The Long Road to Damascus

THE LONG ROAD TO DAMASCUS
by Morrighan



PART 5: Nocturnes I 1.

Monday December 1, 1980, 10.30 PM. The Rookery, Seepurse Lane, Thurso.

The wireless crackled restlessly through its tinny music, and Billy MacPherson looked up from his book (a trashy murder mystery entitled The Muggle of St Mungo's) and used a rotating charm to adjust the dial. It made little difference: the wireless had crackled intermittently ever since his five-year-old nephew Ruari had dropped it in the neighbours' pond last spring.

The children had been put to bed two hours ago, and the house was now silent, save for the tinny voice of the wireless with its staticky interruptions. Billy's brother, Bob and his wife were out for the evening, visiting friends near Wick, and Billy had stayed in to babysit Elspeth and Ruari, their two youngest children.

The wireless's crackling had quietened down again, and the announcer came on the air

"...And now we bring you, live from the Paracelsus Hall, Edinburgh, the renowned pianist Gerhard Spinnet, playing the Sonatas and Interludes for Charmed Piano by Johannes Käfig..."

Billy grimaced and turned the wireless off quickly. Käfig's bizarre experiments as to the musical effects of various inappropriate charms on a grand piano was definitely numbered among the strangest musical works of wizarding history. Opinion was divided as to whether the composer was a madman or a genius, but most of the wizarding world inclined to the former opinion, Billy among them.

The wireless silenced, he turned back to his book, pushing his armchair slightly further from the fireplace, where a large and very vigorous fire burnt fiercely. He'd let the children toast marshmallows on it earlier - under careful supervision of course - and the room was still full of the smell of caramelised sugar.

He had just returned his attention to the book when he was surprised by a soft popping sound from the fireplace, accompanied by the subtle but distinct change in the timbre of the fire's roar. He glanced up quickly, and saw that the head sitting in the nest of flames was that of his old Headmaster, Albus Dumbledore, his long beard draped untidily over the logs below. He felt an involuntary pang of anxiety - nobody ever called this late unless it was an emergency - and his thoughts flew inevitably to his eldest nephew, Callum, who had started at Hogwarts that September.

"Good evening, Billy." The Headmaster's voice was cheerful, as it usually was, but Billy noted that his manner was unusually brisk and businesslike.

"Professor Dumbledore! I'm afraid Bob and Kirsty are both out at the moment. It's not about Callum, is it?"

The Headmaster gave him a wide smile. "Oh, goodness, no. Young Callum's fine –- he's settling in very well, from what I've heard. In fact he got his first detention two days ago - for starting a water fight in the Great Hall, I do believe." He paused, and surveyed Billy with mild interest. "Actually, Billy, it was you I wanted to see. Can you come over to Hogwarts for a few minutes?"

"Well ... I'm afraid I can't right now," Billy said, wondering what Dumbledore could possibly need his help for. "I'm babysitting for Kirsty, so I can't leave the children here alone. But you're welcome to come over here if it's urgent."

"Thank you. I will, if I may. I just need to ask you a favour, so I won't be long."

The connection was broken, and Billy put his book aside, never taking his eyes off the fireplace.

A few seconds later the crackling of the fire changed to a sound like rushing wind and the flames flared up in emerald green plumes as the rotating figure of the headmaster appeared in it. He stepped out of the fireplace and started to brush the ash off his clothes, his expression rueful. "I can't say I care much for travelling by Floo power," he said.

"Oh, nor do I," said Billy fervently. As far as he was concerned, travelling by the Floo Network was about as enjoyable as Apparition, and even worse than broomstick flight. Rather belatedly he remembered his duties as host. "Er ... Do sit down. Can I get you a drink?"

"No, thank you, Billy. As I said, I won't be staying long." He glanced around him at the MacPhersons' sitting room, and his eyes fixed on the Foeglass on the wall. "I see you've got one of those. That's very wise. Kirsty's idea, I suppose."

