[NTLJ] 9. Clearing the Decks
Chapter Summary: In which Tonks has to explain events to her boss, and the Aurors prepare for the World Cup .
Length: 10,050 words
9. Clearing the Decks
Tuesday August 18th 1994
Tonks and Cassius took the opportunity to search the house as thoroughly as possible while their suspect was knocked out. However, although they uncovered plenty of evidence of minor criminal activity and one surprisingly well-painted old portrait (quite possibly nicked, thought Tonks cynically as she made a quick but fruitless check behind it for secret compartments), there was nothing to suggest any particular connection to illegal potion pushers. The search did, however, reveal the man's name -- the rather grandiloquent Sylvester Ballantyne -- and when they looked up his record, it was rather reminiscent of that of Benjamin Farley. There were several convictions for trading in stolen goods, and one for hexing somebody into St Mungo's during a fight, but nothing of major import.
Tonks was rather hoping that Ballantyne might tell them something useful when they brought him back, although Cassius wasn't optimistic -- and unfortunately. the interrogation went much as he'd expected. Their prisoner simply sat tight and refused to say anything helpful as they demanded to know if he had any connection to Farley, the Blackstocks, Arkwright -- or for that matter, anyone else they could think of vaguely connected to the case. Tonks found it frustrating, but Cassius seemed to take it calmly, as if this were only to be expected.
They were on surer ground with the assault charges on the Aurors, and here they did appear to have Ballantyne worried. After all, blanket denial wasn't going to get him anywhere when they all knew they had solid evidence against him. But the questioning still seemed to Tonks to be going round in circles.
"... So why did you attack me?"
"It was self-defence."
"Right. You ran into that courtyard firing Stunners before I even saw you. How is that self-defence?"
"Well, you were holding someone at wandpoint, love. You might have been robbing them. Can't be too careful, can you?"
"But why follow me in the first place?"
"Didn't like the look of you. You went out the pub with a bloke I knew -- only by sight though -- and I thought I'd better keep an eye out and watch his back. Friendly gesture, like."
"And did you Stun my partner here from behind?"
"Don't know who did that. Lots of rough people about, aren't there? He needs to be more careful too."
"And why did you bring along two mates?"
"You always want to have backup."
"Who were they?"
"Can't tell you that. Don't see why they should get into trouble just for ... doing their civic duty like me."
"So if you were all just 'doing your civic duty' why did you run away when the other Aurors arrived?"
"Because you were all attacking me. It was self-defence ..."
After the fourth or fifth round of this, during which Tonks had been scowling ever more obviously, Cassius caught her eye and motioned to her to step out of the interview room. She gave him frustrated glances as she followed him back into the main office and threw herself into the cubicle chair. He sat down more sedately and contemplated her with slight amusement.
"We're not getting anywhere at all with him, are we?" she said in exasperation.
"Not really."
"Do you know him? He seemed to know you back at the pub."
He shook his head. "He doesn't ring a bell, but I'm not too surprised. I was quite well known among the criminal fraternity by the time I retired, just because I'd been in the job for so long. I've seen so many crooks over the years, I don't really remember each one individually unless they stand out in some way. And to put it as tactfully as possible, our Mr Ballantyne doesn't seem the standing out type."
He pursed his lips thoughtfully. "You know, I don't think it's yet sunk in with him quite how much trouble he's in? Assaulting an Auror is a serious charge, and he's never had to face one of those -- nothing likely to carry a long sentence in Azkaban, anyway." An expression of distaste passed across his face at that. "He seems to think this 'self-defence' defence will work -- but frankly, if he tries that in front of the court they'll laugh at him. Especially once they've been shown his record. It's not as if you looked all that threatening dressed up as Beatrice Easton."
"Maybe someone should tell him that. We don't have to let him see a legal representative until we actually charge him with something, do we?"
"Not unless we hold him more than a week." He paused, obviously thinking hard. "And maybe we shouldn't yet -- he may not know the sentencing possibilities. We may be able to put the wind up him a bit."
Tonks stifled a groan. Another thing to add to my ever-growing list of Things I'm Supposed To Know And Will Really Have To Look Up Sometime. "So what are the sentencing possibilities then?"
"Assault on an Auror? Azkaban technically, although in cases like this where there was no real damage done, possibly just a big fine. But he doesn't necessarily have to know that. And if it appears that he was helping out a serious criminal -- and I think our Jacmel seller qualifies as that -- he's looking at the Rock for a while again. That should give us some leverage."
Tonks looked at Cassius curiously, wondering why she found it surprising that there was a genuine Auror hardness beneath the friendly exterior. She hoped she wasn't going to harden too much; Cassius seemed to have struck a reasonable balance, but she didn't want to end up like ... well, Scrimgeour for example. She shuddered. That was an interview she wasn't looking forward to without something to show for their exertions.. "What about the report on that sample?" she asked. "If it was really Jacmel in that Firewhisky, won't that be good leverage?"
"Yes, if we have the report yet." He rummaged around in the in-tray and found a memo, and as he read it a grin spread across his face. "Well now, young lady, we have a catch. The potions chappies in Magical Analysis are sure -- 100% certain, no doubt in their minds -- that there was a good solid dose of the Liquor of Jacmel in that drink, and if you hadn't Transfigured your way out of it, you'd have been in every bit as much trouble as that fellow thought you were." He stood up quickly and waved the parchment at her. "Let's see what we can do with this."
*****
Tonks was quite happy to let Cassius fly with the Quaffle on this one, and simply sat back to watch and be impressed as he cheerfully explained to Ballantyne about the horrible penalties involved in cases of this kind, and the terrors of the Dementors of Azkaban. She was observing him closely, and there seemed to be a definite distaste behind the enthusiasm when he talked about them -- but she was sure Ballantyne wouldn't notice, especially as he was growing increasingly alarmed.
Cassius sat back with a smile; his body language reminding Tonks of a cat who has played with a mouse for a while and now prepares to close in for the kill. "Now then, old chap," he said in a friendly tone, "of course it doesn't have to be like this."
"No?" said the wizard warily. Cassius smiled again. Tonks concentrated on looking stern while she waited for the outcome.
"No. You can of course carry on with this 'it was all self-defence' story, but I don't think the court will find your explanation of why you were there and fighting too convincing. Especially as you say you don't even know who this man was. Not really very plausible, is it? It's the sort of thing that annoys them. Gets them to throw the book at you on the charges we do have -- and let's face it, on the assault charges we do have you -- er, 'bang to rights' is the phrase, I believe. But of course if you were to help us find the man we were looking for in the first place -- well, we might overlook quite a lot of things in that case. Something to think about, isn't it?"
The man's eyes looked shifty. "Suppose I did know him, Smethwyck -- which I don't. Why would I rat him out to you?"
"That would be self-defence." Tonks surprised herself by butting in. She realised she was using the Bad Auror tone she'd used on Easton and grimaced slightly. Cassius smiled pleasantly again.
"I think my colleague here is right. I couldn't have put it better myself."
Ballantyne stared at them. His face had a trapped look. "I need to see a legal representative," he said abruptly
Cassius raised his eyebrows. "But we haven't charged you with anything yet, Mr Ballantyne." When this produced no response except a sullen look, he smiled again. "Look, why don't we leave you to think about it for a bit?" That's in the Auror manuals, thought Tonks suddenly. In interrogations, pressure must be continuous -- but to persuade, you have to give them time out to reason with themselves and consider telling you what you want to know. They rose and motioned to the guards to take Ballantyne back to the holding cell. He looked at them sourly as he left the room.
"Do you think he'll decide to talk?" she asked Cassius abruptly as they returned to their desks again to write up the interview report.
"Can't tell," said Cassius thoughtfully. "It depends how strong his ties really are. Give him time to chew it over ... sad to say, a lot of people in custody do rat out their friends, unless they're too scared. Even sadder, a lot of them don't."
"Right." A memo flew into Tonks' in-tray, but it wasn't on the usual pale violet enchanted paper. This one was bright red, which she knew meant urgent. She picked it up, read it, and blanched.
"Bad news?" asked Cassius.
"Scrimgeour," she said tersely. "He wants to see me right away."
*****
Tonks approached the door to Scrimgeour's office with a feeling that she at first tentatively put down as trepidation, then with a grimace identified more accurately as sheer panic. On the couple of previous occasions she'd been in here -- her first day, and when she'd told him about her parents' offer of help with the portrait from Gringotts -- he'd actually been quite pleased with her. It looked as if it was going to be third time unlucky.
She took a deep breath, raised her hand to knock on the door, then paused with a nagging feeling that she'd forgotten something. Then it dawned on her; when she'd changed back from impersonating Ballantyne's postman, she'd chosen her favourite pink-and-spiky hairstyle without giving much thought to the matter. She wasn't willing to bet a bent Knut that it would go down well with Scrimgeour in a bad mood, so she screwed up her face and changed to her natural mousy brown, then braced herself and rapped on the door quickly, a little more forcefully than she'd really intended.
"Come!" The voice from within the office was as brusque as ever. She opened it tentatively and went in.
"Sit," he said, indicating a chair with a wave of his hand. Tonks sat, with slight surprise, mildly relieved that he'd given up the psychological advantage of keeping her standing while he berated her, and wondering why. She got her answer when he stood up, walked round the front of the desk, and stood towering over her instead with a very cold expression.
"Well?"
"Sir?" She didn't feel like making the first move.
For an answer, he slammed his fist down on the desk, and she jumped. His face hardened still further. "Don't play games, Auror. I don't appreciate it. Explain to me exactly why you thought it was a good idea to follow a man selling Class A Non-Tradeable Substances into a den of his own choosing when you could have arrested him."
Tonks gulped. "I -- er --"
"Spit it out, Auror! I have limited tolerance for listening to this kind of thing."
She forced herself to speak in a voice that was as calm as she could make it. "I just thought ... we didn't have much information ...if I brought him in straight away, he wouldn't talk, and we wouldn't get anywhere for weeks while his associates had time to get away ..." She trailed off as she caught sight of his expression, which hadn't softened in the slightest. "I, er, thought that maybe if I jollied him along a bit he might say something incriminating -- if he was working for anyone else, perhaps -- and I could always arrest him any time if he didn't ... I mean I thought I'd be OK with Cassius watching my back ... I didn't think he'd be knocked out ..."
"Wrong," interrupted Scrimgeour, cutting her off and leaving her looking slightly foolish. His words were being fired out with the force of curses. "You didn't think at all, Auror. You spent days preparing for a golden opportunity to catch the piece of filth red-handed, and then you tossed it all away flying by the seat of your robes!"
"I ... well, I thought ... show a bit of initiative ..."
"Don't spout catch-phrases at me," said Scrimgeour in a dangerous voice. "I like to see initiative in my Aurors at the right time, but this wasn't it. This was just a routine arrest that you screwed up by getting cocky. What did you seriously expect to get from him in one little walk in the moonlight? A signed confession on lavender-scented parchment? With the evidence of that bottle in your pocket the Wizengamot would have entered a guilty verdict without a second thought, and if he is just a middleman, we'd have had a possible ten-year sentence in Azkaban to use as leverage. And now he's vanished into the shadows again, just because one new Auror still wet behind the ears thought she knew what she was doing!"
Tonks swallowed, trying to think of a reply that wouldn't get her head bitten off. A mere "sorry" didn't seem likely to be adequate. "You're right, sir," she said quietly, looking down at her hands. She didn't dare to catch his eye again. It seemed to be a reasonable start, though; he gave her some space to go on (and unfortunately, when it came right down to it, he was right). She took another deep breath and tried not to let herself lapse into insincerity. "I ... I ... I stepped out of my depth. When I got a few lucky breaks early on, I thought ... er, I didn't think about the pitfalls." She risked raising her head to look at him directly. "Yes, I messed up, sir. I know that. I ... I don't have a good excuse. Please ... just give me a chance to learn from this and ... get it right next time?"
