Chapter 210 No. 12, Grimmauld Place

Getting off the train at King's Cross Station, a group of people crossed platform nine and a quarter, dragged their suitcases and walked out of the gate. They took off their wizard robes early on the train, put on Muggle clothes, and wore bright clothes. The four of them formed a stark contrast with the sallow, emaciated, and tattered homeless people around them. Walburga in a western dress raised his legs and stepped over an unconscious child lying beside a rubbish dump by the roadside, and said with a disgusted face, "These Muggles, if you can't beat them, don't beat them, it will affect your mood every time you go home."

"They are actually the side that was invaded." Nelson said from the side. He brought some change when he returned to London this time, took out a few scattered coins from his pocket, held them in his hand and flicked them to the side of the road. After rebounding, the coin miraculously fell into the pocket of the homeless boy. He put his hands back into his pockets again and said, "If the Germans win, I'm afraid your mood on the way home will be even worse."

"Actually, it's okay now. During the war, there will be municipal departments patrolling the streets every day to take in orphans. At least there are very few cases of people starving to death." As a loyal fan of Chamberlain, Tom is more familiar with British government affairs. He shook his head and bypassed the garbage. Dui, said, "If the war is over, no matter whether you win or lose, then there will be no time to pay attention to them. It will be their hard days when the government's reconstruction work begins."

"Anyway, it has nothing to do with us." Alphard supported the brim of the pork pie hat on his head, stared ahead, and hurried forward, but his old grinning face was no longer there, and it could be seen that his heart was not at peace.

Fifteen is really the right age. Little wizards can no longer be called little wizards. Compared with children, they have already begun to really get in touch with society and put themselves into it, including but not limited to A series of labels such as class, identity, blood, etc., when they lose their innocence and become more mature, they often have completely different thinking from a year ago when they face various scenes that were commonplace before.

Alfred has walked this road for four years, and he has even more experience wandering around when he was young, but this is the first time he really lowered his head and took this scene of starvation everywhere into his eyes, but he overestimated Overcoming his ability to bear, this pure-hearted sunny boy couldn't bear to look directly at him just a short distance after leaving the station.

"Nelson," after walking for about ten minutes, Walburga led the way, discussing the antiques in the house with Tom, Alpha grabbed the sleeve of Nelson who was looking left and right with great interest, and asked in a low voice, "may I take the liberty? Just ask, do you know where they will go in the future?"

"Oh? Are you interested in them?" Nelson raised his eyebrows, slowed down, and walked to Alphard. Walburga and Tom in front of them heard the noise and turned around. Nelson waved his hand to indicate that they don't have to wait. Himself, then, he rubbed his hair, thought for a moment, and replied, "Generally speaking, they will be discovered by the municipal department, and then assigned to the surrounding public orphanages. Tom and I grew up in the Westside Orphanage."

"Were you like this before?" Alphard pointed to the vagrant behind him, and asked in a low voice, "I'm not...I mean, were you also found on the street?"

"Not really," Nelson said, shaking his head, "I have relatives in London, my aunt's family. As for Tom, he was born in an orphanage. We have been there since we were young, and we have never experienced these things on the streets." Ups and downs."

"Oh!" Alphard nodded and looked back again, "Then why weren't they sent to the orphanage?"

"It should be that the share of the orphanage is not enough," Nelson sighed, and said, "The income of the orphanage generally comes from social donations, government funding and church support. Now it seems that the income of the first two items should be very little. As for the church, it can earn more money during the war, but very little money can go into the pockets of institutions like orphanages."

"Why do you need money? Is it difficult to have enough food?" Alphard was extremely confused, "As far as I know, wizards—"

"You said you were a wizard," Nelson patted Alphard on the shoulder and interrupted him, lest he make any more high-level remarks such as "why not eat minced meat", he explained, "for non-magic Ma As far as melons are concerned, if you want to eat something, even a simple piece of black bread, you have to plow the land and plant the seeds the year before, and then take care of harvesting the wheat for half a year, grind them into flour, and bake them with other condiments Only then can we eat, and for the vast majority of people, the process has to be done with their own hands."

