Two Wormtails was Re: Plot in OotP (wand confusion)

[pippin_999]

No: HPFGUIDX 118545


--- In HPforGrownups at yahoogroups.com, "nkafkafi" 
> Neri:
> I agree that the passages you brought may be seen (if one 
chooses to)  as presenting a mystery "is Peter strong or weak?" 
I'd even say that  if not for that "correct!" of JKR it would have
been 
possible to  claim that there is a mystery "did Peter really kill 
Cedric?". BUT  there is no reason in canon to think that the "real" 
killer of Cedric  is also called, for some reason, "Wormtail". The 
idea of the "second  Wormtail" was invented in order to explain 
how JKR didn't lie when she confirmed in the chat that Wormtail 
killed Cedric.<

Pippin:
If you care to check back to message 40370, which was posted 
in June of 2002 you will find Elkins discussing the idea of 
whether Snape thought "Wormtail" was Sirius, ie the spy.

It's not the original post on the subject (YahooMort was giving me 
grief) but at least it proves that fans were already discussing this 
notion, suggested by canon, a long time before JKR made that 
statement. 


As I said before, it was a solution to   Snape's apparent 
knowledge of the Marauder nicknames. 

If JKR *meant* the PoA passage as a clue that there was some 
doubt about who was meant by "Wormtail" then her chat answer 
gives those who have figured out that Wormtail is not necessarily 
Peter  a wink and a nod, while those who don't get it are no 
further misled than they were before.

I thought the answer was mostly aimed at explaining  to younger 
readers how Cedric's shadow had come from the wand when  
Voldemort hadn't done the actual killing. 

If Snape *knew* "Wormtail" the spy could  not have been 
Pettigrew, it makes his denials and his fury  in PoA much more 
understandable.

It could even be that "Sirius Black proved he was capable of 
murder at the age of sixteen. You haven't forgotten that, 
Headmaster? You haven't forgotten that he once tried to kill 
*me*?"  is a coded conversation which does not refer to the 
Prank only,  but to a later attempt on Snape's life by the DE 
Wormtail. 

I wouldn't be surprised if Dumbledore has some doubts about 
Lupin..IIRC, he's never left alone with Harry after PoA. And it 
could be that Sirius's house arrest was necessary because 
Dumbledore feared an Order member might try to kill him -- as 
long as he stayed in the house, the spy couldn't attack without 
proving that there was a traitor in the order once again.

Pippin