"Malfoy?"
He hadn't expected uncertainty from her, but there it was. Hermione Granger stood silhouetted in the bright sunshine streaming through the doorframe of Dungo's Chemistry, looking as if she thought she was intruding on something private. The trait he'd come to associate most with her, her bushy hair, was neatly plaited back along her neck and down her back. "Oddsbodds said to help you?"
Confidence was a garb he'd been wearing from an early age. Like armor, he donned it at all times, secure in its posture of folded arms, wide stance, lifted chin. Unlike armor, however, it took great concentration to keep this garb from floating away in the face of shock or humiliation. He donned it now.
Granger looked much the same as she had when they'd both attended their last year of Hogwarts, the Wizarding War behind them. Her face had lost its girlish roundness, had settled into more adult angles, something that he figured happened on that hellish year when he'd been trying to be invisible and she'd been running for her life and her friends.
Like most of the female Aurors, Granger eschewed jewelry, and preferred boots to heels. Unlike the Aurors, who needed the extra fabric to conceal what they might be carrying and to blend in with the crowd, she preferred dark trousers and shirts. The billowing fabric of regular robes could brush against items in a crime scene, taint the evidence. Granger wore no pointed hat, which Draco considered odd, since that mark of status was something he thought she'd flaunt. Her eyes, as always, seemed to take in and evaluate everything, including himself.
"Yes," he replied. Granger seemed to consider this word for a moment, then take it as her invitation, and stepped across the creaking floorboards over to him, a large camera in her hand.
He wondered what she was waiting for - for him to start shouting insults, or to start telling him what to do, perhaps?
"Dungo reported a break-in around lunch," he said, breaking the silence. "Oddsbodds and I got here, and I realized that he was drugged. He didn't seem to know if anything had been taken. Oddsbodds said for us to inventory the place and see if anything is missing."
"You realized?" He bristled at this, but Granger didn't seem to be mocking him. She seemed instead to be regarding him a bit strangely, as if getting his measure. This was going to test every ounce of his sorely tried patience.
"Yes. Anyway, we can split the list and start looking."
"Or we could cut our time and look behind the counter," Granger said, already turning to the glass counter at the front of the store. "Most chemists keep their money and any controlled substances back here. It's unlikely someone would go to this much trouble for essence of dittany or a get-well card."
Less than a minute. Less than one minute, and he could already feel his cheeks draining of blood in anger, the pangs of a headache at his temple.
"That's what this list is," he bluffed, walking over and hastily turning a page, hoping she wouldn't see. "List of all the controlled substances Dungo had…not that there seems to be much."
DUNGO CHEMISTRY LICENSED CONTROLLED SUBSTANCES
With official signed permission from a St. Mungo's Healer or other United Kingdom board-certified healer, Hippocrates Hibblewith Dungo is licensed to dispense the following substances in controlled amounts:
Class D Controlled Substances:
Dragon Toenail Powder - Five grams per patient, per month
South American Freshwater Plimpy Hearts - Three hearts per patient, per month
Syrup of Greek Lotus - One dram per patient, per two months
Sargasso Sea Serpent Fangs (crushed) - Ten grams per patient, per prescription
Opiate of Poppy seed - dispense as directed by healer
Edelweiss Juice - One-half dram per patient, per three months
Class E Controlled Substances:
Boomslang Skin - ¼ gram per patient (not to be purchased in conjunction with bicorn horn)
Bicorn Horn - ½ gram per patient (not to be purchased in conjunction with boomslang skin)
Mashed Rattlesnake Plantain - Three drams per patient
Dried Cannabis Leaf - Five grams per patient
As she examined the list, Draco tapped his hands with a silent Impervius, letting him touch the scene safely. A pearlescent glow emitted from his skin, and a check of Granger's slender fingers showed that she'd already done so.
A loud pop and a flash of light meant that she'd taken a picture of the glass cases, unbroken and untouched behind the counter. "The Class E substances seem to be all here - row's full," Granger spoke, as Draco examined the till, finding it still in good order - though with few enough galleons, sickles, and knuts in their individual drawers. "I guess he might have some in his back storeroom."
