Harry Potter 1 Harry Potter and the Sorcerer's Stone

HP 1 - Harry Potter and the
Sorcerer's Stone

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CHAPTER TEN
HALLOWEEN
M alfoy couldn’t believe his eyes when he saw that Harry and Ron were still
at  Hogwarts  the  next  day,  looking  tired  but  perfectly  cheerful.  Indeed,  by  the
next  morning  Harry  and  Ron  thought  that  meeting  the  three-headed  dog  had
been  an  excellent  adventure,  and  they  were  quite  keen  to  have  another  one.  In
the meantime, Harry filled Ron in about the package that seemed to have been
moved from Gringotts to Hogwarts, and they spent a lot of time wondering what
could possibly need such heavy protection.
“It’s either really valuable or really dangerous,” said Ron.
“Or both,” said Harry.
But as all they knew for sure about the mysterious object was that it was
about  two  inches  long,  they  didn’t  have  much  chance  of  guessing  what  it  was
without further clues.
Neither Neville nor Hermione showed the slightest interest in what lay
underneath  the  dog  and  the  trapdoor.  All  Neville  cared  about  was  never  going
near the dog again.
Hermione was now refusing to speak to Harry and Ron, but she was such
a bossy know-it-all that they saw this as an added bonus. All they really wanted
now was a way of getting back at Malfoy, and to their great delight, just such a
thing arrived in the mail about a week later.
           As  the  owls  flooded  into  the  Great  Hall  as  usual,  everyone’s  attention
was  caught  at  once  by  a  long,  thin  package  carried  by  six  large  screech  owls.
Harry was just as interested as everyone else to see what was in this large parcel,
and was amazed when the owls soared down and dropped it right in front of him,
knocking his bacon to the floor. They had hardly fluttered out of the way when
another owl dropped a letter on top of the parcel.
Harry ripped open the letter first, which was lucky, because it said:
DO NOT OPEN THE PARCEL AT THE TABLE.
                       It  contains  your  new  Nimbus  Two  Thousand,  but  I  don’t  want
everybody  knowing  you’ve  got  a  broomstick  or  they’ll  all  want  one.  Oliver
Wood will meet you tonight on the Quidditch field at seven o’clock for your first
training session.

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Professor McGonagall
Harry had difficulty hiding his glee as he handed the note to Ron to read.
           “A  Nimbus  Two  Thousand!”  Ron  moaned  enviously.  “I’ve  never  even
touched one.”
They left the hall quickly, wanting to unwrap the broomstick in private
before their first class, but halfway across the entrance hall they found the way
upstairs barred by Crabbe and Goyle. Malfoy seized the package from Harry and
felt it.
“That’s a broomstick,” he said, throwing it back to Harry with a mixture
of jealousy and spite on his face. “You’ll be in for it this time, Potter, first years
aren’t allowed them.”
Ron couldn’t resist it.
           “It’s  not  any  old  broomstick,”  he  said,  “it’s  a  Nimbus  Two  Thousand.
What  did  you  say  you’ve  got  at  home,  Malfoy,  a  Comet  Two  Sixty?”  Ron
grinned at Harry. “Comets look flashy, but they’re not in the same league as the
Nimbus.”
“What would you know about it, Weasley, you couldn’t afford half the
handle,” Malfoy snapped back. “I suppose you and your brothers have to save up
twig by twig.”
           Before  Ron  could  answer,  Professor  Flitwick  appeared  at  Malfoy’s
elbow.
“Not arguing, I hope, boys?” he squeaked.
“Potter’s been sent a broomstick, Professor,” said Malfoy quickly.
           “Yes,  yes,  that’s  right,”  said  Professor  Flitwick,  beaming  at  Harry.
“Professor McGonagall told me all about the special circumstances, Potter. And
what model is it?”
“A Nimbus Two Thousand, it is,” said Harry, fighting not to laugh at the
look of horror on Malfoy’s face. “And it’s really thanks to Malfoy here that I’ve
got it,” he added.
           Harry  and  Ron  headed  upstairs,  smothering  their  laughter  at  Malfoy’s
obvious rage and confusion.
           “Well,  it’s  true,”  Harry  chortled  as  they  reached  the  top  of  the  marble
staircase, “If he hadn’t stolen Neville’s Remembrall I wouldn’t be on the team.
…”
           “So  I  suppose  you  think  that’s  a  reward  for  breaking  rules?”  came  an
angry  voice  from  just  behind  them.  Hermione  was  stomping  up  the  stairs,
looking disapprovingly at the package in Harry’s hand.

