Not so very clever Albus...

[arcum42]

No: HPFGUIDX 45366

--- In HPforGrownups at y..., "errolowl" <nithya_rachel at h...> wrote:
> 
> 
> Dicentra in message 45230:
> >>"Dumbledore is often amused by his own
> cleverness, as seen in PP/PS when he confides to Harry that hiding
the
> Stone in Erised was one of his better ideas." <<
> 
> Yes, old Albus is frequently amused by his own cleverness. In fact 
> he frequently seems to go out of his way to complicate things so he 
> can solve them cleverly...though those solutions are debatable.
> 
> Yes, yes, I know, we've all been through this a thousand times, but 
> I'm in just the sort of bad mood to grumble about this a little. 
> First lets start with hiding the stone in the mirror of Erised. 
> yes, that works perfectly when the baddies need to get at the stone 
> doesn't it? Voldmort would just see himself drinking the exlir, 
> just as Quirrel saw himself presenting it to his master. But how 
> long would it have held out? Don't you think that as voldmort got 
> more frustrated and angry, a terrified Qurirrel would have 
> panicked? He'd no longer be so taken by the glory of presenting the 
> stone to his master, but get a desperate case of "Oh my God! I've 
> GOT to find the stone, or I'm dead!!". And once that was his 
> overriding desire, couldn't he have then found it?
> Looks to me like that mirror was just a short term barrier, 
> designed to delay voldemort till Dumbledore could get there....and 
> what if Albus couldn't get back in time? Was there really no more 
> foolproof way? At least it turned out right that time....
> 
Of course there is a better way, if we let things be a bit more
complicated. Lets say that Dumbledore feels Harry needs some hands-on
experiance fighting LV, but wants to try to protect him as much as
possible while doing so. So he makes sure the defences are rigged to
cater to Ron, Hermione, and Harry's strengths (plus one for Neville
Hermione solved). Next, when both Quirrellmort & Harry have all the
information, he stages his absence from Hogwarts by borrowing a
ministry owl and sending a letter to himself, and sending out Minerva
and Severus to make sure Quirrel and Harry know he's gone. After
leaving conspicuously, he then ducks down to where the mirror is
being kept, and hides in a secret chamber there. When LV and Harry
are struggling, he ducks in the room (note that Harry didn't see him
arrive), and helps out.

This theory presumes that Quirrell/Voldemort was waiting for
Dumbledore to leave, or at least were taking advantage of the
opportunity, but, given the time frame, this seems a reasonable
assumption. Anyways, just speculation, but I like the idea of
Dumbledore having been thoroughly in control of the situation in SS...

--Arcum