Avery and Ambushes

[ssk7882]

No: HPFGUIDX 35187

Yay!  Droves flock to the Fourth Man banner!

Well, er...two do, at any rate.  Can two people be called a "drove?"  

---

Eileen wrote:

> Elkins, I think you've hit gold here. Now, if you could tell me 
> who the third murderer is in Macbeth.... :-) 

Mmmmmm...the third murderer in Macbeth.  Let's see...

Nope, can't help you there.  But I *can* offer some very compelling
evidence to prove that it was actually Caroline Shepherd who murdered 
Roger Ackroyd.  Will that do?

> I must admit that I brushed over the fourth man the first seven 
> times I read the book... 

LOL!  What, you mean there was somebody who *didn't* view the Mystery 
of the Fourth Man as the central enigma of the entire novel?

> It is very strange that the fourth man is given no attention by 
> anyone, including Voldemort when he praises the Lestranges and 
> Crouch Jr. 

Yes!  It's bothered me for...well, for over a *year* now, that has.  
It was keeping me awake at night.  I would toss and I would turn...

> I'll also note that the description of the fourth man "thinner and 
> more nervous-looking", eyes "darting around the room" fit perfectly 
> with the nervous wreck we meet in the graveyard.

I favor Thin Nervous Eye-Darty Man as Avery myself.  But the Fourth 
Man theory is also willing to accomodate those who favor Thin Nervous 
Eye-Darty Man as Lestrange, and Thick-set Blank-Stare Man as (an 
already bordering on catatonic? or merely in a state of despair?) 
Avery.

Fourth Man is very inclusive that way.

> Now, the fourth man gets up "quietly"... It's probably Barty Crouch 
> Jr. who leaves our bleeding hearts thinking, and I can't say I 
> blame them. 

Yeah, it really was a good thing for Avery that little Barty carried 
on like that, wasn't it?  

> Even I sometimes wonder how far Crouch Jr. was in the business, 
> though we know he's not as innocent as he made out to be. 

Hey, young Crouch *could* have been innocent -- of torturing the 
Longbottoms, at any rate.  No way to know for sure, is there?  He 
sure seems like a sadist in GoF, but I imagine that ten years spent 
under the Imperius Curse could do a lot of funny things to your mind.

Fourth Man takes no strong stand on the issue of young Crouch's 
complicity in the Longbottom Affair.  

> Crouch Sr. must have been sick at heart when the bleeding hearts 
> reopened Crouch's and Avery's cases. Perhaps, if Crouch Jr. was 
> still around to be released, they wouldn't have released Avery? 
> Instead, Avery walks free and it's Crouch son who's locked up in 
> the kitchen. Must have made him furious. 

And just imagine how Crouch Jr. himself must have felt about it!  You
know how very *cranky* he could get on the subject of DEs walking 
free. 

Sort of makes you wonder what kind of things he might have told 
Voldemort about Avery, doesn't it?

> As mentioned before, the convincing part of all this is that Avery 
> really does act as if he needs forgiveness for something big. And 
> Voldemort, even if he doesn't give it, gives a semblance of it. 

Yes.  The Dark Lord was really very generous there, all things 
considered, don't you think?

Honestly, Avery *ought* to have thanked him.  Had he been a genuine 
Toady, rather than merely a Nerveless Hysteric, he would have...

<Elkins blinks down at the S.Y.C.O.P.H.A.N.T.S badge which seems to 
have made its way out of her pocket and onto her bathrobe somehow, 
shakes her head crossly, and puts it away>

> Finally, an answer for those who ask, "But how can Snape get back 
> into the DE circle?" If Avery can, Snape can too, though I'm sure 
> Voldemort has similar plans re: Cruciatus. 

I think that if that's what Snape's gotta do, then he'll manage just 
fine.  He's got tons of great excuses he can draw on, and unlike 
Avery, he isn't a Nerveless Hysteric.  It woudn't surprise me, in 
fact, if he managed to pull it off without having to endure even a 
single Cruciatus -- although unlike Cindy, I find this notion more 
relieving than disappointing.

> But, having picked up GOF and looked up the scenes, I am feeling 
> VERY surprised, and somewhat elated. Something new, and something 
> real. LOLLIPOPS I fervently believe in, but it's somewhere in the 
> past in the murky realms of motivation, this is right there under 
> our eyes. 

Aw, gee whiz, Eileen.  You're making me blush here.  But you also 
bring up one *very* strong objection to Fourth Man, so let's see if 
we can manage to resolve it.  

