Chapter Eleven: Mona Lisa
The kitten was named Mona, but within a day or two Hermione began calling her Lisa, on the basis that she was such a classic. In an unamused silky- toned lecture, she was informed that Mona was a classic Irish name for 'little noble one', but, of course, it was Lisa that stuck.
So did the luggage. In an unforeseen turn of events, the luggage appointed itself the kitten's protector against Gollum, the caretaker's new fiend.
Gollum was everywhere. New leather pads adorned all portions of Filch's anatomy to shield from sharpened claws, yet he always seemed to be wearing a new wound every time anyone saw him. Like Hagrid, he wore his scratches with pride.
Hagrid viewed the new additions to the Hogwarts menagerie as an early birthday gift. (Though the person who tried to gift-wrap Gollum would have to be just plain stupid!) Gollum he sighed over. "A nice, 'andsome, beastie," he proclaimed happily after nearly losing an eye to a well-placed swipe. When the luggage brought Lisa to meet him, Hagrid was ecstatic.
The visitors announced themselves with a lot of scuffing and clunking on the doorstep. The half-giant, who had just finished baking a tray of rock- cakes, opened the door expecting to see Hermione. About time she came to pay him another visit. Far too much time inside, that girl was spending. She needed Harry and Ron to stop her fading away to nothing in the library.
"Well, 'ello," he said when his guests were revealed.
"C'mon in, yeh know yeh're allus welcome, 'specially you now, 'aven't seen much a' ya fer a'while." The luggage managed to look sheepish.
"Never mind, who's yeh lil friend? Right pretty lil thing, aren't ya? C'mon, hop up 'ere an lets 'ave a look at ya."
The kitten concentrated. Bunching up her back legs, she sprang onto a chair seat. She looked up at the table and Hagrid's hairy face, and miaowed.
"Bit o' a jump fer ya, is it? Shoulda known, shoulda known, c'mon then." With large fleshy fingers he reached down and lifted the kitten tenderly onto the table.
Lisa stood unsteadily on the rough surface. She took a tottering step forward, then another. This was fun. This place smelt nice.
With the look of a doting parent, Hagrid stroked her belly. She purred contentedly. "Oh, yeh are a pretty one," the gamekeeper purred. "Are yeh 'ungry? Yeh want summat teh eat? Think I got summat 'ere, think I do, yes, 'ere we are, 'ere's some milk, I'll give it yeh in a saucer-" he poured the liquid onto a flat, chipped plate "-and I'll give yeh some cake, too. Just baked a nice new batch, I 'ave, 'Agrid's famous rock cakes they are. You'll love 'em. Well, if yeh can eat 'em. Don't feel obliged though. I don' want yeh to go eating summat jus' because yeh think I want yeh to." Wagging one thick finger under the kitten's whiskers, Hagrid tried to assume a fierce expression.
Lisa pounced.
Little claws scrabbled ineffectively against his weathered skin. But they brought tears of joy to the beaming black eyes. "Oh, yeh are a pretty one," he repeated.
"No talkin', yeh. I'm allowed to talk to me pretty darlin' 'ere without yeh making faces."
The luggage looked huffy.
I wasn't!
"'Cause yeh were," Hagrid said affectionately. "Isn't that true, sweetie?"
The little tortoiseshell face looked up at him solemnly.
Hagrid cooed, "'Ave a crumb, go on, won' hurt ya, I wouldn't do that to such a lovely lil girl." Lisa licked tentatively at a crumb of rock cake. It was unusual. She liked it, even if it was a bit hard to swallow. Her teeth were unaccustomed to chewing so much.
Hagrid waited patiently, beaming all over, for her opinion.
When she'd finished her crumb, he said, "There, now wasn't that nice, me little lovely? Jus' a nice bit a cake, never 'urt no one."
But Lisa had never eaten such solid food before, and she threw up.
Cooing, Hagrid carefully lifted her onto the chair, and cleaned up the mess while muttering how rock cakes never 'urt no-one before.
Then he dipped his finger in the milk and held it to her mouth. The first few tries, Lisa pulled away, which left her whiskers smeared with milk.
