Harry Potter and the Order of the Phoenix (82 page)

Professor Umbridge’s smile vanished as suddenly as a light bulb blowing. She sat back in her chair, turned a sheet on her clipboard and began scribbling very fast indeed, her bulging eyes rolling from side to side. Professor McGonagall turned back to Harry, her thin nostrils flared, her eyes burning.

‘Any questions, Potter?’

‘Yes,’ said Harry. ‘What sort of character and aptitude tests do the Ministry do on you, if you get enough N.E.W.T.s?’

‘Well, you’ll need to demonstrate the ability to react well to pressure and so forth,’ said Professor McGonagall, ‘perseverance and dedication, because Auror training takes a further three years, not to mention very high skills in practical Defence. It will mean a lot more study even after you’ve left school, so unless you’re prepared to –’

‘I think you’ll also find,’ said Umbridge, her voice very cold now, ‘that the Ministry looks into the records of those applying to be Aurors. Their criminal records.’

‘– unless you’re prepared to take even more exams after Hogwarts, you should really look at another –’

‘Which means that this boy has as much chance of becoming an Auror as Dumbledore has of ever returning to this school.’

‘A very good chance, then,’ said Professor McGonagall.

‘Potter has a criminal record,’ said Umbridge loudly.

‘Potter has been cleared of all charges,’ said McGonagall, even more loudly.

Professor Umbridge stood up. She was so short that this did not make a great deal of difference, but her fussy, simpering demeanour had given place to a hard fury that made her broad, flabby face look oddly sinister.

‘Potter has no chance whatsoever of becoming an Auror!’

Professor McGonagall got to her feet, too, and in her case this was a much more impressive move; she towered over Professor Umbridge.

‘Potter,’ she said in ringing tones, ‘I will assist you to become an Auror if it is the last thing I do! If I have to coach you nightly, I will make sure you achieve the required results!’

‘The Minister for Magic will never employ Harry Potter!’ said Umbridge, her voice rising furiously.

‘There may well be a new Minister for Magic by the time Potter is ready to join!’ shouted Professor McGonagall.

‘Aha!’ shrieked Professor Umbridge, pointing a stubby finger at McGonagall. ‘Yes! Yes, yes, yes! Of course! That’s what you want, isn’t it, Minerva McGonagall? You want Cornelius Fudge replaced by Albus Dumbledore! You think you’ll be where I am, don’t you: Senior Undersecretary to the Minister and Headmistress to boot!’

‘You are raving,’ said Professor McGonagall, superbly disdainful. ‘Potter, that concludes our careers consultation.’

Harry swung his bag over his shoulder and hurried out of the room, not daring to look at Professor Umbridge. He could hear her and Professor McGonagall continuing to shout at each other all the way back along the corridor.

Professor Umbridge was still breathing as though she had just run a race when she strode into their Defence Against the Dark Arts lesson that afternoon.

‘I hope you’ve thought better of what you were planning to do, Harry,’ Hermione whispered, the moment they had opened their books to ‘Chapter Thirty-four, Non-Retaliation and Negotiation’. ‘Umbridge looks like she’s in a really bad mood already …’

Every now and then Umbridge shot glowering looks at Harry, who kept his head down, staring at
Defensive Magical Theory
, his eyes unfocused, thinking …

He could just imagine Professor McGonagall’s reaction if he was caught trespassing in Professor Umbridge’s office mere hours after she had vouched for him … there was nothing to stop him simply going back to Gryffindor Tower and hoping that some time during the next summer holidays he would have a chance to ask Sirius about the scene he had witnessed in the Pensieve … nothing, except that the thought of taking this sensible course of action made him feel as though a lead weight had dropped into his stomach … and then there was the matter of Fred and George, whose diversion was already planned, not to mention the knife Sirius had given him, which was currently residing in his schoolbag along with his father’s old Invisibility Cloak.

But the fact remained that if he was caught …

‘Dumbledore sacrificed himself to keep you in school, Harry!’ whispered Hermione, raising her book to hide her face from Umbridge. ‘And if you get thrown out today it will all have been for nothing!’

He could abandon the plan and simply learn to live with the memory of what his father had done on a summer’s day more than twenty years ago …

And then he remembered Sirius in the fire upstairs in the Gryffindor common room …

You’re less like your father than I thought … the risk would’ve been what made it fun for James …

But did he want to be like his father any more?

