An Interesting Little Legal Problem

Chapter Six: In Which Remus Has a Well-Intentioned but Somewhat Dubious Inspiration

Harry's three days with the Dursleys were less miserable than usual, thanks to the fact that his blood relatives were still ignoring his presence, while the Evans family invited him over at every possible opportunity. All three of them could usually be found in the garden, ankle-deep in mud.

"We've just been doing some more work on the model, putting in some secret passages" explained Jack. "Your guardian knows all sorts of things about Hogwarts that Lily didn't. We've just added the one behind the Whomping Willow, but this other one that starts on the fourth floor keeps collapsing..."

"That's because it is collapsed," Harry told him. "It caved in my second year."

"You mean the model is self-correcting? Fascinating," said Evans, taking a small note pad out of his pocket and jotting something down. He had taken to keeping notes on everything new he encountered in the wizarding world. "Would you mind helping us with this last one, the one that ends up in the cellar of Honeydukes?"

So Harry spent most of his time in Little Whinging working on the model. There was something intensely satisfying about digging in the dirt. The Evanses rarely pressed him to talk, except when they asked questions about some detail of the Hogwarts grounds or the village, so he had time to reflect on what he had learned in the last few days. He was beginning to feel more comfortable with the idea of owing a life-debt to Lupin. After all, he couldn't imagine a situation where he wouldn't choose to help his guardian ... it was just that having no choice in the matter made him uneasy.

When Harry wasn't digging new passages, he was trying to keep an eye on Mark, who had just been taken to Ollivander's for his first wand and could not resist pointing it at everything in sight. Most of his attempts at spells had no effect whatsoever, but every now and then there was a small explosion, and once he succeeded in turning a garden gnome bright pink and making it tip its hat to the postman. Harry tried to explain why using magic indiscriminately in Little Whinging was not a good idea, but the Evanses, who were clearly indulgent parents, made no attempt to take the wand away. He began to suspect that looking after a cousin at Hogwarts might be more difficult than he had anticipated.

He would have forgiven Jack and Harriet anything, though, after the birthday present they gave him. Harriet handed him an untidily wrapped package without ceremony.

Harry unwrapped a large spiral-bound notebook with slightly yellowed leaves. Most of the pages were filled with flowing script, but there were a few small pencil sketches as well. One of them showed a face strikingly like Harry's own, but he realized, after a moment of blank incomprehension, that it was his father's.

"Your mum's notebook," said Jack. "We've had years to enjoy it, so I thought you'd better have it now. Like it?"

Harry nodded, unable to speak.

On the third afternoon, Tonks stopped by to escort Harry back to London. Evans showed off his new additions to the model, which seemed to interest her very much. "Whoa. How did you know about that passage?"

"Remus told me about it," said Jack.

"Did he?" She looked intrigued. "So he must have got up to a bit of mischief at Hogwarts. I'm starting to be very impressed with him."

"How did you know about it?" Harry asked.

"My cousin told me," she said. "He told me all sorts of things about Hogwarts when I was a kid - when he wasn't teasing me mercilessly. I loved it, of course. He used to tell me he was going to throw me off the balcony of our flat and see if I could fly, but luckily he always caught me at the last minute." She smiled, a little sadly. Harry could almost see Sirius playing with his small cousin. "And then he disappeared. I was only seven and I didn't know exactly what had happened to him -- just that he had done something terrible that my parents would only talk about in whispers. I wasn't even allowed to say how much I missed him."

Harry wondered why Tonks had seemed so surprised that Lupin knew about the passage. Surely she knew he and Sirius were old school friends.

"How's everything going with the house?" Harry asked, to fill the silence.

"Not well," said Tonks. "It attacked Kingsley yesterday - a ladder collapsed right under him. He's OK, but pretty soon it'll be too dangerous to do any more work there. And Mad-Eye Moody keeps saying he sees a lampshade that stalks around at night, but the rest of us think he's just being paranoid. At least, I hope so - not that I can see much harm in a lampshade, but all the same, it's a bit unsettling when the furniture won't stay in one place."

