The world was never quiet
Lie 12 : I forced them to help me
The Snicket's fires file. The Snicket's fires file. Alongside the sugar bowl, I think it's the worst Macguffin of the whole Macguffin's history and believe me, there are a lot of them in VFD. The whole organization elbowed their way to both of them, and I'm not even sure they knew what they meant.
Well, I may be exaggerating regarding the Snicket file. Everyone more or less knew it was aimed at the Arsonists and gathered every evidence linking them to various fires that occurred lately, lately meaning since the begging of the decade or so. You'll probably be surprised to hear that I have never been formally blamed for the 667 Dark Avenue's fire – for my father's murder, but not for the fire, so that my name wasn't in the file, kudos to the Snicket siblings.
Why am I speaking of that now? Because I was with the Baudelaire when I discovered its existence. Jacques never had the opportunity to tell me about it, neither did Lemony and I can't see anyone else telling me anything about it. But really, given the importance of the file, I wouldn't have told myself. Just for safety, even though I still protected the sugar bowl and no one knew where it was hidden.
But anyway. I found the Baudelaire in the Library of Records – I went there pretending I needed a patient file because I knew that the librarian, Hal, was a Volunteer and I wanted to destroy any proves Olaf could have had against me regarding Jacques' murders. Not very noble, right? But the fact remains that I'd recognized the Baudelaire straight away and vice-versa, a proof if you need one that absolutely no one even tried to find me.
And there I was, in the middle of the night, going through the records to find a file that would mention their name. Hal told them he'd seen their name in the infamous Snicket file, and that's what they were looking for. Me? Well, me too obviously. I was almost sure to find something to cover my back in this damned file, back then. I was going through the files between Immelman and Incisor when I heard Klaus gasping.
He was holding a photo that escaped from the now empty Snicket file. And the picture, as far as I remember, represented four people in front of the late 667 Dark Avenue. My heart tightened immediately when I recognized the first of these persons. Jacques, staring at the photographer right in the eyes, a large smile on his lips – a smile I had never seen. Nearby, a man was turning away from the lens. His face wasn't visible but I recognized him. I had met him a few days before. Lemony. I forbid myself from touching the glazed paper, fearing the Baudelaire would understand something they shouldn't, and I looked at the two others. Their parents, Beatrice and Bertrand Baudelaire, visibly frozen but happy to be there. If the picture was my main interest, the children stared at the caption written underneath. "Because of the evidence discussed on page nine, experts now suspect that there may in fact be one survivor of the fire, but the survivor's whereabouts are unknown." When I read it, I raised my eyes and shook my head. I knew who this survivor was. Quigley Quagmire, even if I had no idea where he was.
"Baudelaire children," I begun. "The survivor is not…
- Isn't it a pleasant surprise!" a voice I hated and recognized interrupted me. Esme. "You recognize me, obviously? Esme Gigi Geniveve Squalor, happy to see you again… All of you."
Instead of looking at the orphans as she was, I guess, supposed to do, she was staring at me. Until then, I only told you the horrible things I did, I only showed you my less noble side – I think it's time to announce that I still had, at this point, a few nobility left. But it was only devoted to the Baudelaire, don't imagine anything. If they'd been others orphans, I wouldn't probably had the same urge to help them.
I walked to her, all smiles, under their dumbfounded eyes and took her in my arms. She allowed it, mostly because she wasn't expecting it. She was tensed, though. When I stepped back, I tilted my head in the perfect imitation of a hypocritical friend. She was more talented than me in this domain.
"Esme, my dear, it's been too long! What are you doing here?
- I return the question, Andrea." Oh, yeah, well, she didn't know about me and my make-up looked like Andrea's. Oops. "What are you doing with the Baudelaire?
- Oh, those kids. They had the Library's keys and I was searching for the Snicket file. It's around since too much time for my taste, so I forced them to help me.
- Obviously, that's why Jacques Snicket died."
I rolled my eyes and stopped myself from punching her stupid face. I just smiled, unmoved. They looked a bit unsettled – and for good reason. Olaf probably told her I wasn't part of his troop anymore, some way or another. The fact that he didn't say anything about my identity surprised me though, and still does today. Maybe he wanted to play by the rules, but I have hard time believing that. Maybe he just forgot.
Anyway. I gestured the Baudelaire to start to move behind my back. Those noble idiots didn't, but they were right on this. Esme wasn't angry enough to stop caring about them. Oh, just a personal insight here. If someone tells you a woman's best weapons are her tears, it's not true. At all. A woman's best weapon is the jealousy she can instil in other women's hearts.
"How are you? Last time I saw Olaf you weren't there, so…
- Last time you saw Olaf?" She almost jumped. See? "When was it?
