The Grim Grotto (A Series of Unfortunate Events 11)

"Shh," Violet said, although no one had spoken. It was the gentle, low shushing one might do to comfort a baby, crying in the middle of the night over whatever tragedy keeps babies awake in their cribs, and keeps the other members of the baby's family standing vigil, a phrase which here means "keeping nearby, to make sure everyone is safe." It does not really mean anything, this shushing sound, and yet the younger Baudelaires did not ask their sister what she meant, and merely stood vigil with her, as the shape disappeared into the ocean of the night, and the children were safe once more.

Without a word, Violet took her hands off the glass, climbed off the table, and resumed her place at the Queequeg's controls. For the rest of their journey, none of the children spoke, as if the unearthly spell of that terrible secret shape were still lingering over them.

All night long and into the morning, Violet worked the levers and switches of the submarine, to make sure it stayed on course, and Klaus marked their path on the charts, to make sure they were heading to the right place, and Sunny served slices of Violet's birthday cake to her fellow volunteers, but none of the three Baudelaires spoke until a gentle hump! rocked the Queequeg, and the submarine came to a gentle stop. Violet climbed down the rope ladder and ducked underneath a pipe to peer through the periscope, just as Captain Widdershins must have peered at the Baudelaires up in the Mortmain Mountains.

"We're here," she said, and the three Baudelaires left the Main Hall and walked down the leaky corridor to the room where they had first climbed aboard the submarine.

"Valve?" Sunny asked.

"We shouldn't have to activate the valve," Violet said. "When I looked through the periscope, I saw Briny Beach, so we can simply climb up the ladder –"

"And end up where we were," Klaus finished, "a long time ago."

Without any further discussion the Baudelaire children climbed up the ladder, their steps echoing down the narrow passageway, until they reached the hatch. Violet grabbed the handle, too, so all three children turned the handle together, and opened the hatch together, and together they climbed out of the passageway, down the outside of the submarine, and lowered themselves onto the sand of Briny Beach.

It was morning – the same time of morning as the last time the Baudelaire children had been there, receiving the dreadful news about the fire, and it was just as gray and foggy as that terrible day. Violet even saw a slender, smooth stone on the sand, and picked it up, just as she had done so long ago, skipping rocks into the water without ever imagining she would soon be exploring its terrible depths.

The siblings blinked in the morning sun, and felt as if some cycle were about to begin all over again – that once more they would receive terrible news, and that once more they would be taken to a new home, only to have surround them once more, as had happened so many times since their last visit to Briny Beach, just as you might be wondering if the Baudelaires' miserable story will begin all over again for you, with my warning you that if you are looking for happy endings, you would be better off reading some other book. It is not a pleasant feeling, to imagine that the tables will never turn and that a tedious cycle will begin all over again, and it made the Baudelaires feel passive, just as they had in the waters of the Stricken Stream, accepting what was happening without doing anything about it as they looked around at the unchanged shore.

"Gack!" Sunny said, which meant "Look at that mysterious figure emerging from the fog!" and the Baudclaires watched as a familiar shape stopped in front of them, took off a tall top hat, and coughed into a white handkerchief.

"Baudelaires!" Mr. Poe said, when he was done coughing. "Egad! I can't believe it! I can't believe you're here!"

"You?" Klaus asked, gazing at the banker in astonishment. "You're the one we're supposed to meet?"

"I guess so," Mr. Poe said, frowning and taking a crumpled piece of paper from his pocket. "I received a message saying that you'd be here at Briny Beach today."

"Who sent the message?" Klaus asked. Mr. Poe coughed once more, and then shrugged his shoulders wearily. The children noticed that he looked quite a bit older than the last time they had seen him, and wondered how much older they looked themselves.

"The message is signed J.S.," Mr. Poe said. "I assume that it's that reporter from The Daily Punctilio – Geraldine Julienne. How in the world did you get here? Where in the world have you been? I must admit, Baudelaires, I had given up all hope of ever finding you again! It was a shame to think that the Baudelaire fortune would just sit in the bank, gathering interest and dust! Well, never mind that now. You'd better come with me – my car's parked nearby. You have a great deal of explaining to do."

