Hermione was, indeed, late. As a matter of record she was exceptionally late, and the fact that she hadn't had time for more than a quick bath, had had to pass on shaving her legs rather than attempting it with Severus' cut-throat razor, was in last Friday's charm-cleaned clothes, and had no time to do anything whatsoever with her hair only made it worse.

So laddering her tights on the call-box door as she struggled in, arms full of the week-end's purchases, was the icing on the cake.

"Oh, bloody...." she wailed, and tugged the door shut.

"Welcome to the Ministry of Magic. State your --"

"Hermione Granger, Populations Consultant," she snapped. "Snape, I mean, Hermione Snape."

There was a slightly longer pause than usual before the operator gave the standard, "Good morning, Hermione," and then added in a reproving tone, "You are precisely forty-eight minutes and nineteen seconds late this morning, Hermione," before the call-box began its descent.

"Thanks for stating the obvious," Hermione muttered.

"No need for nastiness, Hermione. Please be advised that the Atrium lifts are experiencing difficulty today due to Poltergeist infestation. Your correct Level may be reached by multiplying its number by six and applying the Second Arithmantic Rule, or you may remain on board until it opens at your Level at random."

Hermione waited until the call-box had reached Atrium-level and the door had opened, and then said quite clearly, "I liked you far better before they charmed you a personality. And that's Madam Snape, to you," before she stepped out and hurried over to the interior lifts, wedging herself in between a very fat witch with a huge wen on her nose and an excessively ugly two-headed parrot on her shoulder, and a weedy-looking scribe with an armful of parchments and no less than three quills stuck behind one ear.

"Level Three," Hermione ordered the lift, and it closed and moved upward.

"Tarty little wench," someone murmured.

Hermione glared at the scribe.

"Hush, Merlin," the fat witch crooned, and chucked the parrot under its beaks. "It's not polite to call young ladies that, poppets. Even if they look it. Treatsies, babykinses?" She rummaged in her pockets and pulled out an owl treat for each head.

"Awwwwwwk," Merlin -- both of them -- said, and gobbled up the treats, shedding crumbs all over the lift floor. "Tasty tarty little wench!" Merlin One said when he'd done, and Merlin Two chimed in with "Tarty wench! Tarty wench! Tasty-tarty! Awwwwwwwk!"

Even the scribe was offended on Hermione's behalf.

"You ought muzzle that -- those things, if they can't behave," Hermione said. "And rewarding them for bad behaviour is irresponsible."

"Muzzle Merlin? How dare you suggest.... Why, I've had him since he hatched," the witch said, face purpling, and added, "He's Mummy's little poopsie-woopsie babykinses," all indignation with Hermione melting away into syrupy baby-talk.

"Level Four -- Departments of Trrrrrrraaaaaansportation and Nasty Magical Beasties that eat tarty, naughty girls all up, Awwwwwk!" screeched a disembodied voice; Hermione nearly jumped out of her skin, and the scribe muttered, "Poltergeist. Really nasty one, this." Fat Witch and the Merlins lumbered out when the doors opened, but not before the damned bird's two beady and salacious pairs of eyes raked over Hermione once more, and Merlin One hissed a final "Tassssssssty."

"I shouldn't be too narked," the scribe said once the doors had closed. "It'll get it comeuppance in a moment or two, given where they're headed."

"Where? I seldom go up above Three."

"Department for the Regulation and Control of Magical Creatures."

"Oh. It's illegal?"

"Right. Not even magical, technically. Just a freak, although the old bat's been claiming for years that it's some kind of Doomsday sign," the scribe volunteered.

"Level Six -- Bumbling Scribes and Underpaid Skivvies' Pool, off now!"

The scribe -- not headed for Six, apparently -- sighed, and waited until the doors closed before adding, "I drew up the orders last week, myself." He struggled to free one arm from his parchments, and drew his index finger across his neck with a descriptive, "Ecccccch."

"Pity they don't sell tickets," Hermione muttered. "I'd pay good money to see that."

"Level Three -- AHA! Ha-ha-ha! Departments of Magical Oopsies and Bureaucratic Horse-shite!" the poltergeist cackled as the lift decided to stop at Level Three; Hermione murmured a "Good-morning," to the scribe, stepped off, rushed down the corridor, turned the corner nearest her office -- and plowed headlong into two persons who were blocking the way. One of them, the owner of a pair of very large, coffee-brown hands, grabbed at her arms to keep her upright.

"Hermione Snape?"