"No good news on this end either," said Evans. "I've had a letter from Draco Malfoy. Actually, it reads like it was really written by his mother, but anyway, it says he's coming to town next week and he demands to see his inheritance. He specifically used the word 'see,' which means he probably knows he can force us to show it."

"Can you think of any more ways to stall him?" Tonks asked.

"One possibility would be raising doubt about whether there was a nearer or older male heir - but it sounds like your family records are pretty thorough."

Suddenly Tonks grinned and screwed up her face. "How's this?" she said. Her hair became short and brown, her body grew taller and less curvy, and she sprouted a pencil mustache. "I bet I could ... oh." Unfortunately, her voice remained distinctly feminine.

Evans chuckled. "Good try, but we'd have to pretend you had a permanent case of laryngitis, and I don't think they'd buy it."

"Guess I'd better go with something more classic," she said, settling on a cluster of dark curls on each side of her head. Harry was surprised; normally her taste in hairstyles and colors did not run to the classic. "Ready to go? D'you want me to carry the owl? Hey, Mark, want to see some flying? Let's go."

They landed on the roof of Lupin's block of flats and climbed down the fire escape. Tonks tapped softly on the door, which slid open. Lupin was asleep on the sofa with Felicity curled up on his chest. A book called The Years from Eleven to Seventeen are Difficult, Even With a Wand was lying on the floor, as if it had fallen from his hand. They tiptoed in, trying not to wake him. "Should we do anything for him?" Tonks whispered. "Tea, maybe?"

"I don't know," said Harry. "I've never spent much time around him after he ... well, yeah, tea sounds like it would be a good idea." He reached for the kettle just as Tonks dropped the owl cage with a crash. Hedwig hooted angrily.

"Shhh," said Harry, but Lupin had woken.

He blinked a little when he saw Tonks' new look. "What ... oh, it's you. No, don't apologize, I'm glad you woke me up. I wanted to talk to you. Hi, Harry. Friends?" he asked in an undertone.

"Yes," said Harry. "How are you feeling?"

"Been better, but I'll survive," said Lupin with a wan smile. "Tonks, I wanted to ask you something about your cousin Draco."

Tonks looked surprised and, Harry thought, slightly disappointed. "To tell you the truth, I don't know him very well. I left Hogwarts the year before he came, and I avoid the Black family gatherings whenever I can, so we haven't met more than half a dozen times."

"But are you on speaking terms with the rest of the family?"

"We haven't actually quarreled, no."

"If you invited Draco to a friend's place for tea, do you think he'd come?"

"What?" said Harry.

"I've been doing some thinking. We've been talking as if it were Draco's parents who had inherited the house in Grimmauld Place, but it really belongs to Draco. I'm wondering if we could - in time - persuade him to let the Order continue to use it, at least until he comes of age. It's not like he has any use for it when he's away at school most of the year."

"Are you out of your mind?!?" Harry asked before he could stop himself. His guardian, for some reason, was looking at him with an oddly pleased expression.

"Possibly," he said briskly. "But hear me out. When I was teaching at Hogwarts, Draco struck me as a profoundly fearful child - afraid of expressing any opinions his father hadn't sanctioned, afraid of going anywhere without Vincent and Gregory to protect him."

It took Harry a moment to remember that Crabbe and Goyle had first names.

"And now his father's spent several weeks in Azkaban and narrowly avoided being sent there for life, which has to have been a great shock for him. I wonder what he'd be like if he got a chance to think for himself. Of course I'm not planning to let him in on anything about the Order just yet, but I was thinking that if he actually met a few of us and we treated him like a human being, we might be able to start bringing him around. I was thinking Severus might be able to help; Draco seems more likely to trust him than any of us."

Harry groaned. Tea with Draco and Snape? He expected Tonks to agree with him that it was a recipe for disaster, but she looked thoughtful. "It is an idea, Remus. At the very least, we should be able to get a feel for what he's actually like."

"Oh, I almost forgot," said Lupin, removing an official-looking envelope from between the pages of The Years from Eleven to Seventeen are Difficult, Even with a Wand. "This came for you yesterday."

