Dumbledore's Magnaminity

[nrenka]

No: HPFGUIDX 142997

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

*ironing my hands--I know I'm one over here...*

> Magpie:
> 
> Maybe I'm wrong, but as I understood it when Petunia took Harry in 
> the thing that she sealed was Dumbledore's protection spell.  As 
> long as Harry was living in her house the spell worked.  So the 
> pact being sealed was from Dumbledore to Harry through Petunia.  It 
> was not a pact between Dumbledore and Petunia.

Actually, Dumbledore strikes me as being the guarantor in this whole 
setup.  Dumbledore is sealing a charm, but Petunia's co-operation and 
free agreement in such (she may have done it grudgingly, but she did 
do it of her own free will) is what seals the charm--which ties baby 
Harry to her, not to Dumbledore.  He has to stay at the Dursley's, 
not where Dumbledore is.  [This may have something to do with 
Dumbledore's non-interference up to a certain point, but I'm 
guessing.]

Dumbledore is then the third party in the entire thing.  Petunia 
agreed to the Deal by accepting Baby Harry into her household--
otherwise the magic wouldn't have worked.  (It's so nice that magic 
provides these explicit delineations of acceptance and all of those 
sorts of things.  You can't fool magic.)  Since Petunia agreed to the 
Deal for which Dumbledore is the guarantor, he is well within his 
legal and moral rights in coming to discuss the actions of the 
parties.

> I don't think she herself was necessarily agreeing to anything 
> except giving her baby nephew room in her house, knowing this would 
> also provide him with protection from LV. The baby was just left 
> the doorstep with a note, no?  So it's not like she and Dumbledore 
> had any sort of discussion about exactly what she was agreeing to 
> beyond taking an abandoned nephew into her house.

It's still open precisely what was in the letter; Petunia certainly 
seems to know more about the wizarding side of things then she lets 
on.  I wouldn't rule out that Petunia knew very well what the dangers 
had been and what they were, when she took her free will action.

> When DD reminded her of this it may not have been that he was 
> reminding her of some contract she entered into but simply 
> reminding her that if Harry did not have a place in her house, he 
> would not be protected.  Did she want her sister's child to die?  
> If not, he stayed.

Acceptance of the child, IMO, is a more-than-simply-implicit 
contract, which includes the whole 'and this keeps the child alive, 
as well'.

> Magpie:
> It seems to me that the Dursleys are only under any threat from LV 
> because of Harry.  Unless he thought he could hurt Harry by doing 
> so, like he did with Sirius, I can't see why LV would go after them 
> rather than go after a Weasley.  There have been a lot of 
> references lately to the Dursleys knowing all about the war, but 
> they honestly don't seem to know much.

Idle speculation here; JKR shot down our wondering about James' 
parents dying from the war (cause of death: old age and wizarding 
disease), but she's never (IMO) done so for the Evans parents.  Given 
Voldie's parental and relative preoccupation, and Lily as someone who 
had denied him three times, Petunia may well have had more of a brush 
with danger in the past.  No canon for any of it, of course, but one 
shouldn't underestimate the pettiness of a major villain.

The scenes with Petunia in both OotP and HBP strike me as someone who 
knows full well what she'd agreed to, and is ashamed and angry about 
being called to account, finally, for her sub-standard performance as 
a human being.

-Nora goes off to slam her hands in the oven door as a good example