Dagger of Doubt

Chapter Seven

The Hogwarts High Inquisitor

Tuesday 7 – Wednesday 15 November 1995

As we stepped out onto the courtyard, a snowball soared in a perfect arc and landed splat in Pansy's face.

"Who did that to my friend?" roared Millicent. "You – Roger Davies – don't just stand there laughing..." Millicent lowered her head and charged through the snow towards the knot of laughing Ravenclaws.

Instead of jumping out of the way, Roger stood his ground and deflected Millicent's charge with a fancy twist of his elbow. She rolled over in the snow, howling with rage. He held out his hand to pull her to her feet, but Millicent was too heavy even for a self-styled superwizard like my brother.

"Take a joke," he told her. "Yesterday it wasyour brother who threw snowballs at Tracey, but she didn't howl like a demented Erumpent. Tracey laughed it off even while you and Parkinson were laughingat her."

No. Roger ought to know better than to retaliate against an important person like Pansy! Hands on hips, I announced, "Roger, you don't need to fight my battles for me. If you think revenge – "

"Revenge? Oh, lighten up, sister mine! It's all ajoke!"

Splat! Millicent had thrown a snowball square into Roger's face, and was now hurtling her spare ammunition at his giggling group of friends.

Roger wiped his face with a grin. "See? All a joke. Have you heard the news? Hagrid's back. He gave us a great lesson yesterday."

I stared. "Hagrid?"

"We don't support Hagrid," said Millicent bluntly. "He's a bad teacher and he's half a giant. His creatures always cause injuries."

Roger looked surprised. "Well, you should have seen the injuries when Kettleburn was the teacher! Hagrid might not take the most professional approach, but he does know his stuff and he does care about students. You couldn't honestly say as much forsome of the staff at this school."

All the girls were clustering around Millicent now, so I nudged Pansy and whispered, "Watch my brother damn himself!"

"Which staff, Davies?" asked Pansy. "Which of our wonderful staff isn't good enough for your Hagrid-loving, snowball-shoving tastes?"

Roger shrugged. "Since you ask, I must say that Trelawney doesn't seem to understand a word she's talking about, and I wouldn't present any Compassion Awards to Snape or Binns. As for the Toad Lady, shereally lowers the tone of Hogwarts!"

Daphne was too shocked to join Pansy's titter. I tried not to think that Umbridgedid look like a toad; people who wanted to get anywhere in life had to suck up to people like her. Could I goad Roger into talking his way to a detention?

I asked, "Why are you studying Defence if you hate the teacher so much?"

Roger shrugged again. "Who can predict who'll turn up to teach Defence around here? The last two teachers were fine; but I don't rely on teachers to sit my exams for me."

I was definitely not going to continue with Defence next year! I wasn't going to continueany of the stupid subjects that Roger had chosen. He was busy with Astronomy and Arithmancy, which he claimed would help him with predicting Quidditch outcomes, and with History of Magic, apparently fulfilled his "cultural cravings". He had even joined Madam Hooch's special flying squad because he thought he had a future in professional Quidditch. He wasn't learning anything useful from any of it; and – unlike Roger – I was auseful sort of person.

As Roger followed his girlfriends indoors, Pansy exclaimed, "How... stupid! If Roger Davies wants to get anywhere in life, he should be sucking up to people like Professor Umbridge. The minute anyone tells her what he said, he'll haveno chance of a job in the Ministry."

"Let's tell!" said Daphne eagerly. "He'll get detention – one of those Magic Quill detentions!"

They were all looking at me, so I was forced to remind them, "No-o-o. His friends witnessed everything, and they'll claim that he didn'tsay anything. He insulted some ‘toad lady', but that isn't a real name, so we can't prove he meant a particular person. Let's not get ourselves into trouble for tattling; let's do something positive to make ourselves Umbridge's favourite students."

"Oooooh,what?" asked Cecilia admiringly.

Quick, a plan! I was the clever one; now it was time to put my brain in action. "Hagrid," I decided. That would show Roger who counted around Hogwarts! "Professor Umbridge hates half-humans, so she'd be grateful for an excuse to get rid of Hagrid. Let's find her one."

Pansy squealed. "Tracey, you havebrains! And it will be so easy. Look at the way his vicious hippogriff injured poor Draco last year... and that nasty little Niffler scratched me..."

I let Pansy rattle on, but I knew we would never get rid of Hagrid just because of his dangerous monsters. Even when the Wizengamot had tried to execute the wild Hippogriff, they hadn't talked about firing Hagrid, so they wouldn't care about Fire-Crab burns and Flobberworm-bites (Pansy hadn't even visited Pomfrey over that Niffler-scratch). Most of the "safety risks" in Hagrid's lessons were no worse than, say, having to boil reactive ingredients for Snape or trim Venomous Tentaculas for Sprout. If we were actually to get rid of him, I would have to think up something completely different.

