Nymphadora Tonks and the Liquor of Jacmel

40. Stalking the Game

Monday 2^nd November 1994

Cassius moved at surprising speed for a man of his age as he stormed away from the house in the general direction of the local Floo station. Tonks almost had to run to keep up with his longer stride.

"Cassius ..." she said tentatively as they passed into the main street and she finally caught up with him. He ignored her. "Cassius!" There was no reply as he marched on. "CASSIUS!" She caught his sleeve and pulled him to a halt. "Talk to me, mate!"

"What do you want me to say, Tonks?" he snapped. "Do you want me to tell you I don't care this has happened?"

"No, but ..."

"Oh I see. Do you want to tell me I should be professional, not let it affect me, you can't let yourself get emotionally involved on the job?" He was actually beginning to rage at her, a development that left her truly startled. "I learnt that lesson a long time ago! I was doing this job for decades before you were even born, young woman!"

Tonks bit her tongue. She had in fact meant to say something very much along those lines, but confronted with this unexpectedly furious Cassius, she thought better of it. Even if it is accurate. "You don't normally storm off like this ..." she said weakly.

"I don't normally have reason! You think I like tormenting a woman who is not just a friend but a Muggle and has already stopped trusting wizards entirely?" Tonks began to get a little nervous; they were already getting some strange looks from passers-by, and she didn't really want to have to resort to mass Memory Charms, let alone write the inevitable reports and suffer the consequent chewing out from Claymore. "She's right, you know! I can't just wave my wand and make it all go away for her!"

"Cassius ..." she muttered, jerking her head at their audience in an attempt to warn him off.

"What do I do, cast an extra-strength Cheering Charm on her? It's not going to make any difference to her family situation, is it?"

"Cassius!" she hissed. "We're being watched, you pillock!"

"And you don't help matters by constantly tripping over your own two feet! We still have to go and bring in Clark now and ... what?" The last word was, mercifully, spoken more quietly, as he realised what was going on around him. Several people stared back, and some were pointing and giggling.

Tonks made a desperate survey of her surroundings, and to her relief spotted a quiet-looking pub about fifty yards down the road. She seized Cassius' arm and began to move him in that direction. "Come on mate, let's have a drink and calm down eh? I've never seen you like this before." She practically dragged him into the pub, found an empty table near the bar and sat him down. His silence throughout this process wasn't encouraging, but at least he didn't resist.

She took a deep breath and crossed to the bar, where the barmaid was watching them open-mouthed. "Two pints of lager," she snapped, then added, "Granddad's a bit of a handful sometimes," in a less aggressive tone, albeit one that didn't encourage questions. The barmaid shrugged, took two glasses from under the bar and began to fill them. Tonks checked for Cassius out of the corner of her eye; he was just sitting there, taking some very deep breaths. His expression was stony, but he seemed at least to have calmed down a little.

She fumbled in her pockets and thanked her stars when she found a Muggle ten-pound note to pay for the drinks. She plonked one of them on the table in front of Cassius and sat down opposite her partner, looking at him helplessly. "So," she said eventually, when the silence had become uncomfortable. "You want to talk about this, Cassius?"

He took a long drink from his pint and breathed heavily a few more times. "Not especially, as it happens, Tonks."

She sighed. "Well okay, not right now, maybe, but we're going to have to discuss this a bit at some point, yeah?"

He didn't reply, but merely finished the drink and half-rose to go to the bar. She jumped up quickly to forestall him. "No, let me."

Unfortunately, while the barmaid was pulling the pint, her situation acquired another complication as a couple of likely lads approached her with grins on their faces. "You all right love?" said the cockier-looking of the two, with a nod at Cassius.

"Oh yes, erm ..." she said, still feeling slightly flustered.

The other man grinned at her. "We heard him mouthing off outside. Are you sure he's safe?"

