“And what about you?”

“And what about you?” asked Hermione, ignoring Ron. “Have you been up at the Room of Requirement all this time?”

“Yep,” said Harry. “And guess who I ran into up there? Tonks!”

“Tonks?” repeated Ron and Hermione together, looking surprised.

“Yeah, she said she'd come to visit Dumbledore.”

“If you ask me,” said Ron once Harry had finished describing his conversation with Tonks, “she's cracking up a bit. Losing her nerve after what happened at the

Ministry.”

“It's a bit odd,” said Hermione, who for some reason looked very concerned. “She's supposed to be guarding the school, why she suddenly abandoning her post to come

and see Dumbledore when he's not even here?”

“I had a thought,” said Harry tentatively. He felt strange about voicing it; this was much more Hermione's territory than his. “You don't think she can have been...

you know... in love with Sirius?”

Hermione stared at him.

“What on earth makes you say that?”

“I dunno,” said Harry, shrugging, “but she was nearly crying when I mentioned his name ... and her Patronus is a big four-legged thing now... I wondered whether it

hadn't become... you know... him.”

“It's a thought,” said Hermione slowly. “But I still don't know why she'd be bursting into the castle to see Dumbledore, if that's really why she was here.”

“Goes back to what I said, doesn't it?” said Ron, who was now shoveling mashed potato into his mouth. “She's gone a bit funny. Lost her nerve. Women,” he said

wisely to Harry, “they're easily upset.”

“And yet,” said Hermione, coming out of her reverie, “I doubt you'd find a woman who sulked for half an hour because Madam Rosmerta didn't laugh at their joke about

the hag, the Healer, and the Mimbulus mimbletonia.”

Ron scowled.