[HPforGrownups] Re: Predictions on the something small

[Iggy McSnurd]

No: HPFGUIDX 88385

> Erin:
> 
> Why, yes, actually, I do have an idea as to what it could possibly be.
> You mentioned your belief that there will be a spy in the Order, and
> I agree wholeheartedly.  In fact, I believe that it is CoS that gives
> us our first clue as to the spy will be.  Let me quote the relevant
> passage.  It takes place in chapter nine, right after the writing on
> the wall has been discovered.
> 
> *****************************
> "I know it's weird," said Harry. "The whole thing's weird.  What was
> that writing on the wall about?  *The Chamber Has Been Opened*....
> What's that supposed to mean?"
> 
> "You know, it rings a sort of bell," said Ron slowly. "I think
> someone told me a story about a secret chamber at Hogwarts once...
> might've been Bill...."
> ******************************
> 
> But later in the book we learn that evidence of the chamber has been
> covered up for the last fifty years.  The only people who know of the
> legend in Harry's time are Slytherins.  So how did Bill find this
> information out?  He must have been hanging around the Slytherins,
> yes?


Iggy de-cloaking for a second:

1:  Considering the intricacy of the entrance to the chamber, both in
the books and in the movie, I can't see that Slytherin himself was the
one who built it... it was more likely that he hired some goblins to
build it in secret while the school itself was constructed.  (And then
he added the magical aspects later... like needing to speak Parseltongue
to open the chamber.)

2:  While goblins might keep something secret from people who don't
employ them, I can't really see them as the type to not gossip among
themselves.

3:  Bill worked for the goblins at Gringotts for years as a curse
breaker... He probably overheard them mentioning it at some point.
Another possibility is that, since the Egyptians are famous for secret
passages and hidden rooms, the chamber was probably accidentally brought
up by one of the goblins in a conversation with them.

4:  You mention that the only ones who know about the chamber in Harry's
time were the Slytherins... but Bill, technically, isn't from Harry's
time.  He left the school *years* before Harry ever got there.  It's
more appropriate to say that he's from the generation between Harry, and
Arthur & Molly.  (Especially when you consider how slowly people seem to
age in the WW...)  He could have heard about it as a "residual urban
legend" that died off by the time Harry got there.

5:  Bill MAY have heard it from Arthur and Molly at some point, since
the original opening of the chamber, IIRC, happened around the time that
the parents were going to school.

6:  If the only people who knew about the chamber in Harry's time were
the Slytherins... why bother to ask the teachers about it?  And how
would they know?  (Oh, wait... all the teachers are former Slytherins,
no matter what house they're associated with... right?  *grin*)


'Nuff said.

Iggy McSnurd

(re-dons his invisibility cloak.)