"Hiss... It's unimaginable to grind flour by hand." Alphard shook his head, lost in thought.

"If you're interested, there's too much time for you to walk around the streets of London this holiday." Nelson pulled up the suitcase and chased after Tom and Walburga's backs.

"Yeah." Alphard nodded and followed.

...

"Is this Grimmauld Place?"

Nelson and Alphard quickly caught up with the other two and walked for about ten minutes. They came to a square. They said it was a square, but it was actually just a flat area surrounded by residential buildings. This kind of place is common in the UK. , the ground of the square is paved with old bluestones. Looking at the shiny bluestones, Nelson can imagine how flat and magnificent it was when it was first built, but the bluestones that have been rounded by the years are now somewhat bumpy. of.

After entering the square, Walburga walked straight to a row of houses next to them. They were uniform in shape, with the same square lintels and the same thin and high windows, giving people an economical and practical Gothic look. She stood still between No. 11 and No. 13, looked left and right under the gaze of the three people behind her, then pulled out her wand and poked at the dividing line between the two houses.

Soon, the two houses No. 11 and No. 13 separated to the two sides. A door painted with black paint squeezed out of the dark gap first, followed by a beautiful big house, which was more than The houses on both sides are much taller, larger and more unique, with their pointed roofs and painted-wrapped attics, and even two bouquets of flowers next to the gate, and the two large windows facing them were wiped dry It is clean, and you can see the busy people inside. It is different from what Nelson imagined. This is a beautiful house with clean windows and full of vitality.

"It seems that they even cleaned the outside." Walburga raised his eyebrows, stepped up the steps first, stretched his arms, and rang the doorbell. There was a silver snake-shaped doorknob under the doorbell. But there is no keyhole on it, and it seems to be just a place for decoration or to use when opening the door.

"Which one?" There was a quick response from the door, which sounded like a serious middle-aged man.

"It's me, Father," Walburga responded, "and we're back."

"Are you bringing your classmates?" The host's tone was a little anxious.

"Yes."

Soon, with the sound of chains colliding, the door opened wide from the inside, the shaft made a "squeak" friction sound, and a serious face poked out from inside.

He has a face not much different from that of Alphard, only older, thinner, and more serious. His short, dense black hair is combed back meticulously, and he holds a ruddy wooden pipe in his hand. Curly blue smoke was coming out of it, and he was wearing a very formal black robe, a robe that could be called gorgeous and normal people would never wear at home. Around the man's neck hangs a silver necklace with a pendant carved in the shape of the Black family crest - two greyhounds surrounding a black shield depicting a mountain peak, dotted with two stars and A sharp sword.

"Hello, welcome to play at home." He stretched out his hand, gently shook hands with Nelson and Tom, and stepped aside, "I'm Walburga and Alphard's father, and my name is Borrox Black. Come in, please."

Everyone returned the salute and approached the house under his greeting. Nelson noticed that there was a glittering golden medal hidden under Borroux's straight collar. When he took a closer look, it turned out to be a Merlin First Class Medal.

Approaching the gate, what greets the eye is a huge tapestry with tree-like patterns embroidered with gold thread, and each tree crown has a name, and on the top are several large golden characters: Noble and oldest Black Family, the only fly in the ointment is that there are a lot of small holes scalded on it, as if an old smoker often smokes by the side, Nelson's thoughts involuntarily diverge to Borroux's pipe.

Nelson leaned closer to the tapestry to have a look, and Borroux's voice came from behind him: "This is the genealogy of the Black family, and every member of the family on it was once full of influence in their own industry. The Black family is an important part of British history. The oldest and purest family."

"Thank you." Nelson felt his teeth ache when he heard this explanation that sounded like a sales pitch.

"You're welcome, let the two children take you around the house first," Borroux nodded, and said, "I'm going to order someone to prepare the dinner first."

After all, before Nelson could reply, he had disappeared.

"Let's go." Walburga shrugged. She immediately relaxed after her father disappeared, pouted her mouth towards the tapestry, and said, "Everyone above is full of influence in their own industries. Of course, those who don't have influence It's those little holes."

