“That can’t be true,” Klaus said, taking off his glasses as if refusing to see the horror of their situation. But at that moment their predicament became perfectly clear, as the children heard a small, eerie sound come from the helmet. It reminded Violet and Klaus of the fish of the Stricken Stream, struggling to breathe in the ashy, black waters. Sunny was coughing.
“Sunny!” Klaus shouted into the helmet.
“Malady,” Sunny said, which meant “I’m beginning to feel unwell.”
“Don’t talk, Sunny!” Fiona called through the tiny window of the helmet, and turned to the elder Baudelaires. “The mycelium has destructive respiratory capabilities,” the mycologist explained, walking over to the sideboard. “That’s what it said in that letter. Your sister should save her breath. The spores will make it more and more difficult for Sunny to talk, and she’ll probably start coughing as the fungus grows inside her. In an hour’s time, she won’t be able to breathe. It would be fascinating if it weren’t so horrible.”
“Fascinating?” Violet covered her mouth with her hands and shut her eyes, trying not to imagine what her terrified sister was feeling. “What can we do?” she asked.
“We can make an antidote,” Fiona said. “There must be some useful information in my mycological library.”
“I’ll help,” Klaus said. “I’m sure I’ll find the books difficult to read, but—”
“No,” Fiona said. “I need to be alone to do my research. You and Violet should climb that rope ladder and fire up the engines so we can get out of this cave.”
“But we should all do the research!” Violet cried. “We only have an hour, or maybe even less! If the mushrooms grew while we swam back to the Queequeg, then—”
“Then we certainly don’t have time to argue,” Fiona finished, opening the cabinet and removing a large pile of books. “I order you to leave me alone, so I can do this research and save your sister!”
The elder Baudelaires looked at one another, and then at the diving helmet on the table. “You order us?” Klaus asked.
“Aye!” Fiona cried, and the children realized it was the first time the mycologist had uttered that word. “I’m in charge here! With my stepfather gone, I am the captain of the Queequeg! Aye!”
“It doesn’t matter who the captain is!” Violet said. “The important thing is to save my sister!”
“Climb up that rope ladder!” Fiona cried. “Aye! Fire up those engines! Aye! We’re going to save Sunny! Aye! And find my stepfather! Aye! And retrieve the sugar bowl! Aye! And it’s no time to hesitate! She who hesitates is lost! That’s my personal philosophy!”
“That’s the captain’s personal philosophy,” Klaus said, “not yours.”
“I am the captain!” Fiona said fiercely. The middle Baudelaire could see that behind her triangular glasses, the mycologist was crying. “Go and do what I say.”
Klaus opened his mouth to say something more, but found that he, too, was crying, and without another word turned from his friend and walked over to the rope ladder, with Violet following behind.
“She’s wrong!” the eldest Baudelaire whispered furiously. “You know she’s wrong, Klaus. What are we going to do?”
“We’re going to fire up the engines,” Klaus said, “and steer the Queequeg out of this cave.”
“But that won’t save Sunny,” Violet said. “Don’t you remember the description of the Medusoid Mycelium?”
“‘A single spore has such grim power,’ ” Klaus recited, “‘That you may die within the hour.’ Of course I remember.”
“Hour?” Sunny said fearfully from inside her helmet.
“Shush,” Violet said. “Save your breath, Sunny. We’ll find a way to cure you right away.”
“Not right away,” Klaus corrected sadly. “Fiona is the captain now, and she ordered us—”
“I don’t care about Fiona’s orders,” Violet said. “She’s too volatile to get us out of this situation—just like her stepfather, and just like her brother!” The eldest Baudelaire reached into the pocket of her uniform and drew out the newspaper clipping she had taken from the grotto. Her hand brushed against the tin of wasabi, and she shivered, hoping that her sister would recuperate and live to use the Japanese condiment in one of her recipes. “Listen to this, Klaus!”
“I don’t want to listen!” Klaus said in an angry whisper. “Maybe Fiona is right! Maybe we shouldn’t hesitate, particularly at a time like this! If we don’t get an antidote to our sister, she might perish! Hesitating will only make things worse!”
“Firing up the engines, instead of helping Fiona with her research, will only make things worse!” Violet said.
