Emma Potter

46: Chamber of Secrets

I muffle a moan. I get up, "I need to go" I mumbled, ignoring my friends calls I stumbled out of the common room. I took a deep breath to calm my nerves and head down. Then I place my hand on my mother's necklace, which I got on Christmas last year, It let's me know whenever someone I cared about needed my help, I took a deep breathe and began remembering my happiest memories. A whoosh of air, and I was standing in front of...

Lockhart's Office?

I could hear voices, I moved closer. I heard Harry's voice "So you've just been taking credit for what a load of other peoplehave done?" said Harry incredulously. 

"Harry, Harry," said Lockhart, shaking his head impatiently,"it's not nearly as simple as that. There was work involved. I had to track these people down. Ask them exactly how they managedto do what they did. Then I had to put a Memory Charm onthem so they wouldn't remember doing it. If there's one thing Ipride myself on, it's my Memory Charms. No, it's been a lot ofwork, Harry. It's not all book signings and publicity photos, youknow. You want fame, you have to be prepared for a long hardslog."

"Awfully sorry, boys, but I'll have to put a Memory Charm onyou now. Can't have you blabbing my secrets all over the place. I'dnever sell another book —" Lockhart was saying. Before he even had the chance to utter a spell, I bellowed  "Expelliarmus!" 

Lockhart was blasted backward, falling over his trunk; his wandflew high into the air; Ron caught it, and flung it out of the openwindow."Shouldn't have let Professor Snape teach us that one," I said  furiously, kicking Lockhart's trunk aside. Lockhart was looking up at us, feeble once more. Harry was now pointing his wandat him."What d'you want me to do?" said Lockhart weakly. "I don'tknow where the Chamber of Secrets is. There's nothing I can do.""You're in luck," said Harry, forcing Lockhart to his feet atwand point. "We think we know where it is. And what's inside it.Let's go." Ron looked at me, "you coming?" he asked "if it saves my friends" I say stiffly. 

We marched Lockhart out of his office and down the neareststairs, along the dark corridor where the messages shone on thewall, to the door of Moaning Myrtle's bathroom. We sent Lockhart in first. Harry looked pleased to see that he wasshaking. 

Moaning Myrtle was sitting on the tank of the end toilet."Oh, it's you," she said when she saw us. "What do you wantthis time?"

 "To ask you how you died," said Harry.Myrtle's whole aspect changed at once. She looked as though shehad never been asked such a flattering question.

 "Ooooh, it was dreadful," she said with relish. "It happenedright in here. I died in this very stall. I remember it so well. I'd hidden because Olive Hornby was teasing me about my glasses. Thedoor was locked, and I was crying, and then I heard somebodycome in. They said something funny. A different language, I thinkit must have been. Anyway, what really got me was that it was a boyspeaking. So I unlocked the door, to tell him to go and use his owntoilet, and then —" Myrtle swelled importantly, her face shining."I died." 

"How?" I asked. 

"No idea," said Myrtle in hushed tones. "I just remember seeinga pair of great, big, yellow eyes. My whole body sort of seized up,and then I was floating away. . . ." She looked dreamily at Harry."And then I came back again. I was determined to haunt OliveHornby, you see. Oh, she was sorry she'd ever laughed at myglasses." 

"Where exactly did you see the eyes?" said Harry. 

"Somewhere there," said Myrtle, pointing vaguely toward thesink in front of her toilet.

 Me, Harry and Ron hurried over to it. Lockhart was standing wellback, a look of utter terror on his face.It looked like an ordinary sink. They examined every inch of it,inside and out, including the pipes below. And then I saw it:Scratched on the side of one of the copper taps was a tiny snake."That tap's never worked," said Myrtle brightly as I tried toturn it.