Gollum went to bed but could not get to sleep right away. He had never really noticed before that he had no morals, or, if he had noticed, it had not bothered him.

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