"Harry could not quite comprehend it. Mad-Eye dead; it could not be...Mad-Eye, so tough, so brave, the consummate survivor..."
From Harry Potter And The Deathly Hallows by J.K. Rowling
Chapter 11 :The Trap
"I wish I had red hair," announced Madeline. "Why can't I be ginger?"
Bill gave her an annoyed look and took the stick from her. "Quit it about your hair. You're not digging." He began gouging out the hole in the lawn that he, Madeline, and Charlie were all kneeling around. "This was your idea, Maddy."
The girl wrinkled her nose. "Don't call me that, Billy." She laid down on her back.
Charlie interjected, "Your hair's all right. Stuff gets stuck in it sometimes, though." He picked a feather out of her coal black hair which was all fanned out over the grass like an oil spill.
She laughed and grabbed the feather back. "I put that there!" She randomly shoved it back into her hair. He reddened slightly thinking that lately he had been feeling inept around her.
Charlie brusquly took the stick from Bill. "Give it here." He began digging industriously, making much better progress than the other two had. Then the stick snapped. Crack! He looked at it, baffled.
Madeline rolled over onto her side to look. She raised herself up on one elbow and giggled. Charlie gaped at her and thought, "She laughs at everything."
"I guess it's deep enough," Madeline said with a playful smirk.
Bill protested, "It's not nearly deep enough."
"It is," she answered tartly.
He pointed out the obvious, "Whatever falls into it will climb right back out."
"It's deep enough," insisted Madeline with all the stubbornness of a mule's mother-in-law.
The two contentious children looked over at Charlie who was quietly wedging sticks around the inside edge of the hole so they angled down slightly. His ruddy freckled face frowned intently on his work. Feeling their eyes on him, he looked up to answer their unspoken question. "When it puts its foot in, it'll get stuck, see?"
"Oh Charlie, you're brilliant!" exclaimed the girl.
He got a little red again, and suppressed a smile of pride, then continued on with his work.
"I still say it needs to be deeper," muttered the elder brother as he began gathering more sticks for the trap.
"Now we need to cover it with leaves and things so the animals can't see the hole," explained Charlie. Somehow the youngest of the three was now in charge. They laid thin twigs and leaves over the top.
Suddenly Mr. Weasley came walking around the corner of the house.
"Shh!" shushed Madeline, "It's your dad.
The boys quickly finished covering the hole, then the three of them sat in a row like mini sentinels in front of the trap. They had guilty grins that the wizard didn't notice.
"Hello kids, how are you doing?"
"Hi," they all said, Madeline suppressing the urge to laugh.
"Boys, mum's made an apple pie. Why don't you go get a piece?" said Arthur.
Charlie eagerly got to his feet and paused when Bill said disappointedly, "She already said not 'til after dinner."
"I think she may have changed her mind. Go see."
Bill was the only one to notice the tense look on his father's face. He reluctantly got up and walked away with Charlie. Madeline jumped up to follow, but Arthur stopped her. "Madeline, wait dear." The boys hesitated before going round the corner of the house. There, Bill grabbed Charlie's arm and hushed him, gesturing for him to wait and listen, out of sight of Madeline and their father.
Madeline sat back down and looked at Arthur expectantly. She suddenly noticed the look on his face. This was how he looked when they had found out about the death of Molly's brothers. The blood drained from her face, fearing the worst.
Arthur squatted down to her level. "Niffler," he began affectionately, using the nick name he had given her when she was smaller and often snuck off with stuff from around the house, "It's about your brother. There was a terrible battle..." He stopped, seeing the look of terror on her face. "He's going to be all right," he quickly assured her.
She let out a sigh. She could finally breath again, but her nose was all red from suppressed tears.
"He got hurt and he's in St. Mungo's. He lost a leg."
"Lost?" she frowned.
"It was cursed off and can't be regrown. Other than that, he's fine, just a bit banged up," he told her.
"May I go see him?" she asked in a tiny voice.
"No, honey, but he'll be home before you know it."
She gritted her teeth in frustration. "Are you going to go see him?"
He nodded.
"If I made a picture, would you bring it to him?"
He managed a smile. "Of course, he'd like that."
"Ok," she said faintly.
Then, she ran off to her room to get out her paints, parchment, and to cry alone, pausing only briefly to accept a hug from Arthur and to shoot the boys a passing glance. She painted Alastor a scene from her favorite Beedle the Bard story, "The Fountain of Fair Fortune." She really was very good.