TBAY: Crouch - Last Orders (6 of 9)

[ssk7882 <skelkins@attbi.com>]

No: HPFGUIDX 47933

[Apologies in advance to Eileen.  This one got just a mite bit cruel 
in places.]

Six

Last Orders

-----------------

"I think that in the end," Elkins concludes, putting 'Sympathy
For the Devil: Veritaserum, a Close Reading' back in her satchel,
"Crouch saved his son because he wanted to.  I'm not buying that 
'last orders' story.  I just don't believe it.  It sounds to me 
far more like Barty Jr's heavily biased speculation about what 
happened than it does like an accurate description of how that 
decision was actually reached."

"But you said yourself that you thought that Mrs. Crouch was
putting on a performance at her son's sentencing!" Eileen objects.  
"You suggested that she faked that fainting spell.  You implied 
that she was deliberately trying to manipulate her husband's 
emotions."

"Oh, I know," sighs Elkins.  "I know.  And I really do think that 
she was, too.  But at the same time, I've always found myself 
wondering just how hard Mrs. Crouch really had to work on her husband 
to get him to agree to her plan.  I find it very difficult to believe 
that Crouch Sr. was nearly as reluctant as his son implies."

"But Elkins," asks Eileen.  "*Why?*"

"Well, because does Crouch Sr. really *act* like someone who doesn't 
value his son's life?  For someone who was supposedly pressured into 
saving his son so very much against his own will and his own 
inclinations, he seems awfully invested in protecting him, don't you 
think?  He seems to be willing to pay just about any price to keep 
him alive.  And in the end," she adds grimly.  "He *pays* it, too."

"Because he loved his wife," Cindy tells her.  "And because remaining
faithful to her dying wish by keeping her son alive was the only way 
that he had to remember her, or to honour her final sacrifice."

"And because even after his wife was gone," adds Eileen.  "He still 
had Winky around to throw her memory in his face all the time."

Elkins thinks about this for a long moment.  "Eileen," she says 
finally.  "Tell me again about Crouch's dismissal of Winky, will 
you?  About it being an expression of hostility against his late 
wife?"

"Well," says Eileen.  "Winky and Mrs. Crouch both occupy the same 
role in the text, really, don't they?  They're described in the same 
terms.  They fill the same functions.  Mrs. Crouch dies but she 
doesn't leave the story. The entire Crouch Sr./Mrs. Crouch dynamic is 
recreated between Crouch Sr. and Winky.  After all, the whole 'Let 
him go to the QWC' is just a continuation of 'Let him switch places 
with me in Azkaban.'  When Mrs. Crouch dies, Winky just takes over 
her role, doesn't she?"

"She certainly seems to.  In some ways."

"Well, doesn't that suggest that in some way when he denounced Winky 
and released her from service, he was actually dismissing the shadow 
of his wife? He didn't let go of Winky because she embarassed him. He 
let go of her because she endangered him. Just as his wife endangered 
him. The two: Winky and Mrs. Crouch, pretty much killed him in the 
end. In dismissing Winky, Crouch is finally throwing off the control 
she had over his life (which is as real as the control he had over 
hers), and throwing off the control his wife had over him as well. 
So, yes, I think he was banishing his wife in some way when he let go 
of Winky. Not so pleasant."

"No," agrees Elkins quietly.  "Not at all pleasant.  Particularly 
when you consider how he's regarding Winky in that scene.  'As though 
she were something filthy and rotten that was contaminating his over-
shined shoes.'"

"Ooooh, harsh," comments Cindy.

"Poor Barty," Eileen sighs.

"Yes, poor old Crouch, eh?  What a life.  So let me just see if I've 
got this straight.  Crouch finally banishes this nasty disgusting 
feminine influence that has been endangering him all of this time.  
He wrests himself free from the control of these wife figures who 
keep exerting such a powerful and dangerous feminizing influence on 
him, luring him into showing mercy even when it is grossly 
irresponsible for him to do so, and who are also, in some sense, 
actively *betraying* him, as they take his son's side against his 
own.  By dismissing Winky, he is striking out not only at Winky 
herself, but also at his late wife.  In effect, he is banishing her 
shade.  He is performing a kind of an exorcism.  Is that more or less 
correct?"

Elkins looks questioningly over to Eileen, who nods tentatively.

"You know, I absolutely love this reading?" Elkins tells her.  

Eileen looks startled.  "You do?"

"Yes.  I'm hopelessly enamoured of it.  But only if I can tweak it a
little bit.  Because my main problem with it as it stands is...well, 
okay, so Crouch banishes Winky and with her, the shade of his late 
wife.  He wrests himself free from their dangerous feminizing 
influence.  So far so good.  But what does he do *then?*"

Eileen frowns.  "What do you mean?"

"Well, what's the *outcome* of that exorcism?  See, this is my 
problem with this reading.  It's the same problem that I have with 
the whole Last Orders story, actually.  It's the problem that I have 
with 'my dying wife forced my hand!' For that matter, it's also my 
problem with your insistence that Winky and Mrs. Crouch were more 
careless and reckless when it came to Barty Jr. than Crouch himself 
was.  You see, I just can't reconcile any of those claims with 
Crouch's actions *after* the QWC."

"His actions after the QWC?"

"Yes.  Really, Crouch's decisions after the QWC are quite damning, 
don't you think?  To my mind, they're far worse than either the 
decision to save Barty Jr. from prison in the first place or the 
decision to allow him to attend the World Cup.  I can see plenty of 
mitigating factors for both of those decisions.  But none of those 
factors are still in effect after the QWC.  After the QWC, all of the 
mitigating factors are gone."

"I don't think that I'm quite seeing what you mean," says Eileen.

"Well, okay.  Look here."


======================================================================

People often cite Crouch's rescue of his son from Azkaban as the
most serious of his errors, THE fatal error, so to speak, the action 
which leads unerringly and inexorably to his destruction.  

While I certainly agree that hindsight reveals this act to have been
a very bad mistake, I am always surprised that more people don't cite 
Crouch's behavior *after* the QWC as a far more damning example of 
his fatal carelessness when it came to his son. 

