Of course you never knew about Florence. She should have been unremarkable. She almost was. And then she got involved with Tom Riddle. That's why you should know her story.
To start with, you should know that he wasn't the first thing that went wrong for Florence. The starting entry in her diary was achingly cheerful. She wrote:
"Dear Diary,
"So, I'm finally at Hogwarts! I've been waiting for so long, and now it's finally happening! I'm so happy.
"Let's see... my friends. There's Doll, she's new too. We met before we even got on the train. And these girls, the Aristocrats. Diana and Bertie and Olive Hornby. They say that maybe we can all be friends together."
Do you know what it means when girls say something like that? It's not that they'll be friends.
The atrocities of men are born in the dreams of children.
"And I met a boy, on the train. His name is Tom Riddle. Doll says she likes him. I wish she wouldn't. It's nothing like that. He just looked so sad. I wonder if there's anyone he can talk to. He's hanging out with Rookwood. Augustus, not Sebastian."
Yes, she knew my father. Or knew of him, at least. And his older brother, too, Sebastian. I'd never heard about Sebastian before that.
Reading Florence's diary, a picture emerges of a girl almost painfully ordinary, who desired most of all the approval of those that she thought of as friends, yet felt entirely unworthy of it. Florence was modestly invested in her schoolwork, complaining only when it interfered with something else she wanted to do, or when Professor Calliope Finchworth did something absentminded like forgetting to assign an essay until the day before it was due.
The two subjects she returned to most often are her would-be friends, the Aristocrats, and Tom Riddle, with whom she felt a kinship of isolation through the lens of a teenage infatuation. As the years passed, there was a growing sense of discontent as Florence was more and more aware of the Aristocrats' underhanded rejection. They kept her around, but she was never really in on it. And she mentions Tom more and more often.
The atrocities of men are born in the dreams of children.
And then, there's this entry:
"Dear Diary,
"I did something really bad. I can't even talk about it. No one knows I did it. They all think it was someone else, but it had to be me. I'm the only one who knew how.
"Doll won't stop crying. Serves her right. How long has it been since she was nice to me? But it's better for her to go along with the Aristocrats, with Bertie and Diana and Olive. They're nice to her if she does.
"But no matter what I do, no matter how hard I try, they only pretend to be nice to me. Bertie spreads rumors about me and they ignore me at meals and even Doll lets me get in trouble for everything.
"That's why I did it. I know Tom wanted me to. He scares me, sometimes, when he's like that. But he understands, he knows what it's really like. And I'm the only one who sees the sadness in his eyes. That's why he's showing me how to get back at them."
At this point, maybe Florence became Tom Riddle's pawn, his victim, even. But if that's all there was to it, how do you explain her eagerness, almost to do his bidding? He wasn't asking her to do anything she wasn't perfectly happy to carry out. And it's not long, you know, until she acted out her vengeance outside of his instructions.
"Dear Diary,
"I hit Bertie today. I slapped her across her lying mouth. I don't regret it."
From the beginning, Florence never had what Tom Riddle was looking for in a follower. She was desperate enough, certainly, and willing enough to make use of violence. What's more, Tom Riddle always had a way of putting pre-existing conflicts to his own uses. And she had plenty of those.
The rest of her entry is evidence enough of that:
"So now the Aristocrats know I'm done trying to be friends with them. Tom seemed kind of disappointed. I guess he had something or else planned, and it won't work now that they know I hate them.
"But I was tired of pretending. I'm glad that I don't have to grovel to any of them anymore. I'm glad that I have Tom, so I can know what a real friend is like.
"Real friends understand each other. Real friends don't tell you to do things to prove what a good friend you are and then let you get in trouble for it. Real friends don't tell you they won't be friends with you for stupid reasons. Real friends are people you can trust and depend on, no matter what. Real friends don't make you feel like you're not pretty enough.
"I won't pretend for anyone anymore."
I heard, your last year at school, you studied the Dark Lord, to know his weaknesses, his strategies, his secrets. But I can't help but think that you never really found the soul of the child that came before the man.
Florence glimpsed that, even if it was only dimly. Even if what she said about it was more mistaken than not. That's why she could never be the follower he wanted. And it's probably why Dumbledore never thought of her as important when he told you the Dark Lord's story.
Are we having an adventure yet?
Florence wasn't. She was not a hero, not really a victim, and not even a proper victim, so to him, it was like she didn't exist. Not in hindsight, anyways.
But even Florence couldn't always see Tom Riddle entirely as she wished to see him:
"Dear Diary,
"I don't know what to do.
"I asked Tom today, whether what happened to Diana was really an accident. And the look he gave me! As if he hated me, for being so weak and stupid.
"I knew it wasn't. I knew it wasn't! I never should have asked!
"But this whole time, I thought I was right by his side. That's all I wanted. But instead, I was really so far away. Everything I thought I knew about him was wrong. He really is as cruel and dangerous as I was always afraid he was.
"Did he ever really care about me? Did he really just hate me the whole time? Was he just hiding that look, the look he gave me today?
"I'm so scared.
"But I know what it's like to be alone.
