Harry Potter 1 Harry Potter and the Sorcerer's Stone

particularly hungry after the excitement of the afternoon. “Wood told me.”
Ron was so amazed, so impressed, he just sat and gaped at Harry.
“I start training next week,” said Harry. “Only don’t tell anyone, Wood
wants to keep it a secret.”
           Fred  and  George  Weasley  now  came  into  the  hall,  spotted  Harry,  and
hurried over.
“Well done,” said George in a low voice. “Wood told us. We’re on the
team too — Beaters.”
“I tell you, we’re going to win that Quidditch cup for sure this year,” said
Fred.  “We  haven’t  won  since  Charlie  left,  but  this  year’s  team  is  going  to  be
brilliant. You must be good, Harry, Wood was almost skipping when he told us.”
“Anyway, we’ve got to go, Lee Jordan reckons he’s found a new secret
passageway out of the school.”
“Bet it’s that one behind the statue of Gregory the Smarmy that we found
in our first week. See you.”
Fred and George had hardly disappeared when someone far less welcome
turned up: Malfoy, flanked by Crabbe and Goyle.
“Having a last meal, Potter? When are you getting the train back to the
Muggles?”
“You’re a lot braver now that you’re back on the ground and you’ve got
your little friends with you,” said Harry coolly. There was of course nothing at
all  little  about  Crabbe  and  Goyle,  but  as  the  High  Table  was  full  of  teachers,
neither of them could do more than crack their knuckles and scowl.
           “I’d  take  you  on  anytime  on  my  own,”  said  Malfoy.  “Tonight,  if  you
want. Wizard’s duel. Wands only — no contact. What’s the matter? Never heard
of a wizard’s duel before, I suppose?”
“Of course he has,” said Ron, wheeling around. “I’m his second, who’s
yours?”
Malfoy looked at Crabbe and Goyle, sizing them up.
           “Crabbe,”  he  said.  “Midnight  all  right?  We’ll  meet  you  in  the  trophy
room; that’s always unlocked.”
When Malfoy had gone, Ron and Harry looked at each other.
“What is a wizard’s duel?” said Harry. “And what do you mean, you’re
my second?”
“Well, a second’s there to take over if you die,” said Ron casually, getting
started  at  last  on  his  cold  pie.  Catching  the  look  on  Harry’s  face,  he  added
quickly, “But people only die in proper duels, you know, with real wizards. The
most you and Malfoy’ll be able to do is send sparks at each other. Neither of you

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knows  enough  magic  to  do  any  real  damage.  I  bet  he  expected  you  to  refuse,
anyway.”
“And what if I wave my wand and nothing happens?”
“Throw it away and punch him on the nose,” Ron suggested.
“Excuse me.”
They both looked up. It was Hermione Granger.
“Can’t a person eat in peace in this place?” said Ron.
Hermione ignored him and spoke to Harry.
“I couldn’t help overhearing what you and Malfoy were saying —”
“Bet you could,” Ron muttered.
“— and you mustn’t go wandering around the school at night, think of
the  points  you’ll  lose  Gryffindor  if  you’re  caught,  and  you’re  bound  to  be.  It’s
really very selfish of you.”
“And it’s really none of your business,” said Harry.
“Good-bye,” said Ron.
All  the  same,  it  wasn’t  what  you’d  call  the  perfect  end  to  the  day,  Harry
thought, as he lay awake much later listening to Dean and Seamus falling asleep
(Neville wasn’t back from the hospital wing). Ron had spent all evening giving
him  advice  such  as  “If  he  tries  to  curse  you,  you’d  better  dodge  it,  because  I
can’t  remember  how  to  block  them.”  There  was  a  very  good  chance  they  were
going to get caught by Filch or Mrs. Norris, and Harry felt he was pushing his
luck, breaking another  school rule today.  On the other  hand, Malfoy’s sneering
face  kept  looming  up  out  of  the  darkness  —  this  was  his  big  chance  to  beat
Malfoy face-to-face. He couldn’t miss it.
“Half-past eleven,” Ron muttered at last, “we’d better go.”
They pulled on their bathrobes, picked up their wands, and crept across
the  tower  room,  down  the  spiral  staircase,  and  into  the  Gryffindor  common
room. A few embers were still glowing in the fireplace, turning all the armchairs
into hunched black shadows. They had almost reached the portrait hole when a
voice spoke from the chair nearest them, “I can’t believe you’re going to do this,
Harry.”
A lamp flickered on. It was Hermione Granger, wearing a pink bathrobe
and a frown.
“You!” said Ron furiously. “Go back to bed!”
“I almost told your brother,” Hermione snapped, “Percy — he’s a prefect,
he’d put a stop to this.”
Harry couldn’t believe anyone could be so interfering.
“Come on,” he said to Ron. He pushed open the portrait of the Fat Lady