Rescuing his son from prison was certainly a very hypocritical thing 
for Mr. Crouch to have done.  Truly sickeningly so.  I don't, 
however, necessarily see it as all that *foolhardy.*  We don't 
actually know what Crouch and his wife were thinking when they 
conspired to save their son from death in Azkaban.  It is possible 
that they might have believed that there was a chance that he really 
had been innocent.  Young Crouch alone of the defendents in the 
Longbottom case had never before stood accused of any Dark activity.  
There seems to have been no real evidence against him, other than the 
circumstantial evidence of his having been caught in the company of 
the others.  Even if he had been fingered by the testimony of his 
three co-defendents, this would hardly have been the most compelling 
evidence, given how we can imagine the Death Eaters as a group must 
have felt about elder Crouch, who had commanded his Aurors against 
them and sent so many of their number to prison.  Both Dumbledore and 
Sirius expressed doubt about Crouch Jr's guilt.  In the part of his 
trial that we see in the Pensieve, his co-defendents ignore his 
outbursts completely, while he himself insists upon his innocence to 
the very last.

Eileen has argued in the past that Crouch "knew" that his son was 
guilty, but I just don't see how he could possibly have known this.  
Nobody did.  If Crouch "knew" that his son was guilty, then he knew 
it in precisely the same way that he "knew" that Sirius Black was 
guilty -- which is to say, he didn't.  I do think that Crouch 
genuinely believed his son to be guilty, but he might also have 
been willing to concede the possibility that there was a chance that 
his son really *could* be innocent.  This could have had some bearing 
on his decision to agree to his wife's plan to free Barty Jr. from 
Azkaban.

Alternatively (and, to my mind, far more likely), the Crouches could 
have believed that their son was, while technically guilty, not 
really a very hard case.  Crouch Jr. was very young, after all.  He 
was barely past the age of majority.  His parents could have believed 
that he'd been led astray.  That he'd been seduced.  That he'd been 
an accessory, but not an accomplice.  That he'd been an accomplice, 
but not an active participant.  That all he really needed to 
straighten him out was one of those proverbial short sharp shocks (if 
one can really use that phrase to refer to a year of imprisonment in 
Azkaban that proved nearly fatal to young Barty and probably had a 
lot to do with driving him completely around the bend).

Judy Serenity once wrote:

> My personal belief is that that Crouch Sr. believed his son was 
> guilty and deserved harsh punishment, but had no idea just how 
> devoted Jr. was to Voldemort. I don't think Crouch Sr. could 
> possibly be expected to know that his son would help return 
> Voldemort to power if released from Azkaban. Any parent would 
> think "My son was under the bad influence of his friends" not "My 
> son is the most evil creature on the face of this earth." 

She also once suggested that Crouch might have envisioned sending 
Barty off to start a new life somewhere abroad under a new identity, 
before he realized that his son was completely unrepentant.  

Indeed, I can see plenty of reasons why the Crouches might have 
thought that rescuing their son from Azkaban was not an action that 
would have had any terrible repercussions or placed anyone at any 
real risk.  Crouch Jr's lack of repentence would seem to have come as 
an utter surprise to his father.  His father did not put him under 
the Imperius Curse until he was fool enough to start shooting his 
mouth off about wanting to run off to seek Voldemort.  The impression 
that I have always received is that until Crouch Jr. was idiotic 
enough to make his intentions known, his father had fully expected 
him to be abjectly grateful for having been liberated: duly 
chastened, repentent, dutiful, obedient.  In short, harmless.

Crouch's decision to continue to keep his son a prisoner in his own 
home even after it became clear that he was both guilty and 
unrepentant was also unwise, but again, I can at least see how he 
might have managed to justify this decision to himself.  His son was 
under the Imperius Curse.  He was under guard.  He wasn't going to 
break free.  What difference does it really make, from the 
perspective of ensuring the safety of the populace, whether a 
criminal is kept prisoner in Azkaban or in his father's home?  
Either way, he is not capable of hurting anybody.  

The decision to allow Crouch Jr. to attend the QWC doesn't strike me 
as all that foolhardy either, really.  Crouch Jr. had been under the 
Imperius Curse for over ten *years.*  Surely neither Winky nor Crouch 
expected that after all of that time, he was suddenly going to be 
able to break free of it.  I imagine that they assumed that if Crouch 
Jr. hadn't been able to crack the Imperius as an angry young 
teenager, then he *certainly* wasn't going to be doing so ten years 
later, at the age of thirty, after over a decade of captivity, 
demoralizing treatment, and mental enslavement.  There is such a 
thing as an institutional mentality, after all.  Crouch may 
even have deluded himself into believing that he had finally 
succeeded in crushing his son's spirit, that Crouch Jr. had been 
cowed, broken, beaten into submission.  Rendered harmless.

Crouch and Winky also probably assumed that Crouch Jr. didn't have 
any magical capabilities.  One of the long-term effects of the 
dementors is supposed to be that they strip wizards of their magical 
powers, and the dementors had young Crouch right on the brink of 
death when he was saved from them.  Furthermore, he hadn't been 
allowed access to a wand since prison.  So really, how dangerous 
could he possibly be?  What harm could letting him go watch a 
sporting event do to anyone?

As it turns out, none of these things was the case. But both Crouch 
and Winky can be forgiven for having assumed them.  They were 
reasonable assumptions, even if they were incorrect.

But *after* the QWC?

After the QWC, Crouch *had* to have realized what kind of a threat 
his son represented.  He must have.  Crouch Jr. had proven himself 
strong enough to throw off his father's Imperius Curse, strong enough 
even to put up a bit of a fight against Winky's powerful elf magic.  
He had proven himself cagey enough to steal a wand from the most 
carefully guarded teenager in the entire wizarding world, and in 
front of an entire slew of witnesses -- still without getting 
caught.  He had proven that even after near-death in Azkaban, even 
after over a decade of mental domination, even after a decade denied 
access to a wand, he was still magically capable enough to use 
somebody *else's* wand to fire the Dark Mark into the sky.  