‘Harry, don’t do it, please don’t do it!’ Hermione said in anguished tones as the bell rang at the end of the class.

He did not answer; he did not know what to do.

Ron seemed determined to give neither his opinion nor his advice; he would not look at Harry, though when Hermione opened her mouth to try dissuading Harry some more, he said in a low voice, ‘Give it a rest, OK? He can make up his own mind.’

Harry’s heart beat very fast as he left the classroom. He was halfway along the corridor outside when he heard the unmistakeable sounds of a diversion going off in the distance. There were screams and yells reverberating from somewhere above them; people exiting the classrooms all around Harry were stopping in their tracks and looking up at the ceiling fearfully –

Umbridge came pelting out of her classroom as fast as her short legs would carry her. Pulling out her wand, she hurried off in the opposite direction: it was now or never.

‘Harry – please!’ Hermione pleaded weakly.

But he had made up his mind; hitching his bag more securely on to his shoulder, he set off at a run, weaving in and out of students now hurrying in the opposite direction to see what all the fuss was about in the east wing.

Harry reached the corridor to Umbridge’s office and found it deserted. Dashing behind a large suit of armour whose helmet creaked around to watch him, he pulled open his bag, seized Sirius’s knife and donned the Invisibility Cloak. He then crept slowly and carefully back out from behind the suit of armour and along the corridor until he reached Umbridge’s door.

He inserted the blade of the magical knife into the crack around it and moved it gently up and down, then withdrew it. There was a tiny click, and the door swung open. He ducked inside the office, closed the door quickly behind him and looked around.

Nothing was moving except the horrible kittens that were still frolicking on the wall plates above the confiscated broomsticks.

Harry pulled off his Cloak and, striding over to the fireplace, found what he was looking for within seconds: a small box containing glittering Floo powder.

He crouched down in front of the empty grate, his hands shaking. He had never done this before, though he thought he knew how it must work. Sticking his head into the fireplace, he took a large pinch of powder and dropped it on to the logs stacked neatly beneath him. They exploded at once into emerald green flames.

‘Number twelve, Grimmauld Place!’ Harry said loudly and clearly.

It was one of the most curious sensations he had ever experienced. He had travelled by Floo powder before, of course, but then it had been his entire body that had spun around and around in the flames through the network of wizarding fireplaces that stretched over the country. This time, his knees remained firm upon the cold floor of Umbridge’s office, and only his head hurtled through the emerald fire …

And then, as abruptly as it had begun, the spinning stopped. Feeling rather sick and as though he were wearing an exceptionally hot muffler around his head, Harry opened his eyes to find that he was looking up out of the kitchen fireplace at the long, wooden table, where a man sat poring over a piece of parchment.

‘Sirius?’

The man jumped and looked around. It was not Sirius, but Lupin.

‘Harry!’ he said, looking thoroughly shocked. ‘What are you – what’s happened, is everything all right?’

‘Yeah,’ said Harry. ‘I just wondered – I mean, I just fancied a – a chat with Sirius.’

‘I’ll call him,’ said Lupin, getting to his feet, still looking perplexed, ‘he went upstairs to look for Kreacher, he seems to be hiding in the attic again …’

And Harry saw Lupin hurry out of the kitchen. Now he was left with nothing to look at but the chair and table legs. He wondered why Sirius had never mentioned how very uncomfortable it was to speak out of the fire; his knees were already objecting painfully to their prolonged contact with Umbridge’s hard stone floor.

Lupin returned with Sirius at his heels moments later.

‘What is it?’ said Sirius urgently, sweeping his long dark hair out of his eyes and dropping to the ground in front of the fire, so that he and Harry were on a level. Lupin knelt down too, looking very concerned. ‘Are you all right? Do you need help?’

‘No,’ said Harry, ‘it’s nothing like that … I just wanted to talk … about my dad.’

They exchanged a look of great surprise, but Harry did not have time to feel awkward or embarrassed; his knees were becoming sorer by the second and he guessed five minutes had already passed from the start of the diversion; George had only guaranteed him twenty. He therefore plunged immediately into the story of what he had seen in the Pensieve.

When he had finished, neither Sirius nor Lupin spoke for a moment. Then Lupin said quietly, ‘I wouldn’t like you to judge your father on what you saw there, Harry. He was only fifteen –’

‘I’m fifteen!’ said Harry heatedly.