---

Here is the great big threatening cannon that, as Eileen points out, 
is indeed aimed straight at Fourth Man's poor palpitating little 
heart:

> "Avery-Nott-Crabbe-Goyle-"

> "You are merely repeating the names of those who were cleared of 
> being Death Eaters thirteen years ago," said Fudge angrily. "You 
> could have found those names in old reports of the trials!" 

<Elkins nods grimly>

Eeeeee-yup.  That's canon, all right.  And since I can think of no 
reason why Fudge would be lying there, we've just got to accept it.  

Okay.  So Avery *did* stand trial shortly after the Fall of Voldemort 
(presumably in late autumn or winter of 1981/1982), and he was 
cleared of the charges against him.

*This,* then, was presumably when Avery used the Imperius Defense to 
which Sirius refers in "Padfoot Returns."  It does seem to have been 
an especially popular defense in the days directly following 
Voldemort's disappearance -- presumably because at least a couple of 
people really truly *had* been kept under Imperius, only to break 
free once Voldemort was discorporated.

"People who was on his side came back ter ours.  Some of 'em came 
outta kinda trances.  Don' reckon they could've done if he was comin' 
back."
-- Hagrid, in PS.

I somehow suspect, though, that three or four years after Voldemort's 
fall, Imperius was no longer seeming like a very convincing defense.  
So let us say then that Avery's Imperius Defense was how he squirmed 
out trouble the *first* time around, back in 1981/1982.

This is all still perfectly consistent with Fourth Man.  Sirius says 
that Crouch's son was "caught with a group of Death Eaters who'd 
managed to talk their way out of Azkaban."  Avery, tried but 
aquitted, would certainly qualify.

The problem, of course, is this:

> So, Avery was acquitted thirteen years ago, as Fudge tells Harry. 
> But then, he gets "caught up" in the Longbottom fiasco, and it's 
> off to Azkaban. Later, the bleeding hearts get him out. So, why 
> tell Harry he was acquitted thirteen years ago, when he was more 
> notoriously acquitted at the most eleven years ago, probably 
> shorter? 

Oooooh, a touch!  A touch, a touch, I do confess!  Can Fourth Man be 
saved?

Hmmmm.  Well first, let's see if we can establish a time-line here.  
Dumbledore says that the attacks on the Longbottoms came "just when 
everyone thought they were safe." Given that the Ministry took some 
time to round up the last of the DEs -- that went on for about a 
year, I'm thinking -- and given how obviously traumatized the entire 
society was by Voldemort's reign of terror, and given that it must 
have taken some time for everyone (fireworks and parties on the night 
of his disappearance notwithstanding) to really and truly and 
*honestly* believe that he was Gone For Good, "just when everyone 
thought they were safe" could mean as late as 1983.

(Yeah, I *know* that most people date the Longbottom Fiasco much 
earlier than that, but I like it better my way.  Admittedly, this is 
largely because I'm also partial to Neville-With-A-Memory-Charm, 
which works much better IMO if Neville was well past the babe-in-arms 
stage by the time of the incident...but even aside from all that, I 
still think that a later date for the Longbottom Fiasco makes more 
sense.)

So let's say, oh, late 1982 or early 1983 for the Longbottom Incident 
and Avery's second arrest and trial, which would make the death of 
Crouch's wife and the supposed death of his son the winter of 
1983/1984.  Winter's good, because (a) sickly people tend to die in 
the wintertime, and (b) the weather in the Potterverse is often 
driven on the principle of pathetic fallacy, and so there really 
*ought* to have been a cold hard driving rain when Sirius watched the 
dementors burying Crouch through the bars of his cell.

Okay.  So 1984 would be the year that Crouch's popularity goes into 
sharp decline.  There's a Bleeding Heart backlash, Crouch gets 
shunted off into IMC, Fudge rides the wave to become Minister of 
Magic, and Crouch's successor comes into office at MLE and starts 
looking into old cases.  Avery stands retrial in 1984, or possibly 
early in '85.

The *second* time around, I don't think that he would have gone for 
Imperius again.  He'd already used that excuse once, and it would 
seem awfully fishy for him to claim to have been under the Imperius 
Curse *twice.*  (Once is merely unlucky.  Twice is...careless.)  And 
besides, the times had changed: by the time of his pardon, it would 
have been the mid-'80s.  The Imperius Defense was probably 'way out 
of vogue by then.

So a slight modification to the Fourth Man theory here.  Avery doesn't
claim Imperius at all at his retrial.  He claims pure and simple 
innocence.  He wasn't there, he didn't do it, he knew nothing about 
it, he was nowhere *near* the Longbottoms that night, and the only 
reason that he was arrested in the first place was because he 
happened to be over at the Lestranges' playing a rousing hand of 
Exploding Snap with them and young Crouch on the night that the 
Aurors came a'knocking on their door.  It was guilt by association, 
pure and simple.  Of course he had no *idea* that the Lestranges 
were involved in any of *that* sort of thing.  If he had, then he 
would hardly have been hanging out in their kitchen playing cards 
with them, would he?  I mean, not after what Voldemort had *done* to 
him, back in the late '70s and early '80s?  Not after the Imperius 
Curse and all?

