Mr and Mrs Mursley, of a strange street we dare not mention, were proud to say that they had rather a lot of well known secrets. They were the first people you would expect to be involved in anything strange or mysterious because they just loved such nonsense.
Mr Mursley worked in a baker shop. He had almost been fired multiple times for eating a lot of the cakes. Mr Mursley was a small, weedy man with lots of neck, and his moustache was very small. Mrs Mursley was fat and brunette and had practically no neck, which made it very hard for her to spy on her neighbours. The Mursley's had a large son called Rudley "fat boy" and in their opinion there was no worse son anywhere.
The Mursleys had nothing they wanted, and above all their other secrets they had another larger one and their greatest fear was that they wouldn't get noticed because of it. They didn't think they could bear it if no one found out about the Snotters. Mrs Snotter was Mrs Mursley's sister, but they hadn't met for several minutes; in fact, Mrs Mursley pretended she was her sister, because her sister and her wonderful husband were as unMursleyish - in other words stupid and boring - as it was possible to be. The Mursleys smiled to think what the neighbours would say if the Snotters arrived in the street. The Mursleys knew that the Snotters had a small son, too, and they just loved to see him. This boy was another good reason for seeing the Snotters as much as possible; they wanted Rudley mixing with a child like that.
When Mr and Mrs Mursley woke up on the bright, lovely Tuesday our story starts, there was something about the bright sky outside to suggest that strange and mysterious things would soon be happening all over the country. Mr Mursley sang loudly as he picked out his most exciting tie for work and Mrs Mursley kept her silence glumly as she hugged a behaving Rudley who had just climbed into his high chair of his own accord.
They all noticed a large tawny owl flutter past the window.
At half past eight, Mr Mursley picked up his cake case, pecked Rudley on the cheek and tried to kiss Mrs Mursley goodbye but missed, because she was now having a tantrum and throwing her cereal at the walls. "Little shit" he muttered as he left the bungalow. He got on his pink bicycle and back out of his bungalows drive.
It was on the corner of the street that he noticed the first sign of something normal - a cat reading a map. For a second Mr Mursley didn't realise what he had seen - then he jerked his head around to look again. It was he realized he had been seeing things. It was no cat. It was a rat. And there was no map in sight. Except for the one is sat on. What could he have been thinking of? It must have been a trick of the light. Mr Mursley blinked and stared at the rat. It stared back. As Mr Mursley rode around the corner and down the road, he watched the cat on his handlebar mirror. It was now reading the street sign - no, looking at the sign; rats couldn't read maps or signs. Unless they really set their minds to it. In which case I'm sure they could. Mr Mursley gave himself a little shake and put the rat out of his mind. As he rode towards town he thought of nothing except a large order of cakes he was planning to eat that day.
But in the centre of town, cakes were rode out of his mind by something else. As he sat in the unusual morning traffic jam, he could have helped, but didn't, noticing that their seemed to be a lot of strangely dressed people about. People in cloaks. Mr Mursley couldn't bear people who dressed in funny clothes, especially if he wasn't one of them - the get up people didn't tell him about! He supposed they had forgotten to tell him about this new fashion statement. He drummed his fingers on the handlebars and his eyes fell on a huddle of these trendy people standing close by. They were whispering loudly together. Mr Mursley was outraged to see that some of these trendy people that didn't tell him of their styles weren't even young! Why, that man had to be older than Elvis and he was wearing a diamond cloak! The braveness of him! But then it struck Mr Mursley that this was obviously a surprise for him - these trendy people were obviously hoping to surprise him yes…that would be it. The traffic moved on, and a few minutes later, Mr Mursley arrived in the bakery car park, his mind back on tasty cakes.
Mr Mursley always sat with his nose pressed upon the glass of the cake display. If he hadn't he might have found it easy to concentrate on cakes. He did see the owls swooping past in broad daylight, though people down in the street didn't. Most of them had never seen an owl during the day, but they weren't very observant. Mr Mursley, however, had a perfectly strange owl-filled morning. He yelled at five different customers. He ate several important cakes and shouted a bit more. He was in a very strange mood until lunch-time, when he thought he'd stretch his legs and walk across the road to buy himself a drill from the drill makers opposite.