Harry tore the envelope open.

Dear Mr. Potter:

We are pleased to announce that you have obtained seven O.W.L.s with the following marks:

Charms = O

Transfiguration = E

Herbology = E

Defence Against the Dark Arts = O

Potions = E

Care of Magical Creatures = E

Divination = P

Astronomy = A (Note: Score adjusted to reflect disruptive testing environment.)

History of Magic = T (Please register for Remedial History of Magic at once.)

You will find a list of N.E.W.T.-level classes for which you are eligible attached. Please circle your choices and send the list back by return owl.

Sincerely,

Griselda Marchbanks, Chair, Board of Examiners

Harry stared dumbly at the letter. He hadn't made an O in Potions, which meant he wouldn't be eligible for Snape's N.E.W.T.-level class, which meant, in turn, that he'd never be an Auror. And he had to take Remedial History of Magic?

"I didn't know you could actually earn a grade of Troll," he said at last, because the others were obviously expecting him to say something. "I thought Fred and George were joking."

"Oh yes," said Lupin cheerfully. "You're looking at the original Potions Troll. The examiners don't like it very much when you spill Vanishing Potions on their clothes - particularly in places that lead to indecent exposure. My dad never completely forgave me; he used to be the Potions Master at Beauxbatons, and he was of the opinion that I'd permanently disgraced the family name. At least you don't have that hanging over you."

"And I am the original Ancient Runes Troll," said Tonks. "I don't know how much this will mean to you if you haven't studied Runes, but the feminine singular and neuter plural pronouns are exactly the same, and the word order is different from what we're used to in English. Do either of you happen to know the first line of the Speech of Otheric the Obsequious to the Council of Elders in 834?"

Harry wondered what sort of person would happen to know anything of the kind, but Lupin wrinkled his forehead for a moment and asked, "Isn't it 'Many men do these things'?"

Tonks nodded. "Well," she said, "I mistranslated it as 'This woman does many men.' Professor Hvarthulf never let me live it down."

Harry began to feel slightly better about Remedial History of Magic.

"What about your other marks?" Lupin asked.

"Not too bad. Four E's, and O's in Charms and Defence Against the Dark Arts."

"Congratulations. Can't say I'm surprised about that last one, though."

"I didn't get an O in Potions, though, and that's the one I really need if I'm going to be an Auror."

"Don't give up hope," said Lupin. "Just between you and me - Minerva won't usually breathe a word about this in front of students, but she's persuaded Severus to bend that requirement in the past. And I think she just might be persuaded to do it again for you."

* * *

"What do you say to a trip to Diagon Alley today?" asked Lupin the next morning. "The Order's having a meeting upstairs from the Three Broomsticks. Nothing terribly exciting, just discussing security measures at Hogwarts for the coming year - and I'd like to run my idea about Draco past some of the other members of the Order."

"Can I come to the meeting?" Harry asked, although he thought he knew what the answer would be.

"'Fraid not. You're not a member - yet - and honestly, the less you know about some of these things the safer you'll be. I will tell you if there's anything that directly concerns you, though. Promise."

So Harry spent most of the afternoon sitting at an outdoor table at Florean Fortescue's ice cream parlor comparing notes about the last couple of weeks with Hermione, Ron, and Ginny. Ron was in an exceptionally good mood because his brothers had offered him a summer job and a room over the joke shop, and he insisted on paying for everything.

Harry explained about Lupin's plan. His friends agreed to come along and give Harry moral support, although they all agreed that the idea was crazy.

"He wants to invite Malfoy to a tea party?" said Ron. "Will there be little lace doilies and china with pink rosebuds?"

Harry felt obliged to defend his guardian. "Well, he didn't say a tea party, exactly, just a friendly cup of tea and a chat. He said he'd always felt sorry for Draco when he was teaching at Hogwarts."

Hermione looked thoughtful. "You know how Hagrid is with monsters?"

Ron snorted. "Yes, of course we know how Hagrid is with monsters. I don't think any of us could forget."

