Chapter Seven

GAUNTlets

Harry, Ron and Hermione arrived just outside Little Hangleton. They looked down at the bustling town.

"So," Ron cleared his throat. "Errr, where do we start?"

"We have the Riddle House," Harry said slowly. "And the Graveyard. It wouldn't hurt to take a look at the Gaunts. We'll check around the general town area too. See if the people know anything. We'll spend a day or so, then we head for a more likely place."

"Sounds like a plan," Hermione said.

They trekked down the hill into the heart of the town. It was rather small, which Hermione expected from the name, and everyone seemed to notice immediately they were not from around here. They all eyed them suspiciously. Feeling uncomfortable, Hermione hurried her friends into the nearest building. They stood in a pub.

"Good call, Hermione," Harry said. "Everyone always talks in pubs."

"Um, do they?" Hermione said. She followed Harry and Ron up to the nearest counter.

"Er, Hi," Harry said.

The barman stared at them.

"Do your girl thing," Ron muttered to Hermione.

"Do my what?"

"You know, your thing. Where you act all innocent and girly and lie and flatter people and stuff. Like you always do. Only don't botch it up like you did last time."

"Well, if I'm so incompetent, you do it then!"

"You have to be a GIRL. You know that."

"Well, seeing as I'm the only one here who fits that requirement, you'd better not complain!"

Harry nudged Hermione impatiently and Hermione took a deep breath and slid on the stool, languishing glamorously, her fingers tracing the outline of her jaw.

"I'll have a soda, please," Hermione said.

The barman got her some, and she gave him the money.

"I've never seen you before," the barman said gruffly.

"Oh, I'm new around here," Hermione said innocently, batting her eyes.

"Oh? What be your name?"

"Lavender," Hermione said, saying the first name that came to her mind. "And my friends here are…Seamus and Dean. We're terribly lost."

"Ay? What are you lookin' for?"

"We-elllll…." Hermione said, twirling a strand of hair round her finger. " I'm related to someone who used to live here…do you know anything about the Riddles?"

The barman's face darkened. "Aye. Word around here is that they were right snobs."

"Oh, I know!" Hermione said earnestly. "Our family is quite ashamed of that. But, I do want to find out a bit about them. I hear they were murdered?"

"Aye. It's quite a legend."

"Could you tell it to us?" Harry asked.

"Do you want sumthin' more to drink?" the barman asked, despite the fact Hermione hadn't touched her soda. Harry paid him and he bought another for them and sat back to tell them.

"Aye…well, the Riddles, they were pretty rich. Nobody liked 'em that much see? There was quite a scandal with the son, Tom and a young lady who lived in a broken down shack right near here. Her family was a bit off, and excusing you, miss, but she was a right ugly lady. So everyone was quite surprised when Tom went off ta marry her. But he came back, spoutin' that she had tricked him, we all reckon she tol' him she had a baby inner and he married her for that, but turned ou' she was lying, ya know? Still doesn't say much about Mr. Tom's character, doing all that hanky panky out of wedlock. I'm tellin' ya miss, don't e'er do that till your married."

"Yeah, Lavender," Ron smirked.

"Yes, well, how did they get murdered?" Hermione said impatiently.

"Getting to it, ain't I? Anyway, abou' sixteen years after Riddle came back, the maid come in one morning and finds 'em dead in the living room. Jus' dead. No sign of a break in at all. Which of course means everyone to think its Frank, the caretaker."

"Did you say Frank?" Harry said suddenly. "Is it Frank Bryce?"

"Yeah. How'd you know?"

"Errrr…read something in the paper."

"Aw, right. I'll get to that. But anyway, Frank was the only one with keys to the apartment. Lived in a shack near the house. So we take him in for questioning, and he denies it flat out. We were ready to throw 'em in jail, but then these medical reports come back and say, the Riddles were in perfect health. You know, except they was dead. No sign of foul play at all. And they weren't old, mind you, the son Tom was in his thirties. So we let ol' Frank go. An' he just continued to stay in 'is shack. Tends the flowers and stuff. The place is breakin' down, bu' someone still owns it for tax reasons."