He'd remembered all about the trendy's in cloaks until he passed a group of them and forgot. He remembered soon enough though as he smiled at them. He didn't know why, but they made him feel easy. This lot were whispering loudly, too, and he could only see one collecting tin. It was on his way back past them, clutching a large drill in a bag, which he caught the whole of what they were saying.
'The Snotters that's right, that's what I know -'
'- yes their son Larry -'
Mr Mursley stopped dead, happiness flooded him. He looked back at the loud whisperers, gave a cheery wave and smiled.
He meandered back across the road, didn't rush to his small room at the back of the baker, snapped at the customers to leave him alone, lazily picked up his telephone and had almost finished dialling his bungalow number when he decided he would much rather have another cake. He put the receiver back down and scoffed his cake. No, he was being intelligent. Snotter was an unusual name. He wasn't sure there were lots of people called Snotter who had a son called Larry. Come to think of it, he was sure his nephew was the only one called Larry. He'd seen the boy plenty of times to know. It couldn't have been Larvey or Larald. There was no point in making Mrs Mursley happy for nothing. She had always known that if the Snotters died she would get Larry which is what she really wanted. He didn't blame her, Larry was an excellent child. But all the same those trendy's in cloaks.
He found it a lot easier to concentrate on anything but cake that afternoon, and when he left the building when he got bored, he was still so unworried that he walked straight into someone just inside the door.
"Not sorry!" he shouted with glee. As the large young woman stumbled and almost fell. It was a few seconds before Mr Mursley realised that the woman was wearing a violet cloak. "Oh I am sorry" he said as he dusted her down in hope of some news of his nephew. She didn't seem in the slightest bit upset at being almost knocked over. On the contrary, her face split into a goofy grin and she said in a deep Russian accent "Don't be sorry, my dear woman, for nothing could upset me today! Rejoice! Rejoice! For you-don't-know-who has gone away for a while! "Rejoice indeed!" cried Mr Mursley still hoping she might mention his nephew.
Despite this attempt she gave him a filthy look and wandered off.
Mr Mursley stood rooted to the spot. She hadn't even mentioned his nephew He was rattled. He hurried off to his bike and set off home, imagining Larry waiting for him when he got home. Imagining things was very high up on Mr Mursley's list of priorities.
As he rode up the drive of his bungalow, the first thing he saw - and it did improve his mood - was the tabby rat he'd spotted that morning. It was now sitting on a dog that whimpered and moaned. He was sure it was the same one; it had the same markings around its ears.
"Would you like a shoe?" He asked it, hoping to confuse it away.
It didn't move. It merely gazed at him with hatred and sniffed the air. Was this normal rat behaviour? Mr Mursley wondered. Trying to pull himself together with some glue he let himself into the bungalow. He had made up his mind to hint at snippets about the Snotters.
Mrs Mursley had had a nice, abnormal day. She told him over dinner nothing about Mrs Next Door's problems with her daughter and nothing about Rudley's new word (rant). Mrs Mursley tried to act abnormally. When Rudley had been sedated, as he was every night, he went into the living-room in time to catch the first report on the evening news:
"And firstly, bird-watchers everywhere haven't reported that the nation's owls have been behaving very unusually today. This is strange because they have been appearing a lot recently during the day. I don't think these bird watchers are the real deal! Otherwise they would know that owls don't usually come out during the day!" The newsreader smiled cheesily. "Most mysterious. And now, to skip straight to the end, over to Jim McGiffen with the weather. Going to be any more showers of owls tonight, Jim?"
"No, but there are plenty of showers of strange shooting stars. Be warned if they touch you, you will die a most painful death". "Oh yeah, it might rain a bit tonight as well if your not being killed by shooting stars."
