Eleven-
What follows is a single month of absolute silence.
Violet avoids him as if he harbors a contagious disease or a curse or a nasty omen. In the days after their discussion of VFD, he climbs her ladder, knocks at her inventing room, and waits for a trapdoor that does not swing open.
He idles in the halls between rehearsals, his Troupe tittering in the basement theatre, and tries to catch a glimpse of dark hair and swinging satchel. Carmelita meets his eye each day, but when she sees him she looks immediately away, keeps her head down, and does not seem guilty. Olaf haunts even the dining hall, scanning the crowd of orphans who watch him back with equal mixtures of curiosity, flirtation, and callousness.
Every class, every day, despite where he waits he does not see her.
This ritual of seeking and coming up empty persists for so long, Olaf begins to feel panic prickle his spine as if he is being watched. Ludicrous thoughts of Violet on the run creep into his mind, of her slipping away from Eliade as easily as the shadows change and setting off into the city.
Of all the ways he has imagined Violet Baudelaire leaving him, this is the one he hates the most.
He imagines her holding out as long as she can, inventing odd things for food money, waiting and scrounging for the day she turns eighteen and an inheritance beyond his comprehension falls into her soft lap. In this particular nightmare, Violet's clothes have been reduced to scraps like the beggar girl costume backstage and she kneels in the streets, whimpering to any men that pass her by, "Please, sir. I'll do anything, anything-" and between the men that find her for her body, she meets Lemony Snicket who whisks her away and cleans her up and stamps an eye onto her ankle like a brand. In this nightmare, he loses her entirely. Romantically, physically, intellectually, she is bound and changed by others and she does not care for him anymore than a passing memory soon to be forgotten.
Three weeks in, Olaf haunting the halls between Remora's classroom and the sanctuary, he is considering this possibility, anxiety twisting his stomach as he wonders when he should begin looking through the city, when he spots her.
Violet is rounding the corner, two friends at her side. She looks nervous, eyes scanning the hall, but she spots him far too late. They meet eyes for the briefest moment and Violet's face goes bright red. He cannot tell if she is embarrassed, ashamed, or furious with him, yet she looks away with a stubborn set to her jaw and mutters something to the girl beside her, who casts him a curious look.
Before he is even aware that he is moving, Olaf is wading through the mass of orphans to stand before the trio, blocking their progression.
"Orphans." He says in greeting.
Violet's friends, the Quagmire's, he remembers, nod. Violet stares neutrally.
"Miss Baudelaire," He begins, satisfied when he sees a small amount of hurt in her eyes. Before he even begins, he knows he will be theatrical and cold, can feel it in the roll of his jaw and the tilt of his shoulders, yet he cannot will it away. "I understand, after our last conversation, if you no longer wish to see me. The polite thing to do, in an instance like this, would be to let me know your feelings have changed. However, as you are unaccustomed to adult relationships of any kind, I will spare you the inconvenience of telling me yourself simply to let you know I have received your message loud and clear. I will not continue to-"
Violet interrupts him, sputtering in disbelief. Her face is uncomfortably red and she glances from him to her friends to the hall of passing orphans with growing distress.
"I didn't want to-" She says, voice low and hurt, "I wasn't going to, er, end things. I just needed some time to- to think. About things. And-"
Olaf takes pity on her and shakes his head. He cannot stand and listen to Violet struggle over not wanting him. Regret sinks his stomach. He realizes her knowledge of VFD was always on the horizon. To keep herself safe from the threat of it, she would have to know of its existence. Yet he wishes he had kept his mouth shut, had merely kissed her and kept kissing her when he had the chance.
Still, a flash of hope soars in his chest. I wasn't going to, er, end things. But that hope warps instantly into irritation. He is too grown for games, too old for a wayward partner.
"Yet you were hiding from me like a scared little girl." He says, voice calm.
Violet winces, grimacing a bit, but does not deny it. Beside her, her friends shift awkwardly. They shuffle their feet and fiddle with their bookbags, looking anywhere else.
Olaf, feeling much too old, says, "I would not have done this now if you hadn't avoided me. My feelings for you, Violet, have not changed although now I find myself perfectly disappointed. Find me if you feel the need."
He does not wait to see her nod. Olaf turns so sharply his lanyard slaps against his chest, and walks calmly towards the backstage door. He opens it to the sound of his Troupe giggling, shouting, "To the getaway car!" and tumbles fast and snappy down the dark staircase, eager to get his mind off the desperation in Violet's voice.
Weeks pass.
In the meantime, he irons out a solid plot for his play and begins drafting costumes between practices. He hunts for scraps of linen and velvet and brass buttons in the backstage props rooms and hangs them in the wings, organized by character and scene like large pieces to a puzzle he is attempting to solve.
He has found a new apartment more secure and oblivious than the last. Summer burns itself out and the mornings sink damp and cool over the city, fresh with the first blusters of Autumn. Olaf keeps his head down, gets his work done, and only ventures from Eliade or his apartment when necessary to cause or survival.
After rehearsals, he gets into the habit of having dinner with his Troupe. They order take away some nights and settle into the props room to drink and judge one another on their improvisation skills. On one such evening, a white-faced woman was instructed to act as the captain of a wayward ship and had called, "Land ho!" into the long hall. The other woman had quipped, "I told you to stop calling me that." Olaf had laughed so hard he'd gotten hiccups. Other nights they dress in their best clothes and settle into a restaurant with fine wine and fancy lighting. They break bread together. They bond over stories of acting triumphs and villainous plots. They leave one at a time before the bill comes and pile into the Count's car, laughing as easily as children.
On one such evening, Olaf pulling his collar high against the wind, he waits outside a bustling restaurant, its bright neon lights proclaiming LOUSY LANE'S PARLOR AND CONFECTIONERY in pink at his back. Inside, his Troupe has ordered enough desserts and alcohol to feed a cafetorium of orphans yet he waits on the stoop, the air fresh and cold on his face.
The individual of indeterminate gender has always been notoriously late. Olaf waits outside, ready to wave them down and hurry together inside. Yet, across the bustling street, the flickering lights of a small boutique catch his eye. Uncertainty rots in his stomach for several moments until finally he hurries across the street and into the shop and returns, nearly ten minutes later, with a small parcel tucked into his trouser pocket. Olaf decides it is only fair. He had a hand in loosing Carmelita upon Violet and feels the need to apologize in some way. Not that he had ever felt the need to apologize for anything ever before this very moment. Justification, a lousy thing, is all he has.
Olaf returns to his spot only to find one of the white-faced women waiting for him, grabbing at his arm in excitement, boasting cotton candy martinis and an endless tap. He forgets the gift in his pocket and his accompanying embarrassment in favor of cherry wine and lemon bars. It is an evening full of sweets and song and thievery.
And it is not the only one.
Meanwhile, Violet emerges from whatever hiding places she used to walk past him as if he were not even present. He waits in the halls the same as ever, hoping like a fool that she will want to explain her actions, to beg for forgiveness.
Although they do not speak, they look their fill each time they pass. Olaf takes great care to appear groomed and polished and absolutely in control. He makes Fernald shine his shoes and the white faced women exaggerate the waves of his slicked hair. He shaves his face close but not bare. He wears similar outfits to the one from the night they first met- a dress shirt rolled at the sleeves, dark trousers, his lanyard glittering and gilded: impresario at his neck. The pin of the eye he forgoes. It is left on the countertop each morning considered then left behind, staring to nothing.
Where he seems functioning, Violet does not.
Her hair hangs in lank greasy strands at her face or up in a knot atop her head, no ribbon to distract from the tangle. Her clothes are rumpled and lined and she walks with an exhaustion he has never seen. Dark circles ring her eyes as if she has been awake for far too long. He wonders each time if Nero is involved, but the young inventor has not bandaged her hands and walks with no noticeable limp. In the mornings she looks as weak and pale as the sinking moon.
