CHAPTER ONE
THE OTHER MINISTER
It was nearing midnight and the Prime Minister was sitting alone in his
office, reading a long memo that was slipping through his brain without
leaving the slightest trace of meaning behind. He was waiting for a call from
the President of a far distant country, and between wondering when the
wretched man would telephone, and trying to suppress unpleasant memories
of what had been a very long, tiring, and difficult week, there was not much
space in his head for anything else. The more he attempted to focus on the
print on the page before him, the more clearly the Prime Minister could see
the gloating face of one of his political opponents. This particular opponent
had appeared on the news that very day, not only to enumerate all the terrible
things that had happened in the last week (as though anyone needed
reminding) but also to explain why each and every one of them was the
government’s fault.
The Prime Minister’s pulse quickened at the very thought of these
accusations, for they were neither fair nor true. How on earth was his
government supposed to have stopped that bridge collapsing? It was
outrageous for anybody to suggest that they were not spending enough on
bridges. The bridge was fewer than ten years old, and the best experts were at
a loss to explain why it had snapped cleanly in two, sending a dozen cars into
the watery depths of the river below. And how dare anyone suggest that it was
lack of policemen that had resulted in those two very nasty and well-
publicized murders? Or that the government should have somehow foreseen
the freak hurricane in the West Country that had caused so much damage to
both people and property? And was it his fault that one of his Junior
Ministers, Herbert Chorley, had chosen this week to act so peculiarly that he
was now going to be spending a lot more time with his family?
“A grim mood has gripped the country,” the opponent had concluded,
barely concealing his own broad grin.
And unfortunately, this was perfectly true. The Prime Minister felt it
himself; people really did seem more miserable than usual. Even the weather
was dismal; all this chilly mist in the middle of July. . . . It wasn’t right, it
wasn’t normal. . . .
He turned over the second page of the memo, saw how much longer it went
on, and gave it up as a bad job. Stretching his arms above his head he looked
around his office mournfully. It was a handsome room, with a fine marble
fireplace facing the long sash windows, firmly closed against the
unseasonable chill. With a slight shiver, the Prime Minister got up and moved
over to the window, looking out at the thin mist that was pressing itself
against the glass. It was then, as he stood with his back to the room, that he
heard a soft cough behind him.
He froze, nose to nose with his own scared-looking reflection in the dark
glass. He knew that cough. He had heard it before. He turned very slowly to
face the empty room.
“Hello?” he said, trying to sound braver than he felt.
For a brief moment he allowed himself the impossible hope that nobody
would answer him. However, a voice responded at once, a crisp, decisive
voice that sounded as though it were reading a prepared statement. It was
coming — as the Prime Minister had known at the first cough — from the
froglike little man wearing a long silver wig who was depicted in a small,
dirty oil painting in the far corner of the room.
“To the Prime Minister of Muggles. Urgent we meet. Kindly respond
immediately. Sincerely, Fudge.”
The man in the painting looked inquiringly at the Prime Minister.
“Er,” said the Prime Minister, “listen. . . . It’s not a very good time for
me. . . . I’m waiting for a telephone call, you see . . . from the President of —”
“That can be rearranged,” said the portrait at once. The Prime Minister’s
heart sank. He had been afraid of that.
“But I really was rather hoping to speak —”
“We shall arrange for the President to forget to call. He will telephone
tomorrow night instead,” said the little man. “Kindly respond immediately to
Mr. Fudge.”
“I . . . oh . . . very well,” said the Prime Minister weakly. “Yes, I’ll see
Fudge.”
He hurried back to his desk, straightening his tie as he went. He had barely
resumed his seat, and arranged his face into what he hoped was a relaxed and
unfazed expression, when bright green flames burst into life in the empty
grate beneath his marble mantelpiece. He watched, trying not to betray a
flicker of surprise or alarm, as a portly man appeared within the flames,
spinning as fast as a top. Seconds later, he had climbed out onto a rather fine
antique rug, brushing ash from the sleeves of his long pin-striped cloak, a
lime-green bowler hat in his hand.
“Ah . . . Prime Minister,” said Cornelius Fudge, striding forward with his
hand outstretched. “Good to see you again.”
The Prime Minister could not honestly return this compliment, so said
nothing at all. He was not remotely pleased to see Fudge, whose occasional
appearances, apart from being downright alarming in themselves, generally
meant that he was about to hear some very bad news. Furthermore, Fudge was
looking distinctly careworn. He was thinner, balder, and grayer, and his face
had a crumpled look. The Prime Minister had seen that kind of look in
politicians before, and it never boded well.
“How can I help you?” he said, shaking Fudge’s hand very briefly and
gesturing toward the hardest of the chairs in front of the desk.
