Harry Potter 1 Harry Potter and the Sorcerer's Stone

HP 1 - Harry Potter and the
Sorcerer's Stone

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CHAPTER SIX
THE JOURNEY FROM PLATFORM NINE AND THREE-QUARTERS
H arry’s last month with the Dursleys wasn’t fun. True, Dudley was now so
scared  of  Harry  he  wouldn’t  stay  in  the  same  room,  while  Aunt  Petunia  and
Uncle  Vernon  didn’t  shut  Harry  in  his  cupboard,  force  him  to  do  anything,  or
shout  at  him  —  in  fact,  they  didn’t  speak  to  him  at  all.  Half  terrified,  half
furious,  they  acted  as  though  any  chair  with  Harry  in  it  were  empty.  Although
this  was  an  improvement  in  many  ways,  it  did  become  a  bit  depressing  after  a
while.
Harry kept to his room, with his new owl for company. He had decided to
call her Hedwig, a name he had found in A History of Magic. His school books
were  very  interesting.  He  lay  on  his  bed  reading  late  into  the  night,  Hedwig
swooping in and out of the open window as she pleased. It was lucky that Aunt
Petunia didn’t come in to vacuum anymore, because Hedwig kept bringing back
dead mice. Every night before he went to sleep, Harry ticked off another day on
the  piece  of  paper  he  had  pinned  to  the  wall,  counting  down  to  September  the
first.
On the last day of August he thought he’d better speak to his aunt and
uncle about getting to King’s Cross station the next day, so he went down to the
living room where they were watching a quiz show on television. He cleared his
throat  to  let  them  know  he  was  there,  and  Dudley  screamed  and  ran  from  the
room.
“Er — Uncle Vernon?”
Uncle Vernon grunted to show he was listening.
“Er — I need to be at King’s Cross tomorrow to — to go to Hogwarts.”
Uncle Vernon grunted again.
“Would it be all right if you gave me a lift?”
Grunt. Harry supposed that meant yes.
“Thank you.”
He was about to go back upstairs when Uncle Vernon actually spoke.
“Funny way to get to a wizards’ school, the train. Magic carpets all got
punctures, have they?”
Harry didn’t say anything.
“Where is this school, anyway?”

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“I don’t know,” said Harry, realizing this for the first time. He pulled the
ticket Hagrid had given him out of his pocket.
           “I  just  take  the  train  from  platform  nine  and  three-quarters  at  eleven
o’clock,” he read.
His aunt and uncle stared.
“Platform what?”
“Nine and three-quarters.”
“Don’t talk rubbish,” said Uncle Vernon. “There is no platform nine and
three-quarters.”
“It’s on my ticket.”
“Barking,” said Uncle Vernon, “howling mad, the lot of them. You’ll see.
You  just  wait.  All  right,  we’ll  take  you  to  King’s  Cross.  We’re  going  up  to
London tomorrow anyway, or I wouldn’t bother.”
           “Why  are  you  going  to  London?”  Harry  asked,  trying  to  keep  things
friendly.
           “Taking  Dudley  to  the  hospital,”  growled  Uncle  Vernon.  “Got  to  have
that ruddy tail removed before he goes to Smeltings.”
Harry  woke  at  five  o’clock  the  next  morning  and  was  too  excited  and
nervous to go back to sleep. He got up and pulled on his jeans because he didn’t
want to walk into the station in his wizard’s robes — he’d change on the train.
He  checked  his  Hogwarts  list  yet  again  to  make  sure  he  had  everything  he
needed, saw that Hedwig was shut safely in her cage, and then paced the room,
waiting  for  the  Dursleys  to  get  up.  Two  hours  later,  Harry’s  huge,  heavy  trunk
had  been  loaded  into  the  Dursleys’  car,  Aunt  Petunia  had  talked  Dudley  into
sitting next to Harry, and they had set off.
           They  reached  King’s  Cross  at  half  past  ten.  Uncle  Vernon  dumped
Harry’s trunk onto a cart and wheeled it into the station for him. Harry thought
this  was  strangely  kind  until  Uncle  Vernon  stopped  dead,  facing  the  platforms
with a nasty grin on his face.
“Well, there you are, boy. Platform nine — platform ten. Your platform
should be somewhere in the middle, but they don’t seem to have built it yet, do
they?”
He was quite right, of course. There was a big plastic number nine over
one  platform  and  a  big  plastic  number  ten  over  the  one  next  to  it,  and  in  the
middle, nothing at all.
“Have a good term,” said Uncle Vernon with an even nastier smile. He
left  without  another  word.  Harry  turned  and  saw  the  Dursleys  drive  away.  All
three of them were laughing. Harry’s mouth went rather dry. What on earth was