By evening she has flipped into her most tempting.
Rehearsals run late nearly every weeknight and Violet knows this yet that does not stop her from sneaking backstage and interrupting. Despite the scene or actors atop the stage, Violet will cross the stage and his Troupe will fall silent mid-sentence, unwilling to let her hear their labors and simply let her pass. She flaunts to her ladder, a snap to her hips and a slight smirk at her mouth. His Troupe eyes him, unsure of what to do, and Violet does not even glance his way.
She walks straight-backed, head held high, her hair curled at the ends to whisp about her back as she trots right past him, close enough he can smell a hint of lavender at her heels. A pretty rouge dusts her cheeks. She has painted her lips the color of fresh roses. He wonders if she has just returned from meeting with another boy, someone not as old or venomous as himself, someone able to be tender and honest.
The idea infuriates him. Each weeknight, every time they pass, he nearly boils. Internally his thoughts are incendiary. (Who does she think she is?) On nights where he is feeling powerful, standing atop the stage, he aches to repeat their exposition, to say, grinning, "A little orphan is out after hours? How exciting."
On days where he is feeling frustrated, he has to clench his fists to still his hands, to grimace through the fire in his chest, to bite his tongue to keep from saying, "Just cut the shit and look at me."
And other nights where he is feeling vicious and venomous and evil standing still and mute while she interrupts his rehearsal and crosses his stage, he nearly spits, "Kneel voluntarily and I'll go easy on that pretty little mouth."
Olaf keeps silent. He lets her go. As Violet passes, his entire Troupe seems to hold their breath as though hurrying through a graveyard. She ascends her ladder and does not even flash him. As always, the sounds of machinery and invention distract his Troupe for the rest of the evening. They lose their lines, forget to swap costumes. Even after she is gone and done, Violet Baudelaire wrecks his head.
They continue this way until it becomes routine. Until the Troupe stops giving him questioning looks and instead glare in annoyance as Violet passes, looking tempting as the grave. Violet does not look at him and Olaf does not say one word to her.
Until, nearly two months later, they do.
"This thing-" Isadora snaps, slamming shut the front cover to The Incomplete History of Secret Organizations. Bits of charred paper flake from the spine, dropping to the floor like inky fish scales. "Is so ungodly frustrating. I want to pitch myself through these windows."
Violet glances to where Isadora sits on the floor of her secret room, her back pressed against the seat of the velvet chair, glaring at Duncan's book as if it had bitten her.
"We share the same sentiment." Violet says from her spot near the trapdoor. Her homework is spread out before her, littering the floor. She has just finished the third page of an essay assigned by Mr. Remora on the many roles of God in classic literature.
Meanwhile, Isadora has been flipping through the book, a stack of old Punctilio's at her side, and taking notes on her findings, which have grown less and less fruitful over time. The two girls have been swapping tasks for several hours already- Violet's back bent over the book with a magnifying glass, her heart slowly sinking with accumulated months of disappointment, while Isadora set to work measuring random things in her piles of inventing scraps and scribbling them down for homework, hoping to appease Mrs. Bass. When one grew weary or frustrated, they switched. This routine has worked for the last two months, has been resolved and smoothed with repetition like any growing commitment.
With eyes freshly opened to clarity in all its terror, they set to hunting VFD.
And, like with so many other mysteries in their lives, they have come up empty.
"This whole situation makes me want to pitch myself through the windows. Maybe those notes would get shredded as I go. Then I'd have the backbone to take them down." Violet eyes the tall tower windows, tinted with grime and dust, where Olaf's notes still hang, faded yellow in the sunlight.
Isadora follows her gaze, frowning, the blaze of her frustration tempered to spark by pity. "Has Olaf tried to-?"
"Yes." Violet snaps through a wince. "He has. He slips me notes beneath the trapdoor. Picks flowering weeds from the alley and leaves them on the stage once the Troupe is gone. Anytime we pass in the halls, he looks at me like he wants to kill me or- well-"
"Or get you naked?" Isadora supplies.
"Sometimes." Violet admits, unembarrassed. "But that's not what I was going to say. Sometimes Olaf sees me and grimaces like I've stomped on his foot. Like the sight of me causes him physical pain."
Sympathetic to matters of the heart, Isadora mutters, "Ouch. That's brutal."
"It is." Violet agrees, sighing, slumping, her head in her hands. "My heart hurts. And I hate it because I am, still, smitten. But this-" she nods to the book at the floor, black with ruin. "Is more serious than budding- No, blooming romance. And if there's some chance of villainy then I should be smart and avoid him… Right?"
It is the first instance where avoiding Count Olaf seemed like less of a necessity and more like a rash attempt at survival.
"Smart." Isadora repeats in a tone that suggests fresh doubt. "Maybe. Maybe not. He is the only one that's been honest about VFD. Even our parents weren't that honest. Maybe he just wanted to, I don't know, prepare you for the risks that come with being together."
Familiar tendrils of dread snake their way into her gut. Violet feels the pain of growing realization, the horror of looking into the past and recognizing all her decisions for wrongness, for folly.
Violet sits silent, worrying, while Isadora continues, "Our parents were in VFD, so we're targets already, sort of. But Olaf, from what it sounds like, was raised in it. Knows its ins and outs. He's, well, a goldmine of knowledge. And looks."
Violet snorts, pleasantly shocked from her downward spiral.
Isadora glances at her nails, a parody of prissiness. "Sorry, but I'm not blind."
"You're right, of course. But why didn't you tell me any of this earlier? It's been nearly two months. Who knows what the truth is? Who knows if Olaf even still-" Violet pauses, unwilling to continue when the man's affectionate notes gather and grow like creeping vines at the window.
"I know what you were going to say and it was stupid. Don't look at those-" Isadora points to an old liquor bottle atop the inventing table, its green glass neck choking on a drooping collection of dandelions. "And say that man wouldn't bend over backwards just to get you to talk to him. He picked you dandelions and probably felt stupid doing it considering you haven't even looked at him in months."
"Hey." Violet warns, edging on annoyed. "Why're you acting like my enemy now?"
"I'm not." Isadora insists. "I just feel bad for him. I think maybe we… freaked out too much." Yet even as she says this, her tone quiets and Violet can tell she doesn't mean it.
"I think we reacted perfectly well to hearing our parents were murdered by a secret organization they were in. That the man I was dating knew them and was, or is, in it too. Of course we would need time and- and space. To think. It's reasonable and… smart."
Isadora only hums at that. "Well. Think of it this way. You've shown him you can cut him off. That you weren't so gullible and lovestruck you couldn't turn away. Why not try to talk now? He was good to you. Gentlemanly. You should at least… talk."
Violet glares to her friend lightly, suspicious. "Sounds like you hope we'll do more than talk."
"Of course I do!" Isadora huffs. "I told Duncan I wanted you to get married. So you have to talk again for that to happen. Get to it."
Violet shakes her head, exasperated, her essay forgotten on the floor. "Yes but that was before we knew he was in VFD. Or is. I still don't know."
Isadora sighs, glancing beyond the windows to the slowly sinking sun. Thoughtful concentration smoothes her features. She wears this look when penning poetry, hunting for the perfect word, stringing consonants and verse.
"It comes down to villainy. We need to know who he is, one way or another."
"Right again, Quagmire." Violet mutters. She rolls onto her stomach, pressing her face against her notebook in weariness. "And how do you think we should find out? We've flipped through Duncan's book hundreds of times. We've dug through Punctilio archives. We've looked up Lemony Snicket and Kit Snicket and tried to find that doctor. Only to come up with next to nothing. Lemony was a journalist. That's all I know."
