Amy managed not to shout out, but it was a close thing.
The little creature on the bed had large, bat-like ears and bulging green eyes the size of tennis balls. Grace knew instantly that this was what had been watching them out of the garden hedge that morning.
As they stared at each other, they heard Dudley's voice from the hall.
Dudley: May I take your coats, Mr. and Mrs. Mason?
The creature slipped off the bed and bowed so low that the end of its long, thin nose touched the carpet. Taylor noticed that it was wearing what looked like an old pillowcase, with rips for arm- and leg-holes.
Harry: Er — hello.
Dobby: The Potters! So long has Dobby wanted to meet you… Such an honor it is…
Amy: Th-thank you
She wanted to ask, "What are you?" but thought it would sound too rude
Amy: Who are you?"
Dobby: Dobby, mam. Just Dobby. Dobby the house-elf.
Grace: Oh — really? Er — I don't want to be rude or anything, but — this isn't a great time for me to have a house-elf in our bedroom."
Petunia's high, false laugh sounded from the living room.
The elf hung his head.
Taylor: Not that we're not pleased to meet you, but, er, is there any particular reason you're here?
Dobby: Oh, yes, mam, Dobby has come to tell you, mam… it is difficult, mam… Dobby wonders where to begin… Amy: Sit down.
Amy points at the bed.
To her horror, the elf burst into tears — very noisy tears.
Dobby: S-sit down! Never… never ever…
Grace thought she heard the voices downstairs falter.
Amy: I'm sorry; I didn't mean to offend you or anything…
Dobby: Offend Dobby! Dobby has never been asked to sit down by a wizard—like an equal…
Amy, the comforting one, ushered Dobby back onto the bed where he sat hiccoughing, looking like a large and very ugly doll. At last he managed to control himself, and sat with his great eyes fixed on Amy in an expression of watery adoration.
Harry: You can't have met many decent wizards.
Dobby shook his head. Then, without warning, he leapt up and started banging his head furiously on the window
Dobby: Bad Dobby! Bad Dobby!
Taylor: Don't — what are you doing
She springs up and pulls Dobby back onto the bed; their owls had woken up with particularly loud screeches and were beating their wings wildly against the bars of their cages.
Dobby: Dobby had to punish himself, mam. Dobby almost spoke ill of his family, mam…
Grace: Your family?
Dobby: The wizard family Dobby serves, mam… Dobby is a house elf—bound to serve one house and one family forever…
Harry: Do they know you're here?
Dobby shuddered.
Dobby: Oh, no, sir, no . . . Dobby will have to punish himself most grievously for coming to see you, sir. Dobby will have to shut his ears in the oven door for this. If they ever knew, sir…
Amy: But won't they notice if you shut your ears in the oven door?
Dobby: Dobby doubts it, mam. Dobby is always having to punish himself for something, mam. They let Dobby get on with it, mam. Sometimes they remind me to do extra punishments…
Grace: But why don't you leave? Escape?
Dobby: A house-elf must be set free, mam. And the family will never set Dobby free . . . Dobby will serve the family until he dies, mam…
Amy stared.
Taylor: And I thought we had it bad staying here for another four weeks. This makes the Dursleys sound almost human. Can't anyone help you? Can't I?
Almost at once, Taylor wished she hadn't spoken. Dobby dissolved again into wails of gratitude.
Taylor: Please, please be quiet. If the Dursleys hear anything, if they know you're here.
Dobby: Taylor Potter asks if she can help Dobby . . . Dobby has heard of your greatness, mam, but of your goodness, Dobby never knew…
Harry: Whatever you've heard about our greatness is a load of rubbish. Taylor and I are not even top of our year at Hogwarts; that's Hermione and Grace, they…
But he stopped quickly, because thinking about Hermione was painful.
Dobby: Harry Potter is humble and modest. Harry Potter speaks not of his triumph over He-Who-Must-Not-Be-Named…
Amy: Voldemort?
Dobby clapped his hands over his bat ears
Dobby: Ah, speak not the name, sir! Speak not the name!
Amy: Sorry, I know lots of people don't like it.
Dobby leaned toward Amy, his eyes wide as headlights.
Dobby: Dobby heard tell, that Harry Potter met the Dark Lord for a second time, just weeks ago… that Harry Potter escaped yet again.
Harry nodded and Dobby's eyes suddenly shone with tears.
Dobby: Ah, sir, Harry Potter is valiant and bold! He has braved so many dangers already! But Dobby has come to protect the Potters, to warn them; even if he does have to shut his ears in the oven door later… the Potters must not go back to Hogwarts.
There was a silence broken only by the chink of knives and forks from downstairs and the distant rumble of Vernon's voice.
