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Rufus Scrimgeour paused in the doorway, leaning on his walking stick and smiling as he observed this affecting scene.

“You must forgive this intrusion,” he said, when Mrs. Weasley looked around at him, beaming and wiping her eyes. “Percy and I were in the vicinity—working, you know—and he couldn’t resist dropping in and seeing you all.”

But Percy showed no sign of wanting to greet any of the rest of the family. He stood, poker-straight and awkward-looking, and stared over everybody else’s heads. Mr. Weasley, Fred, and George were all observing him, stony-faced.

“Please, come in, sit down, Minister!” fluttered Mrs. Weasley, straightening her hat. “Have a little purkey, or some tooding… I mean—”

“No, no, my dear Molly,” said Scrimgeour. Harry guessed that he had checked her name with Percy before they entered the house. “I don’t want to intrude, wouldn’t be here at all if Percy hadn’t wanted to see you all so badly…”

“Oh, Perce!” said Mrs. Weasley tearfully, reaching up to kiss him.

“…we’ve only looked in for five minutes, so I’ll have a stroll around the yard while you catch up with Percy. No, no, I assure you I don’t want to butt in! Well, if anybody cared to show me your charming garden… Ah, that young man’s finished, why doesn’t he take a stroll with me?”

The atmosphere around the table changed perceptibly. Everybody looked from Scrimgeour to Harry. Nobody seemed to find Scrimgeour’s pretense that he did not know Harry’s name convincing, or find it natural that he should be chosen to accompany the Minister around the garden when Ginny, Fleur, and George also had clean plates.

“Yeah, all right,” said Harry into the silence.

He was not fooled; for all Scrimgeour’s talk that they had just been in the area, that Percy wanted to look up his family, this must be the real reason that they had come, so that Scrimgeour could speak to Harry alone.

“It’s fine,” he said quietly, as he passed Lupin, who had half risen from his chair. “Fine,” he added, as Mr. Weasley opened his mouth to speak.

“Wonderful!” said Scrimgeour, standing back to let Harry pass through the door ahead of him. “We’ll just take a turn around the garden, and Percy and I’ll be off. Carry on, everyone!”

Harry walked across the yard toward the Weasleys’ overgrown, snow-covered garden, Scrimgeour limping slightly at his side. He had, Harry knew, been Head of the Auror office; he looked tough and battle-scarred, very different from portly Fudge in his bowler hat.

“Charming,” said Scrimgeour, stopping at the garden fence and looking out over the snowy lawn and the indistinguishable plants. “Charming.”

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1. A bundle of walking sticks was floating in midair ahead of them, and as Percy took a step toward them they started throwing themselves at him.
2. A motherly-looking Healer wearing a tinsel wreath in her hair came bustling up the corridor, smiling warmly at Harry and the others.
3. And now Karkaroff raised his wand. He paused for a moment, and then a number shot out of his wand too—four.
4. Chuckling about Malfoy, they waited, Norbert thrashing about in his crate. About ten minutes later, four broomsticks came swooping down out of the darkness.
5. Dean left, looking as though he was not sorry to depart the scene.
6. Dumbledore had stopped walking, level with the church they had passed earlier.
7. Fleur glided back to her seat, smiling at Cedric as he passed her.
8. Harry could have kicked him. Then he saw, to his astonishment, that Dumbledore was smiling gently, too.
9. Harry jumped to his feet too. Scrimgeour limped toward Harry and jabbed him hard in the chest with the point of his wand; It singed a hole in Harry’s T-shirt like a lit cigarette.
10. Harry said nothing. He could tell that Scrimgeour was watching him.
11. He blinked again. The smiling face of Albus Dumbledore swam into view above him.
12. He climbed carefully along one of the branches, holding tight to his broomstick, trying to see through the leaves.

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