Chapter Three

Chapter Three

Alas, 'tis not mine. Would that it were!

Robert: So how about it, Minna? Want to pick a night and see if we can manage some shooting stars?

(Xiomara manages to choke back a snicker.)

Minerva: I don't know, Robbie. It sounds like fun but it might be going too far. I don't want to do anything to ...

Robert: Risk your scholarship, I know. You may have a point. Oh, hey, I meant to ask, who's the author of that book?

Minerva: (Checking the front of the book) Someone called J. K. Rowling.

Robert: Rowling; why does that sound familiar?

Alastor: Old wizarding family. Lives down in Kent. Powerful, most of 'em, but the family throws up a squib every couple of generations.

Minerva: Chapter Three: The Letters From No One.

The escape of the Brazilian boa constrictor earned Harry his longest-ever punishment. By the time he was allowed out of his cupboard again, the summer holidays had started

Minerva: Does that mean he missed his Final Exams?

Alastor: You'd think even those bloody Muggle teachers would have suspected something wasn't right!

and Dudley had already broken his new video camera, crashed his remote control airplane, and, first time out on his racing bike, knocked down old Mrs. Figg as she crossed Privet Drive on her crutches.

Xiomara: And her cats all swarmed after him with vengeance in their hearts and devoured him down to the bone!

Pomona: Yuck!

Robert: (musingly) I like cats.

Harry was glad school was over, but there was no escaping Dudley's gang, who visited the house every single day.

Filius: Why didn't Dudley ever go to their houses?

Xiomara: Merlin's Beard, Flit, you think any mother but Petunia would let that mob into her house?

Piers, Dennis, Malcolm, and Gordon were all big and stupid,

Minerva: Weren't they saying earlier that Piers was scrawny?

Alastor: Well done for noticing lass. When a witness tells conflicting stories...

Pomona: Maybe he had a growth spurt.

but as Dudley was the biggest and stupidest of the lot, he was the leader. The rest of them were all quite happy to join in Dudley's favorite sport: Harry Hunting.

Pomona: The unspeakable in full pursuit of the uneatable. ^*1

Alastor: Knowing Dudley, I wouldn't be too sure of that.

Minerva: How did the Unspeakables get into this?

Pomona: Er... never mind.

This was why Harry spent as much time as possible out of the house, wandering around

Alastor: Talking with any snakes he met...

and thinking about the end of the holidays, where he could see a tiny ray of hope. When September came he would be going off to secondary school and, for the first time in his life, he wouldn't be with Dudley. Dudley had been accepted at Uncle Vernon's old private school, Smeltings. Piers Polkiss

(Xiomara can't help snickering again. The others ignore it.)

was going there too. Harry, on the other hand, was going to

All: HOGWARTS!

Stonewall High, the local public school. Dudley thought this was very funny.

Filius: Dudley is easily amused.

"They stuff people's heads down the toilet the first day at Stonewall," he told Harry. "Want to come upstairs and practice?"

Pomona: (wryly) They do that at Hogwarts too!

Minerva: Only if you run afoul of the Bulstrodes!

"No, thanks," said Harry. "The poor toilet's never had anything as horrible as your head down it ... it might be sick."

All: Hurrah! Bravo!

Xiomara: That's telling him, Harry!

Filius: Yes, but he'll have to run for it, now!

Minerva: Only if Dudley is bright enough to work out what he said!

Then he ran, before Dudley could work out what he'd said.

Alastor: I wonder how long that took?

Xiomara: Put it this way; Harry had crossed the border into Hampshire by the time Dudley yelled.

One day in July, Aunt Petunia took Dudley to London to buy his Smeltings uniform, leaving Harry at Mrs. Figg's. Mrs. Figg wasn't as bad as usual. It turned out she'd broken her leg tripping over one of her cats, and she didn't seem quite as fond of them as before.

Robert: Doesn't she know, if you trip over the cat it's your fault, not the cat's?

She let Harry watch television and gave him a bit of chocolate cake that tasted as though she'd had it for several years.

Xiomara: Isn't chocolate supposed to be better when it's aged?

Alastor: No that's wine.