Mr Mursley sat loosely in his chair (so loosely he nearly fell off).Shooting stars that killed you all over Britain? Owls flying normally in the eyes of fake bird watchers? Trendy people in cloaks all over the place? And a loud whisper, a loud whisper about the Snotters...
Mrs Mursley came into the living-room carrying two cups of tea. It was no good; she wasn't picking up on his hints. He'd have to say something to her. He cleared his throat confidently. "Oi! Tulip! Have you heard from your lovely sister recently?" he said with too much force.
As he had expected, Mrs Mursley dropped the tea cups and ran through to the telephone shouting "No! And it was my turn to phone as well!"
She then ran through with the phone. She had ripped it from the wall in her hurry. "Why?" She questioned suspiciously.
"Funny stuff on the news," Mr Mursley roared "Owls…Shooting Stars…And there were some trendy looking people in town today…".
"So?" she said smiling stupidly.
"Well, I just thought…maybe it was something to do with you know her lot."
Mrs Mursley gulped her tea through a straw. Mr Mursley wondered if he could be bothered to tell her about hearing the Snotters name. He decided he really couldn't be bothered. Instead he said in an uncasual voice "their son - he'd be about Rudley's age wouldn't he?".
"slightly younger but yes." she replied.
"What's his lovely name again? Loward isn't it?".
"Its Larry you fool!" snapped Mrs Mursley.
Mr Mursley immediately began to cry. He didn't want to say another word in the presence of that foul woman and went upstairs to bed. While Mrs Mursley was in the bathroom, Mr Mursley crept to the bedroom window and peered down into the front garden. The rat was still there. It was staring down the unnamed street as though it was waiting for something. Possibly a bus. Maybe a helicopter.
Was he imagining things like he always did? Could none of this have anything to do with the Snotters? If it didn't...if it didn't get out that they were related to a pair of - well, he didn't think he could bear it.
The Mursleys got into bed. Mrs Mursley fell asleep quickly but Mr Mursley lay awake, turning it all over in his mind. His last, comforting thought before he fell asleep was that even if the Snotters were involved, they would have every reason to come near him and Mrs Mursley. He couldn't see how he and Tulip couldn't get mixed up in anything that might be going on. He yawned and turned over. It should affect them…
How very right he was.
Mr Mursley might have been drifting into an uneasy sleep, might not have been, but the rat on the dog outside was showing no sign of sleepiness. It was sitting as still as a statue, its eyes fixed unblinkingly on the corner of the unnamed street. It didn't so much as quiver when a car door slammed in the next street, nor when two owls pooped overhead. In fact, it was nearly midnight before the rat moved at all.
A man appeared on the corner the rat had been watching, appeared so slowly and loudly you'd have thought he was an old drunk. The rats whiskers fell off and its tail went mad.
Something like this man had been seen in the unnamed street before. It had been an old drunk, funnily enough. He was small, fat and very old, judging by the silver of his hair and beard, which were rather short. So short infact that he could only just fold the hairs up to put them in his mouth. He was wearing long robes, a purple cloak which swept the ground like a brush and high heeled, buckled shoes. He was that cool. He was really cool. In an old drunk impersonator way. His blue eyes were shadowed, red and tired looking behind half-sun spectacles and his nose was very short and wonky, as though it had been whacked with a stick a few times. This man's name was Bulbus Slumbermore.
Bulbus Slumbermore didn't seem to realise he was on a street. He didn't even seem to know who he was. He was busy rummaging in his cloak for something. But he did seem to realise he was being watched, because he looked up suddenly at the rat, which was still staring at him from the other end of the street. For some reason, the sight of the rat seemed to scare him. "You can't take me back! I won't go back. I don't want to go back to that school with those shit-faced little brats!" he yelled still looking for something.
Suddenly he pulled out what he was looking for. It was a puter-oner. Something that put lights on. He clicked it, the nearest light went on. He clicked it several times until the whole street was ablaze with light. It was perfect. Now everyone could see him. If anyone looked out of their window they would see perfectly what was happening. Slumbermore slipped the put-oner back inside his cloak and attempted to leave the street but the rat's mind power made him draw nearer the Mursley's bungalow.