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he  going  to  do?  He  was  starting  to  attract  a  lot  of  funny  looks,  because  of
Hedwig. He’d have to ask someone.
He stopped a passing guard, but didn’t dare mention platform nine and
three-quarters. The guard had never heard of Hogwarts and when Harry couldn’t
even  tell  him  what  part  of  the  country  it  was  in,  he  started  to  get  annoyed,  as
though  Harry  was  being  stupid  on  purpose.  Getting  desperate,  Harry  asked  for
the  train  that  left  at  eleven  o’clock,  but  the  guard  said  there  wasn’t  one.  In  the
end the guard strode away, muttering about time wasters. Harry was now trying
hard not to panic. According to the large clock over the arrivals board, he had ten
minutes left to get on the train to Hogwarts and he had no idea how to do it; he
was stranded in the middle of a station with a trunk he could hardly lift, a pocket
full of wizard money, and a large owl.
           Hagrid  must  have  forgotten  to  tell  him  something  you  had  to  do,  like
tapping  the  third  brick  on  the  left  to  get  into  Diagon  Alley.  He  wondered  if  he
should  get  out  his  wand  and  start  tapping  the  ticket  inspector’s  stand  between
platforms nine and ten.
At that moment a group of people passed just behind him and he caught a
few words of what they were saying.
“— packed with Muggles, of course —”
Harry swung round. The speaker was a plump woman who was talking to
four  boys,  all  with  flaming  red  hair.  Each  of  them  was  pushing  a  trunk  like
Harry’s in front of him — and they had an owl.
Heart hammering, Harry pushed his cart after them. They stopped and so
did he, just near enough to hear what they were saying.
“Now, what’s the platform number?” said the boys’ mother.
“Nine and three-quarters!” piped a small girl, also red-headed, who was
holding her hand, “Mom, can’t I go…”
“You’re not old enough, Ginny, now be quiet. All right, Percy, you go
first.”
What looked like the oldest boy marched toward platforms nine and ten.
Harry  watched,  careful  not  to  blink  in  case  he  missed  it  —  but  just  as  the  boy
reached the dividing barrier between the two platforms, a large crowd of tourists
came  swarming  in  front  of  him  and  by  the  time  the  last  backpack  had  cleared
away, the boy had vanished.
“Fred, you next,” the plump woman said.
       “I’m not  Fred,  I’m  George,” said  the  boy. “Honestly,  woman,  you  call
yourself our mother? Can’t you tell I’m George?”
“Sorry, George, dear.”
“Only joking, I am Fred,” said the boy, and off he went. His twin called

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after him to hurry up, and he must have done so, because a second later, he had
gone — but how had he done it?
           Now  the  third  brother  was  walking  briskly  toward  the  barrier  he  was
almost there — and then, quite suddenly, he wasn’t anywhere.
There was nothing else for it.
“Excuse me,” Harry said to the plump woman.
“Hello, dear,” she said. “First time at Hogwarts? Ron’s new, too.”
She pointed at the last and youngest of her sons. He was tall, thin, and
gangling, with freckles, big hands and feet, and a long nose.
“Yes,” said Harry. “The thing is — the thing is, I don’t know how to —”
“How to get onto the platform?” she said kindly, and Harry nodded.
           “Not  to  worry,”  she  said.  “All  you  have  to  do  is  walk  straight  at  the
barrier  between  platforms  nine  and  ten.  Don’t  stop  and  don’t  be  scared  you’ll
crash into it, that’s very important. Best do it at a bit of a run if you’re nervous.
Go on, go now before Ron.”
“Er — okay,” said Harry.
           He  pushed  his  trolley  around  and  stared  at  the  barrier.  It  looked  very
solid.
He started to walk toward it. People jostled him on their way to platforms
nine and ten. Harry walked more quickly. He was going to smash right into that
barrier and then he’d be in trouble — leaning forward on his cart, he broke into a
heavy run — the barrier was coming nearer and nearer — he wouldn’t be able to
stop — the cart was out of control — he was a foot away — he closed his eyes
ready for the crash —
It didn’t come…he kept on running…he opened his eyes. A scarlet steam
engine was waiting next to a platform packed with people. A sign overhead said
Hogwarts’  Express,  eleven  o’clock.  Harry  looked  behind  him  and  saw  a
wrought-iron archway where the barrier had been, with the words Platform Nine
and Three-Quarters on it, He had done it.
Smoke from the engine drifted over the heads of the chattering crowd,
while cats of every color wound here and there between their legs. Owls hooted
to one another in a disgruntled sort of way over the babble and the scraping of
heavy trunks.
The first few carriages were already packed with students, some hanging
out  of  the  window  to  talk  to  their  families,  some  fighting  over  seats.  Harry
pushed  his  cart  off  down  the  platform  in  search  of  an  empty  seat.  He  passed  a
round-faced boy who was saying, “Gran, I’ve lost my toad again.”
“Oh, Neville,” he heard the old woman sigh.
A boy with dreadlocks was surrounded by a small crowd.

