"Do something about your hair!" Aunt Petunia snapped as harry and I reached the hall. 

I couldn't see the point of trying to make Harry's hair lie flat.Aunt Marge loved criticizing us, so the untidier he looked, the happier she would be.

 All too soon, there was a crunch of gravel outside as Uncle Vernon's car pulled back into the driveway, then the clunk of the car doors and footsteps on the garden path."Get the door!" Aunt Petunia hissed at me.A feeling of great gloom in my stomach, I pulled the door open.

 On the threshold stood Aunt Marge. She was very like Uncle Vernon: large, beefy, and purple-faced, she even had a mustache,though not as bushy as his. In one hand she held an enormous suitcase, and tucked under the other was an old and evil-tempered bulldog. 

"Where's my Dudders?" roared Aunt Marge. "Where's my neffy poo?"

 Dudley came waddling down the hall, his blond hair plastered flat to his fat head, a bow tie just visible under his many chins.Aunt Marge thrust the suitcase into Harry's stomach, knocking the wind out of him, seized Dudley in a tight one-armed hug, and planted a large kiss on his cheek.Harry and I knew perfectly well that Dudley only put up with Aunt Marge's hugs because he was well paid for it, and sure enough,when they broke apart, Dudley had a crisp twenty-pound note clutched in his fat fist. 

"Petunia!" shouted Aunt Marge, striding past Harry and me as though we were hat stands. Aunt Marge and Aunt Petunia kissed, or rather,Aunt Marge bumped her large jaw against Aunt Petunia's bony cheekbone.

 Uncle Vernon now came in, smiling jovially as he shut the door.

"Tea, Marge?" he said. "And what will Ripper take?"

 "Ripper can have some tea out of my saucer," said Aunt Marge as they all proceeded into the kitchen, leaving Harry and myself alone in the hall with the suitcase. 

But I wasn't complaining; any excuse not to be with Aunt Marge was fine by me, so we began to heave the case upstairs into the spare bedroom, taking as long as we could.

 By the time we got back to the kitchen, Aunt Marge had been supplied with tea and fruitcake, and Ripper was lapping noisily in the corner. I saw Aunt Petunia wince slightly as specks of tea and drool flecked her clean floor. Aunt Petunia hated animals. 

"Who's looking after the other dogs, Marge?" Uncle Vernon asked. 

"Oh, I've got Colonel Fubster managing them," boomed Aunt Marge. "He's retired now, good for him to have something to do. But I couldn't leave poor old Ripper. He pines if he's away from me."

Ripper began to growl again as Harry and I sat down. 

This directed Aunt Marge's attention to us for the first time. 

"So!" she barked. "Still here, are you?" Wasn't it obvious?

"Yes," said Harry. 

"Don't you say 'yes' in that ungrateful tone," Aunt Marge growled. "It's damn good of Vernon and Petunia to keep you. Wouldn't have done it myself. You'd have gone straight to an orphanage if you'd been dumped on my doorstep." 

I was bursting to say that I'd rather live in an orphanage than with the Dursleys, but the thought of the Hogsmeade form stopped me. I forced my face into a painful smile. 

"Don't you smirk at me!" boomed Aunt Marge. "I can see you haven't improved since I last saw you. I hoped school would knock some manners into you."

 She took a large gulp of tea, wiped her mustache, and said, "Where is it that you send them, again,Vernon?""St. Brutus's," said Uncle Vernon promptly. "It's a first-rate institution for hopeless cases." 

"I see," said Aunt Marge. "Do they use the cane at St. Brutus's, girl?" she barked across the table. 

"Er —"

 Uncle Vernon nodded curtly behind Aunt Marge's back."Yes," I said. Then, feeling I might as well do the thing properly, I added, "all the time."

 "Excellent," said Aunt Marge. "I won't have this namby-pamby,wishy-washy nonsense about not hitting people who deserve it. A good thrashing is what's needed in ninety-nine cases out of a hundred. Have you been beaten often?" 

"Oh, yeah," said Harry, "loads of times." 

Aunt Marge narrowed her eyes.

"I still don't like your tone, boy," she said. "If you can speak of your beatings in that casual way, they clearly aren't hitting you hard enough. Petunia, I'd write if I were you. Make it clear that you approve the use of extreme force in this boy's case. And help this girl control her mouth, girls shouldn't be speaking."

 I chocked back a snarl.

Perhaps Uncle Vernon was worried that Harry and I might forget our bargain; in any case, he changed the subject abruptly.

