Location: Hogwarts Headmaster’s Office. Present: A. Dumbledore, S. Snape, phoenix (‘Fawkes’). Dumbledore sits behind his desk, reading a newspaper. Snape sits before the desk.
SNAPE: I’ve heard rumour of a jurisdictional shift.
DUMBLEDORE: Ah, yes. [Setting down the newspaper] Always perceptive, weren’t you Severus?
SNAPE: Indeed. Any impact?
DUMBLEDORE: No, no. Quite minor. Merely an extension of 17.b. rights – at least, in our, er, jurisdiction.
SNAPE: Concerned about Ministry meddling, are you?
DUMBLEDORE: Me? Hardly. It’s not my amendment. Though, I suppose, as Chief Warlock, it will hang about my neck if it passes and causes some untold calamity. Heavy hangs the crown, Severus. Or, in this case, the ever-so-charming Wizengamot headdress.
SNAPE: Hm. Any mischief you’re plotting this year, then? Another experimental substance? Some monster of Rubeus’s creation?
DUMBLEDORE: Oh, I don’t think so, no. We’ve had enough dragons and cerberuses for one headmastership, I daresay. No, I believe it shall be a quite ordinary year. But then, at Hogwarts, one must always plot for the unplottable.
SNAPE: Expect the unexpected.
DUMBLEDORE: Precisely.
SNAPE: And so you called me here.
DUMBLEDORE: Well. Yes. I suppose there are some – behaviours – afoot. I wanted to warn you, Severus, of some potential – hmm – mischief I suppose is the correct word. Some potential mischief in your house.
SNAPE: My house?
DUMBLEDORE: You’ve noted the year, I’m sure.
SNAPE: 1992? We’re quite a few months into it at this point.
DUMBLEDORE: The years fly by, don’t they? And in such a cyclical nature. It seems that 1892 was just yesterday.
SNAPE: Does it.
DUMBLEDORE: No, I suppose not. I was but a boy then. No, the year that I recall too well is 1942.
SNAPE: I can’t say the same.
DUMBLEDORE: I forget how young you are sometimes, Severus. Your knowledge belies an older man. Though perhaps your wisdom does not. Anyway. 1942. What do you know of it?
SNAPE: Only that it was 50 years before the current one.
DUMBLEDORE: I shall present you forth the next time some progressive bat begins to shriek about the necessity of adding a mathematics curriculum to the OWL standards. Very good, my lad. 50 years ago. Now, can you put it together?
SNAPE: I cannot.
DUMBLEDORE: Well. Then I must congratulate myself on a job well done. Once upon a time, the ’42s and ’92s were a time of considerable excitement in Slytherin House. Do you know why yet?
SNAPE: Slytherin . . . 50 years . . . ah, yes. I do recall the rumours.
DUMBLEDORE: Perhaps your mother? Yes, she would remember, wouldn’t she. Class of ’48, I believe? The Gobstones championess. Did she ever tell you the stories of 1942?
SNAPE: You are speaking of the Heir of Slytherin, yes?
DUMBLEDORE: Yes. ‘The Chamber of Secrets’. Quite fanciful, that Salazar. It was the Iberian in him, the flair for the drammatic.
SNAPE: She told me – plenty have told me – I – I am head of Slytherin House. I know the stories. Every 50 years, yes? The opening of the Chamber. The beast within. I fancied it rather silly. A story for boastful boys to scare half-bloods and halfwits.
DUMBLEDORE: Indeed. A story. But surely you know by now, Severus, that stories are more often than not the basis of truth?
SNAPE: You are concerned that someone in my house might – ‘open the chamber’, as it were?
DUMBLEDORE: I am not quite at the point of concern. But I like to be prepared. Can you present any candidates?
SNAPE: Some idiot in my house who might fancy themselves Slytherin’s heir and wreak half-baked havoc upon the school? Cursing muggles and blood traitors and squibs and calling it the work of Slytherin’s monster? I can present you a litany. Montague. Flint. Pucey. That little berk Higgs. God, I can’t wait to see him gone –
DUMBLEDORE: Draco Malfoy, perhaps?
SNAPE: Possibly. Possibly. He’s certainly – in the know.
[Pause.]
DUMBLEDORE: Well. Do keep an ear to the ground, will you? It might be worth mentioning to the boys at your start-of-term house meeting. The severity of making such a joke. You know, I’m sure what happened in ’42?
SNAPE: A girl died.
DUMBLEDORE: Myrtle Warren. Poor Argus knows her only too well. She floods the third-floor girl’s toilet on a near monthly basis to this day.
SNAPE: Let us pray she does not offer us a tsunami on her anniversary.
DUMBLEDORE: It would be her right. [Pause.] Well. Keep me informed about what you hear.
SNAPE: I always do.
DUMBLEDORE: I am much obliged.
SNAPE: Anything else?
DUMBLEDORE: Nothing that I can . . . ah. Our newest hire. I anticipate some, er, tension might arise between the two of you.
SNAPE: I can’t imagine why.
DUMBLEDORE: I see my intuitions, are, as is so often the case, correct. Rest assured that I will be working closely with him. To mentor him, as it were. I understand that he is inexperienced. I’ve heard tell that you find him to be a rather suboptimal hire.
SNAPE: I don’t understand how, after the disaster of last year, you could once again –
DUMBLEDORE: You know the difficulties of the personnel director, Severus. You know that I did not have a choice.
SNAPE: No choice? No choice?
DUMBLEDORE: Severus. Calm yourself. And be kind, please. To an old man – and to a young one. I will be working closely with him this year. I beg that you will not become jealous.
[Snape stands and proceeds toward the exit. He looks over his shoulder, glowers, and then exits, slamming the door. Dumbledore returns to his newspaper.]
THE PENSIEVE PAPERS 