Lupin on the Train (was Re: Dumbledore, Head of House, Portkeys)

[Rita Winston]

No: HPFGUIDX 174

--- In HPforGrownups at egroups.com, Peg Kerr <pkerr06 at a...> wrote:
 
> Hello, everyone, this is my inaugural message.

Hey, Peg Kerr: author of Please Don't Eat the Daisies?

> This is an interesting theory, Rita, but I see a couple of problems
> with it.  Remember, Lupin was asleep when Harry got on the train, 
> and in fact, slept through much of the journey.  

In my theory, he was PRETENDING to be asleep. I've lived with cats 
all my life (dear old Foggy slept in my crib while I was getting 
ready to be born -- named for the Foghorn voice he had in his 
youth, not because he came in on little cat feet) and cats spend most 
of their time lying around with their eyes open a mere slit or fully 
closed (they have those big mobile ears like satellite dishes and a 
quarter of their brain is auditory lobe: they don't need eyes) but 
fully alert. It is a Big Compliment (a sign that the cat trusts you 
completely) for a cat to go fully to sleep in your presence. Then if
a loud noise or me touching them wakes them, they wake as startled 
and discombobulated as I do, and get very embarrassed about it. 

> He didn't choose to sit by Harry to guard him; Harry, Ron and
> Hermione chose to sit by him.

If he had been given adequate information, he probably knew or 
guessed that 1) the Triumverate would seek an unoccupied carriage, 
and 2) the Weasley party would arrive at the last second of the last 
possible minute, by which time most carriages would be occupied, so
he could have put a spell of repulsion on the carriage he was in 
(such as putting luggage in the racks and pillows and hats on the 
seats), which he removed as Harry was approaching. That would have 
been a more subtle way to be in the same carriage as Harry than 
walking in after the Triumverate had settled down. 

(Would Hermione allow the making of a pun: the "Triumpherate" as 
their clique's name?) 

> I think it is more likely that the timing of the full moon that 
> month forced Lupin to delay his journey to Hogwarts so that he had
> to arrive later than the other teachers.

He could have arrived enough earlier to spend that Full Moon at 
Hogwarts. With Wolfbane Potion if Snape had already arrived, or in 
the Shrieking Shack if not.

The fanfic which showed Dumbledore asking Lupin to ride the Hogwarts 
Express to protect all the students from Crouch's Dementors had the 
Full Moon occuring the very night before the Arrival Feast, so he 
wouldn't have had to arriive *much* earlier than the students did in 
order to spend Full Moon at Hogwarts rather than on the road.

> Note that Harry notices that Lupin looks as though he has been 
> recently ill; presumably he has just gone through his monthly
> transformation.

Guarding Harry or all students is one reason to travel while very 
much under the weather; spending one last night as a wild wolf in a 
forest far from humans could be another (that was in the fic, too), 
but if I had a week or more of choices when to travel, I would pick a 
time when I was less rather than more like to be under the weather. 
(A man with a monthly cycle: is that why us women like Lupin?)