And since there was probably never any real hard evidence against any 
of them anyway, and since unlike Mrs. Lestrange he had never once 
confessed his guilt, and since he cut a truly pathetic figure in the 
dock, and since public sentiment had turned against Crouch, and since 
everyone was feeling sorta guilty over young Barty Crouch's death, 
Avery got his pardon and walked away free.

Okay.  So why would Fudge have brought up the thirteen-year-old 
acquittal, rather than the ten-year-old pardon, when Harry mentioned 
Avery's name?  That does seem a little strange doesn't it?

<Elkins pauses, bites her lip, shifts in her chair, and then suddenly 
sits bolt upright, smiling triumphantly -- if also just a touch madly>

NO!  It does NOT!  

Because what you have to understand about Fudge is that he was swept 
into office on precisely the same wave of public sentiment that led 
to Avery's pardon -- a Bleeding Heart backlash that _did not last._

The backlash was very short-lived -- which is the reason that we see 
no Bleeding Hearts in canon.  Avery's pardon represented the break of 
that particular wave; no sooner had he walked free than the backlash 
receded quickly, leaving people feeling decidedly...ambivalent about 
the entire affair.  No other cases were in fact reexamined; the 
Avery/Crouch/Lestrange case was the only one that ever made it to 
retrial.

(And this is yet *another* reason that Sirius Black's case was never 
reexamined.  Not only did it lack the pathos of young Barty Jr.'s 
trial [thus not appealing quite so much to the Bleeding Hearts], and 
not only did Albus Dumbledore show no sign of support for the notion 
that Black might be innocent, and not only is Sirius far too *Tough* 
to be willing to take the advice of his legal counsel and try begging 
off on Imperius at retrial, but also even if Black's case was ever on 
someone's agenda, it was far enough down near the bottom of the list 
that by the time it would have been reopened, public enthusiasm for 
the entire idea of reexamining Crouch's old cases had vanished away 
entirely.)

So as things turned out, Avery's pardon did not prove to be at all 
the great political coup that Crouch's successor had hoped for.  Far 
from it: it was a bit of an embarrassment for everyone, and 
particularly for those politicians who had pushed most avidly for it -
- people like Crouch's successor...and Fudge himself.  

Fortunately for them, the cultural insistence on Not Talking Or Even 
Thinking About Those Dark Days Or Anything Related To Them that we 
see in effect in the HP books was now coming to dominate the 
wizarding zeitgeist.  Nobody now wanted to think about any of that 
stuff at *all,* which made it a simple enough matter for politicians 
who might otherwise have been embarrassed by the affair to simply 
sweep it under the carpet where (to their minds) it rightfully
belonged.

So *this* is the reason that Fudge mentions Avery's original
acquittal but not his more recent (and more notorious) pardon.  To 
mention the latter would touch far too closely on the subject of his 
own rather dubious claims to the position as Minister of Magic, as 
well as reminding everyone present of one of his own failed attempts 
to manipulate public sentiment for political advantage -- and that's 
a can of worms he most decidedly does *not* want opened right now. 
Not with these allegations of Voldemort's return and all.  His 
position could be getting unstable enough as it is in the very near 
future, without dragging in all of *that* old business.

Okay.  So, uh, where's the canon?

<thinks>

"Padfoot Returns."  The canonical suggestion for all of this is 
in "Padfoot Returns," when Sirius first says of younger Crouch that 
he was "caught with a group of Death Eaters who'd managed to talk 
their way out of Azkaban," and *then* that he "was definitely caught 
in the company of people I'd bet my life were Death Eaters -- but he 
might have been in the wrong place at the wrong time."

Well, that's an interesting ambiguity, isn't it?  First he says that 
the people Crouch was caught with *were* Death Eaters, next only that 
they were people he would "bet his life" were Death Eaters.  Well, 
come on, Sirius.  Which is it?

The deep ambivalence that Sirius reveals there is perfectly
consistent with a scenario in which the people he's referring to 
include both those he is *certain* are guilty (Lestranges), and those 
about whose guilt he is undecided (Avery).  This undecidedness is 
consistent with the overall cultural attitude toward the Avery 
Affair -- Sirius, you will remember, has come by the majority of his 
information on this subject *after* his escape from Azkaban ("This is 
mostly stuff I've found out since I got out"); it was evidently not 
an incident that was much gibbered about by the imprisoned DEs.  And 
Sirius' suggestion that Crouch might just "have been in the wrong 
place at the wrong time" is telling as well -- wherever would he have 
come by this idea?  Why, from Avery's own defense, of course!

