‘She wants a new angle, Hagrid,’ said Ron wisely, as he shelled salamander eggs. ‘You were supposed to say Harry’s a mad delinquent!’
‘But he’s not!’ said Hagrid, looking genuinely shocked.
‘She should’ve interviewed Snape,’ said Harry grimly. ‘He’d give her the goods on me any day. Potter has been crossing lines ever since he first arrived at this school …’
‘Said that, did he?’ said Hagrid, while Ron and Hermione laughed. ‘Well, yeh might’ve bent a few rules, Harry, bu’ yeh’re all righ’ really, aren’ you?’
‘Cheers, Hagrid,’ said Harry, grinning.
‘You coming to this ball thing on Christmas Day, Hagrid?’ said Ron.
‘Though’ I might look in on it, yeah,’ said Hagrid gruffly. ‘Should be a good do, I reckon. You’ll be openin’ the dancin’, won’ yeh, Harry? Who’re you takin’?’
‘No one, yet,’ said Harry, feeling himself going red again. Hagrid didn’t pursue the subject.
The last week of term became increasingly boisterous as it progressed. Rumours about the Yule Ball were flying everywhere, though Harry didn’t believe half of them – for instance, that Dumbledore had bought eight hundred barrels of mulled mead from Madam Rosmerta. It seemed to be fact, however, that he had booked the Weird Sisters. Exactly who or what the Weird Sisters were Harry didn’t know, never having had access to a wizard’s wireless, but he deduced from the wild excitement of those who had grown up listening to the WWN (Wizarding Wireless Network) that they were a very famous musical group.
Some of the teachers, like little Professor Flitwick, gave up trying to teach them much when their minds were so clearly elsewhere; he allowed them to play games in his lesson on Wednesday, and spent most of it talking to Harry about the perfect Summoning Charm he had used during the first task of the Triwizard Tournament. Other teachers were not so generous. Nothing would ever deflect Professor Binns, for example, from ploughing on through his notes on goblin rebellions – as Binns hadn’t let his own death stand in the way of continuing to teach, they supposed a small thing like Christmas wasn’t going to put him off. It was amazing how he could make even bloody and vicious goblin riots sound as boring as Percy’s cauldron-bottom report. Professors McGonagall and Moody kept them working until the very last second of their classes, too, and Snape, of course, would no sooner let them play games in class than adopt Harry. Staring nastily around at them all, he informed them that he would be testing them on poison antidotes during the last lesson of the term.
‘Evil, he is,’ Ron said bitterly that night in the Gryffindor common room. ‘Springing a test on us on the last day. Ruining the last bit of term with a whole load of revision.’
‘Mmm … you’re not exactly straining yourself, though, are you?’ said Hermione, looking at him over the top of her Potions notes. Ron was busy building a card castle out of his Exploding Snap pack – a much more interesting pastime than with Muggle cards, because of the chance that the whole thing would blow up at any second.
‘It’s Christmas, Hermione,’ said Harry lazily; he was re-reading Flying with the Cannons for the tenth time in an armchair near the fire.
Hermione looked severely over at him, too. ‘I’d have thought you’d be doing something constructive, Harry, even if you don’t want to learn your antidotes!’
‘Like what?’ Harry said, as he watched Joey Jenkins of the Cannons belt a Bludger towards a Ballycastle Bats Chaser.
‘That egg!’ Hermione hissed.
‘Come on, Hermione, I’ve got ’til February the twenty-fourth,’ Harry said.
He had put the golden egg upstairs in his trunk, and hadn’t opened it since the celebration party after the first task. There were still two and a half months to go until he needed to know what all the screechy wailing meant, after all.
‘But it might take weeks to work it out!’ said Hermione. ‘You’re going to look a real idiot if everyone else knows what the next task is and you don’t!’
‘Leave him alone, Hermione, he’s earned a bit of a break,’ said Ron, and he placed the last two cards on top of the castle and the whole lot blew up, singeing his eyebrows.
‘Nice look, Ron … go well with your dress robes, that will.’
It was Fred and George. They sat down at the table with Harry, Ron and Hermione as Ron felt how much damage had been done.
‘Ron, can we borrow Pigwidgeon?’ George asked.