Pomona: Or cheese.

Xiomara: Oh.

That evening, Dudley paraded around the living room for the family in his brand-new uniform. Smeltings boys wore maroon tailcoats, orange knickerbockers,

Robert: With ice cream?

Filius: Maroon with orange?! (Shudders)

and flat straw hats called boaters. They also carried knobbly sticks, used for hitting each other while the teachers weren't looking. This was supposed to be good training for later life.

Minerva: Well, now we understand a lot more about Vernon!

As he looked at Dudley in his new knickerbockers, Uncle Vernon said gruffly that it was the proudest moment of his life. Aunt Petunia burst into tears

Filius: That color combination would make anyone cry!

and said she couldn't believe it was her Ickle Dudleykins, he looked so handsome and grown-up.

Pomona: Nicknamed "The Handsome!" There he sat.

And (think of it!) The man was fat!

Filius: (Ignoring Pomona) This woman has very strange ideas of attractiveness.

Pomona: Well, she married Vernon, after all.

Harry didn't trust himself to speak. He thought two of his ribs might have already cracked from trying not to laugh.

Minerva: Dudley always seems to be cracking Harry's ribs one way or another, doesn't he?

There was a horrible smell in the kitchen the next morning when Harry went in for breakfast.

Xiomara: Dudley had gotten up early.

It seemed to be coming from a large metal tub in the sink. He went to have a look. The tub was full of what looked like dirty rags swimming in gray water.

Robert: Ah-hah! The secret's out! Petunia is really a highly skilled potions brewer!

Alastor: I knew there was something she wasn't telling us!

Pomona: What kind of potion would have things that looked like dirty rags in it?

Alastor: Trust me, lass, you don't want to know!

"What's this?" he asked Aunt Petunia. Her lips tightened as they always did if he dared ask a question.

"Your new school uniform," she said.

Harry looked in the bowl again.

"Oh," he said, "I didn't realize it had to be so wet."

Robert: Neatly done, Harry! Stopped just short of anything she could legitimately call a wisecrack!

Minerva: Probably safest in the circumstances.

"Don't be stupid," snapped Aunt Petunia. "I'm dyeing some of Dudley's old things gray for you. It'll look just like everyone else's when I've finished."

Robert: If it does, I'll have some doubts about that school!

Harry seriously doubted this, but thought it best not to argue. He sat down at the table and tried not to think about how he was going to look on his first day at Stonewall High ... like he was wearing bits of old elephant skin, probably.

Xiomara: And he'll still look better than Dudley!

Filius: The thing about gray is, it doesn't clash with anything!

Robert: The thing about Dudley is, he clashes with everything!

Dudley and Uncle Vernon came in, both with wrinkled noses because of the smell from Harry's new uniform. Uncle Vernon opened his newspaper as usual and Dudley banged his Smelting stick, which he carried everywhere, on the table.

They heard the click of the mail slot and flop of letters on the doormat.

"Get the mail, Dudley," said Uncle Vernon from behind his paper.

Xiomara: Since you'll never get the female!

Others: Xia!

"Make Harry get it."

"Get the mail, Harry."

"Make Dudley get it."

Alastor: Boy's not too ground down yet.

"Poke him with your Smelting stick, Dudley."

Filius: Oh for Merlin's sake, you two, I'll get it myself!

Harry dodged the Smelting stick and went to get the mail. Three things lay on the doormat: a postcard from Uncle Vernon's sister Marge, who was vacationing on the Isle of Wight, a brown envelope that looked like a bill, and ... a letter for Harry.

Robert: From Professor McGonagall, asking if he was keeping his litter-box clean and reminding him to only eat mice that had been approved by the Board of Health.

Harry picked it up and stared at it, his heart twanging like a giant elastic band.

Minerva: (looking at Pomona) Elastic band?

Pomona: It's sort of...(fishes around in her robes, pulls out an elastic band, stretches it and twangs it to demonstrate.)

No one, ever, in his whole life, had written to him. Who would? He had no friends, no other relatives ... he didn't belong to the library, so he'd never even got rude notes asking for books back.

Filius: How sad to be nearly eleven and never had a rude note from the library!