Scrimgeour looked at her without a trace of a smile, but when he spoke, his tone of voice was at least very slightly less biting. "You'll get another chance, because you are new and inexperienced, and because your skills are a good fit for this investigation, and because, frankly, I don't have so many staff to spare at the moment that I can pull them off a case for one mistake. Be warned, Auror Tonks. You have been fortunate, or unfortunate, enough to have been assigned straight from training to what turns out to be a serious investigation. An investigation that I am now raising the status of, given these latest developments. The best way -- no, make that the only way -- that you can mollify me is to get results on it. But any more major blunders like this, any more attempts to conduct your own personal private investigations, and you'll be spending your next year on duty guarding the Minister's teacups. Understood?"
Tonks could feel her heart rise into her mouth. "Yes sir," she said as firmly as possible.
"Very well. Now what did chummy have to say for himself?"
"Sir?" said Tonks again, in surprise at the abrupt change of subject.
"Your prisoner, Auror. The one you have got, which is something retrieved from the wreckage, at least. What has he said?"
"Oh, ah ... nothing much yet," said Tonks reluctantly. "He claims he was just helping out someone he knew. Cassius gave him the line about how he could get out of some of the trouble he was in if he co-operated, but he didn't say anything right away. We left him to think it over for a bit."
"Good. Right, back to work with you then. And send Smethwyck in here. I want a word with him too."
"Yes sir." Tonks leapt up with alacrity -- she'd expected the grilling to last a lot longer -- and had to consciously restrain herself from actually running across the room back to her desk. She didn't like the sound of Scrimgeour's final comment, and from the look on Cassius' face when she passed it on, neither did he.
"See you later, Tonks," he said in a gloomy voice as he left, nodding at Rhiannon Davies, who was just arriving. She dropped into the chair he had vacated and looked at Tonks with a mixture of amusement and sympathy.
"Been having a cosy chat with old Scrimgeour?" she said.
"Ha ha," said Tonks feebly, still chastened.
"Never mind, love," said Rhiannon. "We've all done something like that. You know -- unbelievably stupid." She grinned. "Welcome to the club. When I started around here, they told me there are only three key things you need to remember: don't leave your partner behind, stay on the right side of the boss, and never play cards for money against Mad-Eye Moody. You seem to have done your best to ignore them."
Tonks chuckled nervously. "Um, two out of three's not bad? I've never even met Moody."
"That's because he's retired. Then again, if you suggested a quick game of three-card brag to him these days, he'd probably think you'd jinxed the cards to explode. I heard a rumour he was going into teaching at Hogwarts. Poor little sods won't know what's hit them."
"Probably half the spells in Curses and Counter-Curses by the sound of it!" Now that Tonks had managed to get past the actual interview, she was beginning to recover a little. She was also trying very hard to think of any way to get the case back on track again. "Hey, Rhi," she said, as a possibility occurred to her, "can we access the ticket list for the World Cup, do you think?"
"Yes, via the WEB Access." Seeing Tonks' look of surprise that she could answer this straight away, she explained: "Donnie asked me to check the position of his seat a couple of days ago. There's actually a complete seating plan that any of the security staff can access."
Tonks perked up a bit. "Right. In that case, I'm going to look up the Blackstocks."
The WEB Access proved to contain not only an attendance list, but even a map of the campsites and the known bookings. Tonks found the Blackstock reservations after only a short search; they were in prime positions among the really expensive seats, and were 'camping out' (Tonks doubted that they would actually be roughing it) in an area set aside for upmarket tents. She breathed a sight of relief; it looked as if O'Gregan had analysed the situation correctly, and Archibald Blackstock really was making sure that his family were seen in the places expected of socially ambitious wizards.
As she flicked through the seat listing to see who else might be nearby, to her surprise she caught sight of what looked like a sizeable Smethwyck family block. Well, well, Cassius, she thought, raising her eyebrows. I didn't know you were that well off, you lucky sod.
Since she was there, she looked up the name of Ashford. Mackenzie himself wasn't going, as far as she could see; she couldn't really blame him under the circumstances, as a public event like the World Cup would be an ideal opportunity for someone to take another pot shot at him. But among the cheaper seats, there was an early block booking of four, listed as 'Michael Ashford and partner, Abigail Ashford, Charlotte Perks'.
The last name made her pause for a moment until she remembered that this was Ashford's other niece. She shook her head guiltily; she'd left the nephew and nieces to O'Gregan and Cornworthy to deal with, and their names had barely even registered. To be fair, she and Cassius had concentrated on the Beatrice Easton angle, but Tonks suspected that he'd probably kept himself fully up to date on the other details of the case. She grimaced; she was definitely going to have to buck her ideas up if she didn't want to end up guarding teacups (or whatever tedious task errant Aurors really ended up doing).
She made a note of the seat numbers and checked to see if they had a booking for the campsite as well, in the hope that she might be able to kill two pixies with one curse and take a look at their suspects while she was on guard duty. Her luck was in; their names were listed in the outlying areas -- in fact, according to the note on the booking sheet, as the holders of cheap tickets they would already have to be on the campsite. Tonks perked up; that should at least keep them out of mischief until the World Cup was over -- if, of course, they were really planning any.
She got up to find Shacklebolt standing behind her, patiently waiting to use the WEB Access and watching her with a thoughtful expression.
"Had a slight setback, I hear?" he said with a half-smile that Tonks thought looked as if it might break out into a smirk before too long. For some reason, it touched a nerve.
"Yes, that's right," she said, putting as much biting sarcasm into her voice as she could manage. "Of course, a cheap little criminal like me wouldn't want to actually catch anyone, would she? Isn't that what you think?"
"Now just a minute," he said, spluttering in indignation. "I never said you're a ..."
She interrupted him, glad of a chance to work off a little of the frustration that had been building up in her ever since the previous night. "If you've come to see if Sirius Black has booked a seat in the VIP Section, the answer's no. But don't take my word for it, will you, Kingsley?" She strode off, leaving him behind to fume.
*****
She found Cassius chatting to Rhiannon and looking rather chagrined. He made a face as Tonks joined them. "That wasn't one of the more pleasant interviews of my career."
"What did he say?" asked Tonks in consternation, her Shacklebolt-induced anger rapidly dissipating.
"Quite a lot. Mostly on the subject of watching my back and not letting novices wander off on their own," he explained ruefully. "The worst of it is, he's perfectly right. And I think he makes the point a bit more forcefully with me because he knows I can remember him when he was a novice himself, back in the early 1950s."
Tonks coloured slightly, feeling terrible again. "Oops. Sorry. No, I really am, Cassius, look -- "
He held up a hand to cut her off. "Never mind that for the moment, Tonks. We still have a case to deal with, yes? The most interesting news on that front is that he's stepping up the investigation to a Priority B and combining it with the Ashford case."
Tonks raised her eyebrows. If Scrimgeour now thought this case was a Priority B, it looked as if he were finally starting to take it seriously. As far as she could remember, the only current Priority A case was the hunt for Sirius Black -- not something she really wanted to think about
"We're supposed to work closely with Donnacha and Arnold --" again he held up a hand "-- yes, I know we're doing that already, but now it's official. He's also allocated us some of Rhiannon's time if we need it, so we can call on her when she's not needed for her Muggle-killing case." Rhiannon smiled at Tonks' look of surprise.
"Great! How's that going, Rhi?"
She shrugged. "It isn't. We haven't had a new incident for a couple of months. Maybe he's been lying low, or out of the country. Or maybe he's too caught up in World Cup fever to bother, just like the rest of us. Of course, if we've any luck he'll have tripped over his robes and broken his neck, but I'm not optimistic. Anyway, I'm at your disposal until we get either another incident or a new lead. Well, at Cassius' disposal -- he's co-ordinating."
"Yeah?" Tonks was intrigued by this. "Scrimgeour couldn't have been too angry, then?"
"A matter of seniority, perhaps," said Cassius. "Or maybe he just thinks the rest of you have more important things to do." He shook himself. "Never mind. Rhiannon, can you ask Donnacha and Arnold to meet us tomorrow morning at eleven so we can plan our strategy? I'll book a conference room."
"Sure, Cassius," said Rhiannon. She winked at Tonks and walked away.
"Very well then. As of the weekend, all of us except Arnold will be away from work for anything up to a week, so we should be clearing the decks of as much as possible beforehand," he said briskly. "I think we need to review everything we have so far and plan out what we're going to do next in detail, that's why I'm calling the meeting. We've had a setback, but we still have a number of avenues open to us."
"Sorry," said Tonks again in a small voice. She didn't seem to be able to stop apologising today.
He looked at her thoughtfully. "Apologies needed and accepted, but there's no need to keep making them," he said. "Just learn from the experience, that's all I ask. I'd have preferred to teach you the tricks of the trade at a more leisurely pace, but we're so short-staffed we don't have that luxury."
Tonks looked at him curiously. "That's what Scrimgeour said, more or less. Is it because of the World Cup?"
Cassius snorted. "That doesn't help, but the underlying problem is that the Department is having real trouble getting hold of qualified trainees. If it gets any worse they might have to reduce the entry requirements, or start promoting from the Magical Law Enforcement Patrol again."
"You're kidding!"
"I wish I was. Heaven help us if we have a major crisis in the next few years. As it is, they have to draft in all sorts of people from other departments to assist when there's a problem -- the way they did when Sirius Black escaped." Tonks winced, but Cassius didn't seem to notice. "I expect that's why they were willing to let me rejoin. Only three new Aurors actually made it through from your class to be added to the ranks."
Tonks nodded. "I know. I see the other two about the place from time to time. But to be fair, that was only because they put some foreign trainees in the class to help out the smaller overseas Ministries ... oh."
"Yes, oh. It was the only way they could get enough candidates to make it viable to run the course. I wondered at one point if they'd insist I took part, instead of just sitting at the back from time to time making notes on what had changed. In fact, I don't think they've actually started a new course since your group began -- not enough suitable applicants."
"Bloody hell, I didn't realise." It suddenly struck Tonks that in the excitement of starting the job, she'd rather lost touch with the people who'd been on the course with her, apart from the occasional brief chat in passing. "So what are Al and Bob doing then? Er, sorry, Jenkins and Parsons? They always look busy when I see them."
"Just routine work, as far as I know. In a way, you were a bit unlucky to be dropped straight into a significant case without having a chance to cut your teeth on something smaller first."
"Scrimgeour said that too. Why me then?" asked Tonks curiously. This was another thing she didn't much like the sound of.
Cassius shrugged. "Rufus, I'm afraid. He likes to take the new Aurors he thinks have the most potential and throw them in at the deep end, to see if they live up to it."
Tonks grimaced; that was additional pressure she didn't really need. "But ... it wasn't like I was top of the class in everything!"
Cassius smiled, as if he'd expected that reaction. "No, but you were in some things," he said patiently. "And there are a couple of things about you that are ... unusual. I'm sure Rufus would have wanted to see your special talent in action at the earliest possible moment. It was probably why he was so enthusiastic -- for him -- when he assigned you to me. And probably why he was so annoyed with you when ... erm, when this happened."
Tonks could feel her face burning. "Oh great," she said with indignation. "That's all he cared about, was it? That I can Metamorphose? Get the freak in here, see what she can do?"
"No, no, but it helps," said Cassius hastily. "Regardless of your, um, special talent, you wouldn't have got to this point if you hadn't passed all the tests, young lady. When he assigned you to me, Rufus did mention something about you having the character to overcome your family background -- I didn't realise what he meant until your little disagreement with Kingsley, but if he brought it up he must have needed convincing before approving your application to join."
"Oh. Thanks." Tonks left it at that, but she still wasn't happy about it -- Scrimgeour certainly had needed convincing to approve her application, and she didn't want him to start getting the wrong idea. One more complication to add to the list.
*****
March 1991
As soon as Tonks stepped into the interview room, it was obvious that it had been carefully set up to intimidate -- her chair was in the middle of the room, and the desks at which her three interviewers sat were arranged in a semicircle around it.