Again, Hagrid sat back and waited.
The funny stuff on her face smelt nicer than the cake crumb, so she took a lick. It wasn't bad. Carefully, the little kitten cleaned her face and looked up to Hagrid for more. It wasn't cream like Daddy gave her, of course, but the slightly tangy milk had the taste of a forbidden snack, so she wanted to drink as much of it as she could.
The next milky finger that hovered in front of her mouth was received with enthusiasm and she licked happily.
This was the life!!
Luggage thought so, too.
"So whatt've yeh bin up to, yeh great big suitcase?"
Ambling over to get its lid scratched, Luggage tried to look innocent. Hagrid, well recognising the look, only laughed.
"Din't go after Flich or McGonagall agin, 'ave yeh? Yeh know they both want yeh blood, yeh splinters or summat, jus' gotta learn to lighten up a bit, both o' 'em.
"An' how's 'Ermione? 'Aven't seen 'er much, now that she's allus workin' on summat or other, that girl o' yours works a bit too hard, don'cha think? Oughta come out an' 'ave a bit of summer air an' get a few freckles on 'er nose. What do yeh think?"
Luggage shrugged. Or rather, Hagrid saw it as a shrug, but in actual fact it jiggled its lid and did a little dance. The Mistress can do what she likes, it was saying.
"An' 'ave yeh bitten Snape yet? 'E's a bit o' a git, in my opinion, yeh should giv' 'im a good few bites around the ankles. Get 'im 'oppin'!"
Hagrid boomed with laughter. Fang raised his head from the mat in the corner. He'd been asleep.
"Sorry, ol' boy." The half-giant apologised with a rueful grin and tossed the dog a rock cake. It was gone in one swallow. Shutting his eyes, he laid his head back down on his paws and nodded off again.
"Don' go round repeatin' this now, but I don' think 'e's got much longer," Hagrid confided to the Luggage. Lisa was too involved in gnawing on his fingers to listen. The wooden trunk, however, was a very attentive audience.
Go on, it said.
"Well, it's jus' that 'e's bin gettin' a bit ol', an' yeh know 'ow 'e is, 'e's gettin' slower an' slower, poor ol' thing. I 'ad 'im since 'e was a puppy, yeh know." He looked doleful. "'E 'asn't changed a bit."
Luggage looked dubious.
"Still teh same lil coward 'e's allus bin. Good ol' friend though, me ol' Fang."
Fang slept on, and Luggage kept listening to Hagrid's monologue. Occasionally Lisa would give a little mewl. The meaty fingers offered no purchase for her little teeth and now she sat bunched up on Hagrid's lap, hooking her claws into the fabric of his trousers.
As the last rock cake disappeared down Hagrid's throat, the peace was broken.
With a loud, resounding boom, the hut's wooden door crashed inwards. The noise made three occupants jump. (Fang never stirred.) A dark, ominous figure filled the doorway. Robes billowed.
No one spoke.
Lisa's little forehead crunched up in concentration. This person smelt familiar! As the figure stepped forward, she figured it out.
Daddy!
Ears over paws and tail over whiskers, she jumped off the chair and darted madly towards him.
Professor Snape stooped and picked up the kitten. Cradling it tenderly against his chest, he glared at Hagrid and snarled "Mr. Hagrid, would you kindly like to explain what you are doing with my cat?"
The luggage had the decency to look guilty. After Hagrid mumbled out something about them jus' comin' over ta visit, Snape rounded on the contrite suitcase.
"Explain yourself," he said shortly.
One foot pawed the ground. The others tried to hide behind it. The luggage ended up looking ashamed of itself, which was, for it, quite a remarkable feat.
"Did you ever think of letting someone know your whereabouts?"
Sorry. The lid wagged once.
"Well, I hope you're satisfied. I had no idea where you and Mona had gone."
You could have asked the Mistress. She would have known.
Snape sighed. "You're trying to tell me that Miss Granger knew where you were, aren't you?"