Robert: Now Minna, here, writes rude notes to the library!

Minerva: Well they had misfiled "Love Charms and Passion Potions".

Robert: Minna, it wasn't misfiled, it was in the Restricted Section!

Minerva: Where it wasn't doing anyone any good!

Alastor: What were you meaning to do with a book like that anyway, Miss Duncan?

Minerva: Maybe someday I'll show you, Mr. Moody.

(There are several whoops and catcalls. If Robert's grin is just the tiniest bit forced, no one, not even his best friend, notices.)

Yet here it was, a letter, addressed to him so plainly there could be no mistake:

Mr. H. Potter

The Cupboard under the Stairs

4 Privet Drive

Little Whinging

Surrey

Pomona: That's got to be his Hogwarts letter! No Muggle address would include the cupboard!

The envelope was thick and heavy, made of yellowish parchment, and the address was written in emerald-green ink.

Filius: It sounds like the Hogwarts letter, but mine wasn't written in green ink.

Minerva: The duty of writing them has obviously been taken over by someone with excellent taste!

There was no stamp.

Alastor: What's a stamp?

Pomona: It's... well, it's sort of like paying the owl for delivery ... only without the owl.

Minerva: Um...right.

Turning the envelope over, his hand trembling, Harry saw a purple wax seal bearing a coat of arms; a lion, an eagle, a badger, and a snake surrounding a large letter H.

Pomona: Purple with green?

Filius: After the Maroon and Orange fiasco, I'll believe anything!

"Hurry up, boy!" shouted Uncle Vernon from the kitchen. "What are you doing, checking for letter bombs?" He chuckled at his own joke.

Minerva: What's a letter bomb?

Pomona: Er, ... sort of what Muggles use instead of a Destructus Totalus curse.

Alastor: Happens often in the Muggle world, does it?

Harry went back to the kitchen, still staring at his letter. He handed Uncle Vernon the bill and the postcard, sat down, and slowly began to open the yellow envelope.

Alastor: I don't like this. He should have opened it out in the hall.

Uncle Vernon ripped open the bill, snorted in disgust, and flipped over the postcard.

"Marge's ill," he informed Aunt Petunia. "Ate a funny whelk..."

Robert: I wonder what was funny about it?

Alastor: Well, its jokes were probably better than yours, laddie!

"Dad!" said Dudley suddenly. "Dad, Harry's got something!"

Harry was on the point of unfolding his letter, which was written on the same heavy parchment as the envelope, when it was jerked sharply out of his hand by Uncle Vernon.

Minerva: Charming manners they have in that family!

"That's mine!" said Harry, trying to snatch it back.

"Who'd be writing to you?" sneered Uncle Vernon,

Minerva: And so pleasantly spoken!

shaking the letter open with one hand and glancing at it. His face went from red to green faster than a set of traffic lights. And it didn't stop there. Within seconds it was the grayish white of old porridge.

"P-P-Petunia!" he gasped.

Pomona: (Sings) K-K-K-Katie...

(The others look at her oddly.)

Dudley tried to grab the letter to read it, but Uncle Vernon held it high out of his reach. Aunt Petunia took it curiously and read the first line. For a moment it looked as though she might faint. She clutched her throat and made a choking noise.

"Vernon! Oh my goodness ... Vernon!"

Minerva: Well, what were you expecting, you idiot? Your sister was a witch; she must have gotten a letter like that! Now her son's the same age and you're acting shocked when his letter arrives?

They stared at each other, seeming to have forgotten that Harry and Dudley were still in the room. Dudley wasn't used to being ignored. He gave his father a sharp tap on the head with his Smelting stick.

"I want to read that letter," he said loudly.

"I want to read it," said Harry furiously, "as it's mine."

"Get out, both of you," croaked Uncle Vernon, stuffing the letter back inside its envelope.

Harry didn't move.

"I WANT MY LETTER!" he shouted.

"Let me see it!" demanded Dudley.

"OUT!" roared Uncle Vernon, and he took both Harry and Dudley by the scruffs of their necks and threw them into the hall, slamming the kitchen door behind them. Harry and Dudley promptly had a furious but silent fight over who would listen at the keyhole; Dudley won, so Harry, his glasses dangling from one ear, lay flat on his stomach to listen at the crack between the door and floor.