Neither Mr. nor Mrs. Crouch could have known that their son would be 
dangerous once released from prison.  Neither Winky nor Mr. Crouch
could have known that he would be strong enough to break free of the 
Imperius Curse when they decided to bring him to the QWC.

But after the QWC, Crouch knows the truth of the matter.  His son 
isn't crushed.  He isn't cowed.  He isn't beaten, he isn't broken, 
he isn't bowed.  He isn't in the slightest bit repentent.  He is 
still devoted to Voldemort's cause.  He is still determined to fight 
his father.  He is still in full possession of both his mental 
faculties and his magical capabilities.  He can kick his father's 
Imperius Curse.  And he's not playing with a full deck.

He.  Is.  *Dangerous.*

======================================================================


"Dangerous," repeats Elkins.  "He's dangerous.  A danger to himself 
and others."

"A viper at his father's bosom," murmers Eileen.  Elkins shakes her 
head.

"Oh no," she says pleasantly.  "No, no, no.  He's really much worse 
than that, you see, because he's not just a danger to his father.  He 
is a danger to the public at large.  And Crouch Sr. must have 
realized that.  He may not have done before the QWC, but after the 
QWC, he must have.  Furthermore, he had just dismissed Winky, which 
meant that he no longer had anyone to help him control or watch over 
his highly dangerous prisoner.  And as for that Imperius Curse of 
his...well!"  Elkins laughs savagely.  "Little Barty kicked its ass, 
didn't he!  No Stockholm Syndrome for little Barty.  Ten years of 
mental domination, ten years of captivity, ten years of being treated 
like an Unperson, and he still kicked it."

Cindy stares at her.  "Elkins," she says.  "Do you actually *admire* 
that little psychopath?"

"Sometimes," admits Elkins.  "Sometimes I do.  So.  This is now 
Crouch Sr's predicament.  He has a prisoner on his hands.  His 
prisoner is mad, strong, clever, dangerous, and very angry.  *And* an 
unrepentent Death Eater.  Crouch does not have the resources to keep 
his prisoner safely.  He no longer has Winky's elf magic to call 
upon. He no longer has any allies at all, in fact.  He works a job.  
With Winky gone, there is going to be no one at home during the day 
to keep an eye on his captive, against whose will his Imperius Curse 
has now been proven unreliable."  

Elkins pauses to allow Cindy and Eileen to think about this.

"So," she says.  "What does Crouch do, after putting his son back 
under the Imperius Curse?  What does he do, now that he no longer
has all of these womenfolk around to lure him into endangering
both himself and the public by taking foolish risks with his son?  
What does he *do,* now that he has finally banished his wife's shade 
and by doing so, rid himself of her perniciously Soft influence?"

There is a long silence.

"Eileen," Elkins says softly.  "What would *Brutus* have done?"

Eileen looks down at her shoes.  "Which one?" she asks.

"*Either* one!  Come on.  What would the ruthlessly hubristic Tough 
and Steely proponent of ends over means, the tragic hero who is 
dedicated to the protection of the wizarding world even when it comes 
at immense personal sacrifice, the man who does not let love -- *any* 
of the four loves -- dictate his actions, except for that one little 
slip-up due to his dying wife's baleful influence -- an influence 
which he has now supposedly *banished* -- what does that man *do* in 
this situation?"  

There is an even longer silence.

"It wouldn't have had to be cruel, you know," Elkins says 
gently.  "He could have made it humane.  Far more humane than death 
in Azkaban, that's for sure.  He wouldn't even have had to do 
anything, er, Unforgivable, although we know that he didn't exactly 
balk at that.  But it wouldn't have been necessary.  His son was back 
under the Imperius Curse.  He was totally helpless.  Crouch could 
have given him something to drink.  He could have slipped something 
into his food.  He was a wizard from a fine old pure-blooded family 
who lived in a big old mansion; I'm sure that he had tons of lethal 
stuff lying around all over the place.  If Crouch had just slipped 
something into his son's bedtime Ovril -- with steely resolve, 
with sorrowful wisdom, with loving regret, what have you -- then 
Barty Jr. wouldn't even have had to suffer the terror of 
anticipation.  It could have been quick, it could have been clean, it 
could have been merciful, and it could have been *over.*  For that 
matter..."  

Elkins' voice trails off.  Cindy looks up.

"What?" she asks.

Elkins shakes her head.  "No," she says.  "It's ugly."

"When has that ever stopped you before?" 

"Well...oh, all right.  If Crouch didn't even want to see it, if he
just couldn't stand to watch his son die, if he didn't even want to
get dirt on his hands directly, then he still had another option.  
And it's even one that the text goes out of its way to draw to our 
attention."

"Which is?"

"Last orders," Elkins says flatly.  "Barty Jr. was under the Imperius 
Curse.  His father could have commanded his suicide.  And then just 
left the room, if he had to."

"Ew!  Elkins!"  Cindy stares at her.  "And you're always calling 
*Eileen* Bent?" 

"It's not her fault," says Eileen, smiling slightly.  "She's just had 
one too many Julio-Claudians."  

"I'm sure that it never would have crossed Crouch's mind to do such a 
thing," sniffs Cindy.  "We Tough people just don't *think* like that,
Elkins!"

"Well, I don't know if it ever crossed Crouch's mind or not," replies 
Elkins.  "But it certainly did cross his *son's* mind.  And it 
crossed the author's mind as well."

"What?"  Eileen frowns.  "Where on earth are you getting...oh.  *OH!
*"  She nods and begins flipping rapidly through her copy of 
_GoF_.  "Oh!  I know! 'The Unforgivable Curses.'"

"Yeah, the DADA lesson.  Crouch/Moody really doesn't like it at all 
when the class laughs at his Imperio'd spider, does he?  That upsets 
him a great deal.  It's one of the few places where we ever see him 
lose his cool.  He doesn't lose it nearly as badly as he does with 
Draco Malfoy, admittedly, and not half so badly as he does in the end 
game, when he throws his villainous little bwah-hah-hah tantrum, but 
he does slip there, I'd say.  He loses his temper.  He's really 
*stung* by that laughter."