<pantpantpant>

There.  Does that work?  If anyone has a better suggestion, I'd love 
to hear it.

---

Now, on to the question of whether Avery (who, as we all know, is by 
far the MOST important character in all of canon!) was ever a 
Ministry official, or if he was, whether he still is now.

Cindy wants Avery to have been the head of the Department of Magical
Catastrophies (even at the tender age of twenty-one), so that she can
have him responsible for tampering with evidence in the Sirius Black
case and for recovering Voldemort's wand from the rubble at Godric's
Hollow.  She also wants him to have been given this position back 
after his release from Azkaban and sees no problem with the notion
that Sirius would have failed to mention this, or that he would 
continue to perceive Avery as no particular threat to Harry, or that 
he would list his name last when he rattles off the names of Snape's 
old classmates.  She writes:

> Ah, but look at who else Sirius mentions.  He mentions Rosier 
> (dangerous and crazy enough to take on Moody)...

And dead.

> ...Wilkes (dangerous and crazy enough to take on Voldemort)...

And dead.

> ...and the Lestranges (just plain dangerous and crazy).  

And in Azkaban.

> Wouldn't you mention Avery last out of that group, even if he were 
> responsible for a department that has responsibilities for little 
> things like deflating Aunt Marge?

Er...no.  I wouldn't.  Not unless there were some reason for 
believing him to be really *really* non-threatening, which I hardly 
think that I would have if he had managed to become the head of a 
Ministry Department.

Nor, if he were the head of a Ministry Department, would I refer to 
him merely as 'still at large.'  Being the head of a Ministry 
Department isn't being 'at large,' it's being 'in *power.*'

And besides, the DMC isn't a lame department at all.  Working for the 
DMC must involve a good deal of interaction with many different 
departments, as well as with the Muggle authorities: it's not all 
Aunt-deflating and street-sweeping, you know.  Remember, it was 
Fudge's department, right before he made Minister of Magic.  (Now you 
in the back there, *stop* that snickering.  Yes, Fudge is lame.  But 
he's also the Minister of Magic, so he must have *something* on the 
ball.)  If someone like Fudge can vault himself straight from DMC to 
Buck Stops Here, then I really doubt that the DMC has at all the Lame 
Duck reputation that you suggest.  

But since you've been so nice about swallowing down my Fourth Man 
theory, I'll tell you what I'm gonna do for you here: I'll give you 
Avery in the DMC.  Okay?  Avery *was* in the DMC.  He wasn't the 
Department *Head,* mind, but he was a junior minister in the 
department, just like Fudge.  He was the chief investigator assigned 
to the muggle-blasting site, where he confiscated Sirius Black's wand 
(so that it couldn't be Priori Incantatem'd) and tampered with a bit 
of the evidence to make Sirius' guilt seem all that much more 
incontrovertible.

He was particularly motivated to do this, you see, because Sirius had 
once played a rather nasty prank on him back in their school days, 
and...

Well, okay.  So that part's optional.  You don't have to accept that 
part, if you don't want to.  

There, Cindy.  You can have Avery-Helped-To-Snooker-Sirius-Black.  
But I'm not willing to give you Avery-Retrieved-Voldemort's-Wand-From-
Godric's-Hollow as well, because that would run completely counter to 
the entire "Avery has avoided the other DEs like the plague ever 
since his release from Azkaban" aspect of the Fourth Man theory, 
which is central.  

Pettigrew can have Voldemort's wand all to himself. <snerk>

---

So what did Avery do after his release from prison?  He certainly 
didn't go looking for Voldemort (his failure to do so is absolutely 
essential to the Fourth Man theory).  I suggested that he moved into 
his mother's basement and took up coin collecting.  But Cindy 
insisted:

> His mother's basement?  No, probably not.  I think Avery gets out 
> of Azkaban, and Fudge has been promoted to Minister of Magic....So 
> Avery asks for his old job back.  Fudge knows and likes Avery, and 
> Fudge (being prone to denying the obvious) never really believed 
> Avery was guilty.  Who knows?  Maybe Fudge pardoned Avery 
> singlehandedly.  The DMC is now very short of people who know how 
> to puncture Aunts, so Fudge gives Avery his old job, with back pay 
> to compensate for Avery's wrongful imprisonment.  

Mmmmmm.  Yeah, okay.  I'm willing to run with this, if only because 
it offers yet *more* reason for Fudge to have wanted to avoid the 
issue of Avery's second acquittal altogether.  Probably even Fudge 
has come to suspect, way down deep in his very heart of hearts, that 
Avery really was guilty all along.