"I think I can handle him," she said coolly. "He's ... my granddad." Inwardly, she groaned; the last thing she wanted at the moment was to get into a conversation with any of the locals, but then she didn't want to draw attention to herself by telling them to sod off, either. She sighed when she caught sight of her reflection in the mirror behind the bar and remembered that her hair was currently long and in her favourite pink, which didn't offer much hope of remaining anonymous.

"Yeah, they can go a bit doo-lally at their age, can't they?" said the first man as Tonks paid for the drink, taking great care not to let them see her wand hidden up her sleeve, or indeed any of the many other things in her pockets that might look suspicious. They followed her over to the table with a kind of studied casualness. "What was that magic stuff he was on about? Does he think he's some sort of wizard or something?"

Tonks spluttered and nearly dropped the pint. She looked at the young man suspiciously, but he didn't seem to know how close to home his question was, and the blond streaks in his hair certainly looked as if they had been achieved with dye, not magic. "Well, he's done a bit of, er, conjuring in his time ..." She handed the glass Cassius and flashed him a warning look that told him not to explode again.

"Hiya, Mr ... er, your girl here didn't tell us your name."

Tonks groaned inwardly as she recognised the symptoms of two lads on the pull. It really wasn't a good time for interruptions. "Tonks," she said, at the same time as Cassius said "Scrimgeour."

"He's my mum's dad, you see ..." she added quickly, trailing off as she noticed them trying to hide grins. "What?"

"Nothing - oh sorry love," said the man with blond streaks, laughing, "it's just that Tonks is a bit of a funny name, isn't it? What's your first name?"

Tonks gritted her teeth and flashed another quick glare at Cassius, daring him to comment. "Katie."

"That's better. I'm Vinny, this here's Dave."

"Hi Vinny. Hi Dave." She decided to play for time; with any luck, the distraction might help calm Cassius down. He nodded at them briefly.

"So mate," said Vinny, who seemed to be the designated conversationalist of the two. "Katie here tells us you fancy yourself as a bit of a wizard then? You don't want to go shouting about it in the street, mate, sounds right strange!"

It was Cassius' turn to splutter over his pint, and look at Tonks in mute query. "Well ..."

"Oh yes, Granddad here likes to pretend he's a real wizard, it's ... sort of a little game we play." She grinned slightly at this perfect opportunity to get revenge for what Cassius had once said on a Brighton bus journey. He looked furious for a moment, but then hitched a smile onto his face.

"Yes, ah, sometimes I get a little carried away. I don't really think I can do magic."

Vinny and Dave exchanged looks which clearly said they thought he was lying. Fortunately, they had no way of knowing that he was lying because he really could do magic, not just because he thought he could. "So Katie, what brings you to our neck of the woods then?" asked Vinny breezily. "You stand out a bit round here."

"We were looking for someone we ... met once," she said, caught on the hop for a moment. "We know his mum, you see."

"Who's that then?"

Tonks shrugged. Can't see any harm in telling them, it not like they're going to know him anyway ... "Bloke called Clark Hallendale."

She jumped as Dave chuckled unexpectedly. "Old Clarkie? There's a blast from the past."

Her head turned so quickly that she nearly cricked her neck. "What? How do you know him?"

"Went to primary school with him," he said, looking flattered that he now had her undivided attention. "Bit of an odd one - well, his whole family were really ..."

Vinny turned to his pal. "Did he have an older brother called Monty?"

"Yeah, I think so."

"He was in my year! They sent him off to some posh boarding school up in Scotland when he was eleven. Must have worked, he's some kind of company director up in the Smoke now."

"Yeah? Probably the same one Clark went off to then. Wouldn't have thought they had that kind of money." He turned to Tonks. "Hey Katie, you've got us going down memory lane here. They weren't at Prince Charlie's old place, were they?"

Tonks had no idea what he was talking about, but fortunately Cassius must have seen the baffled expression on her face and jumped in. "Er, no, I don't think his mother sent him there ..."

"Funny bugger, old Clark, isn't he?" asked Dave reflectively. "Always seems a bit dodgy. Never says much."