She glanced up in the midst of juggling the packages before they all fell.

"You know it is, Shacklebolt. Good mor-- "

"Official, I'm afraid," the younger man -- clearly another Auror -- said quite priggishly. "Requires an answer. Hermione Snape?"

"Yes."

"You're to come with us," Shacklebolt said evenly, with no trace of friendliness or recognition. (He could be so damned intimidating, even when one knew he was on your side....)

"Why... ? Look, just let me drop these things in my office --"

"Afraid not," the other man said. "And we'll need your wand before we go any further."

That was frightening. So too was the fact that Shacklebolt made no attempt to help her with the packages, but stood and watched impassively while she struggled, set tote and handbag down, located her wand, and handed it over to him.

"Right, then," the prig said as Shacklebolt pocketed her wand. "Let's go."

"What's happened?" she asked, scrambling for her things. "Am I sacked, and what the bloody hell for?"

"Rather depends on what you have to tell us, I imagine," the prig said.

Shacklebolt and the prig, each with a hand at her elbows, marched her back to the lift; and Shacklebolt informed it "Level Two." True to today's form, however, it went in the opposite direction, toward Level Four.

"Level Four -- Departments of Traaaaaanspor --"

"Oh, shut up!" Shacklebolt barked.

They heard shrieking even before the lift opened.

"Merlin! Poopsie, darling, speak to Mummy!"

"Madam, you must cease this disturbance immediately...."

The doors opened: the fat witch, tears streaming down her face, was clutching the now-obviously expired Merlin to her sagging breasts, its heads lolling drunkenly at distinctly unnatural angles, while an ancient wizard was attempting, with no success, to drag her toward the lift.

"This parrot is my baby! You can't expect him to behave like some ordinary creature, he's a portent -- "

"Bloody hell," Shacklebolt muttered, and bellowed, "Level Two, damn it."

" -- a warning of the fate that waits for us all, in the form of a living, breathing parrot --"

"That, madam," roared the wizard as the doors slid closed, "is an ex-"

The doors closed completely, and the lift started downward.

"I say, standards have dropped, haven't they?" the priggish auror said to Shacklebolt, totally ignoring Hermione. "Used to be exciting things, that department. Renegade hippogriffs, smuggled dragon eggs, fire-breathing Pekinese dogs.... Now all they muck about with is oddities."

"Request a transfer, why don't you," Shacklebolt muttered. "Straighten out their priorities." (Hermione got the impression that Shacklebolt didn't care for the prig.)

"Ought to," the prig said. "Better than mucking about with all this Internal Affairs nonsense."

"Level Two," the poltergeist announced, "Half-Arsed Magical Coppers and --"

"Don't even think about finishing that," Shacklebolt said flatly, and the poltergeist shut up as the doors slid open into a large room -- dingy, windowless, and poorly-lit; it was crowded with bunged-up desks and chairs, obviously rejects from other departments. (Hermione had never been down to Magical Law Enforcement before, but she wasn't surprised: it was typical that the Ministry would present MLE as glamourous, but treat its aurors shabbily.) The aurors scattered about the room glanced toward the lift, sized Hermione up as a hard character, and went on with their work (much of which seemed to involved eating pastries and doing paper-work at the same time). She didn't see anyone she recognised, and she wasn't certain whether that was good or bad.

"This way," Shacklebolt muttered, turning to the left: the prig fell in behind Hermione, and they escorted her down a narrow corridor and into a plain, white-washed room with no furnishings other than a table and several uncomfortable-looking chairs.

"Shacklebolt, will you please tell me what's --"

"Sit down and stay quiet," the prig ordered as he swaggered in.

Well, that's quite enough --

"Unless I have been arrested and charged with whatever this is about, and sacked, which you haven't bothered to tell me," Hermione said, doing her best to skirt the fine line between indignation and arrogance, "I am still a Class 3-A Civil Employee, and you are not. Unless you want a complaint against your record for harassment, perhaps you'd best shelve the tough act -- it makes people think you're trying to compensate for something."

"Look here --" said the prig, scowling, as he stepped quite close to her. (It might have been effective, had Hermione not pegged it as one of Severus' intimidation tactics. The prig didn't perform it nearly as well as Severus, however.)

"Save it for Borgin or Burkes, Ferrars," Shacklebolt said. "She's only being questioned, not given the full treatment. Madam Snape, would you have a chair, please?" he added courteously to Hermione, and pulled one out for her -- one squarely in the middle of the table, she noted, and she assumed that there was an invisible viewing window in the wall opposite. "And if you'd forgive my junior.... Ferrars has difficulty remembering that not all the people we deal with are rotten."

