To Ride the Carousel Again
Chapter 31
Disclaimer: I give, sweat and tears, but since I have
no rights to the characters created by J. K. Rowling,
I make no money.
Ahh, Christmas Holidays. Time for Harry to kick back, relax, etc.
Snort, giggle, chortle, belly laugh.
/*
Approx. 5,100 words.
"Anything else about this 'thing'?"
"Yeah, it gives me a headache when I'm near it."
Those were the last words spoken on their walk back to the manor.
/*
Monday, December 21, 1992
Harry was up early. He had slept moderately well despite Hermione going home with her parents last night as they had to finish cleaning up their office patient schedules as they had originally planned to be off on a short ski vacation during Christmas week.
After having told her parents about Harry never having had a Christmas before, at her literal begging, they decided to stay home and give their daughter's best friend a Christmas he would remember all his life.
They were not sure how they were going to do that. They had seen his financial health and wealth, and he had enough money to buy most anything except a private jet, a yacht, or a mansion. And he already had the last out of the three.
Harry was sharing breakfast with Sirius and Lupin. Sirius had to return to St. Mungo's by nine o'clock. Until the mind healers signed off on his mental health from his Azkaban imprisonment, he had to follow the law and go through his evaluation. A furlough in the company of his godson was considered part of his resocialization.
Harry and Lupin were due at Solicitor Tonks at ten after nine with a picked-up Hermione.
With manly hugs around, Sirius apparated away and Harry had Ypres elf pop the two left to the Granger's house, picked up Hermione, and popped to the Leaky Cauldron with Lupin following by apparition.
Diagon Alley was as Harry or Hermione had never seen. Wild lighting and festive decorations that were only possible through magic were on every storefront. They seemed to compete with each other to be as bright and garish as possible.
When questioned, Lupin had explained that Yule was still regarded as requesting a boon from the essence of magic and was a mostly somber occasion. Christmas without any restrictions from religious overtones was seen as an excuse to be as magically rowdy as possible.
They were at Mrs. Tonks's office for only about fifteen minutes as she gave them directions to a mundaneborn business that would create an identity for wizards in the mundane world. She gave Harry one of her mundane-looking business cards as an introduction to the people she was sending them to.
She had explained that many Mundaneborn effectively had no history for their seven years attending Hogwarts and this business could fill in the gaping education paperwork holes seven years hidden in Scotland produced. Harry noted that Hermione had seemed unsurprised at her declaration.
Located above a non-descript second-hand shoppe in another one of those little off-shoot cul-de-sacs, Seven Years a Magical, had a bright sign hanging over the door to the stairway leading up to the office.
The office foyer was worn but clean. A mixture of light and medium-coloured woods were used in pleasing patterns on the walls. Three half-glass doors led to two offices and a meeting room.
A tallish brown-haired, hazel-eyed wizard dressed in brown robes came out of the left-hand office to greet them. He seemed to work at being nondescript.
"Good morning. My name is Jeremy Leighton," he said, extending his hand.
The three in rotation stated, "Hermione Granger", "Remus Lupin", "Harry Potter", as they shook his hand. Leighton started a bit at Harry's name but covered it fairly well by ostensibly checking the business card Harry handed him.
"If you step into my office, we can start on getting you re-accepted into the muggle world."
He then saw to his visitor's seating and then sat himself behind his desk.
Leighton asked, "Is this paperwork for you, Mr. Lupin?"
"No, I often work in the mundane world and have all the paperwork to do so from Her Majesty's government. Including tax payments."
That comment produced a slight frown on the businessman's face.
Before he could speak again, Harry spoke up. "Mr. Leighton, I will need an Oath from you on client confidentiality. You have recognized me and I do not want my actions to be bandied around in a pub while you're hoisting a pint with your lads."
Hermione had to work at not staring at this mature-sounding Harry. "You'd think I'd be used to it now after five months."