"Good morning, Miss Tonks," said the woman in front of her in a brisk voice. A quill on the desk flipped itself upright and began to record the words as they were spoken. "Presiding: Amelia Bones, Head of the Department of Magical Law Enforcement. Conducting the interview: Rufus Scrimgeour, Head of the Auror Office --"she indicated the man on her right, then turned to her left "-- and Bruno Featherstone, Head of Auror Training. Rufus, you'd better start, I think."
"Very well, Amelia," said the wizard, who was tall, thick-haired, and generally rather intimidating. He stared at Tonks with suspicionthrough a pair of wire-rimmed spectacles. "Now then, Miss Tonks -- as you know, this interview marks the final stage of your application for employment by the Ministry in the capacity of Auror. As you should know by now, this is a highly responsible job, and not to be entered into lightly. This session should assist us in judging your fitness to serve. Clear?"
"Yes, sir," said Tonks. The interview didn't look like it was going to go smoothly, but she'd never really expected that it would.
"We've finally received the confirmatory copy of your academic record from Hogwarts School of Witchcraft and Wizardry, and the results of your aptitude tests, and they meet our requirements. You received six N.E.W.T. level qualifications, is that correct?"
"Yes, sir." Tonks said again, in a voice that sounded a lot more confident than she felt. "Grade 'O' in Transfiguration and Charms, 'E's in Defence Against the Dark Arts, Potions, and Ancient Runes, and an 'A' in Herbology."
"I see. Well, they're up to a reasonable standard. If you are to become an Auror, you'll have to know a lot more than they ever taught you at school, and if you're accepted we'll bring you up to scratch in the subjects you need. Isn't that right, Bruno?"
"Yes, it is," said the wizard on Tonks' right -- he looked younger and had a rather quiet voice, but one that carried a distinct undertone of authority that Tonks found very noticeable. "We tend to discover that our trainees have the uncanny ability to forget most of what they learnt immediately after their final examinations, but we'll be trying to find out what you've retained later on. Of course, that's only half the story, isn't it?"
"Sir?" said Tonks, caught slightly by surprise.
"Academic knowledge can take you only so far in this career, Miss Tonks. I see there was a gap between the time you left school and the date applications opened. Did you do anything in that time to make us think you have the skills and commitment necessary to be an Auror?"
"Er, yes sir, I hope so," said Tonks. At least she'd anticipated this question and had an interview-ready answer memorised and ready to recite. "I've always really wanted to be an Auror, far more than any other career, but when I was told the next intake wasn't due for a while I took the chance to experience something of the world while I didn't have any ties. I didn't want to find myself half way through training wondering what else I might have done, but when I applied I was absolutely sure that this was what I wanted to be. And it's all good experience, isn't it?"
Rufus Scrimgeour, on her left, looked sceptical. "I don't know, Miss Tonks. Where did you go? What did you do?"
This was another expected question. "Well, first I did Europe on the grand tour ... all the touristy things, I suppose, like riding gondolas in Venice, visiting the Parisian Apothecaries, looking round the Black Forest Museum of Sorcery. I went to America and travelled coast to coast, just Apparating from town to town, staying a night or two in each place. I camped for a little while in South America, doing odd jobs, helping the local Ministry look for wild Vipertooths, that sort of thing. I treated myself to a trip round the Caribbean, then came back and got a temporary job here while I waited for the application to go in."
Scrimgeour didn't look especially impressed by this listing of destinations. "Quite adventurous. And you consider this will be useful?"
"Well, sir, I've learnt things that that I'd never have learnt on a training course, practical things that I expect would be useful to me as an Auror."
This reply met with a slightly disconcerting silence. Then Scrimgeour asked "What things?"
"Sir?"
"What things do you think you 'learnt', Miss Tonks? Do you really have any understanding of what an Auror needs to know?"
Tonks gulped, but was relieved to find that her mind hadn't quite gone a blank, and that she could remember the little speech she'd prepared. "I learnt how to size people up, sir. I found out more about what the, um, seamier side of wizarding life is like than I'd ever had cause to before. I had to learn how to defend myself when necessary, how to translate all the duelling theory I was taught at school into real life situations. I learnt ... well, when I needed to fend for myself and when I needed to accept help. Now, I know I'll have to learn loads more to be a good Auror, sir, but I reckon that's a start, and a better start than I'd have got coming straight from Hogwarts."
"Not a bad answer, Miss Tonks," came a voice from her right. She turned to Featherstone, who continued, "Although I suspect that like most people of your age, you only thought you learnt enough. But I noticed that you missed out something rather important, didn't you?"
Tonks groaned to herself. Oh great. He wants me to play guessing games. "Very probably," she said, sparring for time. "I'd be silly to claim that I know everything I need to know for the job, or that I know the right emphasis to place on the things I do know." This noncommittal reply didn't get any reaction, and she realised that she was going to have to take some kind of stab at it. "I'm certainly weak on the details of our laws, but I always expected to have to study them ..."
"Well, that's the problem," interrupted the Head of Auror Training. "It's not just our laws -- or rather our world -- that you need to be familiar with. You've been halfway around the planet, it seems, but are we to understand that you confined yourself to the local magical communities? You won't be able to do that as an Auror -- your work would involve a lot of contact with Muggles."
"Well, naturally I spent a lot of time in Muggle communities as well." Tonks didn't like this line of inquiry much, and decided it had better be tackled head-on. She forced what she hoped was a reasonable facsimile of her usual mischievous smile onto her face. "I wouldn't have seen half the things of interest if I had. And I live in a Muggle flat. Of course, I grew up in a magical family so I'm not an expert, but my dad's Muggle-born so I'm quite at home there." Not that bad an answer, she thought critically. Down a few goals but pulled it back with the Snitch.
"Ah yes, I wanted to get onto the subject of your family at some point," said Scrimgeour, who still hadn't smiled once. "Now will be as good a time as any, before we start talking details. We look closely into the backgrounds of applicants for Ministry positions -- especially in this department, of course -- and to be frank, in your case I don't very much like what I see."
Tonks turned and looked at him in surprise. "Sir? Are you saying Muggle relatives are a handicap for an Auror? Or any Ministry employee for that matter?"
"No, Miss Tonks. I'm not talking about your blood purity, or lack of it. To be blunt, you come from a family that, despite priding itself on its age and nobility, has displayed frequent criminal tendencies and caused this Department no end of trouble in recent years." He looked at her sternly. "How do we convince ourselves that you won't, let us say, revert to type?"
Tonks was beginning to feel uncomfortable now. "My family are not criminals!" she said sharply, barely managing to control her sense of outrage, although it was true that she tended to include only herself and her parents when she thought of the word family. "I'd be the first to admit I've not always behaved myself, but I've never crossed the line, or anywhere near it." This was definitely something she hadn't prepared herself for, although she now realised, too late, that she really should have seen it coming.
Scrimgeour looked at her sharply. "We know you haven't, Miss Tonks, because if you had you would never have got within a million miles of this interview. I think you may have trouble supporting your first claim, though." He turned to the woman in front of Tonks. "Amelia, I believe you authorised a complete record search. Could you oblige us?"
"Certainly, Rufus." Tonks glanced at the stern woman in front of her, who fixed a monocle in her eye, picked up a sheet of parchment, and began reading from it in a booming voice. "Let's see. One of your cousins among You-Know-Who's most senior lieutenants, imprisoned for life in Azkaban. A cousin your mother is recorded as having been close to, incidentally. Known crimes include thirteen murders committed personally, and the betrayal of his best friends to their deaths at the hands of his master. Another cousin, his brother, also a member of the Death Eaters, apparently killed while taking part in their activities. An aunt and uncle serving life sentences in Azkaban" -- here her voice hardened -- "for torturing two of our people into permanent incapacity in an insane attempt to bring You-Know-Who back. I won't read out the details, I'm sure we all know them."
"Yes, Amelia, I agree. I think that's more than enough to be going on with," said Scrimgeour with disgust in his voice. "In addition, Miss Tonks, it's a matter of record that your mother's family publicly supported the aims of He Who Must Not Be Named throughout his initial rise to power. Oh, most of them quietened down when the killings began, of course, but we've no reason to believe they've had an actual change of heart to this day."
He paused for a moment to gaze at her grimly. "Now, as I'm sure you know, there are many people inclined to give members of old families the benefit of the doubt for behaviour like this. Few of them are Aurors. We have to deal with the trouble it causes. I think you'll see that your Muggle relations are the least of our concerns."
Tonks stared at Scrimgeour open-mouthed; even Featherstone was looking at him curiously. Tonks was finding words difficult. "Sir? I have never, ever gone along with the Black family beliefs," she spluttered. "My mother ... she ... she left the family because she couldn't accept them any more! I'm a half-blood myself, if that makes any difference to anyone! It's ridiculous to suppose I would ever be involved in ... in anything like that."
"If you were, you wouldn't be the first half-blood who was, Miss Tonks." This was from Featherstone again, quietly, but with emphasis. "Some of the worst of You-Know-Who's supporters were people disgusted by their own part-Muggle ancestry, people who tried to keep it hidden away where it wouldn't be seen, even by themselves. A person longing to be accepted into the fold despite knowing they are considered inferior, despite believing themselves to be inferior, can be exceedingly dangerous."
"And many supported him for other reasons, of course," added Scrimgeour impatiently. "Fear. Bribery. Blackmail. Peer pressure. A desire for power. You don't need pure blood to be swayed by such things. So tell us, how can we be sure you don't want to follow your family traditions?"
"Because I hate the Death Eaters and everything that they stood for!" This came out so vehemently it surprised even Tonks. "You can't really think our life was like 'Oh Auntie Bella, please drop by for afternoon tea, tell us all about who you tortured today'? We always knew she was an evil cow who thought the sun shone out of You-Know-Who's arse, however well she put on an act for everyone else! We were glad when she finally got caught, we thought she'd got away with it!" Tonks knew she was losing her self-control, but didn't seem able to stop herself. "You can't believe that I would actually have wanted to join them? I was only a kid at the time, but even then I knew what You-Know-Who and his ... his ... his scum did to people! As for my precious cousin ... I have never felt more betrayed in my life than when I realised what he'd done, and neither has my mother! She won't even talk about him! I'd have thrown him to the Dementors myself once I knew!"
She gritted her teeth and forced herself to speak more calmly. "I knew even back then that I'd just love to be the sort of person who stopped bastards like that. Sorry, pardon my French. I don't suppose I realise everything I need to know in order to do that, no, but I want to learn. I really, honestly do. Oh, and I couldn't give a ... couldn't care less about what the Black family think about me. I barely know most of my mother's relatives, and as far as I'm concerned if they don't like me -- or my parents -- that's their problem, and they can just go and stew in their own potion."
A very pronounced silence followed. To her surprise, Featherstone looked quietly pleased, Amelia Bones nodded approvingly, and even Scrimgeour looked somewhat mollified. "Very well, Miss Tonks. I think you've made your position very ... clear. We'd best leave that there. Perhaps we should discuss some of the things you'll be doing if you're taken on. Bruno? ..."
The three Aurors present now began to direct a barrage of difficult technical questions at her, testing her knowledge of offensive and defensive spells, the uses of potions and the minutiae of their ingredients, and the properties of various types of magical equipment; although she came up with solid answers to many of the questions, she knew she'd struggled on the more complex ones. Scrimgeour didn't appear particularly impressed, but by this time she was beginning to suspect that she would barely earn a nod of approval if she'd invented a cure for lycanthropy in a quiet couple of hours the previous evening.
Featherstone, however, smiled encouragingly from time to time, and Amelia Bones listened carefully and occasionally nodded. As the interview wore on, Tonks gradually realised that her nervousness had evaporated after her earlier outburst, and she began to relax and enjoy the challenge. For the first time since sending in the application form, she had begun to feel confident that she might actually be accepted for Auror training.
