GOF Chapter 30: The Pensieve
'Moody' invites Harry to enter the room - it is hard to realize, but this is late May of Harry's 4th year, and it is the second time in his life that he actually enters the headmaster's office. 'Moody' Fudge and Albus were about to leave anyway, but as Harry wants to talk to Albus the headmaster asks Harry to wait for him. And thus for the first time Harry is alone in the office. The sword of Gryffindor is there, in a glass case. Was it there before Harry's trip to the Chamber? Where is it kept when the headmaster is not a Gryffindor? Perhaps it is always in the office unless summoned via Hat by a Gryffindor in need.
Look at that! The headmaster didn't quite close that cabinet. If it isn't closed all the way it should be considered fair game right? Ooooh! A basin with runes and symbols Harry doesn't recognize! Are those runes archaic warnings? Instructions for use? 'This side up'? We'll never know. Harry can't tell if the contents are liquid or gas. Or perhaps a liquid that is emitting vapor.
Harry is cautious enough not to stick his finger in it, but prods it with his wand instead. Since his wand wasn't harmed he peers in, until eventually his nose touches the liquid and he is pulled inside. You know, there are plenty of substances that won't harm a wooden stick but in which you wouldn't want to stick your face.
When Harry sees that the Albus he finds in the basin is ignoring him he realizes he is inside a memory. Ironically 2.5 months from now present-day Albus will ignore him in that very same courtroom.
Turns out this is the hearing of Igor Karkaroff. Igor was already captured by Moody a while back, and now, after Voldemort's fall he wants to testify against other DEs in exchange for his freedom. Igor arrives accompanied by 2 dementors which place him in the chained chair. The chains glow gold and bind Igor's arms. Somewhat reminiscent of an Unbreakable Vow, but without flames.
Another familiar character - Crouch (DMLE head) is presiding over the hearing. He is looking good - fit, alert, unlined face, dark hair. He is the successful leader of the Ministry's anti-DE campaign, he is in his element. Moody is here too. Still with 2 natural eyes. He objects to letting Igor off regardless of his information.
Igor lists a total of 6 names. We are given specific accusations for 4 of them: Dolohov tortured, Mulciber Imperiurized, Travers 'helped kill' - see, one for each Unforgivable. Additionally Rookwood ran a network of spies.
Igor is unaware of events that happened after his own capture, such as Rosier's death at Moody's hands while resisting arrest. Or the fact that Dolohov was one of the 5 DEs who killed the Prewett brothers. This places Igor's arrest after the death of the McKinnons, ie no earlier than July 1981. Moody had been following him for 6 months previously, so since no earlier than January 1981. This timeline is compatible with Moody acting on a tip-off Severus gave to Albus, not too long after their hilltop meeting.
Igor has a strong motivation to tell as much as he can - his Mark has faded, he has no wish to suffer the dementors any longer. If he doesn't tell enough he might be sent back . And indeed, when he isn't certain his information is good enough he stops Crouch to add another name. But eventually he stops. So it looks like either he only knew these 6 to be still alive and about at the time of his capture or something odd is going on. Who are they and what do we know about them?
Antonin Dolohov - he was among the 'friends' who waited for Tom at the pub the night of his job interview, which makes him one of the older DEs. Was he from eastern-Europe, as his name suggests, someone who joined Tom during his years on the continent? Or was he a friend of Tom's from his school days, perhaps born to immigrants (or immigrated in childhood with his parents)? Igor accuses him of torturing Muggles and non-supporters of the Dark Lord. Are non-supporters any wizards or those who were visibly and audibly opposed to Voldemort - Order members, blood-traitors, Aurors? When he was captured he was convicted of his part in killing the Prewetts. But Igor doesn't accuse Dolohov of killing anyone. We will later meet Dolohov at the Ministry battle and later at the London cafe and the Battle of Hogwarts. At the Ministry he will cast that purple spell that will cause Hermione serious injury (but also the dancing-legs spell on Neville - the reason the prophecy record broke). In the Hogwarts battle he will kill Remus and be 'taken down' (captured? killed?) by Filius. While he may have developed the purple spell between his escape from Azkaban and the Ministry battle (he had 5 months) I tend to think this spell is from the first war. Were the Prewetts the only people he killed in that war? Or were his previous kills on raids he participated in with someone other than Igor?