Leighton looked closely at Harry. He was no dummy. Keeping himself informed on the doings of the power structure of magical Britannia was a way to keep from stepping on influential toes and staying away from the attention of those same influential people.
What he worked on for his clients could possibly be considered a violation of the Statute of Secrecy. Sloppy work could get muggle officials looking closely at the paperwork of the type he produced.
He knew that while he was looking at a small twelve-year-old boy, the boy's Lord Potter persona could wield considerable clout that could be very troublesome. What had Solicitor Tonks gotten him into?
Swiftly coming to a decision, he slowly removed his wand from a pocket in his robes and recited the same Oath that Solicitor Tonks had.
"Now that I know you are looking for my services, I assume I will be doing this work for Miss Granger?" he asked.
"No," she replied primly. "I will be taking my "O" and "A" level examinations as a homeschooled student as I plan on going to university after Hogwarts."
"Very well." Stated the slightly confused wizard. "Now then, Lord Potter, what do you need from me? I'll admit I am puzzled."
Harry hauled out the envelope he had been given by his Aunt Petunia and passed it over to Jeremy.
"Despite all those wildly popular children's books, I was raised as a Mundaneborn by mundanes. My mother left me some objects and family keepsakes with a firm in London. As I have not had any contact with the firm, I need documentation that shows I am Harry Potter, son of Lily Potter, so they will give me my legacy."
Jeremy looked thoughtful for a minute, slowly nodding his head as he perused the documents Harry had handed him. Like the vast majority of magicals, he knew the story of James Potter and his muggle-born wife, Lily. He could see her leaving something for her son in a bank or storage building somewhere.
The big surprise was the young Lord had an actual birth certificate with a hospital in Bristol listed as where he was born.
But Lord Harry Potter raised in a muggle household? Jeremy was having trouble remaining professionally composed.
"You have the bare minimum to keep Her Majesty's government happy. You have a Birth Certificate from Bristol, an NIH Health Record needed to attend school, and your records of attending the Little Whinging Primary School for five years."
"I can use the last as proof you have had a residence in England for your early school years."
The document provider had a slight frown on his face. "What you don't have is a guardianship or adoption form showing who is responsible for you. That would help nail down your residency claim and identify someone who could swear an affidavit to your identity."
There was silence in the room for a moment before Harry said, "That may be a bit of a problem. All the correspondence that was sent to my mother before she died is to a different address than that shown on any other paperwork."
Jeremy's look became even more thoughtful. "You're what? Twelve, Lord Potter?"
Harry nodded.
"The people you will be dealing with are not going to want to give some young kid something very valuable without an adult, with provable documentation, showing they are responsible for your best interests."
Harry in turn looked very thoughtful.
"I lived with my aunt and uncle in Little Whinging, Surrey, after that night in Godric's Hollow until my twelfth birthday. I left them forever that day."
"To the best of my knowledge, they never adopted me, nor had any contact with any mundane child service organization in over ten years," he said slowly and carefully, picking his words with care.
"If they had any thought that there was money they could steal from me, they would've descended upon me like hyenas at a carcass. They wouldn't have left enough for the vultures to pick over."
Harry pulled his crooked smile. "So, what we have to do is actually find a guardian for me in the mundane world. I'm emancipated as a Lord of House in the wizarding world."
Jeremy cut his eyes over to look at Lupin.
The scarred man snorted quietly. "I'm afraid that my 'furry' condition has also led to a spotty work record in the mundane world."
Leighton returned his attention to Harry. "I can cover up any gaps in his work record rather easily. The lack of work can be due to an exotic debilitating tropical disease that flares up occasionally."
"No, if you want Mr. Lupin to become your guardian in the mundane world, it is the lack of adoption or foster care paperwork that will be most difficult to fake convincingly."
"I will have to make a paper trail all the way up to the National Council. Normally I could stop at the county level, but if what you plan on acquiring is expensive, the people who now control it will probably be connected in the UK power structure. They could probably check up on your story quite thoroughly using their 'old boy' network."