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“I thought you weren’t speaking to us?” said Harry.
“Yes, don’t stop now,” said Ron, “it’s doing us so much good.”
Hermione marched away with her nose in the air.
           Harry  had  a  lot  of  trouble  keeping  his  mind  on  his  lessons  that  day.  It
kept wandering up to the dormitory where his new broomstick was lying under
his bed, or straying off to the Quidditch field where he’d be learning to play that
night.  He  bolted  his  dinner  that  evening  without  noticing  what  he  was  eating,
and then rushed upstairs with Ron to unwrap the Nimbus Two Thousand at last.
“Wow,” Ron sighed, as the broomstick rolled onto Harry’s bedspread.
           Even  Harry,  who  knew  nothing  about  the  different  brooms,  thought  it
looked wonderful. Sleek and shiny, with a mahogany handle, it had a long tail of
neat, straight twigs and Nimbus Two Thousand written in gold near the top.
As seven o’clock drew nearer, Harry left the castle and set off in the dusk
toward the Quidditch field. Held never been inside the stadium before. Hundreds
of  seats  were  raised  in  stands  around  the  field  so  that  the  spectators  were  high
enough  to  see  what  was  going  on.  At  either  end  of  the  field  were  three  golden
poles  with  hoops  on  the  end.  They  reminded  Harry  of  the  little  plastic  sticks
Muggle children blew bubbles through, except that they were fifty feet high.
Too eager to fly again to wait for Wood, Harry mounted his broomstick
and kicked off from the ground. What a feeling — he swooped in and out of the
goal  posts  and  then  sped  up  and  down  the  field.  The  Nimbus  Two  Thousand
turned wherever he wanted at his lightest touch.
“Hey, Potter, come down!”
Oliver Wood had arrived. He was carrying a large wooden crate under his
arm. Harry landed next to him.
           “Very  nice,”  said  Wood,  his  eyes  glinting.  “I  see  what  McGonagall
meant…you  really  are  a  natural.  I’m  just  going  to  teach  you  the  rules  this
evening, then you’ll be joining team practice three times a week.”
He opened the crate. Inside were four different-sized balls.
“Right,” said Wood. “Now, Quidditch is easy enough to understand, even
if it’s not too easy to play. There are seven players on each side. Three of them
are called Chasers.”
           “Three  Chasers,”  Harry  repeated,  as  Wood  took  out  a  bright  red  ball
about the size of a soccer ball.
           “This  ball’s  called  the  Quaffle,”  said  Wood.  “The  Chasers  throw  the
Quaffle to each other and try and get it through one of the hoops to score a goal.
Ten points every time the Quaffle goes through one of the hoops. Follow me?”
“The Chasers throw the Quaffle and put it through the hoops to score,”
Harry  recited.  “So  —  that’s  sort  of  like  basketball  on  broomsticks  with  six

