Discussion summary: Chapter 35 Veritaserum

[Schlobin at aol.com]

No: HPFGUIDX 14555

Veritaserum.

“…you have a streak of pride and independence that might have ruined all”
Bartemius Crouch, Jr. to and about Harry Potter


This is JKR’s chapter of revelations. If you view the GoF as in part a 
mystery, here the mystery starts to unravel.



We discover that the person who we believed to be Alastor Moody, Auror, 
friend and ally of Albus Dumbledore, is actually Bartemius Crouch, Jr., a 
Death Eater, spy and emissary of Voldemort.

(Bartemius Crouch, BC, Senior will be referred to as BC, Senior; Bartemius 
Crouch, Junior will be referred to as BC, Junior. “Moody” means Bartemius 
Crouch, Junior in his masquerade as Alastor Moody and Moody without 
quotations means the real person. Quotes are from the U.K. Bloomsbury 
version. First Edition.)

The chapter begins as Harry teleports from the clutches of Voldemort into the 
hands of Albus Dumbledore (from Little Hangleton to Hogwarts). Harry is 
clutching in one hand the Triwizard Cup/Portkey,  and in his other arm the 
body of Cedric Diggory. Harry had promised the ghost/appearance of Cedric to 
return Cedric’s body to his parents. When Dumbledore turns Harry over, Harry 
lets go of the cup but clutches Cedric closer. He seizes Dumbledore's wrist 
and whispers that Lord Voldemort is back. The crowd begins to cry out that 
Cedric is dead.

Dumbledore tells Harry to stay, but “Moody” drags/carries Harry from the 
Quidditch field/labyrinth to his office, gives him a stimulant, and insists 
that Harry tell him what happened.

“Moody”(in classic villain manner) tells Harry far more than necessary and 
therefore provides time for a rescue. He reveals the following: 

- that Karkarov was a Death Eater who had betrayed Voldemort and that 
Karkarov fled in fear of Voldemort when he felt the Dark Mark burn on his 
arm. 

- it was he “Moody” who put Harry’s name in the Goblet of Fire (and then 
pulls out his wand and points it at Harry).

-  it was he who fired the Dark Mark into the sky during the Quidditch World 
Cup. 

-  how he yearns to know that Lord Voldemort tortured those he hates the most 
– the Death Eaters who walked free. “Tell me he hurt them, Harry….”

“Moody” boasts (almost at leisure) about how he protected Harry during the 
contest and engineered his victory (If it had not been for Cedric’s decision 
not to take the cup, would Harry have won?). “Moody” says he:

- nudged Hagrid into telling Harry about the dragons
- told Cedric to open the egg underwater –
- gave the book Magical Mediterranean Water-Plants and Their Properties to 
Neville Longbottom so that Harry would find out about Gillyweed. When this 
failed,  “Moody” talked about the Gillyweed while Dobby, the House Elf was 
cleaning clothes, with the (correct) assumption that Dobby would tell 
Harryabout the Gillyweed. 
- stunned Fleur Delacour, put the Imperius Curse on Viktor Krum and forced 
Krum  to attack Diggory (on the final night in the maze)

As Harry wonders how Moody could possibly be a Death Eater, he sees foggy 
shapes in “Moody’s” Foe-Glass. “Moody” fantasizes in whispers how the Dark 
Lord will reward him for first, delivering  Harry to him  so that Lord 
Voldemort could use Harry’s blood for regeneration. Then, “Moody” goes on 
about  when he kills Harry, how Voldemort will reward him,  that he’ll be 
closer to him than a son.   “Moody’s” eye bulged – as he tells of the 
similarities between he and his Lord,  their disappointing fathers, the 
indignity of being named after their fathers, and the intense pleasure they 
had in killing their fathers. Harry blurts out that “Moody” is mad; 
“Moody”, annoyed, finally decides to get on with the job of killing Harry, 
when suddenly.....

“Stupefy!There was a blinding flash of red light and with a great splintering 
and crashing, the door of Moody’s office was blasted apart ---“ and Harry 
sees Snape, McGonagall and Dumbledore. Dumbledore is revealed in his wrath 
and power. Minerva, with great pity, tries to take Harry to the hospital wing 
but Dumbledore intervenes insisting that Harry must stay so that Harry can 
comprehend.

