I Solemnly Swear That I Am Up To No Good

Harry and I took the cloak to Bumbridge's office. We were in the middle of ransacking the place when my Father showed up with Professor Dolohov and Crouch. Now they're ransacking the place.

In case further explanation is required:

- Cloak, barely large enough to fit both of us these days.
- Budged up against a cupboard that they're probably going to search, eventually.
- Do I need to say more?

I Solemnly Swear That I Am Up To No Good - Umbridge's parchments

All right, I stayed up late to finish looking over Bum's parchments and nodded off before I could get through them all. Woke up early to get through the rest.

We snatched a whole stack of them, and since they were right on top, most seem to be recent. I think the very top stack are things she meant to send to someone soon, and the stuff on the bottom are things she just recently received in the owl post. Some are letters, and others are detailed notes about the school that she drew up, presumably to be sent off to someone else. Though who knows, I suppose it could be for her own records. We pulled from two parchment piles but had to hide before really processing how they were organised.

A few of the letters are to people she considers chums, and are written in that sick, simpering way of hers. Short and not very interesting; talk of the weather and "how is your dear Father's spattergroit?" Addressed to people with names like Aggie and Rina. In addition to those there's a lot of other rubbish. A tonne of order receipts for rosewater sweets and "ladies pink foundation garment, size 'well fluffed'." Those should be enormously useful, emphasis on enormous.

Now, I did find a few letters from Strangeweale, the Councilmember. They're all more or less requests for "progress reports" on something or another. Some seem to laud her for her "assistance in the matter," and others seem a little pushier, with him saying things like "refocus your efforts," and reminding her to keep "their mutual goals" in mind. Most curious of all, there's one that seems to be all about OWL exams, which contains this bit: "Related to our conversation about charms related to exam performance, here's a list of 5 that would make it impossible for someone to write a coherent theoretical exam."

So, it seems that Bum wanted to see certain of the student body fail OWLs. Colour me shocked. Oh, she also has a letter of complaint to some shopkeeper about how "these blood quills aren't proving a successful deterrent for wayward students. Please do send me a more severe prototype at your earliest convenience." Are we really sure we don't want to drop the plate?

But anyway, Strangeweale's letters are otherwise short and banal. Possibly encoded in case of interception (though it'd have to be a fairly uncomplicated code, for her to suss out). It seems he didn't really want to chat with her about how the weather's been in New London, or whether or not her well-fluffed foundation garments itch or not. Fancy that.

And as I said before, she was keeping notes, and some of them are on expendable people - halfbloods, in this case (though neither the word expendable nor halfblood appear in the notes). On the list we've got, there's Hopkins, Stebbins, Capper, Fawcett, Li, Bundy, Corner, Jones, Perks, Summers, Brocklehurst, Midgen, Stein, Zimmerman, Finch-Fletchley and Lovegood. On a separate parchment, she'd put together notes on each person from the list. She mentions how Hopkins, Stebbins, and Summers all come from negligent foster families who barely write, don't keep their fosterlings well-clothed, and so forth. She notes how Capper's exam anxiety could be used against him for expulsion. She also mentions the families of Midgen and Corner and how they do care for their charges since both live with actual blood relatives; she adds, though, that their families aren't "the least bit well-connected." Last on that page she mentions Luna Lovegood, who she notes is "actually a pureblood and may, for that reason, be even better suited." So, good news, Lovegood. Someone still thinks you're a pureblood.

Then, on the second page of the list, she has details about the rest. Sally Anne, she says you've become too well-connected, but she also points out that the Strettons don't like you one bit. For Megan Jones, Bum remarks that she's become "so very useful," and says that she hopes she can be allowed "this one little indulgence." And then there's an extra long bit about you, Finch-Fletchley. About how you'd be such a fascinating subject, given your background and parentage; unfortunately, she also seems to think that you're too high risk, and that if anything happened to you there'd be inquiries.

My own conclusion is that the lists of expendable people are connected to whatever Strangeweale is working on and was writing to Bumbridge about. Still, there's not really solid evidence connecting the two together. And we still don't know what, exactly, he was doing. Is doing.