PoA 5, innocent RL

[Zarleycat at aol.com]

No: HPFGUIDX 18865

--- In HPforGrownups at y..., "Amy Z" <aiz24 at h...> wrote:
> Re: Why Remus was on the train

snip
> I assumed that insofar as Remus is a plant and not just traveling 
by 
> train because he's ill/poor, he's there to guard against Sirius.  
The 
> MOM has made sure Harry is accompanied by adult wizards ever since 
> Sirius's escape, and it would make sense that Fudge et al would 
> ask Dumbledore to ask one of his staff to be on the train to keep 
an 
> eye on things.  It could be any of them, but it's Remus because of 
his 
> other reasons to use the train, and/or because Dumbledore wants him 
to 
> know that he trusts him to be on the right side despite his 
friendship 
> with Sirius.  Assigning him the job of protecting Harry from Sirius 
> would be a very Dumbledorean way to convey that trust.

I hadn't thought of that. If so, I guess Dumbledore didn't mention it 
to Snape, since he thought from the get-go that Remus was not to be 
trusted. 
> 
(I always wish I could relive that 
> with my favorite books)

Amen!!


I 
> thought he was a very suspicious character.  For one thing, I was 
> going by the dictum, "Never trust a DADA professor any farther than 
> you can throw him."  Then there was all that improbable sleeping, 
and 
> then handing out chocolate to make nice . . . even the gentle voice 
> Jim Dale gave him couldn't assuage my suspicions.)
> 
> Now, however, I start hyperventilating when someone suggests Lupin 
> might go over to the Death Eaters.  Never!  Not my Remus! 

I can't see that, either. Remus has too many good qualities, and I 
don't get the feeling that he can be corrupted.  Besides, even if the 
DEs want to enlist the help of "dark creatures" I doubt that means 
they would see them as equals.  A werewolf joining V's side would 
just exchange one group with prejudices for another.   

IMO Sirius 
> never had good reason to suspect him of being the spy; it was a 
case 
> of understandable paranoia, combined with "who else could it be?," 
> perhaps combined with suspicious-seeming innocent behavior that we 
> don't know about (could be anything--unexplained absences, getting 
> caught looking through James and Lily's medicine chest, whatever).

Agreed again.  No one could ever suspect Peter because he was so 
forgetable.  We also don't know what James, Remus, Sirius, etc. were 
doing during V's original war, so we can't yet gauge the state of 
their minds.  The general atmosphere of death, destruction, 
treachery, etc. that existed at the time could certainly cloud 
people's judgement.  

I still would like to see a discussion between Sirius and Remus 
regarding why they each suspected the other.  The quick apologies 
tossed out in the Shrieking Shack scene, IMO, do not do justice to 
this sort of event.

Marianne