As the luggage was of the opinion that she could have guessed, it tried to look like it agreed.
"For your information, I couldn't ask her. She's having tea with her Head of House."
Oh. The luggage shuffled forward and rubbed the side of its lid against his robes. Sorry, then.
"I've never seen 'im so tame wit' anyone before," Hagrid marvelled in surprise. "Want a rock cake, Professor?"
The Potions Master viewed them with distaste. "No. Thank you."
"Yeh sure?"
"Yes!"
"Well, alright, then, if yeh're sure. I jus' didn't want ta eat in front of yeh, that's all." He took a big bite of well-burned muffin. Crumbs scattered through his beard.
Snape's lips twisted themselves into a further grimace.
"Believe me, it would be a sensation which I believe I could do without."
Absently he rubbed the kitten. His fingers stopped when they brushed a cake crumb. Coldly, Snape held it up.
"I'm waiting, Hagrid," he snapped. "What is this?"
"It's cake, Professor, good bit o' rock cake that I was jus' givin' teh lil lassie, looked a bit 'ungry…"
Shutting his eyes, Snape dropped the crumb as though it were poison. "The 'little lassie' is only six weeks old. She isn't accustomed to such 'cake'. Not to mention that if she were it would hardly be a good thing."
"It's not too bad," Hagrid protested. "She wen' at it right steady, didn't yeh, love?"
Lisa mewled.
"Wonderful. Now my kitten has betrayed me. Young lady, you have been led astray by a suitcase that ought to know better. Don't creep outside!" This last to the luggage, who knew the benefits of a speedy getaway. "Your owner is not here to defend you and I am appalled at you. How could you let Mona consume such food when it would make her ill?"
He'd noticed the last vestiges of kitten spit on the table. Great, thought Hagrid. The man had maternal instincts stronger than Professor McGonagall's.
Glumly, the gamekeeper settled heavily into his seat and waited for Snape to run out of steam.
It took quite a while.
Eventually, huffily, he stalked out with Lisa riding pillion on his shoulder and the luggage trotting abashedly at his heels. It twitched its lid once at Hagrid in embarrassed farewell, then scampered to keep up.
"I wonder how Harry will take the news?" Hermione observed.
She wasn't talking to Snape, of course, or to Hagrid or a sheepish looking luggage, but to Professor McGonagall over a pot of coffee and a plate of much nicer scones than anything baked by Hagrid.
McGonagall shrugged. "I think he'll be happy. Not everyone has two best friends in positions of power, after all."
"Still…" Hermione sipped her coffee and frowned. "Ron? He wouldn't have been my first choice as Head-Boy. Harry, or maybe even Draco, but not Ron. It hardly seems right."
"Why? Because he's always been the third wing on the owl that was you and Harry?"
Hermione blinked at this. The analogy was a little strange.
"I always thought I was the odd one out, really. I mean, Harry and Ron are much closer to each other than they are to me."
"But you and Harry have always been the star achievers, not Ron." McGonagall leaned forward in her seat and gave her favourite student a warm smile. "That might have been a little bit of mine and Albus' fault, of course, but it's always been warranted! No, Ron is a bit more the average student…but he gets along very well with nearly all the lower years, and not just Gryffindors. I think they see him as a little less 'threatening', perhaps, than you two?"
Hermione ingested a scone in silence.
"Albus and I have talked it over, and we feel a bit more responsibility will do him good. He's a brotherly type, he'll do well looking after the younger ones and giving advice. He could do with a bit of responsibility after always being the little brother in his family. And because of that, he can understand what the younger students are going through."
"Still…it just seems an unusual step, that's all."
McGonagall rolled her eyes. "I know, you were set on Harry being Head Boy. Or Draco, didn't you say?" She laughed. "Ron might not cut as imposing a figure as one of your choices, Hermione, but I think he'll be good at the job. A real 'older brother' figure, someone that the littlies can identify with, someone very approachable."
"Yeah, I just…" Hermione gave her a brilliant smile. "I would love to see his face when he hears the news!"
McGonagall patted her hand. "I'm sure you're the first person he'll tell," she said, and winked.