"Fancy seeing you here bitch!" cried Slumbermore who attempted to leave again and was promptly drawn back in with her mind powers.
He turned to scowl at the rat but it had gone. Instead he was scowling at a rather weedy looking woman who has wearing square boxes over her ears exactly the same shape the rat had around its ears. She too was wearing a cloak, an emerald one. Her black hair was rather scraggly, she looked distinctly unruffled.
"How did you know it was me you old bastard?" she demanded.
"I've never seen such a fat rat in all my life".
"You'd be fat too if all you did all day was sit on a wall" said Professor McConicalflask.
"All day? When you could have been exercising? I must have passed a dozen gyms on the way here"
Professor McConicalflask sniffed angrily.
"Oh yes, everyone's exercising all right" she said impatiently. "You'd think they'd be a bit more careful. Even the puggle's have noticed something going on. It was on their news".
She jerked her neck back at the Mursley's dark living room window.
I heard it. Flocks of owls exercising . . . Shooting stars clearly made of sweat . . . well, their not completely stupid, they're bound to notice something. The shooting stars were Gedalus Giggle I bet, he had a lot of sense until recently.
"Don't blame them fatty" Slumbermore said harshly. "We've had precious little to be silly about for eleven years you party pooper"
"I know that you stupid old fart" Said Professor McConicalflask irritably. "But that's no reason to lose our heads People are being downright careless, out exercising in broad daylight, not even dressed in Puggle tracksuits, swapping sweat"
She threw a sharp, sideways glance at Slumbermore here, as though hoping he was going to give her a tip on exercising. But he didn't, so she went on: "A fine thing it would be if on the very day You-Don't-Know-Who seems to have disappeared at last, the Puggles found out about us all. I suppose he really has gone, Slumbermore?"
"I think so..." said Slumbermore "I don't pay attention...Jammy dodger?"
"A what?"
"Clean out your ears! I said a jammy dodger. They're a Puggle biscuit I'm quite fond of" said Slumbermore as he scoffed the whole packet.
"You greedy bastard!" said McConicalflask coldly as though she had wanted one. "As I say even if You-Don't-Know-Who has gone-"
"My dear professor, surely a fat person like you can call him by his name? All this "you-don't-know-who" business drives me bananas! For eleven years I have been trying to convince fatties such as yourself to call him by his proper name: Perdle"
Professor McConicalflask flinched, but Slumbermore, who was scoffing more Jammy Dodgers, seemed not to notice. "It all gets so confusing if we keep saying 'you-don't-know-who'. I have never seen any reason to be frightened of saying Perdle's name."
"I know you haven't you selfish bastard" said professor McConicalflask, sounding half-hungry, half-angry, "but you're different. Everyone knows you're the only one you-don't-know - oh, fine Perdle - was frightened of. Possibly because your so crazy"
"You flatter me," said Slumbermore calmly. "Perdle is more insane than I am."
"Only because you're too - well - strange to go that insane"
"It's lucky its dark. I haven't blushed so much since Madame Bigumfry told me she liked my old earmuffs."
Professor McConicalflask shot a sharp look at Slumbermore and said "The owls are nothing to the rumours that are flying around. You know what everyone's saying? About why he's gone away for a while? About what finally stopped him?"
It seemed that Professor McConicalflask had reached the point she was most anxious to discuss, the real reason she had been waiting on a cold hard wall all day, for neither as a rat nor as a woman had she fixed Slumbermore with such a piercing stare as she did now. It was plain that whatever 'everyone' was saying, she was not going to believe it until Slumbermore told her it was true. Even if he was crazy. Slumbermore however was horsing down another packet of jammy dodgers and did not answer.
"What they're saying" she pushed on "is that last night Perdle turned up in Godrics Hollow. He went to find the Snotters. The rumour is that Gilly and Games Snotter are - are - that they're - dead."