Minerva: I hope Dudley doesn't step on Harry, or this is going to be a very short book!

"Vernon," Aunt Petunia was saying in a quivering voice, "look at the address ... how could they possibly know where he sleeps?

Alastor: The real question, lassie, is do they know where you sleep??

You don't think they're watching the house?"

"Watching ... spying ... might be following us," muttered Uncle Vernon wildly.

Alastor: Now you're catching on, laddie!

Filius: Alastor, I think you may have a little too much in common with this Muggle.

"But what should we do, Vernon? Should we write back? Tell them we don't want ... "

Harry could see Uncle Vernon's shiny black shoes pacing up and down the kitchen.

"No," he said finally. "No, we'll ignore it. If they don't get an answer... Yes, that's best... we won't do anything... "

"But ... "

"I'm not having one in the house, Petunia! Didn't we swear when we took him in we'd stamp out that dangerous nonsense?"

Alastor: Now that's just stupid! If you think a trained wizard is dangerous, try one who has no idea how to control his powers!

Filius: No offense, Al, but that's the problem I've always had with Salazar Slytherin.

That evening when he got back from work, Uncle Vernon did something he'd never done before; he visited Harry in his cupboard.

"Where's my letter?" said Harry, the moment Uncle Vernon had squeezed through the door. "Who's writing to me?"

"No one. It was addressed to you by mistake," said Uncle Vernon shortly. "I have burned it."

Pomona: Where they burn letters, they will eventually burn people.

Minerva: I think it's "Where they burn books," Mona. But you have a point.

"It was not a mistake," said Harry angrily, "it had my cupboard on it."

"SILENCE!" yelled Uncle Vernon, and a couple of spiders fell from the ceiling. He took a few deep breaths and then forced his face into a smile, which looked quite painful.

Robert/Minerva: Good!

"Er ... yes, Harry ... about this cupboard. Your aunt and I have been thinking... you're really getting a bit big for it... we think it might be nice if you moved into Dudley's second bedroom."

Alastor: (as Vernon) Now that we know we're being watched.

"Why?" said Harry.

"Don't ask questions!" snapped his uncle.

Robert: The Dursley Motto!

"Take this stuff upstairs, now."

Minerva: Including the spiders?

Robert: He wouldn't want to leave his little mates behind!

The Dursley's house had four bedrooms: one for Uncle Vernon and Aunt Petunia, one for visitors (usually Uncle Vernon's sister, Marge),

Robert: They do keep bringing up this Marge person, don't they?

Filius: Suppose she'll turn out to be a witch and she's been hiding it from her brother all these years?

one where Dudley slept, and one where Dudley kept all the toys and things that wouldn't fit in his first bedroom. It only took Harry one trip upstairs to move everything he owned from the cupboard to this room.

Filius: Yes, we get the point, they mistreat the boy.

He sat down on the bed and stared around him. Nearly everything in here was broken. The month-old video camera was lying on top of a small, working tank Dudley had once driven over the next door neighbor's dog;

Minerva: He runs over a dog, he runs down an old woman on crutches... in any normal neighborhood, something would be done!

in the corner was Dudley's first-ever television set, which he'd put his foot through when his favorite program had been canceled;

Pomona: I do wish they'd tell us what a television is!

there was a large birdcage, which had once held a parrot that Dudley had swapped at school for a real air rifle,

Pomona: Dudley with a gun?! Now that's a terrifying thought!

which was up on a shelf with the end all bent because Dudley had sat on it.

Robert: Dudley should get bent!

Other shelves were full of books. They were the only things in the room that looked as though they'd never been touched.

Minerva: Ah-hah! Harry-lad, you've struck gold!

From downstairs came the sound of Dudley bawling at his mother, "I don't want him in there... I need that room... make him get out...."

Harry sighed and stretched out on the bed. Yesterday he'd have given anything to be up here. Today he'd rather be back in his cupboard with that letter than up here without it.

Alastor: Good choice, lad.

