THE KEEPER OF THE KEYS
“A Muggle,” said Hagrid, “it’s what we call nonmagic folk like
them. An’ it’s your bad luck you grew up in a family o’ the biggest
Muggles I ever laid eyes on.”
“We swore when we took him in we’d put a stop to that rub-
bish,” said Uncle Vernon, “swore we’d stamp it out of him! Wizard
indeed!”
“You knew?” said Harry. “You knew I’m a — a wizard?”
“Knew!” shrieked Aunt Petunia suddenly. “Knew! Of course we
knew! How could you not be, my dratted sister being what she
was? Oh, she got a letter just like that and disappeared off to
that — that school — and came home every vacation with her
pockets full of frog spawn, turning teacups into rats. I was the only
one who saw her for what she was — a freak! But for my mother
and father, oh no, it was Lily this and Lily that, they were proud of
having a witch in the family!”
She stopped to draw a deep breath and then went ranting on. It
seemed she had been wanting to say all this for years.
“Then she met that Potter at school and they left and got mar-
ried and had you, and of course I knew you’d be just the same, just
as strange, just as — as — abnormal — and then, if you please, she
went and got herself blown up and we got landed with you!”
Harry had gone very white. As soon as he found his voice he
said, “Blown up? You told me they died in a car crash!”
“CAR CRASH!” roared Hagrid, jumping up so angrily that the
Dursleys scuttled back to their corner. “How could a car crash kill
Lily an’ James Potter? It’s an outrage! A scandal! Harry Potter not
knowin’ his own story when every kid in our world knows his
name!”
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