Billy glanced up at it automatically, noting its cloudy face. "I suppose so. Bob says they're unnecessary, but Kirsty insisted."

"She's quite right. You would be wise to get into the habit of checking it if I were you. I could have been anyone, couldn't I?"

"But surely –"

"You cannot afford to make assumptions, Billy. Not at the moment. Anyway," Dumbledore looked through his half-moon glasses at Billy's good-natured, open face, as if measuring him, weighing him up. "As I said before, there is something I need you to do for me, if you are able to." Billy looked at him expectantly, trying to look serious in spite of the multicoloured woolly sweater and fluffy rabbit slippers he was wearing. "But there is a condition. I need you to do it, as far as possible, without asking questions. You'll have to take it on trust that I know what I'm doing. You will also need to observe absolute secrecy."

"Oh ... well," Billy said doubtfully. "I mean, I'd be happy to help you if I can, of course I would. After all, you're doing so much for the magical world."

Dumbledore twinkled at him. "I'll be blushing in a minute, Billy," he said, and Billy grinned. "What I need you to do is something very simple," he continued. "You work at Skowers, don't you? Do you know Severus Snape?"

"Yes. He's my boss, actually."

"Do you like him?"

Billy thought for a moment, furrowing his brow in concentration. You really didn't think of Mr Snape in terms of ‘like' or ‘dislike'. "Well ... I don't know that I'd say ‘like', exactly. I mean, he can be quite ..." He searched for a suitable adjective. "...touchy at times," he said. "But we get on okay," he added hastily, as if reluctant to make even such guarded criticism.

"I see," and Billy noticed that Dumbledore was suddenly looking very serious. "Well, I need to know if anything unusual happens in that quarter: unexplained absences, unusual behaviour - anything like that. Anything at all, no matter how minor or irrelevant it seems. You won't need to follow him about or anything melodramatic like that. It will simply be a matter of watching. Nothing more."

"Oh. He's not in any kind of trouble, is he?"

"I can't answer that," Dumbledore said quickly, uncomfortably conscious that his words were true in ways that Billy would never suspect.

Billy gave him a doubtful look, perhaps half perceiving the undercurrents in the Headmaster's voice. "Oh. Sorry. I shouldn't have asked." Then he remembered his boss's peculiar behaviour four days before and hesitated. That was probably the exact sort of thing the Headmaster wanted to know. "There is something..." he said hesitantly, and told Dumbledore how Snape had walked out of Skowers suddenly on the Friday afternoon.

"Did you tell anyone about this?"

"No. I shouldn't have done, should I?" The Headmaster said nothing, and Billy, watching him doubtfully, could not read his face. "I mean, he really did look ill, and if I'd said anything at work it would probably have got him into trouble. Bad trouble. I mean, he's not exactly popular there. And he may have threatened me, but he didn't actually do anything..." His voice trailed away and he stared at the Headmaster. "Was I wrong?"

It was Dumbledore's turn to hesitate, though he did it with considerably more finesse and less transparency than his companion. "That, I am afraid, I do not know, though I suspect it makes no difference. But in future, I would like you to inform me quickly if anything like that occurs."

"Okay. Certainly. Is that all you need me to do?"

"Yes. It's just a watching brief, Billy. You won't actually be doing anything out of the ordinary - and you certainly won't be placing yourself at risk."

"I'm not afraid of danger - if you wanted me to do anything else." Billy said, and there was an inflection in his voice that sounded almost wistful. Dumbledore smiled quietly to himself, remembering his own twentieth year. Even amid the dangers of our age, he thought sadly, our children retain their innocence.

"Not for yourself, I daresay. But you have your brother's family to consider as well as yourself, remember."

"Yes ..." Billy said thoughtfully. "That's true. I wouldn't put them at risk for anything." Then he sighed, looking uncharacteristically solemn. "But I suppose that's a bit selfish, isn't it? I mean, when everyone's in danger anyway." He fell silent, pondering this unfamiliar dilemma.