“Difficult to know where to begin,” muttered Fudge, pulling up the chair,
sitting down, and placing his green bowler upon his knees. “What a week,
what a week . . .”
“Had a bad one too, have you?” asked the Prime Minister stiffly, hoping to
convey by this that he had quite enough on his plate already without any extra
helpings from Fudge.
“Yes, of course,” said Fudge, rubbing his eyes wearily and looking
morosely at the Prime Minister. “I’ve been having the same week you have,
Prime Minister. The Brockdale Bridge . . . the Bones and Vance murders . . .
not to mention the ruckus in the West Country . . .”
“You — er — your — I mean to say, some of your people were — were
involved in those — those things, were they?”
Fudge fixed the Prime Minister with a rather stern look. “Of course they
were,” he said. “Surely you’ve realized what’s going on?”
“I . . .” hesitated the Prime Minister.
It was precisely this sort of behavior that made him dislike Fudge’s visits so
much. He was, after all, the Prime Minister and did not appreciate being made
to feel like an ignorant schoolboy. But of course, it had been like this from his
very first meeting with Fudge on his very first evening as Prime Minister. He
remembered it as though it were yesterday and knew it would haunt him until
his dying day.
He had been standing alone in this very office, savoring the triumph that
was his after so many years of dreaming and scheming, when he had heard a
cough behind him, just like tonight, and turned to find that ugly little portrait
talking to him, announcing that the Minister of Magic was about to arrive and
introduce himself.
Naturally, he had thought that the long campaign and the strain of the
election had caused him to go mad. He had been utterly terrified to find a
portrait talking to him, though this had been nothing to how he felt when a
self-proclaimed wizard had bounced out of the fireplace and shaken his hand.
He had remained speechless throughout Fudge’s kindly explanation that there
were witches and wizards still living in secret all over the world and his
reassurances that he was not to bother his head about them as the Ministry of
Magic took responsibility for the whole Wizarding community and prevented
the non-magical population from getting wind of them. It was, said Fudge, a
difficult job that encompassed everything from regulations on responsible use
of broomsticks to keeping the dragon population under control (the Prime
Minister remembered clutching the desk for support at this point). Fudge had
then patted the shoulder of the still-dumbstruck Prime Minister in a fatherly
sort of way.
“Not to worry,” he had said, “it’s odds-on you’ll never see me again. I’ll
only bother you if there’s something really serious going on our end,
something that’s likely to affect the Muggles — the non-magical population, I
should say. Otherwise, it’s live and let live. And I must say, you’re taking it a
lot better than your predecessor. He tried to throw me out the window, thought
I was a hoax planned by the opposition.”
At this, the Prime Minister had found his voice at last. “You’re — you’re
not a hoax, then?”
It had been his last, desperate hope.
“No,” said Fudge gently. “No, I’m afraid I’m not. Look.”
And he had turned the Prime Minister’s teacup into a gerbil.
“But,” said the Prime Minister breathlessly, watching his teacup chewing
on the corner of his next speech, “but why — why has nobody told me — ?”
“The Minister of Magic only reveals him- or herself to the Muggle Prime
Minister of the day,” said Fudge, poking his wand back inside his jacket. “We
find it the best way to maintain secrecy.”
“But then,” bleated the Prime Minister, “why hasn’t a former Prime
Minister warned me — ?”
At this, Fudge had actually laughed.
“My dear Prime Minister, are you ever going to tell anybody?”
Still chortling, Fudge had thrown some powder into the fireplace, stepped
into the emerald flames, and vanished with a whooshing sound. The Prime
Minister had stood there, quite motionless, and realized that he would never,
as long as he lived, dare mention this encounter to a living soul, for who in
the wide world would believe him?
The shock had taken a little while to wear off. For a time, he had tried to
convince himself that Fudge had indeed been a hallucination brought on by
lack of sleep during his grueling election campaign. In a vain attempt to rid
himself of all reminders of this uncomfortable encounter, he had given the
gerbil to his delighted niece and instructed his private secretary to take down
the portrait of the ugly little man who had announced Fudge’s arrival. To the
Prime Minister’s dismay, however, the portrait had proved impossible to
remove. When several carpenters, a builder or two, an art historian, and the
Chancellor of the Exchequer had all tried unsuccessfully to prise it from the
wall, the Prime Minister had abandoned the attempt and simply resolved to
hope that the thing remained motionless and silent for the rest of his term in
office. Occasionally he could have sworn he saw out of the corner of his eye
the occupant of the painting yawning, or else scratching his nose; even, once
or twice, simply walking out of his frame and leaving nothing but a stretch of
muddy-brown canvas behind. However, he had trained himself not to look at
the picture very much, and always to tell himself firmly that his eyes were
playing tricks on him when anything like this happened