"The poor sensitive dear," comments Cindy drily.

"And the very first thing that he says after recovering his 
equilibrium is...?"

Eileen finds the right page and begins to read:

"'Total control,' said Moody quietly as the spider balled itself up 
and began to roll over and over. 'I could make it jump out of the 
window, drown itself, throw itself down one of your throats...'"

She shuts the book with a faint shudder.

"Ugh," she says.

"Yeah.  Ugh.  It does make you wonder, though, doesn't it, just how 
stressed young Crouch might have been about that possibility?  The 
passage implies to my mind that somewhere beneath his Imperius-
induced haze, he had worried about that rather a lot.  Especially 
after the QWC, I'd be willing to wager."

"He was inwardly flinching every time that voice in his head told him 
to draw himself a nice hot bath, you think?" asks Eileen, with a 
slightly twisted smile.

"I do.  I really do.  The specter of Imperius-induced suicide is 
never again raised in the novel, which makes it hard for me not to 
read that passage as in part a character touch.  And am I the only 
person who reads a trace of remembered fear in Crouch Jr's line in 
his confession: 'Now it was just Father and I, alone in the house?'  
Winky was the mitigating influence in that dynamic, wasn't she?"

"That's just what I've been saying!" cries Eileen.

"I know, I know.  But I just can't quite believe that Winky -- or the 
woman whose role she usurps in the text, for that matter -- could 
truly have been all *that* significant an influence on Crouch's 
behavior.  Because what Crouch actually does after the QWC is this: 
he puts his son back under the Imperius Curse.  And then he takes him 
home.  And then the two of them continue on precisely as they were.  
Crouch doesn't even take the precaution of physically restraining his 
son, even though he no longer has Winky around to help watch over and 
control him, and even though he now knows that his son could break 
free from the Imperius at any second.  He doesn't take the precaution 
of clapping him in chains.  He doesn't put a body bind on him.  He 
doesn't even lock him up in a *room.*  He continues to allow him to 
roam freely through the house."  

"Well, we don't really know that," Eileen points out.  "Crouch might 
have locked him in a--"

"No, it really doesn't seem that he did, because when Crouch Jr. 
talks about his father opening the front door to Pettigrew and 
Voldemort that night, he gives the distinct impression of having been 
right there to witness it.  He provides the detail of Voldemort 
showing up 'in the arms of his servant Wormtail.'  He specifies that 
his father didn't have time to put up a struggle: 'It was very 
quick.'  And when he talks about the event itself..."  Elkins squirms 
a bit.  "Well..." 

"That sickening grin," says Eileen, with some distaste.

"Well, er, yes.  I've never claimed that Crouch Jr. didn't have some 
pretty serious emotional problems, have I?  He flashes that insane 
smile 'as though recalling the sweetest memory of his life,' which 
really does suggest quite strongly to my mind that he was an on-the-
spot eye-witness to his father's being placed under the Imperius 
Curse.  But that means that he must have been hanging around the 
*foyer,* doesn't it?  Right next to the front door?  In the middle of 
the night?  Or maybe just trailing Father Dearest around the house, 
like a bored toddler.  Or an imprinted gosling."

"An imprinted gosling..." Cindy muses.  "Hey, Winky had bound Crouch 
Jr. to her physically, right?  With her elf magic.  So maybe Crouch 
Sr. had done something similar.  To keep him close, you know.  To 
keep him in sight.  So you could read that as evidence that he was at 
least trying to minimize the danger."

"Minimize the danger?  Crouch was still going into the office every 
day at that point in the story.  Who was looking after his prisoner 
all day long while he was at *work?*   He must have been leaving his 
son alone in the house all day long, just crossing his fingers and 
hoping that his Imperius Curse would continue to do the trick.  His 
Imperius Curse that had already *failed* him once at the QWC."  
Elkins shakes her head.  "If Crouch had really wanted to minimize the 
danger," she says.  "Then he would have--"

"Oh, but come on now, Elkins," says Cindy.  "You can't really expect
a man to kill his own son, can you?"

"Brutus did it."

"Yes, but...with his own hands?"

"Oh, yes," spits Elkins.  "Heaven forbid that Mr. Crouch should have 
to get blood on his *own* hands.  That's what his *Aurors* are for, 
right? And his *prison.*  And his *dementors.*"

"Elkins," says Cindy quietly.  "Calm down."

"I don't like hypocrites.  Look, we are asked to believe that until 
his wife intervened, Crouch had been willing to allow his teenaged 
son to die of despair and self-induced starvation on the floor of a 
prison cell, after being driven slowly mad by dementors.  That's 
certainly a far nastier way to go than anything that Crouch would 
have been likely to dish out in the privacy of his own home.  Eileen 
has suggested that the only reason that he did not in the end allow 
this to happen was because his dying wife placed unbearable 
psychological pressure on him to convince him to relent.  She has 
suggested that Crouch had come to believe that he had been totally 
wrong to give into that pressure.  That he had realized that his wife 
had talked him into doing something that was not only wrong, but also 
recklessly endangering both his own safety and that of others.  That 
he deeply regretted his decision to accede to her request, and that 
his resentment over this was underlying his rejection of Winky.  She 
has suggested that by renouncing Winky, Crouch was banishing his dead 
wife's shade, and thus finally purging himself of her dangerously 
merciful influence."  

Elkins takes a deep breath.

"So," she says.  "If all of that were really the case, then why 
didn't he just get *rid* of the boy after the QWC?  It would have 
been the prudent thing to do, and it also would have been the logical 
course of action for someone who was really Tough and Steely and self-
sacrificing, and ruthlessly devoted to the protection of the 
Wizarding World against Dark Wizardry even at great personal cost.  
For heaven's sake, if he honestly couldn't bear the thought of 
outright filicide, then he could have turned his son over to the 
authorities!"

"Oh, but you can't really blame him for not wanting to take *that* 
option," objects Eileen.  "He would have been facing life 
imprisonment himself if he'd done that."