*****
Wednesday August 19th 1994
Tonks approached the following morning's meeting with apprehension -- whatever Cassius had said, she was prepared to face more criticism and people openly wondering if she was suitable for the job -- but fortunately, everyone concerned seemed to have tacitly agreed to avoid recriminations, and just do the best they could with the leads on hand. Tonks and Cassius were grilled for every last detail about their visit to the Transfigured Toad, but they were unable to think of anything that hadn't already gone in the reports.
"How's your prisoner doing?" asked O'Gregan. "Any luck with getting the boy to spill his guts, now?"
"Not so far," Cassius told him resignedly. "I thought he seemed to be on the verge of cracking yesterday when we brought him in, but when I saw him today he hadn't made his mind up one way or the other. He didn't say anything new."
"I'll bet he knows more than he's telling though," said the Irishman. "Even an ignorant bowsie like him must realise his story's got more holes than a gnome colony?"
"Can we try to get a Veritaserum warrant again?" asked Tonks hopefully. O'Gregan snorted, and none of the others looked particularly impressed by the suggestion.
"Unfortunately not, Tonks," explained Cassius gently. "We only have an assault charge against him, after all." He shifted, unconsciously seeming to move into what she had come to think of as his 'lecture posture'. "The Wizengamot may be willing to stretch a point with sentencing if they suspect there's more to a case, but these days they don't like handing out coercive interrogation warrants unless there's a pressing need. Too many scandals in the first few years after the war, I'm afraid."
"Oh."
"Yes, well, never mind," said Rhiannon. She grinned. "Look, I've only heard the details of these cases second-hand, from pillow talk --" O'Gregan had the grace to look slightly embarrassed "-- so suppose I ask you where you are and you tell me. OK?" Everyone else nodded. "Right. Tonks, Cassius -- are there any clues at all to who the man you met was?"
Tonks shook her head regretfully. "No, not really. He kept his face well hidden, and his voice disguised. McAllister, the landlord of the pub, says he's occasionally bought cheap cases of booze from the man, but he never told him his name and McAllister says he never cared enough to ask. His excuse for serving me the spiked drink was that he was just doing a favour to keep in with a business associate. He claims that he thought the man just wanted to impress the woman he was with by serving a better class of Firewhisky, and that he took the rest of the bottle with him when he left. He's probably lying through his teeth, but we can't prove it. The few customers we've found claim they only knew Scarf Boy by sight, and that might even be true. Does that mean he's someone with a respectable face to keep up?"
"Could do, but not necessarily. He's in a potentially dangerous trade, after all. Keeping your face hidden is standard practice in dodgy pubs. OK, then, this Ballantyne bloke. Any known associates?"
"No-one specific," said Cassius. "A few people in the Department remember him vaguely in connection with cases they've worked on, but that's all. As far as we can tell, he does a certain amount of dealing in items of questionable provenance, and acts as a sort of errand runner for hire by people with shady business. We can't tell if he's closely associated with anyone in particular. He doesn't seem ever to have been important enough to attract our close attention."
"Ah. One of those. The Ashford case, then. Do we have any more information on his enemies, or potential enemies?"
"The Patrol are keeping an eye on this Arkwright fellow, but he hasn't done anything much since they started," said O'Gregan. "One thing I did find out today was that Ashford's name is up for a big licence to import dragon's eggs and dangerous stuff like that -- and they don't hand those out like sweets, so they don't. It's come down to him and a fellow called Peregrine Witherspoon. No suggestion either of them would use foul play -- well, not that foul, anyway. I don't suppose they'd be above spreading a rumour or two hinting that the other poor spalpeen wasn't up to it. Something to bear in mind, though."
"What are his relatives up to?"
"Nothing out of the ordinary, I'm afraid. Mickey's been very quiet recently, hasn't been hitting the town like he used to. Abby's mostly stayed at home -- always was a quiet little colleen and deferred to Mickey, by all accounts. Charlotte is out researching some sort of book on the development of wizarding governance, and she's supposed to do a bit of charity work, too, haven't found out where yet.. I don't think our Mackenzie wants them calling round until he knows what's happening, and I can't say I blame the poor fellow."
"They're going to the Final," Tonks chipped in. "Can we keep an eye out for them while we're on patrol, Rhi?"
She nodded. "If we get the chance. Right, the enchanted instrument nickers -- I can tell you about that, actually. I had a word with Ellie, but there are no fresh developments on that front. She's coming round to the idea it might be a foreign buyer, in which case we've no chance of finding them unless we catch the people who took it. Unless it was your Blackstock man? Is he at the Final as well, Tonks?"
"Yeah. They're in the posh seats -- near you, Cassius, actually."
He looked surprised. "Really? I'll have to see if I can have a word. You never know what people will let slip if you just chat to them. Have you found out anything more about his daughter?"
"Not much," said Cornworthy glumly. "We have her social calendar, and she could have been at the Toad that night. She was supposed to be at home -- cried off some sort of party her parents were going to, and stayed in -- but there's only a house-elf as witness to that, and you can't trust a word they say about their masters."
"House-elf?" said Rhiannon in surprise. "How did they get one of those?"
Cornworthy shrugged. "The Relocation Office fixed them up. I suppose it's one of the things you have to have if you want to break into high society, like Gladrags' best robes and the latest model broomstick. I wouldn't know. You don't get many available, do you?" He looked around hopefully for an answer.
"Not usually," said Cassius. "Actually, there was one little fellow who came round last year looking for work, but he wanted to be paid, and I don't suppose that would go down well with the people Blackstock would want to impress. I couldn't do anything for him, there's not nearly enough for a house-elf to do in my home. He must have been desperate even to ask."
"Maybe young Nymphadora here should imitate Blackstock's elf and eavesdrop," said O'Gregan with a grin. "Or is that too difficult even for you, now?"
Tonks smiled politely and resisted the temptation to hex him. "Well, they're basically humanoid, so I suppose I probably could imitate one if I had to," she said, hoping he wasn't serious. "But I don't imagine we'd get approval for that, and I'm certainly not going to offer!"
"Very wise," said Rhiannon. "The Gringotts case, then; do we know of anyone who's spending like a sailor when they shouldn't be?"
"I've got a few names," said Cornworthy. "Dodgy types who seem to have come into a bit of money recently. No-one who's actually been flinging sacks of Galleons around, though. If we had fair warning the next time it happens, that might help."
Rhiannon's smile was fading rapidly. "It's looking pretty much like we don't have anything very definite, then?" she said. "Would that be a fair summary?"
Tonks hesitated briefly, wondering whether she should tell them about her arrangement with her parents. With reluctance, she decided the rest of the team really did need to know, even if they didn't need to know the details. "Actually, we do have a contact who'll tip us off if anything happens at Gringotts," she said carefully, crossing her fingers below the table. "One of my ... Knockturn Alley acquaintances promised to inform me."
"They did?" asked O'Gregan in annoyed surprise. "Why didn't you tell us?"
"I had to have a word with Scrimgeour to authorise it," she explained hastily. She really didn't want to get anyone else's back up at this point. "He said -- insisted, actually -- that I keep it as quiet as possible until it paid off, if it ever does. But I thought you should know."
"Well, that's something, at least," said Rhiannon brightly. "They can get the word to you quickly without being found out, I take it? What happens if you're not available?"
"Er, yes, they said they'd contact me via the mirror phone," said Tonks. At the looks of disbelief on the faces of her colleagues, she added hastily, "It's got that Muggle system ... link ... thing? They only need to know the, um, number, and they can contact me from a Muggle phone without it seeming suspicious, right?"
"Good," said Cassius crisply. He glanced at Tonks as if unconvinced that this was all there was to it, but let it go. "Pass on the contact details for me and the Auror Office as well, for emergency use only. We don't want to lose our chance at this."
"Will do," said Tonks. She realised that she'd made it sound as if a shady contact would be Apparating to somewhere with a Muggle phone available, and decided to leave it at that. She was quite sure that her mother wouldn't want the entire Department pestering her.
Rhiannon Davies looked more cheerful at this news, possibly because it meant she was moving to work on a case with one more lead than her own, at least. "Cassius, I'll assume you'll keep working on Ballantyne. When do you have to charge him by?"
"Friday," he replied. "We'll probably have to let him go then if he can bail his way out, but I think that might not be a bad thing on the whole. At least we can keep a watch on him and see who he talks to."
"Fine. Oh, this bookshop. Your suspect met the Easton woman there, right? Is anyone going back to ask her about it?"
Tonks and Cassius looked at each other. "I'll see to it," he said.
"OK. Oh yes, this lady friend of Cassius's --" he grimaced as Rhiannon said this "-- the one who let the Kneazle out of the bag to Beatrice Easton's husband. Is someone going to tell her she's been a naughty girl? Cassius? Are you going to do that job yourself too?" She grinned again.
"I already did," he said with dignity, ignoring their looks of surprise. "I called round last weekend, while you two were indulging yourselves in debauched drinking sessions from Land's End to John O'Groats. We had a long talk, and she was quite contrite and promised not to talk to him again -- well, not about Auror business, anyway." Tonks received this news with interest, but Cassius avoided her eye with determination.
Rhiannon clapped her hands. "Great. Right then, is there anything you want us to do before the World Cup then, Cassius?"
"Nothing specific, no," he replied. "Keep up the pressure on Ballantyne, of course, and if -- or when -- we have to let him go, arrange to keep an eye on him. Erm, Arnold, can you take charge of that, because, um ..."
"... I'm not going to the World Cup?" he finished with a touch of irony. "Never mind. I'm not that much of a Quidditch fan anyway. I'll organise some help from the Patrol. Enjoy yourselves."
"Oh, we will," said Rhiannon with a grin. "Just think, if this Irish git here had had any sense, he'd have got in for free like me and Tonks. Always helps to have a word with the Head of the Sports Department. It's not what you know, it's who you know, you see."
O'Gregan snorted again. "Ah, I'll remember that when I sit back in my comfortable seat and, out of the corner of my eye, see you two standing there on your feet again, far below, as the game goes into the fourth day. I have been saving up my Knuts for this for a long time. I told you to keep some holiday back and have faith that we would make it to the Final, did I not?" He added as an afterthought, "And if you think I am going to spend any effort at all on being jealous of Ludo Bagman, well you have tried that before, my girl, and a very feeble attempt it was indeed." He turned to Cassius. "Where are you seated, then, old lad?"
Tonks chortled. "Oh, they've got a whole Smethwyck block by the look of it," she said. "His family must be richer than Croesus!" Even O'Gregan looked slightly disgruntled by this.
Cassius smiled. "We're comfortably off, yes, but our tickets came courtesy of Ludo Bagman too. We have some modest reputation in the world of Quidditch, you know."
This buzzed at the edge of Tonks' memory for a moment until she remembered the 'Interesting Facts' columns in the Quidditch magazines she'd read as a teenager. "Wait a minute. Didn't one of your family invent Cushioning Charms for broomsticks?"
"My great-grandfather Elliot, as it happens."
"And somebody else was the first British witch to be a referee in the Quidditch League?"
"That was my great-aunt Leopoldina."
"Hang on, Cassius," said Rhiannon, who looked like someone on whom a great light had dawned. "There's a Smethwyck on the League board, isn't there? Ex-player? One of yours?"
"My cousin's grandson Marcus, yes. He played Beater for Pride of Portree for a few years. Ludo Bagman looks on him as a member of the club as far as the art of hitting large lumps of enchanted iron at people goes, so naturally he was very happy to arrange seats for us all." He winked at them as he went out of the door. "It's not what you know, it's who you know, you see."
Chapter Notes: The 'pressure must be continuous, but you have to give them time to reason with themselves' argument is of course drawn from the preface to Hugh Trevor-Roper's The Last Days of Hitler (recommended).
Elliot and Leopoldina are canon Smethwycks as per the Lexicon, although Marcus was invented for this chapter.
