The Goblet of Fire Page 39

  ‘Worrying about poor ’ickle goblins, now, are you?’ Ron asked Hermione. ‘Thinking of starting up S.P.U.G. or something? Society for the Protection of Ugly Goblins?’

  ‘Ha, ha, ha,’ said Hermione sarcastically. ‘Goblins don’t need protection. Haven’t you been listening to what Professor Binns has been telling us about goblin rebellions?’

  ‘No,’ said Harry and Ron together.

  ‘Well, they’re quite capable of dealing with wizards,’ said Hermione, sipping more of her Butterbeer. ‘They’re very clever. They’re not like house-elves, who never stick up for themselves.’

  ‘Uh oh,’ said Ron, staring at the door.

  Rita Skeeter had just entered. She was wearing banana-yellow robes today; her long nails were painted shocking pink, and she was accompanied by her paunchy photographer. She bought drinks, and she and the photographer made their way through the crowds to a table nearby, Harry, Ron and Hermione glaring at her as she approached. She was talking fast and looking very satisfied about something.

  ‘… didn’t seem very keen to talk to us, did he, Bozo? Now, why would that be, do you think? And what’s he doing with a pack of goblins in tow anyway? Showing them the sights … what nonsense … he was always a bad liar. Reckon something’s up? Think we should do a bit of digging? Disgraced Ex-Head of Magical Sports, Ludo Bagman … snappy start to a sentence, Bozo – we just need to find a story to fit it –’

  ‘Trying to ruin someone else’s life?’ said Harry loudly.

  A few people looked around. Rita Skeeter’s eyes widened behind her jewelled spectacles as she saw who had spoken.

  ‘Harry!’ she said, beaming. ‘How lovely! Why don’t you come and join –?’

  ‘I wouldn’t come near you with a ten-foot broomstick,’ said Harry furiously. ‘What did you do that to Hagrid for, eh?’

  Rita Skeeter raised her heavily pencilled eyebrows.

  ‘Our readers have the right to know the truth, Harry, I am merely doing my –’

  ‘Who cares if he’s half-giant?’ Harry shouted. ‘There’s nothing wrong with him!’

  The whole pub had gone very quiet. Madam Rosmerta was staring over from behind the bar, apparently oblivious of the fact that the flagon she was filling with mead was overflowing.

  Rita Skeeter’s smile flickered very slightly, but she hitched it back almost at once; she snapped open her crocodile-skin handbag, pulled out her Quick-Quotes Quill and said, ‘How about giving me an interview about the Hagrid you know, Harry? The man behind the muscles? Your unlikely friendship and the reasons behind it. Would you call him a father substitute?’

  Hermione stood up very abruptly, her Butterbeer clutched in her hand as though it was a grenade.

  ‘You horrible woman,’ she said, through gritted teeth, ‘you don’t care, do you, anything for a story, and anyone will do, won’t they? Even Ludo Bagman –’

  ‘Sit down, you silly little girl, and don’t talk about things you don’t understand,’ said Rita Skeeter coldly, her eyes hardening as they fell on Hermione. ‘I know things about Ludo Bagman that would make your hair curl … Not that it needs it –’ she added, eyeing Hermione’s bushy hair.

  ‘Let’s go,’ said Hermione. ‘C’mon, Harry – Ron …’

  They left; many people were staring at them as they went. Harry glanced back as they reached the door. Rita Skeeter’s Quick-Quotes Quill was out; it was zooming backwards and forwards over a piece of parchment on the table.

  ‘She’ll be after you next, Hermione,’ said Ron, in a low and worried voice as they walked quickly back up the street.

  ‘Let her try!’ said Hermione shrilly; she was shaking with rage. ‘I’ll show her! Silly little girl, am I? Oh, I’ll get her back for this, first Harry, then Hagrid …’

  ‘You don’t want to go upsetting Rita Skeeter,’ said Ron nervously. ‘I’m serious, Hermione, she’ll dig something up on you –’

  ‘My parents don’t read the Daily Prophet, she can’t scare me into hiding!’ said Hermione, now striding along so fast that it was all Harry and Ron could do to keep up with her. The last time Harry had seen Hermione in a rage like this, she had hit Draco Malfoy around the face. ‘And Hagrid isn’t going to hide any more! He should never have let that excuse for a human being upset him! Come on!’

  Breaking into a run, she led them all the way back up the road, through the gates flanked by winged boars, and up through the grounds to Hagrid’s cabin.

