After a few minutes’ progress up the dark tunnel, a distant sound of slowly shifting rock reached Harry’s ears.
“Ron!” Harry yelled, speeding up. “Ginny’s okay! I’ve got her!”
He heard Ron give a strangled cheer, and they turned the next bend to see his eager face staring through the sizable gap he had managed to make in the rock fall.
“Ginny!” Ron thrust an arm through the gap in the rock to pull her through first. “You’re alive! I don’t believe it! What happened? How—what—where did that bird come from?” Fawkes had swooped through the gap after Ginny.
“He’s Dumbledore’s,” said Harry, squeezing through himself.
“How come you’ve got a sword?” said Ron, gaping at the glittering weapon in Harry’s hand.
“I’ll explain when we get out of here,” said Harry with a sideways glance at Ginny, who was crying harder than ever.
“But—”
“Later,” Harry said shortly. He didn’t think it was a good idea to tell Ron yet who’d been opening the Chamber, not in front of Ginny, anyway. “Where’s Lockhart?”
“Back there,” said Ron, still looking puzzled but jerking his head up the tunnel toward the pipe. “He’s in a bad way. Come and see.”
Led by Fawkes, whose wide scarlet wings emitted a soft golden glow in the darkness, they walked all the way back to the mouth of the pipe. Gilderoy Lockhart was sitting there, humming placidly to himself.
“His memory’s gone,” said Ron. “The Memory Charm backfired. Hit him instead of us. Hasn’t got a clue who he is, or where he is, or who we are. I told him to come and wait here. He’s a danger to himself.”
Lockhart peered good naturedly up at them all.
“Hello,” he said. “Odd sort of place, this, isn’t it? Do you live here?”
“No,” said Ron, raising his eyebrows at Harry.
Harry bent down and looked up the long, dark pipe.
“Have you thought how we’re going to get back up this?” he said to Ron.
Ron shook his head, but Fawkes the phoenix had swooped past Harry and was now fluttering in front of him, his beady eyes bright in the dark. He was waving his long golden tail feathers. Harry looked uncertainly at him.
“He looks like he wants you to grab hold…” said Ron, looking perplexed. “But you’re much too heavy for a bird to pull up there—”
“Fawkes,” said Harry, “isn’t an ordinary bird.” He turned quickly to the others. “We’ve got to hold on to each other. Ginny, grab Ron’s hand. Professor Lockhart—”