What were the Malfoys DOING there?

[macfotuk at yahoo.com]

No: HPFGUIDX 113632

--- In HPforGrownups at yahoogroups.com, "carolynwhite2" 
<carolynwhite2 at a...> wrote:

<snip>

if Diary!Tom had had this conversation with Lucius, surely 
> he would have discovered the key facts about Harry that way, and 
> would not have had to extract most of the story from Ginny? 

<snip>

> Tom seems to have needed to get the details from Harry.
> 
> This is also a problem if we speculate that Diary!Tom and LV have 
> full knowledge of each other's memories, and are one and the same 
> person through time. If that were the case (and it is hinted at by 
> the 'odd red gleam' in Tom's eyes), then why does he say 'that 
> killing Mudbloods doesn't matter to me any more.. for many months 
> now, my new target has been - you.'? If he has the adult Voldie's 
> memories available to him, he knows all about why Harry has to be 
not 
> a new, but an enduring target.
> 
> I agree that Lucius must have had some inkling about the powers of 
> the diary, or there would have been no point in the plot, and part 
of 
> what he must have been told by Diary!Tom is that giving it to a 
> student would enable a monster to be unleashed once again to kill 
> mudbloods. DD makes it clear that he assumes this was Malfoy's 
> intent, and Malfoy's reaction confirms it.
>

Very nice post Carolyn. We must all recall that Ginny spends months 
with the diary and almost certainly, as Harry did, was taken in, 
quite literally. Malfoy, on the other hand knew its darkly magical 
nature and so would handle it with kid (or dragon hide) gloves and, 
if he wrote in it, would do so as his ONLY means of communication, 
not allow himself to be taken into its pages as both Harry and Ginny 
did. 

In such a 'writing only' conversation (as we each have with one 
another here in the medium of HPfGU) one can still impart and learn 
much, exchange ideas, make suggestions, influence etc. 

So, Malfoy tells Diary!Tom about HP and that he has the power to 
thwart his future plans/self. Thus Harry should be THE target in the 
hope that Diary!Tom can succeed where 'physical' LV didn't (at GH). 
Lucius knows, hopes or suspects that LV might be back and that 
either way Harry is a threat, so let's use DIARY!Tom to see if he 
does any better. Nothing lost and many things to be gained, 
including all the things people have listed. 

This explanation keeps Harry as the target, makes sense of Dobby's 
warning and his very early knowledge and, even (for the first time 
to me), shows why CoS was necessary within the scheme of things 
(books 1-7 masterplot) over and above revealing the 
parselmouth/connection thing.