"Harry, did I tell you what Princess Diana did at Christmas?"
"No. What?"
"She gave everyone cashmere sweaters."
"Richie, but that's a good gift!"
"Undoubtedly. Harry, you probably don't know this… In the royal family there's a tradition of giving joke gifts at Christmas."
"You never told me about that."
"On Christmas Eve, we usually gather at Sandringham, led by Elizabeth II, in the drawing room and exchange inexpensive, funny presents. According to protocol, we enter the room one by one and place our signed gifts on the table so that no one notices who brought which package. Of course everyone understands who gave what, but protocol is protocol…"
"Richie, do you and your father actually have your own rooms in the royal palace?" Harry asked in surprise.
"No. Naturally we're given guest rooms. Since the dinner ends very late, we spend the night at Sandringham and leave for home in the morning. But I was talking about the drawing room. The gifts are placed on the table at the seat where the person they're intended for will sit."
"I see. Still—what's wrong with cashmere sweaters?"
"They're ordinary, Harry. Expensive, high-quality cashmere sweaters. That's a great gift in a normal family, but not in a royal one. You see, a person who already has everything tends to view practical gifts with skepticism. Why?! I already have everything! I'd be happier with a Kinder Surprise than with a sweater!"
"And how did the Queen react to that?" Harry asked.
"Well… to put it mildly, Princess Diana wasn't exactly understood. And I think she realized she'd done something foolish. You should have seen Granny Liz's expression when she examined the sweater. An ordinary worker would look with the same astonishment at a pink rubber dildo that a coworker had given him as a present."
Harry burst out laughing.
"I can imagine if Uncle Vernon got something like that from another director… He'd hold the thing between two fingers with a disgusted look and stare at it with huge eyes."
"Then test it, Harry. Give your uncle and aunt some original gifts next Christmas."
"Great idea, Richie!" Harry said enthusiastically. "I'll definitely try it. What other funny gifts were there?"
"Hm… Princess Anne, the Queen's daughter, gave Princess Diana a toilet paper holder."
Harry Potter laughed again and asked:
"Does Princess Diana actually use it?!"
"I have no idea. I don't make a habit of peeking into other people's bedroom bathrooms."
"Richie, what did you give the Queen?" Harry asked curiously.
"A portrait of Lenin."
"Lenin?" Harry asked, confused.
"Lenin?!" Scott repeated in amazement.
"LENIN?!" Stephen exclaimed in shock.
"Lenin!" Richard confirmed with a firm nod.
"Well, kid, you really outdid yourself!" Mr. Potter said with a smirk.
Harry shifted his sorrowful gaze from one man to the other and asked in confusion.
"Will someone explain to me who Lenin is?"
"Bald, lisping, fond of climbing onto an armored car to deliver a speech," Richie said.
"Nephew, Vladimir Lenin was a famous Russian revolutionary who overthrew the monarchy," Scott explained. "A very original gift for a queen. How did she take it, anyway?"
"Lady Ferguson, the Duchess of York, laughed like a madwoman. The Queen and many others were amused by my gift as well."
Scott Potter took a sip of cognac from his glass, shook his head, and said:
"Giving a queen, in a circle of aristocrats, a portrait of a revolutionary who fought against monarchy… Yeah, kid, you really push the limits!"
"Cheap, funny, and harmless—those were the criteria my father told me to use when choosing Christmas gifts," Richard said with an indifferent shrug. "Nobody said you couldn't give the Queen a portrait of a communist."
"Now I understand," Harry said. "Richie, where are we flying?"
"North America. The Cape Cod peninsula."
"Why there?"
"Adventure awaits us. Harry, have you ever dreamed of becoming a treasure hunter?"
Young Potter's eyes lit up with excitement.
"Treasure? Pirate treasure?"
"No—something much better and far richer."
"Richie, do you want to dig up a treasure?"
"More accurately—retrieve it from the bottom."
"We're going to look for a sunken ship full of treasure?"
"Yes, Harry."
"But how?! Do you have a pirate map or something?"
"No, nothing like that. I simply know that during World War II a British ship carrying gold, diamonds, and platinum sank somewhere near the Cape Cod peninsula."
"How near?"
"I don't know. Maybe fifty miles from the shore."
From the front seat came a cheerful snort from Scott.
"Kids, do you have any idea what fifty miles in the ocean means? That's a devilish amount of distance. You could be searching for that ship for years—decades!"
"Sir," Richard replied calmly, "you're forgetting that Harry and I are wizards."
Young Potter adjusted his glasses and turned to his friend.
"Richie, treasure is cool, but why do you need it? You're already rich."
"Harry, if you think about it that way, why should we study at Hogwarts? We're already wizards? Or why do people buy tons of clothes and fill their closets when a single suit is enough to live with? A person should always strive for something better—to become wiser, or at least smarter, richer, and so on."
"Better tell me this, kid," the slightly tipsy detective called out to Richard, "how are you planning to split the profits if you find the treasure?"
"That's a strange question, sir. I organized this expedition, I'm providing all the equipment, and you're working for me. What kind of division are we talking about? Only Harry is here as my friend, companion, and assistant. If he actively participates in the expedition, I'll give him ten percent of the treasure we find. The two of you can only count on a generous bonus. Besides, the Russians say you shouldn't divide the skin of a bear that hasn't been killed yet."
"Hm… logical. Devilishly logical!" Detective Potter concluded. "Stephen, how much longer are we flying?"
"About half an hour more, if the navigation equipment isn't lying."
"Devil!" Scott exclaimed in admiration. "Forty minutes to America on a small single-engine plane! Incredible!"
After half an hour of flight, Stephen switched from turbo mode to normal flight. Beneath the landing gear stretched a wild field where it was decided to land the aircraft. The pilot's surprise was immense when the plane calmly slowed down at his command and landed almost vertically.
Stephen, usually possessed of remarkable composure, exclaimed with unusual emotion:
"This isn't a plane—it's some kind of UFO! It takes off and lands like a helicopter, flies at rocket speed, and damn it, it's invisible too!"
(End of Chapter)
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