At that moment, however, both Violet and Klaus saw something that made things worse, and they realized that they both had been wrong. The two Baudelaires shouldn’t have been firing up the engines of the Queequeg, and they shouldn’t have been helping Fiona with her research, and they shouldn’t have been arguing with one another. The Baudelaires, and Fiona, too, should have been standing very still, trying not to make even the smallest noise, and instead of looking at the diving helmet, where their sister was suffering under the poison of the Medusoid Mycelium, they should have been looking at the submarine’s sonar detector, or out of the porthole over the table, which looked out into the dark depths of the cave. On the green panel was the glowing Q, representing the Queequeg, but this was another thing in the world that was difficult to see, because another glowing green symbol was occupying the very same space. And outside the porthole was a mass of small, metal tubes, circling in the gloomy water and making thousands and thousands of bubbles, and in the middle of all those tubes was a large, open space, like a gigantic hungry mouth—the mouth of an octopus, about to devour the Queequeg and all its remaining crew. The image on the sonar detector, of course, was an eye, and the view from the porthole was of a submarine, but either way the children knew it was Count Olaf, and that made things much, much worse indeed.
CHAPTER
Nine
If you are considering a life of villainy—and I certainly hope that you are not—there are a few things that appear to be necessary to every villain’s success. One thing is a villainous disregard for other people, so that a villain may talk to his or her victims impolitely, ignore their pleas for mercy, and even behave violently toward them if the villain is in the mood for that sort of thing. Another thing villains require is a villainous imagination, so that they might spend their free time dreaming up treacherous schemes in order to further their villainous careers. Villains require a small group of villainous cohorts, who can be persuaded to serve the villain in a henchpersonal capacity. And villains need to develop a villainous laugh, so that they may simultaneously celebrate their villainous deeds and frighten whatever nonvillainous people happen to be nearby. A successful villain should have all of these things at his or her villainous fingertips, or else give up villainy altogether and try to lead a life of decency, integrity, and kindness, which is much more challenging and noble, if not always quite as exciting.
Count Olaf, of course, was an excellent villain, a phrase which here means “someone particularly skilled at villainy” rather than “a villain with several desirable qualities,” and the Baudelaire orphans had known this soon after that terrible day at Briny Beach, when the children learned of the terrible fire that began so many of the unfortunate events in their lives. But as the Queequeg tumbled into the mouth of his dreadful octopus submarine, it seemed to the orphans that the villain had become even more villainous during his brief absence from their lives. Olaf had proven his villainous disregard for other people over and over, from his vicious murder of the children’s guardians to his affinity for arson, a phrase which here means “enthusiasm for burning down buildings, no matter how many people were inside,” but the children realized that Olaf’s disregard had become even more dreadful, as the Queequeg passed through the gaping mouth and was roughly tossed from side to side in a mechanical imitation of swallowing, forci
ng Violet and Klaus—and Fiona, too, of course—to hang on for dear life as the Main Hall rolled this way and that, spinning Sunny in her helmet like a water-melon in a washing machine. The count had displayed his villainous imagination on a number of occasions, from his dastardly schemes to steal the Baudelaire fortune to his nefarious plots to kidnap Duncan and Isadora Quagmire, but the siblings gazed out of the porthole and saw that Olaf’s infernal imagination had run utterly wild in decorating this terrible submarine, for the Queequeg rolled along a rumbling tunnel that was almost as dark and threatening as the Gorgonian Grotto, with every inch of its metallic walls covered in eerie glowing eyes. The count always had an assortment of cohorts, from his original theatrical troupe—many of whom were no longer with him—to some former employees of Caligari Carnival, but the orphans saw that he had lured many others to join him when the tunnel rounded a corner and the elder Baudelaires had a brief glimpse of an enormous room full of people rowing long, metal oars, activating the terrible metal arms of the octopus. And, perhaps worst of all, when the Queequeg finally came to a shuddering stop and Violet and Klaus looked out of the porthole, they learned that the villain had clearly been rehearsing his villainous laugh until it was extra wicked and more theatrical than ever. Count Olaf was standing on a small, metal platform with a triumphant grin on his face, dressed in a familiar suit made of slippery-looking material, but with a portrait of another author whom only a very devoted reader would recognize, and when he peered through the porthole and spied the frightened children, he opened his mouth and began his new villainous laugh, which included new wheezes, bonus snarls, and an assortment of strange syllables the Baudelaires had never heard.