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“Give us a look, Lee, go on.”
The boy lifted the lid of a box in his arms, and the people around him
shrieked and yelled as something inside poked out a long, hairy leg.
           Harry  pressed  on  through  the  crowd  until  he  found  an  empty
compartment  near  the  end  of  the  train.  He  put  Hedwig  inside  first  and  then
started to shove and heave his trunk toward the train door. He tried to lift it up
the steps but could hardly raise one end and twice he dropped it painfully on his
foot.
“Want a hand?” It was one of the red-haired twins he’d followed through
the barrier.
“Yes, please,” Harry panted.
“Oy, Fred! C’mere and help!”
With the twins’ help, Harry’s trunk was at last tucked away in a corner of
the compartment.
“Thanks,” said Harry, pushing his sweaty hair out of his eyes.
           “What’s  that?”  said  one  of  the  twins  suddenly,  pointing  at  Harry’s
lightning scar.
“Blimey,” said the other twin. “Are you —?”
“He is,” said the first twin. “Aren’t you?” he added to Harry.
“What?” said Harry.
“Harry Potter.” chorused the twins.
“Oh, him,” said Harry. “I mean, yes, I am.”
The two boys gawked at him, and Harry felt himself turning red. Then, to
his relief, a voice came floating in through the train’s open door.
“Fred? George? Are you there?”
“Coming, Mom.”
With a last look at Harry, the twins hopped off the train.
Harry sat down next to the window where, half hidden, he could watch
the  red-haired  family  on  the  platform  and  hear  what  they  were  saying.  Their
mother had just taken out her handkerchief.
“Ron, you’ve got something on your nose.”
The youngest boy tried to jerk out of the way, but she grabbed him and
began rubbing the end of his nose.
“Mom — geroff” He wriggled free.
           “Aaah,  has  ickle  Ronnie  got  somefink  on  his  nosie?”  said  one  of  the
twins.
“Shut up,” said Ron.
“Where’s Percy?” said their mother.
“He’s coming now.”

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The oldest boy came striding into sight. He had already changed into his
billowing  black  Hogwarts  robes,  and  Harry  noticed  a  shiny  silver  badge  on  his
chest with the letter P on it.
“Can’t stay long, Mother,” he said. “I’m up front, the prefects have got
two compartments to themselves —”
“Oh, are you a prefect, Percy?” said one of the twins, with an air of great
surprise. “You should have said something, we had no idea.”
“Hang on, I think I remember him saying something about it,” said the
other twin. “Once —”
“Or twice —”
“A minute —”
“All summer —”
“Oh, shut up,” said Percy the Prefect.
“How come Percy gets new robes, anyway?” said one of the twins.
“Because he’s a prefect,” said their mother fondly. “All right, dear, well,
have a good term — send me an owl when you get there.”
She kissed Percy on the cheek and he left. Then she turned to the twins.
“Now, you two — this year, you behave yourselves. If I get one more
owl telling me you’ve — you’ve blown up a toilet or —”
“Blown up a toilet? We’ve never blown up a toilet.”
“Great idea though, thanks, Mom.”
“It’s not funny. And look after Ron.”
“Don’t worry, ickle Ronniekins is safe with us.”
“Shut up,” said Ron again. He was almost as tall as the twins already and
his nose was still pink where his mother had rubbed it.
“Hey, Mom, guess what? Guess who we just met on the train?”
Harry leaned back quickly so they couldn’t see him looking.
“You know that black-haired boy who was near us in the station? Know
who he is?”
“Who?”
“Harry Potter!”
Harry heard the little girl’s voice.
“Oh, Mom, can I go on the train and see him, Mom, eh please....”
“You’ve already seen him, Ginny, and the poor boy isn’t something you
goggle at in a zoo. Is he really, Fred? How do you know?”
“Asked him. Saw his scar. It’s really there — like lightning.”
           “Poor  dear  —  no  wonder  he  was  alone,  I  wondered.  He  was  ever  so
polite when he asked how to get onto the platform.”
           “Never  mind  that,  do  you  think  he  remembers  what  You-Know-Who

