A Thousand Words

Chapter 11: But Who Can Name the Face?

The first thing Draco noticed when he arrived at the scene of the Malkin murder was that everything looked disconcertingly normal. Aside from the large throng of Christmas shoppers fighting to get a look into the store and the thick ropes preventing them from doing so, nothing was amiss - no shattered windows, unhinged doors, or turned over flower pots.

'Excuse me,' Draco muttered as he accidentally elbowed an old witch carrying an unusually large purse. She snarled something incomprehensible to Draco, but he ignored her and continued to push his way to the front of the crowd.

When he finally reached the ropes, Draco stepped over them and made his way into the shop, scanning his surroundings critically as he did so. While he walked, he vaguely wondered whether Starlight was on the scene as well; however, he quashed these thoughts when he recalled that she had told him she would be in the office rather than at the actual crime site..

The din died down almost immediately once Draco stepped inside. He could see the other Aurors and Hit Wizards huddled together near the back of the store, so he tramped over to them, carefully making sure not to disturb anything in his path.

'What's going on?' he asked loudly as he stopped behind a short, rotund wizard he didn't know.

A witch who had been bending over a table and examining something straightened up and looked straight at Draco. 'We're just -'

She stopped when she saw who she was addressing. For a moment, her mouth hung slightly open; then, she turned away without bothering to finish her reply.

Just barely managing to contain his surprise at finding out that Hermione had been assigned to the investigation of this murder as well, Draco composed himself and said smoothly, 'Well?'

'We haven't been able to find anything suspicious or unusual so far,' explained the man Draco was standing behind. As if to prove his words, he flicked his wand and conjured up a ghostly image of the shop interior as it had appeared before the murder. Gesturing at it, he pointed out, 'Nothing seems to have been touched.'

Draco thoughtfully tapped his bottom lip with his index finger as he gazed at the image the man had conjured up. That wasn't right. It was not possible for the murderer to not be a Death Eater if the Dark Mark had indeed been found above the body; yet having gotten to perceive their habits through being one himself, Draco knew that Death Eaters rarely - if not never - killed without completely destroying the crime scene afterwards. It was their form of entertainment; their way of letting family members of the victim know that their kind were not to trifled with.

'Are you sure it was the Dark Mark floating above her body?' Draco asked carefully, scanning the ceiling as he said the words.

'Positive. All six of the witnesses confirmed it.'

'Are they here right now? The witnesses, that is. I'd like to question them if it's possible.'

'I'm not sure; I just got here a while ago. You might want to ask Miss Granger - she's the one who answered you earlier - over there. The one with the brown hair and -'

'I know who she is,' said Draco quickly. He thanked the plump wizard for answering his questions, then walked over to Hermione. She was speaking rapidly to a young, sandy-haired man with an Auror-in-training badge pinned onto his chest. Impatiently, Draco crossed his arms and waited for their conversation to end.

After five minutes, however, it seemed that the two of them were not going to part anytime soon. Irritated, Draco tapped Hermione on the shoulder.

She whipped around. 'Yes?' she asked tersely when she saw that it was Draco who had interrupted her.

'That one' - Draco jerked his head in direction of the Auror he had just spoken with - 'told me to ask you if the witnesses are on the scene.'

'No,' Hermione responded curtly. Then, she turned around and returned to discussion without further elaborating on her response.

Raising an eyebrow at Hermione's poorly concealed display of acerbity, Draco placed his hand on her shoulder and forced her to turn around and face him. Deciding to drop his polite pretence, he said bluntly, 'Can you just tell me what the hell is going on?'

Hermione angrily brushed Draco's hand off her shoulder. 'Ask someone else! Unless you haven't noticed, I'm occupied at the moment.'

'Are you the head of this investigation or not?' Draco demanded.

'The head?' Hermione repeated, sounding genuinely astonished. 'What gave you that idea?'

'Well, you seem to be in charge here.'

