Twelve
In many stories, whenever the characters are going thru a particularly rough set of circumstances such as facing off against a dastardly villain atop an unsafe roof or watching as eagles are called down from above to attack; the author might consider using a phrase that will reassure you and this phrase would be "the worst was over with" and it would mean to tell you that the most dangerous portion the story, the part you had already read was the worst part of the story and so everything past this point would be well worth reading.
The story of the Baudelaires however is not one of these books I have mentioned, because for the children the worst was not over with; even though this might've seemed the case.
After all, several terrible events had already occurred since their arrival at Lake Lachrymose to work as volunteers at the Anxious Clown diner and all of them centered around the Baudelaires' archenemy Mister Dominic who will thankfully not be rudely showing up until a later time when it is convenient for him to do so.
The first had been the brunch that Sunny had witnessed Mister Dominic having with the two malevolent magistrates whom the Baudelaires hadn't seen since their escaping from the inferno that blazed at the Hotel Denouement and had presumed incorrectly that these wicked people had died in that fire.
And then that very night whenever their current guardian, the evil twin of Count Olaf; had instructed them to search for the sugar bowl and Klaus and his sisters had found it yet another horrible event occurred whenever Mister Dominic broke into the diner and smashed this vital piece of evidence into a million pieces.
And then most recently and perhaps worst of all, or so the children thought; they had journeyed to the abandoned Anwhistle Aquatics research station and their adversary had found the dangerous and deadly Medusoid Mycelium and he had successfully taken a sample of it for some future foul deed.
So the children had every right to believe that the worst was over with, especially since now they had met Gustav Sebald and his sister Sally and were one step closer to uncovering some of the vital mysteries pertaining to V.F.D. and their parents and now they were sitting at the bottom step of the flight of stairs in the Lavender Lighthouse and Klaus Baudelaire had just stated that he had solved a coded message that Falo had left for them the night before.
But it is my sad duty to report that the worst was not over for them at all because as deadly and depressing as the events that the children had already dealt with during their stay at Lake Lachrymose; it paled in comparison to what would happen shortly afterward whenever they returned to the Anxious Clown anxiously and lost a friend in a terrible fire.
So for the Baudelaires, the worst was yet to come a phrase which here means "If you have any sense at all about you, then you will realize that the continual reading of the tearful chronicles of Violet, Beatrice, Klaus and Sunny will only result in bitter tears and hair loss and quite possibly incarceration at a mental hospital" so I heartily encourage you to cease in your perusal of this book, perhaps in the vain hope of finding a coded message and put it back on the shelf where you might have found it on if someone carelessly thought it was actually something worth reading and step as far away as possible from this volume detailing another unfortunate event that the orphans would have to deal with and go to some other portion of the store, perhaps where ottomans are sold.
"What does the note say, Klaus?" Violet asked her brother as she sat down alongside him and he first read it out loud to them and stated,
"'Khildren, Iit has come to my attenntion thate everyeone here at thee Anxious Clown ddiner is out toy get us and I hoope that you uunderstand my decision to jolt from the toown of Lakea Lachrrymosed had nothing lo doh withe my desire tto be rregarded aas your guardiann, Falo,'"
Klaus seemed to be smiling from ear to ear as he turned to his sisters and commented, "Can't you see, it's as plain as the nose on my face."
Klaus used an expression here that is not very plain and also in my opinion is rather overused, so I will not take the time to explain it here or now and will instead mention that Violet stated, "It seems to tell us that he chose to get out of town while the getting was good."
"And abandoned us," Sunny added. "But of course that might seem to be the case, if you look at it the first time," Klaus explained as he frowned, surprised that his siblings didn't understand and stating, "Didn't you notice how many things were misspelled?"
"Now you are starting to sound like Aunt Josephine," Violet said with a smirk, to which her brother replied, "Exactly! This is just like the suicide note that Aunt Josephine left for us at the Wide Window so long ago. I believe that Falo purposely misspelled those words."
"Or he is very illiterate," Sunny pointed out.
"Dr. Sebald did mention that the note was in some type of code," Violet conceded and then turned to Klaus and asked, "How did you manage to break the code?"
"It wasn't easy, I admit," their well-read brother said and then pointed out three words in the note their guardian had hastily created and remarked, "These three words were the key to me unlocking the rest of the message."
"Khildren should be Children and Jolt should be bolt and lo should be to," Violet replied as she skimmed over those words, to which Klaus replied, "Khildren, or rather children; is the only one that doesn't fit in with what I believe is the message that Falo was trying to give us."
"What message do you believe that might be, Klaus?" Sunny wondered.
"Give me a few moments and I try to find out," he suggested. "We may not have that much time," Violet reminded him and added, "Mister Dominic is already on the run with the Medusoid Mycelium and we have to find out where he went to!" "I'm sorry, Violet; but I can only work so fast," Klaus answered as he carefully studied the note that their current guardian had left for them and began to underline what he felt was the coded message until at last he saw satisfied and showed it to his sisters; and the note now looked like this,
"'Khildren, Iit has come to my attenntion thate everyeone here at the Anxious Clown ddiner is out toy get us and I hoope that you uunderstand my decision to jolt from the toown of Lakea Lachrrymosed had nothing lo doh withe my desire tto be rregarded aas your guardiiann, Falo,'"
and now that he had successfully cracked the code, Klaus seemed rather confused by the message that he had apparently received. "What does it say, Klaus?"