"And we have, er, his obituary." Isadora reminds her.
Even the mention of it has the mood shifting from quiet contemplation to wariness, as if Snicket's ghost had appeared at his name's first utterance to haunt them just out of reach.
"Yes, that too." Violet says, peeling away from her essay to stand and stretch. She moves so she does not feel small and useless. "What a mystery."
Isadora sighs, glancing to the trapdoor. Violet knows what she is about to ask so she says, "No clue. He's been gone for awhile though. I've almost finished his essay."
"The library isn't that far." Isadora murmurs. "He shouldn't be taking this much time."
Violet shrugs, walking to the long table to stare out the windows, purposefully avoiding Olaf's notes she could feel glowing like heat at her cheek. "Depends on which library he went to. Eliade's full of them. Maybe he stopped by the Hall for food. Maybe he… found something interesting."
Isadora does not respond. Instead, she turn and fiddles with Duncan's book once more, as if hoping to summon him from his most valued possession. Violet flips the radio on, letting static and music fill the bright room as they work. She returns to Duncan's essay. The sun begins its slow decline.
They work in near silence for two hours more. Isadora dozes in the velvet chair while Violet, Duncan's essay finished and tucked away, roots through the old Punctilio's. She finds nothing peculiar, nothing of interest, and the repeated chafe of failure has turned her mood sour. She thinks of VFD and feels a cocktail of bloodlust and mystery. She thinks of Olaf and feel simple regret, humbling confusion, and missed opportunity.
With Isadora silent and all of their studies placed so emptily before her, Violet feels, again, stuck in a spiral of downward emotion.
That is, until she hears Duncan screaming.
Far below, he slams the stairwell door shut and thunders across the stage. Violet and Isadora have wrenched the trapdoor open and unfurled the ladder before they even truly hear what he has to say.
"-stupid! I've stared at that book for nearly a whole year and felt familiarity looking at that weird page of scribbles and I didn't pay attention! I would be the worst investigative journalist out there! Unable to recognize a stupid map when I see one. They'd take away my awards, my titles, my column! I'd be disgraced!"
Books tucked like feathers against the crooks of his arms, he hurries up the ladder and drops them heavily, sending the stack of Punctilio's scattering.
"What are you talking about? Duncan? You look terrible. What are you-?" Isadora demands, while Violet asks, "A map? A map of what? A headquarters? Where is-? Oh! You're green, Duncan, how-"
"Ladies." Duncan says, eyeing them both as he sorts through the books at the floor. His skin is pale and a sickly green hue gathers at his mouth. Cold sweat beads his hairline."I'll explain. Shut up."
The two girls glance to one another, refusing to feel shame over their demands at information, yet they fall silent all the same. It takes little time for Duncan to flatten the books at the floor, each one revealing different angles on the same map- geographical landmarks stand out harsh as pinned points. They spot rivers and valleys and contoured anomalies unique to only the city.
"There's The Cathedral of the Alleged Virgin." Violet mutters, pointing to a blight of structure on their closest map.
"And here's Eliade." Isadora says, toeing a page near Duncan's elbow.
"Yes, good." Duncan murmurs, crawling across the floor to where The Incomplete History of Secret Organizations rests against its blackened pillowcase. "I'm glad you two can read maps. A bit more disappointed with your silence skills."
"You shut it, Duncan. Just tell us what you've found." Isadora says, patience thinning.
Her brother casts her a smug, glittering smile and says, "How can I tell you my investigative findings if I shut it? That will waste lots of time, but if you insist."
"Oh my god." Isadora growls, excited but trying to hide it in frustration. "I'm going to strangle you."
"Tell me." Violet insist, tiptoeing over the mass of books to sit at Duncan's side as he gently cracks the burnt book. "I won't strangle you or tell you to shut it."
"Oh, Violet." Duncan says, placing his head briefly at her shoulder. Even the small touch has Violet feeling his fever through her clothes. "If only you had been my sister. Then you'd be nice to me and not threaten me with physical violence."
"I'm strangling both of you." Isadora decides. Violet and Duncan share a sarcastic, fearful look.
Isadora settles at Duncan's other side, as tense silence falls like mist in the room. Three orphans peer down at the same book they have fruitlessly studied for months with fresh chagrin, hoping against hope that it will finally reveal its secrets.
"So, you two have doubtlessly seen this mess." Duncan says, flipping to one of the very first pages, revealing thick grey lines crossing and looping, looking as if someone had dropped a pile of yarn straight to the paper.
Violet hums in agreement as Isadora nods. It was not a page they had studied much, considering it held very little in words or structure at all.
"Well I've stared and stared at it, thinking it was familiar, but never quite realized what it was until now. But I was walking past the Sanctuary- it looks very nice now, with all the renovations- and it just came to me." Duncan says.
"An epiphany." Isadora says.
Violet supplies, "A revelation."
Unwilling to ponder divinity, Duncan shakes his head and continues, "Wherever it's from, I figured it out. It's a map of the city. Look. Here's where the lines avoid. They evade the Grim River. And the Swarthy Swamp. And Hazy Harbor. They turn away from bodies of water, which made me think they were either roads or tunnels."
Duncan reaches for a book amongst the pile, but Violet, closer, grabs it first. It shows a road map of the city, each stoplight and sharp turn, every parking lot and driveway. She holds it next to the larger book, close enough for Isadora to see.
"They don't line up. Those aren't roads, but they cross over some. Or, I guess, beneath some." Violet says. The three eye the maps for several seconds, watching the ways they come together and apart.
"So they're tunnels. Underground tunnels. Of course. But, how are they entered or exited? It's not like they can be recognizable to the average person." Isadora says, brow furrowed, her head in her hand, leaning as close as she could.
"Right." Duncan says, pointing to the burnt map, finger hovering just above the page. "Some of the tunnels begin or stop at certain points. Or just loop around. So, since I knew it was an underground map, I put it next to a tourist brochure of the city. It was stuck in one of these books. Isadora, can you grab it?"
Isadora lurches to her feet and rummages through the books until she pulls free a bright yellow brochure and tosses it to her brother. Duncan unfolds it as Isadora returns to his side. It is printed in bright primary colors, showing each body of water and roadway and monument. Printed across the top of the map is a quote printed in blocky script, red as fresh berries, "'VERY FIRST DESTINATION!'- TRAVELLING VACATIONIST."
"Take a look at this." Duncan says, laying the pages close together. "And tell me what stands out."
The two young women study the pages for several moments in silence, peering at the winding lanes and travel destinations.
"The tunnels, they- they-" Isadora starts, pointing to the fountain in the middle of the city, while Violet jabs a high rise of apartment buildings off Dark Avenue and finishes her thought. "They line up with buildings. And monuments. And tourist attractions."
"This one leads to the horseradish factory!" Isadora says, pointing.
"And this one to a dairy farm! And, here, a fountain in the center of the city. And, oh no. Look." Violet jabs a point next to Eliade's location.
"The Daily Punctilio?" Duncan says, frowning, obviously having missed it. "Looks like it's in the back lot between us."
All at once, they have the same idea.
"No." Isadora insists. "No way. We can't just throw ourselves into some random underground-"
Violet and Duncan share a glance. They rise to their feet in unison.
"Duncan." Isadora insists, tone reminiscent of a mother. "You're sick. Look at you. You're gonna hurl any moment. You've been sick for months and months."
"Oh now you admit I'm sick, huh?" Duncan says, but there is no heat in it. His mind is already snagging on adventure, of possible findings. His body holds the energy of a mystery unlocking. His illness is an afterthought, a physical hindrance to be considered then brushed aside.
Isadora is silent, absent of excuses. Violet reaches for her satchel.