But I still can't buy Avery as Department Head.  The Fourth Man 
theory is far too dependent on the notion that Avery Has Had Enough, 
and Had-Enough Avery wouldn't seek a position of such prestige or 
power.  Too dangerous.

No, if Avery's in DMC, then he's still a lowly (but NOT yet middle-
aged!) desk drone, mistrusted and ill-respected by his co-workers, 
who occasionally gather around the water cooler to mutter darkly 
among themselves while shooting him suspicious glances.  (He takes 
far too many sick days, too, and occasionally goes on extended 
personal leaves of absence for "reasons of emotional health.")

> Avery does, however, resist all contact from Death Eaters like 
> Lucius who would like to go on a Voldemort hunt.  

You think Lucius ever wanted to go on a Voldemort hunt?  I doubt it.

But yes.  Avery resists all contact from former DE colleagues.  In 
fact, he may well have children.  If he does, then the reason we've 
never heard of them is that he sent them off to Beauxbatons or 
someplace.  He wouldn't want them at Hogwarts, where they would be 
exposed not only to all of the other DEs' children, but also to the 
potentially corrupting influence of his old friend, Severus Snape -- 
a bad influence if Avery'd ever known one.

But speaking of Snape, Eileen points out a problem with my 
speculations:

> Now, Elkins suggests we'll meet Avery again and not know who he is. 
> I don't see how we can work this, especially if Avery is in the 
> Ministry, as Cindy insists. 

Well, if he's just a lowly drone these days, then that's not a 
problem.  Snape, though...Snape's a big problem.  Avery can't very 
well go skulking about Hogwarts Up To No Good with his old buddy 
Severus lurking around.  Snape would recognize him, and more to the 
point (since Snape could be up to his old tricks in Book Five) so 
would a bunch of the other adult characters: McGonagall, Hagrid, 
Dumbledore, Flitwick...  

Yeah, okay.  So if any bit of plot does revolve around Unrecognized 
DE Avery, I guess it'll have to be a fairly minor one, and take place 
outside of Hogwarts.

<sigh>

Boy.  Good thing I didn't put any money down on that one.  Isn't it.

---

And finally, on the question of how Evil Avery Really Is, Eileen 
wrote:

> ....it won't be some yet unknown virtuous Slytherin (a relative of 
> Avery, or is Avery really evil now?). 

Well, now, that all depends on which flavor of Fourth Man you prefer.

In "No-frills Fourth Man," Avery sure would seem to be pretty darned
Evil, if also very Weak.  But you could also choose "Fourth Man With 
Remorse," in which Avery truly regrets his past wrongdoings and has 
been leading a virtuous and muggle-embracing lifestyle for the past 
decade in his attempt to atone for all of his sins.  Or, you could go 
for "Fourth Man With SHIP," in which Avery never really was all 
*that* Evil, and only became a DE in the first place due to his 
hopeless desire to impress the future Mrs. Lestrange.  Or you can 
favor "Fourth Man With Imperius," in which Avery proves either too 
squeamish or too genuinely Good to be a very successful DE, and so 
really *was* put under the Imperius Curse by fellow DEs to guide him 
safely through his unwisely-chosen lifestyle.  ("Fourth Man With 
Imperius" also has the added advantage of explaining why poor Avery 
seems so highly suggestible: it's all that Imperius, you see, it 
messed with his mind and left him highly vulnerable to outside 
influence...)

Or I suppose that if you really want him to be innocent, you could 
even go for "Fourth Man With Innocence," in which Avery really *did* 
have nothing to do with the attack on the Longbottoms, but was merely 
in the wrong place at the wrong time when the Aurors broke down the 
door.  

And, of course, there are combinations.  Fourth Man With SHIP, 
Imperius, *and* Remorse is certainly a possibility, and one likely to 
appeal to those who really want to lay a great heaping load o' pathos 
on poor Avery's trembling head.  Fourth Man with SHIP and Imperius, 
on the other hand, is more for those with a taste for perversion, and 
Fourth Man With Innocence and Remorse for those who prefer righteous 
angst to venal whining.

So really, Avery can be just about as Evil or as Redeemable as you 
like him under the Fourth Man Theory.  One thing that he cannot be, 
however, is *Tough.*  

Which brings us to Ambushes...

---

Cindy (who is sold on the Fourth Man Theory, but feels confident that 
these S.Y.C.O.P.H.A.N.T.S. members eat their ice cream straight from 
the carton while lying in bed) wrote:

> This is a dream come true!  People are buying the ambush idea in 
> droves (how many people does it take to make a drove, anyway?)!  

