𝐋𝐚𝐝𝐲 𝐢𝐧 𝐑𝐞𝐝 {𝐇. 𝐆𝐫𝐚𝐧𝐠𝐞𝐫}

88

Johnny could feel the effects of the Liquid Luck deteriorating as he made his way back up to Dumbledore's office that same evening, a proud grin on his face the whole way as he made it past the likes of Snape, McGonagall and Filch without being caught.

"Enter," said Dumbledore when Johnny knocked. He sounded exhausted.

Johnny pushed open the door. There was Dumbledore's office, looking the same as ever, but with black, star-strewn skies beyond the windows. It was clear Dumbledore and Harry had just finished with the lesson Johnny deemed far less important.

"Good gracious, Johnny," said Dumbledore in surprise. "To what do I owe this very late pleasure?"

"Sir--I've got it. I've got the memory from Slughorn."

Johnny pulled out the tiny glass bottle and showed it to Dumbledore and Harry. For a moment or two, the Headmaster and his cousin looked stunned. Then their faces split in wide smiles.

"Johnny, this is spectacular news! Very well done indeed! I knew you could do it!"

"Well done, mate," said Harry, and Johnny gave him an adrenaline filled grin as he sat down in front of Dumbledore's desk. All thought of the lateness of the hour apparently forgotten, Dumbledore hurried around his desk, took the bottle with Slughorn's memory in his uninjured hand, and strode over to the cabinet where he kept the Pensieve.

"And now," said Dumbledore, placing the stone basin upon the desk and emptying the contents of the bottle into it. "Now, at last, we shall see. Boys, quickly..."

Harry and Johnny walked obediently over the Pensieve and felt their feet leave the office floor... once again fell through darkness and landed in Horace Slughorn's office many years before.

There was the much younger Slughorn, with his thick, shiny, straw-colored hair and his gingery-blond mustache, sitting again in the comfortable winged armchair in his office, his feet resting upon a velvet pouffe, a small glass of wine in one hand, the other rummaging in a box of crystallised pineapple. And there were the half dozen teenage boys sitting around Slughorn with Tom Riddle in the midst of them, Marvolo's gold-and-black ring gleaming on his finger.

Dumbledore landed beside Harry and Johnny just as Riddle asked, "Sir, is it true that Professor Merrythought is retiring?"

"Tom, Tom, if I knew I couldn't tell you," said Slughorn, wagging his finger reprovingly at Riddle, though winking at the same time. "I must say, I'd like to know where you get your information, boy, more knowledgeable than half the staff, you are."

Riddle smiled; the other boys laughed and cast him admiring looks.

"What with your uncanny ability to know things you shouldn't, and your careful flattery of the people who matter--thank you for the pineapple, by the way, you're quite right, it is my favorite --"

Several of the boys tittered again.

"-- I confidently expect you to rise to Minister of Magic within twenty years. Fifteen, if you keep sending me pineapple, I have excellent contacts at the Ministry."

Tom Riddle merely smiled as the others laughed again. Johnny noticed that he was by no means the eldest of the group of boys, but that they all seemed to look to him as their leader.

"I don't know that politics would suit me, sir," he said when the laughter had died away. "I don't have the right kind of background, for one thing."

A couple of the boys around him smirked at each other. Johnny was sure they were enjoying a private joke, undoubtedly about what they knew, or suspected, regarding their gang leader's famous ancestor.