- I don't know, I don't think you were around. He probably made the most of a few hours of freedom.
- What are you implying?
- Me?" I cried innocently. "But nothing of course, dear Esme. I just wonder how you're doing since the last we saw each other… A while ago."
She shivered. I could see flames dancing in her eyes. If she'd had a weapon, I think I would have died but thank god, she didn't have any. But I did feel her nails in my arm's flesh, thanks to my gown for stopping her from skewering me. I smiled a bit more and she started to boil. And I gestured the Baudelaire to leave.
And they did. Slowly. They walked to the door while Esme, overwhelmed with anger and jealousy, didn't see anything but my smile and arrogance. Love? No, not love. Esme and Olaf didn't love each other – at least, Olaf didn't love her. The only person Olaf loved wasn't around and she would eventually wouldn't be at all. It was possession, some twisted sort of admiration mixed with vice, cruelty and sadism. Charming, I know.
No, love in VFD whatever the side of the Schism is the worst idea you could ever have. Love is the assurance of pain at some point. Love is always a tragedy – even if we always think that, this time, for us, it'll be fine. Hahahahahaha. No. Look at my parents; it ended up in a quasi-literal blood bath. Look at Lemony and Beatrice. Jacques and I. Kit and Olaf, shit, if that's not a striking example I don't know what you need! I have others examples but it's depressing enough. I don't need to add anything.
Anyway. I grabbed her shoulder and remembered the knife in my pocket. Getting rid of her at this point would have made my life way easier, but I couldn't help thinking about the Baudelaire. I hoped she was alone, that no one was waiting for her outside. I was deluded, I know.
"Esme, Esme… Are we jealous?" My voice, originally sweet, turned cruel. Yeah, I was talented in this kind of things, since Jacques. "Are we scared that a younger and more beautiful woman would steal our Olaf?
- I am his fiancée. Not you!
- You have the title, I suppose. Does he even know?
- You little…"
The slap was painful. My cheek still remembers. But I think hers still remember my knife's blade – she still had the scar the last I saw her. She jumped back and stared at me with a mix of anger, surprise and a bit of fear. And her expression turned bitter and cruel. I laughed and tightened my grip on my knife. Still Olaf's but anyway.
I was going to attack her but a huge bang echoed from the other side of the room. That's when she realized the Baudelaire were running away – and that's the moment when my plan failed. We heard screams and locker knocked down. I think we were both too surprise to react right away, we were too busy trying to understand. That's only when we heard one of Olaf's henchmen screaming that he had one that we started to run. She was running in her colleague's direction and so was I, hoping I would prevent him from taking the orphan he'd grabbed. Violet, in this case. The others managed to sneak into an airway. When I reached the man that neither looked like a man or a woman, I stopped. He held a knife under the girl's throat.
"Ha you're not so clever now," Esme groaned, walking past her colleague and running a nail on the poor girl's cheek. "Well tried, but I have no reason to be jealous of a failure like you.
- You were rather convincing though.
- I'm an excellent actress.
- I won't repeat it, Esme, let her go.
- Or what? You'll attack us with your tiny knife?"
Don't laugh, I did attack. I dashed on the man-not-so-manly-but-no-so-feminine-either he was so surprised he had a start and released Violet who tried to run away. But I didn't manage to save her – I told you, it was a lie since the beginning. I only managed to gravely, perhaps grievously, harm the henchman (or woman) while Esme took the Baudelaire orphan god knows where.
But my victim struggled and fought back. I gasped in pain when I felt his knife cutting my stomach and only had time to jump back to stop him from disembowelling me. I chose to ignore the blood slowly soaking Lemony' shirt and gown – sorry again, and its heat and I dashed on the nearest locker. Everything around it had already collapsed, so I managed to knock it down on my opponent. He couldn't move fast enough. That happens, when you were just stabbed in the chest.
I don't know if I killed him or if he died later, but all I knew was that I had an open wound that was bleeding was looked like litres and litres of blood. In my state, I couldn't help the Baudelaire. I couldn't even help myself. My hand pressed on my stomach, I managed to get out of the Library of Records, and then of the Hospital. I'll find you before you even think of me, Lemony'd said. So I staggered out of the building and walked randomly in the dark streets that surrounded the hospital.
I have a rather complex history with the Snicket family, but one thing is certain and common to all of them: they had the gift of finding me almost dead and fixing me. Kit never had time to do it, though, so let's just say the two brothers had this gift. Because at the precise moment when my head started to spin from pain and dizziness and just when I thought I would fall head first on the concrete, I felt two arms grabbing me by the shoulders, shifted me and taking me to a car. If it'd been foe's arms, I would have died given how I just gave up on struggling. But it was Lemony's arms. Obviously.