"Probably," Draco replied equably, hoping that she'd keep to the matter at hand. "Till doesn't seem to have been touched."
Granger made a noise that might have been disapproval or acknowledgement. "Looks like some Greek Lotus is gone - any recent purchases?"
Draco tried to keep the annoyance out of his voice as he pawed through the ledger. "Knotgrass…flutterby seed…here we are, two grams of Greek Lotus Syrup?"
"That's it," said Granger, sounding disappointed. More lights flashed, and Draco finally tugged the camera away from her, ostensibly to photograph the till, but more to keep her from setting off the flash in his face.
He grimaced at a sudden thought – would he have to take separate pictures of all the things she'd photographed? He refused to rely on her for anything more than he already had. They found enchanted keys for the cabinets, opening them up to do a more thorough examination.
They continued their search behind the counter, and he felt uncomfortably aware of the rustle of her robes beside him, the nearness of someone who despised him (and who wasn't shy about expressing her displeasure with him). Granger, he remembered, was good at witty retorts - almost as good as he, back in his heyday. Nowadays, he felt dulled and at a constant disadvantage, as if the razor edge of his personality was chipped and broken from having to knuckle under.
Perhaps if he could get her talking about something, she'd forget that it was him…and would perhaps leave the investigation in his hands.
"Why did Oddsbodds know to find you at Wheezes?" he asked, his voice cutting through the silence.
Draco heard her pause as she shifted tiny clinking vials and bottles, and watched the movement of her face in the reflection of the glass cabinet doors. "Ron works there - kind of to keep George company, you know."
No, he didn't know. Well, he'd heard of Fred Weasley's death, but not of Ron's employment at the joke shop. Nor of Granger's relationship with the Weasel, implied by the slight gleam in her eye, the blush on her cheekbones.
"I generally have lunch with the two of them, so Oddsbodds knew to find me there," she concluded, and the second pause made Draco aware that she'd turned to get a look at his expression. He turned quickly and maintained a fixed gaze in counting the vials of mashed rattlesnake plantain.
"Ah."
"I take it you have day shift?" she asked, and he got the feeling that she was just as uncomfortable with the situation as he was. At least that put them on equal footing.
"Yes…just coming back from lunch myself when- hang on-"
Granger turned to look at him in interest, but he'd already stood up, looking at the door. "Look at that - the sign on the door says that it's closed."
"So?"
Draco turned around, exiting the counter and walking up to the listed hours of operation. "Look - Dungo's old hours used to be from 7 a.m. to 6 p.m. - no lunch break. But he's crossed them out and now he opens at 12 p.m."
Granger frowned. "Maybe he can't keep up with business?"
"Then he'd hire extra help," Draco replied, growing excited at this potential new turn in the case. "But from the amount in that till, I can't imagine business is all that good." He frowned, remembering Dungo's bloodshot eyes. "You don't suppose…maybe he's abusing potions? Some of them can't get up in the morning so well anymore."
Potions abuse had always been a problem in the wizarding world, though generally less so than St. Mungo's liked to extemporize on. Draco could remember seedy corners and alcoves in Knockturn Alley where dealers would linger, waiting to dole out potions ingredients for exorbitant prices.
Use of such potions had skyrocketed, however, after the war's end. Grieving family members and spouses sought to forget their pain and losses with several illicit potions, growing addicted to the numbing sensation of Catatonius Concoctions and Essence of Ecstasius. Invented for psychiatric care, the potions allowed the user to shut out the pain of the present, exist in an anesthetized cocoon in which the past couldn't touch them.
More than a few crime scenes that Draco accompanied Oddsbodds to bore traces of potions abuse. Since the potion recipe was restricted knowledge, brewers guessed at the ingredients with varying degrees of success, putting both them and those they sold to in danger. Except in the case of dealers and brewers, the Ministry turned a forgiving eye, paroling the abusers out with mandatory counseling sessions.
"Dungo did lose a brother, I think," Granger began uncertainly. "He would have access to some of the key ingredients…"
"Personal stash, you think?" Draco said, nearly biting his tongue at the end of the sentence. Since when did he care what she thought? "Or maybe he's dealing it as well?"