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looks like?”
Their mother suddenly became very stern.
“I forbid you to ask him, Fred. No, don’t you dare. As though he needs
reminding of that on his first day at school.”
“All right, keep your hair on.”
A whistle sounded.
           “Hurry  up!”  their  mother  said,  and  the  three  boys  clambered  onto  the
train.  They  leaned  out  of  the  window  for  her  to  kiss  them  good-bye,  and  their
younger sister began to cry.
“Don’t, Ginny, we’ll send you loads of owls.”
“We’ll send you a Hogwarts’ toilet seat.”
“George!”
“Only joking, Mom.”
The train began to move. Harry saw the boys’ mother waving and their
sister,  half  laughing,  half  crying,  running  to  keep  up  with  the  train  until  it
gathered too much speed, then she fell back and waved.
Harry watched the girl and her mother disappear as the train rounded the
corner. Houses flashed past the window. Harry felt a great leap of excitement. He
didn’t  know  what  he  was  going  to  —  but  it  had  to  be  better  than  what  he  was
leaving behind.
The door of the compartment slid open and the youngest redheaded boy
came in.
           “Anyone  sitting  there?”  he  asked,  pointing  at  the  seat  opposite  Harry.
“Everywhere else is full.”
           Harry  shook  his  head  and  the  boy  sat  down.  He  glanced  at  Harry  and
then looked quickly out of the window, pretending he hadn’t looked. Harry saw
he still had a black mark on his nose.
“Hey, Ron.”
The twins were back.
“Listen, we’re going down the middle of the train — Lee Jordan’s got a
giant tarantula down there.”
“Right,” mumbled Ron.
           “Harry,”  said  the  other  twin,  “did  we  introduce  ourselves?  Fred  and
George Weasley. And this is Ron, our brother. See you later, then.”
“Bye,” said Harry and Ron. The twins slid the compartment door shut
behind them.
“Are you really Harry Potter?” Ron blurted out.
Harry nodded.
“Oh — well, I thought it might be one of Fred and George’s jokes,” said