"I know he hangs around with those other boys, with Rookwood and Lestrange and the rest of them. But he isn't really friends with them. Just like the Aristocrats. Groups like that don't really care about each other.
"What am I going to do?
"It's stupid to keep going like this, to keep pretending that we're the same. I know what he's like. I know what he's doing, now. I know it's not just pranks and stupid things at school. I know I can't let him keep going.
"But I can't just tell e Professor. What would happen to him if I did? They would never understand. They don't know how lonely he really is. I'm the only one who knows.
"I have to find a way to get to him."
Does it surprise you, that this is what she would decide? To help him? Not the part of him that made plans too horrible for her to contemplate, but the child's soul she had glimpsed, dimly, in his isolation. And, perhaps, in the way he sided with her against the Aristocrats.
The atrocities of men are born in the dreams of children.
But even though she was certain that no Professor would ever understand, she ended up telling one anyways. She should have been lucky. She picked, maybe by chance alone, the one Professor who should have understood what she told him. The one who had been through anything like what she was going through.
"Dear Diary,
"Professor Dumbledore is so stupid! I can hardly believe it!
"He called me up to his office, to speak with me. He just started telling me things, things about growing up and what he saw going on at the school. The way he was talking, I thought that maybe he would understand.
"I was so relieved! There was no one I could tell, especially not a Professor. I just wanted someone to hear. I just wanted someone to know what I know.
"So I told him everything. Well, not everything, obviously. I left out names and things. But I told him about how alone I felt, and how maybe I fell in love and how mean the Aristocrats were, but I couldn't leave them, and what Tom did to them (but not really, obviously, I couldn't tell him that) and how I found out and how scared I'd been and what I knew I had to do.
"I kept talking, I couldn't help it, because after a little while, I could tell that Dumbledore wasn't really listening, he was getting everything I said wrong, but I just had to make him understand. I couldn't stop. And when I finally ran out of things to tell him, he just looked at me with that stupid, pitying look.
"This is what he said to me:
"'Miss Hawthorne, please listen to me.'
"How dare he ask me that, when he wouldn't even listen to me!
"'I understand how difficult this must be for you. I know what it's like to have a friend like that.'
"Well, clearly he doesn't, if that's how he thinks of it! Why would I be so foolish as to think of Tom as just a 'friend'?
"'But please, I would very much advise you against trying to save this boy alone. It's dangerous, and it would be so easy for him to ignore you, no matter how great your sacrifice.'
"Of course it's dangerous! Why should I let that stop me? It's stupid to only do things that are safe, that's why we learn about things like courage and valor an honor, so we can do what's right, even when it's dangerous.
"'You are my student, as I believe this boy is, and I want what's best for both of you. Please, don't do anything that place you in any danger, and please let us provide you with assistance.'
"He was just saying that he wanted to help us. It didn't mean anything. If he really wanted what's best for Tom, he wouldn't be asking me to stop. And if he really wanted what's best for me, he would have done something a lot sooner, back when the Aristocrats were picking on me.
"He doesn't care about people like us. He only cares about people like Olive and Diana, who can have happy lives by making us miserable. He only cares about people who can be mean without getting blood on their hands.
"There's blood on Tom's hands, and on mine, and so Professor Dumbledore will never care about us. Not really.
"I wanted to hit him so hard. But of course I didn't. He's so stupid! How could he think that I would ever believe what he told me?"
Dumbledore should have been able to help Florence. That was his job, after all, to help the students put into his charge. But already, he couldn't fit her into the story he told about the school, and about the boy Tom Riddle. What was important to her, helping someone who seemed as alone as she felt, was a thing he had long ago put aside.
Are we having an adventure yet?
He was, certainly, already preparing to play the part of the Wise Mentor to some brave Hero, who would come along to slay the villain that he saw Tom Riddle becoming. Having come away victorious from his own battle with his own Dark Wizard, that was the only possibility he could conceive of.
He claims the body who cannot take the soul.
But what of those who become complicit in their own suffering? What of Florence? What of the girl who allowed herself to be used? What of the girl who delighted in brutal vengeance against the false friends who tormented her? What of the girl who forgave Tom Riddle once she realized that she had also become his victim?
What became of her?
There is one more entry in her diary:
"Dear Diary:
"It's okay. I know what I have to do, and I'm going to do it. I might not come back. But I'm not afraid.
"Isn't it funny, how clear everything gets at a time like this? I know I'm going to take a big risk, and that things could go really badly if it doesn't work out.
"But I know it's the right thing to do. It's the only way to do what's best for everyone. What's best for people like Tom and I, and what's best for people like Diana and Doll and Professor Dumbledore. The only way. So it's okay, even if it's a big risk.
"I just wish there was someone I could tell."
It's not hard to guess what happened to Florence after this. She went to Tom, to make a last effort to reach out to him, and he killed her. There are more pages in her diary, but all of them are empty. She must've taken the diary with her. She must've died in that abandoned cabin, or the woods nearby.
So does that mean she was mistaken about Tom Riddle? I don't think so, not really. If she was mistaken, it was in scale, not in kind. What she saw in him was real. But she never realized how hard he fought against it. He couldn't change what she saw in him, he could only erase it by killing her.
He takes the body who cannot claim the soul.