Peregrin Perkins sighed as he glanced at his watch. Ten o'clock. He poured another mug of strong tea from the bottomless teapot and dropped in enough sugar to make a Muggle dentist cringe. The sweet hot brew would help keep him awake long enough to fulfill this night's duties, but he'd truly rather be elsewhere than the blah little office pulling duty in the Department of Time and Space. The Ministry's official party was still going on up in the formal ballroom, but his name hadn't been on the invitation list since it had turned out that Christmas Eve was his duty night.
"Sorry to spoil your fun, Peregrin," his supervisor had told him the week before. "But you're the junior in the department and traditionally the new fellow has to cover on Christmas Eve."
The order book suddenly glowed and chimed and Peregrin dragged it across the desktop to see what he had to handle over his shift.
Eleven-thirty-o'clock. S. Claus. Time-Turner Pick-up. Coordinate with Floo division to unlock all Floos worldwide between Midnight 24 December and Dawn 25 December.
Peregrin stared at the entry, shook his head and chuckled. "Of course! How else would he do it?" He summoned up a second mug and a plate of cookies, pulled an extra large bag of Floo Powder out of the supply drawer, and the young, ambitious wizard settled back with a grin to wait for his visitor.
FINIS