Harry Potter and The Order of the Phoenix - Rowling Joanne Kathleen - Страница 101

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Harry's question was answered the very next morning. When Hermione's Daily Prophet arrived she smoothed it out, gazed for a moment at the front page and gave a yelp that caused everyone in the vicinity to stare at her.

'What?' said Harry and Ron together.

For answer she spread the newspaper on the table in front of them and pointed at ten black-and-white photographs that filled the whole of the front page, nine showing wizards' faces and the tenth, a witch's. Some of the people in the photographs were silently jeering; others were tapping their fingers on the frame of their pictures, looking insolent. Each picture was captioned with a name and the crime for which the person had been sent to Azkaban.

Antonin Dolohov, read the legend beneath a wizard with a long, pale, twisted face who was sneering up at Harry, convicted of the brutal murders of Gideon and Fabian Prewett.

Algernon Rookwood, said the caption beneath a pockmarked man with greasy hair who was leaning against the edge of his picture, looking bored, convicted of leaking Ministry of Magic secrets to He Who Must Not Be Named.

But Harry's eyes were drawn to the picture of the witch. Her face had leapt out at him the moment he had seen the page. She had long, dark hair that looked unkempt and straggly in the picture, though he had seen it sleek, thick and shining. She glared up at him through heavily lidded eyes, an arrogant, disdainful smile playing around her thin mouth. Like Sirius, she retained vestiges of great good looks, but something — perhaps Azkaban — had taken most of her beauty.

Bellatrix Lestrange, convicted of the torture and permanent incapacitation of Frank and Alice Longbottom.

Hermione nudged Harry and pointed at the headline over the pictures, which Harry, concentrating on Bellatrix, had not yet read.

MASS BREAKOUT FROM AZKABAN

MINISTRY FEARS BLACK IS 'RALLYING POINT '

FOR OLD DEATH EATERS

'Black?' said Harry loudly. 'Not — ?'

'Shhh! ' whispered Hermione desperately. 'Not so loud — just read it!'

The Ministry of Magic announced late last night that there has been a mass breakout from Azkaban.

Speaking to reporters in his private office, Cornelius Fudge, Minister for Magic, confirmed that ten high-security prisoners escaped in the early hours of yesterday evening and that he has already informed the Muggle Prime Minister of the dangerous nature of these individuals.

'We find ourselves, most unfortunately, in the same position we were two and a half years ago when the murderer Sirius Black escaped, 'said Fudge last night. 'Nor do we think the two breakouts are unrelated. An escape of this magnitude suggests outside help, and we must remember that Black, as the first person ever to break out of Azkaban, would be ideally placed to help others follow in his footsteps. We think it likely that these individuals, who include Black 's cousin, Bellatrix Lestrange, have rallied around Black as their leader. We are, however, doing all we can to round up the criminals, and we beg the magical community to remain alert and cautious. On no account should any of these individuals be approached. '

'There you are, Harry,' said Ron, looking awestruck. 'That's why he was happy last night.'

'I don't believe this,' snarled Harry, 'Fudge is blaming the breakout on Sirius?'

'What other options does he have?' said Hermione bitterly. 'He can hardly say, "Sorry, everyone, Dumbledore warned me this might happen, the Azkaban guards have joined Lord Voldemort" — stop whimpering, Ron — "and now Voldemort's worst supporters have broken out, too." I mean, he's spent a good six months telling everyone you and Dumbledore are liars, hasn't he?'

Hermione ripped open the newspaper and began to read the report inside while Harry looked around the Great Hall. He could not understand why his fellow students were not looking scared or at least discussing the terrible piece of news on the front page, but very few of them took the newspaper every day like Hermione. There they all were, talking about homework and Quidditch and who knew what other rubbish, when outside these walls ten more Death Eaters had swollen Voldemort's ranks.

He glanced up at the staff table. It was a different story there: Dumbledore and Professor McGonagall were deep in conversation, both looking extremely grave. Professor Sprout had the Prophet propped against a bottle of ketchup and was reading the front page with such concentration that she was not noticing the gentle drip of egg yolk falling into her lap from her stationary spoon. Meanwhile, at the far end of the table, Professor Umbridge was tucking into a bowl of porridge. For once her pouchy toad's eyes were not sweeping the Great Hall looking for misbehaving students. She scowled as she gulped down her food and every now and then she shot a malevolent glance up the table to where Dumbledore and McGonagall were talking so intently.

'Oh my — ' said Hermione wonderingly, still staring at the newspaper.

'What now?' said Harry quickly; he was feeling jumpy.

'It's . . . horrible, ' said Hermione, looking shaken. She folded back page ten of the newspaper and handed it to Harry and Ron.

TRAGIC DEMISE OF MINISTRY OF MAGIC WORKER

St Mungo 's Hospital promised a full inquiry last night after Ministry of Magic worker Broderich Bode, 49, was discovered dead in his bed, strangled by a pot plant. Healers called to the scene were unable to revive Mr Bode, who had been injured in a workplace accident some weeks prior to his death.