8. How Could I Have Been So Stupid?
Table of Contents
10. The Theatre of Dreams
Length: 10,050 words
9. Clearing the Decks
Tuesday August 18th 1994
Tonks and Cassius took the opportunity to search the house as thoroughly as possible while their suspect was knocked out. However, although they uncovered plenty of evidence of minor criminal activity and one surprisingly well-painted old portrait (quite possibly nicked, thought Tonks cynically as she made a quick but fruitless check behind it for secret compartments), there was nothing to suggest any particular connection to illegal potion pushers. The search did, however, reveal the man's name -- the rather grandiloquent Sylvester Ballantyne -- and when they looked up his record, it was rather reminiscent of that of Benjamin Farley. There were several convictions for trading in stolen goods, and one for hexing somebody into St Mungo's during a fight, but nothing of major import.
Tonks was rather hoping that Ballantyne might tell them something useful when they brought him back, although Cassius wasn't optimistic -- and unfortunately. the interrogation went much as he'd expected. Their prisoner simply sat tight and refused to say anything helpful as they demanded to know if he had any connection to Farley, the Blackstocks, Arkwright -- or for that matter, anyone else they could think of vaguely connected to the case. Tonks found it frustrating, but Cassius seemed to take it calmly, as if this were only to be expected.
They were on surer ground with the assault charges on the Aurors, and here they did appear to have Ballantyne worried. After all, blanket denial wasn't going to get him anywhere when they all knew they had solid evidence against him. But the questioning still seemed to Tonks to be going round in circles.
"... So why did you attack me?"
"It was self-defence."
"Right. You ran into that courtyard firing Stunners before I even saw you. How is that self-defence?"
"Well, you were holding someone at wandpoint, love. You might have been robbing them. Can't be too careful, can you?"
"But why follow me in the first place?"
"Didn't like the look of you. You went out the pub with a bloke I knew -- only by sight though -- and I thought I'd better keep an eye out and watch his back. Friendly gesture, like."
"And did you Stun my partner here from behind?"
"Don't know who did that. Lots of rough people about, aren't there? He needs to be more careful too."
"And why did you bring along two mates?"
"You always want to have backup."
"Who were they?"
"Can't tell you that. Don't see why they should get into trouble just for ... doing their civic duty like me."
"So if you were all just 'doing your civic duty' why did you run away when the other Aurors arrived?"
"Because you were all attacking me. It was self-defence ..."
After the fourth or fifth round of this, during which Tonks had been scowling ever more obviously, Cassius caught her eye and motioned to her to step out of the interview room. She gave him frustrated glances as she followed him back into the main office and threw herself into the cubicle chair. He sat down more sedately and contemplated her with slight amusement.
"We're not getting anywhere at all with him, are we?" she said in exasperation.
"Not really."
"Do you know him? He seemed to know you back at the pub."
He shook his head. "He doesn't ring a bell, but I'm not too surprised. I was quite well known among the criminal fraternity by the time I retired, just because I'd been in the job for so long. I've seen so many crooks over the years, I don't really remember each one individually unless they stand out in some way. And to put it as tactfully as possible, our Mr Ballantyne doesn't seem the standing out type."
He pursed his lips thoughtfully. "You know, I don't think it's yet sunk in with him quite how much trouble he's in? Assaulting an Auror is a serious charge, and he's never had to face one of those -- nothing likely to carry a long sentence in Azkaban, anyway." An expression of distaste passed across his face at that. "He seems to think this 'self-defence' defence will work -- but frankly, if he tries that in front of the court they'll laugh at him. Especially once they've been shown his record. It's not as if you looked all that threatening dressed up as Beatrice Easton."
"Maybe someone should tell him that. We don't have to let him see a legal representative until we actually charge him with something, do we?"
"Not unless we hold him more than a week." He paused, obviously thinking hard. "And maybe we shouldn't yet -- he may not know the sentencing possibilities. We may be able to put the wind up him a bit."
Tonks stifled a groan. Another thing to add to my ever-growing list of Things I'm Supposed To Know And Will Really Have To Look Up Sometime. "So what are the sentencing possibilities then?"
"Assault on an Auror? Azkaban technically, although in cases like this where there was no real damage done, possibly just a big fine. But he doesn't necessarily have to know that. And if it appears that he was helping out a serious criminal -- and I think our Jacmel seller qualifies as that -- he's looking at the Rock for a while again. That should give us some leverage."
Tonks looked at Cassius curiously, wondering why she found it surprising that there was a genuine Auror hardness beneath the friendly exterior. She hoped she wasn't going to harden too much; Cassius seemed to have struck a reasonable balance, but she didn't want to end up like ... well, Scrimgeour for example. She shuddered. That was an interview she wasn't looking forward to without something to show for their exertions.. "What about the report on that sample?" she asked. "If it was really Jacmel in that Firewhisky, won't that be good leverage?"
"Yes, if we have the report yet." He rummaged around in the in-tray and found a memo, and as he read it a grin spread across his face. "Well now, young lady, we have a catch. The potions chappies in Magical Analysis are sure -- 100% certain, no doubt in their minds -- that there was a good solid dose of the Liquor of Jacmel in that drink, and if you hadn't Transfigured your way out of it, you'd have been in every bit as much trouble as that fellow thought you were." He stood up quickly and waved the parchment at her. "Let's see what we can do with this."
*****
Tonks was quite happy to let Cassius fly with the Quaffle on this one, and simply sat back to watch and be impressed as he cheerfully explained to Ballantyne about the horrible penalties involved in cases of this kind, and the terrors of the Dementors of Azkaban. She was observing him closely, and there seemed to be a definite distaste behind the enthusiasm when he talked about them -- but she was sure Ballantyne wouldn't notice, especially as he was growing increasingly alarmed.
Cassius sat back with a smile; his body language reminding Tonks of a cat who has played with a mouse for a while and now prepares to close in for the kill. "Now then, old chap," he said in a friendly tone, "of course it doesn't have to be like this."
"No?" said the wizard warily. Cassius smiled again. Tonks concentrated on looking stern while she waited for the outcome.
"No. You can of course carry on with this 'it was all self-defence' story, but I don't think the court will find your explanation of why you were there and fighting too convincing. Especially as you say you don't even know who this man was. Not really very plausible, is it? It's the sort of thing that annoys them. Gets them to throw the book at you on the charges we do have -- and let's face it, on the assault charges we do have you -- er, 'bang to rights' is the phrase, I believe. But of course if you were to help us find the man we were looking for in the first place -- well, we might overlook quite a lot of things in that case. Something to think about, isn't it?"
The man's eyes looked shifty. "Suppose I did know him, Smethwyck -- which I don't. Why would I rat him out to you?"
"That would be self-defence." Tonks surprised herself by butting in. She realised she was using the Bad Auror tone she'd used on Easton and grimaced slightly. Cassius smiled pleasantly again.
"I think my colleague here is right. I couldn't have put it better myself."
Ballantyne stared at them. His face had a trapped look. "I need to see a legal representative," he said abruptly
Cassius raised his eyebrows. "But we haven't charged you with anything yet, Mr Ballantyne." When this produced no response except a sullen look, he smiled again. "Look, why don't we leave you to think about it for a bit?" That's in the Auror manuals, thought Tonks suddenly. In interrogations, pressure must be continuous -- but to persuade, you have to give them time out to reason with themselves and consider telling you what you want to know. They rose and motioned to the guards to take Ballantyne back to the holding cell. He looked at them sourly as he left the room.
"Do you think he'll decide to talk?" she asked Cassius abruptly as they returned to their desks again to write up the interview report.
"Can't tell," said Cassius thoughtfully. "It depends how strong his ties really are. Give him time to chew it over ... sad to say, a lot of people in custody do rat out their friends, unless they're too scared. Even sadder, a lot of them don't."
"Right." A memo flew into Tonks' in-tray, but it wasn't on the usual pale violet enchanted paper. This one was bright red, which she knew meant urgent. She picked it up, read it, and blanched.
"Bad news?" asked Cassius.
"Scrimgeour," she said tersely. "He wants to see me right away."
*****
Tonks approached the door to Scrimgeour's office with a feeling that she at first tentatively put down as trepidation, then with a grimace identified more accurately as sheer panic. On the couple of previous occasions she'd been in here -- her first day, and when she'd told him about her parents' offer of help with the portrait from Gringotts -- he'd actually been quite pleased with her. It looked as if it was going to be third time unlucky.
She took a deep breath, raised her hand to knock on the door, then paused with a nagging feeling that she'd forgotten something. Then it dawned on her; when she'd changed back from impersonating Ballantyne's postman, she'd chosen her favourite pink-and-spiky hairstyle without giving much thought to the matter. She wasn't willing to bet a bent Knut that it would go down well with Scrimgeour in a bad mood, so she screwed up her face and changed to her natural mousy brown, then braced herself and rapped on the door quickly, a little more forcefully than she'd really intended.
"Come!" The voice from within the office was as brusque as ever. She opened it tentatively and went in.
"Sit," he said, indicating a chair with a wave of his hand. Tonks sat, with slight surprise, mildly relieved that he'd given up the psychological advantage of keeping her standing while he berated her, and wondering why. She got her answer when he stood up, walked round the front of the desk, and stood towering over her instead with a very cold expression.
"Well?"
"Sir?" She didn't feel like making the first move.
For an answer, he slammed his fist down on the desk, and she jumped. His face hardened still further. "Don't play games, Auror. I don't appreciate it. Explain to me exactly why you thought it was a good idea to follow a man selling Class A Non-Tradeable Substances into a den of his own choosing when you could have arrested him."
Tonks gulped. "I -- er --"
"Spit it out, Auror! I have limited tolerance for listening to this kind of thing."
She forced herself to speak in a voice that was as calm as she could make it. "I just thought ... we didn't have much information ...if I brought him in straight away, he wouldn't talk, and we wouldn't get anywhere for weeks while his associates had time to get away ..." She trailed off as she caught sight of his expression, which hadn't softened in the slightest. "I, er, thought that maybe if I jollied him along a bit he might say something incriminating -- if he was working for anyone else, perhaps -- and I could always arrest him any time if he didn't ... I mean I thought I'd be OK with Cassius watching my back ... I didn't think he'd be knocked out ..."
"Wrong," interrupted Scrimgeour, cutting her off and leaving her looking slightly foolish. His words were being fired out with the force of curses. "You didn't think at all, Auror. You spent days preparing for a golden opportunity to catch the piece of filth red-handed, and then you tossed it all away flying by the seat of your robes!"
"I ... well, I thought ... show a bit of initiative ..."
"Don't spout catch-phrases at me," said Scrimgeour in a dangerous voice. "I like to see initiative in my Aurors at the right time, but this wasn't it. This was just a routine arrest that you screwed up by getting cocky. What did you seriously expect to get from him in one little walk in the moonlight? A signed confession on lavender-scented parchment? With the evidence of that bottle in your pocket the Wizengamot would have entered a guilty verdict without a second thought, and if he is just a middleman, we'd have had a possible ten-year sentence in Azkaban to use as leverage. And now he's vanished into the shadows again, just because one new Auror still wet behind the ears thought she knew what she was doing!"
Tonks swallowed, trying to think of a reply that wouldn't get her head bitten off. A mere "sorry" didn't seem likely to be adequate. "You're right, sir," she said quietly, looking down at her hands. She didn't dare to catch his eye again. It seemed to be a reasonable start, though; he gave her some space to go on (and unfortunately, when it came right down to it, he was right). She took another deep breath and tried not to let herself lapse into insincerity. "I ... I ... I stepped out of my depth. When I got a few lucky breaks early on, I thought ... er, I didn't think about the pitfalls." She risked raising her head to look at him directly. "Yes, I messed up, sir. I know that. I ... I don't have a good excuse. Please ... just give me a chance to learn from this and ... get it right next time?"