‘No, he’s off delivering a letter,’ said Ron. ‘Why?’
‘Because George wants to invite him to the ball,’ said Fred sarcastically.
‘Because we want to send a letter, you stupid great prat,’ said George.
‘Who d’you two keep writing to, eh?’ said Ron.
‘Nose out, Ron, or I’ll burn that for you, too,’ said Fred, waving his wand threateningly. ‘So … you lot got dates for the ball yet?’
‘Nope,’ said Ron.
‘Well, you’d better hurry up, mate, or all the good ones will be gone,’ said Fred.
‘Who’re you going with, then?’ said Ron.
‘Angelina,’ said Fred promptly, without a trace of embarrassment.
‘What?’ said Ron, taken aback. ‘You’ve already asked her?’
‘Good point,’ said Fred. He turned his head and called across the common room, ‘Oi! Angelina!’
Angelina, who had been chatting to Alicia Spinnet near the fire, looked over at him.
‘What?’ she called back.
‘Want to come to the ball with me?’
Angelina gave Fred an appraising sort of look.
‘All right, then,’ she said, and she turned back to Alicia and carried on chatting, with a bit of a grin on her face.
‘There you go,’ said Fred to Harry and Ron, ‘piece of cake.’
He got to his feet, yawning, and said, ‘We’d better use a school owl then, George, come on …’
They left. Ron stopped feeling his eyebrows and looked across the smouldering wreck of his card castle at Harry.
‘We should get a move on, you know … ask someone. He’s right. We don’t want to end up with a pair of trolls.’
Hermione let out a splutter of indignation. ‘A pair of … what, excuse me?’
‘Well – you know,’ said Ron, shrugging, ‘I’d rather go alone than with – with Eloise Midgen, say.’
‘Her acne’s loads better lately – and she’s really nice!’
‘Her nose is off-centre,’ said Ron.
‘Oh, I see,’ Hermione said, bristling. ‘So basically, you’re going to take the best-looking girl who’ll have you, even if she’s completely horrible?’
‘Er – yeah, that sounds about right,’ said Ron.
‘I’m going to bed,’ Hermione snapped, and she swept off towards the girls’ staircase without another word.
*
The Hogwarts staff, demonstrating a continued desire to impress the visitors from Beauxbatons and Durmstrang, seemed determined to show the castle at its best this Christmas. When the decorations went up, Harry noticed that they were the most stunning he had yet seen inside the school. Everlasting icicles had been attached to the banisters of the marble staircase; the usual twelve Christmas trees in the Great Hall were bedecked with everything from luminous holly berries to real, hooting, golden owls, and the suits of armour had all been bewitched to sing carols whenever anyone passed them. It was quite something to hear ‘Oh Come, All Ye Faithful’ sung by an empty helmet that only knew half the words. Several times, Filch the caretaker had to extract Peeves from inside the armour, where he had taken to hiding, filling in the gaps in the songs with lyrics of his own invention, all of which were very rude.
And still Harry hadn’t asked Cho to the ball. He and Ron were getting very nervous now, though as Harry pointed out, Ron would look much less stupid than he would without a partner; Harry was supposed to be starting the dancing with the other champions.
‘I suppose there’s always Moaning Myrtle,’ he said gloomily, referr
ing to the ghost who haunted the girls’ toilets on the second floor.
‘Harry – we’ve just got to grit our teeth and do it,’ said Ron on Friday morning, in a tone that suggested they were planning the storming of an impregnable fortress. ‘When we get back to the common room tonight, we’ll both have partners – agreed?’
‘Er … OK,’ said Harry.
But every time he glimpsed Cho that day – during break, and then lunchtime, and once on the way to History of Magic – she was surrounded by friends. Didn’t she ever go anywhere alone? Could he perhaps ambush her as she was going into a bathroom? But no – she even seemed to go there with an escort of four or five girls. Yet if he didn’t do it soon, she was bound to have been asked by somebody else.
He found it hard to concentrate in Snape’s Antidote test, and consequently forgot to add the key ingredient – a bezoar – meaning that he received bottom marks. He didn’t care though; he was too busy screwing up his courage for what he was about to do. When the bell rang, he grabbed his bag, and hurried to the dungeon door.