Leighton was quiet for a minute. "Very well. I will have to get an associate to do some fiddling with the computer systems at the National Council and the Surry County Children's Services. And have some paper backup copies just in case."
Leighton stared at Harry, "Lord Potter, this will cost you two hundred and fifty galleons." (£8,750.00)
At his client's obvious looks of surprise and a bit of anger, he continued, "My associate's work will not be cheap. He's a rare specialist. The false paperwork will be extensive and have to pass more than a casual perusal. A lot of those tasked with protecting children take their job very seriously, and your bare bones paperwork, and no personal contact, might set off some nagging little doubts to them."
"Also, those in charge of your mother's legacy perhaps will not want to give up their stewardship of that legacy to a twelve-year-old lad."
"All in all, M'Lord, this is much more complicated than using the Muggleborn network to get educational credit for those missing years."
Glances passed between all three of the 'clients. The amount in pounds was startling to Hermione and Lupin. The bill to Harry, thinking in galleons, was minor.
Locking his gaze on Leighton, Harry said, "Very well, I'll sign your contract. How long before your work is done? I want to present my paperwork to those institutions before I have to return to Hogwarts."
Back out in the jam-packed pre-Christmas rush that was Diagon Alley, Harry pushed his disappointment at how long it would be before he could try to access the accounts his mother had left him to the side.
First, he needed money, so a quick trip to a Gringotts teller solved his money shortage. He needed to buy presents for his 'Family' plus a bunch of casual acquaintances. He had decided months ago to keep his trust vault as 'spending money.'
He figured if he had to keep going to Tongueripper for money all the time, one of them would eventually have a stroke.
A pair of dragon-hide gloves for Neville, A Magical Guide to Coral Reefs for Luna, an actual diary for Ginny, and a subscription to Quidditch Monthly for Ron. (Harry still thought his almost total personality change had been just too rapid. And he had seen The Rat dose Ron with something.)
A nice collection of chocolates were sent to Susan, Daphne, Tracey, Lavender, and Parvati along with a short note of thanks for their help last term. Bags of Christmas-themed candies for Seamus, Dean, and the Weasley twins finished off his minor buying.
The adults would be harder. Hermione's parents were given a pair of matching, winter-themed jumpers that had runic-controlled warming charms imbued in them that could be controlled by Mundanes.
It was while Harry and Hermione talking about the jumpers for her parents, he mentioned how tough it was to buy for Lupin and Sirius. He already had some small owl order stuff, but he wanted something more. Something larger.
"Oh, c'mon, Harry. It shouldn't be that difficult they're both merely big overgrown kids," said Hermione.
Harry had an instant flash of memory. He had watched his cousin playing a game he had plugged into the telly, and one day when they had left him at home, he plugged it into the telly and played. He had enjoyed it so much he risked the sure beating every time they left him alone to play the Mario Brothers game.
His enthusiasm for the idea did a quick crash and burn when he realized that getting a TV to work in the manor would take some doing. Any magic would ruin the electronics and how would he get a big television and the game console delivered?
Harry was still worrying at the problem as Lupin apparated them back to Hermione's house.
For the first time he looked at how the Granger house was decorated. The parlour had Christmas cards on every shelf. Garland was strung along the room's coving, and what looked like a nine-foot-tall fir tree was in the corner with lights and ornaments and more garlands.
Hermione explained that they did not use tinsel this year because if Crookshanks started eating it, it would make him sick. She ex[lained eating tinsel was a cat thing and she didn't know if Crooks would do something cat-stipid.
Harry decided the Grangers had much better taste in decorating than the Dursleys.
Seeing Mr. Granger looking at him as he zoned back in, he suddenly realized maybe the answers to his questions were right here along with Hermione. He had forgotten the Grangers were working only half days this week.
He explained to Hector what he needed, and why. He told him time was probably too short to figure a way to get a big, heavy television out to Potter Manor by Christmas, but could they temporarily plug it in at their house for Christmas day?
After all, this is where they would be opening presents.