"I may also become a small hole in the future." Alphard added, "Our family now counts about a dozen relatives. In fact, if we don't burn them off, the Black family should still be very prosperous."

"This is the limitation of pure-blood families," Tom commented. "Some families have only one person left."

"Indeed." Nelson looked at Tom and raised his eyebrows.

"Let's go, I'll take you to see the collections in our house. The study is next to it. You should be interested." Walburga said, and was about to go upstairs.

Nelson's first impression of No. 12, Grimmauld Place was that it was black. Unexpectedly, when he went up to the second floor, it was still the same black. It's not that the lighting is not good. It seems that the family is very happy to use black in the decoration. It's worthy of them "BLACK" last name.

"Alphad, where is your room?" Tom suddenly realized an important question.

"Are you in such a hurry? Although they are indeed healthy, they are not in a hurry."

"No, I mean, just looking at your father's clothes, I feel that tonight's dinner should be more formal." Tom tugged at his collar and said, "It doesn't feel very formal for me to wear a sweater and a windbreaker. "

"Exactly." Nelson nodded.

"Actually, there is no need to care about this, after all, we are still underage." Walburga comforted.

"That can't be done," Tom gave her a blank look. "Your family members are asking for Gnar. Since they are very sincere, we can't disrespect them."

"We just bought a dress robe," Nelson added.

"Okay, I didn't think twice." Walburga bowed and told his younger brother, "Take them to the guest room to change clothes, and we'll see you in the study later."

...

"That's it? The healthy thing you said... that's it?"

At the door of the study, Tom was trying his best to spit out the treasure that Alphard brought from the bedroom - a small drill specially used for underground construction. According to him, this drill can dig out a 500-meter-long, The tunnel that can be passed by people is said to be derived from a flash of inspiration from an ancestor of the Black family.

"This is our family's treasure," Alphard said proudly. "When we were called black wizards, this device helped the wizards at that time pass on a lot of information that was difficult to transmit."

"How extreme are these conditions?" Tom held his forehead helplessly, "What kind of situation requires a group of wizards to dig into the ground to deliver messages, besides, where is the pile of soil dug out?"

"Alphad, what are you talking about? Black wizard?" Nelson grasped the point, this was the second time he had heard the word.

"Yes, but those pairs were a long time ago." Alphard scratched his head, "This story is in the family tree I promised you, which is quite interesting."

Nelson nodded, keeping this matter in mind, and then there was a louder and louder sound, and Walburga, who was stepping on a glass slipper, approached, and she hurried to this side, While throwing pieces of used cosmetics into the arms of the house elf.

"Miss, you forgot your brooch."

"I know," Walburga snatched the brooch and pinned it to his chest, "shut up, I don't want him to see that I can't even wear clothes."

"Kreacher knows what Miss wants." The young-looking house elf babbled, holding Walburga's skirt and approaching the crowd, "When Miss has friends, she doesn't need Kreacher, oh …I didn’t need to have friends before.”

Walburga stroked her long hair and threw it back. The red high-necked dress looked radiant, and even the accessories on her body shone. She walked towards the study, bowed slightly, and said to Tom, " Awaited."

"It's okay." Tom took a deep look at Walburga. He admired the aesthetics of the clothes. Tom nodded and praised, "Very beautiful, Walburga."

"Really?!" Walburga's footsteps were much lighter, she lifted the hem of her skirt and spun around on the spot.

Tom nodded again, for he was never stingy with admiring things that were truly beautiful.

"Sorry, it's been a long time changing clothes. Let's see after dinner or tomorrow. Now I have to go to the restaurant quickly."

She is proud of herself, but as for Alphard's "What are you pretending", Nelson's "May I go to the study to learn English table manners quickly" and Kreacher's "Miss your earrings are not fastened", such insignificant words are not Completely filtered by her.

She held her head up like a proud swan and led the way, looking back at Tom's face wrapped in a dress robe from time to time, while Nelson followed Alphard, exchanging the differences between French table manners and British ones, but he soon I found that communicating with Alphard is worse than communicating with house elves.