"I suppose not." said Tonks, and then, as Dave's use of the present tense registered with her, "Hang on, have you seen him recently?"

"Not for a year or two -" Tonks felt her face fall at that "- but come to think of it, Vinny, Pete Webster told me he saw him out by one of those warehouses on the ring road a couple of weeks ago."

"Yeah?" asked Vinny, interested.

"Yeah. Said he was driving by, minding his own business, and suddenly spotted Clarkie through the fence. It was like he'd appeared out of thin air or something." Tonks raised her eyebrows. A lack of concern for basic anti-Muggle Apparition security fitted perfectly with everything she'd ever heard about Clark Hallendale. "If you really wanted to find him, you could go out there and ask at the offices maybe? They might know him."

She exchanged significant glances with Cassius. "Yeah, Dave. Thanks. I think we might just do that."

*****

Tonks shivered and stared across at the warehouse, which seemed to loom larger as the daylight faded. Once they'd pumped Vinny and Dave for as much information as possible it hadn't been hard to find, and as soon as they'd arrived the traces of magic around it were easily detectable.

"Bit daft of him to have his hideout locally, wasn't it?" she asked.

"I don't think Clark is always the most rigorous or cunning of thinkers," replied Cassius heavily.

"No, I suppose not."

An uneasy pause followed this exchange, but then it was just one of many that day.

A few calls to Auror headquarters soon revealed that the warehouse wasn't listed on the register of wizard-owned properties in the Ministry, which wasn't really a surprise. What was mildly surprising was that one of the departmental specialists in locating and examining Muggle records had managed to find out very quickly that it had been rented by Clark Hallendale. All in all, it looked like a handy hideout and storage location for contraband, wizarding or otherwise. Which was how she and Cassius came to be standing on a patch of exposed and chilly waste ground at the rear of the building, at the top of a ridge backing onto a steepish slope that went down to the main ring road, waiting for reinforcements to arrive.

Even the November weather wasn't as chilly as the atmosphere between her and Cassius since that morning, however. Every time she'd tried to engage him in conversation that wasn't strictly related to the case at hand, he'd brushed her off. It had made for a rather uncomfortable day, even if he had calmed down a lot since their stroke of good fortune in the pub.

A rocket streaked across the sky and she jumped, remembering after a second or two that Muggles always let off fireworks at this time of year, for reasons her father had tried to explain but which she'd never quite understood. Whatever day the celebrations were actually supposed to be, the kids always seemed to treat it as a suggestion rather than a fixed point.

She shivered again at a particularly icy gust of wind and racked her brains for a decent warming charm that wouldn't risk setting her clothes on fire.

"Tonks ..."

She turned to Cassius to find him staring fixedly at his shoes. "Yes?"

"I'm sorry," he said, so quietly she could barely hear him.

"Yeah, well ... bad time for you, eh?" she told him, caught unawares by the sudden apology and not knowing quite what to say.

"No, I mean it." His voice was getting slightly stronger. "I had no right to shout at you like that just because of my own hurt feelings ..."

"Don't worry about it." She definitely wanted to discuss the subject with him at some point, but not right in the middle of an operation. And he'd always been tolerant of her own outbursts, after all ... She held up a hand to forestall any protest. "No, I mean it. Everyone's entitled to blow their top occasionally." When he looked uncertain, she added, "Just don't cut me off, Cassius, all right? When you want to talk about it, I'm listening."

"And if I don't particularly want to talk about it?" He said it with a touch of wry grin, which was a little more promising.

"You will. If you can't tell your own partner, who can you tell, eh?" That sounded so cheerily forced it made her wince, and she hastily added, "Anyway, let's call it bygones for now, shall we? Who are we waiting for?"

Cassius thankfully seized the opportunity to move onto another topic. "I got Rhiannon when I contacted Headquarters - she's going to collect Donnacha and Arnold and anyone else she can rope in at short notice. I want to make sure we have as many wands as possible to reduce the chances of something going wrong." He gave her a pointed look, as if defying her to bring up the Jugson case, but she had no intention of doing so.