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Ron. “And have you really got — you know…”
He pointed at Harry’s forehead.
Harry pulled back his bangs to show the lightning scar. Ron stared.
“So that’s where You-Know-Who —?”
“Yes,” said Harry, “but I can’t remember it.”
“Nothing?” said Ron eagerly.
“Well — I remember a lot of green light, but nothing else.”
“Wow,” said Ron. He sat and stared at Harry for a few moments, then, as
though he had suddenly realized what he was doing, he looked quickly out of the
window again.
           “Are  all  your  family  wizards?”  asked  Harry,  who  found  Ron  just  as
interesting as Ron found him.
“Er — Yes, I think so,” said Ron. “I think Mom’s got a second cousin
who’s an accountant, but we never talk about him.”
“So you must know loads of magic already.”
The Weasleys were clearly one of those old wizarding families the pale
boy in Diagon Alley had talked about.
“I heard you went to live with Muggles,” said Ron. “What are they like?”
           “Horrible  —  well,  not  all  of  them.  My  aunt  and  uncle  and  cousin  are,
though. Wish I’d had three wizard brothers.”
           “Five,”  said  Ron.  For  some  reason,  he  was  looking  gloomy.  “I’m  the
sixth in our family to go to Hogwarts. You could say I’ve got a lot to live up to.
Bill and Charlie have already left — Bill was head boy and Charlie was captain
of  Quidditch.  Now  Percy’s  a  prefect.  Fred  and  George  mess  around  a  lot,  but
they  still  get  really  good  marks  and  everyone  thinks  they’re  really  funny.
Everyone  expects  me  to  do  as  well  as  the  others,  but  if  I  do,  it’s  no  big  deal,
because they did it first. You never get anything new, either, with five brothers.
I’ve got Bill’s old robes, Charlie’s old wand, and Percy’s old rat.”
Ron reached inside his jacket and pulled out a fat gray rat, which was
asleep.
“His name’s Scabbers and he’s useless, he hardly ever wakes up. Percy
got  an  owl  from  my  dad  for  being  made  a  prefect,  but  they  couldn’t  aff  —  I
mean, I got Scabbers instead.”
Ron’s ears went pink. He seemed to think he’d said too much, because he
went back to staring out of the window.
           Harry  didn’t  think  there  was  anything  wrong  with  not  being  able  to
afford an owl. After all, he’d never had any money in his life until a month ago,
and  he  told  Ron  so,  all  about  having  to  wear  Dudley’s  old  clothes  and  never
getting proper birthday presents. This seemed to cheer Ron up.

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           “…and  until  Hagrid  told  me,  I  didn’t  know  anything  about  being  a
wizard or about my parents or Voldemort —”
Ron gasped.
“What?” said Harry.
“You said You-Know-Who’s name!” said Ron, sounding both shocked
and impressed. “I’d have thought you, of all people —”
“I’m not trying to be brave or anything, saying the name,” said Harry, “I
just never knew you shouldn’t. See what I mean? I’ve got loads to learn.…I bet,”
he added, voicing for the first time something that had been worrying him a lot
lately, “I bet I’m the worst in the class.”
“You won’t be. There’s loads of people who come from Muggle families
and they learn quick enough.”
While they had been talking, the train had carried them out of London.
Now they were speeding past fields full of cows and sheep. They were quiet for
a time, watching the fields and lanes flick past.
           Around  half  past  twelve  there  was  a  great  clattering  outside  in  the
corridor and a smiling, dimpled woman slid back their door and said, “Anything
off the cart, dears?”
           Harry,  who  hadn’t  had  any  breakfast,  leapt  to  his  feet,  but  Ron’s  ears
went pink again and he muttered that he’d brought sandwiches. Harry went out
into the corridor.
He had never had any money for candy with the Dursleys, and now that
he had pockets rattling with gold and silver he was ready to buy as many Mars
Bars as he could carry — but the woman didn’t have Mars Bars. What she did
have  were  Bettie  Bott’s  Every  Flavor  Beans,  Drooble’s  Best  Blowing  Gum,
Chocolate  Frogs.  Pumpkin  Pasties,  Cauldron  Cakes,  Licorice  Wands,  and  a
number of other strange things Harry had never seen in his life. Not wanting to
miss  anything,  he  got  some  of  everything  and  paid  the  woman  eleven  silver
Sickles and seven bronze Knuts.
Ron stared as Harry brought it all back in to the compartment and tipped
it onto an empty seat.
“Hungry, are you?”
“Starving,” said Harry, taking a large bite out of a pumpkin pasty.
Ron had taken out a lumpy package and unwrapped it. There were four
sandwiches inside. He pulled one of them apart and said, “She always forgets I
don’t like corned beef..”
“Swap you for one of these,” said Harry, holding up a pasty. “Go on —”
“You don’t want this, it’s all dry,” said Ron. “She hasn’t got much time,”
he added quickly, “you know, with five of us.”