Scrimgeour looked at her without a trace of a smile, but when he spoke, his tone of voice was at least very slightly less biting. "You'll get another chance, because you are new and inexperienced, and because your skills are a good fit for this investigation, and because, frankly, I don't have so many staff to spare at the moment that I can pull them off a case for one mistake. Be warned, Auror Tonks. You have been fortunate, or unfortunate, enough to have been assigned straight from training to what turns out to be a serious investigation. An investigation that I am now raising the status of, given these latest developments. The best way -- no, make that the only way -- that you can mollify me is to get results on it. But any more major blunders like this, any more attempts to conduct your own personal private investigations, and you'll be spending your next year on duty guarding the Minister's teacups. Understood?"
Tonks could feel her heart rise into her mouth. "Yes sir," she said as firmly as possible.
"Very well. Now what did chummy have to say for himself?"
"Sir?" said Tonks again, in surprise at the abrupt change of subject.
"Your prisoner, Auror. The one you have got, which is something retrieved from the wreckage, at least. What has he said?"
"Oh, ah ... nothing much yet," said Tonks reluctantly. "He claims he was just helping out someone he knew. Cassius gave him the line about how he could get out of some of the trouble he was in if he co-operated, but he didn't say anything right away. We left him to think it over for a bit."
"Good. Right, back to work with you then. And send Smethwyck in here. I want a word with him too."
"Yes sir." Tonks leapt up with alacrity -- she'd expected the grilling to last a lot longer -- and had to consciously restrain herself from actually running across the room back to her desk. She didn't like the sound of Scrimgeour's final comment, and from the look on Cassius' face when she passed it on, neither did he.
"See you later, Tonks," he said in a gloomy voice as he left, nodding at Rhiannon Davies, who was just arriving. She dropped into the chair he had vacated and looked at Tonks with a mixture of amusement and sympathy.
"Been having a cosy chat with old Scrimgeour?" she said.
"Ha ha," said Tonks feebly, still chastened.
"Never mind, love," said Rhiannon. "We've all done something like that. You know -- unbelievably stupid." She grinned. "Welcome to the club. When I started around here, they told me there are only three key things you need to remember: don't leave your partner behind, stay on the right side of the boss, and never play cards for money against Mad-Eye Moody. You seem to have done your best to ignore them."
Tonks chuckled nervously. "Um, two out of three's not bad? I've never even met Moody."
"That's because he's retired. Then again, if you suggested a quick game of three-card brag to him these days, he'd probably think you'd jinxed the cards to explode. I heard a rumour he was going into teaching at Hogwarts. Poor little sods won't know what's hit them."
"Probably half the spells in Curses and Counter-Curses by the sound of it!" Now that Tonks had managed to get past the actual interview, she was beginning to recover a little. She was also trying very hard to think of any way to get the case back on track again. "Hey, Rhi," she said, as a possibility occurred to her, "can we access the ticket list for the World Cup, do you think?"
"Yes, via the WEB Access." Seeing Tonks' look of surprise that she could answer this straight away, she explained: "Donnie asked me to check the position of his seat a couple of days ago. There's actually a complete seating plan that any of the security staff can access."
Tonks perked up a bit. "Right. In that case, I'm going to look up the Blackstocks."
The WEB Access proved to contain not only an attendance list, but even a map of the campsites and the known bookings. Tonks found the Blackstock reservations after only a short search; they were in prime positions among the really expensive seats, and were 'camping out' (Tonks doubted that they would actually be roughing it) in an area set aside for upmarket tents. She breathed a sight of relief; it looked as if O'Gregan had analysed the situation correctly, and Archibald Blackstock really was making sure that his family were seen in the places expected of socially ambitious wizards.
As she flicked through the seat listing to see who else might be nearby, to her surprise she caught sight of what looked like a sizeable Smethwyck family block. Well, well, Cassius, she thought, raising her eyebrows. I didn't know you were that well off, you lucky sod.
Since she was there, she looked up the name of Ashford. Mackenzie himself wasn't going, as far as she could see; she couldn't really blame him under the circumstances, as a public event like the World Cup would be an ideal opportunity for someone to take another pot shot at him. But among the cheaper seats, there was an early block booking of four, listed as 'Michael Ashford and partner, Abigail Ashford, Charlotte Perks'.
The last name made her pause for a moment until she remembered that this was Ashford's other niece. She shook her head guiltily; she'd left the nephew and nieces to O'Gregan and Cornworthy to deal with, and their names had barely even registered. To be fair, she and Cassius had concentrated on the Beatrice Easton angle, but Tonks suspected that he'd probably kept himself fully up to date on the other details of the case. She grimaced; she was definitely going to have to buck her ideas up if she didn't want to end up guarding teacups (or whatever tedious task errant Aurors really ended up doing).
She made a note of the seat numbers and checked to see if they had a booking for the campsite as well, in the hope that she might be able to kill two pixies with one curse and take a look at their suspects while she was on guard duty. Her luck was in; their names were listed in the outlying areas -- in fact, according to the note on the booking sheet, as the holders of cheap tickets they would already have to be on the campsite. Tonks perked up; that should at least keep them out of mischief until the World Cup was over -- if, of course, they were really planning any.
She got up to find Shacklebolt standing behind her, patiently waiting to use the WEB Access and watching her with a thoughtful expression.
"Had a slight setback, I hear?" he said with a half-smile that Tonks thought looked as if it might break out into a smirk before too long. For some reason, it touched a nerve.
"Yes, that's right," she said, putting as much biting sarcasm into her voice as she could manage. "Of course, a cheap little criminal like me wouldn't want to actually catch anyone, would she? Isn't that what you think?"
"Now just a minute," he said, spluttering in indignation. "I never said you're a ..."
She interrupted him, glad of a chance to work off a little of the frustration that had been building up in her ever since the previous night. "If you've come to see if Sirius Black has booked a seat in the VIP Section, the answer's no. But don't take my word for it, will you, Kingsley?" She strode off, leaving him behind to fume.
*****
She found Cassius chatting to Rhiannon and looking rather chagrined. He made a face as Tonks joined them. "That wasn't one of the more pleasant interviews of my career."
"What did he say?" asked Tonks in consternation, her Shacklebolt-induced anger rapidly dissipating.
"Quite a lot. Mostly on the subject of watching my back and not letting novices wander off on their own," he explained ruefully. "The worst of it is, he's perfectly right. And I think he makes the point a bit more forcefully with me because he knows I can remember him when he was a novice himself, back in the early 1950s."
Tonks coloured slightly, feeling terrible again. "Oops. Sorry. No, I really am, Cassius, look -- "
He held up a hand to cut her off. "Never mind that for the moment, Tonks. We still have a case to deal with, yes? The most interesting news on that front is that he's stepping up the investigation to a Priority B and combining it with the Ashford case."
Tonks raised her eyebrows. If Scrimgeour now thought this case was a Priority B, it looked as if he were finally starting to take it seriously. As far as she could remember, the only current Priority A case was the hunt for Sirius Black -- not something she really wanted to think about
"We're supposed to work closely with Donnacha and Arnold --" again he held up a hand "-- yes, I know we're doing that already, but now it's official. He's also allocated us some of Rhiannon's time if we need it, so we can call on her when she's not needed for her Muggle-killing case." Rhiannon smiled at Tonks' look of surprise.
"Great! How's that going, Rhi?"
She shrugged. "It isn't. We haven't had a new incident for a couple of months. Maybe he's been lying low, or out of the country. Or maybe he's too caught up in World Cup fever to bother, just like the rest of us. Of course, if we've any luck he'll have tripped over his robes and broken his neck, but I'm not optimistic. Anyway, I'm at your disposal until we get either another incident or a new lead. Well, at Cassius' disposal -- he's co-ordinating."
"Yeah?" Tonks was intrigued by this. "Scrimgeour couldn't have been too angry, then?"
"A matter of seniority, perhaps," said Cassius. "Or maybe he just thinks the rest of you have more important things to do." He shook himself. "Never mind. Rhiannon, can you ask Donnacha and Arnold to meet us tomorrow morning at eleven so we can plan our strategy? I'll book a conference room."
"Sure, Cassius," said Rhiannon. She winked at Tonks and walked away.
"Very well then. As of the weekend, all of us except Arnold will be away from work for anything up to a week, so we should be clearing the decks of as much as possible beforehand," he said briskly. "I think we need to review everything we have so far and plan out what we're going to do next in detail, that's why I'm calling the meeting. We've had a setback, but we still have a number of avenues open to us."
"Sorry," said Tonks again in a small voice. She didn't seem to be able to stop apologising today.
He looked at her thoughtfully. "Apologies needed and accepted, but there's no need to keep making them," he said. "Just learn from the experience, that's all I ask. I'd have preferred to teach you the tricks of the trade at a more leisurely pace, but we're so short-staffed we don't have that luxury."
Tonks looked at him curiously. "That's what Scrimgeour said, more or less. Is it because of the World Cup?"
Cassius snorted. "That doesn't help, but the underlying problem is that the Department is having real trouble getting hold of qualified trainees. If it gets any worse they might have to reduce the entry requirements, or start promoting from the Magical Law Enforcement Patrol again."
"You're kidding!"
"I wish I was. Heaven help us if we have a major crisis in the next few years. As it is, they have to draft in all sorts of people from other departments to assist when there's a problem -- the way they did when Sirius Black escaped." Tonks winced, but Cassius didn't seem to notice. "I expect that's why they were willing to let me rejoin. Only three new Aurors actually made it through from your class to be added to the ranks."
Tonks nodded. "I know. I see the other two about the place from time to time. But to be fair, that was only because they put some foreign trainees in the class to help out the smaller overseas Ministries ... oh."
"Yes, oh. It was the only way they could get enough candidates to make it viable to run the course. I wondered at one point if they'd insist I took part, instead of just sitting at the back from time to time making notes on what had changed. In fact, I don't think they've actually started a new course since your group began -- not enough suitable applicants."
"Bloody hell, I didn't realise." It suddenly struck Tonks that in the excitement of starting the job, she'd rather lost touch with the people who'd been on the course with her, apart from the occasional brief chat in passing. "So what are Al and Bob doing then? Er, sorry, Jenkins and Parsons? They always look busy when I see them."
"Just routine work, as far as I know. In a way, you were a bit unlucky to be dropped straight into a significant case without having a chance to cut your teeth on something smaller first."
"Scrimgeour said that too. Why me then?" asked Tonks curiously. This was another thing she didn't much like the sound of.
Cassius shrugged. "Rufus, I'm afraid. He likes to take the new Aurors he thinks have the most potential and throw them in at the deep end, to see if they live up to it."
Tonks grimaced; that was additional pressure she didn't really need. "But ... it wasn't like I was top of the class in everything!"
Cassius smiled, as if he'd expected that reaction. "No, but you were in some things," he said patiently. "And there are a couple of things about you that are ... unusual. I'm sure Rufus would have wanted to see your special talent in action at the earliest possible moment. It was probably why he was so enthusiastic -- for him -- when he assigned you to me. And probably why he was so annoyed with you when ... erm, when this happened."
Tonks could feel her face burning. "Oh great," she said with indignation. "That's all he cared about, was it? That I can Metamorphose? Get the freak in here, see what she can do?"
"No, no, but it helps," said Cassius hastily. "Regardless of your, um, special talent, you wouldn't have got to this point if you hadn't passed all the tests, young lady. When he assigned you to me, Rufus did mention something about you having the character to overcome your family background -- I didn't realise what he meant until your little disagreement with Kingsley, but if he brought it up he must have needed convincing before approving your application to join."
"Oh. Thanks." Tonks left it at that, but she still wasn't happy about it -- Scrimgeour certainly had needed convincing to approve her application, and she didn't want him to start getting the wrong idea. One more complication to add to the list.
*****
March 1991
As soon as Tonks stepped into the interview room, it was obvious that it had been carefully set up to intimidate -- her chair was in the middle of the room, and the desks at which her three interviewers sat were arranged in a semicircle around it.
