THE CHAMBER OF SECRETS
“I’m going down there,” he said.
He couldn’t not go, not now they had found the entrance to the
Chamber, not if there was even the faintest, slimmest, wildest
chance that Ginny might be alive.
“Me too,” said Ron.
There was a pause.
“Well, you hardly seem to need me,” said Lockhart, with a
shadow of his old smile. “I’ll just —”
He put his hand on the door knob, but Ron and Harry both
pointed their wands at him.
“You can go first,” Ron snarled.
White-faced and wandless, Lockhart approached the opening.
“Boys,” he said, his voice feeble. “Boys, what good will it do?”
Harry jabbed him in the back with his wand. Lockhart slid his
legs into the pipe.
“I really don’t think —” he started to say, but Ron gave him a
push, and he slid out of sight. Harry followed quickly. He lowered
himself slowly into the pipe, then let go.
It was like rushing down an endless, slimy, dark slide. He could
see more pipes branching off in all directions, but none as large as
theirs, which twisted and turned, sloping steeply downward, and
he knew that he was falling deeper below the school than even the
dungeons. Behind him he could hear Ron, thudding slightly at the
curves.
And then, just as he had begun to worry about what would hap-
pen when he hit the ground, the pipe leveled out, and he shot out
of the end with a wet thud, landing on the damp floor of a dark
stone tunnel large enough to stand in. Lockhart was getting to his
301