CHAPTER TEN
large splinters. For a second, he thought that was what had woken
him. Then, with a thrill of horror, he realized that someone was
sponging his forehead in the dark.
“Get off!” he said loudly, and then, “Dobby!”
The house-elf ’s goggling tennis ball eyes were peering at Harry
through the darkness. A single tear was running down his long,
pointed nose.
“Harry Potter came back to school,” he whispered miserably.
“Dobby warned and warned Harry Potter. Ah sir, why didn’t you
heed Dobby? Why didn’t Harry Potter go back home when he
missed the train?”
Harry heaved himself up on his pillows and pushed Dobby’s
sponge away.
“What’re you doing here?” he said. “And how did you know I
missed the train?”
Dobby’s lip trembled and Harry was seized by a sudden suspi-
cion.
“It was you!” he said slowly. “You stopped the barrier from letting
us through!”
“Indeed yes, sir,” said Dobby, nodding his head vigorously, ears
flapping. “Dobby hid and watched for Harry Potter and sealed the
gateway and Dobby had to iron his hands afterward” — he showed
Harry ten long, bandaged fingers — “but Dobby didn’t care, sir,
for he thought Harry Potter was safe, and never did Dobby dream
that Harry Potter would get to school another way!”
He was rocking backward and forward, shaking his ugly head.
“Dobby was so shocked when he heard Harry Potter was back at
Hogwarts, he let his master’s dinner burn! Such a flogging Dobby
never had, sir. . . .”
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