Suddenly the idea jumped up in my mind, fully-grown. Ha! It's not for nothing that I'm as bright as a diamond! I knew exactly what I was going to do, and it would show Roger that professionalismdid matter. I didn't pay attention in Transfiguration. I let Cecilia Splinch our newt in five different directions before I remembered that we were supposed to be Vanishing it, and when I did half-heartedly wave my wand, all I managed to do was split the tail in half.

"You're nothelping, Tracey," she wailed.

"I'm busy with our plan," I told her. "Get Millicent to help you with the exercises."

In the end, Pansy generously lent us her Auto-Answer Quill, which meant that Cecilia could answer the Transfiguration questions in a handwriting that looked like mine while I was free to do the brain-work.

"We'll have to work as a team if we're serious about exposing Hagrid," I warned my friends. "Millicent, you have a good broom, don't you?"

"It's a Cleansweep Ten," she confirmed.

"We'll need you to help with the dangerous part of the operation," I said.

"I don't like danger!"

"It will be less dangerous for you because you're our best flier. The most dangerous part is the risk of interference from teachers. But that won't be such a risk if we have Pansy as our look-out."

Pansy objected. "I don't see why I should do the tag-along part. I'm not your house-elf!"

"There's no ‘must'," I told her. "I only meant that you might be kind enough to volunteer as our respectable front. You're a prefect, so teachers will believe that you have some good reason to be hanging around there."

"Hanging around where?" asked Daphne.

"Ravenclaw Tower. That's where our daring quest to upgrade Hogwarts begins."

After a very entertaining lesson with Hagrid (which Umbridge attended, making it quite clear that she disapproved of him) and the standard sparkly stuff with Flitwick, we swarmed outside to the west wing of the castle. Dusk was falling, which meant that not many people were about, but it wasn't too dark to make us look odd for mucking around in the snow.

"This snow is dead cold," complained Cecilia. "It's all inside my shoes."

"Thermo. There, I’ve cleared you a nice green patch. You need to look as if you have an ordinary reason for being out here. Build a snowman or something. Millicent, do you have your broom? Right, let’s get on it, then. Hold it steady; whatever I’m doing behind you, we need to keep still in the air. Remember, Pansy – if anyone asks, we’re just practising for Quidditch."

Millicent kicked us off in a plumb-vertical line, but my stomach lurched – I hadn't been on a broomstick since the end of first year. I heard Pansy decide they would build a caricature of Hagrid before their voices were lost to the whistling wind. We whizzed through the freezing air in a rigid line that didn't look at all like Quidditch practice, but if I begged Millicent to behave more naturally, she might sulk and bump me right off, so I just had to hold onto her and hope for the best. Down below... I whipped my head back upwards again; I felt sick when I looked down, and I couldn't risk toppling off. Some first-years had seemed to be asking about Pansy's snowman, but I mustn't worry about them; I must concentrate on staying astride the broom.

We were level with the base of the round tower. "Slow down," I said. "We're aiming for the fifth-floor dormitories."

Millicent obligingly slowed the Cleansweep, but now we were travelling jerkily, her concentration broken every time she counted out loud. I clutched at her, and finally we reached the lancet windows of the seventh-year dormitory. I turned my head carefully and looked in. A house-elf was laying freshly-ironed pyjamas on the blue-curtained beds, and a trumpet had been carelessly flung into the furthest trunk; this was definitely Roger's dormitory.

Fortunately, house-elves are quick. In the short time before this one Disapparated, I reminded myself to work fast before another witness entered. As soon as it was safe, I held out my wand and fixed my eyes on Roger's trunk.

"Accio!"

Nothing happened. Bother. Iknew Roger had smuggled a crate of Firewhisky in from Hogsmeade last month, but he had obviously drunk the whole lot already. So the easy version of my plan wouldn't work. Never mind, there was Plan B. I stopped thinking about the Firewhisky crate and focussed instead on the books stacked beside his bed. I could see the one I wanted; he had owned it for years; but of course it might not be so easy to steal out of a Hogwarts dormitory.

"Accio!"

The thin, red-spined paperback lifted itself out of the stack and flew into my hand. Trust Roger not to place a Staying Charm on his books! I knew he put anti-theft charms on his broom, his clothes, his trumpet, his art supplies, even his shaving cologne... but of course he would forget to protect a cheap little paperback. Roger was careless like that.

