"Well, that was all that I needed to know. Someone which scores and recommendations like that, but who didn't want to work for the Ministry told me that this lad wanted to become a businessman, but who was also quite happy to start from the bottom and work their way up, which was such a nice change from some of the other usual applicants who thought that they could start out in a managerial role despite having no experience.
"I knew there and then that an opportunity like this one would not raise its head again. I had no children myself, and no desire to leave the shop fully in the control of the inept son of my business partner Everard Borgin. Here was my chance to leave the business in safe, dependable hands."
Cyrus and Croaker exchanged a look, both knowing that Burke had not gotten his wish, and that the shop had been left in the sole ownership of Everard Borgin's son, Edward.
Burke continued "I agreed to meet with the boy a couple of days later in the Spiny Serpent pub. He was well mannered and respectful, smartly dressed and above all confident. I employed him on the spot.
"To begin with I had him selling items to potential customers. This proved to be a mistake on my part. He had a keen eye for what was valuable and refused to ever back down during the inevitable negotiation stage. He was much too forceful and put off a lot of potential customers. But, after sitting down with the boy and having a frank discussion with him, he got better and I soon realised that his talents truly lay in the art of buying.
"He had a silver tongue, that boy, and before long he was persuading one witch or wizard after another to part with their treasured items for sums of gold far less than their actual worth. Soon our storerooms were fit to burst. He was bringing in items faster than we could sell them, but sell we did, allowing our profits to go through the roof.
"Business was booming and yet, I had my concerns. There was no doubt in my mind that Tom Riddle was very good at his job, but I began to become concerned at just how good he was at it. Borgin saw no problem, but I did. Our location in Knockturn Alley made certain people suspicious of us. All that was needed for one of Tom's customers to cry foul and the Ministry would have come down upon us like a mother Dragon upon a wolf that had stolen one of her hatchlings.
"I began to keep a closer eye on him. I began making detailed notes on who he bought from and how much he paid. But in the end it wasn't that which worried me the most. He had obsession with treasures.
"An obsession with treasures?" asked Cyrus, looking for clarification.
Burke nodded and relied "I don't mean what most people would consider treasure. He did not covet gold or diamonds. He was more interested in… well, I suppose he was interested in heirlooms."
"Heirlooms?" asked Croaker.
"Yes. Take a necklace, for example. If you had a necklace that was worth, say five hundred galleons, or even a thousand, he would be relatively uninterested. He would attempt to purchase it as a part of his job of course, but that was as far as his interest went. However, if that necklace had some form of actual significance to a family, something that was known to have been handed down throughout the years and perhaps had the family shield engraved upon it, then he took interest.
"When he first started, we had a brooch on display near the counter that had engraved upon it the shield of the extinct Barton family. The number of times I caught him just staring at this thing. He was most disappointed when it was sold."
"Where there any family names in particular that he was obsessed with?" asked Croaker.
"Not particularly. Though, he did have a ring on his finger. A gold ring with a stone as black as the night itself set in it, though slightly cracked. That piece, in particular, he appeared most fixated upon. I only ever got a good look at it once. It wasn't a particularly nice looking ring, rather inexpertly made as a matter of fact, but there was no doubt that it was ancient. The gold band had a couple of markings on it that led me to believe that it rightfully belonged to the Gaunt family. But the stone… the stone was something else.
"How so?" queried Cyrus.
Burke shook his head and said "The stone had a symbol on it. I never figured it out until much later, but it was almost exactly the same at the symbol used by Gellert Grindelwald during his rise to power; a circle, inside a triangle, with a line running through it from the point at the top, straight down."
"Did he seem interested in Grindelwald?" asked Cyrus.
"Never mentioned him," replied Burke "Could have been a coincidence that his ring bore that symbol, but I'll tell you one thing that was not a coincidence. One of Tom's best clients was an elderly lady by the name of Hepzibah Smith, a rich, eccentric old spinster who claimed to be descended from the Hogwarts' founder Helga Hufflepuff.
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