Evan Rosier was killed by Moody. Presumably this is Severus' school friend Sirius mentions in chapter 27, not the older Rosier who awaited Tom at the pub. (He may also be a maternal cousin of Bellatrix's.)
OTOH, we can't tell if Mulciber is Severus' friend or the one from Tom's days. I find it interesting that Crouch knows it is the same person he already has in custody despite not being told the man's first name. Perhaps the Mulciber family is another wizarding family about to be wiped out. In any case, Igor accuses Mulciber of Imperiurizing. I guess he never killed in Igor's company either. (Though he may have forced some of his puppets to kill for him. Much creepier, as well as safer for him. We never learn what he was convicted of.) Mulciber will be seen again at the Ministry battle and never heard from again. Maybe he died during his second stay in Azkaban. Or during the 7-Potters battle.
Travers helped (Igor, of course) kill the McKinnons. We see DEs attacking in teams of 2 in DH, even when they are expecting to meet Harry, perhaps with support. But what did Travers do before July 1981? Maybe he was a new recruit. Either someone of Barty's age or someone who had been out of Hogwarts for a while and decided to join the DEs at a later time - whether because he expected them to win or because he wanted revenge on the Ministry for something - maybe Crouch's Aurors killed a friend or relative? Travers did not participate in the Ministry battle, but Kingsley mentions him as someone who was broken out by Tom before the 7-Potters battle, so he may have been one of the DEs who failed to escape from Hogwarts in HBP. Kingsley cursed him during the 7 Potter battle. He is one of the two DEs who come to arrest Harry at Xeno's and later he is present during the Gringotts adventure. The wandless Muggle-borns don't fear to approach him, suggesting he didn't have a reputation for being particularly dangerous or cruel under non-combat conditions.
Rookwood - the only useful name Igor provided. Yet enough to have Igor released, so presumably getting his spy network was considered an important achievement. In OOTP he will be the one to give Voldemort correct information about access to the prophecy records. Was that enough to win him forgiveness for the damage he caused by handing in his network? In the Ministry battle he duels with Kingsley and Percy chases him during the battle of Hogwarts, in the great Hall he is eventually stunned by Aberforth.
Then there is Severus Snape. Igor doesn't mention him at first, only when he runs out of names and still isn't sure Rookwood's would suffice. While Igor insists repeatedly that Severus really truly is a DE, he can't name a single crime Severus committed as a DE. I don't think Igor knew of any. Heck, Igor doesn't even say that the Dark Lord was preparing him to spy at Hogwarts. So in what capacity did Igor interact with Severus as DE? There is a fan theory that Severus was the DEs healer, so perhaps he treated Igor a couple of times. Which means - the DEs trusted Severus to heal them and take care of them, and he did, but then he turned around and reported them to Albus. Can you imagine how guilty he would feel about such a scenario? If true this explains why he didn't know about Rookwood - the latter was spying from his day job at the Ministry - no injuries, no need to see the DEs' secret healer.
I wonder if Igor and Severus know about their mutual betrayal (assuming it was mutual). And if so, what they really think of one another.
And what about the people Igor didn't name? Are we to understand he didn't know about Bellatrix or Lucius? Perhaps in the first war when DEs gathered they were always cloaked, masked and never addressed one another by name? And only those who worked closely together or knew each other well enough to recognize one another even while disguised had any idea about one another? If so I doubt any of the DEs in Azkaban knew about Peter/Wormtail before their arrest. Either they were muttering about an unnamed double-crosser, or they picked up the name or nickname that Sirius was muttering.
Next is Ludo Bagman's trial. This is a public event, we see Rita Skeeter reporting from it. Somewhere between the 2 events must have been Rookwood's trial, but it seems Albus wasn't interested in it today. Is the atmosphere in the courtroom cheerful because people are more willing to believe the war was over or because they were looking forward to see a popular sports figure? Hmm, Ludo was looking to end his Quidditch career in 1981, yet at the trial his nose isn't broken yet. Does this mean he returned to play for a while until a Bludger got his nose or was his nose broken when he was working at the Ministry? Maybe someone threw the book at him (sorry, Discworld reference).
