Exotic Matter | Harry Potter for Grownups

Chapter Nine

"No, not at all. You did what anyone would do."

"We did keep some of the furniture. The kids took most of it, but there's a writing desk in my office, if you'd like to see it."

The desk is one of those with a hundred tiny cubbies for the obsessive organiser to fill. There's a holoscreen and a hard copy of E-Auctions for Imbeciles sitting on it. For a moment, Hermione holds out a hope that she'll find some note, some crucial clue, hidden in the desk, but when she performs several Revealing spells—with Perdita's permission—nothing happens.

"There were quite a lot of books," Perdita says from behind her. "I got rid of most of them, but I kept the ones that looked like they might be valuable. They're on that shelf there."

She points to bookcase behind the desk, and Hermione steps around to have a look. There's a leather-bound Complete Works of Shakespeare, several of Dickens's more famous works, and, she smiles to see, a copy of Hogwarts: A History that looks like the edition Hermione first read when she got her Hogwarts letter.

Hermione says, "May I?"

"Be my guest."

She takes the book out and opens it to random page, which details settling of the first Mer-colony in the Black Lake. There is no marginalia, no underlined passages, as she flips through. Not that she expected there to be. Hermione would never mark a book, and she suspects that she and Minerva are—were—alike in that.

When she puts it back on the shelf, she notices The Time Machine next to it. It is very old, this copy, and the faded red cloth of the spine is cracked with wear. Something compels her to pull it out, and when she opens it, her heart begins to thud insistently in her chest. There is a piece of parchment folded between the pages. It almost slides out, but Hermione anchors it with a quick finger.

Closing the book, she says without thinking, "Can I buy these from you?"

Perdita is not expecting the question, and she hesitates before answering.

"I guess so. I don't have any emotional attachment to them, but why would you want them?"

"I collect old books, and it would mean a lot to me to have Minerva's."

The first part of the statement is a lie, but the second is not.

"I should have them appraised, I suppose," said Perdita.

"I'll give you two thousand Galleons."

Perdita bites her lip, and Hermione realises that she's come on too strong, so she softens her tone.

"I'm not trying to cheat you, honestly. I just really want the books. Tell you what: if you'll sell them to me tonight, I'll have an appraiser come look at them as soon as possible. You can choose the appraiser, and I'll pay for it. If he or she thinks I've underpaid, I'll give you the difference. If I've paid too much, you can keep it. I'll take a Wand Oath."

When Hermione gets home with her Shrunken treasure, Ron is, thankfully, out. She doesn't know how she's going to explain the sudden depletion of their Gringotts account. They can afford it, but it will mean cutting back elsewhere. Probably they'll have to skip their planned holiday in Spain.

She opens the book with trembling hands and takes out the parchment hidden in its pages. It is a letter, unsigned and undated.

If you are reading this, I am dead.

I can only hope that, when the charm on this parchment activates, the Dark Lord is dead and Potter victorious, but I must allow for the possibility that the Dark Lord has prevailed, in which case I do not wish to contemplate the circumstances under which you might be reading this.