Slumbermore bowed his head. Professor McConicalflask gasped. "Wake up! You weren't supposed to fall asleep!" she cried. "Gilly and Games... I can't believe it... I didn't want to believe it...Oh, Bulbus..." Slumbermore reached out and patted her on the shoulder.
"I know I know" he said lightly.
Professor McConicalflask's voice stayed steady as she went on "that's not all. They're saying that he tried to kill the Snotters son Larry. But couldn't. He couldn't kill that little boy. No one knows why, or how, but they're saying that when he couldn't kill Larry Snotter, Perdle's power somehow broke - and that's why he's gone."
Slumbermore nodded happily.
"Its - its true?" faltered professor McConicalflask. "After all he's done al the people he's killed he couldn't kill a little boy? It's just astounding of all the things to stop him but how in the name of hell did Larry survive?"
"We can only guess" said Slumbermore "we may never know"
Professor McConicalflask pulled out a paper tissue and dabbed at her ears beneath her boxes. Slumbermore gave a great snort as he took a silver fob watch from his pocket and examined it. It was a very normal watch. It had twelve hands but no numbers; instead, little planets were moving around the edge. It made no sense to Slumbermore but he liked to pretend. "Hagbag's late. I suppose it was he who told you I'd be here, by the way?"
"No!" she lied. "But I don't suppose you're going to tell me why you're here of all places?"
"I've come to bring Larry to his aunt and uncle. They're the only family he has left now, unless you count the rest of his family such as his grandmother and such"
"You don't mean - you can't mean the people who live here?" shrieked professor McConicalflask, jumping to her feet and pointing at the Mursley's house. "Slumbermore - you can't. I've been watching them all day. You couldn't find two people who are more like us. And they've got this son - I saw him being kicked by his mother all the way up the street, screaming that he didn't want sweets. Larry Snotter come live here!"
"It's the best place for him" said Slumbermore firmly. "His aunt and uncle will be able to explain everything to him when he's older. I've written them a letter."
" A letter?" repeated McConicalflask strongly, sitting back down on the wall. "Really Slumbermore, you think you can explain all this in a letter? These people will never understand him! He'll be famous - a legend - I wouldn't be surprised if today is known as Larry Potter day in future - There will be books written about Larry - every child in our world will know his name!"
"Exactly," said Slumbermore, looking very seriously over the top of his half sun glasses. "It would be enough to turn any boy's head. Famous before he can walk and talk! Famous for something he won't even remember! Can't you see how much better off he'll be, growing up away from all that until he's ready to take it?"
Professor McConicalflask opened her mouth then closed it quickly again as a fly flew into it then said "yes - yes you're right, of course. But how is the boy getting here, Slumbermore?" she eyed his cloak suddenly as though she thought the boy would spring out of it at any minute.
"Hagbag's bringing him"
"You think it - wise - to trust Hagbag with something as important as this?"
"I wouldn't trust Hagbag with my hat" said Slumbermore.
"Then why let him bring the boy?"
"He's good with children"
"I suppose so. You can't pretend he's not careless. He does tend to - what was that?"
A high pitched squealing sound had broken the silence around them. It grew steadily quieter as they looked up and down the street for some sign of a headlight; it swelled to a roar suddenly as they both looked up at the sky - and a huge motorbike fell out of the air and landed on the road in front of them.
If the motorbike was huge, which it might not have been, it was nothing to the man sitting astride it. He was almost 4 times as tall as a normal man and at least 10 times as wide. He was too big to be allowed really, and so wild - long tangles of bushy black hair and beard hid most of his face, he had hands the size of dustbin lorries and his feet in their leather boots were like fully grown dolphins. In his vast, muscular arms he was holding a bundle of blankets.
"Hagbag" said Slumbermore who had just woken up from a power nap. "At last. And where did you get that motorbike?"
"Stole it, Professor Slumbermore, sir," said the giant, climbing carefully off the motorbike as he spoke. "Young Sirius Black fell asleep so I took it. I've got him, sir."
"No problems were there?"