The chair doesn't chain Ludo's hands, which he takes as a good sign. I suppose he wasn't considered high risk. But is this decision made by a human or by the chair itself?
The evidence stage of the trial was held already - either Albus wasn't there or he didn't think there was anything interesting there. Crouch was about to propose imprisonment "lasting no less than - " but he got cut off by an angry outcry from the crowd. Yet he insists on a vote without specifying the term. Not a good move. Not one member supports him. The jurors would rather fangirl/boy Ludo than send him to prison. However
Elkins proposed the anger to the point of shaking fists at Crouch might mean that as peace settled the jurors were getting fed up with following Crouch's dictates, that they took the opportunity to rebel against him and his harsh policies. Neither interpretation depends on the truth or falseness of the accusations against Ludo. His DE status remains an unanswered question.
The third scene was the sentencing of the quartet. Mrs Crouch is sobbing, Mr Crouch is gaunter and grayer (any theories about him being a werewolf? because that was enough to start fan theories about Draco being one after HBP). Four prisoners, six dementors. Four chairs, all of which chain their respective occupants. It was obvious the woman was Mrs Lestrange and one of the older men was her husband, but until OOTP there were many theories about the identity of the other man, until it turned out he too was a Lestrange. Looks like a ret-con, because both Sirius and Voldemort only refer to 2 Lestranges. And yes, the teenaged boy is Barty. They tortured Frank Longbottom, Auror, and later his unnamed wife. Who became Alice Longbottom, Auror, in OOTP. Maybe she trained as an Auror but didn't serve as one. Or maybe she never returned from maternity leave. Or perhaps Rowling had a bout of feminism for the course of one book. Barty screams repeatedly, denying the accusations, begging his father for mercy, his mother for protection. I note he begs not to be sent *back* to the dementors - he experienced them before Azkaban already.
When Crouch calls for a life sentence the crowd rises to applaud him. It seems he was playing his cards right - the crowd wanted toughness and that's what he gave. 'Savage triumph' - an apt description of the animalistic revenge this trial was about. Elkins' analysis is that whenever there was a sense of crisis Crouch was popular, when there was calm he lost popularity. The attack on the Longbottoms created enough of a threat for a while. Sirius thought Crouch only lost favor when his son died, but as Bagman's sentencing showed, Crouch wasn't uniformly popular earlier.
Let's not forget Mrs Lestrange's bold speech about waiting faithfully in Azkaban for Tom's return and her certainty in being rewarded by him.
In the end Crouch fully rejects his son (at least in public; in private he broke his son out of prison) - and this came to bite him, eventually.
The present day Albus rescues Harry from the Pensieve. I wonder how many later memories he would have sat through otherwise.
Harry never felt he had too many thoughts on his mind. When he tried to think (a few months ago) his head was filled with buzzing IIRC. I suppose he hasn't tried that again since? To demonstrate how the Pensieve works Albus shows a memory of Severus talking about something that was coming back, stronger and clearer than ever. I'm guessing he was confirming to Harry that Severus was indeed reporting to him? Of course as Harry has no idea what Severus is talking about I doubt the message got through (if it was intended at all).
Then Dumbles uses Bertha Jorkins' history as school gossip as lesson that curiosity, while not a sin, may lead one to harm. What Albus doesn't say is that some actions done out of curiosity (such as entering other people's memories without permission) are wrong in themselves.
BTW there were so many theories about who it was that Bertha saw kissing Florence and who later hexed her. Severus? Sirius? And who was this Florence anyway? Turns out not to have been significant. The memory was in the Pensieve because Albus was wondering about those stories about Bertha's bad memory. Still, can you imagine a student other than Harry talking to Albus about schoolyard fights?
Albus is so understanding of Harry falling asleep in class. Way to encourage academics. Harry's report of his dream is rather thorough. And I think this is the first time Albus learns of Tom's pet snake. And he gets told that Tom is planning to feed Harry to it. He also reveals to Harry that Sirius has been reporting their correspondences to him.
Albus has no more than a theory about why Harry's scar hurts. Yeah, right. The detail that most interests him is the evidence that Voldemort is at least somewhat corporeal.
