The Rat at GH

[justcarol67]

No: HPFGUIDX 116422


Lynx412 wrote:
<snip theory about Peter being in love with Lily>
 The house at GH blew up because Peter blew it up after 
> retrieving LV's wand. <snip>

Carol responds:
This is an interesting idea whether we accept the rest of the theory
or not. But if Peter blew up the house, he probably used his own wand
to do so. He seems to have used it to blow off his finger and blow up
the street, then left the wand behind when he transformed into a rat.
If he had used LV's wand to do so, the twelve Muggles and a finger
would have shown up in the Priori incantatem sequence. I think he
found and hid LV's wand, then used and lost his own in the
confrontation with Sirius Black. He would not yet have lost his own
wand when the house blew up at Godric's Hollow.
> 
Lynx412 wrote:
>        Wy do I think he also contacted Lupin? Lupin's 'You heard
James?'  I suspect that Lupin contacted James to warn him that they
were in danger, and believed that James had gone to visit the SK's
house. Peter could very well have gone to Lupin with a folded sheet of
paper supposedly signed by Sirius, and read it to him, thereby
revealing the Potter's location without betraying the fact that he,
Peter, was the SK, not Sirius.

Carol responds:
I think Lupin would have wanted to read the paper himself, not have it
read to him by someone who (supposedly) wasn't the SK, and he would
have wondered why Sirius had told Peter to inform him rather than
doing so himself.

But, that aside, the real problem for me is that so many people are
reading so much into Lupin's "You heard James?" Lupin was James's good
friend (whether the reverse was true or not, I don't know) and I think
Harry's mention of James caught Lupin off guard and he forgot that he
was trying to hide his own connection to James and Sirius, their
ability to transform into animals, his identity as a werewolf, and all
the rest. A moment later he comes to his senses and merely reveals
that he knew James and thought he knew Sirius, and makes it clear that
he doesn't want the conversation to go any further.

There's no need, given a perfectly natural reaction to Harry's words
on Lupin's part, to assume that it wasn't James's that he heard. JKR
is simply giving us our first hint of the existence of MWPP. Harry
later hears James's voice during the Priori Incantatem sequence and
gives no indication that the voice is different from what he expected.
Also Harry's assumption that the woman whose screams he hears when the
Dementors are near him is his mother is later borne out; I see no
indication that his assumption that the man whose voice he hears
urgently telling Lily to take Harry and run is not also valid.

I realize that we're dealing here with Harry's POV, which is not
always reliable. Many things that he "knows" have turned out to be
wrong. However, in most such cases, he has been previously misinformed
or even lied to (his parents died in a car accident, Sirius Black
betrayed his parents, Crouch!Moody drinks from a hip flask for fear of
being poisoned, etc.). Or he's wrong in his assessment of another
character (Draco Malfoy is the Heir of Slytherin, Snape is responsible
for Black's death, etc.). But a simple matter like hearing his
fahter's voice when we know that his father was present at Godric's
Hollow (Sirius saw his body) and did indeed try unsuccessfully to hold
Voldemort off (as Voldemort himself admits) is, IMO, reading
conspiracy into straightforward exposition.

Similarly ingenious arguments were posed against Harry's assumption
that his father was a Gryffindor ("another Gryffindor Quidditch player
had sat under this very tree rumpling his hair"--quoted from memory)
only to have JKR reveal that James was indeed a Gryffindor. I think
she'll reveal that it was indeed James's voice.

But even if she doesn't, common sense suggests that he would have
spoken words very like the ones Harry attributes to him and no one
else would have done so. Why would Wormtail, accompanying Voldemort,
shout any such words? If he shouted anything, it would have to be more
like, "Lily, he's killed James but I'll fight him off!" And wouldn't
Lily wonder why he was suddenly present and hadn't previously defended
James?

I think JKR expects us to *know* that the voice was really James's, as
any twelve-year-old who's read the books would tell you if you asked her.

Carol

Carol