The Grim Grotto

suffering under the poison of the Medusoid Mycelium, they should have been looking at the submarine's sonar detector, or out of the porthole over the table, which looked out into the dark depths of the cave.

On the green panel was the glowing Q, representing the Queequeg, but this was another thing in the world that was difficult to see, because another glowing green symbol was occupying the very same space. And outside the porthole was a mass of small metal tubes, circling in the gloomy water and making thousands and thousands of bubbles, and in the middle of all those tubes was a large, open space, like a gigantic hungry mouth – the mouth of an octopus, about to devour the Queequeg and all its remaining crew. The image on the sonar detector, of course, was an eye, and the view from the porthole was of a submarine, but either way the children knew it was Count Olaf, and that made things much, much worse indeed.

Chapter Nine

If you are considering a life of villainy – and I certainly hope that you are not – there are a few things that appear to be necessary to every villain 's success. One thing is a villainous disregard for other people, so that a villain may talk to his or her victims impolitely, ignore their pleas for mercy, and even behave violently toward them if the villain is in the mood of thing. Another thing villains require is a villainous imagination, so that they might spend their free time dreaming up treacherous schemes in order to further their villainous careers. Villains require a small group of villainous cohorts, who can be persuaded to serve the villain in a henchpersonal capacity. And villains need to develop a villainous laugh, so that they may simultaneously celebrate their villainous deeds and frighten whatever nonvillainous people happen to be nearby. A successful villain should have all of these things at his or her villainous fingertips, or else give up villainy altogether and try to lead a life of decency, integrity, and kindness, which is much more challenging and noble, if not always quite as exciting.

Count Olaf, of course, was an excellent villain, a phrase which here means 'someone particularly skilled at villainy' rather than 'a villain with several desirable qualities,' and the Baudelaire orphans had known this soon after that terrible day at Briny Beach, when the children learned of the terrible fire that began so many of the unfortunate events in their lives. But as the Queequeg tumbled into the mouth of his dreadful octopus submarine, it seemed to the orphans that the villain had become even more villainous during his brief absence from their lives.

Olaf had proven his villainous disregard for other people over and over, from his vicious murder of the children's guardians to his affinity for arson, a phrase which here means 'enthusiasm for burning down buildings, no matter how many people were inside,' but the children realized that Olaf's disregard had become even more dreadful, as the Queequeg passed through the gaping mouth and was roughly tossed from side to side in a mechanical imitation of swallowing, forcing Violet and Klaus – and Fiona, too, of course – to hang on for dear life as the Main Hall rolled this way and that, spinning Sunny in her helmet like a watermelon in a washing machine.

The count had displayed his villainous imagination on a number of occasions, from his dastardly schemes to steal the Baudelaire fortune to his nefarious plots to kidnap Duncan and Isadora Quagmire, but the siblings gazed out of the porthole and saw that Olaf's infernal imagination had run utterly wild in decorating this terrible submarine, for the Queequeg rolled along a rumbling tunnel that was almost as dark and threatening as the Gorgonian Grotto, with every inch of its metallic walls covered in eerie glowing eyes.

The count always had an assortment of cohorts, from his original theatrical troupe – many of whom were no longer with him – to some former employees of Caligari Carnival, but the orphans saw that he had lured many others to join him when the tunnel rounded a corner and the elder Baudelaires had a brief glimpse of an enormous room full of people rowing long, metal oars, activating the terrible metal arms of the octopus. And, perhaps worst of all, when the Queequeg finally came to a shuddering stop and Violet and Klaus looked out of the porthole, they learned that the villain had clearly been rehearsing his villainous laugh until it was extra wicked and more theatrical than ever.

Count Olaf was standing on a small, metal platform with a triumphant grin on his face, dressed in a familiar suit made of slippery-looking material, but with a portrait of another author whom only a very devoted reader would recognize, and when he peered through the porthole and spied the frightened children, he opened his mouth and began his new villainous laugh, which included new wheezes, bonus snarls, and an assortment of strange syllables the Baudelaires had never heard.

'Ha ha ha heepa-heepa ho!' he cried. 'Tee hee tort tort tort! Hot cha ha ha! Sniggle hee! Ha, if I do say so myself!'

With a boastful gesture, he hopped off the platform, drew a long, sharp sword, and quickly traced a circle on the glass of the porthole. Violet and Klaus covered their ears as the sword shrieked its way around the window. Then, with one flick of his sword, Olaf sent the glass circle tumbling into the Main Hall, where it lay unbroken on the floor, and leaped through the porthole onto the large, wooden table to laugh at them further.

'I'm splitting my sides!' he cried. 'I'm rolling in the aisles! I'm nauseous with mirth! I'm rattling with glee! I'm seriously considering compiling a joke book from all of the hilarious things bouncing around my brain! Hup hup ha ha hammy hee hee!'

Violet dashed forward and grabbed the helmet in which Sunny was still curled, so Olaf would not kick it as he pranced triumphantly on top of the table. She could not bear to think of her sister, who was inhaling the poison of the Medusoid Mycelium as Olaf wasted precious minutes performing his tiresome new laugh.

'Stop laughing, Count Olaf,' she said. ''There's nothing funny about villainy.'

'Sure there is!' Olaf crowed. 'Ha ha hat rack! Just think of it! I made my way down the mountain and found pieces of your toboggan scattered all over some very sharp rocks! Tee hee torpid sniggle! I thought you had drowned in the Stricken Stream and were swimming with all those coughing fishes! Ho ho hagfish! I was brokenhearted!'

'You weren't brokenhearted,' Klaus said. 'You've tried to destroy us plenty of times.'

'That's why I was brokenhearted!' Olaf cried. 'Ho ho sniggle! I personally planned to slaughter you Baudelaires myself, after I had your fortune of course, and pry the sugar bowl out of your dead fingers or toes!'

Violet and Klaus looked at one another hurriedly. They had almost forgotten telling Olaf that they knew the location of the sugar bowl, even though they of course had no idea of its whereabouts.

'To cheer myself up,' the villain continued, 'I met my associates at the Hotel Denouement, where they where they were cooking up a little scheme of their own, and convinced them to lend me a handful of our new recruits.'

The elder Baudelaires knew that the associates were the man with a beard and no hair, and the woman with hair but no beard, two people so sinister that even Olaf seemed to find them a bit frightening, and that the new recruits were a group of Snow Scouts that these villains had recently kidnapped.

'Tee hee turncoat! Thanks to their generosity, I was able to get this submarine working again! Sniggle ha ho ho! Of course, I need to be back at the Hotel Denouement before Thursday, but in the meantime I had a few days to kill, so I thought I'd kill some of my old enemies! Tee hee halbert sniggle! So I began roaming around the sea, looking for Captain Widdershins and his idiotic submarine on my sonar detector! Tee hee telotaxis! But now that I've captured the Queequeg, I find you Baudelaires aboard! It's hilarious! It's humorous! It's droll! It's relatively amusing!'

'How dare you capture this submarine!' Fiona cried. 'I'm the captain of the Queequeg, and I demand that you return us to the sea at once! Aye!'

Count Olaf peered down at the mycologist. 'Aye?' he repeated. 'You must be Fiona, that little fungus freak! Why, you're all grown up! The last time I saw you I was trying to throw thumbtacks into your cradle! Ha ha hot polloi! What happened to Widdershins? Why isn't he the captain?'

'My stepfather is not around at the moment,' Fiona replied, blinking behind her triangular glasses.

'Hee hee terry cloth!' Count Olaf said. 'Your stepfather has abandoned you, eh? Well, I suppose it was only a