Harry Potter and the Secret Treasures

The locket was now around Evan’s neck. Compared with the one around Merope’s neck, it had a little less gold.

Of course, this still did not affect its own value. What was truly valuable about it was that it could absorb excess magic power and feed it back.

This thing was not as simple as an ornament for proving identity. Slytherin had left extraordinary magic on it.

His unfortunate descendants did not discover this, nor could they.

“Mr. Gaunt, your daughter!” said Ogden in alarm, but Gaunt had already released Merope.

She staggered away from him, back to her corner, massaging her neck and gulping for air.

“So!” said Gaunt triumphantly, as though he had just proved a complicated point beyond all possible dispute. “Don’t you go talking to us as if we’re dirt on your shoes! Don’t think of summoning us to the Ministry casually like those Mudbloods and scum. Generations of purebloods, wizards all … more than you can say, I don’t doubt!”

And he spat on the floor at Ogden’s feet. Morfin cackled again.

Merope, huddled beside the window, her head bowed and her face hidden by her lank hair, said nothing.

“Mr. Gaunt,” said Ogden doggedly, trying not to look into Gaunt’s eyes, “I am afraid that neither your ancestors nor mine have anything to do with the matter in hand. I am here because of Morfin, Morfin and the Muggle he accosted late last night. Our information is that Morfin performed a jinx or hex on the said Muggle, causing him to erupt in highly painful hives.”

Morfin giggled, proud of what he had done.

It was a miracle that this family could survive to this day. It could only be said that the Ministry was too lenient on them back then.

“Be quiet boy,” snarled Gaunt in Parseltongue, and Morfin immediately fell silent.

“And so what if he did, then?” Gaunt said defiantly to Ogden. “I expect you’ve wiped the Muggle’s filthy face clean for him, and his memory to boot…”

“That’s hardly the point, is it, Mr. Gaunt?” said Ogden. “This was an unprovoked attack on a defenseless…”

“Ar, I had you marked out as a Muggle-lover the moment I saw you,” sneered Gaunt, and he spat on the floor again.

“This discussion is getting us nowhere,” said Ogden firmly. “It is clear from your son’s attitude that he feels no remorse for his actions. I officially inform you that Morfin will attend a hearing on the fourteenth of September to answer the charges of using magic in front of a Muggle and causing harm and distress to that same Mugg…”

Ogden broke off. The jingling, clopping sounds of horses and loud, laughing voices were drifting in through the open window.

Apparently the winding lane to the village passed very close to the copse where the house stood.

Gaunt froze, listening, his eyes wide with disbelief. Morfin hissed and turned his face toward the sounds, his expression hungry. Merope raised her head, her face was starkly white.

“My God, what an eyesore!” rang out a girl’s voice, as clearly audible through the open window as if she had stood in the room beside them. “Couldn’t your father have that hovel cleared away, Tom? It’s ruining the scenery here!”

“It’s not ours,” said a young man’s voice. “Everything on the other side of the valley belongs to us, but that cottage belongs to an old tramp called Gaunt, and his children. It’s been passed down through their family. The son is quite mad, you should hear some of the stories they tell in the village…”

The girl laughed. The jingling, clopping noises were growing louder and louder. Morfin made to get out of his armchair.

“Keep your seat,” said his father warningly, in Parseltongue.

“Tom,” said the girl’s voice again, now so close they were clearly right beside the house, “I might be wrong … but has somebody nailed a snake to that door?”

“Good lord, you’re right!” said the man’s voice. “That’ll be the son of the Gaunt family. I told you he’s not right in his head. Don’t look at it, Cecilia, darling.”

The jingling and clopping sounds were now growing fainter again.

“’Darling,’” whispered Morfin in Parseltongue, looking at his sister. “’Darling,’ he called her. So he wouldn’t have you anyway. That filthy Muggle’s dumped you!”

Merope’s face went deathly white; she was shaking, on the verge of fainting.

“What’s that?” said Gaunt sharply, also in Parseltongue, looking from his son to his daughter. “What did you say, Morfin?”

“She likes looking at that Muggle,” said Morfin, a vicious expression on his face as he stared at his sister, who now looked terrified. “Always in the garden when he passes, peering through the hedge at him, isn’t she? And last night…”

Merope shook her head jerkily, imploringly, but Morfin went on ruthlessly, “Hanging out of the window waiting for him to ride home, wasn’t she?”

“Hanging out of the window to look at a Muggle?” said Gaunt quietly, his eyes widening a little more.

All three of the Gaunts seemed to have forgotten Ogden, who was looking bewildered and irritated at this renewed outbreak of incomprehensible hissing and rasping. Evan was equally puzzled.

But he could probably guess the content of the conversation. It must be related to Voldemort’s parents. Merope’s love for Riddle had been discovered!

“Is it true?” said Gaunt in a deadly voice, advancing a step or two toward the terrified Merope. “My daughter … pure-blooded descendant of Salazar Slytherin … hankering after a filthy, dirt-veined Muggle?”

Merope shook her head imploringly, shrinking forcefully into the corner.

“You disgusting little squib, you filthy little blood traitor!” roared Gaunt, losing control, and his hands closed around his daughter’s throat.

Merope shook her head frantically, pressing herself into the corner, obviously unable to say a word.

She was about to be strangled to death. She was going to die here, being strangled to death by her father.

“No!” Ogden yelled, raised his wand, and cried, “Relashio!”

Gaunt was thrown backward, away from his daughter; he tripped over a chair and fell flat on his back.

With a roar of rage, Morfin leapt out of his chair and ran at Ogden, brandishing his bloody knife and firing hexes indiscriminately from his wand.

Merope’s screams echoed in his ears, and Ogden ran for his life.

Dumbledore indicated that they ought to follow and Evan obeyed.

Ogden hurtled up the path and erupted onto the main lane, his arms over his head, where he collided with the glossy chestnut horse ridden by a very handsome, dark-haired young man. Both he and the pretty girl riding beside him on a gray horse roared with laughter at the sight of Ogden, finding him ridiculous.

Ogden bounced off the horse’s flank and set off again, his frock coat flying, covered from head to foot in dust, running pell-mell up the lane.

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