TWO!!!!  It takes TWO people to make a drove!

> We're now to the point of talking about ambushes like . . . like 
> there's actually some canon to support them or something! 

<small exasperated noise>  

But of course there is!  There's *plenty* of canonical suggestion to 
support the idea of an ambush.  We have Severus Snape spying for 
Dumbledore; we have Rosier, who "preferred to fight rather than come 
quietly" and took a piece of Moody with him; we have Dolohov -- 
*clearly* a member of Karkaroff's "cell" -- apprehended at the same 
time as Rosier's death...can there really be any *doubt* that we're 
talking ambush here?

O ye of little faith.

> Are we all agreed that Snape arranged the ambush(es) to prove 
> his loyalty to Dumbledore?  Please?  Pretty please?

Nope.  Sorry, can't climb on that wagon.  For one thing, the entire
idea of Albus Dumbledore demanding a blood sacrifice as a proof of
loyalty is utterly sickening.  For another thing, it doesn't even 
make any *sense.*  I mean, surely Big Bad Evil Voldemort would be
perfectly willing to sacrifice a couple of his younger Death Eaters 
to help his valuable spy trick muggle-loving old fool Dumbledore, 
wouldn't he?  (Hell, even *I'd* be willing to do that, and I'm just a 
SYCOPHANT, not an Evil Overlord.)  And surely Dumbledore would 
realize that.  So Snape's willingness to lead his colleagues into an 
ambush wouldn't even be a very *good* proof of his loyalty.

No, I think that Dumbledore was convinced of Snape's sincerity when 
Fawkes hopped into Snape's lap to *snuggle* with him.

Snape snarled and batted at the wretched creature, of course, but by 
that time it was too late: Dumbledore was onto him.

But, yeah.  I *do* think that Snape's information was what tipped off
the Aurors, thus allowing them to set up the ambush(es).  Is that
good enough?

> Well, now that we know for a fact that there absolutely, definitely 
> was an ambush, regardless of what JKR has to say about the matter...

Absolutely!  

<bounces up and down excitedly in chair>

Ambushambushambush!!


>...we have to pin down how it happened.  Here's what we know:

> 1.  Karkaroff.  In the Pensieve, Karkaroff has already been 
> convicted.  Moody apparently took 6 months to track Karkaroff down. 

Yet by the time Karkaroff is testifying before the hearing, Voldemort
has _already fallen._  This gets important later on.

> 2.  Dolohov.  Captured "shortly after" Karkaroff, but Karkaroff 
> doesn't know this.  Karkaroff definitely knew Dolohov, as he saw 
> him torture people.

And helped him to do it.  Or was that just vile slander, O Brave 
Defender of Poor Igor?

> 3.  Rosier.  Caught "shortly after" Karkaroff also.  Dead, but took 
> a piece of Moody with him.  Karkaroff knew him, too.

We also know that both Rosier and Wilkes were "killed by Aurors the 
year before Voldemort fell."  Sirius says so.

What this means is that Karkaroff and Dolohov were both also 
apprehended "the year before Voldemort fell."  By the time of the 
Pensieve hearing, then, Karkaroff has already been in prison for some 
months -- perhaps even for a full year.

(There now, Cindy, you see?  There's another point in poor Igor's 
favor.  He *did* spend a good long time with the dementors before he 
cracked and offered to start naming names.)

(Yes.  You're welcome.)

> 4.  Travers and Mulciber.  Fingered by Karkaroff, but already 
> apprehended.

We don't know when, though, nor even whether it happened before or 
after Voldemort's fall.  They were still at large when Karkaroff 
himself was caught, but that could have been up to a year ago.

> 5.  Wilkes.  Karkaroff doesn't finger Wilkes, but Wilkes is dead, 
> having expired the year before Voldemort fell.

Not just dead.  Not just expired.  Killed by Aurors.  Sirius says 
that Wilkes was "killed by Aurors."  He might have been killed before
Karkaroff's arrest, or he might not have been.

> Karkaroff is desperately casting about for names, and we have to 
> presume he names every single Death Eater he can think of.  

I agree.  So in Karkaroff's cell, we have Dolohov, Rosier, Travers,
Mulciber, and Snape.  Wilkes *may* have been there as well: Karkaroff
could have neglected to mention him because he already knew of Wilkes'
death.  And then there's Rookwood.  I don't believe that Rookwood was
really a member of the cell proper.  But more on that below.

Karkaroff didn't know Avery, the Lestranges, or Crouch Jr.  If he had,
he would have fingered them.  Agreed.

> This, uh, destroys Elkins' half-hearted "Karkaroff Was Mrs.
> Lestranges' Little Pet Igor" theory, thank goodness.  

