MAGIC AND MYSTERY

Part 14 of the Chamber of Secrets

Ron blinked. "I'll go get the girls." He turned on his heel and left the room again.

"That was a . . . surprisingly mild reaction," James frowned.

A few minutes later, he returned with Halley and Hermione. "What's this about you going crazy, Harry?" Halley asked.

Maliana laughed. "Insane."

"I didn't say he was crazy, I said he said Hagrid opened the Chamber of Secrets last time . . . yeah I said he was crazy," Ron relented.

Hagrid puffed at their belief in him.

"So why is it you think Hagrid opened the Chamber," Hermione asked. "Why Hagrid, of all people, is out to kill all the muggle-borns in the school. Because last time I checked, he and I got on just fine, and I've never made my heritage a secret."

"Exactly!" Hagrid nodded.

"What's your evidence?" Hermione prompted. Harry chucked the diary at her. "You found Hagrid's diary? He really doesn't seem like the type to keep one. Did he confess in it or something? Because it's highly unlikely anyone would do that, and then just leave the incriminating evidence lying around."

"Ginny."

"Maybe it's a forgery," Halley guessed.

Harry shook his head again. "I'm not sure how to check if it's a forgery or not, but it's not Hagrid's and it's pretty convincing."

"That's the point," Ginny shivered.

"Someone could have just made it up, you know," Ron piped up. "That sounds like something Fred and George might do, but I can't see them blaming Hagrid. Malfoy, maybe."

Draco threw his hands in the air. "Seriously?"

"Can you stop blaming Malfoy for two seconds Ron?" Hermione ordered.

"Thank you!" Draco nodded

"It's an enchanted diary belonging to Tom Marvolo Riddle. He showed me a memory of how he caught Hagrid," Harry explained.

"That has 'sketchy' written all over it," Owen Cauldwell stated.

"If he ended up catching the perpetrator, wouldn't people have made a bigger deal about it?" Halley asked. "Letting them know that there was no more danger to relieve panic? And if the situation fifty years ago is anything like the situation now, then people would definitely have been panicking."

"That's how Dumbledore works, why would Dippet be any different?" Amelia shook her head

"The Headmaster was ashamed because a girl died and forbade him from telling the truth," Harry said.

"But everyone knew the girl dying, what's the point of not telling the truth?" Hermione pointed out.

"Because they never found the Chamber and people would be uncomfortable and feel unsafe at a school where a bloodthirsty monster could be set loose at any moment," Harry offered.

"That is a good point."

Halley sighed. "You have a point, unfortunately, but Hagrid, really? Could the magic diary dude show us?" she asked.

"Halley!" Theo smacked her.

Ron blinked at her. "Halley, are you insane? Never trust anything that can think for itself if you can't see where it keeps its brains. You want to travel into a mysterious enchanted diary? That's insane!"