Next morning at breakfast, everyone was rather quiet. Dudley was in shock. He'd screamed, whacked his father with his Smelting stick, been sick on purpose, kicked his mother, and thrown his tortoise through the greenhouse room,

Pomona: Oh, that poor tortoise!

and he still didn't have his room back.

Xiomara: Welcome to the real world, Duds!

Harry was thinking about this time yesterday and bitterly wishing he'd opened the letter in the hall. Uncle Vernon and Aunt Petunia kept looking at each other darkly.

Pomona: Through a glass?

Others: What?

Pomona: Never mind.

When the mail arrived, Uncle Vernon, who seemed to be trying to be nice to Harry, made Dudley go and get it. They heard him banging things with his Smelting stick all the way up the hall. Then he shouted, "There's another one! 'Mr. H. Potter, The Smallest Bedroom, Four Privet Drive ... ' "

With a strangled cry, Uncle Vernon leapt from his seat and ran down the hall, Harry right behind him. Uncle Vernon had to wrestle Dudley to the ground to get the letter from him,

Pomona: You'd think after yesterday, even Dudley would be bright enough to keep his mouth shut and read it in the hall!

which was made difficult by the fact that Harry had grabbed Uncle Vernon around the neck from behind. After a minute of confused fighting, in which everyone got hit a lot by the Smelting stick, Uncle Vernon straightened up, gasping for breath, with Harry's letter clutched in his hand.

"Go to your cupboard ... I mean, your bedroom," he wheezed at Harry. "Dudley ... go ... just go."

Pomona: And don't come back!

Harry walked round and round his new room. Someone knew he had moved out of his cupboard and they seemed to know he hadn't received his first letter.

Xiomara: (mistily) The Inner Eye tells me all! (Everyone snickers.)

Surely that meant they'd try again? And this time he'd make sure they didn't fail. He had a plan.

The repaired alarm clock rang at six o'clock the next morning. Harry turned it off quickly and dressed silently. He mustn't wake the Dursleys. He stole downstairs without turning on any of the lights.

Filius: He really needs a Hand of Glory.

Alastor: And just what would you know about that little device, Mr. Flitwick?

Xiomara: Oh, go kiss a broomstick, Al, we learned about those in DADA last year!

Alastor: Oh... right.

He was going to wait for the postman on the corner of Privet Drive and get the letters for number four first. His heart hammered as he crept across the dark hall toward the front door ...

"AAAAARRRGH!"

Harry leapt into the air; he'd trodden on something big and squashy on the doormat ...

Robert: Revenge of the dog next door!

Pomona: Yuck!

something alive!

Lights clicked on upstairs and to his horror Harry realized that the big squashy something had been his uncle's face.

Alastor: Then I hope he stomped good and hard!

Uncle Vernon had been lying at the foot of the front door in a sleeping bag, clearly making sure that Harry didn't do exactly what he'd been trying to do. He shouted at Harry for about half an hour and then told him to go make a cup of tea.

Robert: Complaining that he had a frog in his throat...

Minerva: ... and Harry blinked, and suddenly Vernon choked and a large frog hopped out of his mouth.

Robert: Followed by several more...

Harry shuffled miserably off into the kitchen and by the time he got back, the mail had arrived, right into Uncle Vernon's lap. Harry could see three letters addressed in green ink. "I want..." he began, but Uncle Vernon was tearing the letters into pieces before his eyes.

Uncle Vernon didn't go to work that day. He stayed at home and nailed up the mail slot.

Robert: It wouldn't take more than an hour to nail up a mail slot. What did he do with the rest of the day, hmmm?

Minerva: Why don't they just let Harry go to Hogwarts and be rid of him? They don't want him around anyway!

Robert: Minna, these are the Dursleys. They're not rational.

"See," he explained to Aunt Petunia through a mouthful of nails, "if they can't deliver them they'll just give up."

Xiomara: Pity that didn't work when Dudley was born.

Pomona: Xia!

"I'm not sure that'll work Vernon."

"Oh, these people's minds work in strange ways, Petunia, they're not like you and me," said Uncle Vernon,

Minerva: Yes, for one thing, most of us don't think making a child sleep in a cupboard is a good idea.

