J K Rowling owns all the rights to the books and the amazing characters she created. I write only to satisfy my imagination and use my creativity and make no money from my writings.

Chapter 8 – The Solution

It had been three days since Mary Riddle had disappeared and Harry didn't know whether he should be relieved…or scared. Well, no news is good news, as the old saying goes. Meanwhile, Dobby went out daily to get the newspapers of both worlds and one day he found a £1 coin in a car park where he had also found some small change a few days before. Disillusioning himself, he went back to that lot as well as others around midnight. It seemed that people tended to drop coins out of pockets getting in and out of their cars. He had managed to find several pounds worth of coins with which he bought some eggs, milk and a hunk of cheese.

Harry had praised the elf and said that it was a great idea to find money that was "abandoned" as Harry said he had found money, much the same way and Dobby should go to as many places as possible as so far it was the only "income" they had. "Just be very, very careful" Harry warned.

They hadn't heard from Winky and were really starting to worry, but since they had no real way of contacting her, they had to play the waiting game. In the meantime, Harry explored the house – just looking out of curiosity – and to pass the time. He only did so during the day when he had sunlight to guide him.

It was shortly after dawn when Harry awoke, dressed and decided to explore earlier than usual. Dobby had not returned and this fact was disturbing. If he lost Dobby, he lost everything. He entered the attic and hit the proverbial jackpot. It was filled with dusty boxes, the odd broken chair or side table, a few trunks and an antique pram, which looked so old it might have been Mary's.

"Where should I begin" thought Harry. The trunks looked good and Harry could pretend he was looking for pirate treasure. So he removed some of the boxes (containing old, dusty Christmas decorations) from the top of one trunk only to discover it was locked. Since he didn't have a wand, he would have to do it the old-fashion way that the Weasley Twins taught him. He had prepared for such a thing as he had found some old hair pins in the maids' room and had put them in his pocket, and started picking the locks. It took longer than usual as the lock was a bit rusty, but so was the hair pin.

Opening the trunk he saw that it was filled with sealed canvas bags, so he opened the first one and what did he find – sugar. It was a bit hard but that wasn't a problem as he remember reading once that unless it was stored improperly sugar didn't go bad. Since the Riddles were killed during WWII, they probably had used the black market to stock up on sugar as it was one of the things carefully rationed. If all the bags contained sugar, it would have been worth a small fortune in those days. However, it was plentiful in this era but at least it was one less thing to buy.

He tried to remember what else was rationed but could have earned the Riddles spending their money to hoard. He moved more boxes and opened another trunk, which was filled with jars of honey, another item that lasted forever if stored properly. It too was probably rationed and he tried to remember what other foods stuffs lasted a long time, but at the moment couldn't remember.

He opened a few other trunks, but they were filled with baby clothes and assorted toys which probably belong to Tom, Sr. Some of them were really nice and well-cared for and collectors would probably pay a fortune for them. That was when Mary Riddle popped in and scared the hell out of Harry by whispering in his ear "Don't even consider selling my only child's clothes and especially not his toys. He loved his toys and we were saving them for…his children…which unfortunately were never born."

"What about Tom, Jr.?" Harry asked.

"Ah yes, your great villain that you killed twice" the angry ghost said. "Just so you know, I didn't know anything about a child. All I knew was my baby was bewitched and finally managed to escape and came back quite repentant. My husband was intent on making the poor boy suffer – because that was my husband's nature – but I CONTROLLED THE MONEY AS IT WAS MY MONEY AND FATHER HAD AN AIR-TIGHT MARRIAGE CONTRACT DRAWN UP. It was really necessary, as my father didn't trust Thomas – and neither did I and with good reason."

A smile appeared on her ghostly feature before she continued her tale. "My father was dying and I was his only surviving child and he wanted me to be safe but he was no fool and neither was I. In those days the husband had control over the wife's and offspring's property and could do with it as he willed. My father spent his life making his fortune and knew that Thomas would waste it and leave me bankrupted. And he would have except for that contract. After father died, Thomas tried to break it but it was too excellent a document as our lawyers were better than his lawyers."

"Even if I died before him, he wouldn't receive a penny, other than £200 a year, which was his "allowance" and if he tried to break the contract or treated me harshly, he wouldn't get that. He demanded that I acquiesce to his rightful demands – OR ELSE. He then actually struck me but was greatly shocked when I hit him back. You see papa had arranged for me to have lessons in self-defense, shooting, swimming, archery, etc. After that, I called for the butler and informed him to get a footman and show Mr. Hanley the door, throw him in a carriage and keep him there while his personal possessions and clothes were packed and he was never to darken my doorway again."