‘I’ll meet you at dinner,’ he said to Ron and Hermione, and he dashed off upstairs.
He’d just have to ask Cho for a private word, that was all … he hurried off through the packed corridors looking for her, and (rather sooner than he had expected) he found her, emerging from a Defence Against the Dark Arts lesson.
‘Er – Cho? Could I have a word with you?’
Giggling should be made illegal, Harry thought furiously, as all the girls around Cho started doing it. She didn’t, though. She said, ‘OK’, and followed him out of earshot of her classmates.
Harry turned to look at her and his stomach gave a weird lurch as though he had missed a step going downstairs.
‘Er,’ he said.
He couldn’t ask her. He couldn’t. But he had to. Cho stood there looking puzzled, watching him.
The words came out before Harry had quite got his tongue around them.
‘Wangoballwime?’
‘Sorry?’ said Cho.
‘D’you – d’you want to go to the ball with me?’ said Harry. Why did he have to go red now? Why?
‘Oh!’ said Cho, and she went red, too. ‘Oh, Harry, I’m really sorry,’ and she looked it, too. ‘I’ve already said I’ll go with someone else.’
‘Oh,’ said Harry.
It was odd; a moment before, his insides had been writhing like snakes, but suddenly he didn’t seem to have any insides at all.
‘Oh, OK,’ he said, ‘no problem.’
‘I’m really sorry,’ she said again.
‘That’s OK,’ said Harry.
They stood there looking at each other, and then Cho said, ‘Well –’
‘Yeah,’ said Harry.
‘Well, bye,’ said Cho, still very red. She walked away.
Harry called after her, before he could stop himself.
‘Who’re you going with?’
‘Oh – Cedric,’ she said. ‘Cedric Diggory.’
‘Oh, right,’ said Harry.
His insides had come back again. It felt as though they had been filled with lead in their absence.
Completely forgetting about dinner, he walked slowly back up to Gryffindor Tower, Cho’s voice echoing in his ears with every step he took. ‘Cedric – Cedric Diggory.’ He had been starting to quite like Cedric – prepared to overlook the fact that he had once beaten him at Quidditch, and was handsome, and popular, and nearly everyone’s favourite champion. Now he suddenly realised that Cedric was in fact a useless pretty-boy who didn’t have enough brains to fill an eggcup.
‘Fairy lights,’ he said dully to the Fat Lady – the password had been changed the previous day.
‘Yes, indeed, dear!’ she trilled, straightening her new tinsel hairband as she swung forwards to admit him.
Entering the common room, Harry looked around, and to his surprise he saw Ron sitting ashen faced in a distant corner. Ginny was sitting with him, talking to him in what seemed to be a low, soothing voice.
‘What’s up, Ron?’ said Harry, joining them.
Ron looked up at Harry, a sort of blind horror in his face.
‘Why did I do it?’ he said wildly. ‘I don’t know what made me do it!’
‘What?’ said Harry.
‘He – er – just asked Fleur Delacour to go to the ball with him,’ said Ginny. She looked as though she was fighting back a smile, but she kept patting Ron’s arm sympathetically.
‘You what?’ said Harry.
‘I don’t know what made me do it!’ Ron gasped again. ‘What was I playing at? There were people – all around – I’ve gone mad – everyone watching! I was just walking past her in the Entrance Hall – she was standing there talking to Diggory – and it sort of came over me – and I asked her!’
Ron moaned and put his face in his hands. He kept talking, though the words were barely distinguishable. ‘She looked at me like I was a sea slug or something. Didn’t even answer. And then – I dunno – I just sort of came to my senses and ran for it.’
‘She’s part Veela,’ said Harry. ‘You were right – her grandmother was one. It wasn’t your fault, I bet you just walked past when she was turning on the old charm for Diggory and got a blast of it – but she was wasting her time. He’s going with Cho Chang.’
Ron looked up.
‘I asked her to go with me just now,’ Harry said dully, ‘and she told me.’
Ginny had suddenly stopped smiling.
‘This is mad,’ said Ron, ‘we’re the only ones left who haven’t got anyone – well, except Neville. Hey – guess who he asked? Hermione!’
‘What?’ said Harry, completely distracted by this startling news.