Grace: W-what? But we've got to go back—term starts on September first. It's all that's keeping us going. You don't know what it's like here. We don't belong here. We belong in your world—at Hogwarts."
Dobby: No, no, no. The Potters must stay where they are safe. They are too great, too good, to lose. If the Potters go back to Hogwarts, they will be in mortal danger."
Taylor: Why?
Dobby: There is a plot. A plot to make most terrible things happen at Hogwarts School of Witchcraft and Wizardry this year. Dobby has known it for months, mam. The Potters must not put themselves in peril. They are too important, mam!
Grace: What terrible things? Who's plotting them?
Dobby made a funny choking noise and then banged his head frantically against the wall.
Grace: All right! You can't tell us. We understand. But why are you warning me? Hang on—this hasn't got anything to do with Vol—sorry—with You-Know-Who, has it? You could just shake or nod.
Slowly, Dobby shook his head.
Dobby: Not—not He-Who-Must-Not-Be-Named, mam.
But Dobby's eyes were wide and he seemed to be trying to give Taylor a hint. Taylor, however, was completely lost.
Taylor: He hasn't got a brother, has he?
Dobby shook his head, his eyes wider than ever.
Taylor: Well then, I can't think who else would have a chance of making horrible things happen at Hogwarts. I mean, there's Dumbledore, for one thing—you know who Dumbledore is, don't you?
Dobby bowed his head.
Dobby: Albus Dumbledore is the greatest headmaster Hogwarts has ever had. Dobby knows it, mam. Dobby has heard Dumbledore's powers rival those of He-Who-Must-Not-Be-Named at the height of his strength. But, mam, there are powers Dumbledore doesn't… powers no decent wizard…
And before Taylor could stop him, Dobby bounded off the bed, seized their desk lamp, and started beating himself around the head with earsplitting yelps. A sudden silence fell downstairs. Two seconds later Harry, heart thudding madly, heard Uncle Vernon coming into the hall.
Vernon: Dudley must have left his television on again, the little tyke!
Amy: Quick! In the closet!
She stuffs Dobby in, shutting the door, and flinging herself onto the bed just as the door handle turned.
Vernon: What — the — devil — are — you — doing? You've just ruined the punch line of my Japanese golfer joke… One more sound and you'll wish you'd never been born, girl!"
He stomped flat-footed from the room.
Shaking, Amy let Dobby out of the closet.
Taylor: See what it's like here? See why I've got to go back to Hogwarts? It's the only place I've got—well, I think I've got friends.
Dobby: Friends who don't even write to the Potters?
Harry: I expect they've just been — wait a minute. How do you know our friends haven't been writing to us?"
Dobby shuffled his feet.
Dobby: The Potters mustn't be angry with Dobby. Dobby did it for the best —"
Harry: Have you been stopping our letters?
Dobby: Dobby has them here, sir.
Stepping nimbly out of Harry's reach, he pulled a thick wad of envelopes from the inside of the pillowcase he was wearing. Harry could make out Hermione's neat writing, Ron's untidy scrawl, and even a scribble that looked as though it was from the Hogwarts gamekeeper, Hagrid. Amy could make out a few letters from Ginny.
Dobby blinked anxiously up at Harry.
Dobby: The Potters mustn't be angry… Dobby hoped… if the Potters thought their friends had forgotten him… the Potters might not want to go back to school, sir…
Harry wasn't listening. He made a grab for the letters, but
Dobby jumped out of reach.
Dobby: the Potters will have them, sir, if they give Dobby their word that they will not return to Hogwarts. Ah, sir, this is a danger you must not face! Say you won't go back, sir!"
Harry: No, give us our friends' letters!
Dobby: Then the Potters leave Dobby no choice.
Before they could move, Dobby had darted to the bedroom door, pulled it open, and sprinted down the stairs. Mouth dry, stomach lurching, Harry, Grace, Taylor, and Amy sprang after him, trying not to make a sound. They jumped the last six steps, landing catlike on the hall carpet, looking around for Dobby. From the dining room he heard Vernon talking
Vernon: Tell Petunia that very funny story about those American plumbers, Mr. Mason. She's been dying to hear…
They Potters ran up the hall into the kitchen and felt their stomachs disappear.
Petunia's masterpiece of a pudding, the mountain of cream and sugared violets, was floating up near the ceiling. On top of a cupboard in the corner crouched Dobby.
Taylor: No. Please… they'll kill us…
Dobby: The Potters must say they're not going back to school…
Grace: Dobby…please…
Dobby: Say it, mam…
Amy: We can't…
Dobby gave them a tragic look.
Dobby: Then Dobby must do it, mam, for the Potters' own good.
The pudding fell to the floor with a heart-stopping crash. Cream splattered the windows and walls as the dish shattered. With a crack like a whip, Dobby vanished.