I shoved the book down the front of my robe and gasped, "Down, Millicent!"

She unbraked so fast that we nearly crashed. I landed in the snow, only to be pulled to my feet by Hagrid himself. He had huge purple bruises all over his face.

"Yer wanna be careful, flyin' up so high if yer not used to it," he told us. "No bones broken, Miss Bulstrode? Good. What were yer playin' at, flyin' around in the dark?"

"A bet," I said glibly. "Millicent bet me I couldn't stay on a broom up to the top of the Tower and down again. I think she won."

Hagrid apparently believed me; he turned his attention to Pansy's snowman. "I'm taller'n that," he said with a wink. "But not a bad likeness. P'raps yer should finish it tomorrow. It's gettin' very cold an' dark out here."

We took his advice, slightly surprised that he had swallowed our cover stories so easily. Down in our dormitory, I displayed Roger's book, which was calledThe Domestic Potioneer.

"He only bought it because it had a recipe for mixing oil-paints out of fresh vegetables," I said. "But Iknow it has something else... Here we are... the brewing section."

"Why did we go to all that fuss to steal it?" asked Cecilia. "Why didn't you just ask your brother if you could borrow it?"

My mouth dropped open, too aghast at the thought of asking Roger for any kind of favour to remember the obvious reason.

"Use your brain," said Daphne. "We can't gotelling people about our secret plan."

"We can brew our own Firewhisky," I interrupted. "We'll need malt... and yeast... and lots of sugar..."

"I can send Hoots to Hogsmeade for those things," said Pansy. "None of them looks suspicious on its own."

"Better make it Diagon Alley," I said. "We don't want Hogsmeade traders connecting this order with Hogwarts students. Perhaps we should buy the malt separately."

"Daphne can send Toots for that," said Pansy.

By the next morning, we had our supplies, and we spent the lunch break setting up our spare cauldrons in our bathroom. The distilling process would take four days, so the major problem was to keep spies out of dormitory. Slytherin girls from other years were not absolutely forbidden to visit our sanctuary, and if one of Daphne's sisters chose to snoop, we could be in big trouble. Cecilia wanted to write a crude notice for our front door:

Keep Out.
Secret Ladies' Business in Progress.
ASTORIA – this means YOU!

But, as Pansy pointed out, this was simply inviting curiosity at a time when we wanted to avoid outsiders' attention.

"Astoria isn't really the problem anyway," said Daphne. "She's the one who stole Arnold Bulstrode's Exploding Snap cards – the ones with the rude pictures on them – and turned them in to Filch."

"Good, let's tell Arnold!" interrupted Millicent. "He'll bash her to a pulp!"

"No, let'snot," said Daphne crossly. "Don't you understand anything, Millicent? Astoria knows that Imight tell Arnold, and we have to leave her worrying about it until after we've finished getting rid of Hagrid. Rhoda's not a problem either. She's too stupid to recognise alcohol if it's brewing under her nose – she'd believe us if we said it was the laundry. The person who worries me is Syrinx. She knows I borrowed her emerald earbobs at Hallowe'en, so she might tell on us just out of spite."

"Give her some of the Firewhisky," suggested Cecilia. "That's what I'm going to do for Ursula – she can't tell on us if she's drinking it herself."

Daphne laughed bitterly. "That might work withyour sister, but Syrinx is just about the meanest person in the history of the world. She'd thank us nicely for the present and then take it straight to Snape."

"Exactly," I said. "And it isn't just thehuman nuisance that's a problem. How are we going to keep the house-elves away? Whatever we do is going to look suspicious. I think we're going to have to guard our bathroomin person."

"What, miss two days of lessons?"

"Yes." I looked around at them defiantly. "We'll take turns, with a different excuse each. My Muggle grandfather is going to die in about five minutes, so I'm too upset to come to lessons this afternoon. Flitwick will understand that. Tomorrow Millicent is going to run out of clean underwear, so because she's too big to borrow anyone else's, she'll be spending the morning doing her own laundry."

"Snape will say I ought to have come to Potions anyway!"

"So what if he does? You'll get the detentionafter we've finished our brew. Cecilia is going to suffer food-poisoning over lunch so she'll spend tomorrow afternoon sleeping off her vomiting. On Friday Daphne will rescue Toots from a near-drowning accident and spend the morning nursing him in our dormitory. Pansy has free periods on Friday afternoon, so she'll manage to watch the brew without actually missing a lesson. For the rest of the time, we'll make sure we always have at least one of us there to tell intruders that we're not in the mood for guests this week."