"Yes," Dumbledore said gently. "It's a difficult choice to make, and an uncommonly thankless one. But at the moment I don't require you to make it. That time may well come in the future, but for now I merely need information from you."

"Yes. I suppose - but -" Whatever Billy had been about to say, he visibly changed his mind about it, and all he said was,"So, how do I make contact with you if anything happens? Surely I don't just send an owl to Hogwarts?"

"No. You have an aunt in Hogsmeade, don't you? A Madam Bell. Her husband's a writer, I believe."

"Aunt Catriona? Yes. She's my great-aunt actually. I don't see her or Uncle Ellis very often, I'm afraid. So do you mean-?"

"Do you write to her at all."

"Sometimes. Not as often as I should, I'm afraid."

"Good. Then all you need to do is address the letters to her, and I will make arrangements to have them forwarded on to Hogwarts. If you consider anything particularly urgent, send a letter direct to Hogwarts, but use a Post Office owl, not your own. It's only a few hours from here to Hogwarts. Or from Aberdeen to Hogwarts, if it comes to that."

"Oh. Okay. That sounds simple enough."

"That's good. But I must remind you that you cannot afford to tell anybody what you're doing - not even your own family."

"Yes. I understand that," Billy said. "I'm just glad I can help. Only ... it does seem a bit disloyal. Almost like - well - spying."

"Billy," Dumbledore said firmly, "I have my reasons, and if it was in my power to tell you them, I would. As it is, I can only ask you to trust me. Rest assured that I would never ask you to do anything dishonourable or disloyal for me."

It was the authority in Dumbledore's voice that Billy accepted, as much as the words themselves. "Oh yes. Of course. Sorry. I'm quite happy to do anything for you. I don't need to know what it's all about."

Only a Hufflepuff, Dumbledore reflected, would be happy to place such trust in another's sense of right. This wall of secrecy would never have been acceptable to the likes of Sirius Black or Tulip Mortlake. "Well, then, I suppose I'd best be off back to Hogwarts, to see what chaos has been evolving in my absence."

Both men stood up, and Dumbledore stepped towards the fireplace. "I'll be going then. The best of luck, Billy."

Billy nodded, his face thoughtful. "Thanks. I'll be in touch."

Dumbledore reached into his pocket and removed a small glass salt-cellar, and Billy watched him curiously as he shook a small amount of the powder out into the palm of his hand before throwing it onto the fire. The flames sprang up instantly, green and luminous, with warm, forest-scented breath. "Headmaster's study, Hogwarts," he called softly, and then stepped into the fire, the green flames winding tendril-like around him as if in welcome.

Billy called a farewell, but just before the powder carried him away, Dumbledore turned to him once more, half stepping out of the fireplace again. "Oh, and one other thing ... Watch his back for me, will you?" Before Billy could respond he was gone.

Billy stood before the empty fire for a moment and then sat down again, his pudgy face perplexed and slightly anxious, his head buzzing with unasked - and unaskable - questions.













2.

Thursday December 4, 1980, 11.30 PM. The Giant's Head, Naze Alley, Cardiff.

"He's doing what?"

Lucrezia Lestrange's voice rose in righteous indignation. Virgil Avery, who had just taken a mouthful of Ogden's, spluttered it over the discoloured pine table.

"I'm not kidding - it's true!" Lestrange said, setting down his tankard and thumping Avery hard on the back. "He as good as admitted it, didn't he, Wilko?"

"Damn right." Wilkes gave a knowing leer and took another mouthful of mead. "Never thought he had it in ‘im meself."

They were in a private room at the back of the Giant's Head, hired by Felix Lestrange for the evening. Most of Lestrange's guests had gone now, the Death Eaters lingering a little while after the more innocuous guests, and now it was only the four of them, left in possession of the large chamber. It was a well-designed room, ideally suited for transacting confidential business. The walls and door were panelled with magic-resistant rowan, meaning that most methods of eavesdropping or trap setting were impossible.