"Who was Mr. Hanley?" Harry asked.

"Oh, you don't know but then how could you" came the reply. "My father wanted the family name to live on, so he made it part of the contract that Thomas Hanley-Willborough take the name of Riddle and any offspring would also do so. Thomas was the fourth son from an old family, one which had fallen on hard times due to carelessness on their part. The family had lost most of their wealth and only had their name – which wasn't worth much – and a Barony received by one of the last decent persons the family had. He and all of his brothers, even the heir, went looking for a rich wife, but he was the only one who found one, after many years of looking."

"So you were taking the name of Riddle from him?" Harry asked.

"Yes. I was also getting the marriage annulled, or at least I was until I found out that I was with child. Things were quite different in those days. A divorce and/or an annulment was a scandal, hurting the woman the most as no matter what the reason or how bad she was treated, she was always at fault. My lawyers persuaded me to stop the annulment at least until Tom was born, but I did manage to get rid of Thomas for years by raising his allowance to £400 a year and except for when he was in the company of those who knew of our marriage, he wasn't to disgraceful the Riddle name."

"He did come back long enough on occasions which I won't mention at the moment, as well as to get himself killed, and although there is more information on his disastrous and disgusting life, I am tired talking about him."

Harry was about to ask more questions when Dobby finally popped in. It looked as if the excitable elf was on the verge of having a conniption and he was waving copies of newspapers in front of Harry. He was too far gone in his nervous state to talk so he just handed the papers to Harry and began pulling on his ears and moaning about "the outrage" and "the doom of Magic" until Harry ordered him to stop hurting himself. After calming Dobby down – but just a bit – Harry looked at the Times and after reading the headline, he nearly pulled on his ears.

The Daily Prophet had even worse news and Harry just started saying "Oh Merlin, oh Merlin" until Mary yelled "Merlin isn't a god so call on the Christ, Allah, the Budda or whatever gods/goddesses you worship but Merlin was the son of a demon who raped a nun, so invoking his name is the same as calling on Satan."

At this point Harry seemed incapable of saying anything so in one hand he held up the Prophet and in the other hand held up the Times so that Mary could read them. Her only comment was "Damnation, they'll all die before that happens" and Harry knew she was right.

So what was all the fuss and horror about? Apparently, the Muggle governments assisted by the Squibs had come up with a perfect (in their minds at least) plan to end the panic as well as saving lives. What was it you ask? Starting with Britain, to see if it worked, all Magical beings were to present themselves at the to be named points and a group of wizards/witches from other countries would permanently bind their magic – no exceptions. The Magicals would become Squibs BUT they would be allowed to live, after converting to an established religion to get rid of their pagan and devilish ways, and to keep some of their property and wealth after paying fines, etc.

The fate of people like the Weasleys, who had only the Burrow and Arthur's ministry salary to their names, was still undecided, but their Squib relative would demand something for his trouble but he wouldn't be getting anything of real value. It was just the principle of the thing.

However, most of Magical Britain was, naturally, against it. Then it was mentioned that magical creatures such as house elves, Goblins, etc. were to lose their magic, with the Goblins changing their galleons, sickles and knuts into Muggle currency. The gold and silver could be melted down into ingots to simplify things and, in a gesture of "understanding between races" they could keep the gemstones IF, they gave the Muggles an itemized list of the contents of all vaults so that the fines could be calculated. You really don't want to hear the answer the Goblins gave unless you want your ears to fall off.

"Don't worry about such a thing happening" Dumbledore announced. No one knows all of the people who are Magical in Britain, so some of us will escape this purge."

Of course he was wrong as someone had managed to get a hold of the Hogwarts Book of Names which went back centuries and naming anybody who had magic, including those that hadn't chosen to attend Hogwarts, were Squibs or had already had their magic bound. How the book was found and spirited out of Hogwarts was a mystery but it had happened and the Muggles were threatening to out all Muggleborns, thus endangering the likes of Hermione Granger, Dean Thomas, the Creevey brothers, etc. and their parents and Muggle relatives. The crazed mobs were still out there and no one was safe.

Magical Britain had seven days to comply with this solution or face the wrath of the mobs.

Although he wouldn't admit it, Albus Dumbledore was frightened as even Hogwarts could not protect them, and for once in his life, he didn't have a plan.