"If he is there, do you think he'll have noticed us sneaking round blocking off his exits?" she asked after a moment or two.

"I hope not. We want to achieve surprise."

"No Floo connection in the place?"

"Not according to Mary Edgecombe ..."

They were interrupted by a popping sound as two colleagues appeared next to them. Tonks did a quick double-take; the new arrivals were Rhiannon Davies and (to her surprise) Bentley Williamson, not the expected O'Gregan and Cornworthy.

"Rhiannon? Is this everyone?" asked Cassius, sounding rather alarmed. "Why aren't Donnacha and Arnold with you?"

She grimaced. "Claymore called them into his office for a full discussion of the Carrack case. Apparently your nephew saw the reports, and wasn't entirely satisfied that it had no connection with the World Cup fracas that he still hasn't managed to catch anybody for. Didn't think their report was thorough enough."

Cassius groaned. "That sounds like Rufus, I'm afraid. Damn! I wanted as much cover here as possible."

"Well, don't mind me, I'm just along for the ride," said Williamson, gazing into space in a pointed manner. "Out of the goodness of my heart I agree to help out a fellow worker when I could be sitting in the pub ..."

"Ah." Even in the fading light Tonks could see Cassius blush slightly. "My apologies, Bentley. Well ... I suppose four of us should be plenty to stop him getting away from the building."

"How many exits are there?" asked Rhiannon.

"Several, including a set of large sliding doors at the front, but Tonks and I have sealed them all off except for the one we'll be using." He pointed to a double door in the back wall of the warehouse. "It's a good thing that ridge keeps us out of sight of the main road."

"Magical means of exit?"

"I placed Anti-Disapparation Jinxes on the building," put in Tonks.

"And I reinforced the windows as well. So if has a broom in there, he won't be able to smash a window and fly out, at least not before we can get to him."

"Fair enough," agreed Williamson. "What do you want us to do?"

"I'll go in with Tonks. One of you can come in with us, but I need the other to remain out here to cut off the escape route if he sneaks past us and makes a run for it."

"I can do that," said Rhiannon. "Hex on sight?"

"I'm afraid so."

"No problem."

"Do we go in hard or soft?" asked Williamson. When Tonks looked at him in puzzlement, he amplified, "Do we blast down the door or try to sneak in?"

Cassius hesitated. "Soft, I think," he said eventually. "We've checked the building - it has a few basic security charms on it, which we've neutralised, but nothing major that might draw attention. It seems to be completely dark inside, so if he is there, I think we can get in and put the lights on before he realises and have a few seconds surprise."

"The lights? Do we know the layout of the place?"

"We had a look inside a couple of the other warehouses, Ben," explained Tonks. "They all seem to be built the same way. We chose this door because there should be a light switch on its left hand side. Inside it's basically one big open space except for a couple of offices in the corners at either end, on this side of the building."

"Open space. Right. Unless it's full of stuff, of course, in which case it could be a maze. Is this bloke any good in a fight?"

Cassius shrugged. "Tonks here put him out of action with one spell the last time they met in anger, and it seems that the only way he could think of to commit his murder was to use a Reductor Curse at point-blank range. So no, I don't think he's very good. On the other hand, he'll know the layout and where he can hide, so both of you be careful."

"I always am, Cassius, You know me. And needlessly violent of course. Don't forget that." He grinned.

"Yes ... You have your knife, Tonks?" At her nod, he continued, "Very well. Silencing spell on the door, then unlock it with the knife. Ben, you slip in and put the lights on, it'll be brighter than a spell and we won't have to maintain it. Jinx anyone you see. Rhiannon, if you hear any trouble inside, get ready to hex him if he tries to escape." His voice was brisk and businesslike, but even so, Tonks could detect the note of regret. "All right. Everyone knows what they have to do? Good. Over to you then, Tonks."