"Heard the news this morning, Marge? What about that escaped prisoner, eh?" 

As Aunt Marge started to make herself at home, I caught myself thinking almost longingly of life at number four without her.Uncle Vernon and Aunt Petunia usually encouraged Harry and me to stay out of their way, which Harry and I were only too happy to do. 

Aunt Marge, on the other hand, wanted us under her eye at all times,so that she could boom out suggestions for our improvement. She delighted in comparing Harry and me with Dudley, and took huge pleasure in buying Dudley expensive presents while glaring at Harry and me, as though daring us to ask why we hadn't got a present too.

 She also kept throwing out dark hints about what made Harry and me such unsatisfactory people.

"You mustn't blame yourself for the way those two have turned out,Vernon," she said over lunch on the third day. "If there's something rotten on the inside, there's nothing anyone can do about it."

 I tried to concentrate on my food, but my hands shook and my face was starting to burn with anger. Harry wasn't doing much better. I made a telepathic connection between us.

 Remember the form, I told him. Think about Hogsmeade. Don't say anything. Don't rise — 

Aunt Marge reached for her glass of wine.

"It's one of the basic rules of breeding," she said. "You see it all the time with dogs. If there's something wrong with the bitch,there'll be something wrong with the pup —" 

At that moment, the wineglass Aunt Marge was holding exploded in her hand. Shards of glass flew in every direction and Aunt Marge sputtered and blinked, her great ruddy face dripping. 

"Marge!" squealed Aunt Petunia. "Marge, are you all right?" 

"Not to worry," grunted Aunt Marge, mopping her face with her napkin. "Must have squeezed it too hard. Did the same thing at Colonel Fubster's the other day. No need to fuss, Petunia, I have a very firm grip . . ." 

But Aunt Petunia and Uncle Vernon were both looking at Harry  and me suspiciously, so we decided we'd better skip dessert and escape from the table as soon as he could.

 Outside in the hall, I leaned against the wall, breathing deeply.It had been a long time since we'd lost control and made something explode. We couldn't afford to let it happen again. The Hogsmeade form wasn't the only thing at stake — if we carried on like that, we'd be in trouble with the Ministry of Magic. 

Harry and I were still an underage wizards and witches, and we were forbidden by wizard law to do magic outside school. our record wasn't exactly clean either. Only last summer we'd gotten an official warning that had stated quite clearly that if the Ministry got wind of any more magic in Privet Drive, Harry and I would face expulsion from Hogwarts.

 We heard the Dursleys leaving the table and hurried upstairs out of the way. I got through the  next three days by forcing myself to think about my book of wizard poetry whenever Aunt Marge started on Harry. Like I said, even though we weren't on best terms he was still my brother; and I loved him.

This worked quite well, though it seemed to give me a glazed look, because Aunt Marge started voicing the opinion that I was mentally subnormal.At last, at long last, the final evening of Marge's stay arrived.

Aunt Petunia cooked a fancy dinner and Uncle Vernon uncorked several bottles of wine. We got all the way through the soup and the salmon without a single mention of our faults; during the lemon meringue pie, Uncle Vernon bored us all with a long talk about Grunnings, his drill-making company; then Aunt Petunia made coffee and Uncle Vernon brought out a bottle of brandy.

 "Can I tempt you, Marge?"

 Aunt Marge had already had quite a lot of wine. Her huge face was very red.

"Just a small one, then," she chuckled.  "A bit more than that . . . and a bit more . . . that's the ticket."

 Dudley was eating his fourth slice of pie. Aunt Petunia was sipping coffee with her little finger sticking out. I really wanted to disappear into my bedroom, but I met Uncle Vernon's angry little eyes and knew I would have to sit it out.

 "Aah," said Aunt Marge, smacking her lips and putting the empty brandy glass back down. "Excellent nosh, Petunia. It's normally just a fry-up for me of an evening, with twelve dogs to look after. . . ." 

She burped richly and patted her great tweed stomach. 

"Pardon me. But I do like to see a healthy-sized boy," she went on,winking at Dudley. "You'll be a proper-sized man, Dudders, like your father. Yes, I'll have a spot more brandy, Vernon. . . ." 

"Now, this one here —"She jerked her head at Harry, I felt my stomach clench.Poetry, I thought quickly. "This one's got a mean, runty look about him. You get that with dogs. I had Colonel Fubster drown one last year. Ratty little thing it was. Weak. Underbred." 