"She'd have to be blind," Avery said thoughtfully. "Or desperate."

"Oh yeah. Just picture it: Severus Snape, God's gift to womankind."

It was Lucrezia's turn to choke on her drink. "Do you mind," she said indignantly. "There are some things I prefer not to contemplate."

"I know, love. Too revolting," Lestrange said, looking wistfully at his empty tankard.

There was a soft tap on the door, and Lestrange called "Enter!" It was the pub's landlord, Marcel Quirke, a tall, cadaverous man with a hunched back and the face of a melancholy bloodhound.

"Anyfing more I can do for you, guv'nor?" he enquired lugubriously. "Only I'm about to call last orders."

Lestrange glanced down again at his tankard, carefully avoiding his wife's eye, which contained a clear negative.

"Don't mind if I do, actually. Just a pint of mead for me."

"No, he doesn't," Lucrezia said briskly. "It's your turn to feed Trident when we get home, remember?"

"Damn. I'd forgotten. Sorry, Quirke - duty calls, as always."

His wife smiled sweetly at him, a smile that made the other occupants of the room feel distinctly uneasy. Trident was a manticore, and Lucrezia's pride and joy. He had been a coming-of-age gift from her father, procured from God alone knew where. How she controlled the beast was a mystery, even to her husband - manticores were renowned for the uncontrolled savagery of their natures - but the fact remained that in Lucrezia's hands, Trident was as meek and biddable as a lamb.

"Not for me, then. Can't disobey the missus," Lestrange said regretfully. "We should be going soon anyway. Paul? Virgil?"

Avery shook his head – he still had half a tumbler of firewhisky left – but Wilkes looked up eagerly. "Go on then - twist my arm. Shove another in there for me, Marcy."

Quirke collected the empty tankards and glasses in silence, and returned a minute later with a tankard of metheglin for Wilkes. Only when the door had shut firmly behind him did conversation resume.

"So what are you going to do about it?" Lucrezia asked, her voice steely.

"Oh ... well, you know ..." Lestrange gave a deliberately vague smile. "I'm still pondering that one. Can't rush into these things, can we?"

Avery gave Lestrange a speculative glance. "Well, no. But seriously - are you going to tell the master?"

"Oh yes," Lestrange's voice was light-hearted, but there was an unfamiliar tension to it that the others had never heard there before, as if he was holding some powerful emotion in check. "But not straight away. I've waited for this for years, you know. I can afford to wait a little longer - until it's really going to damage him.

"Oh right? And suppose someone else got there before you?"

Lestrange laughed, and the sound was innocent and boyish -– a charming laugh. "Good heavens, Virgil," he exclaimed. "Do you mean you'd like Amelia to find out about your affair with the Rathbone witch?"

"Good point. Forget I spoke." There was a slight smile on his face. Lucrezia gave him a suspicious glance, and made a mental note to have a quiet word with her husband in the near future. You never crossed an Imperius specialist, ever. And certainly not as one as accomplished as Virgil Avery. They had far too many ways of hitting back.

"I mean, that's the annoying thing about Sev," Lestrange went on, seemingly oblivious. "The bastard just has no vices-"

"You mean, apart from mass-murder."

"You know what I mean, Wilko. I mean normal ones. The master isn't really going to complain about mass-murder, is he? But Sev - he doesn't smoke, he rarely even drinks, he doesn't gamble, embezzle, get into duels, blackmail, rape underage girls - or boys for that matter - and I'm almost certain he isn't doing anything ... recreational ... with those potions of his. Hell, a guy needs his hobbies. It's actually quite nice to know he's human after all."

Oh yes. So that you can use it against him, Avery thought sardonically. Blackmailers are always so predictable. He drained his glass of Ogdens and sighed in satisfaction. "Well guys, much as I've enjoyed this, I really must be going now," he said out loud. "There's an audit I've got to finish before tomorrow."

"Gee whizz! Must be fascinating, being an accountant."