"Thank you," Hermione said, laid down her packages on the floor near the chair, and sat. "It won't take long, will it? I'm already terribly late, and my Department Head will be very cross with me --"

"I shouldn't worry about that," Shacklebolt said briskly. "Mr Bretchgirdle will be in momentarily.... Ferrars, tea for the lady?"

Ferrars glowered at Shacklebolt and flounced from the room, all swagger thoroughly quashed.

Shacklebolt pulled out another chair from the far end of the table -- not quite pointedly, but with enough emphasis that Hermione knew he was trying to tell her that she was being observed -- sat, and pulled a small notebook and pencil from his pocket, and studied the pages, ignoring her. She did her best to stay quiet for a few minutes and managed not to fidget; after a bit she glanced at her watch, sighed, and reached for her handbag.

"I shouldn't," Shacklebolt said softly -- and then laughed under his breath when she pulled out a comb and hair-clip.

"Rather rushed this morning," she apologised, and tried to work her hair into something other than a rat's nest.

"Married recently, did you?" Shacklebolt said rather more loudly, eyes still fixed to his notebook. "I remember seeing your file when you applied for your clearance. You weren't Snape then."

"October, to my old potions master if you'd believe it."

"That Snape," Shacklebolt said, as if there were more than one. "Very little time to adjust?"

"Yes, rotten timing, what with school in term," Hermione said, struggling to work the clip through a knot, and giving up on her fringe as a lost cause. "I'm looking forward to the summer hol and being in the same place for once."

Ferrars returned with a chipped cup and saucer, set it down in front of Hermione, retreated to a corner near the door, and glowered; Shacklebolt returned to his notebook, apparently unwilling to continue priming the observers with Ferrars in the room. With nothing else to do -- for she was damned if she'd try to slop on makeup with Ferrars staring at her -- she sipped at the tea, and grimaced: Ferrars had sugared it heavily, and the milk was off as well.

After another ten minutes (she knew, for she'd been unable to resist checking her watch twice more), the door opened again and a cadaverous-faced wizard entered, crossed to the end of the table, and sat, laying a thick folder in front of him.

"Shacklebolt," he murmured a greeting, and Shacklebolt gravely nodded. "And this is... Hermione Granger, ICW Populations Consultant for Britain, is it not?" he added, not bothering to actually look at Hermione.

"Snape, actually," she corrected him.

Bretchgirdle's eyebrows twitched disapprovingly. "Not noted on your file."

"I've been married since October. I certainly put the change in by late November."

"Very well," Bretchgirdle said, and made a note on the outside of the folder.

"Mr... Bretchgirdle? Why in the world have I been --"

"All in good time, Madam Snape," he said repressively. "For the time being, I shall ask the questions, if you please. For example, Mr Corcoran expected you at eight-thirty this morning, yet you were extremely tardy. Is there a reasonable explanation for this?"

"I was running late this morning," she said, convinced Corcoran was in the observers' room, and had deliberately set Bretchgirdle to asking the question.

"Running late. You have been extremely punctual for most of your history with the Ministry, and yet on... three occasions in the last six weeks," he drawled, checking the top page in her file, "you've been late. Why?"

"When my husband and I share rooms it's a bit of a chore to get ready, what with sharing the bath."

"And where where those rooms?" Bretchgirdle asked sharply.

"What do you mean, where --"

"We know you weren't in London this morning, Madam Snape," he interrupted. "There was no-one at your flat."

"Now, hang on a moment. Why was someone trying to find me at home? Was there an emergency of some --"

"Answer the question."

"At Hogwarts, in my husband's rooms -- Severus Snape, Hogwarts' Potions Master."

"Do you often spend time at Hogwarts?"

"I have recently. He can't be away often as he's Slytherin Head, and we'd agreed at Yule that I should visit most week-ends this Term."

"I see. Unusual arrangement...." Bretchgirdle murmured, and noted it in her file. "So inquiries at Hogwarts will prove you arrived... when?"

"Sunday, about luncheon."

Bretchgirdle looked at her for the first time in the whole uncomfortable interview, fixing her with suspicious, alert eyes. "And the rest of the week-end?"

"Oh. You didn't ask that, I thought you only meant this morning...." Bretchgirdle looked likely to explode, so she added, "He surprised me, you see -- I was expecting to pop home Friday and throw a bag together and then go to Hogwarts, but he met me here instead and took me elsewhere."