"Yes, he might have had to face up to the consequences of his own 
actions.  O horrors."  Elkins shrugs irritably.  "Oh, well.  Like 
father, like son, I guess.  And really, why on earth should we expect 
any better from Barty Crouch than we do from, say, Peter Pettigrew?"

"Oh, now you take that back!" cries Eileen.

Elkins smiles meanly.

"Shan't," she says.  

"But you can't really expect--"

"Expect *what?*  Expect for Crouch to behave responsibly?  Expect for
him to demonstate something *other* than criminal disregard for other
human beings for a change?  Well, no.  No, I suppose that I really 
*can't* expect that of him, can I, because that's what Crouch was all 
about.  Not the protection of the public.  Not service to the common 
weal.  Not opposition to Dark Wizardry.  And *certainly* not self-
sacrifice.  Disregard for other people.  Crouch was all about 
disregard for other people."

"But--"

"Disregard for other people, hypocrisy, and narcissism.  This is a 
man who committed crimes against humanity for his own personal 
benefit and *pretended* that he was doing it because he was a 
ruthless opponent of dark wizardry, privileging the ends over the 
means, dedicating his entire life to the protection of the wizarding 
world and to the service of the commonweal even at immense personal 
sacrifice.  But he won't risk prison for his crimes, he won't take 
the appropriate actions to protect the world from his son, and he 
won't even face up to his own undeniable pathology!  Instead, he 
projects it onto the people around him.  As if Winky had a thing to 
do with his son being able to throw off his Imperius Curse!"

"Yes, but whose stupid idea was it to bring Barty to the QWC in the 
first place?" demands Eileen.

Elkins shrugs.  "Given how Crouch behaves *after* the QWC," she 
says.  "It seems to me that he probably absolutely *relied* on Winky 
to 'talk him into' doing things like that.  Just like he relied on 
his wife to 'talk him into' doing things like saving his son from 
prison.  That was part of what he depended on them for, surely?  To 
absolve him of responsibility for his own behavior?  Really, saving 
Crouch Jr. from prison and taking him to the QWC both pale in 
comparison to what Crouch does after the QWC.  *Who* was in denial 
about just how dangerous Barty Jr. was?  Neither Mrs. Crouch nor 
Winky could possibly have known for sure just how strong or just how 
dangerous that boy was.  Crouch *did* know.  And yet he did nothing.  
Tell me something here," she demands.  "What woman in Crouch's life 
was responsible for his actions *after* the QWC?"

There is a short silence.

"Dear, dear, dear."  Elkins sniggers.  "Poor old Mr. Crouch.  Finally 
ran right *out* of wives, didn't he?  No one left to blame.  So sad."

"My God."  Cindy stares at her.  "You really do hate Crouch, don't 
you?"

"Yes," spits Elkins.  "I do."

"This is beginning to remind me of Cindy's claim that Crouch wasn't
truly repentent because his mission to warn Dumbledore had elements
of self-interest," complains Eileen.  "It's just not fair, Elkins.
Crouch shouldn't have to resign himself to being murdered by Voldemort
to be considered repentent.  And he shouldn't have to resign himself 
either to life imprisonment or to filicide to be considered truly 
concerned about the safety of the wizarding world."

"And besides," says Cindy.  "You can't really tell us that it would
have made you like Crouch any better if he had been able to put his
helpless Imperio'd son down like a rabid dog, can you?  I mean, even 
leaving aside the fact that there would have been no *plot* if he'd 
done that, it's...well, it's just not *like* you, Elkins!  You *hate* 
that sort of thing!"

Elkins blinks.  She frowns.

"You're right, you know," she admits slowly.  "I really do hate that 
sort of thing.  I don't like murder.  I don't like cold-bloodedness.  
I'm not a big fan of Toughness at all, really, or of callousness, or 
even of ruthless pragmatism.  So ordinarily, yes, I suppose that I 
would find it rather sympathetic for someone to refuse either to hand 
his helpless captive over to be psychologically tortured to death in 
a hellish prison or to kill him in cold blood.  But when that someone 
is Barty Crouch?"

Elkins' hobby horse lays back its ears and whinnies dangerously.  

"When it is *Crouch?*" Elkins repeats.  "When that someone is 
CROUCH?  Crouch, who authorized his Aurors to use torture on 
suspects?  Crouch, who allowed them to AK people instead of even 
bothering to *arrest* them?  Crouch, who permitted his Aurors to 
coerce, torment and kill on the basis of nothing more than the merest 
*suspicion* of malfeasance?  On their merest *whim?*"

"Okay, okay," laughs Cindy.  "Calm down."

"When that someone is *Crouch?*" Elkins repeats, her voice now rising
uncontrollably.  "Crouch who sent people to prison for life on the 
basis of no evidence?  Sometimes without even benefit of a trial?  
Who was supposedly willing to bind his son over to torment and death, 
so long as he didn't have to actually *watch* it?  Because he was so 
very concerned about the safety of the *wizarding world?*  So very 
devoted to the protection of the *public?*  Even at great personal 
*cost?*  So very *self-sacrificing?*  You're trying to tell me that 
this man was *squeamish?*"

"Geez.  Take deep breaths, will you?  You're--"

"When it's *Crouch?*" shrieks Elkins.  "When it's CROUCH?  When it's 
*Crouch,* then it doesn't make me like him.  It just *sickens* me!  
It is absolutely *despicable!*"

"Look, would you--"

"Gah!  As if none of the people he sent to prison or let his Aurors 
torture and murder had relatives who loved them!"

"Calm down, okay?  You're--"

"Men like Crouch don't have the *right* to be squeamish," snarls 
Elkins. "Men like Crouch should be getting blood under their 
*fingernails.*  They should be *wading* in it.  They should be armpit 
*deep* in viscera.  They should learn how it *smells.*"

"Okay, Elkins.  Relax.  It's all right.  He's just a character in a 
children's book.  A really really *minor* character in a--"

"CROUCH WAS JUST PLAIN EVIL!" screams Elkins, spit flying from the
corners of her mouth.  "I HATE HIM I HATE HIM I **HATE** HIM!"