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hoops, isn’t it?”
“What’s basketball?” said Wood curiously.
“Never mind,” said Harry quickly.
“Now, there’s another player on each side who’s called the Keeper — I’m
Keeper  for  Gryffindor.  I  have  to  fly  around  our  hoops  and  stop  the  other  team
from scoring.”
           “Three  Chasers,  one  Keeper,”  said  Harry,  who  was  determined  to
remember  it  all.  “And  they  play  with  the  Quaffle.  Okay,  got  that.  So  what  are
they for?” He pointed at the three balls left inside the box.
“I’ll show you now,” said Wood. “Take this.”
He handed Harry a small club, a bit like a short baseball bat.
“I’m going to show you what the Bludgers do,” Wood said. “These two
are the Bludgers.”
He showed Harry two identical balls, jet black and slightly smaller than
the  red  Quaffle.  Harry  noticed  that  they  seemed  to  be  straining  to  escape  the
straps holding them inside the box.
“Stand back,” Wood warned Harry. He bent down and freed one of the
Bludgers.
           At  once,  the  black  ball  rose  high  in  the  air  and  then  pelted  straight  at
Harry’s face. Harry swung at it with the bat to stop it from breaking his nose, and
sent  it  zigzagging  away  into  the  air  —  it  zoomed  around  their  heads  and  then
shot at Wood, who dived on top of it and managed to pin it to the ground.
“See?” Wood panted, forcing the struggling Bludger back into the crate
and  strapping  it  down  safely.  “The  Bludgers  rocket  around,  trying  to  knock
players off their brooms. That’s why you have two Beaters on each team — the
Weasley  twins  are  ours  —  it’s  their  job  to  protect  their  side  from  the  Bludgers
and try and knock them toward the other team. So — think you’ve got all that?”
           “Three  Chasers  try  and  score  with  the  Quaffle;  the  Keeper  guards  the
goal  posts;  the  Beaters  keep  the  Bludgers  away  from  their  team,”  Harry  reeled
off.
“Very good,” said Wood.
“Er — have the Bludgers ever killed anyone?” Harry asked, hoping he
sounded offhand.
           “Never  at  Hogwarts.  We’ve  had  a  couple  of  broken  jaws  but  nothing
worse than that. Now, the last member of the team is the Seeker. That’s you. And
you don’t have to worry about the Quaffle or the Bludgers —”
“— unless they crack my head open.”
“Don’t worry, the Weasleys are more than a match for the Bludgers — I
mean, they’re like a pair of human Bludgers themselves.”

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           Wood  reached  into  the  crate  and  took  out  the  fourth  and  last  ball.
Compared  with  the  Quaffle  and  the  Bludgers,  it  was  tiny,  about  the  size  of  a
large walnut. It was bright gold and had little fluttering silver wings.
“This,” said Wood, “is the Golden Snitch, and it’s the most important ball
of the lot. It’s very hard to catch because it’s so fast and difficult to see. It’s the
Seeker’s job to catch it. You’ve got to weave in and out of the Chasers, Beaters,
Bludgers,  and  Quaffle  to  get  it  before  the  other  team’s  Seeker,  because
whichever  Seeker  catches  the  Snitch  wins  his  team  an  extra  hundred  and  fifty
points,  so  they  nearly  always  win.  That’s  why  Seekers  get  fouled  so  much.  A
game of Quidditch only ends when the Snitch is caught, so it can go on for ages
— I think the record is three months, they had to keep bringing on substitutes so
the players could get some sleep.
“Well, that’s it any questions?”
Harry shook his head. He understood what he had to do all right, it was
doing it that was going to be the problem.
“We won’t practice with the Snitch yet,” said Wood, carefully shutting it
back inside the crate, “it’s too dark, we might lose it. Let’s try you out with a few
of these.”
           He  pulled  a  bag  of  ordinary  golf  balls  out  of  his  pocket  and  a  few
minutes later, he and Harry were up in the air, Wood throwing the golf balls as
hard as he could in every direction for Harry to catch.
Harry didn’t miss a single one, and Wood was delighted. After half an
hour, night had really fallen and they couldn’t carry on.
           “That  Quidditch  Cup’ll  have  our  name  on  it  this  year,”  said  Wood
happily as they trudged back up to the castle. “I wouldn’t be surprised if you turn
out  better  than  Charlie  Weasley,  and  he  could  have  played  for  England  if  he
hadn’t gone off chasing dragons.”
Perhaps  it  was  because  he  was  now  so  busy,  what  with  Quidditch  practice
three  evenings  a  week  on  top  of  all  his  homework,  but  Harry  could  hardly
believe it when he realized that he’d already been at Hogwarts two months. The
castle  felt  more  like  home  than  Privet  Drive  ever  had.  His  lessons,  too,  were
becoming more and more interesting now that they had mastered the basics.
           On  Halloween  morning  they  woke  to  the  delicious  smell  of  baking
pumpkin  wafting  through  the  corridors.  Even  better,  Professor  Flitwick
announced in Charms that he thought they were ready to start making objects fly,
something they had all been dying to try since they’d seen him make Neville’s
toad  zoom  around  the  classroom.  Professor  Flitwick  put  the  class  into  pairs  to
practice.  Harry’s  partner  was  Seamus  Finnigan  (which  was  a  relief,  because

