Quirrel himself makes fun of the Dark Mark

Ah... no? Actually, the opposite of that.

"Division is weakness," said the Defense Professor. His hand closed into a tight fist. "Unity is strength. The Dark Lord understood that well, whatever his other follies; and he used that understanding to create the one simple invention that made him the most terrible Dark Lord in history. Your parents faced one Dark Lord. And fifty Death Eaters who were perfectly unified, knowing that any breach of their loyalty would be punished by death, that any slack or incompetence would be punished by pain. None could escape the Dark Lord's grasp once they took his Mark. And the Death Eaters agreed to take that terrible Mark because they knew that once they took it, they would be united, facing a divided land. One Dark Lord and fifty Death Eaters would have defeated an entire country, by the power of the Dark Mark."

More likely it was his intention that things sit like that.

He 'lost' on purpose. But before he did, he taught Dumbledore to lose in the hostage and ransom thing.

Step 1 : gather the fearful and lead them by fear

Voldemort championed the old blood that felt threatened by muggleborn and was very cruel to them to keep them in line.

Step 2 : force most powerful opponents into taking actions contrary to their ideology

Voldemort probably did any number of nasty things to break lower rank ideologists and might have done an evil thing or two that did not break Dumbledore, but eventually he was successful.

Step 2a : keep a lid on things so they cannot resolve themselves through reasonable application of voilence

Voldemort killed Narcissa once he knew Dumbledore was conditioned to accept the blame and the conflict extending truce that came after.

Step 3 : watch for an opportunity to exit the stage, take it

Voldemort faked his death when he found circumstances that could make a death event of sufficient believabilty for the masses.

Step 4 : hide out under assumed identities while enemies and former subordinates continue to not resolve things either peaceably or voilently for as long as necessary

Voldemort is Jeffe or Quirrell or any number of other people for ten years. He might also have been technically dead for some or all of that time. That does not significantly alter the scenario.

Step 5 : gather tools and staff as opportunities present themselves

Voldemort has the Resurrection Stone, Bella, and who knows what all else.

Step 6 : watch for an opportunity to stage a coup over either side of now old conflict, take it

Voldemort may have multiple scenarios for returning to power. Right now he is playing king maker for Boy Who Lived.

Step 7 : smash opposing side of nearly meaningless conflict because they have been conditioned to fight entirely the wrong kind of war, unite as many factions as possible

Step 8 : dominate world

Step 9 : throw tasteful party with select guests and absolutely, positively, never, ever monologue

Unfortunately, Harry has just shown that he is both able and willing to overcome Dumbledore's refusal to offer concessions.

Yes, technically it looks like he obliviated her much later -- after the final conversation led her to either curse Draco or think thoughts that made that story halfway plausible.

That seems like it must be it, but it still doesn't make much sense. Page 5 has a woman with horribly discolored skin screaming in agony, page 6 has... a guy in a cloak! Oh no!

Being in debt is probably not the same thing as being a vassal, even temporarily.

(Well, maybe... Dumbledore still hasn't told us what rights Lucius now has over Harry.)

If regular courts had veritaserum, I imagine the first question they'd ask would be "What are the things you don't want to tell us?".

wait, Quirrel killed Rita? Can any of you quote that part for me? I can't believe I skipped this one.

Given the number of people struggling with the "Azkaban Saturday" timeline, I thought I'd have a go at mapping it out and uploading the result to Google Documents. If anyone's got any corrections, feel free to say so.