Filius: And how would you know how a wizard's mind works, Dursley, you nitwit? Have you ever exchanged two words with one?

Alastor: Unless he knows more than he's telling...

trying to knock in a nail with a piece of fruitcake Aunt Petunia had just bought him.

Pomona: He's slipping...

Robert: Always knew that fruitcake was good for something.

Filius: I usually use it as a paperweight.

Pomona: Actually, if you soak it in butterbeer for about an hour, it's not bad.

On Friday, no less than twelve letters arrived for Harry. As they couldn't go through the mail slot, they had been pushed under the door, slotted through the sides, and a few even forced through the small window in the downstairs bathroom.

Robert: Why don't they slip a few through the window into Harry's room?

Minerva: Or send it as a Howler! That way no matter where in the house he was, he'd hear it. And we know what happens if you try to destroy a Howler unread, don't we?

Uncle Vernon stayed at home again. After burning all the letters, he got out a hammer and nails and boarded up the cracks around the front and back doors so no one could go out.

Alastor: Including him! The first rule is, Never nail yourself into a trap!

He hummed "Tiptoe Through the Tulips" as he worked, and jumped at small noises.

Pomona: "Tiptoe Through the Tulips"? He really is slipping!

Xiomara: Hear-hear!

Pomona: "On The Good Ship Lollipop" is a much better song! (All look at her strangely.)

On Saturday, things began to get out of hand. Twenty-four letters to Harry found their way into the house, rolled up and hidden inside each of the two dozen eggs that their very confused milkman

Filius: Milkman? That's a biological impossibility!

Pomona: No, no, they deliver milk to people's houses! And eggs too, some of them.

had handed Aunt Petunia through the living room window. While Uncle Vernon made furious telephone calls to the post office and the dairy trying to find someone to complain to, Aunt Petunia shredded the letters in her food processor.

Minerva/Robert: DON'T EAT THE COLESLAW!

"Who on earth wants to talk to you this badly?" Dudley asked Harry in amazement.

Minerva: Someone with taste, apparently!

On Sunday morning, Uncle Vernon sat down at the breakfast table looking tired and rather ill, but happy.

Xiomara: He and Petunia had had quite a night!

Pomona: Xia!

"No post on Sundays," he reminded them cheerfully as he spread marmalade on his newspapers, "no damn letters today ... "

Something came whizzing down the kitchen chimney as he spoke and caught him sharply on the back of the head. Next moment, thirty or forty letters came pelting out of the fireplace like bullets. The Dursleys ducked but Harry leapt into the air trying to catch one ...

Alastor: No, laddie, NO! You don't jump around trying to catch it in plain sight! Use a little cunning! You'll never make it into Slytherin at this rate!

"Out! OUT!"

Uncle Vernon seized Harry around the waist and threw him into the hall. When Aunt Petunia and Dudley had run out with their arms over their faces, Uncle Vernon slammed the door shut. They could hear the letters still streaming into the room, bouncing off the walls and floor.

"That does it," said Uncle Vernon, trying to speak calmly but pulling out great tufts out of his mustache at the same the time. "I want you all back here in five minutes ready to leave. We're going away. Just pack some clothes. No arguments!"

Alastor: You can run, laddie, but you can't hide!

He looked so dangerous with half his mustache missing that no one dared argue. Ten minutes later they had wrenched their way through the boarded-up doors and were in the car, speeding toward the highway. Dudley was sniffling in the back seat; his father had hit him round the head for holding them up while he tried to pack his television, VCR, and computer in his sports bag.

Alastor: Good!

Minerva: I don't usually believe in hitting children, but I've got to admit...

They drove. And they drove.

Even Aunt Petunia didn't dare ask where they were going. Every now and then Uncle Vernon would take a sharp turn and drive in the opposite direction for a while.

"Shake 'em off...shake 'em off," he would mutter whenever he did this.

Minerva: And each time he said it, he shook himself and a few more spiders from Harry's cupboard fell out of his hair...

They didn't stop to eat or drink all day. By nightfall Dudley was howling.

Alastor: Was there a full moon?

