I go about my business as usual, I think, but something is changing anyway. I do wash my hair again two days after seeing her, after eating a sloppy dinner in my flat, and I do follow her instructions to the letter. Naturally I try to figure out what she put in there, I do have a nose after all. I can make out several herbs, magical and not, and what I think is moondew extract. There are several notes that elude me, however, and I both relish in the challenge to work it out and feel annoyed at being bested by a mere slip of a witch in the realm where I have a Mastery.
My attention feels split, torn between work and other such ideas, new research, another meeting at St Mungo's resulting in an agreement to trial a Memory Potion on the one hand, and on the other the mystery of the Hair-ologist. Who is she, where did she come from, what does she actually do with her clients? Why the Glamour to her face, why the blindness? Why won't she say, or can't she say?
A few days after Malfoy Manor I manage to arrange a visit with Pansy Parkinson. She works at the Daily Prophet after her failed engagement to Martinus Selwyn. The wizard ran off with a busty blonde from the States and she still has to care for her mother and little sister since no one else does after the War.
We meet for lunch at a café not far from their office, and I snag a table in a corner.
"Hello, Professor," she says and seems to do a double-take upon laying her eyes on me. She's dressed in purple robes in a businesslike cut but the hems are frayed and the fabric worn and slightly faded. Clearly life hasn't been treating her well since the War.
I scowl, as usual, but nod at her in greeting. "Miss Parkinson."
"You look well," she says, eyes still fixed on my hair.
"And you." I suspect we both know it for the lie it is, but even I am not completely immune to social necessities. Occasionally. "How is Aster?"
Aster, her sister, started Hogwarts during my time as Headmaster. I knew she was sorted into Slytherin but I never interacted much with her. A shy but clever girl, at least that was what she seemed to be at eleven. Dark hair, like her sister.
Miss Parkinson smiled but it didn't reach very far. "She's doing well. She's due to leave Hogwarts this summer."
"Ah. And what does she want to do afterwards?"
"She isn't sure yet… she was talking about Herbology or Healing but I don't think she has the stamina for it, and her grades in Potions weren't good enough."
I nod. Luckily our food arrives, a pasta bolognese for me, a chicken salad for her. I don't know Aster Parkinson well enough to offer any advice, and her older sister doesn't ask.
"How is the Prophet these days?"
She grimaces. "It's hard, you know. The Ministry… something's wrong with it. I guess we all thought things would go alright now after the War ended but it hasn't really, has it?"
I nod again. Something is indeed wrong. The Minister seems to push the same Pure-blood bullshit agenda as the Imperio'd Pius Thicknesse put in place during the height of the War, although a bit more subtly. Higher taxes depending on blood status. Registrations and permits and fines. Business initiatives are strangled and Ministry workers' wages are cut. Kingsley, Shacklebolt that is, had been interim Minister for about a year but was pushed out by the old guard who instead voted in Peasegood. The man was largely unknown to the larger crowd and used to work as an Obliviator if I'm not mistaken.
"How's your own business, Professor?"
I shrug. "Well enough. There are still orders coming in from St Mungo's, and the occasional straggler dropping by to buy Pepper-Up."
Miss Parkinson has finished eating. "That's not why you asked me to lunch, is it, Professor?"
"No… no it wasn't. Miss Parkinson, what do you know of the Hair-ologist in York?"
Miss Parkinson looks surprised, eyes wide and mouth half open, and then she grins. "Ah, I knew it! There was something different about you, Professor, but that explains it. You've been to see her?"
I nod, a bit annoyed by her not answering my question, and raise an eyebrow. It is still efficient, even years after leaving Hogwarts, and she collects herself.
"Well, I saw her three years ago, over a few months. It was Ginny who told me about her. At first I wanted to, I don't know, make myself pretty for Martinus, but then in the end… well, you probably know the story. I sort of knew already and I think what I really wanted, deep down, was to find out the truth. After he left I… stopped going."
"What do you know of the Hair-ologist?"
Miss Parkinson shrugged. "Nothing much, really. Guess I never thought about it? She was good at what she did, and that was that. Maybe I ought to seek her out again."
