d.
For perhaps five minutes they followed the footsteps, until Riddle
stopped suddenly, his head inclined in the direction of new noises.
Harry heard a door creak open, and then someone speaking in a
hoarse whisper.
"C'mon ... gotta get yeh outta here .... C'mon now ... in the box. . ."
There was something familiar about that voice ....
Riddle suddenly jumped around the corner. Harry stepped out behind
him. He could see the dark outline of a huge boy who was crouching
in front of an open door, a very large box next to it.
"Evening, Rubeus," said Riddle sharply.
The boy slammed the door shut and stood up.
"What yer doin' down here, Tom?"
Riddle stepped closer.
"It's all over," he said. "I'm going to have to turn you in, Rubeus.
They're talking about closing Hogwarts if the attacks don't stop."
4 6
"N" at d'yeh -"
"I don't think you meant to kill anyone. But monsters don't make
good pets. I suppose you just let it out for exercise and -"
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"It never killed no one!" said the large boy, backing against the
closed door. From behind him, Harry could hear a funny rustling and
clicking.
"Come on, Rubeus," said Riddle, moving yet closer. "The dead girl's
parents will be here tomorrow. The least Hogwarts can do is make
sure that the thing that killed their daughter is slaughtered ......
"It wasn't him!" roared the boy, his voice echoing in the dark
passage. "He wouldn'! He never!"
"Stand aside," said Riddle, drawing out his wand.
His spell lit the corridor with a sudden flaming light. The door behind
the large boy flew open with such force it knocked him into the wall
opposite. And out of it came something that made Harry let out a
long, piercing scream unheard by anyone
A vast, low-slung, hairy body and a tangle of black legs; a gleam of
many eyes and a pair of razor-sharp pincers - Riddle raised his
wand again, but he was too late. The thing bowled him over as it
scuttled away, tearing up the corridor and out of sight. Riddle
scrambled to his feet, looking after it; he raised his wand, but the
huge boy leapt on him, seized his wand, and threw him back down,
yelling, "NO000000!"
The scene whirled, the darkness became complete; Harry felt himself
falling and, with a crash, he landed spread-eagled on his four-poster
in the Gryffindor dormitory, Riddle's diary lying open on his stomach.
*24 7*
Before he had had time to regain his breath, the dormitory door
opened and Ron came in.
"There you are," he said.
Harry sat up. He was sweating and shaking.
"What's up?" said Ron, looking at him with concern.
"It was Hagrid, Ron. Hagrid opened the Chamber of Secrets fifty
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years ago."
Harry, Ron, and Hermione had always known that Hagrid had an
unfortunate liking for large and monstrous creatures. During their first
year at Hogwarts he had tried to raise a dragon in his little wooden
house, and it would be a long time before they forgot the giant, threeheaded
dog he'd christened "Fluffy." And if, as a boy, Hagrid had
heard that a monster was hidden somewhere in the castle, Harry was
sure he'd have gone to any lengths for a glimpse of it. He'd probably
thought it was a shame that the monster had been cooped up so
long, and thought it deserved the chance to stretch its many legs;
Harry could just imagine the thirteen-year-old Hagrid trying to fit a
leash and collar on it. But he was equally certain that Hagrid would
never have meant to kill anybody.
Harry half wished he hadn't found out how to work Riddle's diary.
Again and again Ron and Hermione made him recount what
he'd seen, until he was heartily sick of telling them and sick of the
long, circular conversations that followed.
"Riddle might have got the wrong person," said Hermione. "Maybe it
was some other monster that was attacking people . . . ."
"How many monsters d'you think this place can hold?" Ron asked
dully.
"We always knew Hagrid had been expelled," said Harry miserably.
"And the attacks must've stopped after Hagrid was kicked out.
Otherwise, Riddle wouldn't have got his award."
Ron tried a different tack.
"Riddle does sound like Percy - who asked him to squeal on Hagrid,
anyway?"
"But the monster had killed someone, Ron," said Hermione.
"And Riddle was going to go back to some Muggle orphanage if they
closed Hogwarts," said Harry. "I don't blame him for wanting to stay
here ......
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"You met Hagrid down Knockturn Alley, didn't you, Harry?"
"He was buying a Flesh-Eating Slug Repellent," said Harry quickly.
The three of them fell silent. After a long pause, Hermione voiced the
knottiest question of all in a hesitant voice.
"Do you think we should go and ask Hagrid about it all?"
"That'd be a cheerful visit," said Ron. "'Hello, Hagrid. Tell us, have
you been setting anything mad and hairy loose in the castle lately?"'