The kitten was named Mona, but within a day or two Hermione began calling her Lisa, on the basis that she was such a classic. In an unamused silky- toned lecture, she was informed that Mona was a classic Irish name for 'little noble one', but, of course, it was Lisa that stuck.
So did the luggage. In an unforeseen turn of events, the luggage appointed itself the kitten's protector against Gollum, the caretaker's new fiend.
Gollum was everywhere. New leather pads adorned all portions of Filch's anatomy to shield from sharpened claws, yet he always seemed to be wearing a new wound every time anyone saw him. Like Hagrid, he wore his scratches with pride.
Hagrid viewed the new additions to the Hogwarts menagerie as an early birthday gift. (Though the person who tried to gift-wrap Gollum would have to be just plain stupid!) Gollum he sighed over. "A nice, 'andsome, beastie," he proclaimed happily after nearly losing an eye to a well-placed swipe. When the luggage brought Lisa to meet him, Hagrid was ecstatic.
The visitors announced themselves with a lot of scuffing and clunking on the doorstep. The half-giant, who had just finished baking a tray of rock- cakes, opened the door expecting to see Hermione. About time she came to pay him another visit. Far too much time inside, that girl was spending. She needed Harry and Ron to stop her fading away to nothing in the library.
"Well, 'ello," he said when his guests were revealed.
"C'mon in, yeh know yeh're allus welcome, 'specially you now, 'aven't seen much a' ya fer a'while." The luggage managed to look sheepish.
"Never mind, who's yeh lil friend? Right pretty lil thing, aren't ya? C'mon, hop up 'ere an lets 'ave a look at ya."
The kitten concentrated. Bunching up her back legs, she sprang onto a chair seat. She looked up at the table and Hagrid's hairy face, and miaowed.
"Bit o' a jump fer ya, is it? Shoulda known, shoulda known, c'mon then." With large fleshy fingers he reached down and lifted the kitten tenderly onto the table.
Lisa stood unsteadily on the rough surface. She took a tottering step forward, then another. This was fun. This place smelt nice.
With the look of a doting parent, Hagrid stroked her belly. She purred contentedly. "Oh, yeh are a pretty one," the gamekeeper purred. "Are yeh 'ungry? Yeh want summat teh eat? Think I got summat 'ere, think I do, yes, 'ere we are, 'ere's some milk, I'll give it yeh in a saucer-" he poured the liquid onto a flat, chipped plate "-and I'll give yeh some cake, too. Just baked a nice new batch, I 'ave, 'Agrid's famous rock cakes they are. You'll love 'em. Well, if yeh can eat 'em. Don't feel obliged though. I don' want yeh to go eating summat jus' because yeh think I want yeh to." Wagging one thick finger under the kitten's whiskers, Hagrid tried to assume a fierce expression.
Lisa pounced.
Little claws scrabbled ineffectively against his weathered skin. But they brought tears of joy to the beaming black eyes. "Oh, yeh are a pretty one," he repeated.
"No talkin', yeh. I'm allowed to talk to me pretty darlin' 'ere without yeh making faces."
The luggage looked huffy.
I wasn't!
"'Cause yeh were," Hagrid said affectionately. "Isn't that true, sweetie?"
The little tortoiseshell face looked up at him solemnly.
Hagrid cooed, "'Ave a crumb, go on, won' hurt ya, I wouldn't do that to such a lovely lil girl." Lisa licked tentatively at a crumb of rock cake. It was unusual. She liked it, even if it was a bit hard to swallow. Her teeth were unaccustomed to chewing so much.
Hagrid waited patiently, beaming all over, for her opinion.
When she'd finished her crumb, he said, "There, now wasn't that nice, me little lovely? Jus' a nice bit a cake, never 'urt no one."
But Lisa had never eaten such solid food before, and she threw up.
Cooing, Hagrid carefully lifted her onto the chair, and cleaned up the mess while muttering how rock cakes never 'urt no-one before.
Then he dipped his finger in the milk and held it to her mouth. The first few tries, Lisa pulled away, which left her whiskers smeared with milk.
