【正文】 through it to the sky above. “ Well, we know our protective charms hold, then, don?t we? They shouldn?t be able to get within a hundred yards of the place in any direction.” Now Harry understood why Voldemort had vanished。 it had been at the point when the motorbike crossed the barrier of the Order?s charms. He only hoped they would continue to work: He imagined Voldemort, a hundred yards above them as they spoke, looking for a way to perate what Harry visualized as a great transpar ent bubble. He swung his legs off the sofa。 he needed to see Hagrid with his own eyes before he would believe that he was alive. He had barely stood up, however, when a door opened and Hagrid squeezed through it, his face covered in mud and blood, limping a little but miraculously alive. “ Harry!” Knocking over tw o delicate tables and an aspidistra, he covered the floor between them in two strides and pulled Harry into a hug that nearly cracked his newly repaired ribs. “Blimey, Harry, how did yeh get out o? that? I thought we were both goners.” “ Yeah, me too. I can?t believe – ” Harry broke off. He had just noticed the woman who had entered the room behind Hagrid. “ You!” he shouted, and he thrust his hand into his pocket, but it was empty. “ Your wand?s here, son,” said Ted, tapping it on Harry?s arm. “It fell right beside you, I picked it up…And that?s my wife you?re shouting at.” “ Oh, I?m – I?m sorry.” As she moved forward into the room, Mrs. Tonks?s resemblance to her sister Bellatrix became much less pronounced: Her hair wa s a light soft brown and her eyes were wider and kinder. Nevertheless, she looked a little haughty after Harry?s exclamation. “ What happened to our daughter?” she asked. “Hagrid said you were ambushed。 where is Nymphadora?” “ I don?t know,” said Harry. “We don?t know what happened to anyone else.” She and Ted exchanged looks. A mixture of fear and guilt gripped Harry at the sight of their expressions, if any of the other s had died, it was his fault, all his fault. He had consented to the plan, given them his hair… “ The Portkey,” he said, remembering all of a sudden. “We?ve got to get back to the Burrow and find out – then we?ll be able to send you word, or – or Tonks will, once she?s – ” “ Dora?ll be ok, ?Dromeda,” said Ted. “She knows her stuff, she?s been in plenty of tight spots with the Aurors. The Portkey?s through here,” he added to Harry. “It?s supposed to leave in three minutes, if y ou want to take it.” “ Yeah, we do,” said Harry. He seized his rucksack, swung it onto his shoulders. “I – ” He looked at Mrs. Tonks, wanting to apologize for the state of fear in which he left her and for which he felt so terribly responsible, but no wor ds occurred to him that he did not seem hollow and insincere. “ I?ll tell Tonks – Dora – to send word, when she… Thanks for patchin g us up, thanks for everything, I – ” He was glad to leave the room and follow Ted Tonks along a short hallway and into a bedroom. Hagrid came after them, bending low to avoid hitting his head on the door lintel. “ There you go, son. That?s the Portkey.” Mr. Tonks was pointing to a small, silverbacked hairbrush lying on the dressing table. “ Thanks,” said Harry, reaching out to place a finger on it, ready to leave. “ Wait a moment,” said Hagrid, looking around. “Harry, where?s Hedwig?” “ She… she got hit ,” said Harry. The realization crashed over him: He felt ashamed of himself as the tears stung his eyes. The owl had been his panion, his one great link w ith the magical world whenever he had been forced to return to the Dursleys. Hagrid reached out a great hand and patted him painfully on the shoulder. “ Never mind,” he said gruffly, “Never mind. She had a great old life – ” “ Hagrid!” said Ted Tonks warningly, as the hairbrush glowed bright blue, and Hagrid only just got his forefinger to it in time. With a jerk behind the navel as though an invisible hook and line had dragged him forward, Harry was pulled into nothingness, spinning uncontrollably, his finger glued to the Portkey as he and Hagrid hurtled away from Mr. Tonks. Second later, Harry?s feet slammed onto hard ground and he fell onto his hands and knees in the yard of the Burrow. He heard screams. Throwing aside the no longer glow ing hairbrush, Harry stood up, swaying slightly, and saw Mrs. Weasley and Ginny running down the steps by the back door as Hagrid, who had also collapsed on landing, clambered “ The Death Eaters were waiting for us,” Harry told her, “We were surrounded the moment we took off – they knew it was tonight – I don?t know what happened to anyone else, four of them chased us, it was all we could do to get away, and then Voldemort caught up with us – ” He could hear the selfjustifying note in his voice, the plea for her to understand why he did not know what had happened to her sons, but – “ Thank goodness you?re all right,” she said, pulling him into a hug he did not feel he deserved. “ Haven?t go? any brandy, have yeh, Molly?” asked Hagrid a little shakily, “Fer medicinal purposes?” She could have summoned it by magic, but as she hurried back toward the crooked house, Har ry knew that she wanted to hide her face. He turned to Ginny and she answered his unspoken plea for information at once. “ Ron and Tonks should have been back first, but they missed their Portkey, it came back without them,” she said, pointing at a rusty oil can lying on the ground nearby. “And that one,” she pointed at an ancient sneaker, “should have been Dad and Fred?s, they were supposed to be second. You and Hagrid were third and,” she checked her watch, “if they made it, Gee and Lupin aught to be bac k in about a minute.” Mrs. Weasley reappeared carrying a bottle of brandy, which she handed to Hagrid. He uncorked it and drank it straight d