[HPforGrownups] Re:TBAY:There's Nothing Like SUCCESS/Minerva Mcgonagall Is E

[Edblanning at aol.com]

No: HPFGUIDX 41164

Eloise was sitting in the basement kitchen of the castle, drinking a cup of 
tea when footsteps came down the stairs.  
'What time is it darling? Have I missed breakfast?'
Eloise glanced at the clock which said 4 o'clock, before giving Diana one of 
the despairing looks she kept solely for her.
'Yes, I'm afraid you have. Cup of tea?'
Diana slumped into the chair opposite. 'I don't suppose you have any Alka 
Saltzer, do you?'  
'Mmm, that incense was a bit much, wasn't it?' she dissembled.
Eloise had learned that one of the rules of castle life was always to have 
hangover cures to hand. Not that she ever needed them herself, of course.
'What went on last night?' Diana asked, as she took the effervescent mixture, 
making a face, 'You and Porphyria, I mean. Did you have a row?'
'Something like that. You were there. Don't you remember?'
'I think I might have dropped off at one point.'
Eloise gave her a withering look.
'Yes, we had a row. Over SUCCESS. She said he's superfluous.'
'But I *love* superfluity!'
'That's what she said. You're not helping. Particularly since she's right.'
'She is?'
'Unfortunately. Got it all worked out. Although she's prepared to compromise.'
'She is?'
'Yes. Do you realise how repetitive you get, sometimes?'
'Well, that's OK, then.'
'As long as she's not just patronising me. But no, I have to think of 
SUCCESS. I brought him into the world and I have to look after him.'
'Where is he?'
'SUCCESS? he's trailing her around like a shadow, afraid that if he lets her 
out of his sight she might change her mind, poor thing. He even spent the 
night with her'
'i hope he hasn't read Browning.' Diana paused to contemplate the image 
Success strangling  the sleeping Porphyria  by means of her own plaits. 'I 
wanted to discuss where we're going to put the jacuzzi.'
'How about in the gazebo?' asked Eloise, the merest trace of sarcasm in her 
voice.

She pulled the file containing Porphyria's evidence across the table.
'It's very good, you know,' she said.
'What does this bit mean?' asked Diana, pointing to the passage, which said

>Plus, Snape might not want to be anywhere near the Mirror of Erised when 
>LV is around.

'Search me. Surely the point is that anyone looking in the mirror can only 
see what they themselves desire. Voldemort wouldn't be able to see whatever 
it was Snape desired, be it black socks (one can never have enough), being 
Dumbledore's golden boy,or the saviour who ridded the world of Voldemort for 
ever. And *surely* he wouldn't have seen himself holding the stone, would he? 
He would want the stone to stay exactly where it was, *in* the mirror.'
She scribbled some rough notes to this effect in the margin of Porphyria's 
beautifully illuminated manuscript.

'What about his bit?' Eloise examined the passage Diana indicated.

>b) Snape was trying to keep secret the fact that he went after Quirrell at 
>the Halloween Ball. Perhaps this is why he turned to Filch for help when 
>he was injured rather than go to the infirmary where he might have 
>attracted a lot of attention from students and had to answer a lot of 
>questions from Pomfrey. He can trust Filch to keep quiet since Filch 
>defers to him, has very little authority of his own and already enjoys a 
>mutually beneficial hall-patrolling partnership with him.

'Now, what is this? Oh yes, one of the arguments that Snape is going it alone 
that Porphyria respects but disagrees with:'

>Also, we don't know whether Snape's attempt at hiding 
>his encounter with Fluffy was an attempt to keep what he knew secret from 
>everyone, or just the students.

'You know, Diana, it's always bothered me, that scene,' she said, scribbling 
more margin notes. 'Just why *does* he go to Filch? After Hermione's 
Polyjuice mishap, one of the reasons the boys give for taking her to madam 
Pomfrey is precisely the fact that she *doesn't* ask too many questions. I 
get the stong impression that although she's not one of the inner circle, her 
discretion can be relied on completely. And in a place like Hogwarts, the 
possibilities for getting your leg nearly ripped off must be nearly endless. 
Taking a stroll in the Forbidden Forest to gather a rare form of fungus for a 
particularly complex potion, perhaps. Who knows what you might encounter 
there? (Fluffy, for one, post PS/SS). In fact, the staff room is perhaps not 
a very good place to get your leg dressed in private, particularly if you 
don't want the rest of the staff to know.'

'But you have to agree that Dumbledore showing up at the second Quidditch 
match indicates that Snape had been telling Dumbledore of his suspicions.'

'Well, what intrigues me is not so much that Dumbledore turns up at the 
second match, but that he wasn't there at the first. These games seem to be 
such a big deal that I would *expect* the headmaster to be there (although I 
do like the suggestion that he and Snape hoped to catch Quirrell red-handed). 
But yes, one of the Weasley twins expresses surprise that he's there, so I 
suppose she's right again,' Eloise snorted. Eloise doesn't like being proved 
wrong, truth be told.
'I wonder if he had a special motive to be at the match in CoS which was 
invaded by the Dementors? The one where he actually *did* save Harry.'