The male dentist was thrilled by the idea. His wife was the skeptical one. The main problem was Harry had no money in the mundane world. No bank savings account, no chequing account, no credit card.
Hector offered to front the money, but Helen countered that they would have to take a large amount of cash from him to deposit in their bank. And with the influx of drug money in England, banks were looking askance at large cash deposits and withdrawals.
Harry countered that they had time to talk to his account manager and see if he had a solution. And if he did, they could dine out and shop during the early evening.
Entering Gringotts, Harry went to the same goblin-manned (goblined?) table he had been directed to a seeming lifetime ago and asked to see Tongueripper.
After ten minutes he was led to Tongueripper's office. There Harry laid out his problem. In a burst of inspiration, he brought up that any contacts Gringotts had with muggle banks would make getting those twenty-thousand galleons back into his account a lot easier.
Harry then sat back and let the goblin think.
Tongueripper had a problem. Lord Potter had once again brought up the return of an amount of money that would bring him near Senior Account Manager status again.
The problem was that to do so he was going to have to talk with, and maybe work a deal with, a small faction of Account Managers in the bank. That group had virtually no clan connections with the upper echelons of Senior Account Managers or Overseer Account Managers.
That lack of connections with senior management was mostly due to their advocating that Gringotts should pay more attention to Muggleborns and the muggle world. Their stance was that since there were a thousand times more muggles than wizards, there was a chance of a thousand times more profit.
Another part of his mind remembered from when he was a Senior Account Manager, closing in on Overseer level, he was slowly being given dribs and drabs of information about parts of Gringotts that did work with the muggle government.
He had another memory of an Operations Manager who, after imbibing a few too many mugs of grog, had confided that sometimes Gringotts loaned out bars of gold to the muggle royal bank when they needed to show that they had a certain amount of gold in their vaults.
The half-drunk Manager thought it humorous because, he slurred, the muggles always paid for the brief loan and no one ever checked to see if the gold was real.
Harry had waited politely while Tongueripper had been thinking.
"Lord Potter, I will look into the matter. Can we again meet at ten tomorrow morning?"
At Harry's assent, Tongueripper wrote a note on a piece of rectangular parchment about the size of a cheque.
"Give this to Nailscratch at the exchange window. He will take care of you."
At Harry's obvious questioning look, he further grated, "I have charged the absolute bank minimum for preferred-rated customers. Four percent. You said you would need three thousand eight hundred fifty English pounds."
Harry nodded and waited patiently until his escort appeared without further disturbing Tongueripper, he left and had Ypres pop him back to the Grangers.
Having exchanged the draft of one hundred ten galleons for pounds, Harry declared dinner would be his treat as long as he could have some General Tso's Chicken.
Dinner was a hit, and Hermione declared next time they would go to an Indian restaurant so Harry could have a change in spices.
Mr. Granger had a store in mind where Harry could look at game consoles and televisions.
Slightly less than half an hour later, he pulled the car into a mall parking lot. Due to the Christmas shopping crowds, they had a long cold walk to the electronics store.
Harry had thought his trip to the office supply store had been amazing. The lights and displays around him had him almost as avid as Hector to look at all the amazing appliances and gadgets around him.
While the women wandered off to browse, Harry followed Mr. Granger into the game consoles and computers area of the store.
He saw what he was looking for almost immediately. A Nintendo gaming console with three Mario Brothers games included. And a gun for the duck hunting game.
After staring at the console and its box for a minute, he looked over to the games to be bought separate section and saw two other games he recognized from Dudley's collection. Legend of Zelda and Dr. Mario.
While Harry had been looking at games. Hector had gotten a salesperson to help out. The two held a several-minute conversation about pricing and any discounts as Hector casually mentioned that they were going to need a large television. That was music to the commissioned salesman's ears.
Looking at telly's he first saw a thirty-two-inch model that looked slightly larger than what the Dursleys had. Harry had no idea how large it was, but that was what the sales placard said.