"Good morning, Miss Tonks," said the woman in front of her in a brisk voice. A quill on the desk flipped itself upright and began to record the words as they were spoken. "Presiding: Amelia Bones, Head of the Department of Magical Law Enforcement. Conducting the interview: Rufus Scrimgeour, Head of the Auror Office --"she indicated the man on her right, then turned to her left "-- and Bruno Featherstone, Head of Auror Training. Rufus, you'd better start, I think."
"Very well, Amelia," said the wizard, who was tall, thick-haired, and generally rather intimidating. He stared at Tonks with suspicionthrough a pair of wire-rimmed spectacles. "Now then, Miss Tonks -- as you know, this interview marks the final stage of your application for employment by the Ministry in the capacity of Auror. As you should know by now, this is a highly responsible job, and not to be entered into lightly. This session should assist us in judging your fitness to serve. Clear?"
"Yes, sir," said Tonks. The interview didn't look like it was going to go smoothly, but she'd never really expected that it would.
"We've finally received the confirmatory copy of your academic record from Hogwarts School of Witchcraft and Wizardry, and the results of your aptitude tests, and they meet our requirements. You received six N.E.W.T. level qualifications, is that correct?"
"Yes, sir." Tonks said again, in a voice that sounded a lot more confident than she felt. "Grade 'O' in Transfiguration and Charms, 'E's in Defence Against the Dark Arts, Potions, and Ancient Runes, and an 'A' in Herbology."
"I see. Well, they're up to a reasonable standard. If you are to become an Auror, you'll have to know a lot more than they ever taught you at school, and if you're accepted we'll bring you up to scratch in the subjects you need. Isn't that right, Bruno?"
"Yes, it is," said the wizard on Tonks' right -- he looked younger and had a rather quiet voice, but one that carried a distinct undertone of authority that Tonks found very noticeable. "We tend to discover that our trainees have the uncanny ability to forget most of what they learnt immediately after their final examinations, but we'll be trying to find out what you've retained later on. Of course, that's only half the story, isn't it?"
"Sir?" said Tonks, caught slightly by surprise.
"Academic knowledge can take you only so far in this career, Miss Tonks. I see there was a gap between the time you left school and the date applications opened. Did you do anything in that time to make us think you have the skills and commitment necessary to be an Auror?"
"Er, yes sir, I hope so," said Tonks. At least she'd anticipated this question and had an interview-ready answer memorised and ready to recite. "I've always really wanted to be an Auror, far more than any other career, but when I was told the next intake wasn't due for a while I took the chance to experience something of the world while I didn't have any ties. I didn't want to find myself half way through training wondering what else I might have done, but when I applied I was absolutely sure that this was what I wanted to be. And it's all good experience, isn't it?"
Rufus Scrimgeour, on her left, looked sceptical. "I don't know, Miss Tonks. Where did you go? What did you do?"
This was another expected question. "Well, first I did Europe on the grand tour ... all the touristy things, I suppose, like riding gondolas in Venice, visiting the Parisian Apothecaries, looking round the Black Forest Museum of Sorcery. I went to America and travelled coast to coast, just Apparating from town to town, staying a night or two in each place. I camped for a little while in South America, doing odd jobs, helping the local Ministry look for wild Vipertooths, that sort of thing. I treated myself to a trip round the Caribbean, then came back and got a temporary job here while I waited for the application to go in."
Scrimgeour didn't look especially impressed by this listing of destinations. "Quite adventurous. And you consider this will be useful?"
"Well, sir, I've learnt things that that I'd never have learnt on a training course, practical things that I expect would be useful to me as an Auror."
This reply met with a slightly disconcerting silence. Then Scrimgeour asked "What things?"
"Sir?"
"What things do you think you 'learnt', Miss Tonks? Do you really have any understanding of what an Auror needs to know?"
Tonks gulped, but was relieved to find that her mind hadn't quite gone a blank, and that she could remember the little speech she'd prepared. "I learnt how to size people up, sir. I found out more about what the, um, seamier side of wizarding life is like than I'd ever had cause to before. I had to learn how to defend myself when necessary, how to translate all the duelling theory I was taught at school into real life situations. I learnt ... well, when I needed to fend for myself and when I needed to accept help. Now, I know I'll have to learn loads more to be a good Auror, sir, but I reckon that's a start, and a better start than I'd have got coming straight from Hogwarts."
"Not a bad answer, Miss Tonks," came a voice from her right. She turned to Featherstone, who continued, "Although I suspect that like most people of your age, you only thought you learnt enough. But I noticed that you missed out something rather important, didn't you?"
Tonks groaned to herself. Oh great. He wants me to play guessing games. "Very probably," she said, sparring for time. "I'd be silly to claim that I know everything I need to know for the job, or that I know the right emphasis to place on the things I do know." This noncommittal reply didn't get any reaction, and she realised that she was going to have to take some kind of stab at it. "I'm certainly weak on the details of our laws, but I always expected to have to study them ..."
"Well, that's the problem," interrupted the Head of Auror Training. "It's not just our laws -- or rather our world -- that you need to be familiar with. You've been halfway around the planet, it seems, but are we to understand that you confined yourself to the local magical communities? You won't be able to do that as an Auror -- your work would involve a lot of contact with Muggles."
"Well, naturally I spent a lot of time in Muggle communities as well." Tonks didn't like this line of inquiry much, and decided it had better be tackled head-on. She forced what she hoped was a reasonable facsimile of her usual mischievous smile onto her face. "I wouldn't have seen half the things of interest if I had. And I live in a Muggle flat. Of course, I grew up in a magical family so I'm not an expert, but my dad's Muggle-born so I'm quite at home there." Not that bad an answer, she thought critically. Down a few goals but pulled it back with the Snitch.
"Ah yes, I wanted to get onto the subject of your family at some point," said Scrimgeour, who still hadn't smiled once. "Now will be as good a time as any, before we start talking details. We look closely into the backgrounds of applicants for Ministry positions -- especially in this department, of course -- and to be frank, in your case I don't very much like what I see."
Tonks turned and looked at him in surprise. "Sir? Are you saying Muggle relatives are a handicap for an Auror? Or any Ministry employee for that matter?"
"No, Miss Tonks. I'm not talking about your blood purity, or lack of it. To be blunt, you come from a family that, despite priding itself on its age and nobility, has displayed frequent criminal tendencies and caused this Department no end of trouble in recent years." He looked at her sternly. "How do we convince ourselves that you won't, let us say, revert to type?"
Tonks was beginning to feel uncomfortable now. "My family are not criminals!" she said sharply, barely managing to control her sense of outrage, although it was true that she tended to include only herself and her parents when she thought of the word family. "I'd be the first to admit I've not always behaved myself, but I've never crossed the line, or anywhere near it." This was definitely something she hadn't prepared herself for, although she now realised, too late, that she really should have seen it coming.
Scrimgeour looked at her sharply. "We know you haven't, Miss Tonks, because if you had you would never have got within a million miles of this interview. I think you may have trouble supporting your first claim, though." He turned to the woman in front of Tonks. "Amelia, I believe you authorised a complete record search. Could you oblige us?"
"Certainly, Rufus." Tonks glanced at the stern woman in front of her, who fixed a monocle in her eye, picked up a sheet of parchment, and began reading from it in a booming voice. "Let's see. One of your cousins among You-Know-Who's most senior lieutenants, imprisoned for life in Azkaban. A cousin your mother is recorded as having been close to, incidentally. Known crimes include thirteen murders committed personally, and the betrayal of his best friends to their deaths at the hands of his master. Another cousin, his brother, also a member of the Death Eaters, apparently killed while taking part in their activities. An aunt and uncle serving life sentences in Azkaban" -- here her voice hardened -- "for torturing two of our people into permanent incapacity in an insane attempt to bring You-Know-Who back. I won't read out the details, I'm sure we all know them."
"Yes, Amelia, I agree. I think that's more than enough to be going on with," said Scrimgeour with disgust in his voice. "In addition, Miss Tonks, it's a matter of record that your mother's family publicly supported the aims of He Who Must Not Be Named throughout his initial rise to power. Oh, most of them quietened down when the killings began, of course, but we've no reason to believe they've had an actual change of heart to this day."
He paused for a moment to gaze at her grimly. "Now, as I'm sure you know, there are many people inclined to give members of old families the benefit of the doubt for behaviour like this. Few of them are Aurors. We have to deal with the trouble it causes. I think you'll see that your Muggle relations are the least of our concerns."
Tonks stared at Scrimgeour open-mouthed; even Featherstone was looking at him curiously. Tonks was finding words difficult. "Sir? I have never, ever gone along with the Black family beliefs," she spluttered. "My mother ... she ... she left the family because she couldn't accept them any more! I'm a half-blood myself, if that makes any difference to anyone! It's ridiculous to suppose I would ever be involved in ... in anything like that."
"If you were, you wouldn't be the first half-blood who was, Miss Tonks." This was from Featherstone again, quietly, but with emphasis. "Some of the worst of You-Know-Who's supporters were people disgusted by their own part-Muggle ancestry, people who tried to keep it hidden away where it wouldn't be seen, even by themselves. A person longing to be accepted into the fold despite knowing they are considered inferior, despite believing themselves to be inferior, can be exceedingly dangerous."
"And many supported him for other reasons, of course," added Scrimgeour impatiently. "Fear. Bribery. Blackmail. Peer pressure. A desire for power. You don't need pure blood to be swayed by such things. So tell us, how can we be sure you don't want to follow your family traditions?"
"Because I hate the Death Eaters and everything that they stood for!" This came out so vehemently it surprised even Tonks. "You can't really think our life was like 'Oh Auntie Bella, please drop by for afternoon tea, tell us all about who you tortured today'? We always knew she was an evil cow who thought the sun shone out of You-Know-Who's arse, however well she put on an act for everyone else! We were glad when she finally got caught, we thought she'd got away with it!" Tonks knew she was losing her self-control, but didn't seem able to stop herself. "You can't believe that I would actually have wanted to join them? I was only a kid at the time, but even then I knew what You-Know-Who and his ... his ... his scum did to people! As for my precious cousin ... I have never felt more betrayed in my life than when I realised what he'd done, and neither has my mother! She won't even talk about him! I'd have thrown him to the Dementors myself once I knew!"
She gritted her teeth and forced herself to speak more calmly. "I knew even back then that I'd just love to be the sort of person who stopped bastards like that. Sorry, pardon my French. I don't suppose I realise everything I need to know in order to do that, no, but I want to learn. I really, honestly do. Oh, and I couldn't give a ... couldn't care less about what the Black family think about me. I barely know most of my mother's relatives, and as far as I'm concerned if they don't like me -- or my parents -- that's their problem, and they can just go and stew in their own potion."
A very pronounced silence followed. To her surprise, Featherstone looked quietly pleased, Amelia Bones nodded approvingly, and even Scrimgeour looked somewhat mollified. "Very well, Miss Tonks. I think you've made your position very ... clear. We'd best leave that there. Perhaps we should discuss some of the things you'll be doing if you're taken on. Bruno? ..."
The three Aurors present now began to direct a barrage of difficult technical questions at her, testing her knowledge of offensive and defensive spells, the uses of potions and the minutiae of their ingredients, and the properties of various types of magical equipment; although she came up with solid answers to many of the questions, she knew she'd struggled on the more complex ones. Scrimgeour didn't appear particularly impressed, but by this time she was beginning to suspect that she would barely earn a nod of approval if she'd invented a cure for lycanthropy in a quiet couple of hours the previous evening.
Featherstone, however, smiled encouragingly from time to time, and Amelia Bones listened carefully and occasionally nodded. As the interview wore on, Tonks gradually realised that her nervousness had evaporated after her earlier outburst, and she began to relax and enjoy the challenge. For the first time since sending in the application form, she had begun to feel confident that she might actually be accepted for Auror training.
