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Chapter 1228: Dumbledore's Visit
🕑 Added 2024-09-13 14:53:13 +0000 UTCHarry returned to his room and checked his trunk once more. After confirming that nothing was missing, he began to wait anxiously.
Time seemed to slow down all of a sudden. He sat beside his bedroom window, which had a reasonable view of both ends of Privet Drive.
He picked up the leaflet and forced himself to read it.
But this was difficult to do, and he couldn't help but look up and glance out the window every few minutes.
It was almost time; but where was Dumbledore? Harry read the letter once again.
Perhaps, it was not written by Dumbledore at all, but was a trick or joke or trap.
Harry suddenly felt a bit regretful. Why hadn’t he sent a letter with Hedwig to Evan or Hermione to inquire about this matter?
A week ago, Harry had received a letter from Hermione and knew that she was currently at Evan's house.
In order not to disturb them both, he had been refraining from writing letters, and he also didn't want them to worry about his affairs.
Hermione surely had a lot to talk about with Evan, and Harry was happy to see his two friends finally get together.
They had gone through a lot together, and it wasn’t until after the Yule Ball during the Triwizard Tournament that they officially confirmed their relationship.
Ron didn't seem very optimistic about this. He had secretly told Harry that Evan and Hermione were both too smart and would definitely separate in the end.
Harry didn't want that to happen, but he also felt that it would be tiring for two too smart people to be together.
Of course, when it came to matters like these, Harry wasn’t in a position to judge others.
Last year, his first date with Cho Chang had ended disastrously, with the two parting on bad terms.
Until now, he was not sure whether he still had feelings for Cho, but if he had been a little smarter at the time...
As Harry's thoughts drifted, the minute hand on the alarm clock reached the number twelve; it was now eleven o'clock p.m.
At that precise moment, the streetlamp outside the window suddenly went out.
Harry awoke as though the sudden darkness were an alarm. Hastily straightening his glasses and unsticking his cheek from the glass, he pressed his nose against the window instead and squinted down at the pavement.
At this moment, a tall figure in a long, billowing cloak was walking up the garden path.
The doorbell rang and Harry jumped up as though he had received an electric shock, knocking over his chair.
"Damn it! Can't this wizard named Dumbledore keep it down?" Uncle Vernon shouted in the living room downstairs. "Does he want the neighbors to know we’re secretly hosting a wizard?"
As Harry opened the door and walked out of his bedroom, he heard a deep, gentle voice saying, "Good evening. You must be Mr. Dursley. I daresay Harry has told you I would be coming for him?"
"Yes, the boy told me, just a few hours ago, it’s all so sudden," said Uncle Vernon. "You should have informed us a few days ago so that we could be prepared, instead of..."
Harry ran down the stairs two at a time, coming to an abrupt halt several steps from the bottom.
There in the doorway stood a tall, thin man with waist-length silver hair and beard. Half-moon spectacles were perched on his crooked nose, and he was wearing a long black traveling cloak and a pointed hat.
Vernon Dursley, whose mustache was quite as bushy as Dumbledore’s, though black, and who was wearing a very formal suit, specially prepared for the occasion, looked particularly stupid, staring blankly at the visitor with his tiny eyes.
"I am indeed very sorry. I think there must have been some misunderstanding. I am certain I informed Harry of my arrival four days ago," said Dumbledore kindly and amicably. "However, it does not matter. You seem to have made preparations. Let us assume that you have invited me warmly into your house. It is unwise to linger overlong on doorsteps in these troubled times."
He stepped smartly over the threshold and closed the front door behind him.
"It is a long time since my last visit," said Dumbledore, peering down his crooked nose at Uncle Vernon and then at the potted plant behind him. "I must say, your agapanthus is flourishing. It is well cared for."
Vernon Dursley said nothing, as if unsure of what to say, but Harry did not doubt that speech would return to him.
Something about Dumbledore seemed to have robbed him temporarily of breath. It might have been the blatant wizardishness of his appearance, but it might, too, have been that even Uncle Vernon could sense that here was a man whom it would be very difficult to bully.
"Ah, good evening, Harry," said Dumbledore, looking up at him through his half-moon glasses with a most satisfied expression. "Excellent, excellent."
The words seemed to rouse Uncle Vernon, who snorted heavily.
It was clear that as far as he was concerned, any man who could look at Harry and say “excellent” was a man with whom he could never see eye to eye.
"Well, regarding your visit tonight, I don’t mean to be rude —" he began, in a tone that threatened rudeness in every syllable.
"— yet, sadly, accidental rudeness occurs alarmingly often," Dumbledore finished the sentence gravely. "Best to say nothing at all, my dear man. Shouldn't you be graciously inviting me into your sitting room? Ah, and this must be Petunia."
The kitchen door had opened, and there stood Harry's aunt, also dressed formally.
Harry knew this was her best dress; he had seen his aunt showing it off to a neighbor's wife last year.
Though she was clearly not pleased to see Dumbledore, she had still prepared some refreshments in the kitchen.
But now, seeing a living, breathing wizard standing in front of her, her horsey face was full of terror.
"Albus Dumbledore," said Dumbledore, noticing that no one had introduced him. "We have corresponded, of course."
Harry thought this a funny way of reminding Aunt Petunia that Dumbledore had once sent her a Howler, but Aunt Petunia didn't challenge the term; she obviously remembered that letter well.
Harry heard Dudley's door slam shut with a bang.
Usually at this time, he would stay in the living room, eating sweets before bed and watching boring evening shows on TV.
Harry had almost forgotten what television was like; he had never been invited to watch it, and such a thing apparently did not exist in the Wizarding world; only people with peculiar interests, like Mr. Weasley, would be curious about television.
But Mr. Weasley couldn't figure out how the TV worked, and repeatedly asked Harry how the Muggles managed to fit people into that small box.
Returning to the current awkward situation, it was clear that Dudley had been warned not to hide in his room.
The Dursleys' reaction to Dumbledore's presence was embarrassingly uncomfortable.
For a moment, silence fell over the house.