The conversation was interrupted by the sound of more footsteps.

'Ooh, nice outfit!' exclaimed Diana at the site of Porphyria in rather 
fetching, obviously brand new black robes.
'Oh, just something I picked up in Madam Malkins' sale. I could do without 
the matching accessory, though,' she said through gritted teeth, throwing 
SUCCESS, who had draped himself round her neck in imitation of a fur collar, 
across the room. Eloise picked him up, stroked him protectively and placed 
him in his basket by the range. 'There's post, by the way.' And she dropped a 
piece of parchment on the table. 

'Minerva McGonagall is Ever So Evil.....' Eloise began to read out.
'Here, let me see that', said Porphyria, grabbing the parchment.
Eloise didn't have time to object as the noise of angry shouting came from 
the top of the stairs. 
'You should never have brought him to the castle!' yelled a voice which 
sounded like Elkins'. 'When Diana finds out - ' 
'When Diana finds out what?' asked Diana.
Elkins appeared, followed by Cindy, who for some reason was wearing the 
highest platform-soled shoes anyone in the kitchen had ever seen and 
consequently was staggering down the steps with some difficulty.
'We were having a nice game of croquet,' said Elkins and she,' (pointing 
vindictively at Cindy) '*She* had to play with that over-sized Hagrid thing. 
It's made ruts all over the lawn and she insisted on wearing those ridiculous 
shoes .....'
'It was the only way I could reach high enough to hold Mme Maxime.' 
interjected Cindy, reasonably, indicating the exceptionally large flamingo 
which was now stalking round the kitchen,  '....so she's left footprints 
everywhere too. And now the damn creature's got stuck in one of the hoops and 
no-one can play at all!'

They sat down at the table, whilst Eloise did what all true English women do 
in times of crisis and made tea: PG Tips for Diana, Earl Grey for Porphyria 
and Keemun for herself, before recollecting herself enough to supply Elkins 
and Cindy with strong coffee.

'What's this?' asked Elkins, perusing the parchment on the table. 
'Evil!Minerva evidence?' Where's this come from? Evil!Minerva's *my* theory. 
Why didn't I know about this?'
'No, darling, I think you'll find *I* was the one who posted that theory,' 
countered Porphyria, acidly. 
A strange expression appeared on Porphyria's  face. 'Why does it say "miffed" 
on Porphyria's face?' asked Cindy. 'Ignore it, replied Eloise. It's a British 
expression. She's been taking lessons.'
'Actually,' she continued, returning to the subject and finding it difficult 
to maintain her composure, 'if you recall, it was *my* idea.'
'Yes, but it was off-list and you said yourself that you were being 
facetious, so that doesn't count,' said Porphyria, with a dangerous note of 
finality in her voice.
'Well, whoever's idea it was, these are good new pieces of evidence: the 
suggestion that Lucius Malfoy might have engineered her taking the reins in 
CoS (and actually, what does she do, apart from bleat about this being the 
end of Hogwarts and 'sending'  that charlatan Gilderoy Lockhart after Ginny. 
She even tries to close the school, for goodness sake) and the strange way 
that Quirrelmort got past the chess set with no sign of a game being played. 
Contrast that with the way the flying key showed obvious sign of previous 
use. I suggest we send the author an invitation to join the Order.'

'Yes!' said Elkins enthusiatically, 'I agree. We need all the help we can 
get. We have to flush out every potential DE in the series. I've no sympathy 
for them.'
Eloise looked at her curiously. It wasn't long since Elkins had apparently 
expressed great concern at the prospect of poor DEs stranded in the graveyard 
and unable to get home. Eloise had questioned her loyalty. But maybe she had 
been wrong in her suspicions. Maybe it had just been Elkins' innate goodness 
speaking.

'There's a mole in our midst!' shrieked Diana suddenly. Elkins made a sudden 
movement. No-one was clear what kind of a movement it was, but it seemed to 
be the right thing to do in the circumstances.
Eloise was puzzled. She hadn't shared her suspicions with anybody and Diana 
wasn't usually that quick on the uptake. Not unless it involved another of 
Porphyria's fancy ideas for the castle, anyway.
'A mole!'
Diana was standing on her chair pointing at a small, black, velvet-coated 
creature crawling blindly across the floor.
'My croquet lawn!' she moaned, hiding her face in her hands.
Elkins relaxed. 
'A mole in the kitchen? If there's one thing I hate, it's a mole who can't be 
bothered to make sure it's in the right place.'
And she tossed it up out of the window, right onto Diana's croquet lawn, 
where it settled down into one of the holes made by Cindy's shoes.

Eloise

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