There is a short shocked silence.

"Well, sure, Elkins," says Eileen reasonably.  "But don't feel that 
you have to hold back on our account.  Why don't you tell us all how 
you *really* feel about Barty Crouch Sr.?"

Elkins stares at her, her mouth opening and closing silently, then 
lets out a single strangled scream.  Her horse screams as well and 
rears up onto its hind legs.  Eileen yelps and dives for cover 
beneath her CRAB CUSTARD table.  Cindy hunkers down, ducking flailing 
hooves, her hands tightened around her Big Paddle.  Elkins spits out 
a word unsuitable for this list and pulls hard on her reins.  Her 
horse screams once more, wheels, and then takes off down the 
promenade at a fast gallop. 

Cindy straightens slowly.  She stares down the promenade, watching 
the seagulls rise squawking out of the path of Elkins' horse.  

"Was it something I said?" she asks.

Eileen peers out from beneath her table and shakes her head.

"I can't even begin to visualize that thing," Cindy mutters, still 
staring down the promenade at Elkins' madly galloping horse.  "How 
can a hobby horse rear, anyway?  And how can it carry its rider off 
like that?  And surely hobby horses don't even *have* front hooves.  
Do they?"

"It's a runaway metaphor."  Eileen crawls out from under the table
and begins brushing herself off.  "A runaway *mixed* metaphor.  I'd
just try not to visualize it at all, if I were you.  It will only 
make your head hurt."

"Well, okay," Cindy begins.  "But..."  She trails off as Elkins 
comes cantering back up to the CRAB CUSTARD table, her high pale
hobby horse now flecked with sweat and blowing hard.  Elkins slows 
to a trot, then begins walking her horse in tight circles around 
the table.  She drops the reins and begins rummaging through her
pockets, sending stray odds and ends wafting down to the promenade 
below.  

"Er...you all right there, Elkins?" asks Cindy.  

Elkins' hand emerges from one pocket clutched tightly around a small 
medicine bottle.  She fumbles with the child-proof cap, breathing 
hard, then snarls and raises it to her mouth, cracks it open with her 
teeth.  She shakes three small yellow pills into one palm, tosses 
them down her throat, closes her eyes, and swallows.  Hard.

Cindy and Eileen exchange glances.

"Elkins?"

Elkins raises one trembling hand to her throat.  She opens her eyes
and glances down to her wrist watch.  Her mouth moves silently, 
counting, counting.

"Um."  Cindy shifts from foot to foot.  "Do you think maybe I should 
go and get Dr. George?" she whispers to Eileen.

"George?  *No!*" hisses Eileen emphatically.  "*Not* Dr. George,
Cindy!  For heaven's *sake!*"

"Oh."  Cindy nods.  "Oh, right.  That.  Well, in that case..."

"Have I mentioned," says Elkins calmly, one hand still at her throat, 
her eyes still fixed on her wrist watch.  "That I *really* don't like 
Barty Crouch Sr.?"

"You've mentioned it a few times," answers Eileen politely.  "Yes."

"That he infuriates me?  That I absolutely despise him?  That he is
capable of rousing in me a sense of moral indignation unmatched by 
that inspired by any other character?  Voldemort included?  That I
actually *enjoyed* watching him suffer while his son was tormenting 
him in that little room off the Great Hall right after Harry's name 
came out of the Goblet?  That on rereading, it made me laugh out
loud with pure malicious *glee?*"

"Yes, I believe that you have mentioned all of those things," says
Cindy.  "Also that he reminds you of your father."

"Yes."  Elkins removes her hand from her throat.  "Well," she says.  
"Just so we're clear on that."  She looks up from her wrist watch.  
"At any rate...do I still have foam on my mouth?"

"A little."

Elkins nods absently and reaches up to wipe it off.

"At any rate," she says.  "Crouch's actions after the QWC make it 
very difficult for me to believe that his wife ever had to put all 
that much pressure on him to get him to agree to rescue their son.  
He seems far too heavily invested in his son's life for me to believe 
that.  He seems far too determined to keep him alive, and not only 
alive, but also free from physical restraint.  No bonds.  No body 
binds.  No locked rooms.  It's almost as if he secretly *wants* his 
son to escape, don't you think?  It certainly doesn't reveal too much 
concern for the common weal, or for the public good.  It's 
appallingly irresponsible behavior.  Pathological, really.  A 
pathological behavior pattern that he projects upon others because he 
can't face up to it himself.  Because I do think that he was 
projecting onto Winky at the QWC, you know.  I do think that he was 
trying to affect a kind of an exorcism."

"You do?"  Eileen looks up.

"Yes.  You've convinced me of that.  You've convinced me that Crouch 
was projecting onto Winky at the QWC.  I'm not sure that what he was 
seeing in her was really his wife, though.  I think it far more 
likely that he was seeing himself."

"You think that when he was looking at Winky 'as though she were 
something filthy and rotten that was contaminating his over-shined 
shoes,' he was seeing *himself?*" Cindy repeats incredulously.

"I don't think that Mr. Crouch liked himself very much," says Elkins 
quietly.  "I don't really think that he was lying, you know, when he 
claimed to despise and detest the Dark Arts and all those who 
practice them.  But the Unforgivable Curses *are* Dark Arts, aren't 
they?  Really," she asks.  "Would *you* like yourself very much, if 
you were Bartemius Crouch?"

"Uh-huh.  And *who's* the one projecting here?" demands Cindy.

"Elkins said before that she reads Crouch as a narcissist," Eileen 
reminds her.  "Someone who sees others only as reflections of 
himself."

Elkins nods.  "I do read him that way," she says.  "And I think that 
his denunciation of Winky was in part an expression of self-hatred.   
But really, it works fine for me either way.  Whether you think that 
he was seeing himself or his wife in Winky, the basic principle 
remains the same.  After all, I'm sure that Crouch saw himself in his 
wife, too.