Dumbledore himself drops the next bombshell as he states that “Moody” is not 
truly Alastor Moody. He dispatches Snape for his strongest Truth Potion and 
for Winky the House-Elf and sends McGonagall for the black dog/ Sirius who's 
hanging out at Hagrid's.  Dumbledore opens the magic trunk with seven locks 
and finds the real Mad-Eye Moody, starved, asleep,  and exhausted. Dumbledore 
states that the fake Moody used the Imperius Curse and Polyjuice Potion to 
impersonate the real Auror.

Harry watches as the fake Moody transforms in front of him into the man Harry 
saw as a boy in the Pensieve  – Barty Crouch, Jr. Snape and Winky immediately 
recognize him as well .Dumbledore administers the truth serum that Snape 
brought.

The rest of the chapter is the interrogation of Barty Crouch. (Winky pleads 
with BC, Junior not to reveal the family’s secrets, trembles, cowers in fear 
and wails in despair throughout).  We learn that BC Junior’s dying mother 
persuaded his father to help BC, Junior escape from Azkaban. Mother and son 
changed places using the Polyjuice Potion. Mother was buried under her son’s 
name, and when the father got his son home, father staged his wife’s death. 
 BC, Senior subdued his son with a number of spells, and with the assistance 
of the House Elf, Winky. Winky became BC, Junior’s keeper and caregiver. 
Crouch, Jr.has been imprisoned and controlled for years.

Bertha Jorkins, from the Ministry of Magic, discovered the Crouch secret, and 
BC, Senior put a very powerful memory charm on her so that she would forget 
whats he knew (Does this account  for BC, Senior’s intense worry about her 
whereabouts at the beginning of the GoF?)

Winky spent months persuading BC, Senior to let BC, Junior go to the World 
Quidditch cup, invoking the memory of his dead mother. BC Senior agreed, and 
Winky took BC Junior there under the cover of the Invisibility Cloak. But BC, 
Junior was regaining his powers (how? why?) and was able to snatch HP’s wand 
from his pocket.

BC, Junior found the Death Eaters tormenting the Muggles, and became enraged 
at their lack of dedication to Voldemort's return.  BC, Junior was pulled 
away from confronting the DEs by Winky’s “own brand of magic”. Then BC, 
Junior cast the Dark Mark into the sky, and  the Ministry of Magic wizards 
(including Arthur Weasley and Amos Diggory) stunned BC, Junior and Winky with 
a Stunning Spell. BC, Senior found his son, and dismissed Winky for almost 
letting him escape.

Voldemort had captured  and tortured  Bertha Jorkins in Albania. She revealed 
the scoop about  the Triwizard Tournament, and that Moody would be teaching 
at Hogwarts. She relayed that BC, Junior had escaped from Azkaban, was being 
 held prisoner by BC, Senior, and was still fanatically devoted to  Lord 
Voldemort. 

Then Voldemort arrived at the Crouch home carried by Wormtail.  BC, Junior 
smiles in ecstasy as he recalls how his father answered the door, and was 
cursed and controlled by Voldemort in the same way his father had cursed and 
controlled him. Voldemort, controlling BC, Senior, through the Imperius 
curse, forced BC, Senior to go to work as usual.

BC, Junior jumped at the chance to go to Hogwarts to trap Harry and deliver 
him to Voldemort.. Then BC, Junior and Wormtail went to Moody’s home, and 
subdued himj ust in time. BC, Junior became the fake Moody through the use of 
the PolyjuicePotion.

BC, Senior started to fight the Imperius Curse and finally escaped to 
Hogwarts to warn Dumbledore (see the Madness of Mister Crouch). Through use 
of the Marauder’s Map (which Dumbledore finally finds out about), BC, Junior 
kept track of his father’s whereabouts.

BC,Junior states that the Map nearly encompassed his ruin, because it let 
Potter know that Bartemius Crouch was in Snape’s office. BC Junior explained 
to Harry at the time that his father hated Snape and that’s why BC, Senior 
might be searching Snape’s office. 

When BC, Senior showed up at Hogwarts, BC, Junior stunned Krum, and killed 
his father. BC, Junior transfigured BC, Senior’s body into a bone and buried 
it in the earth in front of Hagrid’s cabin.

Then BC, Junior states that he carried the Triwizard Cup in to the maze and 
turned it into a Portkey. 

The chapter ends with.....

“The insane smile lit his features once more, and his head drooped onto his 
shoulder as Winky wailed and sobbed at his side.”

More questions and thoughts soon….and at some point a character sketch on Ron 
Weasley.


Susan McGee, Ann Arbor, Michigan (with gratitude to my partner for being 
almost as obsessed as I am)





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