  The curtains were still drawn, and they could hear Fang barking as they approached.

  ‘Hagrid!’ Hermione shouted, pounding on his front door. ‘Hagrid, that’s enough! We know you’re in there! Nobody cares if your mum was a giantess, Hagrid! You can’t let that foul Skeeter woman do this to you! Hagrid, get out here, you’re just being –’

  The door opened. Hermione said ‘About t–!’ and then stopped, very suddenly, because she had found herself face to face, not with Hagrid, but with Albus Dumbledore.

  ‘Good afternoon,’ he said pleasantly, smiling down at them.

  ‘We – er – we wanted to see Hagrid,’ said Hermione in a rather small voice.

  ‘Yes, I surmised as much,’ said Dumbledore, his eyes twinkling. ‘Why don’t you come in?’

  ‘Oh … um … OK,’ said Hermione.

  She, Ron and Harry went into the cabin; Fang launched himself upon Harry the moment he entered, barking madly and trying to lick his ears. Harry fended Fang off, and looked around.

  Hagrid was sitting at his table, where there were two large mugs of tea. He looked a real mess. His face was blotchy, his eyes swollen, and he had gone to the other extreme where his hair was concerned; far from trying to make it behave, it now looked like a wig of tangled wire.

  ‘Hi, Hagrid,’ said Harry.

  Hagrid looked up.

  ‘’Lo,’ he said, in a very hoarse voice.

  ‘More tea, I think,’ said Dumbledore, closing the door behind Harry, Ron and Hermione, drawing out his wand and twiddling it; a revolving tea-tray appeared in mid-air, along with a plate of cakes. Dumbledore magicked the tray onto the table, and everybody sat down. There was a slight pause, and then Dumbledore said, ‘Did you by any chance hear what Miss Granger was shouting, Hagrid?’

  Hermione went slightly pink, but Dumbledore smiled at her, and continued, ‘Hermione, Harry and Ron still seem to want to know you, judging by the way they were attempting to break down the door.’

  ‘Of course we still want to know you!’ Harry said, staring at Hagrid. ‘You don’t think anything that Skeeter cow – sorry, Professor,’ he added quickly, looking at Dumbledore.

  ‘I have gone temporarily deaf and haven’t any idea what you said, Harry,’ said Dumbledore, twiddling his thumbs and staring at the ceiling.

  ‘Er – right,’ said Harry sheepishly. ‘I just meant – Hagrid, how could you think we’d care what that – woman – wrote about you?’

  Two fat tears leaked out of Hagrid’s beetle-black eyes and fell slowly into his tangled beard.

  ‘Living proof of what I’ve been telling you, Hagrid,’ said Dumbledore, still looking carefully up at the ceiling. ‘I have shown you the letters from the countless parents who remember you from their own days here, telling me in no uncertain terms that, if I sacked you, they would have something to say about it –’

  ‘Not all of ’em,’ said Hagrid hoarsely. ‘Not all of ’em wan’ me ter stay.’

  ‘Really, Hagrid, if you are holding out for universal popularity, I’m afraid you will be in this cabin for a very long time,’ said Dumbledore, now peering sternly over his half-moon spectacles. ‘Not a week has passed, since I became Headmaster of this school, when I haven’t had at least one owl complaining about the way I run it. But what should I do? Barricade myself in my study and refuse to talk to anybody?’

  ‘Yeh – yeh’re not half-giant!’ said Hagrid croakily.

  ‘Hagrid, look what I’ve got for relatives!’ Harry said furiously. ‘Look at the Dursleys!’

&nbs
p; ‘An excellent point,’ said Professor Dumbledore. ‘My own brother, Aberforth, was prosecuted for practising inappropriate charms on a goat. It was all over the papers, but did Aberforth hide? No, he did not! He held his head high and went about his business as usual! Of course, I’m not entirely sure he can read, so that may not have been bravery …’

  ‘Come back and teach, Hagrid,’ said Hermione quietly, ‘please come back, we really miss you.’

  Hagrid gulped. More tears leaked out down his cheeks and into his tangled beard. Dumbledore stood up.

  ‘I refuse to accept your resignation, Hagrid, and I expect you back at work on Monday,’ he said. ‘You will join me for breakfast at eight thirty in the Great Hall. No excuses. Good afternoon to you all.’

