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Chapter 437: The Fireplace Blasted up
🕑 Added 2019-03-31 22:58:17 +0000 UTCIn this silent, tense atmosphere, time passed very slowly.
Evan, Harry and Hermione had already drunk up the tea in their cups, but no one refilled them.
Neither Harry's uncle nor aunt seemed to have any intention to do that.
Evan knew a spell that could make wine, but he couldn’t use it here.
But it was hard to beat him. The cloth bag he carried with him, which had been expanded with the Undetectable Extension Charm, contained a lot of drinks.
They were the juices he had brought back from France. Under the light, these juices would have colorful dreamy reflections and were very famous in the French wizarding world.
Evan took out the juice and gave himself, Harry, and Hermione a cup, and filled the opposite Dudley’s cup.
Sniffing the sweet smell of the juice, Dudley couldn’t wait to pick up the cup.
"Oh, no, Dudley dear!" Harry's Aunt Petunia shouted out loud. "Don't touch that thing, put it down."
"Don't worry, this juice is fine!" said Evan. "But what other wizards give you, you’d better not put it in your mouth, especially the twins coming soon. Be extra careful. They like to play pranks."
Perhaps it was Evan’s identity, or his attitude, and Aunt Petunia finally allowed Dudley to drink the juice.
Of course, the awkward atmosphere in the room did not loosen up.
Evan told Harry and Hermione what he had seen in Beauxbatons. On the opposite side, the Dursleys were whispering.
Dudley stared at the half-empty bottle of juice on the table, licking his lips, and his eyes were shining with greed.
In this way, five o'clock came and then went.
For some reason, the Weasleys were late.
Because of the sultry weather and the heavy clothes, Mr. Dursley had begun to perspire slightly in his suit.
He stood up impatiently, opened the front door, peered up and down the street, and then withdrew his head quickly.
"They’re late!" he snarled at Harry in a gruff voice.
"I know!" Harry replied. "Maybe, er…the traffic’s bad, that must be it!"
Although he said so, he was a bit impatient as well.
Harry turned around and looked anxiously at Evan, who shook his head.
In his view, Mr. Weasley would come through the Floo Network or Apparate. Either way, he would not be stopped just by traffic congestion.
‘Hold on, Floo Network?!’
Evan suddenly thought that if they came here through the Floo Network, they must come out of the fireplace.
The Dursleys' fireplace was sealed and there was a fake electric stove burning coal in front of it.
Evan hurriedly stood up and walked over to the fireplace and observed it carefully.
He seemed to hear something. Behind Evan, the Dursleys were still muttering in the living room.
"No consideration at all!"
"We might have had another engagement."
"Maybe they think they’ll get invited to dinner if they’re late."
"Well, don't even think about it!" said Mr. Dursley. "They’ll take the three children and go. There will be no hanging around."
Then, he shouted to Harry and Hermione sitting on the sofa. "I mean, if they’re coming. They’ve probably mistaken the day. I daresay their kind don’t set much store by punctuality."
Just then, Evan heard a voice coming from inside the fireplace, someone was inside!
He guessed it, the Weasleys came here through the Floo Network.
Before he even thought about what to do, there was a scream of horror.
" Ah ah ah ah ah!" Dudley shouted.
Curious about what Evan was doing in front of the fireplace, he had just followed him and was startled by the sound inside the fireplace.
In fact, his screaming also made Evan startled.
"What’s the matter? What happened?" Harry rushed over at once.
From the corner of the living room came the sounds of the Dursleys scrambling, panic-stricken, across the room.
Dudley kept rubbing the sweat on his forehead, his expression was terrible.
He seemed unable to speak, his hands still clamped over his buttocks.
"They seem to be there, just inside the fireplace!" said Evan.
At this moment, from behind the Dursleys' fireplace came the sounds of heavy knocks and frictions..
"Ouch! Fred, no… go back, go back, there’s been some kind of mistake…tell George not to… OUCH! George, no, there’s no room, go back and tell Ron not to come over"
"Dad, I heard Evan and Harry talking, they’re outside." Fred shouted.
"I heard that too; maybe they’ll be able to let us out!"
As soon as George's voice fell, there was a loud hammering of fists on the boards behind the electric heater.
"Evan, Harry, can you hear us?!"
"It's Mr. Weasley, he's inside!" Hermione ran over. "They must have come here by Floo powder, but they didn’t know that unlike the wizards, Muggles’ fireplaces are usually blocked."
"I heard Hermione, she’s also outside!" Mr. Weasley said with delight.
"Maybe we can…"
Evan hadn't finished yet and the Dursleys rounded on the three of them like a pair of angry wolverines.
“What’s going on?” Mr. Dursley growled and asked, “What are they doing?”
"They’ve tried to get here by Floo powder." Harry said, fighting a mad desire to laugh. "They can travel by fire, but you have blocked the fireplace, hang on!"
At this time, Evan and Hermione were talking to them through the boards.
"Mr. Weasley, it’s Evan!" he shouted. "The fireplace has been blocked up!"
"Damn!" said Mr. Weasley's voice. "What on earth did they want to block up the fireplace for?"
"They’ve got an electric fire." Hermione explained.
“Really?” said Mr. Weasley’s voice excitedly. “Electric, you say? With a plug? Gracious, I must see that, let me think about it…ouch, Ron!”
Ron’s voice now joined the others’.
"What are we doing here? Has something gone wrong?"
"Nothing wrong!" Fred's voice came out, very sarcastically. “No, this is exactly where we wanted to end up."
"Yeah, we’re having the time of our lives here!" said George, whose voice sounded muffled, as though he was squashed against the wall.
"Boys, boys!" said Mr. Weasley vaguely, "I’m trying to think what to do, okay, the only way, Evan, Harry, Hermione, you three stand back."
They hurried back to the sofa in the living room, and Mr. Dursley made a few steps forward.
"Wait!" he bellowed at the fire. "What exactly are you going to do?"
BANG, his fireplace had blasted up before he could say anything else!!