"What tax reasons?" Harry asked.

"Hell if I know, 'scuse me, miss. But here's the mysterious part. About three years ago, we find old Frank dead too." The man lowered his voice for dramatic effect. "In the exact place the Riddles died. And like the Riddles, he in perfect health. 'cept for his leg, he got it shot in World War II. But we figure it was old age, 'e was getting up there. But no sign otherwise, and it's odd isn' it? Wha' was he doin' up there? The fire'd been goin' too. Makes ya think. I wonder if 'e really did kill 'em, ya know. 'e had a hard life, Frank. Maybe we oughta have been kinder to him."

"Yeah," Ron muttered.

"Had anything else odd happened?" Hermione asked.

"Yeah, actually. Not long after Franks death there was a disturbance in the graveyard, near the Riddle's graves. In the mornin' we find the sons grave all dug up and a bunch of graves around it all cracked. Blood smeared all over the ground and someone retched all over the ground." Harry shifted uncomfortably next to Hermione. "Plus a bit of black fabric torn on one of the graves. Figure it's vandals, but odd ain't it? 'Specially since no one was bleedin' the next day. We checked. Plus, old man came round two years ago arou' town. Really weird looking, long beard and this mad suit. And after he left, we discovered the Gaunt House in ruins. Ya know that was the house that Riddle's ugly lover lived in?"

"I see," Hermione said. "Anything else?"

"Seen a couple odd characters in cloaks. I mean, who wears cloaks anymore? 'Sides Lord of the Rings fanatics, that is. But never doin' nothing. Just in and out, like they are checkin' up on us."

"Any glimpse of their faces?"

"Nope."

"Well, then if that's all, thanks." Harry said, getting up to leave.

"Wait!" Hermione said suddenly. "Who owns the Riddle House right now?"

"Fellow called Lucius Malfoy."

"WHAT?" Harry, Ron and Hermione said together.

"Yeah, weird name, right? Haven't seen him lately though. He's a snob just like the Riddles, lemme tell ya."

"Uh, yeah," Harry gasped. "Okay then…um, where's the Riddle House?"

"On that hill over yonder. Wouldn't go there if I was you, though. It's cursed."

"We're quite experienced with curses." Hermione said firmly. "Thanks again."

As they got out of the bar, Ron said, "Good one, Hermione."

Hermione smiled, it was rare to get a compliment from Ron besides "You're the smartest person in the world, please do my homework for me?"

"So Lucius Malfoy owns the Riddle House," Harry said slowly.

"Voldemort must have told him to look after it, like the Diary. Seems like Malfoy was the most trusted Death Eater before he blew it," Hermione said.

"And they say You-Know-Who is supposed to be smart," Ron mumbled. "I wouldn't trust any of the Malfoys if you paid me."

"So we'd best check out the Riddle House, I suppose," Hermione said nervously.

"Yeah," Harry said, leading the way.

They trekked up the hill until the reached a crumbling old mansion. Next to it was a shack at the edge of a very overgrown garden.

"Lets see the shack first, we're closer," Ron said. Harry and Hermione nodded and they looked in the shack. It was very small, with a stove and hot water bottle and a cramped bed. No telephone, Hermione noted.

"Poor man," she murmured, running her fingers over countless rows of dusty overalls. "Blamed for a murder he didn't commit."

"Murdered by the man that framed him," Harry agreed.

"How many waistcoats can one man OWN?" Ron wondered aloud.

"Well, there's nothing here," Harry said.

"Besides this really cool pipe," Ron said.

"Put it DOWN, Ron," Hermione snapped.

"Okay! I wasn't gonna take it!"

When they reached the mansion, Hermione touched the doorknob and the door fell over.

"Why was this place supposed to be so hard to break into?" Ron muttered as they walked in.