"I won't sleep tonight if we don't go now." Duncan says.
The three orphans gather their things in the sunset, dreading and anticipating sinking beneath the streets, eager as viruses to invade the lifeline of VFD.
"We've taken this turn already." Isadora insists.
Their footsteps echo in the low-lit tunnels, stretching out like stones skipped over water. Duncan sighs, clutching his stomach. "We haven't. Look. Montgomery. That's a new name."
He nods to an arrow fixed to the brick wall, pointing into a large, dark cavern. They pass it warily, peering into the hall as if staring into the long throat of a beast about to eat them all whole.
"He's right. Montgomery is new." Violet says, penning it into the notebook in her arms. "Ever known a Montgomery?"
The Quagmires shake their heads.
"Me neither." Violet admits. "Let's keep going."
"We've been walking forever." Isadora whines. "My feet hurt and this place is creepy. These yellow lights are doing things to my eyes, and-"
She is cut off by footsteps. Far behind them in the tunnels, someone is quickly approaching.
Dread roots the three to the spot, grabs them momentarily by the ankles.
"What do we do?" Isadora whispers, panicked. "If we run they'll hear us. We don't know which way these tunnels lead. There's nowhere to hide."
Violet and Duncan share a glance. Options gather in their minds, all useless and foolish.
Their choice is made for them when a voice cuts through their panicking, vowels long and warbling against the brick.
"Children-" the unfamiliar voice calls. "I heard you tumble in. Do not be me to introduce myself. My name is Lemony Snicket. Did you get my letter? Could I take you for a rootbeer float?"
The man's footsteps grow closer. Panic drops Violet's stomach, remembering Olaf's warnings. She snatches the hands of her friends and says, uncaring at her volume, and shouts, "Run!"
That is just the moment where Duncan heaves, terror on his face, to vomit atop the bricks. Lemony Snicket is so close they can hear the labored draw of his breathing, the quick rhythm of his shoes on the tunnel floor. When Violet looks back she can see the outline of him- dressed in a smartly tailored suit, his face obscured in shadow by a bowl-shaped hat.
"Children!" He calls again.
Duncan heaves. Isadora rushes to his other side, hooking her arms around his shoulders as Violet does the same.
"Come on, Duncan, you can-" Useless assurances fall from their lips as they run, dragging a half-stumbling Duncan as he continues to vomit, sickness slicking the front of his uniform.
Violet and Isadora run as quickly as possible, hauling a stumbling weight between them while Lemony Snicket tails them like a predator, his eyes boring like maggots into their backs. The orphans struggle and stumble, their throats full of pleas, waiting for an inevitable confrontation violent as any burning home.
They brace themselves, holding onto composure like water in cupped hands, and keep running.
Esmé has been waiting for him.
Olaf sees that in the way she leans very carefully against the brick wall of the tunnel and the practiced crossing of her long legs at the ankle, still so concerned that she look perfect at any angle despite lounging in a grimey tunnel, harsh yellow lights casting unflattering shadows. Carmelita sits on the dirt floor not far off, scribbling furiously in a tattered commonplace book.
He had come through the Southern entrance, ducking beneath the fountain at the center of the city and taking that long spiral staircase down to darkness. He is still damp from spray, his hair heavy with it. He walks towards them slowly, languidly, a man with all the time in the world. Time he would prefer not to waste on betrayal.
Although he wishes to appear calm and unfazed, he thinks of his burning apartment, of the aftermath and nothing left behind. He had searched through the rubble for scraps of his past, hoping to find his collection of disguises, his collection of incriminating evidence, and every matchbook he had ever used. Instead he found ashes and grit and nothing but char.
"Sorry to say, but I'm still breathing." He says, and both their eyes snap to where he emerges from the connecting side tunnel. They are instantly cautious. Esmé straightens. Carmelita freezes at her heels. "But of course you'd know that, Esmé, given your little mole."
He nods to Carmelita, who glances immediately away. Just to twist that knife of fear deeper, he mutters, "Tell me, girl, have those bruises healed yet?"
She rubs at her throat as though soothing an ache but does not respond. Esmé ignores his taunting and instead breathes his name in a pouty, lusty voice as if she had not attempted to burn him alive.
"Olaf!" She cries, throwing her arms wide and hurrying towards him. Her boots grind gravel as she approaches. "It's been too long, my pet, far too-"
He interrupts her, voice calm and low with derision. "Do not touch me."
Esmé pauses, considering him with calculation. She lowers her arms and casts him a sad look, trying another tactic. "Oh, of course. I can only imagine what you think of me after your tragedy. Although I will not deny that I burnt your apartment to the ground, I will tell you it was for a perfectly good reason. A warning."
She eyes him smugly, waiting for him to bite. Olaf sighs, wondering why every woman he has ever met has wanted him to bend to their will. He glares at her but questions, "A warning?"
Esmé grins. "A warning. I saw Lemony Snicket walk into that very building. He was heading straight to your penthouse. I had to do something, you understand."
Olaf rolls his eyes, but a sudden confusion nearly gives him vertigo. He hates this feeling. Has never experienced it frequently but remembers it most clearly when he was first inducted, when he saw his first house fire and, most recently, nearly half a year ago when he heard Nero hiss Baudelaire. A feeling of sick epiphany, like reality had changed right before his eyes.
"Last I saw Lemony Snicket he was in a casket sinking six feet deep." Olaf sniffs, folding his arms. Although he has learned to doubt the validity of anything that came from Esmé's mouth, he still feels a prickle of discomfort at his back, as if being haunted by a spectre. He resists the urge to peer over his shoulder into the darkness.
Esmé smiles yet it is grim and agitated like a parent when their child repeats a stupid question. Instead of insulting him she asks softly, "How many years have you had that tattoo?"
Olaf feels the ink beneath his skin grow hot with awareness. He does not need to reflect or count numbers and replies nearly immediately, "Next month it will be-"
"Rhetorical, Olaf." Esmé says, voice hard. Carmelita snickers and the man has a sudden urge to stomp over and kick her teeth in.
"And?" He hisses. "What's your point?"
"In all the years you've had that tattoo how many associates have not been as dead as you thought?" Esmé asks, peering at him although they both know the number is high.
"A few." He admits. He remembers the first time he had seen Widdershins' obituary and kept eyeing Fernald for a reaction that never came only to see the man alive and well years later. "And you think Snicket's alive?"
"I know Snicket's alive. I saw him. I think he was coming to see you and I'm sure he wouldn't be up for a chat." Esmé says, the first hint of gravity in her voice. Olaf knows her well enough to take that tone seriously. Esmé Gigi Genevieve Squalor is all mouth and glitz until the world gets loud and she goes quiet and deadly in response. For all her obvious failings, she is a woman with flawless intuition. On Snicket at least, he trusts her.
He remembers the obituary reported by the Punctilio, how he had only found slight comfort in it, as if Lemony Snicket's death had been mere fantasy instead of fact. Part of him feels he should have known all along, especially when that rag of a journal reported, "As no one seems to know when, where, how, and why he died, there will be no funeral services. A burial may be scheduled for later this year."
Olaf's suspicions had been trampled however upon witnessing the burial, the casket, the epitaph. (Lemony Snicket-Author and Fugitive) and his weeping siblings. At that point he had not seen Kit nor Jacques for several years yet their ruddy mourning faces were immediately discernible from a crowd of hundreds of concerned citizens gathered to guarantee a notorious criminal was indeed dead.
He remembers how this crowd had stood very quietly, seeming scarcely to move or even breathe as if the news of their deaths had also been printed in the newspaper. He recalls standing on that side street, huddled in an alleyway cloaked in shadow and feeling, absolutely, like a victor. Seeing Lemony Snicket's coffin felt like seeing the final plumeing cough of a fire just smothered. Yet part of him still wondered, still doubted, still had vivid daydreams of Snicket converting Violet like a slick-tongued ideologue. Which, of course, he had been.
