Cook's Journal

The first indication I had that something was amiss at Casa Rumpole was that the door was ajar. Not by much, mind you; but She Who Must Be Obeyed was never one for leaving doors ajar. It offends her sense of what's proper and decent, you see. Chops are meant to be grilled, potatoes are meant to be boiled, and doors are meant to be shut, and preferably locked, when people aren't actually stepping over the threshold.

Drawing on dim memories of long-ago and never-used RAF training, as well as on much more vivid memories of the exploits of Allan Quatermain and Mr Holmes and his good friend Dr Watson, I crept up to the opened door as quietly as I could until I was able to hear the voices within:

"...Hermione? Oh, goodness yes. She's a good girl. I met her at Tesco's a few weeks ago; I was having trouble with my grocery bags. She helped me get them home, and I invited her in for a cup of tea.  Haven't seen her since."

That was Hilda, the old dear, sounding quite calm and unruffled. This was a new and wholly unexpected development; in all our years of wedded conjugality, I never knew until that moment that C.H. Wystan's daughter could fabricate extremely plausible lies on the spot with a facility that would be the envy of any crime boss lugged before the beak. At that moment I loved her with every fibre of my being.

There was a slight snort, light and feminine, from whoever it was that Hilda was addressing. "That sounds like Hermione," the addressee said, and indeed it was female, and not much older than Miss Granger from the sound of it. "She probably would have been a Girl Guide if she hadn't been accepted at Hog-- at her boarding school instead."

"Yes, you're right, she probably would have been. Speaking of tea," Hilda said, "would you like a cup, Officer Tonks?"

"I'd love to, Mrs. Rumpole, but I've got to be going. An Auror's-- I mean police officer's -- work is never done."

That was my cue to back away from the door and get out of sight behind the tall yew planted next to the front stoop.  I did, just as Officer Tonks came out the door.

My perch behind the yew was ideal; so long as Tonks didn't spin around for any reason, she couldn't see me, but I could get a tolerably good look at her as she passed by.  She had mousy brown hair that was was partially hidden under a Metropolitan Police cap, spiked in a somewhat more sedate version of that 'punk' fashion I had been trying to wish out of existence for the past two decades. I didn't get much more than a quick glimpse of her eyes, but they seemed to be darkish, perhaps a few shades of brown darker than said hair. She had a heart-shaped face that on another woman would have been prettily dainty, but the daintiness effect, not to mention her attempt to impersonate a constable, was somewhat compromised by her ripped jeans and deliberately-torn leather jacket.  I watched quietly as she went on her energetic and non-dainty way, the leather of her motorcycle jacket creaking with each swing of her arms as she strode along the pavement.

Once the bogus Officer Tonks was out of sight, I stepped into the house to find Hilda staring at the floor, shaking her head.   She looked up at me and smiled.  "How long were you standing outside, Rumpole?"

"Long enough to hear the essence.  It seems I missed a spot of excitement," I said both to her and to Dumbledore, as I put away my coat.

"You did indeed, Horace," averred the late Chief Warlock of the Wizengamot, who had just stepped out from behind the tree in the painting above the fireplace.   "And now I must go too, to find Hermione before Nymphadora does, so I can inform her of what has just transpired. I'll be back later this evening, if possible." And with that, he winked out of the frame, presumably to go find a painting at Hogwich or Sandwarts or whatever that place was called.

"'Nymphadora'?" I repeated after Dumbledore had vanished. 

"Now, now, Rumpole, I suppose that to them, names like 'Horace' and 'Hilda' are every bit as strange."

"She doesn't seem very nymphlike to me, old thing.  I suspect that in her orisons all my sins will not be remembered.  I take it that Hermione was spotted here by the Auror?"

"Not quite, but near enough.  That Tonks witch was trying not to give too much away to a Muggle, but it was obvious why she was here.  You remember Professor Dumbledore mentioning the curfew?" 

"I do indeed."  It was one of the first things Dumbledore had mentioned in his daily sessions with us on the Snape brief.  It seemed that because of the Voldemort problem, all Hogwarts pupils had been ordered to keep to the school grounds at all times unless accompanied by an adult witch or wizard. 

"Well, the curfew is especially strong for those pupils known to be close friends of the Potter boy.   She was spotted in the neighborhood when she came here -- thank goodness Professor Snape had the good sense to be under an Invisibility Cloak when he was out walking with her -- and Tonks has been interviewing everyone in the neighborhood to find out where Hermione was going."

"Ah. She must have been seen some distance from here, then, for Tonks to have taken so long to work her way through the neighborhood before finding us." I sighed and pulled out a cigar, though I found I was having the devil of a time keeping my hands steady enough to light it. "That's a relief."

Oh, the foolish words out of foolish mouths...

(...to be continued...)