Avery smirked. "It pays, Wilko. It definitely pays. Much better than ... wireless repair, isn't it?" Wilkes glared at him, but Avery's face was expressionless. "Anyway, I'd better be getting home to the fair Amelia. So long, folks."

"Bye then," Lestrange called as he reached the door. "Keep those numbers moving."

Avery left the chamber and shut the door firmly after him, a faint and rather pensive smile on his face. Yes, Mugglish reputation notwithstanding, accountancy definitely had its uses.

Embezzlement, for example. Funny that Felix should mention that, wasn't it? It looked simple enough in theory, but in practice it left a paper trail a mile wide, if you knew what you were looking at. If Felix Lestrange was going to push him about, he'd soon be finding himself in a very sticky situation at work. Not to mention the considerable dangers inherent in Lucrezia's wrath.

The pub was just starting to empty out: on the quieter weekday evenings people didn't tend to linger. Besides, this was a pub where business was transacted. Avery started to make his way over to the door, ignored by the few remaining drinkers: a party of hags at the large corner table, and two men at the bar whom Avery recognised as Owain Pritchard, the safe-breaker and his brother Dewi.

"Goodbye Mr Avery, sir," Marcel Quirke called softly from behind the bar. "Mind you go carefully now."

"Goodnight," Avery called in reply. A change appeared to have come over him since he had Lestrange's hired room. His voice, which in the private room had held a lively, mocking note, now sounded monotonal and self-effacing. His stride had shortened and his shoulders rounded slightly, his arms held close to his body as if reluctant to intrude on the world's personal space, his eyes slightly downcast as though too timid to look it in the face. He made his way to the door and opened it, and then, with body language more effective than any invisibility cloak, he stepped out into the world outside.

Avery allowed himself a small smile as he closed the door behind him. Perhaps he was dull, perhaps he was grey and boring and inconspicuous - all the things people thought he was. Well, that suited him just fine.

After all, it was one of his greatest weapons.











3.



Saturday December 6, 1980, 8.30 PM. Flat 3, 121 Marlborough Road, Cheltenham

Bzzzzt.

Arabella looked up from her work in annoyance as the door bell to her flat sounded. Of all the times for a Muggle visitor-! She had papers and scrolls – most of them highly sensitive - spread all over her writing desk, and a caller now would mean having to hide them all away and risk losing her place completely.

Bzzzzzzzzzzzt.

"All right, I'm coming," she muttered irritably, hastily bundling the scrolls to the bottom drawer of the desk and using a charm to seal it. One of her three black cats, Jessop, was asleep on her knee and she shoved him onto the ground unceremoniously, before standing up a little stiffly and making her way over to the door.

Bzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzz-

The final (needlessly Wagnerian) blast on the buzzer was cut short as Arabella picked up the entryphone.

"Hello?"

There was a momentary silence on the other end of the line, and then she heard, very faintly, a voice muttering, "Well, go on then."

"What do I do next?" said another voice. Arabella recognised this voice and sighed. Of course. Anybody else would have used the apparition point in the roof.

"How should I know? It was your idea, wasn't it?"

A third voice, which sounded younger than the others, interrupted their deliberations. "You could always try talking to it."

"Do you think so? Oh, okay." The voice suddenly became very loud, as if the second speaker had just put its head near the microphone and started shouting. "Er ... hello."

Arabella gave a grim little smile. "You don't need to shout, Arthur - speaking is perfectly adequate. You could try telling me who you've got with you."

"Oh, right," the voice answered at a more normal pitch. "Well, it's me, Arthur Weasley, and I've got Simon and Bilius with me. Could you hear that all right?"

"Perfectly clearly, dear." She was about to press the button that unlocked the front door when it occurred to her that it would be a good idea to explain first. "I'm going to let you in in a minute. You'll here a buzzing sound and that will tell you that the door's unlocked. You only have to push it to come in," she said emphatically. "I'm in Flat 3, which is on the top floor."