Tonks ran the unlocking gadget on K's knife around the doorframe, and the lock clicked open without trouble. She nodded at Cassius, then waved her wand once to open the door; Bentley Williamson was already moving with impressive smoothness as soon as it opened. He slipped in and hit the light switch; the other two following quickly with wands drawn to start jinxing at the first hint of movement.

Unfortunately, there was no-one in sight. Tonks' heart sank when she saw the many boxes, clothing racks, containers and other assorted junk piled high inside the warehouse, all of which provided an ample number of possible hiding places.

The Aurors exchanged quick glances and spread out through the building, moving cautiously. Tonks went right, in which direction a series of large pallets had been stacked so as to form a sort of impromptu passageway around the edge of the building. By taking advantage of this and staying close to the wall, she soon reached one of the offices, and peered cautiously through the window. All she could see though were boxes of fireworks strewn over the floor - nicked ones, I wouldn't be surprised - with no sign of Clark Hallendale. She swore under her breath and continued at a slow pace along the wall.

She'd almost reached the far corner of the warehouse when there was a sudden loud bang. A curse flew from somewhere in the middle of the room and blasted the main strip lights, plunging the room back into darkness.

"Lumos!" cried Williamson. "Argh ... Nox!" He ducked and swore loudly as the bright light brought a curse flying his way. Tonks could hear someone running and hesitantly pointed her wand in what seemed to be the general direction, but in the big echoey room it was hard to tell exactly where the sound was coming from.

Cassius' voice rang out impatiently. "Omnilumens!"

The magical light that illuminated the room was dim compared to the fluorescent lights, but did at least provide enough visibility to see what was happening, and show her where she could put her feet without falling over anything (she didn't normally need help in that regard, after all). She could just see Clark Hallendale through a small gap in the containers, caught in the middle of running for the main doors on the front of the building. He froze for a moment, then dived for cover behind some of the junk.

As Cassius and Williamson began to move in his direction, he fired off a wild spell. It never stood much chance of hitting them, but as luck would have it the spell ricocheted off a container and hit a teetering pile of miscellaneous bric-a-brac, which wobbled for a moment or two and then came crashing down on top of the Aurors. Tonks heart leapt to her mouth, but after a moment she heard muffled cursing from Cassius and not-so-muffled cursing from Williamson. It sounded as if they'd managed to get themselves tangled up in rolls of material, at which point it dawned on her that for the next minute or two she was the only one in a position to do something about Clark

She raced to head him off, finally catching sight of him attempting to blast the main doors open with a Reductor Curse. Luckily, the reinforcement they'd put on the building held, as the doors buckled very slightly but stayed in one piece. She fired an off-balance Stunner at him as she stumbled round the corner of the building, but missed. His return spell was easily blocked, but unfortunately as it bounced off her shield it sent some more junk crashing to the ground, and he used the diversion to scoot off into a gap, heading back in the direction of the door the Aurors had entered by.

Gritting her teeth, she gave chase, coming out into relatively open space just in time to see him dodge a spell sent by Williamson on the other side of the warehouse, hurdle a low box, and disappear behind the very set of containers in front of the office that she'd just used for concealment.

Both of them had started to turn the air blue when Cassius appeared behind them, keeping back to stay out of Clark Hallendale's line of sight. He placed a finger on his lips before they could start talking.

"What do we do? Try to Vanish the stuff he's hiding behind?" she mouthed at him.

He shook his head. "Too big. Too much of it," he mouthed back, then pointed first at himself and then at the ad hoc passageway that Tonks had followed to get there. They nodded to show that they understood that this meant he was going to try to outflank Clark, and he gave them a quick thumbs-up and slipped out of sight, moving excruciatingly slowly to reduce the noise.

Tonks exchanged uneasy glances with Williamson. "Oi, you behind the boxes!" the ponytailed Auror yelled suddenly. "Are you going to stop buggering around and come out of there nice and quiet?" Tonks felt her jaw drop, then realised that if they could keep him talking, the less attention he'd be able to give to what Cassius was doing. Williamson's sally didn't result in anything but a short reply telling him exactly what he could do.