And perhaps still was.
"No." Olaf agrees, "He'd want me dead. Well, both of us. If he knew."
Esmé nods sharply at that, shifting where she stands. Only then does the grimey yellow light illuminate her t-shirt and seeing Esmé Squalor in a garment so plebeian stuns him into hissing, "What are you wearing?"
Esmé scoffs and pinches the shirt away from her body as if disgusted.
"Don't remind me." She mutters. At her tugging he spots the printed logo across her chest- THE CAFÉ KAFKA in large block letters.
He understands immediately.
Between classes and missions and sneaking around, his childhood had been filled with unconsensually listening to Lemony Snicket speak and the amount of times Olaf had heard the name Kafka seemed nearly comparable to the times he had heard his own. Snicket's devotion to the author was nearly a punchline so when the café opened that was the key spot to find him, sipping strong tea and sorting through research and photographs of people long forgotten. If the resurrected Snicket was going to haunt any old hang, it would be the Café Kafka.
"You're staking him out." Olaf says. "Clever. Any sightings?"
"Not yet." Esmé snips, defensive. "But I'm hopeful."
"Well good luck ghost hunting." He mutters, voice dipping to a threatening growl. "But you still burnt down my apartment building with me inside. Is that not cause for some suspicion? Revenge?"
With a flick, he reaches for his pocket knife and hauls it, gleaming, into the damp air. Esmé glances from the man's knife to Carmelita who has gone still, the pen motionless in her small grip.
"No, Olaf." Esmé says, voice annoyed and dismissive yet there is an unmistakable tremor to her voice. "We had a deal. I wouldn't hurt you even after what you did to my darling daughter."
"Adoptive daughter." Olaf corrects, as if it matters.
"Who cares?" Esmé snaps. "You were the one who wanted her at Eliade in the first place. It's only fair she should have some fun with the orphans while she counts them so well."
Esmé turns so her back is to the wall and looks to the girl on the floor, unwilling to turn her back on him. "Right Carmelita? Who could have known our Countie here would get so wrapped around the finger of Beatrice and Bertrand's spawn?"
Wisely, Carmelita stays silent, only glancing neutrally between them. To disguise a flinch, Olaf flips the glittering length of his blade back into its metal body and returns it to his pocket. Thin, high-strung panic jolts through his limbs as if one of the lights above had sparked and hit him live. The man is an actor (he hears himself, amused, to Violet, an impresario-) and he has had extensive training and mastered every veiled facial disguise still taught. He knows denial would be useless. Carmelita and Violet had been scrapping about something and he was sure part of it had to do with him. Carmelita had seen him stalking the halls, watching for Violet. Their relationship was obvious. His final option is obvious as his affection for pretty wayward orphans. What he could do, the only thing he could do, happened to be his most talented trick.
Count Olaf could lie.
In the grimey light, he smiles. He can feel the faint heat of the lights casting wicked shadows down his face. Esmé peers at him, suspicious.
"She is a talented lay. And easily charmed by an older man. Who could blame her?" Olaf smirks, running a hand through his hair still damp from the fountain. "But I am not a man manipulated by the heart. I'm surprised you don't remember that, Esmé."
At that, the woman freezes. He catches Carmelita glancing between them, confused and slightly repulsed.
He wonders if Esmé will be truthful with her later. If, on the car ride back to Eliade, she will explain how she had fallen head first into violent, wild love with him. How they had been the best of partners. Until, inevitably with most women, she had wanted something deeper. Commitment. A confession of love returned and multiplied cyclically between them. He hopes she tells Carmelita all of this only so she can also say how he had let her down. Had ripped her open and gutted her with absence.
This thought has him remembering a shred of lecture he had heard while wandering the halls of Eliade. It was taught in an easy cadence of a knowledgeable professor in a silent room, students alert and engaged and Olaf had thought he must have been a guest to be so good. The man's voice had reverberated through the hall like the steady roll of a cathedral bell.
"Many common religions have central icons that become intangible after death or departure and it is this absence that gives them importance and mystery and inspires devotion. It is a six phase process but can be cut to three. Engage physically, neglect emotionally, and separate entirely."
He had followed those steps with Esmé. And now that he was poking at her wounds he found them surprisingly tender.
"I haven't forgotten your heartlessness, Olaf. Carmelita's still wheezing, you know. From what you did." Esmé turns a fierce glare onto him, one heavy with threats and a wicked woman's best work.
"Right. Thank you for reminding me." The man says, voice oily and faux charming as he stalks slowly over to where Carmelita sits on the grimey stones. Her gray eyes stare neutrally to his yet he can still see the absolute terror behind the glaze of disinterest.
A grin curls like smoke at his lips. He raises his left foot very slowly and steps atop the page she had been writing on, grinding the ink with the wet sole of his shiny shoes. Carmelita doesn't have the backbone to look properly enraged. Instead a weary disappointment flickers across her eyes and the twisted pout of her lips as if she is unsurprised by the cruelty of her superiors.
"How many?" He asks, deliberately obtuse.
"Thirty seven." Carmelita says. Olaf is surprised to hear no tremble in her voice. "Thirty seven orphans total. Thirteen different families."
Beside him, Esmé hums in approval. "Sounds about right. Especially with the Marksons last week."
"The Marksons? You went after the Marksons?" Olaf asks, shocked and impressed and appalled all at once. "We didn't discuss that."
Esmé shrugs, looking cool and collected even under the yellow lights in a café t-shirt. "We didn't need to. S trained Snicket."
Olaf hums, considering that. He has vague memories of S. Theodora Markson, most involving her enormous mass of tangled red hair. "What does the S stand for?"
Esmé grins, a wicked little smirk. It has been a long time since he's seen it. "Success in this case. Went off without a hitch."
"Good." Olaf mutters. He feels a slight weight lift from his shoulders at the knowledge. "Now. Later this year there will be-"
A sudden gasp echoes from far down the tunnel, so far the sound comes at them round, bouncing off the wall from odd angles. It would have been easy to mistake as the shriek of a gas leak just burst or the squeal of tires on pavement from the roads above.
Olaf, however, would recognize that voice anywhere. He can imagine multitudes of scenarios- blindfolded, backwards, upside down- he would recognize Violet Baudelaire's voice like an unconscious thought.
"What was that?" Esmé hisses, dramatic even in true danger like a reaction she could never shake.
"Probably nothing." Olaf says, playing at calm, even as the three of them peer anxiously down the tunnel as far as they can.
"If there's nothing down there then what was that noise?" Carmelita says, voice waspish and scared.
"I don't know, you cretin, why don't you-" Olaf starts but a ragged scream cuts him off. Rapid footsteps pound from the darkness towards them, and snatches of sentences over the noise.
"Where did he-? How-?"
"Duncan, come on, you can make it-"
Over the noise of their footsteps, Olaf realizes he hears his own voice in the chaos, saying, "They're running from something. Get out, get-" and then Violet Baudelaire emerges from the darkness brilliant as a firework just sparked or a crow flying through a pitch-black night.
Her dark hair is messy, her face is red from cold. Black ash covers her hands like disease and smears atop her uniform. She looks as though she has crawled free from a pile of cinders. Panic has her eyes blown wide and feral, yet she sees him and stops immediately, recognition erasing the distress. Wordlessly, she reaches out and snatches his hands at the wrist. Violet looks into his eyes with exhausted relief, as if she has been saved.
The sight of her makes his knees humiliatingly weak. Even through several layers, he can feel the heat of her skin against the underside of his wrist.