“Ha ha ha heepa-heepa ho!” he cried. “Tee hee tort tort tort! Hot cha ha ha! Sniggle hee! Ha, if I do say so myself!” With a boastful gesture, he hopped off the platform, drew a long, sharp sword, and quickly traced a circle on the glass of the porthole. Violet and Klaus covered their ears as the sword shrieked its way around the window. Then, with one flick of his sword, Olaf sent the glass circle tumbling into the Main Hall, where it lay unbroken on the floor, and leaped through the porthole onto the large, wooden table to laugh at them further. “I’m splitting my sides!” he cried. “I’m rolling in the aisles! I’m nauseous with mirth! I’m rattling with glee! I’m seriously considering compiling a joke book from all of the hilarious things bouncing around my brain! Hup hup ha ha hammy hee hee!”
Violet dashed forward and grabbed the helmet in which Sunny was still curled, so Olaf would not kick it as he pranced triumphantly on top of the table. She could not bear to think of her sister, who was inhaling the poison of the Medusoid Mycelium as Olaf wasted precious minutes performing his tiresome new laugh. “Stop laughing, Count Olaf,” she said. “There’s nothing funny about villainy.”
“Sure there is!” Olaf crowed. “Ha ha hat rack! Just think of it! I made my way down the mountain and found pieces of your toboggan scattered all over some very sharp rocks! Tee hee torpid sniggle! I thought you had drowned in the Stricken Stream and were swimming with all those coughing fishes! Ho ho hagfish! I was brokenhearted!”
“You weren’t brokenhearted,” Klaus said. “You’ve tried to destroy us plenty of times.”
“That’s why I was brokenhearted!” Olaf cried. “Ho ho sniggle! I personally planned to slaughter you Baudelaires myself, after I had your fortune of course, and pry the sugar bowl out of your dead fingers or toes!”
Violet and Klaus looked at one another hurriedly. They had almost forgotten telling Olaf that they knew the location of the sugar bowl, even though they of course had no idea of its whereabouts. “To cheer myself up,” the villain continued, “I met my associates at the Hotel Denouement, where they were cooking up a little scheme of their own, and convinced them to lend me a handful of our new recruits.” The elder Baudelaires knew that the associates were the man with a beard and no hair, and the woman with hair but no beard, two people so sinister that even Olaf seemed to find them a bit frightening, and that the new recruits were a group of Snow Scouts that these villains had recently kidnapped. “Tee hee turncoat! Thanks to their generosity, I was able to get this submarine working again! Sniggle ha ho ho! Of course, I need to be back at the Hotel Denouement before Thursday, but in the meantime I had a few days to kill, so I thought I’d kill some of my old enemies! Hee hee halbert sniggle! So I began roaming around the sea, looking for Captain Widdershins and his idiotic submarine on my sonar detector! Tee hee telotaxis! But now that I’ve captured the Queequeg, I find you Baudelaires aboard! It’s hilarious! It’s humorous! It’s droll! It’s relatively amusing!”
“How dare you capture this submarine!” Fiona cried. “I’m the captain of the Queequeg, and I demand that you return us to the sea at once! Aye!”
Count Olaf peered down at the mycologist. “Aye?” he repeated. “You must be Fiona, that little fungus freak! Why, you’re all grown up! The last time I saw you I was trying to throw thumbtacks into your cradle! Ha ha hoi polloi! What happened to Widdershins? Why isn’t he the captain?”
“My stepfather is not around at the moment,” Fiona replied, blinking behind her triangular glasses.
“Tee hee terry cloth!” Count Olaf said. “Your stepfather has abandoned you, eh? Well, I suppose it was only a matter of time. Your whole family could never choose which side of the schism was theirs. Your brother used to be a goody-goody as well, trying to prevent fires instead of encouraging them, but eventually—”
“My stepfather has not abandoned me,” Fiona said, though her voice faltered a bit, a phrase which here means “sounded as if she weren’t so sure.” She did not even add an “Aye!” to her sentence.
“We’ll see about that,” Olaf said, grinning wickedly. “I’m going to lock all of you in the brig, which is the official seafaring term for ‘jail.’”
“We know what the brig is,” Klaus said.
“Then you know it’s not a very pleasant place,” the villain said. “The previous owner used it to hold traitors captive, and I see no reason to break with tradition.”
