The Mystery of the Chamber of Secrets

Chapter 9: Polyjuice Potion

In the Common Room that night Harry, Ron and Hermione were sitting away from everyone, whispering. Ron was trying to do his Charms homework, but seemed far too angry to finish it as at one point his wand ignited the parchment.

Etta came over and said to Harry, "What's up with Ron?"

Harry explained about Moaning Myrtle and Percy catching them in a girl's bathroom.

Suddenly Hermione spoke, "Who can it be, though?"

She said in a quiet voice, as though continuing a conversation they had just been having, "Who'd want all the Squibs and Muggle-borns out of Hogwarts?"

"Let's think," said Ron in mock puzzlement, "who do we know who thinks Muggle-borns are scum?"

He looked at Hermione.

Hermione looked back, unconvinced, "If you're talking about Malfoy-"

"Of course I am!" said Ron, "you heard him: 'You'll be next, Mudbloods!' Come on, you've only got to look at his foul rat face to know its him-"

"Malfoy, the hair of Slytherin?" said Etta sceptically.

"Look at his family," said Harry, closing his books too, "the whole lot of them have been in Slytherin, he's always boasting about it. They could easily be Slytherin's descendants."

"His father's definitely evil," said Ron, "they could've had the key to the Chamber of Secrets for centuries! Handing it down, father to son..."

"Well," said Hermione cautiously, "I suppose it's possible..."

"But how do we prove it?" said Harry darkly.

"There might be a way," said Hermione slowly, dropping her voice still further with a quick glance across the room at Percy, "of course, it would be difficult. And dangerous, very dangerous. We'd be breaking about fifty school rules, I expect."

"If, in a month or so, you feel like explaining, you will let us know, won't you?" said Ron irritably.

"All right," said Hermione coldly, "what we'd need to do is to get inside the Slytherin common room and ask Malfoy a few questions without him realising it's us."

"But that's impossible," said Harry, as Ron laughed.

"No, it's not," said Hermione and Etta at the same time. 

"All we'd need would be some Polyjuice Potion," said Etta.

Hermione nodded in agreement.

"What's that?" said Ron and Harry together.

"Snape mentioned it in class a few weeks ago-" said Hermione.

"Do you think we've got nothing better to do in Potions than listen to Snape?" muttered Ron.

"It transforms you into someone else. Think about it! We could change into four of the Slytherins. No one would know it was us. Malfoy would probably tell us anything. He's probably boasting about it in the Slytherin common room right now, if only we could hear him," said Etta.

"This Polyjuice stuff sounds a bit dodgy to me," said Ron, frowning, "what if we were stuck looking like four of the Slytherins for ever?"

"It wears off after a while," said Hermione, waving her hand impatiently, "but getting hold of the recipe will be very difficult. Snape said it was in a book called 'Moste Potente Potions' and it's bound to be in the Restricted Section of the library."

There was only one way to get out a book from the Restricted Section: you needed a signed note of permission from a teacher.

"Hard to see why we'd want the book, really," said Ron, "if we weren't going to try and make one of the potions."

"I think," said Hermione, that if we made it sound as though we were just interested in the theory, we might stand a chance..."

"Oh, come on, no teacher's going to fall for that," said Ron, "they'ed have to be really thick..." 

"I think Hermione could persuade Lockhart to sign for it," said Etta, "you know he'd sign anything, if you flatter him enough."

Hermione did not look happy with what Etta had said, but simply replied, "I will give it a try."