"What I can't see, though," she continues.  "Is his renunciation of 
Winky as a *successful* banishment.  Because really, it didn't change 
anything, did it?  After the QWC, Crouch remains every bit as 
negligent as he was before.  Even more so, really.  So I can't read 
it as an exorcism.  I read it as a failed exorcism.  *Another* failed 
exorcism."

"Another failed exorcism?" asks Eileen.

"Parallel scenes."

"Oh."  Eileen nods.  "Oh, yes, I see," she says.  "'I have no son.'"

"Yes.  'I have no son' was a failed exorcism, because Crouch reneged 
on it one year later.  And its parallel, his denunciation of Winky, 
is also a failed exorcism, because after it, his behavior in regard 
to his son continues unchanged."

"You do realize, of course," Eileen says, with a slighty Malfoyish 
smirk.  "That you're only making him *more* sympathetic with all of 
this?  At least from a Bleeding Heart perspective, you are.  I just 
claimed that Crouch fell into error due to his love for his wife and 
his overwhelming sense of True Wizarding Honour.  But here you have 
him erring out of love for his son as well, a love so powerful that 
it overrides even the most compelling practical reasons not to 
continue to show him mercy."

"Love?"  Elkins stares at her.  "Who said anything about love?  Or 
about mercy, for that matter?"

Cindy and Eileen both stare right back at her.

"You think *that's* why Crouch wanted so very badly to keep his son 
alive?" demands Elkins.  "And not only to preserve his life, but also 
to allow him a kind of perverted illusion of independence?  Under the 
Imperius Curse and kept indoors, yet never actually physically 
restrained?  In full view of others, and yet invisible?  Capable of 
walking right up to the front door, but never of passing beyond it?  
Permitted a kind of sick twisted parody of autonomy?  Turned into 
a...a kind of a *meat marionette?*  You think that was done out of 
*love?*"  

"Well, I--"

"That's not love," snaps Elkins.  "That bears about the same 
relationship to love as rape does to sex.  I don't think that Crouch 
was about love, really.  That's not his role.  It's not his 
function.  It's not what he's all about."

"I don't--"

"Haven't you ever noticed that there's a distinct *pattern* to the 
subplots and running motifs with which Crouch is associated 
throughout _Goblet of Fire?_" asks Elkins.  "These are the things 
that touch on Crouch.  The Imperius Curse.  The Unforgivable Curses 
in general.  Memory Charms. Azkaban.  Dementors.  Insanity.  Human 
rights violations.  Mass hysteria.  House Elves.  Father-son 
relationships."

"I--"

"Don't you see the pattern here?  Crouch is connected to all of those 
subplots and running motifs that center thematically on the denial or 
negation of *volition.*  He is connected to everything in the book 
that deals with these issues: control, coercion, power, servitude, 
domination, the loss of individual freedoms and autonomy.  The 
negation of individuation.  The negation of personal *choice.*  
That's where Crouch lives.  Whenever you see Barty Crouch in this 
novel, there's a thematic thread dealing with that entire conceptual 
cluster not too far away.  He's bound to those themes even more 
securely than his son was bound to Winky at the QWC."

"But--"

"Crouch is not about *love,*" Elkins spits.  "Crouch is about 
domination.  Crouch is about narcissism.  Crouch is about coercion.  
Crouch is about control.  But primarily, Crouch is all about the 
denial of volition.  And that's not compatable with love.  How can 
you love other people if you don't even respect their right to exist 
*as* other people?  Confronted with that which he chose to define 
as 'Other,' Crouch was only capable of two reactions, it seems.  
Either he tried to get it as far away from himself as possible, by 
renouncing his affiliation with it completely, or he tried to force 
it to *change,* to no longer be Other anymore, to instead be a mirror 
that would reflect him as he wished to believe he really was.  Isn't 
that what the Imperius Curse is all about, really?  It's about 
denying the autonomous existence of the Other.  It's about 
narcissism: turning another person into your Mirror of Erised, 
forcing another to reflect nothing back at you but your own 
desires.  It's about the negation of human individuality.  The 
negation of freedom of choice.

"As are all of the Unforgivables, really," Elkins adds, after a
moment's thought.  "They're all about the negation of volition.
That's the real reason that I think that they're 'Unforgivable,' 
you know.  In the Potterverse, choice *is* a rather important 
concept."

"But--" 

"I'm sure that Crouch believed that he loved his son," Elkins 
says.  "I'm absolutely positive of that.  I'm sure that he told 
himself that he was taking such pains to preserve his son's life not 
only to honor his wife's last wishes, but also because he truly and 
genuinely loved his son.  But I'm not altogether convinced that Barty 
Crouch Sr. really understood the meaning of that word.  I don't think 
that he really got that whole love concept any better than Voldemort 
does."

"Slander," says Eileen flatly.  

"Is it?  The Crouch family plotline is awfully strongly tied to 
Voldemort, isn't it?"  

"Crouch *Junior* is linked to Voldemort," Eileen corrects 
her.  "Through the parricide motif and its attendant symbolism.  But 
Crouch Senior is not."

"Isn't he?  Who is Crouch Jr's *second* father?  His substitute 
father?  The father to whom he dreams of proving himself worthy?  
Voldemort may be a parricide, but he presents as a father figure in 
the graveyard, doesn't he?  And not just as a father figure, but as a 
representative of a very specific *aspect* of paternity?  Father as 
Critic?  Father as Enforcer?  Father as Disciplinarian?  Father as 
*Judge?*"

Eileen opens her mouth, then closes it.

"He presents, in fact," Elkins continues.  "As a rather domineering 
father figure.  A tyrannical father figure.  A father figure who 
prides himself on being able to *conquer death itself.*  Whose 
followers call themselves 'Death Eaters,' who is associated with the 
yew, whose familiar is a man-eating snake.  Who demands absolute 
obedience from his servants, his children.  Who demands that they 
subsume their own individual identities into his own.  
Metaphorically, he wants to *eat* them.  He is oral aggression 
personified.  He is the *Devouring* Father.

