enigmatic Bill

[foxmoth at qnet.com]

No: HPFGUIDX 21335

--- In HPforGrownups at y..., pigwidgeon37 at y... wrote:
> Scott wrote:
> "After Arthur makes the above statement there was silence for a 
> moment, and then Bill says "Well, it didn't help us tonight, whoever 
> conjured it." (This sentence confuses me the more I read it. Is he 
> saying that they "didn't help" by scaring away the DEs? How *could* 
> the Dark Mark "help" them?) He goes on to say "It scared the Death 
> Eaters away the moment they saw it. They all Disapparated before we'd 
> got near enough to unmask any of them. We caught the Robertses before 
> they hit the ground though."
> 
> You're not te only one to be confused about this sentence. I tried 
> the old trick reading it aloud, putting the emphasis on different 
> words (it *didn't* help us tonight, it didn't *help* us tonight, it 
> didn't help *us* tonight, it didn't help us *tonight*), but didn't 
> get much more sense out of it. Because who has ever been *helped* by 
> the Dark Mark? It would be clear if he said something like "It made 
> our work even more difficult tonight" which would be the "it didn't 
> *help* us tonight" version.

	I think emphasis on *help* is correct, and the meaning is indeed 
"it made our work more difficult". It's British ironic understatement, 
the same way "a small fortune" means "fabulous wealth", and "a spot of 
bother" means "an earthshaking disaster".

Pippin