"Where?"

"Whitemarsh."

"In winter? Whatever for?"

She shrugged. "Holiday. He wanted to surprise me. It certainly worked --"

"Whitemarsh. In winter, out of season," Bretchgirdle interrupted her. "As a surprise holiday. What would possess someone to think that a nice holiday?

"He isn't exactly spendthrift," Hermione admitted, and bristled when Ferrars snorted and smirked. "I believe he got a very good package-rate. Mucking about outside wasn't the point, at any rate."

"And what was?"

"Time together. We haven't had much."

"But you would have that at your flat or at Hogwarts."

"No, I mean..." Thank God for Severus' nasty little comments.... "...I mean, we're trying to... start a family, and it hasn't been, erm, taking. Our timing's been off, and I've been under a great deal of stress at work. So I believe he wanted to go somewhere we could, ah, concentrate on each other alone, so to speak."

Shacklebolt suppressed a chortle, and shot Bretchgirdle an apologetic look.

"And when did the two of you leave for Whitemarsh, and from where?" Bretchgirdle continued, ignoring Shacklebolt. He was staring openly at Hermione now, unblinking, practically daring her to slip.

"Friday evening, by one of the Atrium floos. He'd already packed a bag for me, you see, called it an 'abduction' -- sort of a joke."

Bretchgirdle's nostrils flinched in distaste, and Ferrars snorted again.

"Ferrars, if you can't keep the commmentary to yourself, leave," Bretchgirdle rapped out, and Ferrars muttered an apology. "And you floo'd where?"

"The... Metropole, I think it was. On West Pier."

"What time did you arrive?"

"I've no idea, really. I didn't think to check my watch."

"You'll want to check the floo-logs, Shacklebolt.... So the concierge can confirm you stayed there?"

"Oh, no, we didn't stay there -- too expensive, even out of season."

(Ferrars turned pink with the effort not to snort.)

"It was a place called, ah, Foybel Spires," she added.

"And they can confirm your stay?"

"Oh, I should think so -- there was a muddle over the reservation, they should remember having to sort it out. And the proprietor was rather a nosy type of fellow, as well. You know, the kind who's always hanging about one's door, trying to hear things," she explained earnestly, and shot a glance at Shacklebolt: he was maintaining an absolutely straight face but for a suspicious twitching at one corner of his mouth.

"You stayed in the hotel the whole time?"

"No, we did go out on the Saturday. And Sunday morning."

"Really.... So you have no way of confirming that you were in Whitemarsh the entire time?"

"No, no, we never left Whitemarsh -- oh. Well, we did go into Brighton itself, the Muggle town, because there were more shops open there, you see. And far better restaurants than the hotel's. Why should it be a problem, if we --"

"Because we need to know where you were at all times, Madam Snape," Bretchgirdle informed her with a thin, unpleasant smile. "To rule you out as a suspect."

"A suspect in what?"

"Never mind that for now. So you can't prove that you didn't return to London sometime on Saturday, in between these... activities?"

"Well, for Merlin's sake, how can one prove one wasn't somewhere if one isn't...? I certainly can't account for every single minute," she said, and sighed, reaching for the tote, "but we did do quite a bit of shopping."

"Wait," Bretchgirdle commanded, and jerked his head at Ferrars: Ferrars jumped over to the tote and begin rooting about in it.

"Oh, really -- is that absolutely --"

"Yes, it is.... Receipts, Ferrars, look for receipts, don't admire the craftsmanship," Bretchgirdle ordered as Ferrars fondled a particularly twee set of tea-towels emblazoned with the slogan Brighton is for Lovers!. "So, you arrived in Whitemarsh Friday evening, went from the Metropole to this... Foybel Spires, and then did what?"

"We dined there, and then went to bed."

"You didn't go out?"

"No, they lock their lobby doors at nine-thirty. Anyway, the food was terrible," Hermione said, one eye on Ferrars' thorough pillaging of her packages (he'd got to the new shoes, and was intrigued with the Muggle sales-slip), "and Severus got an awful case of indigestion, so an early bed-time was really the only option."

"And next day?"

"Next day we breakfasted out, did some shopping, and in the afternoon we toured some of the Brighton attractions. The Royal Pavilion, places like that -- "

Ferrars had pulled a smaller, pink bag from the larger tote -- one Hermione didn't recall acquiring, but couldn't help recognising, given the colour and design -- and he rooted in it for the receipt, pink wrapping-tissue flying as he ripped it aside.