“We’re not traitors, and we’re not leaving the Queequeg,” Violet said, and held up the diving helmet. Sunny tried to say something, but the growing fungus made her cough instead, and Olaf frowned at the coughing helmet.
“What’s that?” he demanded
“Sunny is in here,” she said. “And she’s very ill.”
“I was wondering where the baby brat was,” Count Olaf said. “I was hoping she was trapped underneath my shoe, but I see that it’s just some ridiculous book.” He lifted his slippery foot to reveal Mushroom Minutiae, the book Fiona had been using for her research, and kicked it off the table where it skittered into a far corner.
“There is a very deadly poison inside that helmet,” Fiona said, staring at the book in frustration. “Aye! If Sunny doesn’t receive an antidote within the hour, she will perish.”
“What do I care?” Olaf growled, once again showing his villainous disregard for other people. “I only need one Baudelaire to get my hands on the fortune. Now come with me! Ha ha handiwork!”
“We’re staying right here,” Klaus said. “Our sister’s life depends on it.”
Count Olaf drew his sword again, and traced a sinister shape in the air. “I’ll tell you what your lives depend on,” he said. “Your lives depend on me! If I wanted, I could drown you in the sea, or have you strangled by the arms of the mechanical octopus! It’s only out of the kindness of my heart, and because of my own greed, that I’m locking you in the brig instead!”
Sunny coughed inside her helmet, and Violet thought quickly. “If you let us help our sister,” she said, “we’ll tell you where the sugar bowl is.”
Count Olaf’s eyes narrowed, and he gave the children a wide, toothy grin the two Baudelaires remembered from so many of their troubled times. His eyes shone brightly, as if he were telling a joke as nasty as his unbrushed teeth. “You can’t try that trick again,” he sneered. “I’m not going to bargain w
ith an orphan, no matter how pretty she may be. Once you get to the brig, you’ll reveal where the sugar bowl is—once my henchman gets his hands on you. Or should I say hooks? Tee hee torture!”
Count Olaf leaped back through the porthole as Violet and Klaus looked at one another in fear. They knew Count Olaf was referring to the hook-handed man, who had been working with the villain as long as they had known him and was one of their least favorite of Olaf’s comrades. “I could race up the rope ladder,” Violet murmured to the others, “and fire up the engines of the Queequeg.”
“We can’t take the submarine underwater with the window gone,” Fiona said. “We’d drown.”
Klaus put his ear to the diving helmet, and heard his sister whimper, and then cough. “But how can we save Sunny?” he asked. “Time is running out.”
Fiona eyed the far corner of the room. “I’ll take that book with me,” she said, “and—”
“Hurry up!” Count Olaf cried. “I can’t stand around all day! I have plenty of people to boss around!”
“Aye!” Fiona said, as Violet, still holding Sunny, led Klaus through the porthole to join Count Olaf on the platform. “I’ll be there in a second,” she said, and the mycologist took one hesitant step toward Mushroom Minutiae.
“You’ll be there now!” Olaf growled, and shook his sword at her. “He who hesitates is lost! Hee hee sniggle!”
At the mention of the captain’s personal philosophy, Fiona sighed, and stopped her furtive journey—a phrase which here means “sneaking”—toward the mycological book. “Or she,” she said quietly, and stepped through the porthole to join the Baudelaires.
“On the way to the brig, I’ll give you the grand tour!” Olaf announced, leading the way out of the round, metal room that was serving as a sort of brig for the Queequeg itself. There were several inches of water on the floor, to help the captured submarine move through the tunnel, and the Baudelaires’ boots made loud, wet splashes as they followed the boasting villain. While Sunny coughed again in her helmet, Olaf pressed an eye on the wall, and a small door slid open with a sinister whisper to reveal a corridor. “This submarine is one of the greatest things I’ve ever stolen,” he bragged. “It has everything I’ll need to defeat V.F.D. once and for all. It has a sonar system, so I can rid the seas of V.F.D. submarines. It has an enormous flyswatter, so I can rid the skies of V.F.D. planes. It has a lifetime supply of matches, so I can rid the world of V.F.D. headquarters. It has several cases of wine that I plan to drink up myself, and a closet full of very stylish outfits for my girlfriend. And best of all, it has plenty of opportunities for children to do hard labor! Ha ha hedonism!”