Hermione sneezed as dust wafted in the air. The whole place reminded her of a crumbling abandoned temple, it's majesty broken by the toll of time and absence of care.

"Okay, we need to fan out and see if we can find anything," Harry said.

They split up. Hermione searched the living room, getting down on her hands and knees to look under couches and what not. The whole living room was done in a very classic style, with giant fireplaces and old rocking chairs and armchairs. Dust spread over it all like a blanket. This must have been where the Riddle's died, because Hermione found some old police tape. Other than that, she located nothing.

She met Harry and Ron back near the entrance, they hadn't found anything either. They went upstairs to search as well. They stumbled across what appeared to be Tom Riddle Seniors bedroom.

"The lair of the snob himself, huh?" Ron said, looking at the dusty books and old bed that hadn't been touched in years. Harry opened the drawers to look for anything suspicious, but Hermione was intrigued by an old red journal that lay on a bedside table. She opened it to read: Diary of Thomas Alfred Riddle

"Hey, you two, I've found the original Tom Riddle's diary!" she called.

Harry and Ron rushed over.

"Check to see if there's anything about Merope or any of it," Harry urged.

"Right," Hermione flipped through the pages until she reached a likely looking passage.

"This is odd, Listen: ' It's impossible. This can't be happening! How could that barbarian do it? The boils on my face sting and burn, the oaf made them appear as if by magic, waving a bloody stick about and they just-'/I And then it's cut off, and a little ways down he writes again-I 'How odd. What is that writing from before? I cannot make any sense of it. I don't remember anything about boils on my face-my face feels fine. I must have written this when I was half asleep. I probably had a bad dream.' What do you make of that?"

"He must have written that when Morfin cursed him, remember I told you in one of the memories Dumbledore showed me Morfin was to be taken to a hearing for cursing Riddle? And then when he was writing that, they must of obliviated him and wiped his face!" Harry exclaimed. "Is there anything else?"

Hermione flipped further on. Suddenly there were gushing entries about Merope's beauty and tales of her piety and generosity. They got married and escaped "the town which rejects or love so". One of the entries made the three of them gasp.

Today I received a gift from my kind, beautiful, generous spouse. She presented me with a pair of gauntlets she claims belonged to a famous wizard called "Griffin-door". She says that he gave him to his best friend "Slither-in" who is her ancestor, so they have been a secret heirloom in her family for ages, though they are valuable, her family loathed Griffindoor for his betrayal of Slitherin and no one outside the family knew of the gauntlets until now. She, in her unfailing kindness, has bestowed them to me. They are beautiful, though not nearly as much as her, with a magnificent lion seal. I shall always keep them close to my heart as they are a gift from my most beloved."

"No way," Harry gasped.

"A possession of Gryffindor Dumbledore didn't know about!" Ron cried.

"Amazing," Hermione muttered.

"Where are they? We have to find out!" Harry urged.

Hermione frantically flipped forward in the journal until she found a sentence.

I have placed those hideous gauntlets the lying wench forced upon me in the back of my closet. The damn things will never see the light of day again.

"The closet!" Ron cried and they ran to the wardrobe, frantically searching it, throwing everything out in their haste, but the gauntlets were not there.

"Where can they be?" Hermione gasped.

"Search the rest of the room!" Harry cried.

They did so, positively dismantling Riddle's room, but they did not unearth the ancient artifact.

"If they're not here," Harry gasped, "Then where are they?"

Hermione went back to the journal and flipped through it again. She noticed something she hadn't before. The entry revealing the gauntlets location was ripped at the bottom as if someone had thrown it down in haste upon reading it. "Voldemort," she muttered.

"What?"

"After killing his family, Voldemort must have searched the place like we have. He would have found the journal and taken the gauntlets."

"Which means…" Ron said

"The gauntlets are a Horcrux now," Harry said grimly.

"There are many things that we would throw away if we were not afraid others might pick them up."-Oscar Wilde