  Dumbledore left the cabin, pausing only to scratch Fang’s ears. When the door had shut behind him, Hagrid began to sob into his dustbin-lid-sized hands. Hermione kept patting his arm, and at last Hagrid looked up, his eyes very red indeed, and said, ‘Great man, Dumbledore … great man …’

  ‘Yeah, he is,’ said Ron. ‘Can I have one of these cakes, Hagrid?’

  ‘Help yerself,’ said Hagrid, wiping his eyes on the back of his hand. ‘Ar, he’s righ’, o’ course – yeh’re all righ’ … I bin stupid … my ol’ dad woulda bin ashamed o’ the way I’ve bin behavin’ …’ More tears leaked out, but he wiped them away more forcefully, and said, ‘Never shown you a picture of my old dad, have I? Here …’

  Hagrid got up, went over to his dresser, opened a drawer and pulled out a picture of a short wizard with Hagrid’s crinkled black eyes, beaming as he sat on top of Hagrid’s shoulder. Hagrid was a good seven or eight feet tall, judging by the apple tree beside him, but his face was beardless, young, round and smooth – he looked hardly older than eleven.

  ‘Tha’ was taken jus’ after I got inter Hogwarts,’ said Hagrid, croakily. ‘Dad was dead chuffed … thought I migh’ not be a wizard, see, ’cos me mum … well, anyway. ’Course, I never was great shakes at magic, really … but at least he never saw me expelled. Died, see, in me second year …

  ‘Dumbledore was the one who stuck up for me after Dad went. Got me the gamekeeper job … trusts people, he does. Gives ’em second chances … tha’s what sets him apar’ from other Heads, see. He’ll accept anyone at Hogwarts, s’long as they’ve got the talent. Knows people can turn out OK even if their families weren’ … well … all tha’ respectable. But some don’ understand that. There’s some who’d always hold it against yeh … there’s some who’d even pretend they just had big bones rather than stand up an’ say – I am what I am, an’ I’m not ashamed. “Never be ashamed,” my ol’ dad used ter say, “there’s some who’ll hold it against you, but they’re not worth botherin’ with.” An’ he was right. I’ve bin an idiot. I’m not botherin’ with her no more, I promise yeh that. Big bones … I’ll give her big bones.’

  Harry, Ron and Hermione looked at each other nervously; Harry would rather have taken fifty Blast-Ended Skrewts for a walk than admit to Hagrid that he had overheard him talking to Madame Maxime, but Hagrid was still talking, apparently unaware that he had said anything odd.

  ‘Yeh know wha’, Harry?’ he said, looking up from the photograph of his father, his eyes very bright. ‘When I firs’ met you, you reminded me o’ me a bit. Mum an’ dad gone, an’ you was feelin’ like yeh wouldn’ fit in at Hogwarts, remember? Not sure yeh were really up to it … an’ now look at yeh, Harry! School champion!’

  He looked at Harry for a moment and then said, very seriously, ‘Yeh know what I’d love, Harry? I’d love yeh ter win, I really would. It’d show ’em all … yeh don’ have ter be pure-blood ter do it. Yeh don’ have ter be ashamed of what yeh are. It’d show ’em Dumbledore’s the one who’s got it righ’, lettin’ anyone in as long as they can do magic. How you doin’ with that egg, Harry?’

  ‘Great,’ said Harry. ‘Really great.’

  Hagrid’s miserable face broke into a wide, watery smile. ‘Tha’s my boy … You show ’em, Harry, you show ’em. Beat ’em all.’

  Lying to Hagrid wasn’t quite like lying to anyone else. Harry went back to the castle later that afternoon with Ron and Hermione, unable to banish the image of the happy expression on Hagrid’s whiskery face as he had imagined Harry winning the Tournament. The incomprehensible egg weighed more heavily than ever on Harry’s conscience that evening, and by the time he had got into bed, he had made up his mind – it was time to shelve his pride, and see if Cedric’s hint was worth anything.

  — CHAPTER TWENTY-FIVE —

  The Egg and the Eye

  As Harry had no idea how long a bath he would need to work out the secret of the golden egg, he decided to do it at night, when he would be able to take as much time as he wanted. Reluctant though he was to accept more favours from Cedric, he also decided to use the Prefects’ bathroom; far fewer people were allowed in there, so it was much less likely that he would be disturbed.