There were many disappearances during Tom's first rise, there were 3 disappearances this year. Albus found out about Bryce's disappearance from the Muggle press, he is so open-minded. Or perhaps he knew where to look when Sirius reported to him Harry's scar hurt sometime in late August. (Note that Albus knew about Little Hangleton. I wonder why he didn't find Tom's ring. Is it because when he conducted his research the ring hadn't been placed there yet? If true then I want to know why Albus did not call the Aurors to his interview with Tom.)
Harry never asked Neville about his family, despite the shared fate of not being raised by one's parents. No, he isn't self-centered, he was respecting Neville's privacy, that's what. Really!
Were the Longbottoms popular as teenagers, like James and Lily? Or was their popularity the result of their activity as Aurors?
Oh the mysteries: Was Barty really guilty? Was Ludo a DE? And why does Albus trust Severus?
--------------
What can we learn from Albus' choice of memories about his understanding of the unfolding events? By now he knows there is a plot that has to do both with Voldemort becoming stronger and with Harry's participation in the Tournament. Someone involved with the plot was at Hogwarts at least twice - to put Harry's name in the Goblet and to kill Crouch. He may have worked out that Crouch had been under Imperius - he might have entered Harry's name while under the curse, but someone else killed him. Harry reported Crouch mentioned Bertha Jorkins as well as his son. Did Albus already suspect Barty Jr was alive? Then there's Igor - was he really planning to escape as it appears from his exchanges with Severus or is he trying to return to Voldemort (while also testing Severus' loyalty)? Or perhaps Ludo was really a DE who is now bringing Tom back?
Since Harry was pulled out of the Pensieve we don't know what other possibilities Albus was considering, but we do see him adding memories. Some other options he might have thought of:
- Voldemort was controlling a staff member or one of the older students - perhaps via an object like the diary or like the coin Draco will use for Rosmerta.
- Voldemort's agent was an Animagus who was spending most of hir time in animal form
- Voldemort's agent was spending much of hir time invisible (or just hidden by more conventional means). The 2 times the agent definitely acted s/he remained unseen.
- And yes, maybe the agent is using Polyjuice - after all, Albus probably received a report from Sirius that someone broke into Severus' office. However, he does not know if the agent is impersonating one person all the time or only the few times s/he has to be in the open. Or perhaps s/he is impersonating different people at different times. It certainly would have been helpful to have that 'thief's downfall' the goblins use in Gringotts in DH to remove all disguises.
Look at that! The headmaster didn't quite close that cabinet. If it isn't closed all the way it should be considered fair game right? Ooooh! A basin with runes and symbols Harry doesn't recognize! Are those runes archaic warnings? Instructions for use? 'This side up'? We'll never know. Harry can't tell if the contents are liquid or gas. Or perhaps a liquid that is emitting vapor.
Harry is cautious enough not to stick his finger in it, but prods it with his wand instead. Since his wand wasn't harmed he peers in, until eventually his nose touches the liquid and he is pulled inside. You know, there are plenty of substances that won't harm a wooden stick but in which you wouldn't want to stick your face.
When Harry sees that the Albus he finds in the basin is ignoring him he realizes he is inside a memory. Ironically 2.5 months from now present-day Albus will ignore him in that very same courtroom.
Turns out this is the hearing of Igor Karkaroff. Igor was already captured by Moody a while back, and now, after Voldemort's fall he wants to testify against other DEs in exchange for his freedom. Igor arrives accompanied by 2 dementors which place him in the chained chair. The chains glow gold and bind Igor's arms. Somewhat reminiscent of an Unbreakable Vow, but without flames.
Another familiar character - Crouch (DMLE head) is presiding over the hearing. He is looking good - fit, alert, unlined face, dark hair. He is the successful leader of the Ministry's anti-DE campaign, he is in his element. Moody is here too. Still with 2 natural eyes. He objects to letting Igor off regardless of his information.
Igor lists a total of 6 names. We are given specific accusations for 4 of them: Dolohov tortured, Mulciber Imperiurized, Travers 'helped kill' - see, one for each Unforgivable. Additionally Rookwood ran a network of spies.