"Maybe," she replied, biting her lip, carefully not looking at him. "Does he live above the store?"
"I think so," Draco muttered. "Lumos!"
He marched into the back storerooms, looking for a staircase or a bedroom, his wand held alit before him. Behind him, he could hear Granger's quiet step.
"There we are," he said, pointing his wand at a well-used slouching chair, several empty and stained beakers balanced precariously on its armrests. Even from there, his nose pricked and wrinkled at the syrupy-sweet scent coming off of them - no mistaking that odor.
"Familiar sight?"
He'd been waiting for it, and here it was - though, surprisingly, it was not about his family, his actions, his switch to her side, or the tattoo he kept hidden on his arm.
"No, as a matter of fact," he snarled, taking pleasure in the sharp jerk of her head towards him, the widened eyes. "Whatever else you lot might think I'm guilty of, potions abuse isn't on the list." Hermione's face, however, fell back into composed lines, except for her eyebrows, which lifted at him in what might have been amusement.
"Actually, I meant your work on the Catatonius bust in Hogsmeade," she said, strolling with a casual air towards the cabinet near the chair. "Oddsbodds was bragging on you."
Oh. He felt his face flush, and wondered if she'd made that up just to confound him.
Granger looked as if she were debating broaching the subject, but decided against it. Instead, she opened the cabinet.
"Ugh!" she exclaimed, screwing up her features into a moue of distaste at the smell. The cabinet was stuffed to the brim with the ingredients for Catatonius Concoctions. "Well, at least we know whoever broke in wasn't after that."
"Do you…" Draco began, and cleared his throat. Granger closed the cabinet door and faced him, fanning the air about her face. "Do you think whoever broke in was aware of Dungo's habit? Timed their break-in for when he'd be sacked out here? He looked like a regular Catatonius addict, now that I think about it."
"Maybe," Granger said, now looking about the room. "Think he had anything valuable hidden around here? It doesn't look like whoever broke in was after potions ingredients or money."
Draco shrugged diffidently, glad to forget the tension that had been there a minute ago. "We can always ask him again when he's in his right mind."
Granger nodded thoughtfully, raising the camera to her eyes to take a few pictures of the chair, the beakers, the full cabinet. "Where did they break in?"
"Back door." He nodded towards the area, and together they walked over to examine the flimsy door. Draco trailed a finger in the scorched grooves, then hastily pulled it back, rubbing it against his robes.
"Dark magic," he said, rubbing finger and thumb against one another. Granger's trusty camera captured the images, but fell away from her face to reveal wide eyes. "This suddenly got much more interesting."
"I don't know about Dark magic, but that's a lot of force and effort for something that must be very small," Granger said, sounding worried. She brushed past him to get a few more pictures from different angles. "The suspect got through the wards…somehow. I'd think the wards around a chemist's shop would be pretty strong…"
"Unless Old Dungo's been letting things slide as of late," Draco interjected. "His shop is out of the way, wouldn't attract much attention, and from the state of things inside, whatever's missing could go missing for days without being noticed."
"Who goes to the trouble of using Dark magic to break into a shop in Diagon Alley and doesn't take anything?" They contemplated her question for a moment. "We could go back and look through regular inventory. It's possible that someone had a really bad headache and couldn't wait for Dungo to open…"
"No," Draco replied, twisting his lips. "We're missing something. Something small. Something that this person thought Dungo would miss - either because his head's three meters off the ground, or because it's something he wouldn't look for right away…"
He went back to the counter, trying to take it all in at once, see if anything was amiss. This was a task performed with much greater ease in neat and orderly homes. Behind Dungo's counter, however, things were terribly messy, though in an organic way, an arrangement that spoke more of a distracted mind than of a thief intent on finding something. Draco prowled from shelf to shelf, acutely aware of the fact that Granger was watching him instead of the scene.
He almost missed it - the corner of a parchment envelope, jammed underneath the till. He beckoned to Granger to take a picture before he carefully extracted it, examining the stamp and embossment on its front.
