Gloom pervaded the house of M. Morrie, once so fortunate that precious stones were as marbles with which his children played, but now fallen into a sombre and bitter despair, broken only by the strangely discordant singing of the creditors, who feasted and revelled, believing that the house of Morrie was overthrown and that nothing remained but to take the spoils. For, unlike Morrie himself, they were not of the altruistic sort. No longer profitable was the pipe-weed concern Morrie had obtained from Tobaud Hornebloueur. Morrie's sole hope in Middle-earth was the return of the Pharazon; returned that vessel not with good tidings, must the house of Morrie perish, and none could foresee its rising again. With Morrie remained only his wife, his son, his daughter, her fiancé Armalvéguil, and Morrie's faithful - if accurate to a fault – bookkeeper Céléborne.
It was in this state that affairs rested when the representative of the firm of Bombadil and Forn arrived. He was received somewhat less than enthusiastically by Armalvéguil and Bilbette, whom every new face terrified, for every new face meant yet another creditor gibbering over his prey like a very crow of Saroumand. Nevertheless, they did not hinder his approaching M. Morrie. The latter was in his studio, where the Forodois found him unmanned before his ledger, laid low by debts that turned the minds if the living to madness and horror, so that into Morrie's mind a blackness came, and he thought only of hiding and crawling, and of death. Even mushrooms had lost their delight. Such was M. Morrie when Lord Adam Madeupname, the representative of Bombadil and Forn, entered his presence.