"Game's up, Clark!" cried Tonks, joining in. This produced a strangled sound from behind the containers and she continued gleefully, "Yeah, I know who you are now! This time we've got four against one!"

Clark Hallendale swore again, then added in a bitter voice, "I should have let Sylvester pick you up like he wanted to."

"Pity you killed him then, wasn't it?" taunted Williamson.

"Think you're so bleeding clever, don't you, Auror?" he snarled. "I know all about you. You're that poncy long-haired git who was trying to crowd Finlay. There's a laugh. And I know all about her, too. She's the slag who works with that old fart Scrimgeour."

"Yeah, that's me!" she yelled, stung. "The slag that's going to bring you in! You really shouldn't have shown your face in the Ministry Saturday night, Clark, I'd never have realised who you were otherwise!"

It took a second or two for him to find a reply to this piece of information. "Well you'll have to kill me to get me out of here!" If he was trying to sound tough he hadn't quite achieved it, she could hear a definite quaver in his voice. "And if you try, I'll ..."

"What, use a Reductor Curse on us?" She could just hear Cassius making his way round the wall, irritatingly slowly. She wasn't even sure if he'd rounded the corner of the building yet, and the closer he got, the harder it would be to sneak up on Clark Hallendale. She shouted even louder to cover up the noise. "Yeah, that'd work, Clark! If we head-butted your wand first, maybe. Just to let you get the range!"

Williamson picked up on what she was doing. "Hang on. Is this the loser you told me about who couldn't even think of a decent lethal curse? What a bloody wimp!"

"That's not the only curse I know ..." he spat. They could hear him moving, and Tonks suddenly realised he was using the same tactic they were in an attempt to sneak away. He was clearly close to the end of the bank of containers now, and might be able to run for it.

"Yeah it is, laddie," replied Williamson, taking aim. "If you knew anything decent you'd have used it by now. Nah, you use a Killing Curse like -" as Clark poked his head out - "this! Avada Ked ..." There was a choked sound and the head was hastily pulled back behind the containers.

"Williamson, you stupid git!" hissed Tonks, shocked. "What the frigging hell was that?"

"Just trying to put the wind up him a bit," he muttered defensively. "Wasn't going to say the whole curse, was I? Remember how old Dawlish always used to pat himself on the back for that bit of bluff in training?" Tonks wasn't at all sure that Clark had realised that the curse had been stopped half-way through, and it didn't help when Williamson raised his voice to shout, "Not that little Clarkie here could do one of those anyway, could you, eh?"

She huffed at him - don't scare him too much Ben, a desperate man might try desperate measures - but let it go at noises from behind the containers that strongly suggested Clark was moving rapidly back the other way, which would mean that he'd soon encounter Cassius unexpectedly. They were already exchanging semi-satisfied glances when, to their surprise, they could hear the sound of a door opening.

It took Tonks a couple of seconds to realise that it must be the door of the little office she'd previously checked, a couple more seconds to remember what was in that office, and a further couple of seconds to react. That was just a couple of seconds too many.

As she opened her mouth to shout a warning there was a sinister wheeeeee sound that would have drowned out anything she might have been intending to say - and then all hell broke loose as a volley of charmed fireworks shot out all around them.

She had about half a second to react this time and for a miracle hit on the right answer, the one she'd used in their first fight, making the same long sweeping motion with her wand that Transfigured a clothes rack into a wall around herself and Williamson to bear the brunt of the explosions that happened a second later. As it collapsed around them, they shook their heads to get the ringing out of their ears and turned towards the door, only to find they had a new problem: the fireworks had started at least half a dozen fires burning.

"Shit!" cried Williamson, who was unfortunate enough to be nearest. "Aguamenti!"

Tonks let him get on with it as she stumbled, coughing, towards the back door. Her heart sank as she saw that Clark Hallendale had already blasted it open and was running towards it full-tilt, and then to her enormous relief she saw Rhiannon Davies appear in the doorway.