Again, Hagrid sat back and waited.
The funny stuff on her face smelt nicer than the cake crumb, so she took a lick. It wasn't bad. Carefully, the little kitten cleaned her face and looked up to Hagrid for more. It wasn't cream like Daddy gave her, of course, but the slightly tangy milk had the taste of a forbidden snack, so she wanted to drink as much of it as she could.
The next milky finger that hovered in front of her mouth was received with enthusiasm and she licked happily.
This was the life!!
Luggage thought so, too.
"So whatt've yeh bin up to, yeh great big suitcase?"
Ambling over to get its lid scratched, Luggage tried to look innocent. Hagrid, well recognising the look, only laughed.
"Din't go after Flich or McGonagall agin, 'ave yeh? Yeh know they both want yeh blood, yeh splinters or summat, jus' gotta learn to lighten up a bit, both o' 'em.
"An' how's 'Ermione? 'Aven't seen 'er much, now that she's allus workin' on summat or other, that girl o' yours works a bit too hard, don'cha think? Oughta come out an' 'ave a bit of summer air an' get a few freckles on 'er nose. What do yeh think?"
Luggage shrugged. Or rather, Hagrid saw it as a shrug, but in actual fact it jiggled its lid and did a little dance. The Mistress can do what she likes, it was saying.
"An' 'ave yeh bitten Snape yet? 'E's a bit o' a git, in my opinion, yeh should giv' 'im a good few bites around the ankles. Get 'im 'oppin'!"
Hagrid boomed with laughter. Fang raised his head from the mat in the corner. He'd been asleep.
"Sorry, ol' boy." The half-giant apologised with a rueful grin and tossed the dog a rock cake. It was gone in one swallow. Shutting his eyes, he laid his head back down on his paws and nodded off again.
"Don' go round repeatin' this now, but I don' think 'e's got much longer," Hagrid confided to the Luggage. Lisa was too involved in gnawing on his fingers to listen. The wooden trunk, however, was a very attentive audience.
Go on, it said.
"Well, it's jus' that 'e's bin gettin' a bit ol', an' yeh know 'ow 'e is, 'e's gettin' slower an' slower, poor ol' thing. I 'ad 'im since 'e was a puppy, yeh know." He looked doleful. "'E 'asn't changed a bit."
Luggage looked dubious.
"Still teh same lil coward 'e's allus bin. Good ol' friend though, me ol' Fang."
Fang slept on, and Luggage kept listening to Hagrid's monologue. Occasionally Lisa would give a little mewl. The meaty fingers offered no purchase for her little teeth and now she sat bunched up on Hagrid's lap, hooking her claws into the fabric of his trousers.
As the last rock cake disappeared down Hagrid's throat, the peace was broken.
With a loud, resounding boom, the hut's wooden door crashed inwards. The noise made three occupants jump. (Fang never stirred.) A dark, ominous figure filled the doorway. Robes billowed.
No one spoke.
Lisa's little forehead crunched up in concentration. This person smelt familiar! As the figure stepped forward, she figured it out.
Daddy!
Ears over paws and tail over whiskers, she jumped off the chair and darted madly towards him.
Professor Snape stooped and picked up the kitten. Cradling it tenderly against his chest, he glared at Hagrid and snarled "Mr. Hagrid, would you kindly like to explain what you are doing with my cat?"
The luggage had the decency to look guilty. After Hagrid mumbled out something about them jus' comin' over ta visit, Snape rounded on the contrite suitcase.
"Explain yourself," he said shortly.
One foot pawed the ground. The others tried to hide behind it. The luggage ended up looking ashamed of itself, which was, for it, quite a remarkable feat.
"Did you ever think of letting someone know your whereabouts?"
Sorry. The lid wagged once.
"Well, I hope you're satisfied. I had no idea where you and Mona had gone."
You could have asked the Mistress. She would have known.
Snape sighed. "You're trying to tell me that Miss Granger knew where you were, aren't you?"
As the luggage was of the opinion that she could have guessed, it tried to look like it agreed.
