Nagini's attack on Arthur in OotP

[terri-testing.livejournal.com]

We know that Arthur was an Order member, guarding the door to the DoM (and asleep on the job under an invisibility cloak which didn't hide him from a creature that hunted by heat and scent), when Voldemort's snake attacked him.

What did the Ministry think, and the average Prophet reader?


If Fudge had realized Arthur was there on Dumbledore's orders, surely he'd have sacked him?

In fact, why wasn't Arthur sacked anyway? What business had he to be in the Ministry at all in the middle of the night? Much less loitering suspiciously outside the DoM with an invisibility cloak?

And just what kind of security does the Ministry have, that Order members, Voldemort's slaves and pets, and schoolkids, can come and go after hours as they please? I've never worked anywhere that didn't lock up when everyone left.

In fact, aren't the Aurors based in the building? Shouldn't they have a night shift (what, Dark wizards never operate at night, you tell me?), and therefore a night shift on reception to check people in who have business there?

Finally, if Fudge didn't think the snake was Tom's pet, whose did he think it was and how did he think it got in and escaped?

Thoughts?

Comments

[madderbrad.livejournal.com]

So by keeping the prophecy protected like that, Dumbledore was ensuring that his enemies' attention was focused on this comparitively useless device, rather than doing things which might help them more, such as recruiting extra followers or gaining control of the Ministry.

I'd accept that if Dumbledore had made good use of the time himself! But he *didn't*. He wasn't organising a publicity campaign to bring the Ministry over to his side, he wasn't actively recruiting Order members, he didn't do a darn thing while wasting people's lives keeping Riddle in a holding pattern.

Making Riddle wait one year or ten years has no practical benefit if the dark lord can proceed to carry on his original plans of taking over the world with absolutely no difference due to the pause.

[oryx_leucoryx]

What Albus did was review the information he had about the Horcruxes. After all, it was in June of GOF that Harry brought the information that caused Albus to realize there were more Horcruxes. In December he realizes Nagini is a Horcrux and in July he retrieves the ring. (Why didn't he find more of them? Well, if we believe him it took him all of the following year to find Tom's cave. Maybe he isn't much better of a detective than the trio. Or maybe he was following too many false leads.)