She blushed. 'I'm not. Another Auror, Patrick Dawlish, is. He's by the back door if you need to speak to him.'

Draco shrugged. 'I don't if you can tell me if any of the witnesses are around.'

'I've already drained them of everything they knew, if that's what you were planning to do,' Hermione sighed, shooting Draco a look that clearly read 'Now you can leave me alone'.

'I'd still like to talk to -'

'Fine,' Hermione snapped. 'Only two of the witches are here, though. I think they're talking to Kingsley right now.'

Draco nodded. No need to thank her when she so obviously made it clear that she hates me, he reasoned as he walked around a stack of boxes in search of Kingsley.

'Mr Malfoy?'

Draco turned to face the pretty young witch who had spoken to him. 'Yes?'

'I was told that you had some questions for me.'

Draco furrowed his brows. 'Were you? By whom?'

'The lady over there,' replied the witch. She pointed in Hermione's direction. 'Me and my mum were two of the witnesses,' she explained.

Draco breathed a sigh of relief. Wondering why Hermione had decided to aid him in a task she had discouraged, Draco said briskly, 'Would you like to sit down? I have a few things to ask you.'

The girl looked uneasy. 'We might be leaving soon...'

'Don't worry,' Draco reassured, 'I won't keep you for too long.'

'Okay, then,' she said with a slight smile. She let Draco lead her over to some crates lined up against the back wall.

'So,' began Draco as he sat down uncomfortably on one of the crates and gestured for his companion to do the same, 'let's start with the basics. What time was it when you happened upon the body, and what were you doing?'

'I'm afraid I can't quite remember the exact time.' The girl frowned. 'It was night...Diagon Alley was just about to close; my mum and I were hurrying along as quickly as we could to get out before they sealed the gateway. There were only a few other late shoppers on the street, and we had joined up with a few of them as we made our way down the streets.'

'Mmhmm...' Draco murmured, twirling his wand thoughtfully between his fingers. 'And how did you find it?'

'That was the odd part,' the girl explained. She bit her lip. 'It was real windy, you see, and a pamphlet one of the young men with us was carrying got torn out of his hands by a gale. It flew into the alley between this store and Flourish & Blotts. We tried to tell him not to go after it - it was too dark and late to be wandering down alleys - but he insisted that it was very important to him, and that he needed it.

'He disappeared into the alley, and we waited for a bit. We were just about to leave him - we must have waited for five or ten minutes, and we really just wanted to go home - before we heard a scuffle, a few shouts, and then the sound of someone muttering something. Then the young man ran out of the alley, his glasses askew and his hair all mussed up. He said he had tripped over a body, and that before he'd had the chance to come back to us, a cloaked witch had leapt out of the shadows behind him and tried to strangle him. He told us he pushed her off, then hastened out of the alley without ever finding his pamphlet.'

Draco let out a breath that made a whistling sound as it escaped through his clenched teeth. 'Could you pick out what the person was muttering?'

The girl shook her head. 'We were too far away,' she said, her voice tinged with regret. 'I think it was an incantation, though.'

'An incantation,' Draco repeated to himself. He rubbed his forehead. This was not new to him; he had expected that there would have to be some sort of incantation spoken in order for any form of the Dark Mark to appear. It frustrated him, however, that the witness hadn't been able to hear which incantation it had been.

'I think it was a man's voice who said it, though,' the girl offered hopefully.

'A man's voice?' Draco asked sharply. 'Are you sure?'

'I think so...'

Draco frowned. 'But that's not possible,' he said blankly. 'You told me the young man had said that a witch attacked him. If he pushed her off, he wouldn't have had to say anything.'

The girl's eyes suddenly darkened. 'You don't think he lied, do you?' she asked in a whisper.

'I don't know,' said Draco truthfully. He cleared his throat. 'Okay, tell me what happened next...sorry, what did you say your name was?'

'Oh, I didn't tell you; it's Anna,' said the girl with an apologetic smile.

