The Slippery Slope

me a basket of strawberries right now, I'm going to poke you with this large stick.' But when the two elder Baudelaires and Quigley Quagmire opened the refrigerator, they found nothing that would help someone who was wounded, dying of thirst, or being threatened by a strawberry-crazed, stick-carrying maniac or anything that looked important at all. The fridge was mostly empty, with just a few of the usual things people keep in their refrigerators and rarely use, including a jar of mustard, a container of olives, three jars of different kinds of jam, a bottle of lemon juice, and one lonely pickle in a small glass jug.

'There's nothing here,' Violet said.

'Look in the crisper,' Quigley said, pointing to a drawer in the refrigerator traditionally used for storing fruits and vegetables. Klaus opened the drawer and pulled out a few strands of a green plant with tiny, skinny leaves.

'It smells like dill,' Klaus said, 'and it's quite crisp, as if it were picked yesterday.'

'Very Fresh Dill,' Quigley said.

'Another mystery,' Violet said, and tears filled her eyes. 'We have nothing but mysteries. We don't know where Sunny is. We don't know where Count Olaf is. We don't know who's signaling to us at the top of the waterfall, or what they're trying to say, and now here's a mysterious message in a mysterious ode in a mysterious refrigerator, and a bunch of mysterious herbs in the crisper. I'm tired of mysteries. I want someone to help us.'

'We can help each other,' Klaus said. 'We have your inventions, and Quigley's maps, and my research.'

'And we're all very well-read,' Quigley said. 'That should be enough to solve any mystery.'

Violet sighed, and kicked at something that lay on the ashen ground. It was the small shell of a pistachio nut, blackened from the fire that destroyed the headquarters. 'It's like we're members of V.F.D. already,' she said. 'We're sending signals, and breaking codes, and finding secrets in the ruins of a fire.'

'Do you think our parents would be proud of us,' Klaus asked, 'for following in their footsteps?'

'I don't know,' Violet said. 'After all, they kept V.F.D. a secret.'

'Maybe they were going to tell us later,' Klaus said.

'Or maybe they hoped we would never find out,' Violet said.

'I keep wondering the same thing,' Quigley said. 'If I could travel back in time to the moment my mother showed me the secret passageway under the library, I would ask her why she was keeping these secrets.'

'That's one more mystery,' Violet said sadly, and looked up at the slippery slope. It was getting later and later in the afternoon, and the frozen waterfall looked less and less shiny in the fading sunlight, as if time were running out to climb to the top and see who had been signaling to them. 'We should each investigate the mystery we're most likely to solve,' she said. 'I'll climb up the waterfall, and solve the mystery of the Verdant Flammable Device by learning who's up there, and what they want. You should stay down here, Klaus, and solve the mystery of the Verbal Fridge Dialogue, by learning the code and discovering what the message is.'

'And I'll help you both,' Quigley said, taking out his purple notebook. 'I'll leave my commonplace book with Klaus, in case it's any help with the codes. And I'll climb up the waterfall with you, Violet, in case you need my help.'

'Are you sure?' Violet asked. 'You've already taken us this far, Quigley. You don't have to risk your life any further.'

'We'll understand,' Klaus said, 'if you want to leave and search for your siblings.'

'Don't be absurd,' Quigley said. 'We're all part of this mystery, whatever it is. Of course I'm going to help you.'

The two Baudelaires looked at one another and smiled. It is so rare in this world to meet a trustworthy person who truly wants to help you, and finding such a person can make you feel warm and safe, even if you are in the middle of a windy valley high up in the mountains. For a moment, as their friend smiled back at them, it seemed as if all the mysteries had been solved already, even with Sunny still separated from them, and Count Olaf still at large, and the abandoned V.F.D. headquarters still in ashes around them. Just knowing that they had found a person like Quigley Quagmire made Violet and Klaus feel as if every code made sense, and every signal was clear.

Violet stepped forward, her fork-assisted climbing shoes making small, determined noises on the ground, and took Quigley's hand. 'Thank you,' she said, 'for volunteering.'

Chapter Ten

Violet and Quigley walked carefully across the frozen pool until they reached the bottom of the waterfall. 'Good luck!' Klaus called, from the archway of the ruined library. He was polishing his glasses, as he often did before embarking on serious research.

'Good luck to you!' Violet replied, shouting over the rush of the mountain winds, and as she looked back at her brother, she remembered when the two siblings were trying to stop the caravan as it hurtled down the mountain. Klaus had wanted to say something to her, in case the drag chute and the mixture of sticky substances hadn't worked. Violet had the same feeling now as she prepared to climb the frozen waterfall and leave her brother behind at the ashy remains of the V.F.D. headquarters. 'Klaus —' she said.

Klaus put his glasses on and gave his sister his bravest smile. 'Whatever you're thinking of saying,' he said, 'say it when you return.'

Violet nodded, and tapped the candelabra against a spot on the ice. She heard a deep thunk! as if she were tapping something very solid. 'We'll start here,' she said to Quigley. 'Brace yourself.'

The expression 'brace yourself,' as I'm sure you know, does not mean to take some metal wiring and rivets and other orthodontic materials and apply them to your own teeth in order straighten them. The expression simply means 'get ready for something that will probably be difficult,'and it was indeed very difficult to climb a frozen waterfall in the middle of a windswept valley with nothing but a candelabra and a few well-placed forks to aid the two children in their climb. It took a few moments for Violet and Quigley to work her invention properly, and push the forks into the ice just far enough to hold them there, but not so far that they would be permanently stuck, and once both of them were in position, Violet had to reach up as far as she could and tap the candelabra on the ice above them to find the next solid place to climb. For the first few steps, it seemed like ascending the icy slope in this manner would be impossible, but as time went on, and the two volunteers grew more and more skillful with the fork-tipped climbing shoes and the candelabra ice-tester, it became clear that once again Violet's inventing skills would carry the day, a phrase which here means 'enable Violet Baudelaire and Quigley Quagmire to climb up a frozen waterfall after bracing themselves for the difficult journey.'

'Your invention is working,' Quigley called up to Violet. 'These fork-assisted climbing shoes are marvelous.'

'They do seem to be working,' Violet agreed, 'but let's not celebrate just yet. We have a long way to go.'

'My sister wrote a couplet about that very thing,' Quigley said, and recited Isadora's poem:

'Celebrate when you're half-done, And the finish won't be half as fun.'

Violet smiled, and reached up to test the ice above her. 'Isadora is a good poet,' Violet said, 'and her poems have come in handy more than once. When we were at the Village of Fowl Devotees, she led us to her location by hiding a secret message in a series of couplets.'

'I wonder if that's a code she learned from V.F.D.,' Quigley said, 'or if she made it up herself.'

'I don't know,' Violet said thoughtfully. 'She and Duncan were the first to tell us about V.F.D., but it never occurred to me that they might already be members. When I think about it, however, the code she used was similar to one that our Aunt Josephine used. They both hid a secret location within a note, and waited for us to discover the hidden message. Maybe they were all volunteers.' She removed her left fork-assisted climbing shoe from the ice, and kicked it back in a few inches up to further her climb. 'Maybe all our guardians have been members of V.F.D., on one side or the other of the schism.'

'It's hard to believe,' Quigley said, 'that we've always been surrounded by people carrying out secret errands, and never known it.'