ESE!Lupin condensed and Lupin and Sirius replies

[pippin_999]

No: HPFGUIDX 147032

 
> Neri:
. But AFAIK there isn't in the books any similar clue suggesting
> "Wormtail" might be someone other than Pettigrew, certainly not
> something that is highlighted as an official mystery. 

Pippin:

The identity of the person who hexed Harry's broom in PS/SS is not
an "official" mystery either. Nobody except Hagrid ever suggests that
it wasn't  Snape. Interestingly, Hagrid is the only character in HBP
to suggest that Harry might have misunderstood what happened on
the tower, which you also seem to feel is not an "official" mystery.

The identity of Wormtail *is*  an "official"  mystery, at least until 
Lupin says, "Peter is Wormtail." At that point it seems solved -- 
but what if it isn't?

There are mysteries for which we are given provisional solutions
which in later books turn out to be incomplete...why Dumbledore left 
Harry at the  Dursleys, for example, or why Snape hates the Marauders. 
There is usually some hint that they are partial, as there is in this case.
You can find plenty of debates on this list over whether Snape knew
the Marauder nicknames or recognized the names on the map
from some other source. The Pensieve scene in OOP does not really
answer the question, as it's not clear how much of the MWPP dialogue
Snape could hear at  the time.

Wormtail's inconsistent ability *is* an "official" mystery: 
"But Wormtail --displaying a presence of mind I would never have
expected of him--convinced Bertha Jorkins to accompany him on
a night-time stroll." --GoF ch 33. 

What can kill unicorns is also an "official" mystery. 
Wormtail is  able to prepare a potion "concocted from unicorn blood" 
with no explanation of how a "poor wizard" like Peter would obtain it. 
Quirrell was able to kill unicorns, supposedly, but Quirrell is now dead, 
so who is helping Voldemort kill unicorns in GoF? Hagrid said a werewolf
couldn't do it, but the unicorns in PS/SS were attacked previous to the
night of Harry's detention. "Second time in a week." Hagrid
says, "I found one dead last Wednesday." Hagrid knows that a non-
wizard werewolf couldn't catch one, and the attacks are too spaced out
to have been done at full moon. But he's not thinking about 
someone casting a spell -- and now we know that there's a spell
that causes terrible slashing cuts, and the Marauders knew it.

Why Dumbledore is so confident that a supposed murderer's escape 
will prove a godsend is also an "official" mystery. One possible
explanation is that Peter is no occlumens and Dumbledore knows
he couldn't have been the spy.

Your interpretation of Wormtail's line "The boy is nothing to me,
nothing to me at all!" is that Voldemort doesn't know it's a lie. But
a legilimens does not detect objective truth. He can only detect the
thoughts and feelings that contradict the lie. 

Voldemort does not believe that any of his servants are faithful to him. 
He has no comprehension of human ties whatever. If Wormtail feels 
some underlying loyalty to Harry, how would Voldemort detect it?
He has never felt such things himself.  Indeed
he consistently underestimates what people are willing to do for
one another -- he never thought that Lily would throw herself
in front of Harry, and he thinks she was a fool to do so even though
it resulted in his discorporation. 

Inviting people to forswear their ties to one another floats his boat -- 
it validates his choice to live as he does. He did it to Lily, he does it
to Wormtail here, and he'll do it to the Malfoys in HBP. In short,
IMO, if the sentence were changed to "My life debt to Harry Potter is
nothing to me, nothing to me at all!" Voldemort would accept
it  just as easily. 

 Whether Dumbledore was  reckless in trusting Snape is also an
 "official" mystery.  At least automatically assuming Lupin was 
worthy of trust is a far more understandable mistake.

> Neri:
> Here is my own explanation for Lupin's behavior. I think that JKR is
> slightly guilty of plot-device-ness here (what is the proper literary
> term?). She needs Pettigrew to leave the Shack with a Life Debt to
> Harry. So Pettigrew must have died if not for Harry, and Harry alone
> is allowed to save him. Well, Sirius definitely would kill Pettigrew,
> but Lupin must go along with him. Otherwise Pettigrew would have owed
> his Debt to Lupin.

