What about the Door?

[a_reader2003]

No: HPFGUIDX 99501

--- In HPforGrownups at yahoogroups.com, "potioncat" <willsonkmom at m...> 
wrote:
> Severus is tricked into going through the tunnel.  James goes after 
> him to save him from the werewolf.  Severus sees the werewolf just 
> before he's dragged away.
> 
> Isn't the werewolf on the other side of the door?  Why would 
Severus have even opened the door if he could see that there was a 
werewolf on the other side?  Didn't Lupin say he made horrible noises 
and sounds when he was in the werewolf state?  So wouldn't Severus 
had heard something when he got close, even if he didn't see the 
werewolf?  Seems to me he would have seen it, heard it and gone back 
to tell everyone.  What am I missing?
> 

Carolyn:
No, there is no door, all Lupin says is that 'Snape glimpsed me..at 
the end of the tunnel'

But, never mind the door, there is the little question of how a 
tunnel so small that the kids had to crouch double to walk along in 
POA (1), was big enough to take a full-grown stag, complete with 
antlers *and* a large werewolf(2)- at the time of the Prank, and at 
other times a gigantic dog (3). 

Is it possible that at the time of the Prank, James also went down 
the tunnel in human form to get Snape? If Lupin could not actually 
get out that way when in werewolf mode because he was simply too big, 
it would seem neither Snape nor James was in much danger. It could be 
that Sirius knew this all along, and hence has been maligned unfairly 
for his rashness, and Snape was too frightened at the time to realise.

Even if this is not true, there are further unexplained aspects to 
this part of the story. If it was possible for the Marauders to 
somehow get in to the Shack in their gigantic transformed states and 
lead a large werewolf out, what was to prevent Lupin getting out 
anytime he was confined to the Shack? Was there not a danger he would 
inevitably find the tunnel exit and rush out? There seems to have 
been nothing to stop him. Surely all-powerful Dumbledore could manage 
a blocking spell or two ? If he didn't why not? More forgetfulness ? 
If he had put such a spell on the Shack, then the Marauders could 
never have got Lupin out, in their transformed states or not. 

Making an effort to be charitable to DD, perhaps the simple 
explanation is that a werewolf *is* too big to get down that tunnel, 
and DD knew that Snape was never in any danger, and that's why no one 
was ever punished for the Prank. In which case, how did Lupin get out 
to play each month.

The only other logical explanations are that there is another way out 
of the Shack, or animagi can also shrink if they need to, or the 
tunnel expands and contracts to suit the size of the people trying to 
get down it (4) - again, not particularly safe for caging a werewolf, 
don't you think? 

Whichever way you look at this, all the explanations are 
unsatisfactory. We have no canon to support another exit from the 
Shack. It is beyond credibility that the transformed Lupin, thrashing 
around regularly once a month might not discover the exit to the 
tunnel. The simplicity of the spells needed to prevent this are 
obvious. 

If Sirius, Peter and Lupin are telling the truth about what they did 
all those years ago, then DD took a fantastic, careless risk in 
allowing it to happen..or he knew it was happening. Did no one in the 
Forbidden Forest tell him about a werewolf regularly on the loose 
accompanied by at least two other enormous animals? All those magical 
centaurs, the mer-people having a midnight float on the surface of 
the lake? The intelligent owls, and who knows what else goes squeak 
in the night in the WW? Even the most rudimentary information system 
should have informed him what was happening.

Carolyn
Wondering where the DUST* squad have got to these days
(*Dumbledore Surveillance Team)




Refs:
(1) POA,p247 (UK)'Harry went next; he crawled forwards, headfirst, 
and slid down an earthy slope to the bottom of a very low tunnel'..
'This way, said Harry, setting off, bent-backed, after 
Crookshanks'....'They moved as fast as they could, bent almost 
double..'

(2) POA, p.260 'Sirius & James transformed into such large animals, 
they were able to keep a werewolf in check'

p279 (UK) 'As the werewolf reared, snapping its long jaws, Sirius 
disappeared from Harry's side. He had transformed. The enormous, bear-
like dog..'

(3)p.260 'They transformed..Peter, as the smallest could slip beneath 
the Willow...They would then slip down the tunnel and join me.'

(4)p.277 As they exit the Shack, the tunnel is suddenly big enough to 
allow four adults to creep along in single file, with Snape 'bumping 
his lolling head on the low ceiling'.