There were screams from the dining room and Vernon burst into the kitchen to find Taylor, Grace, Amy, and Harry, rigid with shock, covered from head to foot in Petunia's pudding. At first, it looked as though Vernon would manage to gloss the whole thing over. ('Just our nephew and nieces—very disturbed—meeting strangers upsets them, so we kept them upstairs…') He shooed the shocked Masons back into the dining room, promised
The Potters he would flay him to within an inch of their life when the Masons had left, and handed them mops. Petunia dug some ice cream out of the freezer and Amy, Harry, Grace, and Taylor, still shaking, started scrubbing the kitchen clean. Vernon might still have been able to make his deal—if it hadn't been for the owl.
Petunia was just passing around a box of after-dinner mints when a huge barn owl swooped through the dining room window, dropped a letter on Mrs. Mason's head, and swooped out again. Mrs. Mason screamed like a banshee and ran from the house shouting about lunatics. Mr. Mason stayed just long enough to tell the Dursleys that his wife was mortally afraid of birds of all shapes and sizes, and to ask whether this was their idea of a joke. The Potters stood in the kitchen, clutching their mops for support, as Vernon advanced on them, a demonic glint in his tiny eyes.
Vernon: Read it! Go on—read it!
Harry took it. It did not contain birthday greetings.
Dear Mr. H. Potter, Miss. T. Potter, and Miss. G. Potter,
We have received intelligence that a Hover Charm was used at your place of residence this evening at twelve minutes past nine. As you know, underage wizards are not permitted to perform spells outside school, and further spell work on your part may lead to expulsion from said school (Decree for the Reasonable Restriction of Underage Sorcery, 1875, Paragraph C). We would also ask you to remember that any magical activity that risks notice by members of the non-magical community (Muggles) is a serious offense under section 13 of the International Confederation of Warlocks' Statute of Secrecy.
Enjoy your holidays!
Yours sincerely,
Mafalda Hopkirk
Improper use of magic office
Ministry of Magic
Harry looked up from the letter and gulped.
Vernon: You didn't tell us you weren't allowed to use magic outside school. Forgot to mention it… Slipped your mind, I dare say… Well, I've got news for you, kids… I'm locking you up… You're never going back to that school… never… and if you try and magic yourself out—they'll expel you!
And laughing like a maniac, he dragged Amy, Taylor, Grace, and Harry back upstairs. Vernon was as bad as his word. The following morning, he paid a man to fit bars on Amy, Harry, Grace, and Taylor's window. He himself fitted a cat-flap in the bedroom door, so that small amounts of food could be pushed inside three times a day. They let the four out to use the bathroom morning and evening. Otherwise, they were locked in their room around the clock.
Three days later, the Dursleys were showing no sign of relenting, and the four couldn't see any way out of his situation. They lay on their beds watching the sun sinking behind the bars on the window and wondered miserably what was going to happen to them. What was the good of magicking themselves out of their room if
Hogwarts would expel them for doing it? Yet life at Privet Drive had reached an all-time low. Now that the Dursleys knew they weren't going to wake up as fruit bats, he had lost his only weapon. Dobby might have saved Harry from horrible happenings at Hogwarts, but the way things were going, he'd probably starve to death anyway. The cat-flap rattled and Petunia's hand appeared, pushing four bowls of canned soup into the room. Harry, whose insides were aching with hunger, jumped off his bed and seized it. The soup was stone cold, but he drank half of it in one gulp. The girls made their way to the soup. Then they crossed the room to their owls' cages and tipped the soggy vegetables at the bottom of the bowl into their empty food trays. They ruffled their feathers and gave them a look of deep disgust.
Taylor: It's no good turning your beaks up at it—that's all we've got.
She put the empty bowl back on the floor next to the cat-flap and lay back down on the bed, somehow even hungrier than she had been before the soup. Supposing they were still alive in another four weeks, what would happen if they didn't turn up at Hogwarts? Would someone be sent to see why he hadn't come back? Would they be able to make the Dursleys let him go?
The room was growing dark. Exhausted, stomach rumbling, mind spinning over the same unanswerable questions, the four fell into an uneasy sleep. They dreamed that they were on show in a zoo, with a card reading underage wizard and witches attached to their cage. People goggled through the bars at them, as they lay, starving and weak, on a bed of straw. They saw Dobby's face in the crowd and shouted out, asking for help,
Dobby: The Potters are safe there!
Then the Dursleys appeared and Dudley rattled the bars of the cage, laughing at him.
Harry: Stop it. Leave me alone… cut it out… I'm trying to sleep…
They opened their eyes. Moonlight was shining through the bars on the window. And someone was goggling through the bars at them: a freckle-faced, red-haired, long-nosed someone. Ron Weasley was outside the four's window.