After they had all left me grieving for my newly-deceased grandparent, I checked on the cauldrons, then began to scrub at the shower recess. This really was a nuisance! I had to keep thinking about the look on Roger's face when Hagrid finally left (to say nothing of the gratitude I would receive from Draco) to keep myself motivated.

Crack! A house-elf had arrived.

"Hello," I said. "I know you usually do this job, but can you leave this bathroom to us for a couple of days?"

"Miss Davies should not be dirtying her hands in lesson time."

Bother, it knew my name. "Iam doing lessons," I said, cheerfully nodding at our arrangement of cauldrons without a care in the world. "This is a Potions project for Professor Snape. I have to watch it all day. But it's really important that nobody else touches it."

The house-elf wrinkled its nose dubiously. "It doesn't smell good to Cuby."

"Potions often stink," I agreed. "The fumes might not be safe for someone as small as you – I'm not really sure. Anyway, to keep youand our project safe, we honestly don't mind doing our own cleaning for a couple of days. Here... You came to take our towels, didn't you?" I handed her a pile of them.

"Miss Davies is considerate!" said the elf. "Cuby does not like that potion, no, not at all."

I didn't really trust the elves to remain idle: Cecilia reported the next day that one of them did run a mop all over the bathroom. However, it scrupulously avoided touching the cauldrons, so they had evidently learned not to interfere there.

By Sunday afternoon, we were ready to pour the Firewhisky into bottles, which I had transfigured out of pebbles.

"It'll be raw," said Pansy disdainfully. "Isn't Firewhisky meant to mature for years before you actually drink it?"

"We weren't aiming for quality," I reminded her. "Think of this brew as, er, medicinal. Now, we have to get rid ofall our distilling equipment. There can't be any evidence of what we were doing."

On Tuesday afternoon, we settled our five bottles of very potent home-brewed Firewhisky in a plain brown sack, and I slid on top of them a gift card on which I had written

Welcome home, Hagrid!
with love from
all your admirers.

I had borrowed Pansy's Auto-Answer Quill to produce a handwriting like Madame Maxime's, but it didn't matter if Hagrid knew the bottles weren't from her. He would never work out which student had done it.

"It's better not to be seen, but if anyone does spot us, we're just checking whether Hagrid's pumpkins have survived the snow," I reminded the girls again. "I'll only take a second – I just put the bottles down, and then we walk off to Care of Magical Creatures in the Forest."

After all the elaborate alibis of the last week, it was ridiculously easy for the girls to crowd around the pumpkin patch in a way that hid me. A couple of other fifth-years did pass us as I set the brown sack outside Hagrid's back door, but none of them took any notice. We trudged through the snow to Hagrid's lesson, and we weren't even the last to arrive.

The lesson was boring because we didn't actually see any magical creatures at all: Hagrid was conveniently claiming to show us invisible beasts. Theo pretended he could see whatever-they-were but Theo always does have to claim he's one better than the rest of us.

"It'll be so much more interesting tomorrow!" Cecilia giggled.

"Now we need a witness," I said. "Professor Umbridge will be busy, so let's invite Filch. I'll do the talking, Cecilia; you just laugh and agree with whatever I say. But wait until Filch can hear us!"

When we clattered back into the Entrance Hall, snow all over our shoes, Filch came storming out of his office, mop aloft and bucket angrily swinging.

"I don't think they were joking," I announced to the air. "I think they meant it. Theyare going to set the trees on fire."

Filch's eyebrows lifted while Cecilia giggled dutifully.

"In period five tomorrow on the edge of the Forbidden Forest," I declared. "I'm nearly sure they do have the fireworks, and theyare planning to set the trees alight, probably before Hagrid even arrives."

Cecilia laughed more loudly, and I shepherded her down the dungeon staircase.

"Well done," I told her. "Now we don't have to do anything else. Now we can sit back and watch the show!"

"Sitting down out there will be dead cold," Cecilia remarked.

Sure enough, when we arrived at Care of Magical Creatures the next day, Filch was waiting for us. He ordered three of the Gryffindors to turn their pockets inside-out and he emptied Gregory's schoolbag into the snow, but he didn't find anything except Finnigan's Dung Bombs before Hagrid came lurching towards us.

Hagrid was a dream come true! His face was all shades of green, yellow and purple, as if he had been fighting off a very vicious Hippogriff. Perhaps his invisible horses had turned on him. Or perhaps it had all been a very complex accident, for he staggered and swayed and nearly tripped over just in the short walk to join the class.

"Afternoon, all," he said. "Today we're talkin' about feedin'..."

"Merlin, but our groundsman's been drinking!" cried Draco to Blaise.

