CONVERSATION AT NIGHT

If there was a worse time to be alone with Mad-eye Moody than late at night with no moon, Remus Lupin could not think of it. The man was scary enough in a nice mild spring morning. To walk beside him, with that fearsomely unnatural stride ending in the CLUNK! of the peg leg, was so unnerving that Remus was beginning to wonder whether that was how he got his criminals to confess.

"You know, Lupin," said the older man at last, hardly breaking stride, "Nymphadora Tonks is going through Hell right now."

After a silence, he went on. "it should not bother me any more. I am out of the Corps now - technically, at least. But it was me who got her enlisted. It was nearly my last act as an officer on active service."

Remus knew that he should not have reacted, but he could not help it. He had never heard this part of her story before. "It was?"

"Yeah. The examinations panel was split down the middle, and I was called to give the casting vote."

"Why you?"

"Because I had observed her under fire. Everyone else just knew her in the classroom." Remus grinned to himself - it was easy to imagine that Tonks, clumsy, easy-going and not particularly academic, would hardly show at her best there. And he had the impression that a grin was fighting its way through Moody's forest of scars, as if the old veteran shared his thoughts.

"She is different under fire, Lupin. She is completely without fear, she always knows exactly what she wants, and she will go through any kind of Hell to achieve it. Yes," Moody repeated in a lower, brooding tone, "she is fearless... A smart fighter, and unselfish. She is the kind you want to be sharing a foxhole with. I told the board of examinations so, and they accepted her."

Lupin was tempted to ask Moody whether he was trying to tell him something. But he kept his mouth closed - he had no intention to be led down that path. Not yet, at least.