"For your information, I couldn't ask her. She's having tea with her Head of House."
Oh. The luggage shuffled forward and rubbed the side of its lid against his robes. Sorry, then.
"I've never seen 'im so tame wit' anyone before," Hagrid marvelled in surprise. "Want a rock cake, Professor?"
The Potions Master viewed them with distaste. "No. Thank you."
"Yeh sure?"
"Yes!"
"Well, alright, then, if yeh're sure. I jus' didn't want ta eat in front of yeh, that's all." He took a big bite of well-burned muffin. Crumbs scattered through his beard.
Snape's lips twisted themselves into a further grimace.
"Believe me, it would be a sensation which I believe I could do without."
Absently he rubbed the kitten. His fingers stopped when they brushed a cake crumb. Coldly, Snape held it up.
"I'm waiting, Hagrid," he snapped. "What is this?"
"It's cake, Professor, good bit o' rock cake that I was jus' givin' teh lil lassie, looked a bit 'ungry…"
Shutting his eyes, Snape dropped the crumb as though it were poison. "The 'little lassie' is only six weeks old. She isn't accustomed to such 'cake'. Not to mention that if she were it would hardly be a good thing."
"It's not too bad," Hagrid protested. "She wen' at it right steady, didn't yeh, love?"
Lisa mewled.
"Wonderful. Now my kitten has betrayed me. Young lady, you have been led astray by a suitcase that ought to know better. Don't creep outside!" This last to the luggage, who knew the benefits of a speedy getaway. "Your owner is not here to defend you and I am appalled at you. How could you let Mona consume such food when it would make her ill?"
He'd noticed the last vestiges of kitten spit on the table. Great, thought Hagrid. The man had maternal instincts stronger than Professor McGonagall's.
Glumly, the gamekeeper settled heavily into his seat and waited for Snape to run out of steam.
It took quite a while.
Eventually, huffily, he stalked out with Lisa riding pillion on his shoulder and the luggage trotting abashedly at his heels. It twitched its lid once at Hagrid in embarrassed farewell, then scampered to keep up.
"I wonder how Harry will take the news?" Hermione observed.
She wasn't talking to Snape, of course, or to Hagrid or a sheepish looking luggage, but to Professor McGonagall over a pot of coffee and a plate of much nicer scones than anything baked by Hagrid.
McGonagall shrugged. "I think he'll be happy. Not everyone has two best friends in positions of power, after all."
"Still…" Hermione sipped her coffee and frowned. "Ron? He wouldn't have been my first choice as Head-Boy. Harry, or maybe even Draco, but not Ron. It hardly seems right."
"Why? Because he's always been the third wing on the owl that was you and Harry?"
Hermione blinked at this. The analogy was a little strange.
"I always thought I was the odd one out, really. I mean, Harry and Ron are much closer to each other than they are to me."
"But you and Harry have always been the star achievers, not Ron." McGonagall leaned forward in her seat and gave her favourite student a warm smile. "That might have been a little bit of mine and Albus' fault, of course, but it's always been warranted! No, Ron is a bit more the average student…but he gets along very well with nearly all the lower years, and not just Gryffindors. I think they see him as a little less 'threatening', perhaps, than you two?"
Hermione ingested a scone in silence.
"Albus and I have talked it over, and we feel a bit more responsibility will do him good. He's a brotherly type, he'll do well looking after the younger ones and giving advice. He could do with a bit of responsibility after always being the little brother in his family. And because of that, he can understand what the younger students are going through."
"Still…it just seems an unusual step, that's all."
McGonagall rolled her eyes. "I know, you were set on Harry being Head Boy. Or Draco, didn't you say?" She laughed. "Ron might not cut as imposing a figure as one of your choices, Hermione, but I think he'll be good at the job. A real 'older brother' figure, someone that the littlies can identify with, someone very approachable."
"Yeah, I just…" Hermione gave her a brilliant smile. "I would love to see his face when he hears the news!"
McGonagall patted her hand. "I'm sure you're the first person he'll tell," she said, and winked.