Double Dog Dare! -- Episode 2
Hecate, 14 December 2001

Fred and George watched the two Americans manage to find the longest possible route between two points as they headed for St. Odilo's. The Weasleys not only beat them to the base of the bell tower, but had plenty of time both to distract the curate with a well-tossed dungbomb in the direction of the cemetery and to hide themselves in a small grove of trees opposite the somewhat ramshackle stone sanctuary before the oddly matched Muggles made their appearance.

"Wish we had Potter's cloak," George muttered.

"You always say that," said Fred. "Shows a lack of imagination, if you ask me."

"Nah. Just think of the expanded possibilities. . . ."

"George! Look!" Fred nodded his head in the direction of the Muggles, who had begun to do an amazingly canny impression of wasted youth lounging about the church's doorstep.

"What do you suppose they're going to try?"

"Something about a dog, what?" Fred whispered.

"They haven't got a dog."

"Lucky dog," said Fred, cuffing his brother on the head.

"Ow!" said George.

"Shut your trap, then. C'mon, we'll miss it!"

Using his brother's knee as a stepladder, Fred clambered a bit higher into the grove's largest ash tree. The Muggles were skulking from window to window, in some supposedly surreptitious attempt to find an opening in the small building.

"Nutters," said Fred. "You'd think they'd start with the door."

"What fun is that?" Fred had to concede that George had a point.

~*~*~

On the other side of Ottery St. Catchpole, the postman was thunking his hand against the side of his head. He thought he'd just seen a decidedly odd pair sauntering lazily down the towpath. A very large and shaggy black dog was one thing; really, it was completely normal. But perched on the black dog's shoulders was a miniscule spaniel, a lock of the larger dog's hair clenched in its jaws, presumably to keep it from falling off.

"Bloody heat," muttered the postman. "Everyone will be seeing things if it doesn't let up soon." With that thought in mind, the postman hurried up the road in hopes of catching the widow Tewksberry sunbathing in her vegetable patch for the second time that week.