She pushed the entryphone button, and was relieved to hear, a few seconds later, three pairs of feet making their way up the stairs. As she listened to them climbing, she checked her Foeglass and Secrecy Sensor. Both were clear, but she still drew her wand, just in case.

As she listened, the three pairs of feet reached the top landing, and after a moment's whispered consultation, knocked on the door. There was a lens set in the door, and Arabella checked it before opening, automatically keeping her wand hand free and out of sight.

The sight that greeted her as she opened the door was one of slightly surreal comedy: a vision of three Muggle men, the tallest dressed in a pin-striped suit and orange kipper tie, the second, slightly younger and much shorter in mechanic's overalls (clean mechanic's overalls, Arabella noted automatically), and the youngest in biker's leathers that were too big for him, with a motorbike helmet under one arm. All three had vivid red hair and excited faces.

"Greetings," the tallest said, with a flamboyant bow. "I am Arthur Weasley, and these are my cousin Simon and my brother Bilius, all bringing you gifts from furthest Hogsmeade.

Arabella suppressed a smile and attempted to look disapproving. "Come in quick, before the neighbours see you," she said, and stood back to let them enter, closing the door after them.

"We were so careful about everything," Arthur said reproachfully. "Where did we go wrong?"

Arabella smirked. Poor dear. He'd obviously tried so hard, and yet he clearly didn't have a clue.

"Oh, the details are fine - though you would be doing the world a favour if you burnt that tie. And Simon, dear - I'd get some paint or oil on those overalls if I were you. They'd look much more convincing." She glanced at the two men's crestfallen faces and added tactfully, "but apart from that it's fine. It's just the overall effect that's needs a little work." She gestured them towards the sofa and the three sat down. It was a two-seat sofa, and Bilius, in the middle, looked a little squashed. "You just don't get businessmen walking down the street with mechanics and bikers - and you don't usually get businessmen and mechanics in the same family. It's a class thing - you wouldn't understand."

"Try us. We're not stupid." That was the boy, Bilius. He was - what? - barely eighteen. Possibly even still at Hogwarts.

"Well, it's like the Hogwarts houses, except with Muggles it's all about what family you come from, so it's much harder to alter, especially as intermarriage between classes tends to be quite rare." She gave them a sweet, deceptively innocent smile. "But you're not here to talk about Muggle culture, are you? Can I get you a drink?"

"We'd love to, Madam Figg, but we've got to get back to Dumbledore soon. He just sent us to deliver some information to you." Arabella did not ask why it had taken three people to deliver it: both Simon and Bilius scoffed at Arthur's fascination with all things Muggle, but neither of them lost a chance to get out into the Muggle world.

"Of course," she said. "I've been expecting it. I've got some papers for you to take back to him."

"Oh right." Arthur picked up the Muggle briefcase he'd been carrying and placed it on Arabella's writing desk, fiddling unsuccessfully with the catches. The case had a combination lock, and Arabella wondered doubtfully whether Arthur had really grasped the concept before he had locked it. After several minutes of inept fumbling he gave up and tapped the case with his wand. It sprang open immediately, and he picked up the three slim packages of papers lying inside. "Early Christmas present for you," he said. "I hope you like it."

"Oh, I will," Arabella said, her wrinkled face creasing into a smile.

"The first two were the papers you were expecting. Dumbledore's also sent some school records along, though what use they can be I don't know."

"Oh, you never know when information will come in handy," Arabella said, in a voice that was carefully noncommittal.

"Why do you need all this so suddenly, anyway?" Bilius piped up, fiddling with his motorcycle helmet with restless fingers. "Have you found something useful?"

Simon raised his eyes to the ceiling and Arthur gave his brother a forbidding look. "Bilius! You never ask that sort of question."

Arabella merely gave the boy a sweet smile. "You don't need to let that worry you, dear," she said. "Leave it to your elders and betters."

Bilius went rather red and stared at the floor, muttering something that was probably an apology. "Don't worry, dear," Arabella said to him. "We were all young once." Though not possibly quite so indiscreet, she added mentally, remembering how obsessively secretively an eighteen-year-old she had once been.

