Chapter 148 — A Request from the Minister

The owl arrived while I was halfway through a comic and considering another cup of tea. It was neither Leo, Hedwig nor Pig, which made Dumbledore’s handwriting inside the envelope more of a surprise.

He asked whether I could meet him at the Extra Sunday the following morning. He wanted somewhere quiet to discuss a matter connected with the World Cup, and offered to arrange another time if I already had plans.

I read it twice before showing Emma. She looked over the page while I tried to remember whether anyone had recently mentioned the tower window in my presence.

‘He’s asking when it suits you,’ she said, handing the letter back. ‘Does tomorrow suit you?’

‘Yes, but that doesn’t explain why he wants to see me.’ I sat on the edge of her desk, keeping clear of the papers she had spread there.

‘No. You’ll have to let him arrive for that.’ She pointed towards the waiting owl, which had begun inspecting the comic. ‘You can answer the question he has asked.’

I sent my reply and wrote separately to Daniel to reserve a quiet room. By the following morning, I had considered several reasons for the meeting and found none improved by considering it again.

The first person I saw inside the restaurant was Dobby. He wore a clean apron over clothes which fitted him, and stood beside a stack of delivery boxes, sorting the intact ones from those beginning to fall apart.

‘Good morning, Mr Mercer!’ He put down a box and straightened his apron, making me feel as though I had arrived for an inspection I knew nothing about.

‘Morning, Dobby. I didn’t know you were working here.’ I stopped beside the stack, where he had balanced one rather doubtful box on top of two good ones.

‘Some mornings in the kitchen,’ he said. ‘Mr Tom knows. Dobby is still helping at the bookshop too.’

His Christmas letter had described earning his first wages there. I asked how he had come to be cooking at the Extra Sunday, and his chin lifted slightly before he answered.

‘Dobby asked.’ He rested both hands on the box. ‘Mr Tom spoke to Mr Daniel, and there was some work Dobby could try. Dobby did afternoons first.’

He explained the arrangement with enough care that I let him finish before asking another question. The two managers had agreed a trial rota, each business paid for his work there, and nobody expected him in the bookshop while he was preparing food here.

‘What about these?’ I asked, touching the doubtful box. Its corner yielded beneath my finger.

‘For Dobby’s deliveries. This one is no good.’ He lifted it to demonstrate, and the bottom fell out between us. I caught the loose piece before it reached his foot.

‘Your evidence is convincing.’ I passed it back, and Dobby laughed before putting both parts on the rejected pile.

Daniel appeared from the kitchen carrying a sheet of paper. Since I had bought the restaurant, most of our dealings had passed through reports, though I had visited often enough to recognise the expression he wore when a useful person arrived with a new complication.

‘I have the revised rota,’ he said. ‘Tom returned his copy yesterday, so you’ve saved me sending an explanation as well.’

He laid it on the nearest empty table. The kitchen hours and pay were written separately from Dobby’s bookshop shifts, with a date to review the arrangement after he had tried it for longer.

‘He can keep doing both if that suits him,’ Daniel said, while Dobby checked the paper beside us. ‘Or we can discuss changing it. The breakfast preparation has gone well.’

‘And the pies,’ Dobby added. His ears lifted as Daniel turned towards him.

‘We had a difference of opinion about the lids,’ the manager told me. ‘Several customers have since sided with Dobby.’

I looked at the elf, who was smiling down at the rota. ‘Then I’m glad you asked,’ I said. ‘And that you’ve found something you like doing.’

He thanked me, but when Daniel mentioned a delivery in the kitchen he went to deal with it without waiting for my permission to move. I watched him pass through the door before returning the paper to the manager.

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I asked Daniel to send the administration copy to Emma with the other reports. Three businesses in the Alley and the two small Frozen trials outside it already gave people plenty to do. Knowing who was actually working where mattered more than my arriving occasionally with another idea.

Upstairs, Daniel showed me the room he had reserved. I had eaten at home, so I asked for tea when Dumbledore arrived and sat where I could see the door, with my notebook open to our World Cup questions.

Transport, tickets, somewhere to sleep: none seemed to require a private appointment with the headmaster. I was still looking at the list when Daniel brought him in, followed by Cornelius Fudge.

I stood too quickly and caught my chair before it struck the wall. ‘Professor. Minister.’ The second greeting came after a pause I would have preferred to avoid.

‘Good morning, Oswald,’ Dumbledore said. ‘Thank you for seeing us.’