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Neville had been trying to catch his eye). Ron, however, was to be working with
Hermione  Granger.  It  was  hard  to  tell  whether  Ron  or  Hermione  was  angrier
about this. She hadn’t spoken to either of them since the day Harry’s broomstick
had arrived.
           “Now,  don’t  forget  that  nice  wrist  movement  we’ve  been  practicing!”
squeaked  Professor  Flitwick,  perched  on  top  of  his  pile  of  books  as  usual.
“Swish  and  flick,  remember,  swish  and  flick.  And  saying  the  magic  words
properly  is  very  important,  too  —  never  forget  Wizard  Baruffio,  who  said  ‘s’
instead of ‘f’ and found himself on the floor with a buffalo on his chest.”
           It  was  very  difficult.  Harry  and  Seamus  swished  and  flicked,  but  the
feather  they  were  supposed  to  be  sending  skyward  just  lay  on  the  desktop.
Seamus  got  so  impatient  that  he  prodded  it  with  his  wand  and  set  fire  to  it  —
Harry had to put it out with his hat.
Ron, at the next table, wasn’t having much more luck.
           “Wingardium  Leviosa!”  he  shouted,  waving  his  long  arms  like  a
windmill.
“You’re saying it wrong,” Harry heard Hermione snap. “It’s Wing-gar-
dium Levi-o-sa, make the ‘gar’ nice and long.”
“You do it, then, if you’re so clever,” Ron snarled.
Hermione rolled up the sleeves of her gown, flicked her wand, and said,
“Wingardium Leviosa!”
Their feather rose off the desk and hovered about four feet above their
heads.
“Oh, well done!” cried Professor Flitwick, clapping. “Everyone see here,
Miss Granger’s done it!”
Ron was in a very bad mood by the end of the class.
“It’s no wonder no one can stand her,” he said to Harry as they pushed
their way into the crowded corridor, “she’s a nightmare, honestly.”
Someone knocked into Harry as they hurried past him. It was Hermione.
Harry  caught  a  glimpse  of  her  face  —  and  was  startled  to  see  that  she  was  in
tears.
“I think she heard you.”
“So?” said Ron, but he looked a bit uncomfortable. “She must’ve noticed
she’s got no friends.”
Hermione didn’t turn up for the next class and wasn’t seen all afternoon.
On  their  way  down  to  the  Great  Hall  for  the  Halloween  feast,  Harry  and  Ron
overheard Parvati Patil telling her friend Lavender that Hermione was crying in
the girls’ bathroom and wanted to be left alone. Ron looked still more awkward
at this, but a moment later they had entered the Great Hall, where the Halloween

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decorations put Hermione out of their minds.
A thousand live bats fluttered from the walls and ceiling while a thousand
more  swooped  over  the  tables  in  low  black  clouds,  making  the  candles  in  the
pumpkins stutter. The feast appeared suddenly on the golden plates, as it had at
the start-of-term banquet.
Harry was just helping himself to a baked potato when Professor Quirrell
came  sprinting  into  the  hall,  his  turban  askew  and  terror  on  his  face.  Everyone
stared  as  he  reached  Professor  Dumbledore’s  chair,  slumped  against  the  table,
and gasped, “Troll — in the dungeons — thought you ought to know.”
He then sank to the floor in a dead faint.
There was an uproar. It took several purple firecrackers exploding from
the end of Professor Dumbledore’s wand to bring silence.
           “Prefects,”  he  rumbled,  “lead  your  Houses  back  to  the  dormitories
immediately!”
Percy was in his element.
“Follow me! Stick together, first years! No need to fear the troll if you
follow  my  orders!  Stay  close  behind  me,  now.  Make  way,  first  years  coming
through! Excuse me, I’m a prefect!”
“How could a troll get in?” Harry asked as they climbed the stairs.
“Don’t ask me, they’re supposed to be really stupid,” said Ron. “Maybe
Peeves let it in for a Halloween joke.”
They passed different groups of people hurrying in different directions.
As  they  jostled  their  way  through  a  crowd  of  confused  Hufflepuffs,  Harry
suddenly grabbed Ron’s arm.
“I’ve just thought — Hermione.”
“What about her?”
“She doesn’t know about the troll.”
Ron bit his lip.
“Oh, all right,” he snapped. “But Percy’d better not see us.”
Ducking down, they joined the Hufflepuffs going the other way, slipped
down a deserted side corridor, and hurried off toward the girls’ bathroom. They
had just turned the corner when they heard quick footsteps behind them.
“Percy!” hissed Ron, pulling Harry behind a large stone griffin.
Peering around it, however, they saw not Percy but Snape. He crossed the
corridor and disappeared from view.
           “What’s  he  doing?”  Harry  whispered.  “Why  isn’t  he  down  in  the
dungeons with the rest of the teachers?”
“Search me.”
           Quietly  as  possible,  they  crept  along  the  next  corridor  after  Snape’s