"See the rip? The smudged fingerprints?" he said excitedly. "I think this must have been what the suspect was after. Good chemists - or at least ones that have been at it for a while - always wash their hands before going to work."
He thumbed the envelope over, looking for something, some hint of what might have been inside - an explanatory letter, a bill or an invoice…
Nothing.
Piqued, Draco slapped it back down on the counter, swearing under his breath. Hermione mirrored his disappointment. They were still rookies, he knew, apt to get excited and think they could solve a case within the hour.
He started at the feel of Granger's fingers upon his own, and whipped his head to look over at her. But no, she was pushing his hand to the side to get a better look at the writing on the envelope.
Department for the Regulation and Control of Potions Ingredients
Ministry of Magic
To:
Hippocrates Hibblewith Dungo
Dungo's Chemistry
Number 52, Diagon Alley
Re: Licensure and Procurement
"Malfoy, you were right!" she exclaimed. "This is it!"
There were four words he'd never thought to come out of her mouth.
"What is what?"
"This is the thing that's missing - his licensure!"
"So?"
"Identity theft!" Granger cried.
"Sorry?"
"You know, when you steal someone's identity and pretend to be them, so that you can steal from them."
"All the restricted Polyjuice Potion ingredients are accounted for, Granger."
"No, not that!" She looked slightly flushed and excited, and he idly wondered if he looked the same way when he had a lead. "It's common among Muggle criminals. In the Department for the Regulation and Control of Potions Ingredients, you need proper clearance to order the restricted stuff - so they know they're not giving it to dealers, or to people who don't know how to distribute it properly. You need a license. I bet whoever broke in took this and is using the license to order a big shipment of some controlled items right now! Why bother with the little bit Dungo's got here when they can use his license to get a lot?"
"Are you sure?"
"No," she admitted, tearing her gaze from the envelope to look him in the eyes. "But it makes the most sense. Someone who knows Dungo came in here with the intent of just getting that license - and supposing that Dungo would be too out of it to realize for a while that they were making purchases in his name."
Draco frowned. It would make sense for a chemist to dabble in illicit potions on the side, for some extra money…it could even explain his ability to open later in the day. "Someone? Either Dungo's dealer…or someone he was supplying - who decided to cut out the middleman."
Granger grimaced. "It's the difference between a Class W and a Class Y felony, and they carry some serious differences in penalties. Unless there were some mitigating circumstances, like if his life had been threatened, or if there was a criminal information exchange of any kind, it might qualify under…"
Draco decided to cut her off before she recited the entire law book to him.
"Has anyone ever told you that you are an insufferable know-it-all?"
"Ron and Harry. Twice daily, each. I don't pay attention to them, either."
She shot him a smirk, which he returned with a glare.
"Anyway," he said, brushing past her. "I'm going to contact Oddsbodds. That license needs to be watched, so we can see what's being ordered and where it's being shipped to."
"We'll contact him together." She stepped forward quickly, and Draco felt the argument coming.
"No we won't. It's my case - you were brought on as unnecessary help. I can do this on my own." He tried on a sneer, which, he was gratified to note, hadn't lost any of its trademark effect. Granger pursed her lips in annoyance, the calm that she'd been displaying previously ebbing away.
"Unnecessary! You wouldn't have connected the dots without my help!"
"I already found the envelope," he said, dismissing her objection with a wave of his hand. "I connected the dots and found out about Dungo's addiction and the Dark magic used to open the door. Matter of time."
"A matter of about a month, you mean," she shot back, eyes blazing. Draco fought against the instinct to back up a step and shield his face. "By which time the suspect and whatever he wanted to take using Dungo's license would be long gone!"
"Is there a problem, Miss Granger, Mr. Malfoy?"
In a curiously coordinated movement, Malfoy felt his head turn at the same time Granger did to look back at the hallway. Slightly sooty, an enigmatic expression on his face, Oddsbodds watched them. Draco wondered how long he'd been standing there.
"No, sir," he said. Granger shook her head.
"I take it that you have some leads on the case?"
"Yes!" They answered as one, and Draco felt that Granger was struggling just as hard not to glare at him as he was at her.
Oddsbodds spread wide a hand. "Lead on."