Fudge shook my hand with a careful smile. For a moment I could see the tower window again, and hear my own voice from inside the hospital wing while I waited outside it. Then the Minister placed a notebook on the table, which seemed an oddly restrained way to begin an arrest.

Daniel asked about refreshments. Dumbledore requested tea and something from the pastry selection; Fudge accepted tea, then waited until the tray had arrived and the door closed before speaking.

‘Your restaurant has acquired a good reputation, Mr Mercer.’ He glanced towards the street below. ‘One hears about the family interests. The bookshop, and the newer venture.’

‘Frozen,’ I said. ‘Daniel and the staff deserve much of the credit for this place.’

‘Naturally.’ Fudge took his cup without drinking. ‘And are you enjoying your holiday?’

I told him I was, wondering how long it would take to reach whatever might change that. Dumbledore selected a pastry and appeared content to let the Minister choose his approach.

Fudge opened the notebook. ‘Perhaps we ought to discuss the business first, Albus,’ he said, finding a folded sheet between the pages.

‘Please do.’ Dumbledore put down his pastry and turned towards him. I followed the movement, leaving Fudge with two people waiting for the same explanation.

‘You know we are preparing for the Quidditch World Cup,’ he began. ‘The site has been selected, and much of the necessary work is already in hand. Some of the funding, however, has proved less straightforward than expected.’

That explained why we were meeting in my restaurant instead of his office. Fudge unfolded the sheet and laid it between us, smoothing the crease with his thumb.

‘The Minister would like to discuss a sponsorship,’ Dumbledore said. He waited while I read the heading, then met my eyes when I looked up.

‘As a request?’ I asked. ‘I’d like to be clear before we discuss it.’

‘Entirely,’ he said. ‘Your place at school has nothing to do with your answer.’

Fudge’s hand stopped on the paper. ‘We are not giving you an instruction, Mr Mercer,’ he added, turning the figures towards me.

I read the total and then the headings beneath it. The sum made me stop thinking about the tickets we wanted and consider what would remain in the vault after a payment of that size.

‘Why me?’ I asked. Fudge began with the value of a successful event to the magical community, and I listened until he paused over the international visitors.

‘I understand why you want it funded,’ I said. ‘I’m asking why you’ve come to this table.’

He sat back, leaving the page in front of me. ‘We have approached other possible supporters. Some have pledged funds; others cannot contribute at the scale required. There have also been proposals with conditions we cannot accept.’

I could believe that without needing a lesson on old families. Ron’s surname did not make Arthur capable of paying for a national celebration, and my own did not mean every part of the estate could be turned into Galleons whenever somebody wanted them.

‘There are businesses and property involved,’ I said. ‘Money already committed elsewhere. Most of it isn’t something I can simply take out tomorrow.’

‘You do have substantial resources at Gringotts.’ Fudge said it pleasantly, though he was watching my response more closely now.

‘They still have a limit.’ I kept my hand beside the total. I did not know where his information came from, but I knew the accounts no longer resembled what I had seen on my first visit to the bank.

Emma and the administrators would have to examine any payment. I said so before asking for the detailed costs, the dates when money was needed and the arrangements a sponsor would have to work around. Fudge looked at his sheet as though its headings ought to have covered more of that.

‘The details can be supplied,’ he said. He took out his pen while I marked the questions in my notebook.

A remote site, crowds waiting before a match and people needing somewhere to eat: I knew smaller versions of those problems from the Alley. The scale here would change them. It might also make the proposition worth examining, provided I did not mistake wanting to attend for knowing how to serve everyone else who did.

There was something else I needed to ask before the conversation went further. I closed my notebook over the page of costs and looked across the table.

‘The accounts about Pettigrew,’ I said. ‘Professor Snape’s, Professor Lupin’s, ours. Is your office still dealing with them?’

Fudge lowered his pen. ‘I cannot discuss an investigation as part of a financial negotiation.’

‘Neither can I. I’m not asking you to sell me an answer.’ I left the funding sheet where it was. ‘I’m asking whether the evidence we gave you is being dealt with.’

Dumbledore set down his cup. ‘I shall continue to pursue the written response separately, Cornelius.’

‘The material has been received,’ Fudge said, with a stiff nod towards him. ‘Pettigrew has not been located.’

It was less than I wanted, and gave us nothing new to act on. At least he had acknowledged the accounts in front of both of us. I wrote that down on a separate page before returning to his proposal.

‘I might be interested in a commercial arrangement,’ I said. ‘If the figures work, and the terms make it worth doing.’

Fudge leaned forward again. When he asked what terms I meant, I turned to a fresh sheet and began drawing the space around a stadium.