ESE!McGonagall (not what you think)

[justcarol67]

No: HPFGUIDX 164270

Julie proposed:
> *(snip)*
> >  A McGonagall who has been "enchanted" by Tom Riddle, perhaps
since their school days. 
> *(snip)*
> > It also provides a perfect tie-in between Tom Riddle and 
> McGonagall, something substantial related to their shared past for 
> JKR to exploit while avoiding any supposed physical attraction 
> between them during their school days--YUCK.
> 
> Ceridwen:
> Aside from the fact that Tom Riddle was good-looking enough for
Harry to notice when he met the sixteen year old memory of Tom (so,
not YUCK, just creepy, and only then in hindsight), we don't have any 
> canon that McGonagall was in school with Harry.
> 
> In fact, if she was a "sprightly seventy" in the first book (heck, 
> maybe I'm the one with memory difficulties, blame old age if I am), 
> then she was born about 1921, and would have graduated Hogwarts in 
> 1939.  There may be one shared year with Tom Riddle, but for an 
> eighteen year old to have a crush on an "ickle firstie" is even 
> creepier than two same-age students having crushes on each other.
<snip>

Carol responds:
I agree with Ceridwen that Enchanted!McGonagall is unlikely, but we
still have the problem that Julie pointed out: Dumbledore doesn't
confide in McGonagall, his deputy headmistress (though I'm not sure
whether she held that job when Harry was placed at the Dursleys as a
toddler) and the Head of Gryffindor House. I realize that JKR says in
an interview that Dumbledore has no confidante, no equal, but
McGonagall is one of his most senior teachers (possibly the oldest on
the staff, setting aside Ghost!Binns), holds his own former position
as Transfiguration teacher (and I'm guessing that he was also Head of
Gryffindor House and deputy headmaster in his time). By the time Harry
starts school, she's second in command, and is usually at his side
(along with the much younger Severus Snape) in times of crisis. Given
her age and experience, she's as close to an equal as anyone at Hogwarts.

Why, then doesn't he confide in her? Is it merely his own tendency to
secretiveness, telling half-truths out of habit because he doesn't
trust anyone else with that dangerous but beautiful thing, truth? Of
course, he doesn't yet know the full truth himself, but why not tell
her as much as he knows, or at least give her the real or primary
reason for leaving Harry with Lily's relatives? (Yes, of course, JKR
doesn't want the reader to know, but I mean in terms of character, not
plot.) If McGonagall isn't enchanted or under a long-term Imperius
(and I do think we can safely rule out that possibility), what is
about her that Dumbledore doesn't trust? I don't think it's her
intelligence. She seems to be quite bright with regard to teaching and
knowledge of her subject. Nor do I think it's her loyalty since she
defies Fudge to stand up for Dumbledore in OoP and she's a member of
the Order, at least the second time around. Possibly he's protective
of her because of her age (those four Stunners in the chest didn't do
her any good), but he's almost twice as old, so I don't think that's
it. Nor does he have any reason to doubt her courage (she defies
Umbridge as well as Fudge, confronting all those Aurors for Hagrid's
sake).

I think the answer is McGonagall's emotions. Though she's usually
straight-laced and stern, she was very fond of James and Lily, and she
develops an equal fondness for Harry, revealed by her buying him an
expensive racing broom and allowing him on the Quidditch team in his
first year when other first-years aren't even allowed their own broom
and later by her softness in allowing Harry and Ron to visit Hermione
in the hospital wing without an escort despite the danger of the
monster from the CoS attacking them. (I don't think she thought about
their blood status possibly protecting them, only their friendship
with Hermione.) He doesn't want to tell McGonagall about the Horcruxes
or the full contents of the Prophecy or anything else because she'd be
too protective of Harry. (And of course he wouldn't tell her or
antyone else about Snape's being the eavesdropper because he's
protecting Snape's privacy.)

As for McGonagall's role in the Order, she's not in the photograph
that Moody shows Harry, so this appears to be her first time around.
Dumbledore seems to be recruiting those close to him or loyal to him
to supplement the few surviving members of the old Order. Apparently
he recruits her (without actually mentioning the Order) right before
he sends Sirius Black to alert the "old crowd" and Snape to rejoin
Voldemort. (Interestingly, he sends her to Hagrid *before* he sends
the others, so she's absent for Black's transformation and the
grudging handshake, IIRC.) Most of the new Order members (aside from
Molly and Sirius Black) appear to be spies or liaisons of some
sort--Tonks, Shacklebolt, and Arthur Weasley for the Ministry; Snape
for the Death Eaters; Bill Weasley for the Gringotts goblins; Lupin
for the werewolves; Mundungus for the Knockturn Alley crowd; Aberforth
(IMO) for the Hog's Head clientele. The one time we see McGonagall at
12 GP, IIRC, she's looking very odd in Muggle clothes. Maybe
McGonagall is a Half-blood who, despite her apparent prejudice against
those who aren't "our kind" (not unique to her--the whole WW appears
to share her view) knows enough about Muggles to pass as one and help
DD learn what's going on in the Muggle world, say in her native
Scotland rather than England, where he has Figgy, among others, to
keep an eye on things? And, of course, she would report to Dumbledore
via Patronus just as Snape seems to do when DD is not at Hogwarts. (He
would know about Umbridge's attempt to thwart Harry's ambition to be
an Auror through her, for example.) And if she did go to school with
Tom Riddle, even for a year or two, he'd have asked her for her
recollections of him. (He probably asked her contemporary and fellow
Gryffindor, Augusta Longbottom, as well.)

Maybe he's using the old girl as best he can, capitalizing on her
loyalty without letting her get emotionally involved (his own love for
Harry has nearly interfered with his plans to defeat Voldemort, after
all, but her primary role seems to be at Hogwarts as teacher, HoH for
Gryffindor, and assistant headmistress rather than as Order member
outside the school. That's quite enough to be getting on with for a
witch in her seventies, after all.

Carol, just tossing out ideas here and committed to any McGonagall
theories