  Harry planned his excursion carefully, because he had been caught out of bed and out of bounds by Filch the caretaker in the middle of the night once before, and had no desire to repeat the experience. The Invisibility Cloak would, of course, be essential, and as an added precaution, Harry thought he would take the Marauder’s Map, which, next to the Cloak, was the most useful aid to rule-breaking Harry owned. The map showed the whole of Hogwarts, including its many shortcuts and secret passageways and, most importantly of all, it revealed the people inside the castle as minuscule, labelled dots, moving around the corridors, so that Harry would be forewarned if somebody was approaching the bathroom.

  On Thursday night, Harry sneaked up to bed, put on the Cloak, crept back downstairs and, just as he had done on the night when Hagrid had shown him the dragons, waited for the portrait hole to open. This time it was Ron who waited outside to give the Fat Lady the password (‘Banana fritters’). ‘Good luck,’ Ron muttered, climbing into the common room as Harry crept out past him.

  It was awkward moving under the Cloak tonight, because Harry had the heavy egg under one arm, and the map held in front of his nose with the other. However, the moonlit corridors were empty and silent, and by checking the map at strategic intervals, Harry was able to ensure that he wouldn’t run into anyone he wanted to avoid. When he reached the statue of Boris the Bewildered, a lost-looking wizard with his gloves on the wrong hands, he located the right door, leant close to it, and muttered the password, ‘Pine-fresh’, just as Cedric had told him.

  The door creaked open. Harry slipped inside, bolted the door behind him, and pulled off the Invisibility Cloak, looking around.

  His immediate reaction was that it would be worth becoming a Prefect just to be able to use this bathroom. It was softly lit by a splendid candle-filled chandelier, and everything was made of white marble, including what looked like an empty, rectangular swimming pool sunk into the middle of the floor. About a hundred golden taps stood all around the pool’s edges, each with a different-coloured jewel set into its handle. There was also a diving board. Long white linen curtains hung at the windows; a large pile of fluffy white towels sat in a corner, and there was a single golden-framed painting on the wall. It featured a blonde mermaid, who was fast asleep on a rock, her long hair fluttering over her face every time she snored.

  Harry put down his Cloak, the egg and the map, and moved forwards, looking around, his footsteps echoing off the walls. Magnificent though the bathroom was – and quite keen though he was to try out a few of those taps – now he was here he couldn’t quite suppress the feeling that Cedric might have been having him on. How on earth was this supposed to help solve the mystery of the egg? Nevertheless, he put one of the fluffy towels, the Cloak, the map and the egg at the side of the swimming-pool-sized bath, then knelt down and turned on a few of the taps.

  He could tell at once that they carried different sorts of bubble bath mixed with the water, though it wasn’t bubble bath as Harry had ever experienced it. One tap gushed pink and blue bubbles the size of foot
balls, another poured ice-white foam so thick that Harry thought it would have supported his weight if he’d cared to test it; a third sent heavily perfumed purple clouds hovering over the surface of the water. Harry amused himself for a while turning the taps on and off, particularly enjoying the effect of one whose jet bounced off the surface of the water in large arcs. Then, when the deep pool was full of hot water, foam and bubbles (which took a very short time considering its size), Harry turned off all the taps, pulled off his pyjamas, slippers and dressing-gown, and slid into the water.

  It was so deep that his feet barely touched the bottom, and he actually did a couple of lengths before swimming back to the side and treading water, staring at the egg. Highly enjoyable though it was to swim in hot and foamy water with clouds of different-coloured steam wafting all around him, no stroke of brilliance came to him, no sudden burst of understanding.

  Harry stretched out his arms, lifted the egg in his wet hands and opened it. The wailing, screeching sound filled the bathroom, echoing and reverberating off the marble walls, but it sounded just as incomprehensible as ever, if not more so with all the echoes. He snapped it shut again, worried that the sound would attract Filch, wondering whether that hadn’t been Cedric’s plan – and then, making him jump so badly that he dropped the egg, which clattered away across the bathroom floor, someone spoke.

  ‘I’d try putting it in the water, if I were you.’

  Harry had swallowed a considerable amount of bubbles in shock. He stood up, spluttering, and saw the ghost of a very glum-looking girl sitting cross-legged on top of one of the taps. It was Moaning Myrtle, who was usually to be heard sobbing in the S-bend of a toilet three floors below.

  ‘Myrtle!’ Harry said in outrage. ‘I’m – I’m not wearing anything!’

  The foam was so dense that this hardly mattered, but he had a nasty feeling that Myrtle had been spying on him from out of one of the taps ever since he had arrived.

  ‘I closed my eyes when you got in,’ she said, blinking at him through her thick spectacles. ‘You haven’t been to see me for ages.’