No, no, no, Cindy!  You're confused.  It's *Avery* who might have been
the Dead Sexy Mrs. Lestrange's Little Pet.  That's the operating
premise of "Fourth Man With SHIP and Imperius," a fine and upstanding 
(if also rather perverted) variant on Fourth MAn that has nothing in 
the least bit half-hearted about it!

> So I'm thinking that in the Pensieve scene, Karkaroff knows nothing 
> about the ambush at all, which is why he keeps naming people who 
> are captured or dead.  That leads me to believe that the people he 
> names were the victims of the ambush.

Absolutely.  Karkaroff was caught by Moody before the ambush 
happened.  

It would seem to not have been all *that* bloody of an ambush, alas, 
but you can't have everything...

> Wilkes?  Who knows?  I guess he wasn't in the ambush.  Maybe 
> Voldemort killed him. :-)

Aurors, dammit.  Wilkes was killed by Aurors.  Sirius says so.

Of course, Sirius never says that Wilkes was a 'he' at all.  Perhaps 
Wilkes was actually *Florence* Wilkes, Snape's lost love, whom he 
used to snog romantically behind the greenhouses back in their 
Hogwarts days...until they were caught out and humiliated by that 
meddling little Nosy Parker Bertha Jorkins, that is.  No wonder he 
hexed her!

Alas, Love Of Wilkes Left Anguish, Polluting Our Poor Severus, which 
is the reason that he's always so damned cranky, and the reason that 
he joined the DEs in the first place, and the reason that he picks on 
poor little Neville Longbottom (Frank was the one who killed 
Florence, you see), and the reason that he was willing to defect to 
Dumbledore's cause (for with Florence gone, why would he remain in 
their midst?), and the reason that he will never, EVER be able to 
love again...

<Elkins grins and tosses a seashell lazily -- if with no real malice -
- out to sea in the general direction of the Good Ship 
L.O.L.L.I.P.O.P.S.>


> I know what you're thinking.  Karkaroff also names Rookwood, who we 
> know was still at large.  Ah, but Rookwood is the head of the 
> Department of Mysteries, making him, well, mysterious.  Why wasn't 
> Rookwood at the ambush?  It's because Rookwood had intelligence 
> that the ambush was going down.

<blink>

Rookwood wasn't actually the *head* of the Department of Mysteries, 
surely.  Is that really stated anywhere?  I thought he was just a 
member of the department.

But at any rate, I refuse to believe that Rookwood was a member of 
Karkaroff's little gang of thugs.  He filled some sort of 
intelligence function for the organization as a whole, I think, and 
the fact that Karkaroff actually knew his identity was probably an 
accident.  Karkaroff knows that Rookwood's the best he has to offer, 
which is why he saves his name for last...er, except for Snape's, 
that is.  He didn't name Snape until the very end because he, um... 
<clears throat> liked the guy.

So that's why Rookwood wasn't caught in the ambush, IMO.  Not because
he caught wind of it ahead of time, but simply because he was far too
important to be out and about torturing muggles with Karkaroff and his
little death squad.  Rookwood was intelligence.  He had Big Important 
Taking Over the Wizarding World stuff that he was working on;
Voldemort didn't want him wasting his time on *frivolities.*

> To recap, then, we have Death Eater Cell 1 with Rookwood, 
> Karkaroff, Wilkes, Travers, Dolohov, Snape, Mulciber.  

I hold out against Rookwood.  And I'm not entirely sure about Mulciber
either, come to think of it -- does the Imperius Specialist really 
travel around with a Thug Squad?  Or is he more of a specialist who 
gets called in for special occasions?  Could be the latter, and 
Karkaroff could have just known his name.

> Tell ya what I'm gonna do.  We can have A Great Ambush with 
> Dolohov, Rosier, Travers, Mulciber.  It's two Aurors against four 
> Death Eaters.  

<Elkins opens her eyes wide, breathless with anticipation>

> Rosier is a loose cannon who has always been a great shot and a 
> little too impressed with his own dueling abilities.  

A loose canon?  Who woulda thought it?

> Rosier sees Moody and immediately knows he has been set up.  Moody 
> starts to shout out something like "Keep your wand where I can see 
> it, and let's talk about this, because we wouldn't want anyone to 
> get . . . "  Rosier pulls out his wand and tries to blast Moody,
> but misses wide right and grazes a chunk from Moody's nose.  Moody, 
> (being Tough so that one little wand blast will never bring him 
> down) shows no mercy and blasts Rosier point blank, right between 
> the eyes, just like Elkins so desperately wants.  