---

“Go on, have a pasty,” said Harry, who had never had anything to share
before or, indeed, anyone to share it with. It was a nice feeling, sitting there with
Ron,  eating  their  way  through  all  Harry’s  pasties,  cakes,  and  candies  (the
sandwiches lay forgotten).
           “What  are  these?”  Harry  asked  Ron,  holding  up  a  pack  of  Chocolate
Frogs. “They’re not really frogs, are they?” He was starting to feel that nothing
would surprise him.
“No,” said Ron. “But see what the card is. I’m missing Agrippa.”
“What?”
           “Oh,  of  course,  you  wouldn’t  know  —  Chocolate  Frogs  have  cards,
inside them, you know, to collect — famous witches and wizards. I’ve got about
five hundred, but I haven’t got Agrippa or Ptolemy.”
Harry unwrapped his Chocolate Frog and picked up the card. It showed a
man’s face. He wore half-moon glasses, had a long, crooked nose, and flowing
silver  hair,  beard,  and  mustache.  Underneath  the  picture  was  the  name  Albus
Dumbledore.
“So this is Dumbledore!” said Harry.
“Don’t tell me you’d never heard of Dumbledore!” said Ron. “Can I have
a frog? I might get Agrippa — thanks —”
Harry turned over his card and read:
ALBUS DUMBLEDORE
CURRENTLY HEADMASTER OF HOGWARTS
C  onsidered  by  many  the  greatest  wizard  of  modern  times,  Dumbledore  is
particularly  famous  for  his  defeat  of  the  dark  wizard  Grindelwald  in  1945,  for
the  discovery  of  the  twelve  uses  of  dragon’s  blood,  and  his  work  on  alchemy
with  his  partner,  Nicolas  Flamel.  Professor  Dumbledore  enjoys  chamber  music
and tenpin bowling.
Harry  turned  the  card  back  over  and  saw,  to  his  astonishment,  that
Dumbledore’s face had disappeared.
“He’s gone!”
“Well, you can’t expect him to hang around all day,” said Ron. “He’ll be
back. No, I’ve got Morgana again and I’ve got about six of her…do you want it?
You can start collecting.”
           Ron’s  eyes  strayed  to  the  pile  of  Chocolate  Frogs  waiting  to  be
unwrapped.
           “Help  yourself,”  said  Harry.  “But  in,  you  know,  the  Muggle  world,

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people just stay put in photos.”
           “Do  they?  What,  they  don’t  move  at  all?”  Ron  sounded  amazed.
“Weird!”
Harry stared as Dumbledore sidled back into the picture on his card and
gave him a small smile. Ron was more interested in eating the frogs than looking
at the Famous Witches and Wizards cards, but Harry couldn’t keep his eyes off
them.  Soon  he  had  not  only  Dumbledore  and  Morgana,  but  Hengist  of
Woodcroft, Alberic Grunnion, Circe, Paracelsus, and Merlin. He finally tore his
eyes  away  from  the  Druidess  Cliodna,  who  was  scratching  her  nose,  to  open  a
bag of Bertie Bott’s Every Flavor Beans.
“You want to be careful with those,” Ron warned Harry. “When they say
every flavor, they mean every flavor — you know, you get all the ordinary ones
like chocolate and peppermint and marmalade, but then you can get spinach and
liver and tripe. George reckons he had a booger-flavored one once.”
Ron picked up a green bean, looked at it carefully, and bit into a corner.
“Bleaaargh — see? Sprouts.”
           They  had  a  good  time  eating  the  Every  Flavor  Beans.  Harry  got  toast,
coconut,  baked  bean,  strawberry,  curry,  grass,  coffee,  sardine,  and  was  even
brave enough to nibble the end off a funny gray one Ron wouldn’t touch, which
turned out to be pepper.
The countryside now flying past the window was becoming wilder. The
neat  fields  had  gone.  Now  there  were  woods,  twisting  rivers,  and  dark  green
hills.
There was a knock on the door of their compartment and the round-faced
boy  Harry  had  passed  on  platform  nine  and  three-quarters  came  in.  He  looked
tearful.
“Sorry,” he said, “but have you seen a toad at all?”
When they shook their heads, he wailed, “I’ve lost him! He keeps getting
away from me!”
“He’ll turn up,” said Harry.
“Yes,” said the boy miserably. “Well, if you see him…”
He left.
“Don’t know why he’s so bothered,” said Ron. “If I’d brought a toad I’d
lose it as quick as I could. Mind you, I brought Scabbers, so I can’t talk.”
The rat was still snoozing on Ron’s lap.
“He might have died and you wouldn’t know the difference,” said Ron in
disgust. “I tried to turn him yellow yesterday to make him more interesting, but
the spell didn’t work. I’ll show you, look…”
He rummaged around in his trunk and pulled out a very battered-looking