'Right. Anna.' Draco stored the name in his memory. 'Anyway, what happened next?'

'Well, we lit up our wands and rushed into the alley. We found the Madam Malkin not too far away from the entrance, her body propped up against the wall of her shop.' Anna gave a little shudder and closed her eyes briefly. 'It was horrible, Mr Malfoy. She was...she was all cut up, and there was blood everywhere...all over the walls, the ground, everywhere. I hardly even recognised her face; half of it had been torn off. We backed away, intending to call for help, but we stopped when Mum caught the sight...the sight of the Dark Mark...'

Draco waited for Anna to recollect her composure. While he waited, he turned one detail over and over again in his head. If the body was not too far from the entrance, why was it that it had taken so long for the man to discover it?

'I'm sorry about that,' said Anna suddenly, bringing Draco out of his thoughts. 'It's just that it was so horrible, it being so late at night and...the alley...the Mark...everything, it was so surreal.' She sniffed. 'But when we turned around, the young man who had first entered the alley was gone. We thought he might have gone to get help, but he didn't return after half an hour of waiting, so we hightailed it out of there.'

'Okay,' said Draco slowly. He ran over everything Anna had told him in his mind. 'Can you give me an accurate description of this man?'

'He was tall. About this much taller' - Anna held her hands a few inches apart - 'than me. He wore square, wire-rimmed glasses, and he had longish, dark brown hair. He was sort of skinny, but not scrawny.' She paused, scrunched up her nose, then added, 'Oh yes, and one side of his face was covered in scars. Scars a lot like...a lot like yours.' She blushed, as if hoping that she hadn't been too rude in mentioning Draco's disfigurements.

'Right,' said Draco curtly. He brushed away Anna's remark; it was not the time to dwell on himself. 'Have you told all of this to everyone else?'

At this, Anna cast her eyes downwards and murmured, 'No.'

'What?!' Draco exclaimed. 'Why the hell not?'

Anna looked up, her cheeks flushed. 'I don't know. I described the man, the setting, and the body, but I didn't really tell them why we walked into the alley in the first place.'

Draco shook his head incredulously. 'Then why are you telling me?'

'Because I like you,' Anna stated without a trace of embarrassment. She hesitated, then added, 'A lot.'

Draco eyed Anna warily. He wasn't exactly sure what she was implying with her last statement, but he decided to ignore it and continue with the interrogation. 'Where did you meet up with this man?'

'I think he joined up with our group somewhere around the Apothecary.' Anna looked up at Draco through her eyelashes. 'He was carrying the pamphlet then, and didn't say a word when he started walking with us.'

'Hmm...okay...' In vain, Draco wished fervently that he had brought along a quill and parchment to take notes with. 'Is there anything else you noticed that seemed out of place?'

Anna bit her lip, but after a few seconds, said resignedly, 'Sorry, that's all I remember.'

Draco nodded. 'Thank you for your time.' He began to stand up, but Anna grabbed his arm before he could walk away. 'Yes?' he asked, furrowing his eyebrows as he looked down at her.

'I was just wondering...well, would you like to join me for lunch?'

Draco stared at Anna in silence as he processed her words, one by one, in his mind. When the meaning behind them became understandable to him, he said tersely, 'I'm afraid I have to stay here for another few hours.'

'I can wait,' she said eagerly. Then her eyes widened. 'Sorry, I didn't mean to seem so forward. You don't have to if you don't want to.'

Draco shook his head. Wordlessly, he examined Anna's face. She was quite pretty, he decided. And it wasn't as if he had anything else to do later that day...

'Fine. I should be done by eleven.'

Her face brightened. 'Great!' she said cheerfully, and Draco winced at the overwhelmingly chippy tone of her voice, wondering how she could be so unfazed after having discovered a mutilated body in a dark alley just a few days ago. 'I'll wait for you with Mum; I think some of the other Aurors have questions for us.'