<Elkins, beside herself with excitement, jumps up and down in her 
seat, shrieking happily>

YAY!!!!!!!!!!!  Bloody ambush!  Bloody ambush!  Bloody ambush!

> Then Travers, Mulciber and Dolohov put up a fierce struggle against 
> Frank Longbottom, who eventually subdues all three in a glorious 
> firefight.  

YAY!!!!!!!!!!  Glorious firefight!  Glorious firefight!  Glorious 
firefi--

<Elkins stops abruptly.  Her expression of bloodthirsty satisfaction 
slowly dissolves into one of stark horror>

Oh, good Lord.  When precisely did I *get* like this?  

Cindy?  Are you *sure* there was nothing in that brandy?

> (Moody helps a little, but Frank does the heavy lifting).  Moody, 
> being a fabulous guy and also rather thankful that Frank saved 
> Moody's life in the firefight...

Well, that creates some sort of a mystic bond between wizards, right?

> ...tells everyone how fabulous Frank is and gives him all the 
> credit in the Daily Prophet, making Frank very popular.  (This 
> makes the scenes between Fake Moody and Neville all the more 
> chilling because Real Moody has told Crouch Jr. all about this, and 
> Fake Moody uses it to get close to Neville.)  

Hmmmmm....  Neville...  Fake Moody... Longbottom Incident...  Mystic 
bonds between wizards...

Hey, wait!  Didn't Eileen want us to thow a memory charm theory in 
here somewhere?

Well, this isn't quite a Memory Charm Theory, but it's on a related 
topic, so here goes.

How's this?  Crouch didn't really *need* this story to get close to
Neville.  You see, Neville is _instinctively drawn_ to Fake Moody
anyway, due to the mystic bond formed when one wizard saves another's 
life, because back when Neville was but a wee toddler, young Barty 
Crouch took pity on him and *hid* him from Avery and the Lestranges 
when they were targetting Frank's family.

Neville can't really remember this, of course, because of the whole 
Memory Charm thing, but the bond is still there: he responds to it as 
a matter of instinct.  It's the reason that he's willing to speak up 
in class even when the subject matter is the dread Cruciatus Curse; 
it's the reason that he's willing to venture into Scary Fake Moody's 
office to have tea with him; and it's the reason that Fake Moody's 
herbology praise is so very effective in giving him that nice boost 
of self-esteem.

And as for Crouch himself: that explanation that he gives Harry of 
why he took Neville under his wing is not entirely accurate.  It 
wasn't until he already *had* Neville in his office for a while, and 
had already fed him some hot chocolate and biscuits, and talked him 
down from his state of rather extreme distress, and been generally 
uncharacteristically kind and compassionate to him that it even 
*occurred* to him that he could turn this situation to his advantage 
by planting the Water Plants book.  The ploy was really only an 
afterthought.  It wasn't until well into his tea-and-sympathy 
conversation with Neville that he even *learned* that the kid was
particularly friendly with Harry.  That's when he thought of 
planting the book on him.  But as to why he felt compelled to show
such kindness to young Longbottom in the first place...well, Crouch 
could never understand that *himself.*  It rather preyed on his mind, 
in fact -- it disturbed him -- and so he eventually succeeded in
convincing himself that planting the book had actually been his 
Cunning Plan all along.  In actuality, however, he had merely been 
a helpless pawn of that mystic bond forged between wizards when one 
saves another's life.

There.  How's *that* for subversive?  ;-)


> I also like this theory because it explains why Mrs. Lestrange went 
> after Frank....she picks Frank because she wants revenge for his 
> role in the ambush because he killed her old flame Rosier.  (She 
> doesn't know it was Moody who killed Rosier because Moody gave 
> Frank all the credit, and Mrs. Lestrange is still a little woozy 
> from her time in Azkaban.)  

Woozy?  From a mere couple of weeks awaiting trial in Azkaban?  

Hah!  The Dead Sexy Mrs. Lestrange is way too *Tough* to get that 
easily woozed.

No, she knew perfectly well that Moody was the one who killed
Rosier.  That's why she did such an inspired number on the poor man's 
leg, and his eye, and heaven only knows what other body parts that 
*could* be salvaged over at St. Mungo's without resort to the magical 
bionics. (I quite agree with Cindy that this *must* be the reason 
that Moody was not present at her trial.)

No, she went after *Longbottom* because Longbottom killed *Wilkes.*

(Haven't I told you again and again that Longbottom killed Wilkes?)

> Anyway, I know I'm a little short on canon here.  

Canon?  Oh, right.  That.

> But you have to admit that JKR seems to have been very precise in 
> weaving a rather complex tale of which DEs did what and where 
> everyone was at particular points in the timeline.  I doubt that 
> it was all random.

The truth is out there.


-- Elkins