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wand. It was chipped in places and something white was glinting at the end.
“Unicorn hair’s nearly poking out. Anyway —”
He had just raised his wand when the compartment door slid open again.
The toadless boy was back, but this time he had a girl with him. She was already
wearing her new Hogwarts robes.
“Has anyone seen a toad? Neville’s lost one,” she said. She had a bossy
sort of voice, lots of bushy brown hair, and rather large front teeth.
           “We’ve  already  told  him  we  haven’t  seen  it,”  said  Ron,  but  the  girl
wasn’t listening, she was looking at the wand in his hand.
“Oh, are you doing magic? Let’s see it, then.”
She sat down. Ron looked taken aback.
“Er — all right.”
He cleared his throat.
“Sunshine, daisies, butter mellow,
Turn this stupid, fat rat yellow.”
He waved his wand, but nothing happened. Scabbers stayed gray and fast
asleep.
“Are you sure that’s a real spell?” said the girl. “Well, it’s not very good,
is it? I’ve tried a few simple spells just for practice and it’s all worked for me.
Nobody in my family’s magic at all, it was ever such a surprise when I got my
letter,  but  I  was  ever  so  pleased,  of  course,  I  mean,  it’s  the  very  best  school  of
witchcraft there is, I’ve heard — I’ve learned all our course books by heart, of
course, I just hope it will be enough — I’m Hermione Granger, by the way, who
are you?”
She said all this very fast.
Harry looked at Ron, and was relieved to see by his stunned face that he
hadn’t learned all the course books by heart either.
“I’m Ron Weasley,” Ron muttered.
“Harry Potter,” said Harry.
“Are you really?” said Hermione. “I know all about you, of course — I
got  a  few  extra  books,  for  background  reading,  and  you’re  in  Modern  Magical
History and The Rise and Fall of the Dark Arts and Great Wizarding Events of
the Twentieth Century.”
“Am I?” said Harry, feeling dazed.
“Goodness, didn’t you know, I’d have found out everything I could if it
was me,” said Hermione. “Do either of you know what house you’ll be in? I’ve
been  asking  around,  and  I  hope  I’m  in  Gryffindor,  it  sounds  by  far  the  best;  I

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hear  Dumbledore  himself  was  in  it,  but  I  suppose  Ravenclaw  wouldn’t  be  too
bad....Anyway,  we’d  better  go  and  look  for  Neville’s  toad.  You  two  had  better
change, you know, I expect we’ll be there soon.”
And she left, taking the toadless boy with her.
“Whatever house I’m in, I hope she’s not in it,” said Ron. He threw his
wand back into his trunk. “Stupid spell — George gave it to me, bet he knew it
was a dud.”
“What house are your brothers in?” asked Harry.
           “Gryffindor,”  said  Ron.  Gloom  seemed  to  be  settling  on  him  again.
“Mom and Dad were in it, too. I don’t know what they’ll say if I’m not. I don’t
suppose Ravenclaw would be too bad, but imagine if they put me in Slytherin.”
“That’s the house Vol-, I mean, You-Know-Who was in?”
“Yeah,” said Ron. He flopped back into his seat, looking depressed.
“You know, I think the ends of Scabbers’ whiskers are a bit lighter,” said
Harry, trying to take Ron’s mind off houses. “So what do your oldest brothers do
now that they’ve left, anyway?”
Harry was wondering what a wizard did once he’d finished school.
           “Charlie’s  in  Romania  studying  dragons,  and  Bill’s  in  Africa  doing
something for Gringotts,” said Ron. “Did you hear about Gringotts? It’s been all
over  the  Daily  Prophet,  but  I  don’t  suppose  you  get  that  with  the  Muggles  —
someone tried to rob a high security vault.”
Harry stared.
“Really? What happened to them?”
“Nothing, that’s why it’s such big news. They haven’t been caught. My
dad says it must’ve been a powerful Dark wizard to get round Gringotts, but they
don’t think they took anything, that’s what’s odd. ’Course, everyone gets scared
when something like this happens in case You-Know-Who’s behind it.”
Harry turned this news over in his mind. He was starting to get a prickle
of  fear  every  time  You-Know-Who  was  mentioned.  He  supposed  this  was  all