" -- I should have all the ticket-stubs in my handbag, because I had more Muggle currency --"

The most extraordinary looked crossed Ferrars' face, and he reached into the bag with thumb and forefinger, as if the contents might bite.

Ferrars withdrew a scrap of fabric, dropped the bag, and spread the scrap apart with both index fingers.

It was a pair of knickers. Silk, and faintly racey in an understated way. Severus had, quite predictably, picked a shade as close to Slytherin green as he could manage.

Hermione almost wished one could actually die from embarrassment.

Ferrars looked intrigued; Bretchgirdle was staring at the knickers with disgust. Shacklebolt was silent, but Hermione could feel little tremours coming from his end of the table, as if he were shaking with repressed laughter.

"No receipt," Ferrars accused.

"I... didn't buy those. I didn't even know they were in there," Hermione admitted, face hot. "Severus must've got them while I was buying the shoes. That place is just across from the shoe shop."

"So you weren't together the entire time?" Bretchgirdle verbally pounced. "For Merlin's sake, Ferrars, put them away...."

"Other than that we were together the entire time. It couldn't have taken him more than ten minutes, I should think. He'll have the receipt, since he must have meant them for a surprise," Hermione explained as Ferrars stuffed the knickers back into their bag.

"And the rest of the afternoon?" Bretchgirdle prodded, quite forgetting she'd already volunteered that.

"Um, as I said, the Royal Pavilion and gardens, some of the Regency attractions.... May I?" she asked, gesturing to her handbag, and when Bretchgirdle nodded wearily she pulled it over, dug through the jumbled contents for the receipts, and handed them to Ferrars.

"Evening?" Bretchgirdle asked.

"Dinner at the Metropole -- he'll have the receipt for that as well, he paid -- and we were back at Foybel Spires just before they locked the doors."

"After that?"

"After that, we went to bed,." Hermione said with a puritanical little blush, making it clear that they did indeed go to bed, but not to sleep.

"And you did not leave the room again until the next morning?"

"No, it had an ensuite bath. No need to. We didn't even open the window for air, as it was so cold out."

"Very well," Bretchgirdle muttered, and closed Hermione's file with a petulant slap of his hand. "That's all for the time being, I think. Ferrars, you'll establish a time-table given those receipts --"

"But I don't have all of them --"

"I'll pop up to Hogwarts," Shacklebolt said. "Unless you'd care to go yourself, sir?"

"No, no, you're perfectly capable of speaking to the man, Shacklebolt," Bretchgirdle said.

"You don't need Sunday's itinerary?" Hermione asked.

"Not relevent at the moment. You may return to your department, but don't leave town for the time being without informing Shacklebolt," Bretchgirdle said, rose from his chair, and left the room without another word.

"You get to working on that, then. I'll get the rest of them this afternoon," Shacklebolt instructed Ferrars, who grumpily gathered together the receipts and left the room. "Madam Snape, apologies for the delay, but...."

"Can anyone tell me what all this is about?" Hermione asked, trying to shove all the packages back in the tote (Ferrars had left them all lying about the floor, the arsehole). "I shall have to explain --"

"Mr Corcoran knows about it," Shacklebolt said. "An intruder in the department. This is just a routine check-up of department personnel whereabouts for the time of the incident."

"An intruder?" Hermione blurted out, and paused. "Good God, I hope I remembered to ward my office --"

"Already checked, and everything seemed fine," Shacklebolt assured her. "Your commitment to security measures isn't in question at all." He rose from the table and handed her back her wand. "So it's a bit difficult, getting back into the swing of things Monday mornings?"

"Yes," Hermione muttered, stuffing the remaining packages into the tote willy-nilly.

"Funny. I was at school with your husband -- different House and year, true -- and I'd never have pegged him as a morning man, myself."

Hermione gaped at him. Shacklebolt was known to make the occasional wry, straight-faced observation, but never anything quite that ribald. He grinned, but his eyes darted toward the wall opposite: Corcoran must still be there, then, and Shacklebolt was having some fun at the man's expense.

Given that, Hermione decided she might as well, too.

"Severus Snape," she said primly, "is very much an anytime man, as the mood strikes him. Which I don't mind at all except when it makes me late to work. I'm expected at Hogwarts Friday evening, by the way...."

"Shouldn't be a problem, if Snape's got the receipts to round out the timetable," Shacklebolt assured her. "I'll ask you, however, not to speak with him today until after I've seen him."

