MAGIC AND MYSTERY

Harry Potter and the Chamber of Secrets Part 3

"Ron!" Harry breathed, creeping to the window and pushing it up so they could talk through the bars. "Ron, how did you—What the—?"

Harry's mouth fell open. Ron was leaning out of the back window of an old turquoise car, which was parked in midair. Grinning at Harry from the front seats were Fred and George.

Arthur leaned forward to watch eagerly. He had never flown the car before, and was excited to see how it went.

"All right, Harry?" George asked.

"What's been going on?" Ron said. "Why haven't you been answering my letters? I've asked you to stay about twelve times, and then Dad came home and said you'd got an official warning for using magic in front of Muggles—"

"It wasn't me—and how did he know?"

"He works for the Ministry," Ron said. "You know we're not supposed to do spells outside school—"

"You should talk," Harry said, staring at the floating car.

"Oh, this doesn't count," Ron said. "We're only borrowing this. It's Dad's, we didn't enchant it. But doing magic in front of those Muggles you live with—"

"I told you, I didn't—but it'll take too long to explain now look, can you tell them at Hogwarts that the Dursleys have locked me up and won't let me come back, and obviously I can't magic myself out, because the Ministry'll think that's the second spell I've done in three days, so—"

"Stop gibbering," Ron said. "We've come to take you home with us."

"But you can't magic me out either—"

"It's Fred and George."

"We don't need to," Ron said, jerking his head toward the front seat and grinning. "You forget who I've got with me."

"Mini Sirius and James," Marlene nodded. Fred and George looked flustered at being compared to their heroes.

"Tie that around the bars," Fred said, throwing the end of a rope to Harry.

"If the Dursleys wake up, I'm dead," Harry reminded them as he tied the rope tightly around a bar and Fred revved up the car.

"Don't worry," Fred said, "and stand back."

Harry moved back into the shadows next to Hedwig. The car revved louder and louder and suddenly, with a crunching noise, the bars were pulled clean out of the window as Fred drove straight up in the air. Harry ran back to the window to see the bars dangling a few feet above the ground. 

Panting, Ron hoisted them up into the car. Harry listened anxiously, but there was no sound from the Dursleys' bedroom.

When the bars were safely in the back seat with Ron, Fred reversed as close as possible to Harry's window.

"Get in," Ron said.

"But all my Hogwarts stuff—my wand—my broomstick—"

"Where is it?"

"Locked in the cupboard under the stairs, and I can't get out of this room—"

"No problem," George said from the front passenger seat. "Out of the way, Harry."

Fred and George climbed catlike through the window into Harry's room. George took an ordinary hairpin from his pocket and started to pick the lock.