Hector and Harry were talking with the salesman about picture color and clarity when a bone-rattling boom went off about twelve feet away.
Looking over, Harry saw a telly. An ENORMOUS telly. The bloody thing was bigger than he was! Yet it was only as deep as a bookshelf.
At the moment, conversation was almost impossible as the movie playing on the TV was in the midst of a huge firefight between soldiers and terrorists or somebody. There was near-constant machine gun fire and grenade explosions creating an ear-aching din.
Harry could only stand in awe at the huge pictures on the screen in front of him.
Harry turned to the salesman. "Can the Nintendo console play on this telly?"
The salesman affirmed it could.
Harry waved Hector over to where they could talk privately. "This is what I want, Dr. Granger," he said.
Hector looked rather nonplussed. "Harry, that is a top-of-the-line, rear projection television that will cost thirty-two to thirty-four hundred pounds! Add in the Nintendo and taxes and you will be paying almost four thousand pounds!"
Harry looked the dentist straight in the eye. "Cost is not a concern. You've seen my bank statements. It's for my godfather. I think it will be a form of therapy for him that cannot be matched in the magical world."
Hector deflated a bit at the last. Except for the problems associated with Harry just paying cash for the equipment, he knew, having met Sirius Black, all of Harry's arguments were valid. The kid wasn't even trying to use his godfather as a ploy for himself to be able to play the games.
"Alright. Here is what we are going to do. We'll pay about half in cash, put the rest on a credit card, and order the stuff to be delivered on Wednesday. You pay me the difference I put on the card and I'll figure some way to blend it into our cash flow to pay off the credit card. Suits?"
Harry had no idea what Mr. Granger was proposing except that the father of his friend was going to take care of the problem that Harry couldn't buy the television and game by himself.
And that was how it was done. Earlier in the car, Harry had given an envelope to Mr. Granger, who stuffed most of it into an interior coat pocket. Harry noted he paid £2,500.00 in cash and put £1,348.46 on a credit card like Uncle Vernon always carried in his wallet. The store promised delivery to the Granger house at two PM on Wednesday.
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Tuesday was spent mostly alone at the Manor. Tongueripper had owled him postponing the mundane banking meeting. It seemed someone was not cooperating.
He had some holiday homework he wanted out of the way, and Lupin had Potter family business and a short meeting with Tongueripper planned.
Harry had wanted to go with Lupin to learn something about his tenants and how Lupin worked with Tongueripper.
Lupin turning him down had Harry's ire rising until the scarred man explained, "I would not want them to think that the next time I visited them, they might want you to be present. First, for some sort of prestige they think it might give them. Second, they might set up a trap for you if they thought you would show up."
With a small grimace, he carried on. "Also, if we are directly associated, word will get back to Professor Dumbledore and I would rather not talk to him just now. I'm actually surprised no one seems to understand that if I am your Facilitator, I must know where you live."
Harry crushed his ire under a boot and nodded in understanding.
He finished his homework by mid-afternoon and then spent time both missing Hermione and berating himself for being such a wimp that he couldn't be separated from her for a day. Hedwig would have lots of time to deliver her a short note.
Harry and Lupin arrived at the Granger house at half one PM the next day.
Hermione met them at the kitchen door and met them with hot tea and some bisquits. After about ten minutes of talk an anxious Hermione could not restrain herself any longer and asked Harry if he had brought his homework.
Knowing his friend so well, he drew out walking to the closet where his coat was hanging to slowly search its pockets before finding the elusive pages. He then took his time sauntering back to the table before delivering them with great care into her hands.
He missed her evil smirk as she graciously accepted his offering with her left hand while poking him in the hip with her right forefinger. Harry jumped a foot as an electric shock galvanized his body.
"Merlin, Hermione. Did yo" . . .
"Why, yes Harry, I did. Wandless Stinging Hex. You should remember that pranking always carries some risk the pranker will be caught by the prankee and punished."
Harry said nothing. He just stared.