"No question of that, we're not the type to call back-and-forth during the week," Hermione said as she stood, and grabbed for tote and handbag. "We're both far too busy."

"Thanks. And good luck on starting a family," Shacklebolt added, opening the door for her. "How will you manage a sprog, between your jobs? Hard enough for me and the missus with both of us in London...."

"I'll stop work for a while and move to Hogsmeade, I expect. Professor Sprout -- remember her? -- told us of a lovely little cottage," Hermione said, and headed for the lift. "Of course, think of all the doting aunties to do baby-minding if I moved directly into Hogwarts...."

Shacklebolt boarded the lift with her, commanded, "Level Three," and after the doors closed, mouthed, "Good show," while the poltergeist cackled insanely.

"Why not --" Hermione mouthed back, and mimed slugging back a dose of Veritaserum.

"They thought you had," Shacklebolt mouthed back. "Ask Snape later." And then he clammed up when the doors opened on Level Three.

She went straight to her office, closed and warded the door, dropped the bloody tote in a corner, and sat for a very long time with her head on her arms, until the shaking in her hands had stopped.

It took all of Hermione's nerve to act calmly for the rest of the work-day, and particularly when she passed an enraged and practically snarling Corcoran in the main corridor.

*****

The long and short of it -- when Hermione finally got the story out of one of the gossips in the scribal pool later that day -- was that Corcoran's office had been burgled on Saturday in the early evening: he'd returned from his own holiday, decided quite uncharacteristically to stop in at the office on the Sunday afternoon, had found something missing, and had raised the alarm. ("Absolutely hysterical, I heard he was," Hermione's informant confided. "Nearly blubbering, went straight to the aurors and then wouldn't tell them what was actually gone. I reckon it's a high-level document he left in a desk drawer rather than sending back to the lock-up, the lazy sod.") The only activity the Sneakoscope records revealed was a visit by a heavily-pregnant charwoman who'd entered Corcoran's office to clean and who, after a longer stay than usual -- which the auror then on Observation detail had explained away to himself as natural, given the woman's slow and lumbering gait -- had shuffled off down the corridor, gone into the cleaning-cupboard, and had never come out again.

The problem was, while it appeared to be the charwoman who did normally clean Level Three on the week-end, that lady was, at the time, actually in St. Mungo's in the middle of a thirty-two hour labour.

MLE would never live it down. New mother of triplets Hilda Blodgett falsely arrested mere hours after giving birth! had been The Quibbler's lead story on Monday.

*****

The aurors hadn't just knocked at her flat: they'd barged in. She didn't need confirmation of that: she felt it, a faint sense that everything wasn't quite as she'd left it; but she hadn't been home ten minutes when there was a timid knock at the back door, and she opened it to find Mr Harrison, Junior, looking abashed and apologetic.

"I thought I should tell you," he said in a whisper, "that there was a bit of unpleasantness on premises yesterday. Some Aurors came around and --"

"Yes, Mr Harrison, I know," Hermione said wearily. "They told me this morning when I got to work."

"They didn't ask us, you see, because they know our loyalty to our clients won't permit us to give them entrance. But the alarms went off when they broke the wards, and when we got here -- one minute four second response time, I'm proud to say -- they showed all the proper warrants. We hung about and reset everything after they'd gone."

She'd figured that: her last-set password hadn't worked, and she'd resorted to "utter bollocks," which had.

"It's quite all right, Mr Harrison, not your fault. And I appreciate that you set everything right again."

"They didn't, er, remove anything that we could see. Very worrying, this," Harrison said. "It's been happening a lot."

"Raids?"

"Yes. Not just to Ministry persons like yourself, either. Absolutely ordinary clients. They carted one poor woman off right in front of my eyes, said she'd some kind of illegal potion.... Didn't look the type to me, frankly. Left her five little kiddies with only the next-door neighbour to watch them."

"Good God...."

"Well, I'll leave, then -- I just wanted to check on you personally, as Pa told me to."

"Has he?"

"Oh, yes. Said your husband's done him a good turn or two. We should take a special interest in you anyway, even if you hadn't chosen Residential Deluxe." Harrison tipped his bowler to her, and popped away.

Cripes, that's frightening, she thought as she closed and bolted the door. 'Illegal potion' and five kids.... Bloody hell, they're not going after contraceptive users now, are they?