"Look, we'd better go, Madam Figg. We - Oh! Is that a tellyfizzing? Can I turn it on?" Arthur almost ran over to the box and crouched down by it, fiddling with the knobs. Back on the sofa, Bilius moved gratefully into the space his brother had vacated and Simon sighed loudly.

Arabella gave a thin smile. "No, dear. I'm afraid it doesn't actually work. It's just window-dressing for the Muggles. I even pay for the licence, you know."

"Oh." Arthur sounded disappointed. "I couldn't see if I could fix it, could I?"

"Oh, spare us, Arthur! Remember we've got to get the baby of the family back to Hogwarts before anyone finds out he's playing truant."

"Oh, right. I suppose we'd better. Well, maybe another time." Arthur left the television reluctantly and collected his briefcase as his brother and cousin stood up, and then followed Arabella to the door. "I expect we'll see you soon, Madam Figg."

"Oh, I expect so. Take care, won't you? Don't forget those papers for Albus." She thrust them into his hand just as he was about to step through the doorway, and he retreated back into the flat to put them in the empty briefcase. "Goodbye Arthur. My regards to Molly and the family. Goodbye, you two. Don't do anything I wouldn't."

Arthur called his farewells, his brother and cousin echoing them, and Arabella gave them a crooked smile as she watched them troop down the stairs.

Her smile vanished almost as soon as she'd shut the door of her flat again. She sat down at the writing desk again, and immediately the smallest of her cats, an elderly half-blind creature called Jill, jumped up onto her knee, looking inquiringly up at her out of one unclouded eye. She sighed, and began to stroke the soft fur absently.

She always found talking to the Weasleys depressing. Their straightforwardness and ebullience always left her feeling jaded - cynical and old - and their innocent manner always succeeded in putting her on the defensive. Always had; probably always would, for all she had the artistry not to let it show.

They never noticed, of course. Like all the Gryffindors of the world, they always seemed blithely unaware of the effect they had on others. They could not understand that their clear-eyed, uncompromising virtue, their instinctive righteousness and the rigid code of honour they held so proudly was a constant, belittling rebuke to those who could not or would not share it. And yet the unbendable Gryffindor chivalry was every bit as cold in its way as was the starkly Darwinian world-view of the Slytherin. In their purest forms, both were equally monstrous -- if neither was tempered by the Hufflepuff sense of community or the Ravenclaw respect for the individual.

She sighed and reached for the three bundles of parchments she had been brought, gazing unseeing at their blank, paper-swathed faces. She made to open them and then changed her mind, and placed them in a drawer still sealed. Better to come to them fresh in the morning. She was feeling tired this evening - tired and perhaps a little melancholy.

The papers wouldn't be urgent, or Albus would have told her. She had no doubt that most of the information in them would be innocuous enough, until it was interpreted aright. Seemingly irrelevant tidbits, viewed rightly, became isolated fragments of a huge and complex mosaic, which only someone who really understood how to connect the scraps of information could decipher correctly.

Information was her business, of course. Always had been, in a way, even back at Hogwarts, where she'd supplemented her meagre pocket money allowance with a little light blackmail. And then later, after leaving Hogwarts: within a year of her graduation she'd been recruited to the Intelligence Division of the Department of Magical Law Enforcement, first as an agent in the field, later running her own networks.

She was retired now, ostensibly, but the old habits had never died out. When Albus had come to her, late in 1970, asking her to join his newly formed Irregulars as Intelligence Officer, she hadn't even pretended to hesitate. Within a fortnight she had resurrected a good handful of her old contacts and was starting to put out feelers for new blood - slow, careful enquiries and heavily-disguised bait, laid out with the subtlety of a master angler.

Which was why, of course, she had taken the network's utter lack of success as a personal insult. Ten years of tidbits and rumours was all her network had to show. Useful tidbits, possibly, but still little more than chickenfeed, isolated flotsam of knowledge adrift in an ocean of ignorance. Incredibly, the master-angler had failed to land her fish.