Igor is unaware of events that happened after his own capture, such as Rosier's death at Moody's hands while resisting arrest. Or the fact that Dolohov was one of the 5 DEs who killed the Prewett brothers. This places Igor's arrest after the death of the McKinnons, ie no earlier than July 1981. Moody had been following him for 6 months previously, so since no earlier than January 1981. This timeline is compatible with Moody acting on a tip-off Severus gave to Albus, not too long after their hilltop meeting.
Igor has a strong motivation to tell as much as he can - his Mark has faded, he has no wish to suffer the dementors any longer. If he doesn't tell enough he might be sent back . And indeed, when he isn't certain his information is good enough he stops Crouch to add another name. But eventually he stops. So it looks like either he only knew these 6 to be still alive and about at the time of his capture or something odd is going on. Who are they and what do we know about them?
Antonin Dolohov - he was among the 'friends' who waited for Tom at the pub the night of his job interview, which makes him one of the older DEs. Was he from eastern-Europe, as his name suggests, someone who joined Tom during his years on the continent? Or was he a friend of Tom's from his school days, perhaps born to immigrants (or immigrated in childhood with his parents)? Igor accuses him of torturing Muggles and non-supporters of the Dark Lord. Are non-supporters any wizards or those who were visibly and audibly opposed to Voldemort - Order members, blood-traitors, Aurors? When he was captured he was convicted of his part in killing the Prewetts. But Igor doesn't accuse Dolohov of killing anyone. We will later meet Dolohov at the Ministry battle and later at the London cafe and the Battle of Hogwarts. At the Ministry he will cast that purple spell that will cause Hermione serious injury (but also the dancing-legs spell on Neville - the reason the prophecy record broke). In the Hogwarts battle he will kill Remus and be 'taken down' (captured? killed?) by Filius. While he may have developed the purple spell between his escape from Azkaban and the Ministry battle (he had 5 months) I tend to think this spell is from the first war. Were the Prewetts the only people he killed in that war? Or were his previous kills on raids he participated in with someone other than Igor?
Evan Rosier was killed by Moody. Presumably this is Severus' school friend Sirius mentions in chapter 27, not the older Rosier who awaited Tom at the pub. (He may also be a maternal cousin of Bellatrix's.)
OTOH, we can't tell if Mulciber is Severus' friend or the one from Tom's days. I find it interesting that Crouch knows it is the same person he already has in custody despite not being told the man's first name. Perhaps the Mulciber family is another wizarding family about to be wiped out. In any case, Igor accuses Mulciber of Imperiurizing. I guess he never killed in Igor's company either. (Though he may have forced some of his puppets to kill for him. Much creepier, as well as safer for him. We never learn what he was convicted of.) Mulciber will be seen again at the Ministry battle and never heard from again. Maybe he died during his second stay in Azkaban. Or during the 7-Potters battle.
Travers helped (Igor, of course) kill the McKinnons. We see DEs attacking in teams of 2 in DH, even when they are expecting to meet Harry, perhaps with support. But what did Travers do before July 1981? Maybe he was a new recruit. Either someone of Barty's age or someone who had been out of Hogwarts for a while and decided to join the DEs at a later time - whether because he expected them to win or because he wanted revenge on the Ministry for something - maybe Crouch's Aurors killed a friend or relative? Travers did not participate in the Ministry battle, but Kingsley mentions him as someone who was broken out by Tom before the 7-Potters battle, so he may have been one of the DEs who failed to escape from Hogwarts in HBP. Kingsley cursed him during the 7 Potter battle. He is one of the two DEs who come to arrest Harry at Xeno's and later he is present during the Gringotts adventure. The wandless Muggle-borns don't fear to approach him, suggesting he didn't have a reputation for being particularly dangerous or cruel under non-combat conditions.
Rookwood - the only useful name Igor provided. Yet enough to have Igor released, so presumably getting his spy network was considered an important achievement. In OOTP he will be the one to give Voldemort correct information about access to the prophecy records. Was that enough to win him forgiveness for the damage he caused by handing in his network? In the Ministry battle he duels with Kingsley and Percy chases him during the battle of Hogwarts, in the great Hall he is eventually stunned by Aberforth.