She made a beeline for her hidey-hole, and then stopped herself, calmly stepped into the kitchen, poured a glass of wine, and settled in front of the telly to waste time watching it until dark fell; and then she drew the curtains and began scouring the flat, starting with said hidey-hole -- the little niche Severus had made in the chimney, behind the facing-panel. The contraceptive was still there, fortunately, as was the packet of documents that she still hadn't been able to get to François.

Except she hadn't. When she pulled the panel back over, she noted a little scribble of soot on the unfinished side: a crude sketch which, after a moment's puzzling-over, she determined to be of old-fashioned manacles and an arrow.

Shackle and bolt. Oh, fuck me....

So much for being clever. She'd known an auror would find any warding: she'd hoped they'd overlook something this mundane and unmagical. The only saving grace was that Shacklebolt had been the one to find it, not that bastard Ferrars.... She licked her finger and scrubbed at the soot until it was hopelessly smeared, and then pounded the panel back in place.

A check of her desk proved that the paper files had been gone through; she was certain they'd attempted the computer's hard drive as well, and set to checking on that. She'd been careful with the computer. When she'd bought it -- well before all this idiocy, but with an unaccountable urge to give herself plenty of privacy -- she'd had Mark, her computer geek, program a log file.

The file proved that yes, the computer had been powered up on Sunday. They'd figured out how to use the mouse, for the desktop icons had been activated and their files opened; they'd opened her financial software as well, and probably printed off those records, judging by the level of paper left in the printer.

They hadn't, though, got into the operating system and found the hidden directory that contained the stolen Ministry documents.

They didn't find it this time, she cautioned herself. Now that they know about the computer, they'll read up a bit and discover just how easy it is to hide things... and then I'm done for.

She should have to get rid of those files, and soon. Perhaps ask Mark to swap out another hard drive, and to keep this one at his shop.

The little orb she'd got from Fred and George was still safely tucked into its tissue in the Christmas box, although she noted indignantly that some clod (Ferrars, it must have been) had badly bent back one corner of the antique pasteboard St. Nicholas she'd had since she was eight, a gift from Grandmother Granger. It was surprising that they hadn't taken the orb; Ferrars should have recognised it for what it was, and she should have been questioned about the contents. (It would have been relatively innocuous on examination -- a dispute with her superior that she wanted documented, and had hidden among like-looking things to conceal it from any Muggles -- but still, she was amazed that they'd let it slip.) She was also practically frothing at the mouth from the indignity of having her home invaded and her privacy violated.

She gave up on both rage and the search by the time she'd got half-through the bedroom, though. There wasn't anything she'd hid there, and she couldn't tell what might have been the aurors' snooping and what might have been Severus' pawing-about (although she suspected the aurors wouldn't have left quite such a mess in her lingerie drawer, and chalked that down to Severus).

He was also, she assumed, responsible for the disappearance of a beautifully-fragrant wedge of Stilton from the kitchen, though whether he'd mistaken it for something going off or had nicked it for himself, she couldn't guess.

It was all too much: her hands had started to shake again, her head to swim, and she sank down onto her haunches and huddled, arms tightly clasped about her knees, until she felt she could manage to crawl to the bathroom.

That's terribly cruel toward him, she thought, draped a cold, wet flannel across her forehead, and leaned back against the tub, legs splayed across the cool floor-tile. He was right about this morning -- over-estimated it a bit, perhaps, but right in the main -- and right to worry about a pretty damned air-tight alibi for Saturday. I may not always understand why he insists on doing things his way, but he has good reason....

The absurdity of that hit her, and she started giggling; and she didn't quite notice when her laughter turned to sobs, or remember later that she'd desperately wished Severus was there so she could talk to him.

*****

The week was an agony. She couldn't floo Severus to ask what he'd heard about the burglary or what he'd said to Shacklebolt; Corcoran was even more snappish and nasty than usual, and she couldn't find out anything more than the scribe had told her initially.

She thought it likely, however, that whatever had been found in his office related directly to the problem of Flaherty and the potion. There was no official censure issued against Corcoran: it wasn't, therefore, anything that related to official department policies and Ministry matters. That Corcoran had got a censure from Fudge was indisputable -- he'd been called upstairs, had been absolutely livid on his return, and had holed himself up for the rest of the day; but no other action was taken against him. (As far as Hermione was concerned, that was a very bad sign.)

The only good thing was that he didn't seem suspicious of her. Unpleasant, yes, of course -- even more than he'd been since their last confrontation: but he seemed to have taken her alibi as given, especially after Shacklebolt had sent a memo to them both, stating that Hermione's whereabouts on the Saturday were accounted for and that she was cleared of any suspicion in the matter of the break-in.

