[HPforGrownups] Re: Winky's presence during Crouch interrogation

[djtarb at aol.com]

No: HPFGUIDX 24868

In a message dated Fri, 24 Aug 2001  1:25:46 PM Eastern Daylight Time, "Caius Marcius" <coriolan at worldnet.att.net> writes:

> 
> Good question - of course we don't know much about the effectiveness 
> of Veritaserum. Perhaps there are powerful antidotes that can protect 
> the subject from the serum's truth-telling effects. If that's the 
> case,  Winky may have been included by Dumbledore as a means of 
> establishing Crouch's veracity. She probably wouldn;t have so reacted 
> to a fictitious account.
> 
My read on this is that she had to hear it being confessed (and hear that Crouch, Sr., was dead) before she could break her own loyalty to the family and confirm Barty's story.  Even though she'd been given clothes, she still kept the covenant.  House elves have their own peculiar honor...Dobby's self-punishment for breaking faith with the Malfoys (even though he didn't do so at all effectively!) is another case in point.

Diane in PA