Five minutes to go. Harry heard something creak outside. He hoped the roof wasn't going to fall in, although he might be warmer if it did. Four minutes to go. Maybe the house in Privet Drive would be so full of letters when they got back that he'd be able to steal one somehow.
Three minutes to go. Was that the sea, slapping hard on the rock like that? And (two minutes to go) what was that funny crunching noise? Was the rock crumbling into the sea?
One minute to go and he'd be eleven. Thirty seconds… twenty … ten… nine — maybe he'd wake Dudley up, just to annoy him — three… two… one…
(Harry Potter and the Sorcerer's Stone)
I guess would in the highlighted sentence is used ‘to express a wish.’ If it is right, what does maybe mean? Maybe he wished to wake Dudley up, seems somewhat funny.
Best Answer
See it is an idea that came to his mind as a wish, but he intended not to do that. "Would" is used here to express that he will do something in future (it happened in past of now). So,
it means "He will surely wake Dudly up" (in past of now). But he did not actually intend to do so. It was just a quick thought. So "maybe" is used to make the sense a "wish" or "possibility". So when the sentence is rewritten as:
it consists of the whole sense i.e. he is not surely going to Dudly up, but he is just having a quick thought of it.