The Movie and the Book

A Conspiracy Unmasked

Most of this chapter was left out of the film. In fact, the following three chapters were also left out. In the film it appeared that the hobbits arrived at Bree as soon as they crossed the river but in the book they still had a long way to go. A brief description of what took place in this chapter is given below.

After the hobbits reached the other side of the Brandywine river on the ferry, they saw a black rider on the side of the river that they had just come from.

They arrived at the house in Crickhollow to find that Merry and Fredegar (Fatty) Bolger had prepared food, baths and beds for them.

While they were talking that night, Frodo discovered that Merry, Pippin and Fredegar all knew about his supposedly secret plan to leave the shire. They had guessed a lot of it and learned the rest from their informant Sam. It was this conspiracy lead by Merry that the chapter title referred to. They had already made preparations and arranged for Merry and Pippin to go with them. Fredegar was appointed to stay behind to deal with anyone looking for Frodo and to make it appear as though Frodo still lived there. At first Frodo was worried that he'd been so careless with his secrets but he was also glad that his close friends were willing to go with him despite the danger. This was quite different from the version in the film where Merry and Pippin had no idea where they were going and met up with them by accident.

Useless Trivia

When the hobbits saw a rider on the other side of that river, that rider was none other than Khamûl, chief of the ringwraiths. He was also the same ringwraith that stabbed Frodo on Weathertop.