When the wind from the north rattled the shutters, the two rangers
would sit by the fire for hours, hunched over a chessboard marked in
black and white squares. At first, Barliman had been
annoyed. He was lucky if they ordered a second pint during the
evening, and he worried that their grim looks might scare away honest
folk. Until he saw how the other guests were watching their match
with great interest.
The rangers called it “the game of kings” and Strider had offered to
teach him, but all those pieces and rules were too much for Barliman to
remember. Kings, castles, knights, pawns—it was enough to
make your head spin! But Breelanders, dwarves, Shirefolk,
and southerners gathered about the table to watch and sometimes even
play. Whenever a dwarf sat down at the chessboard, there were
long discussions about which moves were lawful, and the Shire hobbits
insisted on using their own names for some of the pieces—thain for king and archer
for knight. The matches lasted for hours and sometimes even
days. Barliman was puzzled. This pastime seemed as amusing
as watching the grass sprout on the Greenway, but if it kept his guests
happy, who was he to complain?
Then the two rangers would disappear, leaving the chessboard sitting on
the table. Barliman guessed they were off in the wild, doing
whatever it was that rangers did. The less he knew of their
business, the better, he supposed. The innkeeper would not see
them for days and sometimes even months; and then one evening, he would
look across the common room, and there they were playing chess, as if
they had never left. Except that their boots were more worn
and their faces a little more grim. “The game of kings.”
Barliman would mutter as he brought two tankards of ale. “That’s
a funny name for a game played by rangers.”