GINNY'S OTHER LIFE
Chapter 3
Things in the wizard world were always slow to change. After the fall of Voldemort, many new faces occupied space at the Ministry of Magic. But that was several years ago, and people were getting tired of the corruption and ineptness of the current administration. There was still too much political favouritism slowing down progress and putting good people out of their ministry jobs. Good people were being replaced by unskilled political friends and relatives.
But that was about to change. A new minister was elected on the promise that he would clean up the whole ministry and revamp the Wizengamot. As part of these changes, past charges and political appointments were reviewed and corrected where appropriate. One such review was the incident with Ginny Weasley and her father.
The person that accused Ginny of switching reports and forcing her out of the ministry was now in a Muggle prison. He was accused and convicted of many charges against both wizard and muggle laws. On his barrister's advise, he confessed to everything in order to get a lighter sentence, which he didn't. Among the things he confessed to was the 'switching papers' incident. He admitted that another person was paid by him to make the switch and implicate Ginny Weasley.
The Wizengamot quickly reversed their previous decision on the case and cleared Ginny Weasley of all charges. Her father was rehired and given back-pay for the time he was out of his job. They agreed to do the same for Miss Weasley, but couldn't find her. Anxious to clear up this miscarriage of justice, they assigned her brother, Ron Weasley and his wife Hermione, to find Ginevra Molly Weasley and bring her back to the fold.
Ron and Hermione searched London and surrounding areas for several months, but came up empty. Not a single clue or lead was found. Like Harry Potter, she just disappeared without a trace. They began to suspect that she might have gone off with Harry, but dropped that when it was reported that Harry Potter had recently been killed in Australia.
Ron and Hermione flew to Australia to investigate Harry's death and bring his body back to Brittan for a proper burial. While there the found no evidence of Ginny being with him at any time. The needed to start their search again.
The months flew by without a clue to where she was hiding. Then they got a break reading old police arrest reports in a small suburb of the city. A young girl was arrested and held on a disturbing the peace charge. But the accuser, a bouncer at a local pub, refused to press charges on advice from his employer who didn't want the publicity.
Ron and Hermione thought that this was important because the description of the girl roughly fit Ginny's size and height, but it was only a shot-in-the-dark. The girl's hair as described in the arrest report was the wrong colour. No one could miss her flaming red locks.
Still, the black and white police photo did look a little like Ginny. It was the closest lead they had, so they decided to investigate further. Fortunately the report gave a current address, so that was their next stop. But every effort they made to find the street address turned up nothing. There was such a street, but no such street address. Another dead end. If this was really Ginny, she was being very careful hiding herself.
The only other information on her arrest report was the name of the pub and the name of the bouncer. So the next day they set out to find the pub. That was easy, but the manager was no help. He was still acting to avoid any publicity.
The bouncer had just arrived as Ron and Hermione were leaving the manager's office. They interviewed him, but again no useful information was uncovered. But he did comment that to his knowledge it was the only time the girl attempted to enter the pub. He also described the street-walker clothing the girl was wearing, much to Ron's dismay. Somehow he couldn't picture Ginny dressed like a common whore.
"So it's back to square one," Ron commented. Hermione disagreed.
"Ron, consider this," she said as she pointed to a street map of the area. "Two things. First, her place of employment listed in the report is only a short distance from the street address where this girl said she lived."
"Yea, but that address doesn't exist," Ron reminded her.
"True, but the police wouldn't have known that unless they checked it out. And they had no reason to do that."
"Ok, I'll give you that. What else?"
Hermione smiled. "Ok then. Next, the bouncer said that she walked up to the door from across the street. There is no parking in that area, and no busses ran that late on that street. So she must have walked there from wherever she lives."
Again Hermione pointed to the street map. "The street in the report is only short walk from the pub."
Hermione drew a red circle around the centre of the alleged street address listed as the girl's home.
"Nice red circle Mione." Ron joked.
"Stuff it Ron. Get serious, ok." she chided him.
"Sorry. So continue on."
Hermione gave him 'that' look that all men knew well. Then she drew lines from the circle to the address of the pub and to the address of the girls place of employment.
"Look Ron, the place where lives is within a short walking distance to the two other address, but in different directions. She must live right here," Hermione told him pointing to the red circle.
"Ok, I see your point Mione. But it's pure conjecture. We really don't even know if this girl is Ginny."
"Yes, that's true. But it's the only lead we have at this point. Let's walk up and down that street and just take a look, ok."
He agreed, but suggested that they drive up and down the street first to get an idea of what type of buildings were there. As Ron drove slowly up and down the street, Hermione made note of the buildings. It was not a very good area, and many of the buildings were in disrepair and either occupied by small businesses or were abandoned.
There were four apartment buildings in a cluster about half way down the street. They were all in a state of disrepair also, but it appeared that all of them were occupied, at least partially. This type of old building had an entrance foyer that lead to a staircase and to the upper units. By law, a list of tenants was always posted somewhere in the foyer, usually next to a row of postboxes.
"See there Ron. Those apartment buildings are half way along this street, just as I indicated on the map."
"Ok Mione. We'll take a look. But It's getting late, and I didn't want you out walking along in this type of neighbourhood in the dark. Let's come back here early. Tomorrow. is Sunday, and the girl will probably be home. We'll go into each building and make a list of all the names in each of the apartments."
"Good idea Ron. Thanks."
On the way home, Hermione was thinking, as per usual.
"Ron, suppose it is Ginny? How are we going to handle it?"
"Don't know Mione. We'll just play it by ear."
"Ok. Now what about Harry? Do we tell her that he's dead? I know she will ask about him."
"Again, I don't know Mione. It will be very hard to tell her that he is gone. Why don't we just try to work around that till we see what state of mind she's in."
Hermione agreed.
They returned to their home and reviewed all of their findings. There had to be something there somewhere.
End chapter three