"What are you doing here?" He asks, voice gruff. Hundreds of questions pile high in his mouth yet he cannot settle on more to speak. How did you discover these tunnels? Are you hurt? If you no longer want me why are you looking at me like a godsend?
Violet's wild eyes are still roaming his face as if she cannot quite believe he is there. Beside them, Carmelita and Esmé have shaken themselves from stunned fear to watching the two of them with obvious intrigue. Only Olaf is aware of the obvious danger this has put Violet in. He can almost see the plots running untamed and gorey through Esmé's mind.
"Violet." He shakes the hands she holds. "Why are you here? Why are you running?"
His demanding tone shakes her enough that she turns to look to the tunnel and see the Quagmires hurrying into view. The girl supports the weight of her brother who is pale and drawn, his eyes heavy. Vomit spatters the front of his clothes. Ash blights them as messy as Violet.
"Lemony Snicket." Violet says, voice wavering. "We saw him in the tunnels. He was following us, he- he's here somewhere. You told me not to interact, that he's dangerous, so we ran and he heard and-"
From the moment the name Snicket had left the girl's mouth, Esmé and Carmelita were turning and hurrying back into the easy protection of a side tunnel traveling East. Olaf cannot blame them. His resentment towards Esmé vanishes and instead he feels towards her a sense of partnership. Of accomplice. He hopes they make it back to Dark Avenue.
"Alright." Olaf says, but Violet is still babbling.
"I know you said it's a conspiracy and dangerous but we had to see if we could find something to prove it, something real and-"
"Violet." Olaf growls, ripping his hands from hers and going for the long knife in his pocket. He flips it free and feels satisfaction at the snap of blade into the low light. "Shut up. Get going. Stay safe. Wait up. No, wait. How did you get here? Nevermind. Just move."
He hears the quick trot of footsteps far ahead, trying to be quiet and hurry at the same time. Instead of forcing the trio forward into tunnels they do not know, Olaf leaves them behind, leaves Violet staring after him, and runs forward to face his truest enemy.
A sudden boom echoes straight down the tunnel like a boulder dropping. The noise is so loud the brick walls crumble. Dust shimmers in the air. Rubble seeps through new cracks in the stone above their heads. The yellow lights swing so wildly the man feels nauseous yet he keeps running until he finds the man standing still and tall in the middle of a side tunnel, one with an arrow pointing the way he had come, QUAGMIRE emblazoned golden in a large arrow.
Lemony Snicket looks the same as when they last met- covered in ash, dressed in a tailored suit, eyes bright and burning with hatred upon seeing him. It has been at least half a decade since they last met in person.
"Ah. Olaf." Snicket says. His voice holds the same cadence as ever, lilting with knowledge, syllables clipped tight. "Time's cruel persistence has brought us together yet again. I cannot say I'm pleased."
"Likewise." He sneers. "Aren't you supposed to be dead?"
A grim smile quirks at the other man's mouth. He dips his eyes very briefly to check a grimey watch at his wrist. "I am, as of half-past four this afternoon, still alive. And as a consequence of this I have duties that must be done. I was busy chasing children through these tunnels before you interrupted. Let me pass."
A deranged smile crosses Olaf's face. He grips the knife tighter, rolls his wrist in preparation to swing. He will put this dead man back in the grave before he allows him a chance near Violet Baudelaire.
"Bite me, Snicket. I'm about as likely to let you pass as I am to quit acting or read for fun."
The other man shakes his head wearily. As if disappointed, he says, "You've not changed at all."
Beneath the present danger, beneath the crowded buzz of thoughts in his mind, this statement strikes Olaf as odd. In very basic ways, he will always be himself. He will forever love to drape another identity atop his own and spew perfectly-delivered lines atop a warm theatre stage. He will always enjoy a cool glass of wine, or six. He will never read for fun.
But in other ways, he feels completely different from the man Lemony Snicket last saw. He is more driven, more aware of his limits. He works with a calm and steady hand. His heart is full and heavy. He works not only for himself, but for a world Violet can find quieted. Surely this should show. Yet, he feels no disappointment that Snicket cannot sense this. The less he knows about Olaf and Violet and their liaison the better.
"You're as tactless as ever. Where have you been hiding all these years?" Olaf asks. He widens his stance, tries to take up as much space within the tunnel as possible. Lemony Snicket has crouched somewhat, like a sports performer aiming for a tackle.
"I don't think tactless works in that sentence." Lemony snips and Olaf resist the urge to toss his knife right at the man's smarmy mouth. "And as for your last question… That's simply none of your business."
He knows there are several things he could say to further distract Snicket. Although they are enemies, absolutely, they were raised together in the close-knit halls of the same shady organization. They watched one another's failures along with their successes. They know each other too well to resort to casual cruelties.
The Count feels several words gathering in his mouth he could spew- Bertrand, traitor, Kit, obituary, farcity. Yet they all vanish as soon as he feels rubble fall against the back of his neck and down his spine beneath his shirt. He does not look, does not want the other man to follow his gaze, but he is sure a fresh crack has split the tunnel above his head.
A dangerous idea takes form. Olaf grips his knife tighter.
"Nothing to say?" Lemony asks, voice low and derisive. "Then let me pass."
"There are several things I could say to you," Olaf mutters, that same devilish grin at his lips. "But those will have to wait."
Snicket casts him a wary look, confused. Olaf takes the opportunity to summon all his strength and jam the long blade of his knife overhead, driving it deep into the crack. A sound of stone splitting echoes in the long map of tunnels. The ground begins to tremor.
The knife is stuck into the parting tunnel so deeply Olaf has to wrench his hand free. When he does, a large cluster of brick and rock tumbles down. A gushing hole has opened overhead. The tunnel has begun its steady collapse.
Enormous portions of stone split the space between them. The two men jump back reflexively.
And this is where Lemony Snicket fails.
By the time he could have followed the Count towards the orphans, the space between them is crowded with rubble so dense he cannot pass. Olaf turns had pounds down the shuddering tunnel, his heart in his throat. He hopes he remembers the way these walls wind.
"Orphans-" He calls, his voice echoing round and long. He hears Violet call back but cannot string together words from the chaos. Overhead, the yellow lights flicker and die. He is left running in darkness, the whole world falling.
"Olaf!" He can see the faintest hint of spark ahead. Violet and her friend stand struggling with the weight of the boy, his arms draped over their necks. "Over here!"
"Give him to me. Let me-" He is saying before he even reaches them. Without asking he ducks, scoops the Quagmire boy at the knees, and throws him onto his back.
"Run!" Olaf yells, snatching the lighter out of Violet's hands. She tries to shout over the noise, rubble falling around them like ash but he cannot focus. "Follow me! Shut up! Get going! Stay safe!"
They run as quickly as possible, the lighter flickering like a slim measure of hope between them. The walls had increased their rumble and the floor actively trembled beneath their feet, causing them to stumble and slow and falter. Gravel crunches beneath their shoes. Duncan is heavy at his back and a cold sweat beads the man's forehead but he persists, swinging the flame at the walls, searching for another arrow.
"What are you-?" Violet shouts.
"Here!" Olaf cries, catching sight of a shimmer of gold. He stumbles towards a side tunnel and holds the lighter up high. The faint flame catches the letters meekly, nearly one at a time, yet the name is as familiar as the blazing sun.
BAUDELAIRE points them down the tunnel. Violet makes a pained noise next to him as if she has been wounded in some irreversible way. Olaf can only imagine how seeing that proof, the undeniable moniker, must ache. He reaches out, brushes his hand along the small of her back.
"Let's go." He says. There is no time for mourning. They dash down the tunnel which is so long his throat feels raw when that tight spiral staircase comes into view.