‘Yeah, I know!’ said Ron, some of the colour coming back into his face as he started to laugh. ‘He told me after Potions! Said she’s always been really nice, helping him out with work and stuff – but she told him she was already going with someone. Ha! As if! She just didn’t want to go with Neville … I mean, who would?’
‘Don’t!’ said Ginny, annoyed. ‘Don’t laugh –’
Just then Hermione climbed in through the portrait hole.
‘Why weren’t you two at dinner?’ she said, coming over to join them.
‘Because – oh, shut up laughing, you two – because they’ve both just been turned down by girls they asked to the ball!’ said Ginny.
That shut Harry and Ron up.
‘Thanks a bunch, Ginny,’ said Ron sourly.
‘All the good-looking ones taken, Ron?’ said Hermione loftily. ‘Eloise Midgen starting to look quite pretty now, is she? Well, I’m sure you’ll find someone somewhere who’ll have you.’
But Ron was staring at Hermione as though suddenly seeing her in a whole new light. ‘Hermione, Neville’s right – you are a girl …’
‘Oh, well spotted,’ she said acidly.
‘Well – you can come with one of us!’
‘No, I can’t,’ snapped Hermione.
‘Oh, come on,’ he said impatiently, ‘we need partners, we’re going to look really stupid if we haven’t got any, everyone else has …’
‘I can’t come with you,’ said Hermione, now blushing, ‘because I’m already going with someone.’
‘No, you’re not!’ said Ron. ‘You just said that to get rid of Neville!’
‘Oh, did I?’ said Hermione, and her eyes flashed dangerously. ‘Just because it’s taken you three years to notice, Ron, doesn’t mean no one else has spotted I’m a girl!’
Ron stared at her. Then he grinned again.
‘OK, OK, we know you’re a girl,’ he said. ‘That do? Will you come now?’
‘I’ve already told you!’ Hermione said, very angrily. ‘I’m going with someone else!’
And she stormed off towards the girls’ dormitories again.
‘She’s lying,’ said Ron flatly, watching her go.
‘She’s not,’ said Ginny quietly.
‘Who is it, then?’ said Ron sharply.
<
br /> ‘I’m not telling you, it’s her business,’ said Ginny.
‘Right,’ said Ron, who looked extremely put out, ‘this is getting stupid. Ginny, you can go with Harry, and I’ll just –’
‘I can’t,’ said Ginny, and she went scarlet too. ‘I’m going with – with Neville. He asked me when Hermione said no, and I thought … well … I’m not going to be able to go otherwise, I’m not in fourth year.’ She looked extremely miserable. ‘I think I’ll go and have dinner,’ she said, and she got up and walked off to the portrait hole, her head bowed.
Ron goggled at Harry.
‘What’s got into them?’ he demanded.
But Harry had just seen Parvati and Lavender come in through the portrait hole. The time had come for drastic action.
‘Wait here,’ he said to Ron, and he stood up, walked straight up to Parvati and said, ‘Parvati? Will you go to the ball with me?’
Parvati went into a fit of giggles. Harry waited for them to subside, his fingers crossed in the pocket of his robes.
‘Yes, all right, then,’ she said finally, blushing furiously.
‘Thanks,’ said Harry, in relief. ‘Lavender – will you go with Ron?’
‘She’s going with Seamus,’ said Parvati, and the pair of them giggled harder than ever.
Harry sighed.
‘Can’t you think of anyone who’d go with Ron?’ he said, lowering his voice so that Ron wouldn’t hear.
‘What about Hermione Granger?’ said Parvati.
‘She’s going with someone else.’
Parvati looked astonished.
‘Ooooh – who?’ she said keenly.
Harry shrugged. ‘No idea,’ he said. ‘So what about Ron?’
‘Well …’ said Parvati slowly, ‘I suppose my sister might … Padma, you know … in Ravenclaw. I’ll ask her if you like.’
‘Yeah, that would be great,’ said Harry. ‘Let me know, will you?’
And he went back over to Ron, feeling that this ball was a lot more trouble than it was worth, and hoping very much that Padma Patil’s nose was dead centre.
— CHAPTER TWENTY-THREE —
The Goblet of Fire Page 34