"If I'm correct in my attempts to unlock it, Falo is telling 'I need you to board the train'," the middle Baudelaire replied; to which Sunny and Violet looked at each other in confusion and the eldest Baudelaire remarked, "But why would he want us to do that?"
"And what train is he talking about?" Sunny wondered. "And why do we need to board it?" Klaus thought aloud as he gazed down at the note that Falo had left them and then added, "But if I follow the pattern set here in this message; then that is precisely what Falo is telling us that we need to do."
"But I don't know of any trains around here," Violet remarked.
"And I don't know why we would have to board one," Sunny stated.
"Count Olaf's evil twin must have some reason that he is instructing us to do this, otherwise he wouldn't have left this note for us," Klaus said.
Just then they heard a car approaching and the children realized that Gustav Sebald had returned.
He carried with him several large volumes or books and walked inside the Lavender Lighthouse and placed them on the table in front of the children. The scraggily bearded man looked at the four children and said, "I think the best book I can use to crack this code would be my copy of Vocabulary Falsification Directory by the late I. Anwhistle and it will help me to determine just what message that Falo wanted to tell us."
Gustav opened the book and as he did, Klaus said, "I think I might have solved the code already."
"Nonsense, you are only a child after all and don't understand these codes as well as I do," Gustav said as he took the note from Sunny's hand and began to study it.
"But there are several clues that helped me to figure out how to break it," Klaus objected, wishing that older people wouldn't always treat him like a child especially he was now almost sixteen years of age and had only recently been having a growth spurt. So whenever Gustav Sebald referred to the middle orphan as a mere child, Klaus felt quite offended.
But apparently their new friend was too engrossed in studying the note to even give Klaus a nod and so the teenager sat down alongside Beatrice, Violet and Sunny and tried his hardest not to be angry or antsy with their new friend, a word which here means "Klaus Baudelaire wanted to remind Gustav that they were on a tight schedule and that the adult needed to trust him when it came to the message that Falo had left for them" but resisted this urge and waited patiently until Gustav turned to the children and stated, "I do believe I have determined what Falo was trying to tell us."
Violet, Sunny and Beatrice all turned to their brother and wondered his guess had been correct and Gustav stated, "He needs for you children to board a train."
Klaus smiled slightly and decided not to reveal that he had already guessed this; but both he and his siblings seemed proud of this fact even though they were the only ones that knew it.
"Falo must've left before Sally woke up this morning," Violet concluded.
"Which reminds me, we still need to find your sister," Sunny said to their new friend.
"Quite right, I suppose the best thing to do would be to head to the diner. Sally is probably there," Gustav Sebald explained. "Falo's note makes little sense to us. Does it make any at all to you?" Violet wondered as they got into the back seat of the doctor's car again and he explained, "I believe the reason that he wrote it in code is because he felt that Mister Dominic and your other enemies were close by, just as I chose to use Sebald Code. Although I didn't know at the time that you weren't aware of this code, Falo must've felt you were familiar with the method he used."
"Our Aunt Josephine used it ages ago when Count Olaf was pretending to be Captain Sham so he could woo her and seize our fortune," Klaus recalled.
"Well then, you should've been able to solve that code rather simply then," Gustav noted with a raised eyebrow and none of the children had the courage to point out that they'd said they did so and they remained quiet as their new companion drove thru the town of Lake Lachrymose toward the Anxious Clown.
At the beginning of this chapter, I pointed out to you that for the Baudelaires; the worst was yet to come and although these two chapters would be considerably shorter than the others the events within them would be just as troublesome and dire as though they took many more pages to describe.
I am reminding you of this yet again before Klaus, Sunny, Violet and Beatrice arrive at the Anxious Clown diner because I do not want you to believe that simply because the children had decoded Falo's message to them, their luck had turned around but to insist that the worst was yet to come for the Baudelaires; not just in this story but in every story relating to them in the future or in the past or just mentioned briefly in passing.
And since you know that the worst isn't over for the orphans but rather it is about to come, then you should stop reading this story altogether and presume just as a companion of mine once did that nothing whatsoever would happen whenever she returned to the Royal Gardens and yet found them to be nothing more than a dirt mound and she presumed incorrectly just as you have done that the worst was over and that maybe things would improve; but sadly they did not for anyone connected to that awful event and the other terrible events connected to it or my quest for answers in the mystery that is life.
It would be far wiser for you to presume that the worst was yet to come and it would be wise for you to do so for as their driver turned onto Sour Street; he remarked, "The lights to the Anxious Clown appear to be brighter than usual today."
But as they approached, everyone in the car immediately realized that it wasn't the neon lights of the diner that were so bright; but rather what was engulfing the establishment. The car came to a stop and Gustav looked in disbelief as did the children, for the entire structure was covered in flames and the scraggily bearded man stepped out of the car and looked at what had happened to the establishment and then came to another dangerous and deadly revelation and it became abundantly clear how the worst was yet to come for the children as Gustav Sebald exclaimed,
"I think Sally is inside! Children, we've got to rescue her!" And that is why, dear reader; that the worst was yet to come.
P.s. Beatrice, I need you to leave where you are and go where I am.
The worst is the last for the Baudelaires! stay tuned for the shocking finale! read and review please!