"There it is!" Isadora says. Olaf goes first, rubble spraying into his hair, the whole staircase trembling. Large cracks have split the tunnel where the metal rods hold the structure upright. It sways when they ascend like a surfaced submarine.
Even before they reach the trapdoor, Olaf sees the glimmer of typewriter keys and knows there will be trouble.
"Shit." He curses, grabbing at the small paper folded against the platen roller and the paper finger. Without warning, he drops Duncan who hits the small landing platform with an audible clang. Beside him, Isadora shrieks and goes to catch him yet the young man rises on his own, shaking his head. Olaf pays them no mind, instead calls, "Violet, come here." and her name feels addictive on his tongue after so long an absence.
"What is it?" She leaps over Duncan, already peering at the note.
"It's a Vernacularly Fastened Door. A proper one. We have this list of clues and you're the only one that will know them."
In the low light, he can see the nerves on her face, the evident anxiety. Far down, they hear the crack and crash as part of the tunnel collapses completely. A thick spray of dust shoots towards them.
"Okay- First one?"
Olaf shines the light towards the paper and is met again with Bertrand's handwriting. Violet prepares her fingers atop the keys.
"The world's greatest inventor. Nickname of the eldest Baudelaire child." He recites and Violet is instant. He sees those slim fingers working, the snap of a lock sprung free, and then her voice, "Next."
"The next is a quote. The curtain falls just as the knot unties. What is this knot?"
Violet makes a small noise of recognition and her fingers fly across the keyboard. Another click of release from the typewriter. The trapdoor rattles in its frame.
"Hurry!" Isadora cries. Another crash follows and the middle section of the tunnel crumbles, large chunks of rocks falling and scattering against the dusty floor.
Over the noise, dust coating his throat, Olaf calls, "Another knot invented by Finnish female pirates in the 15th century!"
A moment of pause with dust so thick he can no longer see Violet or the typewriter or even the orphans at his feet. But then a large swatch of light beams into the darkness and Violet is hauling her friends upright and shoving them through the trapdoor. Isadora climbs up first, then helps drag Duncan through. Once he is up, she reaches for Violet's hands and, immediately, unquestioningly, Olaf crouches to place his hands beneath her foot and shove her up and through. Only once they are safe, does he allow himself to reach into that gleaming pit of salvation and join them. He places his feet on the edge of the staircase and kicks off, and even as he makes it through, the staircase splits from the wall and clangs to the floor. He drags himself through char and wreckage and once he is through, Violet stomps atop the door, closing it off.
She reaches for his hand and the man rises, pushing against splintered wood and brick and glass. When he stands, he sees the two other orphans have hurried out of the wreckage to stand on the broken remains of the front stoop. Violet looks pale, covered in dust and debris. Her eyes have a haunted look to them. Olaf stands and shakes his head, feels his heart pounding high and sharp in his chest and realizes the glass crunching under his boots are remnants of window panes from the Baudelaire mansion. Above the trapdoor, singed bits of oriental rug show proof of its hiding place.
"This was the library." Violet says. She has not dropped his hand.
It is only then that Olaf can comprehend what he is seeing. Long beams of wood once supporting the home now lie burnt and broken in ragged piles all around. The remains of a grand staircase travel up and curl as if once having led to a large upper floor, then drop off mid-step into only air. All around, enormous piles of a once noble home now gather as silent and tangible as gravestones.
He does not know what to say.
Instead of condolences or heartfelt apologies, he can only focus on the Quagmires, the young boy with vomit on his clothes, and the tunnels rapidly sinking beneath them. He is sure that parts of the city have collapsed. Sure that, somewhere, entire roadways have sunken into the earth.
"Violet." He shakes the hand she holds and some of that haunted look leaves her eyes. "We need to get going. It's not safe. I'm parked a few blocks away."
Violet takes one last look at the ruins of her home, cast grey and smudged by the falling darkness, and nods.
"Right." She says. "Let's go."
They join together silently on the sidewalk and hurry to the car, Olaf leading the way. He walks a considerable distance ahead of them, his collar pulled high, his hands shoved into his pockets. He keeps his distance, keeps alert. Tries to watch for any suspicious person who looks their way too long, while the girls fuss over the limping boy. Olaf finds his car just as he left it- polished dark as coal and perfectly intact.
Violet takes the passenger seat while her friends slump into the back. Olaf resists the urge to say, "Get vomit in my vehicle and I'll throw you back in those tunnels, orphan." He could already imagine the harsh look he'd get from the young woman slumped beside him. The Count keeps his mouth shut.
"To Eliade?" He asks.
"Please." Isadora says. He nods, cranks the heater, and speeds away.
The radio is faint and shot with static as they drive. Olaf notices the orphans relaxing around him, drawing their knees into the seats, leaning their heads against the windows, sighing as deep as any adult faced with an uncomfortable reality.
Several times he glances towards Violet only to find her staring at his right hand which rests in his lap. He wonders what she is looking for- a tattoo, a ring, a smattering of ash? He does not find it in himself to break the heavy silence just to ask. Violet Baudelaire could look at him as much as she wanted. Better this, he thinks, than the calculated avoidance of months past.
When he turns down the alleyway beside Eliade, the two orphans in the back drag themselves into sitting positions and wearily eye the door. He feels the silence in the air that one might feel at funerals or weddings or baptisms- simply that there is too much to say. Silence is settled upon for the comfort of everyone involved.
That is, until a decision must be made.
Olaf parks and kills the engine. Isadora meets his eyes in the rearview mirror and says, "Thank you, Olaf."
He nods, settled on silence.
The Quagmire orphans shift and slide across the seat until they are standing in the alley, the door ajar. Isadora frowns at Violet who has not moved. A familiar frown quirks her mouth.
"Violet," Isadora murmurs, like a mother waking a dozing child. "Are you coming inside?"
"No." She answers immediately. "Go on."
Isadora waits for further explanation. Violet shifts in her seat, stretching her arms high above her head. Olaf fights and fails to keep his eyes from her midriff.
"Go on." Violet repeats, voice stern. "I'll see you later. Get Duncan inside."
Duncan casts her a weakly grateful look, his hand on his stomach, his face pale as the sky. Isadora nods, turns to her brother, and helps him up the steps. Before the door closes behind them, the girls meet eyes once more.
Being around so many women in his youth has left Olaf with the idea that they can communicate fluently with a single look. He sees an understanding pass between them, invisible as a radio wave, yet there all the same. Beside him, Violet nods and Isadora shuts the door.
The man braces himself and disguises his nerves in the fast twist of his keys. His car hums alive and goes quiet. He shifts to look her in the face and sees Violet watching him uncertainly, her eyes hesitant and sad and very tired.
"I wasn't aware we had anything to discuss." Olaf says, breaking the silence.
"Of course we do." Violet says, voice soft. She reaches over and touches the back of his hand lightly. Their skin seems to be a lesson in opposites- his pale, hers black from coal. When she withdraws, four little fingerprints smudge the space behind his knuckles.
He glances to their hands blankly then returns his eyes to hers.
"I'm sure you feel like I've ruined everything. And I don't blame you." Violet says, returning her dirty hands to her lap, her fingers tangled. She picks her fingernails, tries to rub away the ash. A nervous fidgeter without a ribbon. Seeing her fuss has Olaf remembering his gift but he dismisses the thought, pushes it to the back of his mind to focus. He doesn't answer.
"Our first real date went so well. And I really, really like you. And you're ungodly handsome. But when you told me about VFD… I wasn't surprised. I mean, I was about you being involved. But not that it existed. I should have recognized that eye in the cathedral we went to. It's all over Duncan's book. I guess there are a few different ways to draw it, but… I still should've known." Violet trails off, her eyes drifting through the windshield and to the stars just starting to shimmer.