Then there is Severus Snape. Igor doesn't mention him at first, only when he runs out of names and still isn't sure Rookwood's would suffice. While Igor insists repeatedly that Severus really truly is a DE, he can't name a single crime Severus committed as a DE. I don't think Igor knew of any. Heck, Igor doesn't even say that the Dark Lord was preparing him to spy at Hogwarts. So in what capacity did Igor interact with Severus as DE? There is a fan theory that Severus was the DEs healer, so perhaps he treated Igor a couple of times. Which means - the DEs trusted Severus to heal them and take care of them, and he did, but then he turned around and reported them to Albus. Can you imagine how guilty he would feel about such a scenario? If true this explains why he didn't know about Rookwood - the latter was spying from his day job at the Ministry - no injuries, no need to see the DEs' secret healer.
I wonder if Igor and Severus know about their mutual betrayal (assuming it was mutual). And if so, what they really think of one another.
And what about the people Igor didn't name? Are we to understand he didn't know about Bellatrix or Lucius? Perhaps in the first war when DEs gathered they were always cloaked, masked and never addressed one another by name? And only those who worked closely together or knew each other well enough to recognize one another even while disguised had any idea about one another? If so I doubt any of the DEs in Azkaban knew about Peter/Wormtail before their arrest. Either they were muttering about an unnamed double-crosser, or they picked up the name or nickname that Sirius was muttering.
Next is Ludo Bagman's trial. This is a public event, we see Rita Skeeter reporting from it. Somewhere between the 2 events must have been Rookwood's trial, but it seems Albus wasn't interested in it today. Is the atmosphere in the courtroom cheerful because people are more willing to believe the war was over or because they were looking forward to see a popular sports figure? Hmm, Ludo was looking to end his Quidditch career in 1981, yet at the trial his nose isn't broken yet. Does this mean he returned to play for a while until a Bludger got his nose or was his nose broken when he was working at the Ministry? Maybe someone threw the book at him (sorry, Discworld reference).
The chair doesn't chain Ludo's hands, which he takes as a good sign. I suppose he wasn't considered high risk. But is this decision made by a human or by the chair itself?
The evidence stage of the trial was held already - either Albus wasn't there or he didn't think there was anything interesting there. Crouch was about to propose imprisonment "lasting no less than - " but he got cut off by an angry outcry from the crowd. Yet he insists on a vote without specifying the term. Not a good move. Not one member supports him. The jurors would rather fangirl/boy Ludo than send him to prison. However
Elkins proposed the anger to the point of shaking fists at Crouch might mean that as peace settled the jurors were getting fed up with following Crouch's dictates, that they took the opportunity to rebel against him and his harsh policies. Neither interpretation depends on the truth or falseness of the accusations against Ludo. His DE status remains an unanswered question.
The third scene was the sentencing of the quartet. Mrs Crouch is sobbing, Mr Crouch is gaunter and grayer (any theories about him being a werewolf? because that was enough to start fan theories about Draco being one after HBP). Four prisoners, six dementors. Four chairs, all of which chain their respective occupants. It was obvious the woman was Mrs Lestrange and one of the older men was her husband, but until OOTP there were many theories about the identity of the other man, until it turned out he too was a Lestrange. Looks like a ret-con, because both Sirius and Voldemort only refer to 2 Lestranges. And yes, the teenaged boy is Barty. They tortured Frank Longbottom, Auror, and later his unnamed wife. Who became Alice Longbottom, Auror, in OOTP. Maybe she trained as an Auror but didn't serve as one. Or maybe she never returned from maternity leave. Or perhaps Rowling had a bout of feminism for the course of one book. Barty screams repeatedly, denying the accusations, begging his father for mercy, his mother for protection. I note he begs not to be sent *back* to the dementors - he experienced them before Azkaban already.
When Crouch calls for a life sentence the crowd rises to applaud him. It seems he was playing his cards right - the crowd wanted toughness and that's what he gave. 'Savage triumph' - an apt description of the animalistic revenge this trial was about. Elkins' analysis is that whenever there was a sense of crisis Crouch was popular, when there was calm he lost popularity. The attack on the Longbottoms created enough of a threat for a while. Sirius thought Crouch only lost favor when his son died, but as Bagman's sentencing showed, Crouch wasn't uniformly popular earlier.
