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His name was Frodo, and he was just some nothing hobbit for anybody knew, standing by the water barrel of a tavern at the outskirts of the Hobbiton, The Shire. He had large feet, and his hair was hanging down over his ears to his neck, and he had his hand out trying to thumb a ride from a cart that was stopped at the pump. To see him there, leaning on one hip, a tankard in his hand and a rolled up pipeweed bag near his feet on the dirt road, you could never have guessed that on Tuesday, a day later, most of the Wraiths in Shire county would be hunting him down. Certainly you could not have guessed that by Thursday he would be running from Uruk-Hai of Isengard and six of the Fellowship and good many Orcs of Mordor who liked to shoot. But then from just seeing him there ragged and dusty by the water pump of a tavern, you could never have figured the kind of hobbit Frodo was, or what was about to make it all begin.
Frodo knew there was going to be trouble, though. Big trouble, if somebody didn’t watch out. The cart he was trying to thumb a ride nearly ran him over when it left the pump. The stablehand crammed some coppers and a book of trade stamps into his pocket and grinned and the hoof prints on the hot dirt near Frodo’s feet. Then the wizard’s cart pulled of traffic and towards him and he recognised the start of the pattern again and stiffened. ‘No by Bagginses. Not this time. This time I will not be pushed.’