*****
Wednesday August 19th 1994
Tonks approached the following morning's meeting with apprehension -- whatever Cassius had said, she was prepared to face more criticism and people openly wondering if she was suitable for the job -- but fortunately, everyone concerned seemed to have tacitly agreed to avoid recriminations, and just do the best they could with the leads on hand. Tonks and Cassius were grilled for every last detail about their visit to the Transfigured Toad, but they were unable to think of anything that hadn't already gone in the reports.
"How's your prisoner doing?" asked O'Gregan. "Any luck with getting the boy to spill his guts, now?"
"Not so far," Cassius told him resignedly. "I thought he seemed to be on the verge of cracking yesterday when we brought him in, but when I saw him today he hadn't made his mind up one way or the other. He didn't say anything new."
"I'll bet he knows more than he's telling though," said the Irishman. "Even an ignorant bowsie like him must realise his story's got more holes than a gnome colony?"
"Can we try to get a Veritaserum warrant again?" asked Tonks hopefully. O'Gregan snorted, and none of the others looked particularly impressed by the suggestion.
"Unfortunately not, Tonks," explained Cassius gently. "We only have an assault charge against him, after all." He shifted, unconsciously seeming to move into what she had come to think of as his 'lecture posture'. "The Wizengamot may be willing to stretch a point with sentencing if they suspect there's more to a case, but these days they don't like handing out coercive interrogation warrants unless there's a pressing need. Too many scandals in the first few years after the war, I'm afraid."
"Oh."
"Yes, well, never mind," said Rhiannon. She grinned. "Look, I've only heard the details of these cases second-hand, from pillow talk --" O'Gregan had the grace to look slightly embarrassed "-- so suppose I ask you where you are and you tell me. OK?" Everyone else nodded. "Right. Tonks, Cassius -- are there any clues at all to who the man you met was?"
Tonks shook her head regretfully. "No, not really. He kept his face well hidden, and his voice disguised. McAllister, the landlord of the pub, says he's occasionally bought cheap cases of booze from the man, but he never told him his name and McAllister says he never cared enough to ask. His excuse for serving me the spiked drink was that he was just doing a favour to keep in with a business associate. He claims that he thought the man just wanted to impress the woman he was with by serving a better class of Firewhisky, and that he took the rest of the bottle with him when he left. He's probably lying through his teeth, but we can't prove it. The few customers we've found claim they only knew Scarf Boy by sight, and that might even be true. Does that mean he's someone with a respectable face to keep up?"
"Could do, but not necessarily. He's in a potentially dangerous trade, after all. Keeping your face hidden is standard practice in dodgy pubs. OK, then, this Ballantyne bloke. Any known associates?"
"No-one specific," said Cassius. "A few people in the Department remember him vaguely in connection with cases they've worked on, but that's all. As far as we can tell, he does a certain amount of dealing in items of questionable provenance, and acts as a sort of errand runner for hire by people with shady business. We can't tell if he's closely associated with anyone in particular. He doesn't seem ever to have been important enough to attract our close attention."
"Ah. One of those. The Ashford case, then. Do we have any more information on his enemies, or potential enemies?"
"The Patrol are keeping an eye on this Arkwright fellow, but he hasn't done anything much since they started," said O'Gregan. "One thing I did find out today was that Ashford's name is up for a big licence to import dragon's eggs and dangerous stuff like that -- and they don't hand those out like sweets, so they don't. It's come down to him and a fellow called Peregrine Witherspoon. No suggestion either of them would use foul play -- well, not that foul, anyway. I don't suppose they'd be above spreading a rumour or two hinting that the other poor spalpeen wasn't up to it. Something to bear in mind, though."
"What are his relatives up to?"
"Nothing out of the ordinary, I'm afraid. Mickey's been very quiet recently, hasn't been hitting the town like he used to. Abby's mostly stayed at home -- always was a quiet little colleen and deferred to Mickey, by all accounts. Charlotte is out researching some sort of book on the development of wizarding governance, and she's supposed to do a bit of charity work, too, haven't found out where yet.. I don't think our Mackenzie wants them calling round until he knows what's happening, and I can't say I blame the poor fellow."
"They're going to the Final," Tonks chipped in. "Can we keep an eye out for them while we're on patrol, Rhi?"
She nodded. "If we get the chance. Right, the enchanted instrument nickers -- I can tell you about that, actually. I had a word with Ellie, but there are no fresh developments on that front. She's coming round to the idea it might be a foreign buyer, in which case we've no chance of finding them unless we catch the people who took it. Unless it was your Blackstock man? Is he at the Final as well, Tonks?"
"Yeah. They're in the posh seats -- near you, Cassius, actually."
He looked surprised. "Really? I'll have to see if I can have a word. You never know what people will let slip if you just chat to them. Have you found out anything more about his daughter?"
"Not much," said Cornworthy glumly. "We have her social calendar, and she could have been at the Toad that night. She was supposed to be at home -- cried off some sort of party her parents were going to, and stayed in -- but there's only a house-elf as witness to that, and you can't trust a word they say about their masters."
"House-elf?" said Rhiannon in surprise. "How did they get one of those?"
Cornworthy shrugged. "The Relocation Office fixed them up. I suppose it's one of the things you have to have if you want to break into high society, like Gladrags' best robes and the latest model broomstick. I wouldn't know. You don't get many available, do you?" He looked around hopefully for an answer.
"Not usually," said Cassius. "Actually, there was one little fellow who came round last year looking for work, but he wanted to be paid, and I don't suppose that would go down well with the people Blackstock would want to impress. I couldn't do anything for him, there's not nearly enough for a house-elf to do in my home. He must have been desperate even to ask."
"Maybe young Nymphadora here should imitate Blackstock's elf and eavesdrop," said O'Gregan with a grin. "Or is that too difficult even for you, now?"
Tonks smiled politely and resisted the temptation to hex him. "Well, they're basically humanoid, so I suppose I probably could imitate one if I had to," she said, hoping he wasn't serious. "But I don't imagine we'd get approval for that, and I'm certainly not going to offer!"
"Very wise," said Rhiannon. "The Gringotts case, then; do we know of anyone who's spending like a sailor when they shouldn't be?"
"I've got a few names," said Cornworthy. "Dodgy types who seem to have come into a bit of money recently. No-one who's actually been flinging sacks of Galleons around, though. If we had fair warning the next time it happens, that might help."
Rhiannon's smile was fading rapidly. "It's looking pretty much like we don't have anything very definite, then?" she said. "Would that be a fair summary?"
Tonks hesitated briefly, wondering whether she should tell them about her arrangement with her parents. With reluctance, she decided the rest of the team really did need to know, even if they didn't need to know the details. "Actually, we do have a contact who'll tip us off if anything happens at Gringotts," she said carefully, crossing her fingers below the table. "One of my ... Knockturn Alley acquaintances promised to inform me."
"They did?" asked O'Gregan in annoyed surprise. "Why didn't you tell us?"
"I had to have a word with Scrimgeour to authorise it," she explained hastily. She really didn't want to get anyone else's back up at this point. "He said -- insisted, actually -- that I keep it as quiet as possible until it paid off, if it ever does. But I thought you should know."
"Well, that's something, at least," said Rhiannon brightly. "They can get the word to you quickly without being found out, I take it? What happens if you're not available?"
"Er, yes, they said they'd contact me via the mirror phone," said Tonks. At the looks of disbelief on the faces of her colleagues, she added hastily, "It's got that Muggle system ... link ... thing? They only need to know the, um, number, and they can contact me from a Muggle phone without it seeming suspicious, right?"
"Good," said Cassius crisply. He glanced at Tonks as if unconvinced that this was all there was to it, but let it go. "Pass on the contact details for me and the Auror Office as well, for emergency use only. We don't want to lose our chance at this."
"Will do," said Tonks. She realised that she'd made it sound as if a shady contact would be Apparating to somewhere with a Muggle phone available, and decided to leave it at that. She was quite sure that her mother wouldn't want the entire Department pestering her.
Rhiannon Davies looked more cheerful at this news, possibly because it meant she was moving to work on a case with one more lead than her own, at least. "Cassius, I'll assume you'll keep working on Ballantyne. When do you have to charge him by?"
"Friday," he replied. "We'll probably have to let him go then if he can bail his way out, but I think that might not be a bad thing on the whole. At least we can keep a watch on him and see who he talks to."
"Fine. Oh, this bookshop. Your suspect met the Easton woman there, right? Is anyone going back to ask her about it?"
Tonks and Cassius looked at each other. "I'll see to it," he said.
"OK. Oh yes, this lady friend of Cassius's --" he grimaced as Rhiannon said this "-- the one who let the Kneazle out of the bag to Beatrice Easton's husband. Is someone going to tell her she's been a naughty girl? Cassius? Are you going to do that job yourself too?" She grinned again.
"I already did," he said with dignity, ignoring their looks of surprise. "I called round last weekend, while you two were indulging yourselves in debauched drinking sessions from Land's End to John O'Groats. We had a long talk, and she was quite contrite and promised not to talk to him again -- well, not about Auror business, anyway." Tonks received this news with interest, but Cassius avoided her eye with determination.
Rhiannon clapped her hands. "Great. Right then, is there anything you want us to do before the World Cup then, Cassius?"
"Nothing specific, no," he replied. "Keep up the pressure on Ballantyne, of course, and if -- or when -- we have to let him go, arrange to keep an eye on him. Erm, Arnold, can you take charge of that, because, um ..."
"... I'm not going to the World Cup?" he finished with a touch of irony. "Never mind. I'm not that much of a Quidditch fan anyway. I'll organise some help from the Patrol. Enjoy yourselves."
"Oh, we will," said Rhiannon with a grin. "Just think, if this Irish git here had had any sense, he'd have got in for free like me and Tonks. Always helps to have a word with the Head of the Sports Department. It's not what you know, it's who you know, you see."
O'Gregan snorted again. "Ah, I'll remember that when I sit back in my comfortable seat and, out of the corner of my eye, see you two standing there on your feet again, far below, as the game goes into the fourth day. I have been saving up my Knuts for this for a long time. I told you to keep some holiday back and have faith that we would make it to the Final, did I not?" He added as an afterthought, "And if you think I am going to spend any effort at all on being jealous of Ludo Bagman, well you have tried that before, my girl, and a very feeble attempt it was indeed." He turned to Cassius. "Where are you seated, then, old lad?"
Tonks chortled. "Oh, they've got a whole Smethwyck block by the look of it," she said. "His family must be richer than Croesus!" Even O'Gregan looked slightly disgruntled by this.
Cassius smiled. "We're comfortably off, yes, but our tickets came courtesy of Ludo Bagman too. We have some modest reputation in the world of Quidditch, you know."
This buzzed at the edge of Tonks' memory for a moment until she remembered the 'Interesting Facts' columns in the Quidditch magazines she'd read as a teenager. "Wait a minute. Didn't one of your family invent Cushioning Charms for broomsticks?"
"My great-grandfather Elliot, as it happens."
"And somebody else was the first British witch to be a referee in the Quidditch League?"
"That was my great-aunt Leopoldina."
"Hang on, Cassius," said Rhiannon, who looked like someone on whom a great light had dawned. "There's a Smethwyck on the League board, isn't there? Ex-player? One of yours?"
"My cousin's grandson Marcus, yes. He played Beater for Pride of Portree for a few years. Ludo Bagman looks on him as a member of the club as far as the art of hitting large lumps of enchanted iron at people goes, so naturally he was very happy to arrange seats for us all." He winked at them as he went out of the door. "It's not what you know, it's who you know, you see."
Chapter Notes: The 'pressure must be continuous, but you have to give them time to reason with themselves' argument is of course drawn from the preface to Hugh Trevor-Roper's The Last Days of Hitler (recommended).
Elliot and Leopoldina are canon Smethwycks as per the Lexicon, although Marcus was invented for this chapter.
8. How Could I Have Been So Stupid?
Table of Contents
10. The Theatre of Dreams