Let's not forget Mrs Lestrange's bold speech about waiting faithfully in Azkaban for Tom's return and her certainty in being rewarded by him.
In the end Crouch fully rejects his son (at least in public; in private he broke his son out of prison) - and this came to bite him, eventually.
The present day Albus rescues Harry from the Pensieve. I wonder how many later memories he would have sat through otherwise.
Harry never felt he had too many thoughts on his mind. When he tried to think (a few months ago) his head was filled with buzzing IIRC. I suppose he hasn't tried that again since? To demonstrate how the Pensieve works Albus shows a memory of Severus talking about something that was coming back, stronger and clearer than ever. I'm guessing he was confirming to Harry that Severus was indeed reporting to him? Of course as Harry has no idea what Severus is talking about I doubt the message got through (if it was intended at all).
Then Dumbles uses Bertha Jorkins' history as school gossip as lesson that curiosity, while not a sin, may lead one to harm. What Albus doesn't say is that some actions done out of curiosity (such as entering other people's memories without permission) are wrong in themselves.
BTW there were so many theories about who it was that Bertha saw kissing Florence and who later hexed her. Severus? Sirius? And who was this Florence anyway? Turns out not to have been significant. The memory was in the Pensieve because Albus was wondering about those stories about Bertha's bad memory. Still, can you imagine a student other than Harry talking to Albus about schoolyard fights?
Albus is so understanding of Harry falling asleep in class. Way to encourage academics. Harry's report of his dream is rather thorough. And I think this is the first time Albus learns of Tom's pet snake. And he gets told that Tom is planning to feed Harry to it. He also reveals to Harry that Sirius has been reporting their correspondences to him.
Albus has no more than a theory about why Harry's scar hurts. Yeah, right. The detail that most interests him is the evidence that Voldemort is at least somewhat corporeal.
There were many disappearances during Tom's first rise, there were 3 disappearances this year. Albus found out about Bryce's disappearance from the Muggle press, he is so open-minded. Or perhaps he knew where to look when Sirius reported to him Harry's scar hurt sometime in late August. (Note that Albus knew about Little Hangleton. I wonder why he didn't find Tom's ring. Is it because when he conducted his research the ring hadn't been placed there yet? If true then I want to know why Albus did not call the Aurors to his interview with Tom.)
Harry never asked Neville about his family, despite the shared fate of not being raised by one's parents. No, he isn't self-centered, he was respecting Neville's privacy, that's what. Really!
Were the Longbottoms popular as teenagers, like James and Lily? Or was their popularity the result of their activity as Aurors?
Oh the mysteries: Was Barty really guilty? Was Ludo a DE? And why does Albus trust Severus?
--------------
What can we learn from Albus' choice of memories about his understanding of the unfolding events? By now he knows there is a plot that has to do both with Voldemort becoming stronger and with Harry's participation in the Tournament. Someone involved with the plot was at Hogwarts at least twice - to put Harry's name in the Goblet and to kill Crouch. He may have worked out that Crouch had been under Imperius - he might have entered Harry's name while under the curse, but someone else killed him. Harry reported Crouch mentioned Bertha Jorkins as well as his son. Did Albus already suspect Barty Jr was alive? Then there's Igor - was he really planning to escape as it appears from his exchanges with Severus or is he trying to return to Voldemort (while also testing Severus' loyalty)? Or perhaps Ludo was really a DE who is now bringing Tom back?
Since Harry was pulled out of the Pensieve we don't know what other possibilities Albus was considering, but we do see him adding memories. Some other options he might have thought of:
- Voldemort was controlling a staff member or one of the older students - perhaps via an object like the diary or like the coin Draco will use for Rosmerta.
- Voldemort's agent was an Animagus who was spending most of hir time in animal form
- Voldemort's agent was spending much of hir time invisible (or just hidden by more conventional means). The 2 times the agent definitely acted s/he remained unseen.
- And yes, maybe the agent is using Polyjuice - after all, Albus probably received a report from Sirius that someone broke into Severus' office. However, he does not know if the agent is impersonating one person all the time or only the few times s/he has to be in the open. Or perhaps s/he is impersonating different people at different times. It certainly would have been helpful to have that 'thief's downfall' the goblins use in Gringotts in DH to remove all disguises.