Clark skidded to a halt, raised his wand and yelled "Stupefy!"

Rhiannon casually blocked the curse, looking at Clark with a slightly mocking grin on her face. Tonks continued to pick her way towards them through those parts of the warehouse that weren't on fire.

"Impedimenta! Reducto!" Her sudden appearance just when he thought he was about to get away had obviously induced panic. "Petrificus Totalus!"

Rhiannon, still grinning, blocked the spells easily with wordless Shield Charms.

Tonks finally found a position where she had a clear shot at him. It wasn't until she looked back at the events that followed that it became clear that they could only have taken a few seconds, as she got her balance and took aim. But at the time, they appeared to take place in slow motion.

Rhiannon raised her wand, preparatory to firing back a hex of her own.

Clark Hallendale lost it completely and waved his wand in her general direction, yelling "Avada Kedavra!"

An aghast Rhiannon threw herself backwards as green light shot from the end of the wand.

Tonks realised that there wasn't be enough room to get out of the way a split-second before the curse struck her colleague in the face .

Rhiannon was blasted back against the doorframe and crumpled to the floor, where she lay unmoving.

*****

Tonks froze. So did Clark Hallendale.

He turned towards her with mute appeal on his face. She could read his thoughts perfectly without needing any skill whatsoever in Legilimency: "I didn't think that would happen oh Mother NOW what have I done?"

The tableau could not have lasted more than a split-second before he whirled and ran for the door, and Tonks realised that she had only one chance to stop him before he reached it and was able to Disapparate. Later, her unoriginal but nonetheless accurate reflection would be that it was bloody strange what flashed through your mind at a time like that.

The thing that did was her apology to Cassius many months before: I hope I'm not the sort of person who'd kill for revenge. Not even if ... I don't know, a friend got killed in front of me. Back then, she'd been talking about her willingness to kill her escaped cousin on sight. A man who she now believed was probably innocent. Unlike Clark Hallendale.

She shook off the memory, raised her wand and aimed it at the fleeing Clark. The only thing that made sense to her at that precise moment was to prevent him from getting away.

"Remansio!"

She saw him stumble as he crossed the threshold of the doorway and exited the building, and felt a brief flash of satisfaction at her sudden intuition; cast a wide-angle spell, make sure I get him ...

As she followed him out she saw him twist on the spot, and some strangely detached part of her mind noted with satisfaction that the way he froze when the Disapparation attempt failed looked exactly the same as the Gringotts thief in similar circumstances. So did the way he whirled round on her in horror.

He fired off a curse and she hastily ducked out of the way, but the streak of light this time was red not green, and failed to make much of an impression when it hit the reinforced window behind her. He turned again and ran.

Trying to control her jumpy nerves, she began to chase him, although a couple of curses she fired on the run just missed. He was using his head start to make for the little ridge that led to the main road, and as they ran a horrible realisation dawned on her; if he could make it as far as the road itself, he might very well be able to hijack a car. And as both of them by now were in sight of that road, if she tried anything spectacular she would probably land in the middle of a serious Statute of Secrecy breach - it would surely be seen by at least half-a-dozen motorists, who would be out of reach down the road before she had any chance to Memory Charm them ...

Maybe your safety-first option wasn't such a smart idea, idiot!

Half-panicking herself now, and knowing that she had to come up with something that looked natural, she aimed very carefully and threw a Trip Jinx at him. She almost cheered when his feet jerked up and he went stumbling down the hill, but as she followed realised with horror that it had worked too well. Clark stumbled headlong down the hill and out onto the main road itself, just as a speeding lorry emerged from the curve of the roundabout.

The driver braked hard, but there wasn't a hope of him of stopping in time. The side of the cab slammed into Clark Hallendale and sent him flying.

*****

Tonks stood frozen for a moment as she struggled to take in this latest cock-up. Then she hastily tucked away her wand and made her way down to the road as quickly as she could, ending up by more or less sliding on her bum for most of the way.