I was trying to remember page twelve of my book.

"It all comes down to blood, as I was saying the other day.Bad blood will out. Now, I'm saying nothing against your family,Petunia" — she patted Aunt Petunia's bony hand with her shovel like one — "but your sister was a bad egg. They turn up in the best families. Then she ran off with a wastrel and here are the results right in front of us."

 I  was staring at his plate, a funny ringing in my ears. A pinch of magic can and will--,I thought. But I couldn't remember what came next. Aunt Marge's voice seemed to be boring into me like one of Uncle Vernon's drills.

 "This Potter," said Aunt Marge loudly, seizing the brandy bottle and splashing more into her glass and over the tablecloth, "you never told me what he did?" 

Uncle Vernon and Aunt Petunia were looking extremely tense.Dudley had even looked up from his pie to gape at his parents. 

"He — didn't work," said Uncle Vernon, with half a glance at Harry and me. "Unemployed."

 "As I expected!" said Aunt Marge, taking a huge swig of brandy and wiping her chin on her sleeve. "A no-account, good-for nothing, lazy scrounger who —" 

"He was not," said Harry suddenly. The table went very quiet.Harry was shaking all over, so was I. I had never felt so angry in my life. 

"MORE BRANDY!" yelled Uncle Vernon, who had gone very white. He emptied the bottle into Aunt Marge's glass. "You boy,"he snarled at Harry. "Go to bed, go on —" 

"No, Vernon," hiccuped Aunt Marge, holding up a hand, her tiny bloodshot eyes fixed on Harry's. "Go on, boy, go on. Proud of your parents, are you? They go and get themselves killed in a car crash (drunk, I expect) —" 

"They didn't die in a car crash!" I said,  finding myself on my feet.

 "They died in a car crash, you nasty little liar, and left you to be a burden on their decent, hardworking relatives!" screamed Aunt Marge, swelling with fury. "You are an insolent, ungrateful little —" 

But Aunt Marge suddenly stopped speaking. For a moment, it looked as though words had failed her. She seemed to be swelling with inexpressible anger — but the swelling didn't stop. Her great red face started to expand, her tiny eyes bulged, and her mouth stretched too tightly for speech — next second, several buttons had just burst from her tweed jacket and pinged off the walls — shewas inflating like a monstrous balloon, her stomach bursting free of her tweed waistband, each of her fingers blowing up like a salami — 

"MARGE!" yelled Uncle Vernon and Aunt Petunia together as Aunt Marge's whole body began to rise off her chair toward the ceiling. She was entirely round, now, like a vast life buoy with piggy eyes, and her hands and feet stuck out weirdly as she drifted up into the air, making apoplectic popping noises. Ripper came skidding into the room, barking madly. 

"NOOOOOOO!"

Uncle Vernon seized one of Marge's feet and tried to pull her down again, but was almost lifted from the floor himself. A second later, Ripper leapt forward and sank his teeth into Uncle Vernon's leg. 

 Harry  and I tore from the dining room before anyone could stop us,heading for the cupboard under the stairs. The cupboard door burst magically open as we reached it. In seconds, we had heaved our trunks to the front door. We sprinted upstairs and threw ourselves under the our beds, wrenching up the loose floorboard, and grabbed the  pillowcases full of our books and birthday presents. 

Harry wriggled out,seized Hedwig's empty cage, and dashed back downstairs to his trunk me right behind, just as Uncle Vernon burst out of the dining room, his trouser leg in bloody tatters. 

"COME BACK IN HERE!BOTH OF YOU!" he bellowed. "COME BACK AND PUT HER RIGHT!"

 But a reckless rage had come over Harry and me. I kicked my trunk open, pulled out my wand, and pointed it at Uncle Vernon. 

"She deserved it," I said, breathing very fast. "She deserved what she got. You keep away from us."Harry fumbled behind him for the latch on the door. 

"we're going," Harry said. "we've had enough."

And in the next moment, he was out in the dark, quiet street,heaving his heavy trunk behind him, Hedwig's cage under his arm.

I turned back to look at Uncle Vernon, I jabbed the tip of my wand into Uncle Vernon's chin. "She said our family was rotten, eh?" I snarled "well, guess what. Our family was 10 times better than yours. And Also--" I leaned close enough to see the drops of persperation above his mustache "Karma exists, Uncle Vernon. You'll get what you deserve eventually too. I swear it.