"Baby, are you kidding me?" Narcissa, who was sitting at the dining table, screamed in disbelief.
"I don't think so," Malfoy said calmly.
"I don't agree. How can there be homework for Christmas? You even have to go so far away. Tell me, did your giant teacher arrange this?" Narcissa slammed the mahogany table. "I must get your father to fire him. It's hard to imagine that Hogwarts would hire a murderer as a teacher."
"Oh, Mother, he's just a janitor now," Malfoy explained slowly. "This is just an extra-curricular assignment for Potions class. It's not a mandatory requirement. But shouldn't your son be the best? Any mission should be completed perfectly, shouldn't it? " Malfoy paused for a moment before adding, "The Potions teacher is called Severus Snape. You should know him."
"Snape." Narcissa repeated the name once. "He seems to have done something with your father before, but I still don't agree," Narcissa said after thinking for a while. "You're actually willing to leave Mother alone at home for Christmas?" Narcissa seemed to be trying to squeeze some tears out of her eyes.
Malfoy was speechless for a moment.
"I'm back." A middle-aged man's gloomy voice suddenly came from the marble fireplace.
"Mother, I think Father can accompany you now." Malfoy's tone had a hint of joy.
"You're really not here when you should be, but back when you shouldn't be." Narcissa's tone was much worse than Malfoy's.
The travel-worn Lucius clearly didn't understand the situation and was confused. He came to the table and took a sip of honey tea. Malfoy then explained to him.
"The Malfoys aren't reckless people, but they aren't people who lack courage." Lucius turned to Malfoy and said, "Of course, Father supports you."
"Back then, I was also …" Then he had a nostalgic expression, as if he was thinking about his school days.
"Enough. It's not like I don't know about your past." Narcissa was in a very bad mood, so she used Lucius, who was reminiscing about the past, as a punching bag.
Lucius, who was interrupted, smiled awkwardly and stopped talking. He obviously didn't want to argue with the angry Narcissa.
In the words of the people of the Celestial Empire, "It's a big festival, why bother?"
After lunch, Malfoy said goodbye to his parents and began his journey for the day.
Before he left, he made a special trip to the Muggles' market and bought a few beef bones, but he didn't know what they were for.
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The villagers of Little Hangerton still called the house "Liddell Hall", although the Liddell family had not lived there for many years. The house was situated on a hillside, from which one could see the whole village. Several windows of the house were sealed, and the roof tiles were incomplete. Ivy was crawling all over the house with its fangs bared and claws brandished. Riddell Hall, which had been a large and handsome house, the largest and most imposing for miles around, was now damp, desolate, and uninhabited.
Today, the house welcomed a small guest. He had light blonde hair and carried a black bag in his hand.
Malfoy walked on the wide road, and a few curious villagers asked him where he was going. Any unfamiliar face in such a small village would make people curious. When Malfoy told them his destination, every villager who asked him about it changed their expressions. Obviously, in their impression, the house had a gloomy and frightening feeling. The murder case fifty years ago was enough to leave a deep impression on these little villagers.
After failing to persuade him, the villagers shook their heads and left helplessly. They were puzzled by the boy's behavior, because no one wanted to go near the gradually desolate house.
Except for Frank, who was the caretaker of the house and a gardener.
He was the biggest suspect in the murder case fifty years ago. He had been on the battlefield, and the villagers speculated that he was mentally unstable, so he murdered the Liddell family.
The police also thought he was a serious suspect, so they took him back to the police station. Frank denied the charges, stubbornly repeating over and over again that he was innocent. He said that the only person he had seen in the vicinity of the house on the day of the Liddells' deaths was a boy of about ten whom he did not know. The boy had dark hair and a pale face. No one else in the village had ever seen such a boy, and the police were sure that Frank had invented the story.
However, the autopsy report left the police at a loss. The police had never seen a report as strange as this one. A team of doctors examined the bodies, and came to the conclusion that none of the Liddells had been harmed by poison, sharp weapons, or pistols, nor had they been suffocated or strangled. In fact (the report went on in a tone of obvious bewilderment), all three of the Liddells appeared to be in good health — except for one thing, they were all dead. The doctors noticed (as if they were determined to find something wrong with the bodies) that each of the Liddells had an expression of terror on his face — but as the perplexed policeman said, who ever heard of three people being frightened to death at the same time?
Frank was set free.
What was more surprising was that he had returned to his little wooden hut in the Liddell House garden.
The new owner of the house did not live there, nor did he use it for any purpose, as if he were doing something about the tax? The villagers did not know. But the wealthy owner continued to pay Frank to be his gardener.
"Knock, knock, knock." There was a knock at the front door.
Frank slowly stood up from the chair in the courtyard and limped towards the door with the help of his walking stick. Perhaps it was because of the hidden injuries from the battlefield, or perhaps it was because he was old, but one of his legs was not very nimble, and he could only rely on the walking stick to help him walk.
As he walked, Frank wondered who would come to the house.
"It can't be the kids," Frank thought. "They're not that polite." The village boys were fond of throwing stones at the windows of the Liddell House. Frank had spent a lot of effort to keep the grass flat, but they rode their bicycles and casually stepped on it. Once or twice, they even broke into the old house for a bet.
He believed that the boys were torturing him because, like their parents and grandparents, they thought he was a murderer.
The front door slowly opened. The old door made an unbearable sound as it touched the ground.
"Oh, child, what are you doing here?" After opening the door, Frank saw an unfamiliar boy with a pale face and light blonde hair. He gave off a different feeling from the other brats. He felt that this child was very classy. Looking at Malfoy, he seemed to recall the pale-faced, black-haired child from back then.
"Take a nap, I'm sorry," Malfoy said softly, then raised his wand. "Faint!" A red flame shot out from the tip of the wand and hit Frank.
His body slowly fell to the grass, and then he lost consciousness.