"Would you mind telling me what happened?" he said, lying me on the back seats and opening without any comment my gown and shirt. "I thought you wanted to find the Baudelaire.
- That's what I did. I didn't think I would find Esme Squalor and… HA!"
He'd touched my wound. I whined and closed my eyes. After my shoulder, I had managed not to be wounded, at least visibly. I will never get used to this kind of stabbing pain. Lemony went through his stuff and grabbed my hand. Nothing romantic, really : he didn't have anything to anesthetize me and I wasn't supposed to scream like a gutted pig. He'd rather have me bit to death the piece of fabric he'd put in my hand. I shook my head, trying to convince him not to do that, but he didn't even look at me.
He didn't say anything. He didn't comment while he cleaned and sewed my wound. I, on the other hand, made plenty of them. I thought I'd broken my jaw and all my teeth. I screamed all the same, but the fabric prevented it from echoing outside the car. I think I also tore the one that covered the seats by dint of stabbing it with my nails. It wasn't only tears on my cheeks, it was an actual stream. Even the knife in my shoulder hurt less – I had lost consciousness, and when I woke up, my wound was already tended.
When it was finally over, he stuffed everything he used in a bag, all the pads, gauzes and bandages, and sat near my feet, still silent. I was struggling not to lose consciousness. Strangely enough, I was sure I wouldn't wake up before long if I ever let myself slip away. God, I wanted to.
"Talk to me," I ordered him. "I must stay awake. Say something, anything.
- You're going to talk. What happened?
- I was looking for your fucking smile in the Records with the Baudelaire and…
- My file?" He turned his head. "The Snicket file?
- Yes, the Snicket file! They were certain they would find explanations, and I wanted to get rid of Jacques' murder's proves.
- Noble.
- Shut up."
And this idiot did so. He shut up. And I felt myself slipping. If I'd had the choice, I would have never spoken to him again before long. But I didn't have the choice. I needed to stay alive until the next evening to release Violet from this nightmare. Well, for that I would need something to keep me alive but, how convenient, I had stolen some interestingly-looking drugs before I went to the Records. My pockets were full of them.
"I told you to speak.
- But then you told me to shut up. Make your decision.
- You…" I refrained myself from insulting him. He'd just saved my life, after all. "I tried to attack one of Olaf's henchmen. I got him, I think, but he fought back and…
- You got him?
- If you're thinking about blaming me for murdering people, know that my father and your brother already did it."
He stared at me. Even in the night, I could feel his gaze's weight on my shoulder. I sighed and took my gown. I had retrieved a syringe with a product that was supposed to keep me awake – or something like that. I grabbed it, tore the packaging and watched it. Lemony took it from me before I even had the time to take the cap off. A Snicket's thing I suppose.
"What is this?
- If I want to wake up tomorrow morning, I need that.
- Do you even know what it exactly is?
- No." Lying was pointless. "Make yourself useful and inject me with this. Let's get this over with.
- You'll collapse once this wears out.
- And you'll be there to grab me. Inject me."
He would've refused if I hadn't been so persistent. He told me a week or so ago that he would have never injected anyone with an unknown product, even a total stranger, and that he would have largely hesitated to do it to an infamous enemy. But I wasn't offering him any choice; if he didn't do it, I would. And probably terribly.
He looked at the syringe and sighed. He took off the cap and checked there was no bubble inside. He crawled between the front seats and me to be able to reach my carotid. I granted him access to my neck, keeping an eye on him. Trust does not preclude control, and lack of trust entails control – I suppose? He took away what remained of my soaked shirt. Looking back, I realize how the situation could be confused with a sappy romantic movie, given that Lemony essentially denuded me at the back of his taxi, if you forget about the open wound, the flesh sewing and the syringe full of a powerful drug. I winced when I felt the needle in my neck.
"If you die, it won't be my fault.
- No, it would be thanks to you," I groaned, taking a deep breath. "VFD will probably commend you for this.
- If VFD ever thanks me for anything, then the world stopped turning.
- It already stopped."
I don't know why I said that. I don't know why I was so brutally honest – no wonder why he didn't say anything, the poor man was uncomfortable and it was perfectly understandable. He finally sat at the front and we talked. And we talked again. About stupid things, music mainly. He told me about Duke Ellington, the jazzman, at length. Do you have any history with this guy or do you just talk about the same man for ages for no reason, I asked him when he eventually stopped. He smiled absentmindedly. The same story you have with pianos, he replied. I didn't insist and we gave up on music until sunrise. I stayed lying for a while, but the drug worked. I could sit, then stand up even if my stitches hurt each and every times I dared to move a bit too abruptly. I had to find Violet, move her to safety and make sure Olaf didn't get the Snicket file.
And all that while the only thing that kept me alive worked, of course.