Dobby redux

[Barry Arrowsmith]

No: HPFGUIDX 106175

What's with Dobby?
This a question, one of the questions, one of the *many* questions that 
still has to be sorted out in the Potterverse.

Personally I can't stand the little creep.
It may be movie contamination but the expression on his face when 
levitating the cake in CoS just confirmed my prejudices.
A sly, vicious leer. Quite startling from a supposed 'cuddly' intended 
to engage our sense of humour and/or sympathy.
Nail the little bugger to the wall by his ears and extract his 
knee-caps through his nostrils, that's my advice.

Unfortunately that won't make the question go away, though it would 
definitely be a moment of rare merriment for like-minded folk.

OK. CoS. Dobby inflicts himself on Harry in Privet Drive. Tries to 
persuade him not to go back to Hogwarts. Warns him of dire plots, dirty 
work at the crossroads, that sort of thing. Why? Of what concern is 
Harry to Dobby? House Elves do their master's bidding, they don't go 
gadding about the countryside doing poor imitations of Trelawney at her 
most enigmatic. They concern themselves with the household they serve, 
not total strangers. If he wanted to nip the plot in the bud, he'd warn 
the Weasleys,  not Harry. The dastardly plot is to go forward, it 
seems; but Harry, *just* Harry is to be kept out of it. Or maybe not. 
As we all appreciate, telling Harry "hands off" is equivalent  to 
handing him a map showing how to get to ground zero, a packet of 
sandwiches and a "See you when it's all over."

Two possibilities occur to me - well, three, but we should be able to 
discount one of them out of hand. We'll  deal with that one first.

I wondered if there was a parallel in the behaviour of Dobby and 
Kreacher. Ole Kreech goes beetling off to Chateau Malfoy at the first 
opportunity, spilling beans to Narcissa that the Order would rather 
remain unspilled. Dobby might  have  done  the same, expressing his 
philosophical disapproval of Malfoy's moral stance by telling Harry as 
much as Malfoy's instructions allowed him to. But this would mean that 
Harry and the Malfoys were somehow related, and we've been told that 
Harry has no living relatives except the Dursleys. Shame. Could have 
cobbled together some entertaining posts around that idea. So, scrub 
that one.

Secondly - there's this mysterious Office for House Elf Relocation in 
the Ministry. Herself rarely  does something without good reason and 
this seems a largely irrelevant snippet to throw into FBaWTFT -  
especially since House Elves aren't mentioned in the body of the text, 
there's just this brief reference in 'About the Author'. Hmm. I find 
that suspicious, but then I find everything suspicious.

But: we know that the Potters are pureblood, an old wizarding family, 
with loadsadosh (James inherited wealth) - just the sort of people to 
have a House Elf pottering around the family pile, according to Ron. Is 
Dobby the old family retainer, still retaining vestiges of loyalty to 
the Young Master - even though he has been re-located? Could  be, 
though it does have a deus-ex-machina feel about it. Throw in all that 
palaver of of "Master has given Dobby a sock," followed soon after  by 
"Harry Potter freed Dobby!" to the mix. Is this meant to be taken at 
face value (Harry  was instrumental in Dobby being freed) or is JKR 
pulling a fast one - (Harry somehow had the necessary authority to 
instigate Dobby's release since what Malfoy did was clearly 
unintentional) and sneakily hiding a clue in plain sight? This subject 
has been picked over, dissected, discussed, disagreed about, 
interpreted and re-interpreted at almost tedious length. Life's too 
short to go through that again - unless something new turns up in the 
way of evidence. And sometimes I muse on the fact that none of 
James/Lily's friends (except DD who never  gives any information away 
unless absolutely necessary) have met Dobby in the timeline of the 
books. Is this chance or authorial intent? Would they recognise Dobby?

It's the third possibility that I find fascinating, mostly because it 
opens up vistas of double-dealing, betrayal  and duplicity. Lovely! 
Unfortunately, for all it's attractions it's the option with the least 
evidential or even inferential  support. Still, that's never stopped a 
conspiracy theorist before, so...

Dobby is under orders from Lucius.
After all, it's not just a single visit to Privet Drive we're talking 
about, he drops in on Harry at Hogwarts a few times too. How often can 
House Elves flout their masters wishes, for Heavens sake? Once - 
possible; more seems a bit iffy  to me.

And there's the strange way he identifies the danger - "Not he who must 
not be named" - very odd, very.....rehearsed. Add in the mildness of 
DD's reaction at the finale - after he's  been suspended, Hagrid's been 
to Azkaban, students have been petrified and Malfoy just gets a warning 
regarding his future behaviour. Hardly seems just or equitable. You 
begin to wonder if Malfoy's been covering all the options, that hints 
have been passed and understood; that by sending Dobby with a warning 
he's also sent a message - "I  can be useful." He's not the type to 
totally commit himself to a cause that might lose; doesn't Voldy think 
so too? "Lucius, my slippery friend..." Though he was rather silly 
getting involved in the Ministry  fiasco. Still, he does seem the type 
to play both ends against the middle, and to do that he has to appear 
co-operative when Voldy says "Jump!"

Personally, I  think option 2 is the likeliest, but option 3 has the 
most potential for fun and games.

The possibility that it can all be taken at face value, that Dobby had 
heard how 'great' Harry is and took the opportunity to nip over and 
tell him to watch his step is highly unlikely given that  House Elves 
are so fixatedly family orientated. Dobby, like Kreacher would go to 
the family member most in tune with his views - that'd  be Andromeda, 
Tonks's mother. Unless she's ESE too....

Kneasy