On Cowardice, or
With Fearsome Things To See
Chapter 26
Dear Mummy,
Harry Potter's not what I expected at all. He's not big or grand or even powerful. He's just like another boy at school. Except…he's not. He's…I don't know…deep? It's like there's so much more to him than to most other boys I know his age. He very soon makes you think that being big, grand, and powerful in all the ways I expected is a bit overdone and not really real and that real power is like his—in the eyes, sort of. I don't know if I'm making any sense at all.
He told me about Draco, because I asked—his view of Draco, which Astoria says is fairly accurate, though Myrtle thinks Harry was just about as bad as Draco. I doubt that. I don't doubt Harry has a temper, but I can't see him being as outright nasty as everyone says Draco acted. It's that whatever-it-is in his eyes. Whatever his temper's like, Harry kept choosing goodness. Whereas Draco—we know what he chose.
One thing I didn't expect was that he thinks of Draco as a coward. Of course, being a Gryffindor he'd think of anyone as a coward who didn't run straight into danger without thinking, armed with nothing more than a teakettle. Or a wooly jumper. But he says Draco was always running away. I don't know why that bothers me so much. It seems like it's easier to fix an evil heart than a cowardly one. Is that true?
Anyway, Myrtle says it's not true—not that true, at least. She says he was scared to death about what he had to do in the Room of Requirement, with the big cabinet that he had to fix so people could transport into Hogwarts from Diagon Alley. It was very dangerous to fix, because he had to experiment on himself, and he could have killed himself or hurt himself badly, but he still did it. Because there was something worse: Voldemort killing his parents. Is that courage? Doing what you're afraid of because something worse might happen? Of course it's not like doing something you're afraid of because it's right. Myrtle doesn't understand that distinction, or she doesn't want to. But at least contradicting Harry is getting her to tell me more about Draco. She doesn't dislike Harry, says he was decent to her, but people who have been pushed around sort of get her sympathy, and she only ever knew Draco when he was being pushed around by Voldemort.
And you get to go to Romania! That's exciting. All these years traveling around the Continent, and you've never been to Romania. Do you think it's true you really have Romanian gypsy ancestors, like Grandfather Bonhomme thought? It would explain why you like to travel so much. But I don't know if I really understood what you found in Draco's diary that makes you think he decided to end up there. He wrote the end of it months ago, before he even left. Anyway, please find him soon. I'm getting a little anxious.
Love, Lucia.