Pippin:
That's a stretch, IMO.  Why not have Lupin suggest taking the other children 
back to the castle? Surely Ron and Hermione don't need to see Pettigrew
die? 

Indeed, the evil plot-device fairy was very busy with Lupin that night.
First she made him forget that he was going to transform, then he
forgot that Snape would be bringing the potion, then he
forgot to de-activate the Marauder's Map, then he overlooked Harry's
invisibility cloak, then he forgot his duty as a teacher to ignore Ron's 
protests and splint his leg, then he forgot that killing would split his 
and Sirius's souls (surely as a DADA teacher he would know that?), 
and he constantly forgot that he wasn't the leader of the gang and
should therefore not be telling Sirius what to do. 

It's a strange thing. My theory is unashamedly plot-driven, yet
it allows the characters to behave in character-driven ways, while your
theory, which is supposedly character-driven, appears to require
clumsy plotting to support it.

> > Pippin:
> > I  think that if the body of the deceased has fresh
> > blood on it a considerable interval of time after it's supposed
> > to have died of a curse that doesn't leave any trace --
> > well, if that's not meant to be a clue, then JKR *is* a 
> > terrible mystery writer. 
> > 
> 
> Neri:
> If that's not meant to be a clue, then JKR is perhaps a terrible
> mystery writer in Agatha Christy's standards. But is she writing a
> Christy style mystery? 

Pippin:
It really doesn't matter what style or genre she's writing in.
Unless you can explain why it improves the story  for JKR to
ignore the interior logic of the rules she herself has invented
in a crucial scene involving the principal characters, it's bad 
writing for her to do so.

Olivier:
To name but a few, he could have killed Sirius or delivered
him to the Dementors at any point during the Shrieking Shack 
event. no one would have blamed him, he might even be 
the first werewolf to gain an order of Merlin first class
 and a thank you note from LV. 

Pippin:
You're forgetting that it's Pettigrew he wants here, not
Sirius. But he also wants to know whose side Sirius is on,
and how far he can depend on him. 

Olivier:
He  could have helped Peter find and take care of LV, and 
if he did, LV shows very poor gratitude in the graveyard 
(the argument about not blowing out Lupin's cover his feeble, 
LV blew Lucius' cover and Lucius is a very useful spy in the 
Ministry during OoP, arguably LV's most useful DE : his cover 
rested solely on Fudge's disbelief of Harry). 

Pippin:
Lucius and all the other DE's named at the graveyard had already
been openly accused of being Death Eaters. Dumbledore already
had reason to suspect them. Naming them was Voldemort's
way of punishing them for denying their allegiance to him.


Olivier:
He could have let Harry throw himself through the veil (JKR insists 
numerous times that Harry fights "viciously" and "with every bit of
strength" against Lupin and that Lupin later maintains a 
"precautionary grip" on Harry). 

Pippin:
If Lupin knows and believes the entire prophecy, he knows that the Veil will
not kill the Chosen One. So if Harry is killed by it, he's not the Chosen
One, and his death would be pointless. Anyway, he hasn't got anything
against Harry personally, he just wants Voldemort victorious over the 
Ministry (IMO). I doubt he cares very much what happens to Voldie 
once the Ministry is out of the way.

LV seems awfully well-informed about Dumbledore's movements.
Rosmerta notified Draco that Dumbledore had gone to Hogsmeade,
but who notified the Death Eaters that the time for the attack had come?
Who petrified Fenrir? Why is the DE on top of the tower found 
"stupefied" when Harry used the full body bind? That plot device
fairy's been busy again  I suppose-- strange how she has to work 
overtime when Lupin's around! 

Anyway, if  one purpose of The Plan was to force Snape into the open
(and I think it was) then it wouldn't have done for the Death Eaters to
win the battle before Snape reached the battlement.

Lupin clearly didn't want or expect Dumbledore to die -- I believe he
thought Dumbledore was so powerful that nothing could harm him.

Pippin