Remus was having to work hard at not collapsing and laughing like a loon at the reverse prank the girl had played Harry with.
Everyone started when the doorbell rang and it was the delivery truck from the electronics store. Hermione directed them upstairs to where the study was, and in less than half an hour the three men had the television and the Nintendo set up and tested that they both worked.
Remus placed a messy scrawl on the paperwork, and with Hermione presenting them with a twenty-pound note, they were gone, leaving the three to stare at a telly screen that said 'Press Start.'
It was over four hours later that the Granger parents, who had guessed what would happen, found the three magicals sitting raptly in front of the telly as Remus and Harry, with Hermione cheering her friend on, were making Mario and Luigi jump, and bounce, and collect coins.
As Hermione's parents made their presence known, Harry immediately started apologizing for losing track of time and not having dinner ready for them. The Grangers explained that they had finished some last-minute shopping so they would have been late anyway.
Feeling his Master's distress, Ypres popped in. When the reasons for all the anxiety were explained, the little elf donned his majordomo persona and informed them all that dinner would be served in the dining room in ten minutes, and they should all get ready for it.
Everyone hustled to get ready as they all realized they were now very hungry.
True to the elf's word, ten minutes later, a beef roast with mashed potatoes with smushy turnips and peas with a sprinkling of sharp cheese was sitting on the completely set dining room table.
Afters were small individual fruit pies with a scoop of berry ice cream.
As the busted-diets group sat in the parlour afterward, the Grangers had to fight hard to keep everyone from bolting upstairs to resume their addiction to the most famous plumbers in the world as they try to save the princess game.
When Harry mentioned that he had spent yesterday doing his holiday homework, Hermione jumped up with a wordless cry and promptly grabbed Harry's work from where she had laid it down.
Admonished by her parents that her checking of Harry's work could wait, she semi-rejoined the conversation as she also kept sneaking quick looks at Harry's work.
It was during one of these looks she missed the plan to have Remus, Hector and Harry try to contact the solicitor firms that Lily Potter had used to overwatch her investment firms. One firm was responsible for five of the investment firms, the other, the remaining four.
Part of the plan was to have Hector buy a pair of cellular telephones, so any calls from Lily's solicitors or holdings could be answered and/or acknowledged. They thought this would make Harry's guardians seem to have a 'presence'.
Remus said he thought that Seven Years a Magical would have the needed documentation done by Wednesday next, the day before New Year's Eve. The people they needed to talk with might or might not be in the offices as it was the Holidays, but they could at least set up firm appointment times.
Further reading of their letters, had shown their main job for twelve years was to hire accounting firms that ran an audit every two to three years on the stewardship of the various accounts.
The men had determined that it had cost some money to do so, but it added a layer of protection against fraud being perpetrated against some unknown child who might be dead for all they knew. The real beauty of Lily's system was that the same accounting firm could not be hired for two audits in a row.
It was late when Harry and Lupin got home.
Harry was surprised to find the large parlour decorated with Christmas greenery and garland. On the wall away from the fireplace was an ornament and shiny garland-decorated pine tree with a glowing spire placed on top.
"Happy Christmas, Harry," said Lupin. "I had the elves do this after we left. We'll have to tell them they did really well. Now we have a place to put our presents before taking them over to Hector and Helen's house."
Harry just stood there taking it in.
Overwhelmed, he turned and gave Lupin a fierce hug. "Thank you, thank you," he repeated over and over.
A/N:
I'll apologize to those who wanted a faster pace in this chapter. (That's next chapter.)
However, I've only seen one story that even partially explains a relationship between muggle banking and Gringotts. It seems it's always goblin 'handwavium' and presto, Lord Potter, "here is everything you need."
Anyhow, among my problems, I still can't find how much HMG is going to sock it to Harry to cash out his G20,000. In the US he would only pay long-term capital gains on the amounts earned over the original £100,000 investment. 1992-1993? Inheritance taxes? The internet has let me down. Keeps letting me down on translating Americanism's into Brit speak.