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fading footsteps.
“He’s heading for the third floor,” Harry said, but Ron held up his hand.
“Can you smell something?”
           Harry  sniffed  and  a  foul  stench  reached  his  nostrils,  a  mixture  of  old
socks and the kind of public toilet no one seems to clean.
And then they heard it — a low grunting, and the shuffling footfalls of
gigantic feet. Ron pointed — at the end of a passage to the left, something huge
was  moving  toward  them.  They  shrank  into  the  shadows  and  watched  as  it
emerged into a patch of moonlight.
It was a horrible sight. Twelve feet tall, its skin was a dull, granite gray,
its great lumpy body like a boulder with its small bald head perched on top like a
coconut.  It  had  short  legs  thick  as  tree  trunks  with  flat,  horny  feet.  The  smell
coming  from  it  was  incredible.  It  was  holding  a  huge  wooden  club,  which
dragged along the floor because its arms were so long.
The troll stopped next to a doorway and peered inside. It waggled its long
ears, making up its tiny mind, then slouched slowly into the room.
“The keys in the lock,” Harry muttered. “We could lock it in.”
“Good idea,” said Ron nervously.
They edged toward the open door, mouths dry, praying the troll wasn’t
about  to  come  out  of  it.  With  one  great  leap,  Harry  managed  to  grab  the  key,
slam the door, and lock it.
“Yes!”
Flushed with their victory, they started to run back up the passage, but as
they  reached  the  corner  they  heard  something  that  made  their  hearts  stop  —  a
high,  petrified  scream  —  and  it  was  coming  from  the  chamber  they’d  just
chained up.
“Oh, no,” said Ron, pale as the Bloody Baron.
“It’s the girls’ bathroom!” Harry gasped.
“Hermione!” they said together.
It was the last thing they wanted to do, but what choice did they have?
Wheeling around, they sprinted back to the door and turned the key, fumbling in
their panic. Harry pulled the door open and they ran inside.
Hermione Granger was shrinking against the wall opposite, looking as if
she was about to faint. The troll was advancing on her, knocking the sinks off the
walls as it went.
“Confuse it!” Harry said desperately to Ron, and, seizing a tap, he threw
it as hard as he could against the wall.
The troll stopped a few feet from Hermione. It lumbered around, blinking
stupidly,  to  see  what  had  made  the  noise.  Its  mean  little  eyes  saw  Harry.  It

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hesitated, then made for him instead, lifting its club as it went.
“Oy, pea-brain!” yelled Ron from the other side of the chamber, and he
threw a metal pipe at it. The troll didn’t even seem to notice the pipe hitting its
shoulder,  but  it  heard  the  yell  and  paused  again,  turning  its  ugly  snout  toward
Ron instead, giving Harry time to run around it.
“Come on, run, run!” Harry yelled at Hermione, trying to pull her toward
the  door,  but  she  couldn’t  move,  she  was  still  flat  against  the  wall,  her  mouth
open with terror.
           The  shouting  and  the  echoes  seemed  to  be  driving  the  troll  berserk.  It
roared again and started toward Ron, who was nearest and had no way to escape.
Harry then did something that was both very brave and very stupid: He
took a great running jump and managed to fasten his arms around the troll’s neck
from  behind.  The  troll  couldn’t  feel  Harry  hanging  there,  but  even  a  troll  will
notice if you stick a long bit of wood up its nose, and Harry’s wand had still been
in his hand when he’d jumped – it had gone straight up one of the troll’s nostrils.
           Howling  with  pain,  the  troll  twisted  and  flailed  its  club,  with  Harry
clinging on for dear life; any second, the troll was going to rip him off or catch
him a terrible blow with the club.
Hermione had sunk to the floor in fright; Ron pulled out his own wand
— not knowing what he was going to do he heard himself cry the first spell that
came into his head: “Wingardium Leviosa!”
The club flew suddenly out of the troll’s hand, rose high, high up into the
air, turned slowly over — and dropped, with a sickening crack, onto its owner’s
head. The troll swayed on the spot and then fell flat on its face, with a thud that
made the whole room tremble.
           Harry  got  to  his  feet.  He  was  shaking  and  out  of  breath.  Ron  was
standing there with his wand still raised, staring at what he had done.
It was Hermione who spoke first.
“Is it — dead?”
“I don’t think so,” said Harry, I think it’s just been knocked out.”
He bent down and pulled his wand out of the troll’s nose. It was covered
in what looked like lumpy gray glue.
“Urgh — troll boogers.”
He wiped it on the troll’s trousers.
A sudden slamming and loud footsteps made the three of them look up.
They  hadn’t  realized  what  a  racket  they  had  been  making,  but  of  course,
someone downstairs must have heard the crashes and the troll’s roars. A moment
later, Professor McGonagall had come bursting into the room, closely followed
by Snape, with Quirrell bringing up the rear. Quirrell took one look at the troll,