She fails to produce any more details, or even any interest in the witch herself. Grumbling inwardly I thank her anyway, pay for our meals and drop her off at the Daily Prophet's office.
~oo~oo~oo~oo~
The Potters are my next target but they're a bit harder to catch, it seems. Both of them took up Quidditch a few years after the War and are now playing on the same team as Chaser and Seeker, respectively. To my annoyance I drown in orders from St Mungo's and don't have time to go Potter-hunting. Of course it's a good thing that business is going well, but I don't have time for this.
One weekday evening a few days later I wander down Diagon Alley again, heading for the giant WWW sign.
"Professor!" The remaining Weasley twin was apparently just about to close the store when I turn the handle. "Come in, come in."
He goes to shake my hand and I quickly put up a small shield charm around my hand.
"Ow! Well played, Professor." As I thought, he had a small gadget in his hand that would have Stunned mine, but now it rebounded onto himself.
I raise an eyebrow. "That one was old even when I grew up, Weasley. Do you have a moment?"
Weasley nods and ushers me in. "Certainly. I've been meaning to talk to you, you know. About business opportunities. I just never managed to get around to it. Come in, we can order some food, I need dinner."
Well, I would never eat something Weasley cooked in his own kitchen, but take-away could work.
We end up ordering Indian, and I scan everything twice for curses, hexes, pranks or otherwise before touching anything. He does manage to get me with a hiccup hex on the door handle to the loo, but is quick to provide the counter when I hex his boots for him, making them dance. I do end the hex but tell him they may break out in a twirl or skip or something whenever he thinks of hexing me again. He grins and calls for a truce.
Weasley — this one, the remaining ear-less twin — is almost Slytherin in his thinking sometimes. It both unsettles and encourages me.
"How's business?" I ask, forestalling his question.
He frowns and rubs the side of his nose. "Bad, Snape. I don't get it. The Ministry is talking about restricting our business hours and making us register all our products, essentially shutting it down. I don't understand their motivation for it, it's as if they want people to be sad, poor and unhappy."
I nod. I don't understand it either but something is up.
He twirls his wand at the kitchen and a kettle starts boiling. I idly wonder if he's learnt that from Molly, or if it is something he discovered when living alone.
"Is there anything else you can think of? Something that strikes you as odd, after the end of the War?"
He shrugs but thinks about it while the tea is steeping. "Not sure, to be honest. Well, I thought Harry would do something more with his life. He was on track to become an Auror, you know, before dropping out. Alright, Quidditch is good but it's not… I thought he'd have more drive. Ron is, well, Ron. He's doing a decent job running the business, you know of our branch in Hogsmeade, and the pair of them is always in the media, you know, the two Golden Heroes that took out old Voldy. It doesn't seem right, there's something off about that picture."
Yes, he's right in that. Not a week goes by without their ugly mugs in the Prophet. "What about your sister?"
"Well, she always wanted to play Quidditch professionally so that makes more sense, I get the feeling she's in the right spot, you know? They're in town next week I think, her and Harry. Some wedding or other, I asked if they were staying at the Burrow but they're staying at Grimmauld. Horrible place but they've started to get it fixed up."
I nod and try not to think of Weasleys, or Potters. Too much of that and my ears start to itch. "So, business? What was it you wanted to discuss?"
Weasley grins and Summons a stack of parchments, wordlessly. He and his twin were pretty decent students, all things considered. They certainly had creativity, and raw talent, they just didn't care much about rules even when they were for their own safety.
"Well, you see, Snape, we have some ideas for new products that are based on potions. Now I could do them myself but some need tweaking, and I get the feeling you're better at that than I am. If you're interested we could collaborate, I'd even give you a royalty on the sold products."
"Thirty percent," I say without inflection.
He gasps theatrically, eyes sparkling. "I was thinking more like five. Are you trying to push me out of my own business?"
I shrug and we start haggling, ending up at twenty percent, ten if his own brewers take over the rote brewing, and I retain all the rights to the patent.
I come away from dinner with a full stomach, a notebook full of product ideas and a nagging feeling of having forgotten something. Someone?