She rolls her head against the seat to return her attention to his hands, as if she wants to touch him again but cannot bring herself to try for fear of rebuff.
"I didn't want to avoid you. That wasn't what I tried to do-"
Olaf snorts and barely resists rolling his eyes like a petulant child.
"No, really." Violet insists. "I just didn't know what to do. If our situations were reversed and some lady you'd been dating told you she was part of the organization that got your parents killed, what would you do?"
Olaf's answer is easy. A grim smirk quirks his mouth.
"Believe it or not, little orphan," He says, voice intentionally calm and low, "I have been in that situation. But, to be fair, I had already known about VFD. Had gone through training and could see through her disguise. We continued dating."
Violet eyes him warily. "But you're not dating now?"
He debates the idea of shrugging and smirking and not answering, hopeful of inciting ravenous jealousy within her. The more he thinks, though, the more he is sure that Violet, always polite, would respect the false relationship and leave him be.
"Wouldn't you like to know?" He teases, but Violet does not smile. Olaf sighs. "No, we aren't. I haven't seen her in years."
Violet glances away. He can tell she is wondering how they went from an explanation of her absence to talk of his failed relationships. Instead of insistent questions on his past lovers as he had expected, Violet looks at him sadly, all big dark eyes and wild eyelashes, her face shadowed in coal and exhaustion. She asks, voice calm as the truth, "And are we not dating now, too?"
The question has riotous indignation and hurt broiling in his chest. "You decided that Violet. I had told you I was hopelessly entranced by you. What was unclear?"
Olaf clenches the steering wheel so tightly his knuckles go white. Part of him wants to tell her to get out, to not speak with him ever again so he can mend his heart in villainous conquests. Another part wants to tell her to shut her mouth and strip her bare right outside of Eliade and not care if she spots the tattoo at his ankle and have his wicked way with her, even as she frets and eyes the door and wishes to say, 'Now is not the time.' Yet another part wants to speed away, Violet cozy in the car, to his apartment to talk and reconnect and laugh as if he has been tamed. He does not know which route to take so Olaf merely sits and bristles and grits his teeth.
Violet frowns at him. Her voice is taut and simmering with low anger and humiliation when she says, "Oh there was nothing unclear about you breaking up with me in the middle of Eliade in front of my friends and whoever else happened to walk by. Unaccustomed to adult relationships of any kind, you said. Really had to rub it in that my parents are dead, didn't you? That was cruel, Olaf. Villainous."
He resists the urge to sigh. Instead, he scowls and pinches the bridge of his nose, willing away an oncoming headache. So much has happened in the small limits of a single day he wonders how much more toil he could endure. More than anything, he feels he does not have the energy to argue. The man wishes he had made a decision. Had kicked her out, or shut her up with his hands and mouth and words that inflamed her in an altogether different manner.
"That's not what I meant-" Orphan sits on his tongue but he bites it back, aware before he says it that this time the moniker would be too vicious. "You are seventeen. You are not yet an adult. That is what I meant-"
His gaze to her is calm when he says, "-simply that you must have been in over your head."
That has Violet closing her mouth before she can spew something foul at him. Instead, her face softens. Her hands fiddle uneasily against her skirt. "Not with you. With you I feel perfectly safe and cherished and… I don't know. Good. I've been in over my head with VFD. When you told me about them, I felt like I needed to avoid you too. To do some research on my own to see what I could find."
To see if you are as dangerous as them, she does not say but they both feel it. Violet sighs, a memory of frustration in it. "But I couldn't find shit. Nothing. All I had was Duncan's book and I've dissected that thing for months."
"That's the thing about secret organizations," Olaf murmurs, unsurprised that her hands had come up empty. "They're secret."
"I've realized." Violet says. A silence blossoms into the car. Olaf wonders where they go from here. Several options present themselves to him at once, and none of them seem particularly smart. Yet, he knows what he must do. He has foisted the responsibility of Violet's education of VFD onto himself and the least he could do was continue it, to allow her to keep herself safe if she could no longer trust him to do so.
"If you wish to be educated about VFD, I assure you I know nearly everything. Learning the codes, the disguises, and all the tricks will help you survive against it. Even if you weren't aware of VFD, you would still be a target simply because of your last name. I could teach you. If you are willing." He offers.
He can feel Violet's gaze roaming the side of his face. Just like with his hands, he is not sure what she searches for. She shifts beside him. When he glances over, he is surprised to see a small blush against her cheeks. The sight leaves him momentarily breathless.
"And my other lessons?" She asks. The question goes straight to the man's head, already replaying their lurid activities. He remembers their very first brush with indecency, Violet bent over before him, blood dripping down her legs, her voice so soft and high. He had repaired another man's foulness against her. He wonders if, this time, he could repair his own.
"If you wish to become romantic with me again, that, of course, I am ever willing to do." He leaves it at that.
Violet does not hesitate. "Of course I do."
Aware she will not be rejected, Violet reaches out and grasps his hand in both of hers. When he meets her eyes, they are open and honest and apologetic. "I'm sorry, Olaf. I really didn't mean to hurt you. Can you forgive me?"
Instead of answering, he leans over and nearly presses their lips together. He watches Violet's eyes flutter closed, watches a vein in her neck spike, watches her lean into where he waits.
"You must make it up to me somehow. We've lost precious time, haven't we?" He mutters. Before she can react, he kisses her fully, a hand coming to tip her chin, to graze her cheek. He kisses her deeply, desperately, as if he could communicate the utter frustration he has felt at not having touched her for many months.
When he pulls away, Violet seems dizzy with relief. Voice small and dreamy, she agrees, "We have."
"Now, Violet," Olaf says, voice stern. The sudden change has some of the dreaminess fading from her soft face and she watches him with curiosity and intrigue. "Lesson One of VFD: Do not linger. I'd say we've pushed the limit of allotted time. Especially with the tunnels collapsing. We can continue this discussion at a later date, when we are both free, in there." He nods to the alleyway door, and deeper, to Eliade. "Or, you can accompany me to my new apartment-" He eyes her dirty hands, her smudged face. "And take a bath."
Violet pretends to think on this, a smile she could not suppress curling the edges of her mouth. She hums to herself. When she glances to him again, her eyes are full of tired happiness. She says, "If there's no bathtub when we get there, I'm leaving."
Olaf laughs. He feels ultimate satisfaction and victory in the snappy way he revs the car and the roguish, wild grin at his lips. He has again won Violet's affections and triumphed over Lemony Snicket's plans. He will have her in his bath and in his bed. He wonders how, suddenly, his night had become so exciting.
"I told you on our very first date, Miss Baudelaire," He purrs, pulling out of the alley and heading straight towards the city and its collection of dazzling lights, "That I am not a liar."
"You did." She agrees, and Olaf can feel her heavy gaze again on the side of his face. Violet looks at him with an expression more sensitive than nerve, as if from the moment her property first caught aflame, or the moments before they had even glanced upon one another, she had been waiting for him and (like a sinner waiting to pass into an afterlife of bliss-) had suffered enough to finally, finally, come home.
"I am, as of half-past four this afternoon, still alive." - Lemony Snicket, The Unauthorized Autobiography.
Hopefully most of you would have been able to unlock our Vernacularly Fastened Door. For those who want to be sure, here are the answers. 1) Ed, after Thomas Edison 2) My Silence Knot, after the poem written by Beatrice Baudelaire 3) The Devil's Tongue, a knot which Violet uses throughout ASOUE.
I know this chapter is insanely long (and I wanted to make it even longer, but had to curb myself) but I wanted to make up for missing last weekend. I was traveling and thought I could handle adding scenes, editing, and posting too. Nope! My apologies. I hope this plotty chapter feels like a little consolation.
Please let me know what you think!