Clark Hallendale had been thrown back on to the grass verge by the roadside and was lying very still. She checked for a pulse, and wasn't quite sure to be relieved or not when she found one, albeit weak. She'd always known intellectually, from watching Quidditch, that wizards had more resilience against heavy impacts and a better chance of surviving them, but it had never really sunk in at such a gut level before.

She heard a noise behind her, and looked up to see the white-faced lorry driver coming over to them.

"Is he all right, Miss? He just came out of nowhere - I couldn't even hit the brakes in time!"

Tonks nodded somewhat shakily. "Not your fault, mate. I saw it all, don't worry." She made a brief critical examination of Clark Hallendale. "I think a Healer can patch him up, if I can get him there in time ..."

"A Healer?" said the driver, staring at her goggle eyed. "Bloody crystals and stuff? No way! He needs an ambulance!" Tonks closed her eyes for a moment and tried not to scream as he fished a mobile phone from his pocket and began pressing buttons. Luckily for her state of mind, they were interrupted by a sudden noise, and both turned to see Williamson scrambling down the hill

"I saw what happened, I'm a doctor," he said to the driver, who sagged in relief. "Let me look at him." Tonks swore under her breath. Doctor! Should have remembered that. With a scowl on his face he gave his 'patient' a brief and none too gentle once-over, then stood up, searched the bank for a moment or two and found an empty bottle that must have been tossed out of a car window. He handed it to Tonks and gave her a surreptitious wink. "We can all cling to this. You know what to do, you've done it before, right?"

He turned to the bewildered driver and pulled out his wand. "Sorry about this, mate. Obliviate!"

The driver's eyes slid out of focus, and Tonks seized the opportunity to tap the bottle with her wand and mutter "Portus". The blue light had only just faded when his eyes snapped back into focus again, and he shook his head as if to clear it.

"What happened?" he said, staring at Clark Hallendale in amazement.

"He was hit by ... a car. Driver didn't stop," said Tonks quickly.

"Decent of you to help out by phoning for an ambulance, mate," added Williamson, "but you'd better get going before the Mugg ... the police get here. You've obviously had a bit of a shock, they might stop you driving. Have you got to be somewhere?"

His eyes widened. "Bugger! That's a fair point. See you!" He ran off back to his lorry, and as he did Tonks moved to hide Williamson from view. He cast a few emergency first aid charms over their captive as the lorry pulled away

"That'll hold him till we get him to St Mungo's." He looked up and met Tonks' eye, and his expression was ugly. "Not sure why we're bothering though ..."

"Rhiannon?" asked Tonks. Tears began to form in her eyes when he didn't reply; the shock was beginning to set in. "Oh God, Ben, who's going to tell Don?"

"Haven't a clue," he said, his face set and bleak. "I came straight after you and this little scumbag, and left old Cassius to put out the fires and deal with her. At least he'll be a bit more sensitive than I could manage. Poor bastard. Poor Rhiannon. He wasn't supposed to know how to do that."

"Why did you have to do that stupid pretend Killing Curse?" she raged, the tears spilling down her cheeks now. "You complete prick, Ben, you gave him the idea!"

"I know." Williamson was obviously trying very hard not to shed tears of his own; virtually all of his usual cockiness had deserted him. "Look ... I suppose we have to bring chummy in. Let's go. We're in deep shit whatever we do, let's not make it any worse."

"Yeah. Right." She blinked the moisture away from her eyes and wiped her face, trying not to snap at him. She remembered to cast a Muggle-Repelling Charm around them to discourage any passing motorists from watching what was about to happen, then wrapped one of Clark Hallendale's limp hands round the neck of the bottle, took the other end in her hand, and nodded to Williamson. "Are you ready? It activates when we all touch it."

Without a word he touched the middle and the side of the dual carriageway was suddenly empty again.

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Note for non-Brits: Bonfire Night was what Ted Tonks was trying to explain to his daughter.