Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows - Rowling Joanne Kathleen - Страница 47

• Предыдущая
• 47/144
• Следующая

He knew at once that he had done the right thing; thought he appeared to be standing in water, his shoes, feet, and robes remained quite dry. He reached up, pulled the chain, and next moment had zoomed down a short chute, emerging out of a fireplace into the Ministry of Magic.

He got up clumsily; there was a lot more of his body than he was accustomed to. The great Atrium seemed darker than Harry remembered it. Previously a golden fountain had filled the center of the hall, casting shimmering spots of light over the polished wooden floor and walls. Now a gigantic statue of black stone dominated the scene. It was rather frightening, this vast sculpture of a witch and a wizard sitting on ornately carved thrones, looking down at the Ministry workers toppling out of fireplaces below them. Engraved in foot-high letters at the base of the statue were the words MAGIC IS MIGHT.

Harry received a heavy blow on the back of the legs. Another wizard had just flown out of the fireplace behind him.

“Out of the way, can’t y—oh, sorry, Runcorn.”

Clearly frightened, the balding wizard hurried away. Apparently the man who Harry was impersonating, Runcorn, was intimidating.

“Psst!” said a voice, and he looked around to see a whispy little witch and the ferrety wizard from Magical Maintenance gesturing to him from over beside the statue. Harry hastened to join them.

“You got in all right, then?” Hermione whispered to Harry.

“No, he’s still stuck in the hog,” said Ron.

“Oh, very funny… It’s horrible, isn’t it?” she said to Harry, who was staring up at the statue. “Have you seen what they’re sitting on?”

Harry looked more closely and realized that what he had thought were decoratively carved thrones were actually mounds of carved humans: hundreds and hundreds of naked bodies, men, women, and children, all with rather stupid, ugly faces, twisted and pressed together to support the weight of the handsomely robed wizards.

“Muggles,” whispered Hermione, “In their rightful place. Come on, let’s get going.”

They joined the stream of witches and wizards moving toward the golden gates at the end of the hall, looking around as surreptitiously as possible, but there was no sign of the distinctive figure of Dolores Umbridge. They passed through the gates and into a smaller hall, where queues were forming in front of twenty golden grilles housing as many lifts. They had barely joined the nearest one when a voice said, “Cattermole!”

They looked around: Harry’s stomach turned over. One of the Death Eaters who had witnessed Dumbledore’s death was striding toward them. The Ministry workers beside them fell silent, their eyes downcast; Harry could feel fear rippling through them.

The man’s scowling, slightly brutish face was somehow at odds with his magnificent, sweeping robes, which were embroidered with much gold thread. Someone in the crowd around the lifts called sycophantically, “Morning, Yaxley!” Yaxley ignored them.

“I requested somebody from Magical Maintenance to sort out my office, Cattermole. It’s still raining in there.”

Ron looked around as though hoping somebody else would intervene, but nobody spoke.

“Raining… in your office? That’s—that’s not good, is it?”

Ron gave a nervous laugh. Yaxley’s eyes widened.

“You think it’s funny, Cattermole, do you?”

A pair of witches broke away from the queue for the lift and bustled off.

“No,” said Ron, “no, of course—”

“You realize that I am on my way downstairs to interrogate your wife, Cattermole? In fact, I’m quite surprised you’re not down there holding her hand while she waits. Already given her up as a bad job, have you? Probably wise. Be sure and marry a pureblood next time.”

Hermione had let out a little squeak of horror. Yaxley looked at her. She cough feebly and turned away.

“I—I—” stammered Ron.

“But if my wife were accused of being a Mudblood,” said Yaxley, “—not that any woman I married would ever be mistaken for such filth—and the Head of Department of Magical Law Enforcement needed a job doing, I would make it my priority to do this job, Cattermole. Do you understand me?”

“Yes,” whispered Ron.

“Then attend to it, Cattermole, and if my office is not completely dry within an hour, your wife’s Blood Status will be in even greater doubt than it is now.”

The golden grille before them clattered open. With a nod and unpleasant smile to Harry, who was evidently expected to appreciate this treatment of Cattermole, Yaxley swept away toward another lift. Harry, Ron, and Hermione entered theirs, but nobody followed them: It was as if they were infectious. The grilles shut with a clang and the lift began to move upward.

“What am I going to do?” Ron asked the other two at once; he looked stricken. “If I don’t turn up, my wife… I mean, Cattermole’s wife—”

“We’ll come with you, we should stick together—” began Harry, but Ron shook his head feverishly.

“That’s mental, we haven’t got much time. You two find Umbridge, I’ll go and sort out Yaxley’s office—but how do I stop a raining?”

“Try Finite Incantatem,” said Hermione at once, “that should stop the rain if it’s a hex or curse; if it doesn’t something’s gone wrong with an Atmospheric Charm, which will be more difficult to fix, so as an interim measure try Impervius to protect his belongings—”

“Say it again, slowly—” said Ron, searching his pockets desperately for a quill, but at that moment the lift juddered to a halt. A disembodied female voice said, “Level four, Department for the Regulation and Control of Magical Creatures, incorporating Beast, Being, and Spirit Divisions, Goblin Liaison Office, and Pest Advisory Bureau,” and the grilles slid open again, admitting a couple of wizards and several pale violet paper airplanes that fluttered around the lamp in the ceiling of the lift.

“Morning, Albert,” said a bushily whiskered man, smiling at Harry. He glanced over at Ron and Hermione as the lift creaked upward once more; Hermione was now whispering frantic instructions to Ron. The wizard leaned toward Harry, leering, and muttering “Dirk Cresswell, eh? From Goblin Liaison? Nice one, Albert. I’m pretty confident I’ll get his job now!”

He winked. Harry smiled back, hoping that this would suffice. The lift stopped; the grilles opened once more.

“Level two, Department of Magical Law Enforcement, including the Improper Use of Magic Office, Auror Headquarters, and Wizengamot Administration Services,” said the disembodied witch’s voice.

Harry saw Hermione give Ron a little push and he hurried out of the lift, followed by the other wizards, leaving Harry and Hermione alone. The moment the golden door had closed Hermione said, very fast, “Actually, Harry, I think I’d better go after him, I don’t think he knows what he’s doing and if he gets caught the whole thing—”

“Level one, Minister of Magic and Support Staff.”

The golden grilles slid apart again and Hermione gasped. Four people stood before them, two of them deep in conversation: a long-haired wizard wearing magnificent robes of black and gold, and a squat, toadlike witch wearing a velvet bow in her short hair and clutching a clipboard to her chest.

• Предыдущая
• 47/144
• Следующая