A Hogwarts Legend: Round Two [2]

Chapter Three

"Nah," I grin, "I'll help, I slept in the car."

And by help, I mean sitting on my arse doing nothing.....

"I'll help Ron," Harry says quickly, "I've never seen a de-gnoming -"

"That's very sweet of you, dears, but it's dull work," says Mrs Weasley. "Now, let's see what Lockhart's got to say on the subject."

And she pulls a heavy book from the stack on the mantlepiece. George groans.

"Mum, we know how to de-gnome a garden."

I look at the cover of Mrs Weasley's book. Written across it in fancy gold letters are the words: Gilderoy Lockhart's Guide to Household Pests. There's a big photograph on the front of a wizard with wavy blond hair and bright blue eyes.

He looks like a prick...

"Oh, he is marvellous," Mrs Weasley says, "he knows his household pests, all right, it's a wonderful book ..."

"Mum fancies him," says Fred, in a very audible whisper.

"Don't be so ridiculous, Fred," says Mrs Weasley, her cheeks rather pink. "All right, if you think you know better than Lockhart, you can go and get on with it, and woe betide you if there's a single gnome in that garden when I come out to inspect it."

Yawning and grumbling, the Weasleys slouch outside with Harry and I behind them. The garden is large and there are plenty of weeds, the grass needs cutting, but there are gnarled trees all around the walls, plants spelling from every flower bed and a big green pond full of frogs.

"Muggles have gnomes, too, you know," Harry says as we cross the lawn.

"Yeah, I've seen those things they think are gnomes," says Ron, bending down with his head in a peony bush. "Like fat little Father Christmases with fishing rods ..."

There's a violent scuffling noise, the peony bush shudders and Ron straightens up. "This is a gnome," he says grimly.

"Gerroff me! Gerroff me!" squeals the gnome.

It's certainly nothing like a Father Christmas. It is small and leathery-looking, with a large, knobbly, bald head exactly like a potato. Ron holds it at arms length as it kicks out at him with its horny little feet; he grasps it around the ankles and turns it upside-down.

"This is what you have to do," he says. He raises the gnome above his head ("Gerroff me!") and starts to swing it in great circles like a lasso. Seeing the shocked look on Harry's face, Ron adds, "It doesn't hurt them - you've just got to make them really dizzy so they can't find their way back to the gnomeholes."

He lets go of the gnome's ankles: it flies twenty feet into the air and lands with a thud in the field over the hedge.

"Pitiful," says Fred. "I bet I can get mine beyond that stump."

Laughing, I sit on a tree stump, watching the boys. The air is soon thick with flying gnomes.

"See, they're not too bright," says George, seizing five or six gnomes at once. "The moment they know the de-gnoming's going on they storm up to have a look. You'd think they'd have learned by now just to stay put."

Soon, the crowd of gnomes in the field started walking away in a straggling line, their little shoulders hunched.

"Awh, they look so sad," I pout, jumping to my feet.

"They'll be back," says Ron, laughing at my expression. "They love it here ... Dad's too soft with them, he thinks they're funny ..."

Just then, a door slams, and I jump.

"He's back!" says George. "Dads home!"

We hurry through the garden and back into the house. Mr Weasley is slumped in a kitchen chair with his glasses off and his eyes closed. He is a thin man, going bald, but the little hair he has is as red as any of his kids. He's wearing long green robes which are dusty and travel-worn.

"What a night," he mumbles, groping for the teapot as we all sit down around him. "Nine raids! Nine! And old Mundungus Fletcher tried to put a hex on me when I had my back turned ..." Mr Weasley takes a long gulp of tea abs sighs.

"Find anything, Dad?" says Fred eagerly.

"All I got were a few shrinking door-keys and a biting kettle," yawns Mr Weasley. "There was some pretty nasty stuff that wasn't my department, though. Mortlake was taken away for questioning about some extremely odd ferrets, but that's the Committee on Experimental Charms, thank goodness ..."

"Why would anyone bother making door-keys shrink?" says George.

"I think the real question is, why wouldn't you?" I say, grinning.

"Just Muggle-baiting," sighs Mr Weasley. "Sell them a key that keeps shrinking to nothing so they can never find it when they need it ... Of course, it's very hard to convict anyone because no Muggle would admit their keys kept shrinking - they'll insist they just keep losing it. Bless them, they'll go to any lengths to ignore magic, even if it's staring them in the face ... but the things our lot have taken to enchanting, you wouldn't believe -"

"LIKE CARS, FOR INSTANCE?"

Mrs Weasley has appeared, holding a long poker like a sword. Mr Weasley's eyes jerk open. He stares guiltily at his wife.

Oh god this is going to be good!

I really should keep popcorn on me for times like this...

"C-cars, Molly, dear?"

"Yes, Arthur, cars," says Mrs Weasley, her eyes flashing. "Imagine a wizard buying a rusty old car and telling his wife all he wanted to do with it was take it apart to see how it worked, while really he was enchanting it to make it fly."

Mr Weasley blinks.

"Well, dear, I think you'll find that he would be quite within the law to do that, even if, er, he maybe would have done better to, um, tell his wife the truth ... There's a loophole in the law, you'll find ... as long as he wasn't intending to fly the car, the fact that the car could fly wouldn't -"

"Arthur Weasley, you made sure there was a loophole when you wrote that law!" shouts Mrs Weasley. "Just so you could carry on tinkering with all that Muggle rubbish in your shed! And for your information, Harry arrived this morning in the car you weren't intending to fly!"

"Harry?" says Mr Weasley blankly. "Harry who?"

No one knows really...

He looks around, sees Harry and jumps.

"Good Lord, is it Harry Potter? Very pleased to meet you, Ron's told us so much about -"

"Your sons flew that car to Harry's house and back last night!" shouts Mrs Weasley. "What have you got to say about that, eh?"

"Did you really?" says Mr Weasley eagerly. "Did it go all right? I-I mean," he falters, as sparks fly from Mrs Weasley's eyes, "that-that was very wrong, boys - very wrong indeed ..."

"Let's leave them to it," Ron mutters to Harry and I. "Come on, I'll show you my bedroom Harry."

We slip out the kitchen and down a narrow passageway to an uneven staircase, which zigzags its way up through the house. On the first landing, I leave Harry and Ron, heading to my room.

I don't need to see Ron's room, it's basically a shrine to the Chudley Cannons (his Quidditch team).

I walk into my room and shut the door behind me. Flopping in the bed, I smile up at the ceiling.

I love it here, even if it's full of gingers!

Kidding!

Maybe...