He'd never had such a bad day in his life. He was hungry, he'd missed five television programs he'd wanted to see, and he'd never gone so long without blowing up an alien on his computer.

Robert: What's an alien?

Pomona: No idea! Maybe they haven't been invented yet.

Uncle Vernon stopped at last outside a gloomy-looking hotel on the outskirts of a big city. Dudley and Harry shared a room with twin beds and damp, musty sheets. Dudley snored but Harry stayed awake, sitting on the windowsill, staring down at the lights of passing cars and wondering....

They ate stale cornflakes and cold tinned tomatoes on toast for breakfast the next day. They had just finished when the owner of the hotel came over to their table.

"'Scuse me, but is one of you Mr. H. Potter? Only I got about an 'undred of these at the front desk."

She held up a letter so they could read the green ink address:

Mr. H. Potter

Room 17

Railview Hotel

Cokeworth

Minerva: She ought to borrow a few of those "H"s, it sounds like she could use them!

Harry made a grab for the letter but Uncle Vernon knocked his hand out of the way. The woman stared.

"I'll take them," said Uncle Vernon, standing up quickly and following her from the dining room.

* * *

"Wouldn't it be better just to go home, dear?" Aunt Petunia suggested timidly, hours later, but Uncle Vernon didn't seem to hear her. Exactly what he was looking for, none of them knew.

Alastor: (grimly) A place to dispose of Harry, if the blighter's as far gone as I think he is.

Minerva: It's only the third chapter, Al. Even if the book ends tragically, they couldn't kill the hero this soon.

He drove them into the middle of a forest, got out, looked around, shook his head, got back in the car, and off they went again. The same thing happened in the middle of a plowed field, halfway across a suspension bridge, and at the top of a multilevel parking garage.

Alastor: Damn good places for tossing people off, those last two.

"Daddy's gone mad, hasn't he?" Dudley asked Aunt Petunia dully late that afternoon.

Robert/Minerva: Ah, glimmerings of intelligence!

Filius: How do you two do that?

Uncle Vernon had parked at the coast, locked them all inside the car, and disappeared.

It started to rain. Great drops beat on the roof of the car. Dudley sniveled.

Xiomara: Drips outside and drips inside.

"It's Monday," he told his mother. "The Great Humberto's on tonight. I want to stay somewhere with a television."

Xiomara: And just who is the Great Humberto?

Pomona: I don't know, but the name sounds like a stage magician.

Minerva: I'm amazed Vernon and Petunia would let him watch it!

Alastor: Queer thing, how Muggles'll make a great fuss over a phony magician with a bag of tricks, but fight to the death to try to prove real magic doesn't exist.

Monday. This reminded Harry of something. If it was Monday ... and you could usually count on Dudley to know the days of the week, because of television ... then tomorrow, Tuesday, was Harry's eleventh birthday.

Of course, his birthdays were never exactly fun ... last year, the Dursleys had given him a coat hanger and a pair of Uncle Vernon's old socks. Still, you weren't eleven every day.

Robert: If you were, you'd never get out of First Year!

Uncle Vernon was back and he was smiling.

Alastor: Bad sign.

He was also carrying a long, thin package and didn't answer Aunt Petunia when she asked what he'd bought.

Robert: Petunia, you forgot the Dursley Motto!

"Found the perfect place!" he said. "Come on! Everyone out!"

It was very cold outside the car. Uncle Vernon was pointing at what looked like a large rock way out at sea.

Alastor: I don't like the sound of that.

Perched on top of the rock was the most miserable little shack you could imagine. One thing was certain, there was no television in there.

Pomona: Poor Dudley.

"Storm forecast for tonight!" said Uncle Vernon gleefully, clapping his hands together. "And this gentleman's kindly agreed to lend us his boat!"

Alastor: I really don't like the sound of that.

Pomona: I wonder if there are any sea snakes around that Harry could call on for help?

A toothless old man came ambling up to them, pointing, with a rather wicked grin, at an old rowboat bobbing in the iron-gray water below them.

Alastor: You don't suppose he's this Voldy-person, do you?

"I've already got us some rations," said Uncle Vernon, "so all aboard!"