'I would suspect so,' Draco replied stiffly. He eased his arm out of her grip and turned away. 'I'll see you later, then. Thanks again, Anna.'

'It was my pleasure.'

As Draco walked away, thoughts of the (as he saw it) awkward situation with Anna were pushed out of his mind by the facts he had learned from her. It was clear to him now that the man she had described to him had played a large part in Madam Malkin's murder, either in the form of an accomplice to the murderer or the murderer himself. He doubted whether the woman Anna told him the man had mentioned even existed, but at the moment, there was only one thing for him to do: visit the alley and see if any evidence that might help had been left behind. Perhaps he might even find the mysterious pamphlet, if it hadn't yet been picked up by the other Aurors and Hit Wizards investigating the crime.

True to Anna's word, the circle around the area the body had been found was only five or six feet away from junction the alley formed with the sidewalk. Large spots of dried blood dotted the dirt-packed ground there, and more of it could easily be seen splattered across the brick wall of the apparel store.

Draco ventured a little further down the alleyway, making a mental note to return to the circled space later. As he walked, he examined the ground closely for any signs of the scuffle Anna had mentioned or the pamphlet. Though he found nothing of the former, he fortunately came across what he had really been interested in - the corner of a piece of paper, half-covered in dirt and caught on one of the thick thorns of a weed growing up against the wall of Flourish & Blotts.

As Draco bent down to get a better look at his find, he noted that it appeared as if someone had torn away the rest of the page in a hurry. Carefully, he brushed off the dirt masking the words, and removed the scrap of paper from the thorn ensnaring it.

'Crushed aconite leaves - 3 pinches,' he read out loud. The rest of the sheet had torn off underneath that line, leaving only the words 'r two months' visible. 'This sounds like a potion recipe,' he muttered to himself, frowning on concentration as he ran through all the potions that required aconite in his mind. There were hundreds.

'What sounds like a potion recipe?'

'Merlin's beard!' Draco yelped, jumping up and spinning around to face the stranger who had interrupted his thought process.

It was Hermione. She was leaning against the wall of Madam Malkin's former shop and watching him attentively. 'What have you found?' she asked curiously.

'Why did you sneak up on me?' Draco asked angrily, quickly hiding the hand clutching the piece of the pamphlet behind his back. 'You scared the hell out of me.'

'I didn't mean to,' she apologised. 'I saw you leave after talking to Anna, and I figured she must have told you something important.'

Draco shrugged. 'Why so companionable all of a sudden?' he sneered.

Hermione looked away. 'I'm sorry, I shouldn't have snapped at you. I really was busy.'

'Yeah, sort of like you're always busy whenever I'm around, right?'

'What do you mean?'

Draco ground his teeth together. 'You're always rude to me, Granger.'

Hermione looked back up, her mouth agape. 'I'm always rude to you?' She snorted derisively. 'I see it as the other way around, Draco Malfoy.'

'That was in Hogwarts. I was still a kid.' Draco resisted the urge to roll his eyes. 'I can't believe you still hold a grudge over that.'

'You haven't exactly made any attempts to be chummy now that you've "changed",' Hermione shot back. 'And don't you blame me for that; I have too many things going on to try to find a way through your stupid pride.'

Draco laughed out loud. 'That's enough,' he said once he regained his composure. 'I have a job to do here, and I believe you do as well, so if you'd kindly return to yours -'

'I'd like to know what you found before I leave you alone,' Hermione interrupted, her voice suddenly as cool and calm as Draco's.

'It was nothing,' Draco replied shortly. 'Just a few bits of paper.'

'That could be something.' Hermione uncrossed her arms and straightened up. Holding out her hand, she inquired, 'May I see?'

Draco's hand twitched. His first impulse was to say no - to keep what he had rightfully found, and take all the praise that would come along with providing it as proof - but he knew that Hermione could decipher it if he didn't manage to. It would be selfish and unprofessional of him to pass up her help. Thus, with a resentful sigh, he handed it over.