Healer Miriam Strout, who was in charge of Mr Bode's ward at the time of the incident, has been suspended on full pay and was unavailable for comment yesterday, but a spokeswizard for the hospital said in a statement:

'St Mungo 's deeply regrets the death of Mr Bode, whose health was improving steadily prior to this tragic accident.

'We have strict guidelines on the decorations permitted on our wards but it appears that Healer Strout, busy over the Christmas period, overlooked the dangers of the plant on Mr Bode 's bedside table. As his speech and mobility improved, Healer Strout encouraged Mr Bode to look after the plant himself, unaware that it was not an innocent Flitterbloom, but a cutting of Devil 's Snare which, when touched by the convalescent Mr Bode, throttled him instantly.

'St Mungo 's is as yet unable to account for the presence of the plant on the ward and asks any witch or wizard with information to come forward. '

'Bode . . .' said Ron. 'Bode. It rings a bell . . .'

'We saw him,' Hermione whispered. 'In St Mungo's, remember? He was in the bed opposite Lockhart's, just lying there, staring at the ceiling. And we saw the Devil's Snare arrive. She — the Healer — said it was a Christmas present.'

Harry looked back at the story. A feeling of horror was rising like bile in his throat.

'How come we didn't recognise Devil's Snare? We've seen it before . . . we could've stopped this from happening.'

'Who expects Devil's Snare to turn up in a hospital disguised as a pot plant?' said Ron sharply. 'It's not our fault, whoever sent it to the bloke is to blame! They must be a real prat, why didn't they check what they were buying?'

'Oh, come on, Ron!' said Hermione shakily. 'I don't think anyone could put Devil's Snare in a pot and not realise it tries to kill whoever touches it? This — this was murder . . . a clever murder, as well . . . if the plant was sent anonymously, how's anyone ever going to find out who did it?'

Harry was not thinking about Devil's Snare. He was remembering taking the lift down to the ninth level of the Ministry on the day of his hearing and the sallow-faced man who had got in on the Atrium level.

'I met Bode,' he said slowly. 'I saw him at the Ministry with your dad.'

Ron's mouth fell open.

'I've heard Dad talk about him at home! He was an Unspeakable — he worked in the Department of Mysteries!'

They looked at each other for a moment, then Hermione pulled the newspaper back towards her, closed it, glared for a moment at the pictures of the ten escaped Death Eaters on the front, then leapt to her feet.

'Where are you going?' said Ron, startled.

'To send a letter,' said Hermione, swinging her bag on to her shoulder. 'It . . . well, I don't know whether . . . but it's worth trying . . . and I'm the only one who can.'

'I hate it when she does that,' grumbled Ron, as he and Harry got up from the table and made their own, slower way out of the Great Hall. 'Would it kill her to tell us what she's up to for once? It'd take her about ten more seconds — hey, Hagrid!'

Hagrid was standing beside the doors into the Entrance Hall, waiting for a crowd of Ravenclaws to pass. He was still as heavily bruised as he had been on the day he had come back from his mission to the giants and there was a new cut right across the bridge of his nose.

'All righ', you two?' he said, trying to muster a smile but managing only a kind of pained grimace.

'Are you OK, Hagrid?' asked Harry, following him as he lumbered after the Ravenclaws.

'Fine, fine,' said Hagrid with a feeble assumption of airiness; he waved a hand and narrowly missed concussing a frightened-looking Professor Vector, who was passing. 'Jus' busy, yeh know, usual stuff — lessons ter prepare — couple o' salamanders got scale rot — an' I'm on probation,' he mumbled.

'You 're on probation? ' said Ron very loudly, so that many of the passing students looked around curiously. 'Sorry — I mean — you're on probation?' he whispered.

'Yeah,' said Hagrid. ' 'S'no more'n I expected, ter tell yer the truth. Yeh migh' not've picked up on it, bu' that inspection didn' go too well, yeh know . . . anyway,' he sighed deeply. 'Bes' go an' rub a bit more chilli powder on them salamanders or their tails'll be hangin' off 'em next. See yeh, Harry . . . Ron . . .'

He trudged away, out of the front doors and down the stone steps into the damp grounds. Harry watched him go, wondering how much more bad news he could stand.

*

The fact that Hagrid was now on probation became common knowledge within the school over the next few days, but to Harry's indignation, hardly anybody appeared to be upset about it; indeed, some people, Draco Malfoy prominent among them, seemed positively gleeful. As for the freakish death of an obscure Department of Mysteries employee in St Mungo's, Harry, Ron and Hermione seemed to be the only people who knew or cared. There was only one topic of conversation in the corridors now: the ten escaped Death Eaters, whose story had finally filtered through the school from those few people who read the newspapers. Rumours were flying that some of the convicts had been spotted in Hogsmeade, that they were supposed to be hiding out in the Shrieking Shack and that they were going to break into Hogwarts, just as Sirius Black had once done.

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