‘Look, Harry,’ said Sirius placatingly, ‘James and Snape hated each other from the moment they set eyes on each other, it was just one of those things, you can understand that, can’t you? I think James was everything Snape wanted to be – he was popular, he was good at Quidditch – good at pretty much everything. And Snape was just this little oddball who was up to his eyes in the Dark Arts, and James – whatever else he may have appeared to you, Harry – always hated the Dark Arts.’

‘Yeah,’ said Harry, ‘but he just attacked Snape for no good reason, just because – well, just because you said you were bored,’ he finished, with a slightly apologetic note in his voice.

‘I’m not proud of it,’ said Sirius quickly.

Lupin looked sideways at Sirius, then said, ‘Look, Harry, what you’ve got to understand is that your father and Sirius were the best in the school at whatever they did – everyone thought they were the height of cool – if they sometimes got a bit carried away –’

‘If we were sometimes arrogant little berks, you mean,’ said Sirius.

Lupin smiled.

‘He kept messing up his hair,’ said Harry in a pained voice.

Sirius and Lupin laughed.

‘I’d forgotten he used to do that,’ said Sirius affectionately.

‘Was he playing with the Snitch?’ said Lupin eagerly.

‘Yeah,’ said Harry, watching uncomprehendingly as Sirius and Lupin beamed reminiscently. ‘Well … I thought he was a bit of an idiot.’

‘Of course he was a bit of an idiot!’ said Sirius bracingly, ‘we were all idiots! Well – not Moony so much,’ he said fairly, looking at Lupin.

But Lupin shook his head. ‘Did I ever tell you to lay off Snape?’ he said. ‘Did I ever have the guts to tell you I thought you were out of order?’

‘Yeah, well,’ said Sirius, ‘you made us feel ashamed of ourselves sometimes … that was something …’

‘And,’ said Harry doggedly, determined to say everything that was on his mind now he was here, ‘he kept looking over at the girls by the lake, hoping they were watching him!’

‘Oh, well, he always made a fool of himself whenever Lily was around,’ said Sirius, shrugging, ‘he couldn’t stop himself showing off whenever he got near her.’

‘How come she married him?’ Harry asked miserably. ‘She hated him!’

‘Nah, she didn’t,’ said Sirius.

‘
She started going out with him in seventh year,’ said Lupin.

‘Once James had deflated his head a bit,’ said Sirius.

‘And stopped hexing people just for the fun of it,’ said Lupin.

‘Even Snape?’ said Harry.

‘Well,’ said Lupin slowly, ‘Snape was a special case. I mean, he never lost an opportunity to curse James so you couldn’t really expect James to take that lying down, could you?’

‘And my mum was OK with that?’

‘She didn’t know too much about it, to tell you the truth,’ said Sirius. ‘I mean, James didn’t take Snape on dates with her and jinx him in front of her, did he?’

Sirius frowned at Harry, who was still looking unconvinced.

‘Look,’ he said, ‘your father was the best friend I ever had and he was a good person. A lot of people are idiots at the age of fifteen. He grew out of it.’

‘Yeah, OK,’ said Harry heavily. ‘I just never thought I’d feel sorry for Snape.’

‘Now you mention it,’ said Lupin, a faint crease between his eyebrows, ‘how did Snape react when he found you’d seen all this?’

‘He told me he’d never teach me Occlumency again,’ said Harry indifferently, ‘like that’s a big disappoint––’

‘He WHAT?’ shouted Sirius, causing Harry to jump and inhale a mouthful of ashes.

‘Are you serious, Harry?’ said Lupin quickly. ‘He’s stopped giving you lessons?’

‘Yeah,’ said Harry, surprised at what he considered a great overreaction. ‘But it’s OK, I don’t care, it’s a bit of a relief to tell you the –’

‘I’m coming up there to have a word with Snape!’ said Sirius forcefully, and he actually made to stand up, but Lupin wrenched him back down again.

‘If anyone’s going to tell Snape it will be me!’ he said firmly. ‘But Harry, first of all, you’re to go back to Snape and tell him that on no account is he to stop giving you lessons – when Dumbledore hears –’

‘I can’t tell him that, he’d kill me!’ said Harry, outraged. ‘You didn’t see him when we got out of the Pensieve.’

‘Harry, there is nothing so important as you learning Occlumency!’ said Lupin sternly. ‘Do you understand me? Nothing!’

‘OK, OK,’ said Harry, thoroughly discomposed, not to mention annoyed. ‘I’ll … I’ll try and say something to him … but it won’t be –’