"No," Violet said.

"No?" Mr. Poe said in amazement, and coughed violently into his handkerchief. "Of course you do! You've been missing for a very long time, children! It was very inconsiderate of you to run away without telling me where you were, particularly when you've been accused of murder, arson, kidnapping, and some assorted misdemeanors! We're going to get right in my car, and I'll drive you to the police station, and –"

"No," Violet said again, and reached into the pocket of her uniform. She held up the telegram to her siblings and read:

"At the pink hour when the eyes and back Turn upward from the desk, when the human engine waits Like a pony throbbing party…

"That's what's in the telegram." She paused, and scanned the horizon of the beach. Something caught her eye, and she gave her siblings a faint smile. "The real poem," she said, "goes like this:

"At the violet hour when the eyes and back Turn upward from the desk, when the human engine waits Like a taxi throbbing waiting."

"Verse Fluctuation Declaration," Klaus said.

"Code," Sunny said.

"What are you talking about?" Mr. Poe demanded. "What is going on?"

"The missing words," Violet said to her siblings, as if the coughing banker had not spoken, "are 'violet,' 'taxi,' and 'waiting.' We're not supposed to go with Mr. Poe. We're supposed to get into a taxi." She pointed across the beach, and the children could see, scarcely visible in the fog, a yellow car parked at a nearby curb. The Baudelaires nodded, and Violet turned to address the banker at last. "We can't go with you," Violet said. "There's something else we need to do."

"Don't be absurd!" Mr. Poe sputtered. "I don't know where you've been, or how you got here, or why you're wearing a picture of Santa Claus on your shirts, but –"

"It's Herman Melville," Klaus said. "Goodbye, Mr. Poe."

"You are coming with me, young man!" Mr. Poe ordered.

"Sayonara," Sunny said, and the three Baudelaires walked quickly across the beach, leaving the hanker coughing in astonishment.

"Wait!" he ordered, when he put his handkerchief away. "Come back here, Baudelaires! You're children! You're youngsters! You're orphans!" Mr. Poe's voice grew fainter and fainter as the children made their way across the sand.

"What do you think the word 'violet' means?" Klaus murmured to his sister. "The taxi isn't purple."

"More code," Sunny guessed. "Maybe," Violet said. "Or maybe Quigley just wanted to write my name."

"Baudelaires!" Mr. Poe's voice was almost inaudible, as if the Baudelaires had only dreamed he was there on t

he beach.

"Do you think he's in the taxi, waiting for us?" Klaus asked.

"I hope so," Violet said, and broke into a run. Her siblings hurried behind her as she ran across the sand, her boots showering sand with each step. "Quigley," she said quietly, almost to herself, and then she said it louder. "Quigley! Quigley!"

At last the Baudelaires reached the taxi, but the windows of the car were tinted, a word which here means "darkened, so the children could not see who was inside."

"Quigley?" Violet asked, and flung open the door, but the children 's friend was not inside the taxi.

In the driver's seat was a woman the Baudelaires had never seen before, dressed in a long, black coat buttoned up all the way to her chin. On her hands were a pair of white cotton gloves, and in her lap were two slim books, probably to keep her company while she waited. The woman looked startled when the door opened, but when she spied the children she nodded politely, and gave them a very slight smile, as if she were not a stranger at all – also not a friend. The smile she gave them was one you might give to an associate, or another member of an organization to which you belong.

"Hello, Baudelaires," she said, and gave the children a small wave. "Climb aboard."

The Baudelaires looked at one another cautiously. They knew, of course, that one should never get into the car of a stranger, but they also knew that such rules do not necessarily apply in taxis, when the driver is almost always a stranger. Besides, when the woman had lifted her hand to wave, the children had spied the name of the books she had been reading to pass the time. There were two books of verse: The Walrus and the Carpenter, and Other Poems, by Lewis Carroll, and The Waste Land, by T. S. Eliot. Perhaps if one of the books had been by Edgar Guest, the children might have turned around and run back to Mr. Poe, but it is rare in this world to find someone who appreciates good poetry, and the children allowed themselves to hesitate.