---

let out a faint whimper, and sat quickly down on a toilet, clutching his heart.
Snape bent over the troll. Professor McGonagall was looking at Ron and
Harry.  Harry  had  never  seen  her  look  so  angry.  Her  lips  were  white.  Hopes  of
winning fifty points for Gryffindor faded quickly from Harry’s mind.
“What on earth were you thinking of?” said Professor McGonagall, with
cold  fury  in  her  voice.  Harry  looked  at  Ron,  who  was  still  standing  with  his
wand  in  the  air.  “You’re  lucky  you  weren’t  killed.  Why  aren’t  you  in  your
dormitory?”
Snape gave Harry a swift, piercing look. Harry looked at the floor. He
wished Ron would put his wand down.
Then a small voice came out of the shadows.
“Please, Professor McGonagall — they were looking for me.”
“Miss Granger!”
Hermione had managed to get to her feet at last.
“I went looking for the troll because I — I thought I could deal with it on
my own — you know, because I’ve read all about them.”
Ron dropped his wand. Hermione Granger, telling a downright lie to a
teacher?
“If they hadn’t found me, I’d be dead now. Harry stuck his wand up its
nose and Ron knocked it out with its own club. They didn’t have time to come
and fetch anyone. It was about to finish me off when they arrived.”
Harry and Ron tried to look as though this story wasn’t new to them.
“Well — in that case ...” said Professor McGonagall, staring at the three
of  them,  “Miss  Granger,  you  foolish  girl,  how  could  you  think  of  tackling  a
mountain troll on your own?”
Hermione hung her head. Harry was speechless. Hermione was the last
person to do anything against the rules, and here she was, pretending she had, to
get them out of trouble. It was as if Snape had started handing out sweets.
“Miss Granger, five points will be taken from Gryffindor for this,” said
Professor McGonagall. “I’m very disappointed in you. If you’re not hurt at all,
you’d better get off to Gryffindor tower. Students are finishing the feast in their
houses.”
Hermione left.
Professor McGonagall turned to Harry and Ron.
           “Well,  I  still  say  you  were  lucky,  but  not  many  first  years  could  have
taken  on  a  full-grown  mountain  troll.  You  each  win  Gryffindor  five  points.
Professor Dumbledore will be informed of this. You may go.”
They hurried out of the chamber and didn’t speak at all until they had
climbed two floors up. It was a relief to be away from the smell of the troll, quite

---

apart from anything else.
“We should have gotten more than ten points,” Ron grumbled.
“Five, you mean, once she’s taken off Hermione’s.”
           “Good  of  her  to  get  us  out  of  trouble  like  that,”  Ron  admitted.  “Mind
you, we did save her.”
“She might not have needed saving if we hadn’t locked the thing in with
her,” Harry reminded him.
They had reached the portrait of the Fat Lady.
“Pig snout,” they said and entered.
The common room was packed and noisy. Everyone was eating the food
that had been sent up. Hermione, however, stood alone by the door, waiting for
them. There was a very embarrassed pause. Then, none of them looking at each
other, they all said “Thanks,” and hurried off to get plates.
But from that moment on, Hermione Granger became their friend. There
are  some  things  you  can’t  share  without  ending  up  liking  each  other,  and
knocking out a twelve-foot mountain troll is one of them.

---