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and climbed through the hole.
Hermione wasn’t going to give up that easily. She followed Ron through
the portrait hole, hissing at them like an angry goose.
“Don’t you care about Gryffindor, do you only care about yourselves, I
don’t  want  Slytherin  to  win  the  house  cup,  and  you’ll  lose  all  the  points  I  got
from Professor McGonagall for knowing about Switching Spells.”
“Go away.”
“All right, but I warned you, you just remember what I said when you’re
on the train home tomorrow, you’re so —”
           But  what  they  were,  they  didn’t  find  out.  Hermione  had  turned  to  the
portrait  of  the  Fat  Lady  to  get  back  inside  and  found  herself  facing  an  empty
painting. The Fat Lady had gone on a nighttime visit and Hermione was locked
out of Gryffindor tower.
“Now what am I going to do?” she asked shrilly.
“That’s your problem,” said Ron. “We’ve got to go, we’re going to be
late.”
They hadn’t even reached the end of the corridor when Hermione caught
up with them.
“I’m coming with you,” she said.
“You are not.”
“D’you think I’m going to stand out here and wait for Filch to catch me?
If he finds all three of us I’ll tell him the truth, that I was trying to stop you, and
you can back me up.”
“You’ve got some nerve —” said Ron loudly.
“Shut up, both of you!” said Harry sharply. I heard something.”
It was a sort of snuffling.
“Mrs. Norris?” breathed Ron, squinting through the dark.
It wasn’t Mrs. Norris. It was Neville. He was curled up on the floor, fast
asleep, but jerked suddenly awake as they crept nearer.
“Thank goodness you found me! I’ve been out here for hours, I couldn’t
remember the new password to get in to bed.”
“Keep your voice down, Neville. The password’s ‘Pig snout’ but it won’t
help you now, the Fat Lady’s gone off somewhere.”
“How’s your arm?” said Harry.
           “Fine,”  said  Neville,  showing  them.  “Madam  Pomfrey  mended  it  in
about a minute.”
“Good — well, look, Neville, we’ve got to be somewhere, we’ll see you
later —”
“Don’t leave me!” said Neville, scrambling to his feet, “I don’t want to