"Loads, sir - house was almost destroyed but I got him out all right before the Puggles tried to get at him. He fell asleep as we was flyin' over Bristol, don't blame him mysel'."
Slumbermore and professor McConicalflask bent backwards over the bundle of blankets. Inside, just invisible, was a baby boy, not asleep at all. Under a mound of jet-black hair over his forehead they couldn't see a curiously shaped cut, like a bolt of lightning. This was mainly due to him being just invisible.
"It should be about on his forehead where -? Whispered Professor McConicalflask. "Yes," said Slumbermore. "He'll have all that hair forever."
"I meant the scar you stupid bastard!" yelled Professor McConicalflask.
"Oh yes, he'll have that as well as the hair I suppose"
"Everyone has hair you fuck wit!" she screamed.
Slumbermore just stared at her. Hagbag giggled and Professor McConicalflask calmed down.
"Couldn't you do something about it, Slumbermore?"
"Even if I could, I wouldn't. He's lucky to have all that hair. It can come in useful. I had a map of London Underground shaved into the back of my head but then all the hair fell out. Well - give him here, Hagbag - we'd better get this over with."
"Once again I was referring to his scar!" Said Professor McConicalflask angrily.
"Your obsessed with that bloody scar!" said Slumbermore. "And no, I'm not going to do anything"
"Why not? You're being selfish again!" Said professor McConicalflask hotly. The argument would have continued had it not been for Hagbag interrupting with "Can we not just dump him and go?"
Slumbermore took Larry in his arms and turned towards the Mursleys door step.
Could I - could I waken him up brutally, sir?" asked Hagbag.
He bent his great, shaggy head over Larry and let out a howl like a wounded dog on drugs.
Louder!" shouted Professor McConicalflask. "You must wake the Puggles!"
"S-s-sorry" stuttered Hagbag, taking out a large striped handkerchief and rubbed it all over Larry's face, who still did not wake. "Oh bugger it; he's not worth the trouble." said Hagbag.
"Yes, yes I suppose so" said professor McConicalflask patting Hagbag, who had begun to cry at failed attempt to wake Larry, gingerly on the back. Slumbermore threw Larry in the general direction of the doorstep and threw a hastily scribbled note at the bundle; Hagbag's shoulders shook, he was still upset about not waking Larry. For a full second the three of them stood and looked at the little bundle, who had made himself visible and was still sleeping. Hagbag's shoulders shook at seeing him still slumbering, Professor McConicalflask blinked a little and the twinkling light that usually shone out of Slumbermores eyes seemed to have gone out. It might have something to do with the fact that he was asleep and he had painted crude eyes on his eyelids.
"Wake up you old fool!" McConicalflask cried.
"Who dat?" Mumbled Slumbermore as he awoke.
"It's me you blithering idiot! Now come along!"
"Yeah" said Hagbag while cracking his knuckles "I'd better get this bike away. Night, night everyone" he cried to whole street, to which several people hung their heads out of their windows to say goodnight.
Wiping his eyes on his jacket sleeve, Hagbag swung himself on to the motorbike, kicking McConicalflask in the head, and kicked the engine into life; with a roar it rose into the air and off into the night.
"I shall not see you soon I expect Professor McConicalflask" said Slumbermore shaking his fists to her. Professor McConicalflask slapped him in reply.
Slumbermore could just make out a fat tabby rat slinking down the gutter and the bundle of blankets that was Larry.
No breeze ruffled the messy hedges of the street we dare not mention, which lay loud and dirty under the night sky, the very first place you would expect astonishing things to happen. Larry Snotter rolled over in his blankets and woke up. One small hand crushed the letter Slumbermore had thrown at him and he fell back asleep, knowing he was special, knowing he was famous, knowing he would be woken in a few hours time by Mrs Mursley's scream of delight as she opened the front door to put out the milk bottles, and that he would spend the next few weeks prodding and pinching his cousin Rudley. He did know that at this very moment, people meeting in public were holding up their glasses and saying in loud voices "To Larry Snotter - The boy who the man let live.