And then? And then, nearly two weeks ago, a young, apparently highly-placed Death Eater had appeared out of nowhere and it had been Albus - innocent, guileless Albus - and not herself, who had landed the fish, collected the information from him and recruited him as his own personal spy.

She gave a soft sigh. No point in dwelling on that, after all. Albus may have recruited the lad, but it was she, Arabella, who would be using the information, which meant she still had work to do. She unlocked the bottom drawer with her wand and removed the papers she had placed in them earlier, reconstructing the piles and categories of papers she had sorted them into earlier, and flicking through them in a vain attempt to locate the sheet of memoranda she had been preparing.

Then she did something that would doubtless have startled any Muggle observer, had there been one. She removed the hearing aid carefully from her right ear and laid it before her on the table. It was a perfectly ordinary Muggle hearing aid, as far as appearances went, a small, curiously shaped flesh-coloured plastic box, connected to the ear itself by unpleasant-looking transparent tubing. A clunky, unnecessary device, for Arabella's hearing had always been exceptional, and was in no way dulled by the passing years. No: she had other uses entirely for this diminutive box of tricks.

She touched it lightly with her wand and rested her elbows on her desk like a schoolgirl as soft sounds suddenly filled the room. Footsteps, rustling, and then two voices, in a replay of a conversation that she had first heard nearly two weeks before.

"Now, Severus, what can I do for you?"

"I wish to give myself up."

She listened for a few seconds in silence, and then touched the hearing aid again with her wand, so that the sound ceased.

Albus had not been pleased when he found that she'd recorded the entire conversation without permission. She'd pointed out, quite acidly, that it hadn't exactly been possible to get permission under the circumstances, and offered to delete the recording immediately. As she'd expected, Albus had said no, quickly, and then asked for a transcript of the conversation.

That, of course, was the other problem with the Gryffindor mentality. It always needed somebody else to do the dirty work, somebody who was not handicapped by their crippling scruples.

She sighed again and turned her attention back to the parchments before her, trying to find the rolls she had been looking at before the Weasleys had interrupted her. There had been something she'd been cross-checking: a raid the kid had been talking about which seemed to tie in with an old receipt that had found its way to her from Laila Zabini's potions shop, and which should have been somewhere in the pile just in front of her.

She was finding it harder, these days, not to lose her concentration, a fact that she found faintly worrying. It wasn't that her mind was going, and her memory was still exceptional. No - it was the objectivity which seemed to be so hard to maintain.

Take the Snape kid, for example. Ten years ago, when she'd still been with the Ministry she would immediately have been able to classify him: genuine/fake, sound/unreliable, useful/obsolete/dangerous, important/negligible, and made an almost instant decision as to his usefulness and how it was to be exploited. The thing was, if not a game, then an intellectual exercise, not so different from chess, save that the pieces moved in wilder and less predictable ways. She had kept her emotions utterly detached from the work, no matter what her feelings towards the agent were.

As it was, when she'd seen him the week before, and understood what he had done and why he'd come to Dumbledore, she'd had to choke down a quite irrational irritation at him. She'd battled constantly with the desire to slap him, shake him, forcibly to jolt some sense into him. It had been an utterly nonsensical reaction, and whatever Albus had see in the boy had totally escaped her. She could not afford to allow her judgement to be clouded like that.

The trouble was, she knew herself too well to believe her irritation with the boy was just disgust at his crimes, or even revulsion at meeting one of those whom she and Albus and the others had so vigorously worked against. No: those she could have faced with detachment - she'd seen as bad or worse by her twenty-fifth birthday. But what got under her skin in the way those other things could not was that tiny voice that whispered whenever she thought about him, that could have been me.

"I'm losing my touch," she muttered, and began to flick through the sheafs of parchment in search of the small strip of parchment headed ‘Zabini's'. "Must be getting old."