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stay here alone, the Bloody Baron’s been past twice already.”
           Ron  looked  at  his  watch  and  then  glared  furiously  at  Hermione  and
Neville.
“If either of you get us caught, I’ll never rest until I’ve learned that Curse
of the Bogies Quirrell told us about, and used it on you.”
Hermione opened her mouth, perhaps to tell Ron exactly how to use the
Curse of the Bogies, but Harry hissed at her to be quiet and beckoned them all
forward.
They flitted along corridors striped with bars of moonlight from the high
windows. At every turn Harry expected to run into Filch or Mrs. Norris, but they
were  lucky.  They  sped  up  a  staircase  to  the  third  floor  and  tiptoed  toward  the
trophy room.
           Malfoy  and  Crabbe  weren’t  there  yet.  The  crystal  trophy  cases
glimmered where the moonlight caught them. Cups, shields, plates, and statues
winked  silver  and  gold  in  the  darkness.  They  edged  along  the  walls,  keeping
their eyes on the doors at either end of the room. Harry took out his wand in case
Malfoy leapt in and started at once. The minutes crept by.
“He’s late, maybe he’s chickened out,” Ron whispered.
           Then  a  noise  in  the  next  room  made  them  jump.  Harry  had  only  just
raised his wand when they heard someone speak — and it wasn’t Malfoy.
“Sniff around, my sweet, they might be lurking in a corner.”
It was Filch speaking to Mrs. Norris. Horror-struck, Harry waved madly
at  the  other  three  to  follow  him  as  quickly  as  possible;  they  scurried  silently
toward  the  door,  away  from  Filch’s  voice.  Neville’s  robes  had  barely  whipped
round the corner when they heard Filch enter the trophy room.
“They’re in here somewhere,” they heard him mutter, “probably hiding.”
           “This  way!”  Harry  mouthed  to  the  others  and,  petrified,  they  began  to
creep  down  a  long  gallery  full  of  suits  of  armor.  They  could  hear  Filch  getting
nearer.  Neville  suddenly  let  out  a  frightened  squeak  and  broke  into  a  run  he
tripped, grabbed Ron around the waist, and the pair of them toppled right into a
suit of armor.
The clanging and crashing were enough to wake the whole castle.
“RUN!” Harry yelled, and the four of them sprinted down the gallery, not
looking  back  to  see  whether  Filch  was  following  —  they  swung  around  the
doorpost and galloped down one corridor then another, Harry in the lead, without
any  idea  where  they  were  or  where  they  were  going  —  they  ripped  through  a
tapestry and found themselves in a hidden passageway, hurtled along it and came
out  near  their  Charms  classroom,  which  they  knew  was  miles  from  the  trophy
room.

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“I think we’ve lost him,” Harry panted, leaning against the cold wall and
wiping his forehead. Neville was bent double, wheezing and spluttering.
I — told — you,” Hermione gasped, clutching at the stitch in her chest,
“I — told — you.”
           “We’ve  got  to  get  back  to  Gryffindor  tower,”  said  Ron,  “quickly  as
possible.”
“Malfoy tricked you,” Hermione said to Harry. “You realize that, don’t
you? He was never going to meet you — Filch knew someone was going to be in
the trophy room, Malfoy must have tipped him off.”
Harry thought she was probably right, but he wasn’t going to tell her that.
“Let’s go.”
It wasn’t going to be that simple. They hadn’t gone more than a dozen
paces when a doorknob rattled and something came shooting out of a classroom
in front of them.
It was Peeves. He caught sight of them and gave a squeal of delight.
“Shut up, Peeves — please — you’ll get us thrown out.”
Peeves cackled.
           “Wandering  around  at  midnight,  Ickle  Firsties?  Tut,  tut,  tut.  Naughty,
naughty, you’ll get caughty.”
“Not if you don’t give us away, Peeves, please.”
“Should tell Filch, I should,” said Peeves in a saintly voice, but his eyes
glittered wickedly. “It’s for your own good, you know.”
“Get out of the way,” snapped Ron, taking a swipe at Peeves this was a
big mistake.
“STUDENTS OUT OF BED!” Peeves bellowed, “STUDENTS OUT OF
BED DOWN THE CHARMS CORRIDOR!”
           Ducking  under  Peeves,  they  ran  for  their  lives,  right  to  the  end  of  the
corridor where they slammed into a door — and it was locked.
“This is it!” Ron moaned, as they pushed helplessly at the door, “We’re
done for! This is the end!”
             They  could  hear  footsteps,  Filch  running  as  fast  as  he  could  toward
Peeves’s shouts.
“Oh, move over,” Hermione snarled. She grabbed Harry’s wand, tapped
the lock, and whispered, “Alohomora!”
The lock clicked and the door swung open — they piled through it, shut
it quickly, and pressed their ears against it, listening.
“Which way did they go, Peeves?” Filch was saying. “Quick, tell me.”
“Say ‘please.’”
“Don’t mess with me, Peeves, now where did they go?”