Hagrid swayed and then steadied himself; I could smell the Firewhisky on his breath.

"Thestrals appreciate a hot mash – " Hagrid was speaking more carefully than usual so he wouldn't slur his words.

"Hagrid, you're drunk!" Pansy did not trouble to keep her tone low. "Filch, he can hardly stand up straight. Go and tell Professor Umbridge that this man is unfit to teach us!"

"I fell over," said Hagrid with dignity. "No time to see Madam Pomfrey, so I'm limpin' a bit fer now. But I can teach yer same as always, Miss Parkinson."

Cecilia nearly hugged me when Filch cackled, "I don't think Dumbledore will like to hear that his staff drink on the job! And Professor Umbridgedefinitely won't like it, not with her report to the Ministry due. So tell us, Hagrid, did you or did you not drink something stronger than Butterbeer today?"

"Yes, I took a glass!" Hagrid's voice boomed over the cackles and sniggers. "I'm not denyin' that.One glass,after I fell, but I stopped soon as I realised there was somethin' wrong with the drink. It definitely isn' real Ogden's."

Still cackling, Filch asked permission to search Hagrid's hut. None of us could pay attention to Hagrid's instructions on how to mix a Thestral-mash even though he was speaking quite clearly – he was obviously telling the truth about "only one drink".

"...And look whatI've found!" When Filch finally returned, holding a familiar bottle aloft, every eye was on him. "Dear, dear, dear, Hagrid, how would this little receptacle come to be full of something very like Firewhisky?"

"Present," said Hagrid calmly. "Students gave it to me."

"Oho,did they now? Ve-ery interesting, given that it'sagainst the rules for students to bring alcohol into school. So just who gave you this very nice and illegal present?"

Cecilia stiffened next to me. I ignored her, glad we had covered our tracks well.

"Dunno," said Hagrid. "It was anonymous."

"Think, Hagrid. You're in plenty of trouble, so which student do you think was trying to make the trouble for you?"

Hagrid's eye flickered very briefly over Draco, Vincent and Gregory. "No-one," he said firmly. "It was kin'ly meant. A present. And I'm sorry if yer think I shouldn' have a drink over lunch, but I can still teach. Dean, will yer come and add the bran ter the trough?"

"Ooooh, wehave him!" squealed Pansy as Filch tramped off again.

Our joy lasted all through the afternoon until half way through dinner. But by the time I was soaking up my gravy in the last bite of dumpling, I could not ignore the rumours that we didn't "have" Hagrid at all. Umbridge had been so delighted by the news that Hagrid had been caught drunk on duty that she had insisted Pomfrey examine him immediately. Pomfrey had very quickly confirmed that Hagridhad suffered some kind of falling accident – that he wascovered in week-old bruises – and that his tottering gait was not connected with his single shot of highly-suspect spirits. Snape had demanded to analyse the liquor, but Hagrid had already tossed it down the sink, so Umbridge couldn't even prove that he stored illegal drugs in his hut. Everyone knew he drank, yet no-one could prove that he drank to excess, or even that he hadever arrived in class under the influence.

We hadn't achieved anything. We had tipped off Umbridge with one more reason to get rid of Hagrid, but she didn't even know which students to thank.

So I was totally unprepared for Draco's reaction down in the dungeon. When he sauntered past our sofa, he gave my arm a condescending tap.

"You've done well, Tracey. Pansy told me how you set up the whole operation. That's the kind of house loyalty that Slytherin deserves."

"Er, thanks."

"Too bad that the great oaf bluffed his way out of it," Draco continued. "But Umbridge won't forget that Hagridwas caught drunk. It'll strengthen whatever case we mount against him next."

"And you gave us all a jolly good laugh," Pansy added, clutching at Daphne as she relived the humour. "Oh, it was worth it just for the laugh! Tracey, you're so clever!"

"Would you by any chance have any of that little home-brew left over?" asked Draco.

To my surprise, Cecilia cut through my apology. "Yes! Yes, my sister has some! Ursula, it's time to bring out thelemonade."

Cecilia had really done it! She had sneaked off half our supplies as a present to her sister!

Ursula Runcorn brought out a glass gallon bottle, and Syrinx Greengrass followed with a tray of gill-goblets, while Pansy reminded everyone who would listen that it was my birthday, and Millicent and her brother shoved out of our rapidly-growing circle everyone who wasn't in fifth or seventh year. Syrinx poured the firstlemonade for me, but it seemed wise to pass the glass on to Draco.

"Happy birthday to our brilliant Tracey," he said. "Let's all toast – to Slytherin!"