"Well," said Hermione, "I get the feeling Remus is that way with people. He won't believe any of them are as bad as they really are."

"Tonks seemed to think it was a good idea, and she's Draco's cousin." Almost as soon as he'd said this, Harry wondered why he kept bringing up points in favor of a plan that was so clearly idiotic.

"Of course she's going to think it's a good idea," said Ginny. "I'm pretty sure she fancies him."

Ron looked at his sister as if she'd grown a second head. "Tonks ... fancies ... Malfoy?"

"No, you prat, she fancies Profess - Remus."

Harry and Ron spat ice-cream soda across the table more or less simultaneously, and Hermione said, "Oh, honestly, he's practically ancient! What makes you think she'd fancy him?"

Ginny grinned. "Just because you had a crush on Gilderoy Lockhart doesn't make him the only decent-looking Defence teacher we've had. Besides, some of the stuff Harry's been telling us - 'cold nose, healthy dog'? Don't tell me that wasn't flirting."

Ron stared at her. "That's the weirdest kind of flirting I've ever heard of." He dribbled a bit of his drink onto the crumpled paper wrapper from his straw, making it squirm like a caterpillar.

"Well, Tonks is a little weird." Ginny shrugged. "But I don't know that she has bad taste, really."

Ron dropped the paper caterpillar down Hermione's neck. "Ronald Bilius Weasley!" she snapped. "You cut that out before I hex you all the way to Saturn!"

Harry watched his two best friends as they pelted each other with paper napkins. Suddenly he began to suspect that Tonks might not be the only person he knew with a weird method of flirting. He wasn't sure how he felt about this.

Lupin joined them at the table. He was still looking pale and he sat down rather heavily, but he insisted there was nothing wrong with him that ice cream couldn't fix.

"How was the meeting?" Ginny asked.

"Boring."

"Did you get a chance to tell everybody about the plan? What did they say?" asked Harry, hoping against hope that the other members of the Order would have talked some sense into his guardian.

"Well, I invited Severus, but he said he'd really rather not witness this. And then he told me not to send him the cleaning bill if there's any blood drawn."

"Uh-oh," said Harry. "You don't think he might know Draco Malfoy better than we do?"

"Possibly," answered Lupin. "On the other hand - he does have a way of confusing people with their fathers. And I'm not nearly as willing to write off a sixteen-year-old as a dead loss as he seems to be."

Harry had to admit there was a certain amount of justice in this way of looking at things.

"And Mundungus and Alastor said it didn't sound like a bad plan at all, and they'd be happy to come. I'm not sure they're absolutely the right people for this, but I didn't like to say no."

Harry's misgivings about the approaching party deepened. He was quite sure Mad-Eye Moody was not the right person to win over Draco. "Did you invite anybody else?" he asked.

"Bill and Fleur. I thought it would be better to have some younger people around; they might put him more at ease. And Jack Evans and his family are coming, of course - as the Order's solicitor, he has a professional interest in all this."

"Are you sure that's a good idea?" asked Hermione. "You know how Draco is about the pureblood thing."

"We know how his father is about the pureblood thing," Lupin said firmly. "I don't think we really know about Draco at all. The Evanses are such nice people I'm hoping they'll start to open his mind, even if Mark is a bit obsessive about severed heads and things. I did ask them to see that he leaves his wand at home so he can't turn Draco pink."

Harry had a feeling Mark could make all sorts of unexpected things happen even without a wand. This was beginning to seem more and more like a disaster in the making.

The look on Hermione's face suggested she was thinking the same thing. "Do you have ... a lot of experience hosting parties?" she asked diplomatically.

"No," said Lupin, "but there's got to be a first time for everything. Anyway, how hard can it be? You just see that everybody has something to eat and drink, and that everyone treats Draco civilly." He looked around the table, and his eyes rested on Ron and Ginny slightly longer than on the others. "Listen, I'm counting on all of you to be as friendly as possible to our guest, and to guarantee that there will not be any of Fred and George's joke shop products at this party. It's important."