Harry Potter 04 - Harry Potter and the Goblet of Fire

working when she is …’
    But Hermione wasn’t at dinner, and nor was she in the library when they went to look for her afterwards. The only person in there was Viktor Krum. Ron hovered behind the bookshelves for a while, watching Krum, debating in whispers with Harry whether he should ask for an autograph – but then Ron realised that six or seven girls were lurking in the next row of books, debating exactly the same thing, and he lost his enthusiasm for the idea.
    ‘Wonder where she’s got to?’ Ron said, as he and Harry went back to Gryffindor Tower.
    ‘Dunno … Balderdash.’
    But the Fat Lady had barely begun to swing forwards, when the sound of racing feet behind them announced Hermione’s arrival.
    ‘Harry!’ she panted, skidding to a halt beside him (the Fat Lady stared down at her, eyebrows raised). ‘Harry, you’ve got to come – you’ve got to come, the most amazing thing’s happened – please –’
    She seized Harry’s arm and started to try and drag him back along the corridor.
    ‘What’s the matter?’ Harry said.
    ‘I’ll show you when we get there – oh, come on, quick –’
    Harry looked around at Ron; he looked back at Harry, intrigued.
    ‘OK,’ Harry said, starting off back down the corridor with Hermione, Ron hurrying to keep up.
    ‘Oh, don’t mind me!’ the Fat Lady called irritably after them. ‘Don’t apologise for bothering me! I’ll just hang here, wide open, until you get back, shall I?’
    ‘Yeah, thanks,’ Ron shouted over his shoulder.
    ‘Hermione, where are we going?’ Harry asked, after she had led them down through six floors, and started down the marble staircase into the Entrance Hall.
    ‘You’ll see, you’ll see in a minute!’ said Hermione excitedly.
    She turned left at the bottom of the staircase, and hurried towards the door through which Cedric Diggory had gone the night after the Goblet of Fire had regurgitated his and Harry’s names. Harry had never been through here before. He and Ron followed Hermione down a flight of stone steps, but instead of ending up in a gloomy underground passage like the one which led to Snape’s dungeon, they found themselves in a broad, stone corridor, brightly lit with torches, and decorated with cheerful paintings that were mainly of food.
    ‘Oh, hang on …’ said Harry slowly, halfway down the corridor. ‘Wait a minute, Hermione …’
    ‘What?’ She turned around to look at him, anticipation all over her face.
    ‘I know what this is about,’ said Harry.
    He nudged Ron, and pointed to the painting just behind Hermione. It showed a gigantic silver fruit-bowl.
    ‘Hermione!’ said Ron, cottoning on. ‘You’re trying to rope us into that spew stuff again!’
    ‘No, no, I’m not!’ she said hastily. ‘And it’s not spew , Ron –’
    ‘Changed the name, have you?’ said Ron, frowning at her. ‘What are we now, then, the House-Elf Liberation Front? I’m not barging into that kitchen and trying to make them stop work, I’m not doing it –’
    ‘I’m not asking you to!’ Hermione said impatiently. ‘I came down here just now, to talk to them all, and I found – oh, come on , Harry, I want to show you!’
    She seized his arm again, pulled him in front of the picture of the giant fruit-bowl, stretched out her forefinger and tickled the huge green pear. It began to squirm, chuckling, and suddenly turned into a large green door handle. Hermione seized it, pulled the door open, and pushed Harry hard in the back, forcing him inside.
    He had one brief glimpse of an enormous, high-ceilinged room, large as the Great Hall above it, with mounds of glittering brass pots and pans heaped around the stone walls, and a great brick fireplace at the other end, when something small hurtled towards him from the middle of the room, squealing, ‘Harry Potter, sir! Harry Potter! ’
    Next second all the wind had been knocked out of him as the squealing elf hit him hard in the midriff, hugging him so tightly he thought his ribs would break.
    ‘D-Dobby?’ Harry gasped.
    ‘It is Dobby, sir, it is!’ squealed the voice from somewhere around his navel. ‘Dobby has been hoping and hoping to see Harry Potter, sir, and Harry Potter has come to see him, sir!’
    Dobby let go and stepped back a few paces, beaming up at Harry, his enormous, green, tennis-ball-shaped eyes brimming with tears of happiness. He looked almost exactly as Harry remembered him; the pencil-shaped nose, the bat-like ears, the long