Harry Potter and the Secret Treasures

Chapter 1069: The Old House of the Gaunt Family

“Alright … Well, who was Bob Ogden?”

“He was employed by the Department of Magical Law Enforcement,” said Dumbledore softly. “He died some time ago, but not before I had tracked him down and persuaded him to confide these recollections to me. We are about to accompany him on a visit he made in the course of his duties. Again, remember what you are going to see…”

Dumbledore pulled out the stopper of the crystal bottle and tipped its silvery contents into the Pensieve, where they swirled and shimmered, neither liquid nor gas.

“After you,” said Dumbledore, gesturing toward the bowl.

Evan bent forward, took a deep breath, and plunged his face into the silvery substance.

He felt his feet leave the dimly lit living room floor; he was falling, falling through whirling darkness and then, quite suddenly, he was blinking in dazzling sunlight. Before his eyes had adjusted, Dumbledore landed beside him.

They were standing in a typical British country lane, full of nostalgic rural atmosphere, bordered by high, tangled hedgerows, beneath a summer sky as bright and blue as a forget-me-not.

Some ten feet in front of them stood a short, plump man wearing enormously thick glasses that reduced his eyes to molelike specks.

At this moment, he was reading a wooden signpost that was sticking out of the brambles on the left-hand side of the road.

Needless to say, this must be Ogden! A typical wizard, who had only learned Muggle knowledge in school, strictly adhering to the rules but lacking flexibility. He was also wearing the strange assortment of clothes so often chosen by inexperienced wizards trying to look like Muggles: in this case, a frock coat and spats over a striped one-piece bathing costume, with shoe covers on his feet, looking extremely odd.

Evan looked at Ogden. Although he didn’t have much impression of this name, by now, he had guessed that this important memory was related to Voldemort. Or more accurately, it should be related to Horcruxes.

Since Dumbledore brought it out at this moment and said they would need it in Norway, combined with everything else, it was enough to indicate that the Horcrux that would appear in this memory should be Slytherin’s ring, another protective item.

So, they were going to the old house of the Gaunt family, an ancient and conservative pure-blood wizard family.

As Evan pondered, Ogden set off at a brisk walk down the lane, and they hurriedly followed.

As they passed the wooden sign, Evan looked up at its two arms. The one pointing back the way they had come read: GREAT HANGLETON, 5 MILES. The arm pointing after Ogden said LITTLE HANGLETON, 1 MILE.

It was indeed here, Evan knew it in his heart.

After Sirius’s prison break came to an end, he had once asked Lupin to investigate Voldemort’s father’s ancestral home.

The original plan was to destroy the materials needed for Voldemort’s resurrection, his father’s bone, and the old house in Little Hangleton.

Unfortunately, they had arrived a step too late.

Voldemort had already been prepared. As early as when he encountered vampires in Albania, he sent people back to take away the bone.

Evan and Dumbledore followed Ogden for a while, seeing nothing around them but the hedgerows, the wide blue sky overhead and the swishing, frock-coated figure ahead.

Then the lane curved to the left and fell away, sloping steeply down a hillside, so that they had a sudden, unexpected view of a whole valley laid out in front of them.

A village appeared in front of them, undoubtedly Little Hangleton, nestled between two steep hills, its church and graveyard clearly visible.

Across the valley, set on the opposite hillside, was a handsome manor house surrounded by a wide expanse of velvety green lawn.

Needless to say, this manor was Riddle House, but it was not in ruins at all; on the contrary, it looked very beautiful.

Under the sunlight, it sparkled and looked very luxurious, clearly a house only wealthy people could afford.

Ogden had broken into a reluctant trot due to the steep downward slope. Dumbledore lengthened his stride, and Evan hurried to keep up.

Since Riddle House, the ancestral home of Voldemort’s father, was right in front of him, where was the old home of the Gaunt family? Evan originally thought they were going to the Little Hangleton village ahead, but they didn’t. The lane curved to the right and when they rounded the corner, it was to see the very edge of Ogden’s frock coat vanishing through a gap in the hedge.

Dumbledore and Evan followed him onto a narrow dirt track bordered by higher and wilder hedgerows than those they had left behind. The path was crooked, rocky, and potholed, sloping downhill like the last one, and it seemed to be heading for a patch of dark trees a little below them.

They hadn’t gone far before the track opened up at the copse.

Dumbledore and Evan came to a halt behind Ogden, who had stopped and drawn his wand.

Despite the cloudless sky, the old trees ahead cast deep, dark, cool shadows, and it was a few seconds before Evan discerned the building half-hidden amongst the tangle of trunks.

He had to say that it was a very strange location to choose for a house, or perhaps it was more in line with the unique taste of the Gaunt family.

Those big trees grew beside the house, blocking all light and the view of the valley below.

Even when the sun was at its strongest at noon, there was no trace of light inside, a true Slytherin style.

Neither he nor his descendants: the Gaunt family and the vampire branch, liked the sun.

The walls of the house were mossy and so many tiles had fallen of the roof that the rafters were visible in places.

Nettles grew thickly all around the house, their tips reaching the windows, which were tiny and thick with grime.

Suddenly, one of the windows was thrown open with a clatter, and a thin trickle of steam or smoke issued from it, as though somebody was cooking!

Ogden moved forward quietly, his movements very cautious.

As the dark shadows of the trees slid over him, he stopped again, staring at the front door, to which somebody had nailed a dead snake.

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