"Pardon?" McGonagall asked, as guilty as any First Year he'd ever seen.
"You forget who you're talking to?" Lester said, turning to her. "I've asked around. A couple of these kids are First Years and Harry is Mister Moneybags," he flicked a thumb Harry's way. "The kid doesn't deserve to be guilted into paying for other people. It's not his responsibility."
"I know it's not," the Scot woman said, actually managing to sound torn about what she was planning to do. "And far be it for me to compound the boy's worries by asking him to but I truly have nowhere else to turn," she explained. "Hogwarts has promised them an education and we are honor-bound to live up to it. Every one of the Hogwarts Governors have either flatly said no or given me trifles to clear their conscience."
"What has Albus said about it?" he prompted.
"He's of the opinion that everything will sort itself out so there's no point in worrying," McGonagall said with an exasperated look. "Though if you meant in a higher or more personal capacity, you needn't bother; I haven't asked him. I've seen the way he handles other peoples' money, so as far as I'm concerned he's stolen that position too. And if he had access to anything of his own you haven't already seized, I still wouldn't take it from him."
"That's good to hear, coming from the Deputy Headmistress," Lester said thoughtfully. 'Things might work out after all, ' he thought. "You haven't gone to the public though," he noticed aloud. "Trying to keep things as secret as I am?"
"If I can help it, yes," she said after waiting for one of those young people to grab something and wander off. "Mister Potter's involvement with the Weasleys has changed their position at home, even if temporarily, so it eases my conscience about rescinding the offer to Miss Weasley. Mister Creevey and Miss Lovegood are a different matter though," McGonagall went on to say. "Their circumstances haven't changed and it wouldn't be right to put one above the other. If I pick one then I'm choosing a boy above a girl and if I choose the other it's a pureblood above a muggleborn."
"They prefer 'person of non-magical heritage' - if you have to mention the heritage at all that is," Lichfield interjected. "They think muggle is demeaning; but I see the tricky position you're in."
"Tricky or not, if I don't find a solution soon I either have to go back on our word to both of them or appeal to the public for their generosity. Regardless," she said with a sigh, "the program itself can't continue, not once what he's done is made public."
'And that will be soon, ' Lester thought. Something she had said was nagging at him though. "Lovegood, that name sounds familiar. Why is that?"
"The girl's father, Xenophilius, runs a magazine called The Quibbler, though it's gone downhill fast since his wife's death," McGonagall informed him. "It's not too far from the Weasleys so I thought they might be one of yours."
Lester shook his head, they didn't have anyone by that name; at least they didn't when he'd known them all personally. "The Weasleys are on the edge of that bit of land; one of the free-holdings then. You said the wife was dead? What did she do?"
"She was the brains behind The Quibbler, " she said with an odd mixture of frustration and admiration. "She was the reason they got the name. Pandora loved to pick holes in everything: proposed legislation, the current state of international affairs, the latest edition of Transfiguration Today… I once had an article the editor cut down to save space and she lambasted me for it," McGonagall said with a furrowed brow. "All of her criticisms were true, of course, the subjects she raised really were short-changed, though there was no way she could know my original draft had addressed them."
Pandora, what a horribly chosen name. Lester remembered her now; dirty blonde hair and remarkably sharp eyes for scrutinizing everything. She had been of the opinion they had done something wrong and that was why everyone had died; like some corrected calculation could bring everyone back.
"She was a researcher of some kind, wasn't she?" he asked, already knowing the answer and hoping to be proven wrong.
"I believe so, when she wasn't writing, that is," McGonagall said, still hung up on the ancient barb. "It's tragic, really. There are precious few brave enough to chance something new after what happened with you, only to have her die unexpectedly."
"I met her," Lester admitted finally. "She came by a couple times to pick my brain about what happened back then and why. I thought she was writing a history, I didn't think she'd go meddling with things that shouldn't be meddled with."
"You don't mean," McGonagall said, making the horrible connection, "that she became one of the Lost?"
"I wouldn't be surprised if she did," Lester nodded. 'The Lost Generation, ' he thought derisively, 'an overly romantic way of looking at things. They weren't lost and wandering around somewhere, they were dead. '
"At times I feel sorry for you lot who are left," she admitted, "though sometimes I'm relieved I was never asked to join you."
"You were safe," he told her. "You were always a bit of a prig."
"I was a Prefect," she said defensively. "It's a Prefect's job to be a prig."
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