THIRTEEN
Now, I am poignant-a word which here means utterly and remarkably sad- to inform you that Violet did sign the document, and she did marry Count Olaf. But, only for a few minutes. Improvising, her thoughts drifted back to the first day she'd held a pen. She had dissected it and put it back together in less than 5 minutes. As she now knew, a fountain pen is a pen that contains a reservoir of water-based liquid ink.
The ink is fed to the nib through a feed via a combination of gravity and capillary action- a phrase which here means a phenomenon in which a liquid's surface rises, falls, or becomes distorted in shape where it is in contact with a solid. Filling the fountain pen reservoir with ink may involve replacing a disposable ink cartridge, which is what this very pen, with a Visconti stainless steel nib and feed, used to replace ink.
If you have ever used a fountain pen, you must know that they are exceedingly messy, and that ink can come seeping out of the pen if the ink cartridge is not totally and properly inserted into the pen reservoir.
Of course, this was not Count Olaf's pen, but a pen that he had pick pocketed from Sylvia Poe, while she was signing her invitation. And while he gazed greedily at the almost signed document, he saw the Parker sign carved into the silver pen, glinting in the spot light that bathed Violet when she signed the document.
But Violet, concealing her hand motions casually, pressed the pen onto her signature. As I said before, ink can seep out of the pen when used incorrectly. But in Violet's case the ink didn't seep
out, it didn't even splatter out. The nib literally snapped in half, and the jet black liquid cascaded onto the paper.
Violet sighed to conceal her grin. At the same time, she knew what had happened. Mr. Poe had a financial crisis, that much had been apparent when Mrs. Poe had bought them those hideous clothes. They had resorted to buying cheap fake pens that were Made In China.
As soon as Olaf saw what had happened, you could have seen the rage in his eyes.
"You imbecile! Were you not taught how to use a fountain pen!" he yelled. He ran his eyes across the remains of the pen and saw that Made In China was carved into the nib. Furious, and in an attempt driven by rage, he took the remains and signed using the broken nib and some spare ink. "There, Wifey, I've signed it for you!"
"Au contraire, you've signed it, but not for me…you've signed it for yourself," replied Violet, a smile spread across her face from ear to ear. As he looked down his face turned white as a sheet.
Sure enough, in perfect recognizable script handwriting was:
"I'll get you for this!" he cried. His hands whizzed to Violet's neck and began to choke her. The audience gasped in surprise as her face turned blue. Her arms were trying to wrestle his hands free, but it was of no use.
Suddenly, Mr. Poe stood up and after a frightful fit of coughs, he yelled: "Leave that girl alone!" However, I am sorry to report that the events after this are so frightening and scary that I would personally recommend you burning this piece of literature then throwing the remains to the dogs. But if you want to die crying, you may turn the page to read about the most uneventful thing ever recorded.
But they had all forgotten about Klaus. He'd escaped from the man in the frenzy of Olaf choking Violet, but now, Violet was sprawled across the wooden table, arms limply by her side. Klaus timidly walked over, full of hate than ever before.
Klaus was lost. With no parents and no older sibling, he only had Sunny to live for. And her life was about to come to an end as well. He thought of how she now felt, suspended metres above the roughly mowed, dead grass. For a split second, Klaus felt a touch of envy bubbling inside of him, but then Count Olaf rushed at Klaus, while lighting his cigar.
Klaus rapidly moved out of the way, but it was too late. Count Olaf had aimed it carefully. The lighter had just entered his mouth when he screamed in agony and pain. He felt on fire. Of course, that's because he was on fire. The fire spread quickly, and quickly he was hardly visible between the flames.
The only sign that he was there was the piercing scream that would sound every few seconds. Klaus was so completely bathed in flames that when he screamed it seemed to the audience as if the flames were the ones in agony.
Minutes later, a pile of ashes stood where Klaus had been standing.
Like father like son.