The Level Three charwoman's cupboard, however, was warded and padlocked shut, and a low-level auror set to guard Corcoran's office at all times; his notoriously loose-lipped personal secretary had been demoted to the scribal pool, and a viper of a woman who Hermione knew wouldn't give one the time of day had taken her place.

Most of her time at home was filled with stupid and niggling, but necessary, tasks: calling Mark and arranging for a new hard drive, an expense she really didn't want to go to, but must, with much nail-biting over whether to keep hard copies of the stolen documents somewhere; deciding in the end to hide the contraceptive potion in a shampoo-bottle, in plain view -- an act she kicked herself over, for not thinking of before; and, lastly, after a desperate and rushed trip to Harrods' toy department, to buy a ridiculously over-priced baby-doll for nefarious purposes. (She knew François had daughters, one of fairly recent vintage, so to speak; and as anything resembling a letter or documentation going from her to the man would likely be opened and searched, she couldn't think of anything more seeming-innocent than a birthday present to a colleague's little girl.)

Worked with Ron, she thought grumpily as she wrestled with all the idiotic packaging. At least I hope it has -- I don't dare check up on him. My God, I think half the cost goes for all the damned pasteboard and cello-wrap.... How do parents afford it all?

She finally got the wretched doll free of its box and ruthlessly stripped it of its clothes, searching for the best way to hide the documents; there was an on toggle at the back of the doll's neck, and with a What the hell Hermione switched it on.

"Waaaaaaaaaaaahhhhhhhhh --"

It was truly revolting: a high-pitched, slightly electronic whine that rose in volume and wouldn't stop, even when she turned switch off. She scrabbled for the instruction book and flipped through with one hand, and discovered to her great disgust the reason for the doll's expense: this was no ordinary doll, but a mock-baby complete with the latest electronic circuitry. It wouldn't stop screeching, the booklet noted, until she... comforted it.

Her only consolation was that there was no-one about to see her sprawled on the floor of the sitting-room, cradling a naked baby-doll in one arm and frantically paging through the owner's manual with the other hand. (The rocking wasn't helping, unfortunately -- the bloody thing seemed to be getting worse, in fact, and Hermione had to concentrate very hard on the manual.)

She flipped the damned thing arse over head, and discovered to her great surprise that the doll was anatomically correct -- alarmingly so, with latex-like folds of skin (presumably to teach all good little girls about cleaning up messes, as well), and a... a...

The baby didn't like being turned on its head, and shrieked.

Bloody computer chips, Hermione thought, plopped the baby upright on her shoulder, and jiggled it. I hope they didn't prime the bladder at the factory.

Baby didn't like the jiggling, either, and let Hermione know it; and it took a good ten minutes of a more moderate rocking to get the damned thing to belt up.

Some judicious groping of Baby's bottom proved that it wasn't quite as anatomically correct in back as it was in front.

There was only one thing for it, as far as hiding the documents: Hermione would have to engage in some surgery (and in this case, she'd do it with a certain amount of satisfaction).

She charmed a slit in the latex of the baby's belly and the plastic underlayment -- carefully, not quite trusting that the thing was actually off -- and pulled the edges aside to take a look: the abdomen was crowded with tubes and simulacra of a stomach, rudimentary intestines, and bladder, but Hermione thought she could just wedge the documents in, if she shrunk them a bit.

One little modification first, though, she thought, and bent closer to snip apart the tube that constituted the doll's urethra. Have to give him a reason to look inside....

She shrunk the documents and wrapped them in a zip-bag to keep them waterproof, just in case François didn't get the point straight off; and then she shoved the bag in and sealed the baby back up, rather proud that the new seam didn't show at all. (She didn't dare turn it back on, though. It was terribly life-like, or as good a one as she'd ever seen, and she probably ought feel a little guilty at her panic and impatience with its crying -- even though it was simply a computer of sorts...)

It was a silly and fruitless -- though easy -- fantasy to indulge in: the doll's scanty hair was jet-black, its eyes a dark brown.... (She hadn't planned that, really. It was the first one she'd grabbed off the first shelf of dolls she'd come to, and might easily have been blue-eyed and blonde.)

"All right, you poor little sod," she told it, sighed, re-clothed and re-boxed it, finished it off with a fussy and frilly gift-wrap that she didn't really have an aptitude for, and reached for the gift-card.