'R — riddikulus! ' she sobbed again.

Crack.

Mr Weasley's body replaced Bill's, his glasses askew, a trickle of blood running down his face.

'No!' Mrs Weasley moaned. 'No . . . riddikulus! Riddikulus! RID-DIKULUS! '

Crack. Dead twins. Crack. Dead Percy. Crack. Dead Harry . . .

'Mrs Weasley, just get out of here!' shouted Harry, staring down at his own dead body on the floor. 'Let someone else — '

'What's going on?'

Lupin had come running into the room, closely followed by Sirius, with Moody stumping along behind them. Lupin looked from Mrs Weasley to the dead Harry on the floor and seemed to understand in an instant. Pulling out his own wand, he said, very firmly and clearly:

'Riddikulus! '

Harry's body vanished. A silvery orb hung in the air over the spot where it had lain. Lupin waved his wand once more and the orb vanished in a puff of smoke.

'Oh — oh — oh!' gulped Mrs Weasley, and she broke into a storm of crying, her face in her hands.

'Molly' said Lupin bleakly, walking over to her. 'Molly don't . . .'

Next second, she was sobbing her heart out on Lupin's shoulder.

'Molly it was just a Boggart,' he said soothingly, patting her on the head. 'Just a stupid Boggart . , .'

'I see them d — d — dead all the time!' Mrs Weasley moaned into his shoulder. 'All the t — t — time! I d — d — dream about it . . .'

Sirius was staring at the patch of carpet where the Boggart, pretending to be Harry's body, had lain. Moody was looking at Harry, who avoided his gaze. He had a funny feeling Moody's magical eye had followed him all the way out of the kitchen.

'D — d — don't tell Arthur,' Mrs Weasley was gulping now, mopping her eyes frantically with her cuffs. 'I d — d — don't want him to know . . . being silly . . .'

Lupin handed her a handkerchief and she blew her nose.

'Harry, I'm so sorry. What must you think of me?' she said shakily. 'Not even able to get rid of a Boggart . . .'

'Don't be stupid,' said Harry, trying to smile.

'I'm just s — s — so worried,' she said, tears spilling out of her eyes again. 'Half the f — f — family's in the Order, it'll b — b — be a miracle if we all come through this . . . and P — P — Percy's not talking to us . . . what if something d-d — dreadful happens and we've never m — m — made it up with him? And what's going to happen if Arthur and I get killed, who's g — g — going to look after Ron and Ginny?'

'Molly, that's enough,' said Lupin firmly. 'This isn't like last time. The Order are better prepared, we've got a head start, we know what Voldemort's up to — '

Mrs Weasley gave a little squeak of fright at the sound of the name.

'Oh, Molly, come on, it's about time you got used to hearing his name — look, I can't promise no one's going to get hurt, nobody can promise that, but we're much better off than we were last time. You weren't in the Order then, you don't understand. Last time we were outnumbered twenty to one by the Death Eaters and they were picking us off one by one . . .'

Harry thought of the photograph again, of his parents' beaming faces. He knew Moody was still watching him.

'Don't worry about Percy,' said Sirius abruptly. 'He'll come round. It's only a matter of time before Voldemort moves into the open; once he does, the whole Ministry's going to be begging us to forgive them. And I'm not sure I'll be accepting their apology,' he added bitterly.

'And as for who's going to look after Ron and Ginny if you and Arthur died,' said Lupin, smiling slightly, 'what do you think we'd do, let them starve?'

Mrs Weasley smiled tremulously.

'Being silly,' she muttered again, mopping her eyes.

But Harry, closing his bedroom door behind him some ten minutes later, could not think Mrs Weasley silly. He could still see his parents beaming up at him from the battered old photograph, unaware that their lives, like so many of those around them, were drawing to a close. The image of the Boggart posing as the corpse of each member of Mrs Weasley's family in turn kept flashing before his eyes.

Without warning, the scar on his forehead seared with pain again and his stomach churned horribly.

'Cut it out,' he said firmly, rubbing the scar as the pain receded.

'First sign of madness, talking to your own head,' said a sly voice from the empty picture on the wall.

Harry ignored it. He felt older than he had ever felt in his life and it seemed extraordinary to him that barely an hour ago he had been worried about a joke shop and who had got a prefects badge.