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“Shan’t say nothing if you don’t say please,” said Peeves in his annoying
singsong voice.
“All right — please.”
“NOTHING! Ha haaa! Told you I wouldn’t say nothing if you didn’t say
please! Ha ha! Haaaaaa!” And they heard the sound of Peeves whooshing away
and Filch cursing in rage.
“He thinks this door is locked,” Harry whispered. “I think we’ll be okay
—  get  off,  Neville!”  For  Neville  had  been  tugging  on  the  sleeve  of  Harry’s
bathrobe for the last minute. “What?”
Harry turned around — and saw, quite clearly, what. For a moment, he
was  sure  he’d  walked  into  a  nightmare  —  this  was  too  much,  on  top  of
everything that had happened so far.
           They  weren’t  in  a  room,  as  he  had  supposed.  They  were  in  a  corridor.
The  forbidden  corridor  on  the  third  floor.  And  now  they  knew  why  it  was
forbidden.
They were looking straight into the eyes of a monstrous dog, a dog that
filled the whole space between ceiling and floor. It had three heads. Three pairs
of rolling, mad eyes; three noses, twitching and quivering in their direction; three
drooling mouths, saliva hanging in slippery ropes from yellowish fangs.
It was standing quite still, all six eyes staring at them, and Harry knew
that the only reason they weren’t already dead was that their sudden appearance
had  taken  it  by  surprise,  but  it  was  quickly  getting  over  that,  there  was  no
mistaking what those thunderous growls meant.
           Harry  groped  for  the  doorknob  —  between  Filch  and  death,  he’d  take
Filch.
They fell backward — Harry slammed the door shut, and they ran, they
almost  flew,  back  down  the  corridor.  Filch  must  have  hurried  off  to  look  for
them  somewhere  else,  because  they  didn’t  see  him  anywhere,  but  they  hardly
cared — all they wanted to do was put as much space as possible between them
and that monster. They didn’t stop running until they reached the portrait of the
Fat Lady on the seventh floor.
           “Where  on  earth  have  you  all  been?”  she  asked,  looking  at  their
bathrobes hanging off their shoulders and their flushed, sweaty faces.
“Never mind that — pig snout, pig snout,” panted Harry, and the portrait
swung  forward.  They  scrambled  into  the  common  room  and  collapsed,
trembling, into armchairs.
It was a while before any of them said anything. Neville, indeed, looked
as if he’d never speak again.
“What do they think they’re doing, keeping a thing like that locked up in

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a school?” said Ron finally. “If any dog needs exercise, that one does.”
Hermione had got both her breath and her bad temper back again. “You
don’t use your eyes, any of you, do you?” she snapped. “Didn’t you see what it
was standing on.
           “The  floor?”  Harry  suggested.  “I  wasn’t  looking  at  its  feet,  I  was  too
busy with its heads.”
“No, not the floor. It was standing on a trapdoor. It’s obviously guarding
something.”
She stood up, glaring at them.
“I hope you’re pleased with yourselves. We could all have been killed —
or worse, expelled. Now, if you don’t mind, I’m going to bed.”
Ron stared after her, his mouth open.
           “No,  we  don’t  mind,”  he  said.  “You’d  think  we  dragged  her  along,
wouldn’t you.
           But  Hermione  had  given  Harry  something  else  to  think  about  as  he
climbed  back  into  bed.  The  dog  was  guarding  something…What  had  Hagrid
said?  Gringotts  was  the  safest  place  in  the  world  for  something  you  wanted  to
hide — except perhaps Hogwarts.
It looked as though Harry had found out where the grubby little package
from vault seven hundred and thirteen was.

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