Which dribbled down her chin.

“How do you -?” croaked Doge.

“My mother was friendly with old Bathilda Bagshot,” said Auntie Muriel happily.

“Bathilda described the whole thing to mother while I was listening at the door. A

coffin-side brawl. The way Bathilda told it, Aberforth shouted that it was all Albus’ fault

That Ariana was dead and then punched him in the face. According to Bathilda, Albus did

not even defend himself, and that’s odd enough in itself. Albus could have destroyed

Aberforth in a duel with both hands tied behind his back.

Muriel swigged yet more champagne. The recitation of those old scandals

Seemed to elate her as much as they horrified Doge. Harry did not know what to think,

What to believe. He wanted the truth and yet all Doge did was sit there and bleat feebly

That Ariana had been ill. Harry could hardly believe that Dumbledore would not have

Intervened if such cruelty was happening inside his own house, and yet there was

Undoubtedly something odd about the story.

“And I’ll tell you something else,” Muriel said, hiccupping slightly as she lowered

her goblet. “I think Bathilda has spilled the beans to Rita Skeeter. All those hints in

Skeeter’s interview about an important source close to the Dumbledores – goodness

knows she was there all through the Ariana business, and it would fit!”

“Bathilda, would never talk to Rita Skeeter!” whispered Doge.

“Bathilda Bagshot?” Harry said. “The author of A History of Magic?”

The name was printed on the front of one of Harry’s textbooks, though admittedly

Not one of the ones he had read more attentively.

“Yes,” said Doge, clutching at Harry’s question like a drowning man at a life heir.

“A most gifted magical historian and an old friend of Albus’s.”

“Quite gaga these days, I’ve heard,” said Auntie Muriel cheerfully.

“If that is so, it is even more dishonorable for Skeeter to have taken advantage of

her,” said Doge, “and no reliance can be placed on anything Bathilda may have said!”

“Oh, there are ways of bringing back memories, and I’m sure Rita Skeeter knows

them all,” said Auntie Muriel “But even if Bathilda’s completely cuckoo, I’m sure she’d

still have old photographs, maybe even letters. She knew the Dumbledores for years….

Well worth a trip to Godric’s Hollow, I’d have thought.”

Harry, who had been taking a sip of butterbeer, choked. Doge banged him on the

Back as Harry coughed, looking at Auntie Muriel through streaming eyes. Once he had

control of his voice again, he asked, “Bathilda Bagshot lives in Godric’s Hollow?”

“Oh yes, she’s been there forever! The Dumbledores moved there after Percival

was imprisoned, and she was their neighbor.”

“The Dumbledores lived in Godric’s Hollows?”

“Yes, Barry, that’s what I just said,” said Auntie Muriel testily.

Harry felt drained, empty. Never once, in six years, had Dumbledore told Harry

that they had both lived and lost loved ones in Godric’s Hollow. Why? Were Lily and

James buried close to Dumbledore’s mother and sister? Had Dumbledore visited their

graves, perhaps walked past Lily’s and James’s to do so? And he had never once told

Harry … never bothered to say…

Date: 2015-12-11; view: 773