"And he also presents," she adds.  "As a very very *disappointed* 
father.  Doesn't he.  Disappointed.  Reproving.  Injured.  Betrayed 
by his own children.  He is a father who tells his erring son 
Avery 'I do not forgive' and punishes him harshly for his 
transgressions, yet in the end spares him, declaring his expectation 
of receiving repayment for his clemency.  Of receiving repayment on a 
*debt.*  Repayment in the form of thirteen years of *service.*"

"I--" Eileen begins.

"Why did Crouch place his son under the Imperius Curse when he 
realized that he was still devoted to Voldemort's cause?" demands 
Elkins.  "Why did he keep him around even after Bertha Jorkins not 
only discovered him, but also overheard him saying something so 
damning that when Voldemort hears of it, he will return to England in 
full confidence that he can rely on Crouch Jr's devoted service?  Why 
is he so determined to keep him safe from harm?  Why does he remain 
so determined even after the QWC, when it becomes clear that his son 
is strong, powerful, dangerous, mad, and still unrepentent?"

"Because--"

"Not because he loved his wife," answers Elkins harshly.  "Not 
because he loved his son.  Not because he was merciful.  And 
certainly not because he was *squeamish.*  But because his son *was* 
still unrepentent.  That's why.  Because if Barty Jr. had died with 
his loyalty and his allegiance still intact, with his *Otherness* 
still intact, then Barty Jr. would have *won.*  And Crouch wasn't 
willing to allow that.  He wasn't going to let his son win.  He 
wasn't going to allow him to be Other.  Not even in death.  Crouch 
wanted that boy to reflect him in more ways than just carrying his 
name.  Crouch wasn't even willing to cede his son to human volition; 
you think that he was going to cede him to *death?*" 

Elkins clasps her hands over each other, trying to stop their now
quite violent shaking.  She takes a deep breath.

"Voldemort presents as a father figure in the graveyard." she says 
again, very softly.  "And he is strongly textually linked to Crouch 
Sr.  Do you want to know why I think that Crouch Sr. was so terribly 
invested in keeping his son alive?  Do you?  Do you really?  I think 
that it was because obedience was a virtue that Mr. Crouch wanted to 
teach his son.  It was a virtue that he wanted to teach him before he 
died."

There is a very long silence.

"You know, Elkins," Eileen says softly, at length.  "The text really
doesn't invite us to equate Voldemort with Crouch Sr. nearly as 
strongly as it does to equate him with Crouch Jr.  It is Crouch Jr. 
who *literally* serves Voldemort.  It is Crouch Jr. who is 
*explicitly* compared with him, and not just by the narrative voice, 
either.  Even by the character himself.  The text may nudge us to 
equate Voldemort with Crouch Sr.  But it outright begs us to equate 
him with Crouch's son."  

"Oh, it most certainly does!" agrees Elkins.  "That connection is
made *quite* explicit in the text.  So what do we make of that?
What does that tell us about the relationship between Crouch and 
his son?  What does it signify that Crouch and his son share the same 
name?  That over the course of the novel, their identities are 
confused, reversed, conflated?  What do we make of the difference 
between Crouch Jr's conscious identification with Voldemort and
Crouch Sr's unconscious one?  Between Crouch Jr's explicit allegiance 
and service, and Crouch Sr's implicit allegiance and service?  
Conscious and unconscious.  Explicit and implicit.  Open and hidden.  
What are we to make of that?  What is the traditional relationship 
between hypocrite fathers and their rebellious sons?"

She looks from Cindy to Eileen, then back again.

"What do you think that Crouch Sr. really wanted?" she asks.  "In his 
heart of hearts.  What did he want more than anything else in the 
world?"  

"For his wife to be alive, his son dutiful, and his family not in 
disgrace," answers Eileen promptly.  "And also probably to be going 
out with the Fudges."

Elkins blinks.

"Oh," she says.  "Er...right.  Well, yes.  Okay.  Actually, I guess
you're probably right about that.  Okay, allow me to rephrase.  What 
was something that he wanted very badly?"

There is silence.

"Badly enough to have a bit of a 'mania' about it?" prompts Elkins.

"Well," says Cindy slowly.  "According to Sirius, he wanted to catch 
just one last Dark Wizard..."

"Right.  To regain his lost *popularity.*  But you have to have 
Dark Wizards *around* before you can start catching them, don't you?  
Crouch was a war-time politician.  His wagon was hitched to 
Voldemort's star.  When Voldemort fell, so did he.  So what do you 
think that he might have secretly desired?  What was his hidden 
wish?  What did Crouch Sr. want that was so dreadful, so utterly 
unacceptable, that he would never have been able to admit to it?  Not 
even to himself?

"Why did Crouch become so apoplectic at his son's sentencing?" demands
Elkins.  "Why did he react that way?  What was he really *seeing,* do 
you think, when he looked down at his son in the dock?  At his son, 
who shared his name?  At his son, who stood accused of *trying to 
restore Voldemort to power?*"

"And of planning to resume the life of violence that he had led 
before Voldemort's fall," murmers Cindy.

Eileen stares up at Elkins.  "Parallel scenes," she whispers.  "You 
insisted on claiming that Crouch was seeing himself in Winky when he 
denounced her.  Because you see him as a narcissist.  As somebody 
who sees himself in others."

Elkins nods slowly.

"You see him," says Eileen.  "As someone who stares at his own 
*reflection.*  The mirror reverses..."

"The mirror reverses," agrees Elkins quietly.  

"But that which the mirror reverses, it also always reflects."


******************

Elkins

**********************************************************************

REFERENCES

This post is continued from part five.  It is primarily a response
to messages #45402 (Crouch Sr as Tragic Hero), #45693 (Crouch and 
Winky) and #46923 (It's All Winky's Fault), but it also cites or 
references message numbers 37476, 38380, 39102, 43010, 44258.


For further explanation of the acronyms and theories in this post, 
visit Hypothetic Alley at
http://www.i2k.com/~svderark/lexicon/faq/ 
and Inish Alley at
http://groups.yahoo.com/group/HPforGrownups/database?
method=reportRows&tbl=13