Time and Space in The Portrait Universe

[Steve]

No: HPFGUIDX 182725

In the recent chapter discussion, a question was asked regarding
whether Phineas spend all his time hanging around in Hermione's
dark 'beaded bag' just waiting for them to let something slip.
Seems a very dull existance.

But that does bring up another question in my mind, what is 
the Portrait's Universe like? 

First, how many portrait Phineas's are there? Is there just one
who wanders from portrait to portrait, or is there one for each
portrait, all with identical knowledge and experience. Each
merely wandering around in their respective portrait universes.

For Phineas-1, his portrait universe is all the portraits in
Hogwarts plus the 'portrait room' (more on that later) which
represents his own portrait.

As Phineas, or any other portrait, perceives it, his personal
universe is merely a large room with a window for each
portrait he has. When he looks out one window, he see the
Headmaster's office. When he looks out the other, he sees 
out a window into Harry's bedroom at the Black house. (Of
course, only while the portrait is in the Black house.)

I speculate that the other portraits at Hogwarts represent
separate rooms in which the individual portrait characters 
live. Though strickly speaking it would be literally a room
as some of the portraits are outside. But none the less,
the metaphorical equivalent of passing from portrait to 
portrait would be a normal person passing from room to room.

So, in this model, for Phineas to check on his Black House
portrait, now located in the Beaded Bag, he just has to 
walk to the otherside of the room.

Not, just like a person stepping to the side on a window to
be hidden from view. A portrait subject needs merely to step
away, or to the side of, the portrait frame. Note when 
Harry enters his bedroom in the Black House, he senses that
Phineas is there, but he can't see him. I believe this 
happens more than once. Likely Phineas is listening for 
trouble, but is keeping out of sight.

But, do you get a sense of time as Portrait characters move
around? When the move within the castle, the seem to move in
real time. Yet, when the move between locations the times
seems greater than simply walking across the room. Remember
in Dumbledore's office, the night Harry had the dream about
Arthur, Dumbledore sent various portraits on missions for 
him. Not huge, but certainly a significant time seems to
have elapsed before they return with messages. Even when
Dumbledore sends Phineas to tell Sirius that the Weasely
will come to visit, a noticeable length of time passed before
Phineas return. Still, I guess other factors could account
for that time. 

While this was just a lot of speculation, I can't help 
wondering exactly what it is like and what is going on behind
those portraits? What are the perceptions of time and space
in there? 

Steve/bboyminn