It was freezing in the boat. Icy sea spray and rain crept down their necks and a chilly wind whipped their faces. After what seemed like hours they reached the rock, where Uncle Vernon, slipping and sliding, led the way to the broken-down house.

The inside was horrible; it smelled strongly of seaweed,

Pomona: Even worse than cabbage!

the wind whistled through the gaps in the wooden walls, and the fireplace was damp and empty. There were only two rooms.

Xiomara: And if there's any sort of a cupboard, guess where Harry'll end up!

Uncle Vernon's rations turned out to be a bag of chips each and four bananas. He tried to start a fire but the empty chip bags just smoked and shriveled up.

"Could do with some of those letters now, eh?" he said cheerfully.

Xiomara: That's right, rub it in!

Minerva: Don't worry, Vernon, I'm sure you'll have some soon enough.

He was in a very good mood. Obviously he thought nobody stood a chance of reaching them here in a storm to deliver mail. Harry privately agreed, though the thought didn't cheer him up at all.

Robert: Just how long do you think the storm will last, Vernon?

Minerva: And how long can you stay holed up on that rock after it passes?

As night fell, the promised storm blew up around them. Spray from the high waves splattered the walls of the hut and a fierce wind rattled the filthy windows. Aunt Petunia found a few moldy blankets in the second room and made up a bed for Dudley on the moth-eaten sofa.

Xiomara: Any hope that the moths will eat Dudley?

Pomona: Poor moths!

She and Uncle Vernon went off to the lumpy bed next door, and Harry was left to find the softest bit of floor he could and to curl up under the thinnest, most ragged blanket.

Pomona: I hope he's still got that old pair of socks ... he'll need to keep his feet warm!

The storm raged more and more ferociously as the night went on. Harry couldn't sleep. He shivered and turned over, trying to get comfortable, his stomach rumbling with hunger. Dudley's snores were drowned by the low rolls of

Pomona: Cinnamon?

Xiomara: They wish!

thunder that started near midnight. The lighted dial of Dudley's watch, which was dangling over the edge of the sofa on his fat wrist, told Harry he'd be eleven in ten minutes' time. He lay and watched his birthday tick nearer, wondering if the Dursleys would remember at all,

Robert: A boy can always use an extra coat hanger.

wondering where the letter writer was now.

Five minutes to go. Harry heard something creak outside. He hoped the roof wasn't going to fall in, although he might be warmer if it did.

Xiomara: You know, if he'd cut Dudley's stomach open and burrow inside, he could stay warm for at least...

Pomona: YUCK!

Minerva/Robert: Shut UP, Xia!!!

Alastor: I've heard of people doing that in blizzards, but they usually use a horse or something.

Four minutes to go. Maybe the house in Privet Drive would be so full of letters when they got back that he'd be able to steal one somehow.

Three minutes to go. Was that the sea, slapping on the rock like that? And (two minutes to go) what was that funny crunching noise?

Xiomara: Dudley eating the furniture in his sleep.

Was the rock crumbling into the sea?

One minute to go and he'd be eleven. Thirty seconds...twenty...ten...nine ... maybe he'd wake Dudley up, just to annoy him ... three...two...one...

BOOM.

The whole shack shivered

Pomona: Who wouldn't in that weather?

and Harry sat bolt upright, staring that the door. Someone was outside, knocking to come in.

Minerva: And, that's the end of Chapter Three.

Filius: Amazing books they have in the future!

Alastor: If it's really from the future...I'm still not saying I buy that.

(They all look at him. Pause.)

Alastor: Oh, all right, I admit I'm getting caught up in the thing. If only to see if Harry-the-Parselmouth manages to escape going to the Dark.

Pomona: Er, guys? Suspense is strong but hunger is even stronger. Isn't it almost dinnertime?

Filius: The lady has a point. Minna, I think if you tuck the book into a drawer of that side-table it should be safe enough for now.

(Minerva does so, and the whole gang gets to their feet and goes trooping off, leaving the book to keep it's secrets and the used teacups for the house elves to clean up.)

^{* 1} Oscar Wilde's famous quote about fox hunting.