In the end, they decided that they would not say anything to Hagrid
unless there was another attack, and as more and more days went by
with no whisper from the disembodied voice, they became
hopeful that they would never need to talk to him about why he had
been expelled. It was now nearly four months since Justin and Nearly
Headless Nick had been Petrified, and nearly everybody seemed to
think that the attacker, whoever it was, had retired for good. Peeves
had finally got bored of his "Oh, Potter, you rotter" song, Ernie
Macmillan asked Harry quite politely to pass a bucket of leaping
toadstools in Herbology one day, and in March several of the
Mandrakes threw a loud and raucous party in greenhouse three. This
made Professor Sprout very happy.
"The moment they start trying to move into each other's pots, we'll
know they're fully mature," she told Harry. "Then we'll be able to
revive those poor people in the hospital wing."
The second years were given something new to think about during
their Easter holidays. The time had come to choose their subjects for
the third year, a matter that Hermione, at least, took very seriously.
"it could affect our whole future," she told Harry and Ron as they
pored over lists of new subjects, marking them with checks.
"I just want to give up Potions," said Harry.
"We can't," said Ron gloomily. "We keep all our old subjects, or I'd've
ditched Defense Against the Dark Arts."
215
"But that's very important!" said Hermione, shocked.
"Not the way Lockhart teaches it," said Ron. "I haven't learned
anything from him except not to set pixies loose."
Neville Longbottom had been sent letters from all the witches and
wizards in his family, all giving him different advice on what to
choose. Confused and worried, he sat reading the subject lists with
his tongue poking out, asking people whether they thought Arithmancy
sounded more difficult than the study of Ancient Runes. Dean
Thomas, who, like Harry, had grown up with Muggles, ended up
closing his eyes and jabbing his wand at the list, then picking the
subjects it landed on. Hermione took nobody's advice but signed up for
everything.
Harry smiled grimly to himself at the thought of what Uncle Vernon
and Aunt Petunia would say if he tried to discuss his career in
wizardry with them. Not that he didn't get any guidance: Percy
Weasley was eager to share his experience.
"Depends where you want to go, Harry," he said. "It's never too early
to think about the future, so Id recommend Divination. People say
Muggle Studies is a soft option, but I personally think wizards should
have a thorough understanding of the non-magical community,
particularly if they're thinking of working in close contact with them -
look at my father, he has to deal with Muggle business all the time. My
brother Charlie was always more of an outdoor type, so he went for
Care of Magical Creatures. Play to your strengths, Harry."
But the only thing Harry felt he was really good at was Quidditch. In
the end, he chose the same new subjects as Ron, feeling that if he was
lousy at them, at least he'd have someone friendly to help him.
Gryffindor's next Quidditch match would be against Hufflepuff. Wood
was insisting on team practices every night after dinner, so that Harry
barely had time for anything but Quidditch and homework. However,
the training sessions were getting better, or at least
drier, and the evening before Saturday's match he went up to his
dormitory to drop off his broomstick feeling Gryffindor's chances for
the Quidditch cup had never been better.
216
But his cheerful mood didn't last long. At the top of the stairs to the
dormitory, he met Neville Longbottom, who was looking frantic.
"Harry - I don't know who did it - I just found -"
Watching Harry fearfully, Neville pushed open the door.
The contents of Harry's trunk had been thrown everywhere. His
cloak lay ripped on the floor. The bedclothes had been pulled off his
four-poster and the drawer had been pulled out of his bedside
cabinet, the contents strewn over the mattress.
Harry walked over to the bed, open-mouthed, treading on a few
loose pages of Travels with Trolls. As he and Neville pulled the
blankets back onto his bed, Ron, Dean, and Seamus came in. Dean
swore loudly.
"What happened, Harry?"
"No idea," said Harry. But Ron was examining Harry's robes. All the
pockets were hanging out.
"Someone's been looking for something," said Ron. "Is there anything
missing?"
Harry started to pick up all his things and throw them into his trunk.
It was only as he threw the last of the Lockhart books back into it
that he realized what wasn't there.
"Riddle's diary's gone," he said in an undertone to Ron.
"What?"
Harry jerked his head toward the dormitory door and Ron followed
him out. They hurried down to the Gryffindor common
room, which was half-empty, and joined Hermione, who was sitting
alone, reading a book called Ancient Runes Made Easy.
Hermione looked aghast at the news.
217
"But - only a Gryffindor could have stolen - nobody else knows our
password -"
"Exactly," said Harry.
T