The Grim Grotto

by Lemony Snicket

  The elder Baudelaires looked, although it took them a few moments to realize what Sunny was talking about, as they could not see what direction their sister was pointing. But in a moment they saw two small lights, a short distance from where the volunteers were crawling. Hesitantly, they stood up – except for Sunny, who remained curled up in her helmet – and saw that the lights were coming from a place many lights come from: lamps.

  A short distance away, standing against the wall, were three floorlamps, each with a letter on its shade. The first lamp had a large V, and the second had an F. The third floorlamp had burnt out, and it was too dim to read the shade, but the children knew, of course, that it must have had a D.

  "What is this place?" Fiona asked, but as the children stepped closer they could see what kind of place it was.

  As they had suspected, the currents of the Gorgonian Grotto had carried them to a beach, but it was a beach contained in a narrow room. The youngsters stood at the top of the slope of sand and peered at this small, dim room, with smooth tiled walls that looked damp and slippery, and a sand floor covered in an assortment of small objects, some in piles and some half-buried in the sand. The children could see bottles, some still with their corks and caps, and some cans still intact from their journey. There were a few books, their pages bloated as if soaked in water, and a few small cases that looked locked. There was a roller skate, turned upside down, and a deck of cards sitting in two piles, as if someone were about to shuffle them. Here and there were a few pens, sticking out of the sand like porcupine quills, and there were many more objects the children could not identify in the gloom.

  "Where are we?" Fiona asked. "Why isn't this place full of water?"

  Klaus looked up, but could not see past a few feet. "This must be a passage of some sort," Klaus said, "straight up to dry land – an island, maybe, or maybe it curves to the shore."

  "Anwhistle Aquatics," Violet said thoughtfully. "We must be underneath its ruins."

  "Oxo?" Sunny asked, which meant "Does that mean we can breathe without our helmets?"

  "I think so," Klaus said, and then carefully removed his helmet, an action for which I would have given him a citation for bravery. "Yes," he said. "We can breathe. Everybody take off their helmets – that way, our oxygen systems will recharge."

  "But what is this place?" Fiona asked again, removing her helmet. "Why would anybody build a room way down here?"

  "It looks like it's been abandoned," Violet said. "It's full of junk."

  "Someone must come to change the light-bulbs," Klaus pointed out. "Besides, all this junk was washed up here by the tide, like us."

  "And like sugar bowl," Sunny said.

  "Of course," Fiona said, looking down at the objects in the sand. "It must be here someplace."

  "Let's find it and get out of here," Violet said. "I don't like this place."

  "Mission," Sunny said, which meant "Once we find the sugar bowl, our work here is done."

  "Not quite," Klaus said. "We'll still have to return to the Queequeg against the current, I might add. Looking for the sugar bowl is only half the battle."

  Everyone nodded in agreement, and the four volunteers spread out and began to examine the objects in the sand. Saying that something is half the battle is like saying something is half a sandwich, because it is dangerous to announce that something is half the battle when the much more difficult part might still be waiting in the wings, a phrase which here means "coming up more quickly than you'd like." You might think learning how to boil water is half the battle, only to learn that making a poached egg is much trickier than you thought and that the entire battle would be much more difficult and dangerous than you ever would have imagined

  The Baudelaires and their mycologist friend thought that looking for the sugar bowl was half the battle, but I'm sorry to tell you that they were wrong, and it is lucky that you fell asleep earlier, during my description of the water cycle, so you will not learn about the other half of the Baudelaires' battle, and the ghastly poison they would end up battling not long after their search through the sand.

  "I've found a box of rubber bands," Violet said, after a few minutes, "and a doorknob, two mattress springs, half a bottle of vinegar, and a paring knife, but no sugar bowl."

  "I've found an earring, a broken clipboard, a book of poetry, half a stapler, and three swizzle sticks," Klaus said, "but no sugar bowl."

  "Three can soup," Sunny said, "jar peanut butter, box crackers, pesto, wasabi, lo mein. But nadasuchre."

  "This is harder than I thought," Klaus said. "What have you found, Fiona?" Fiona did not answer. "Fiona?" Klaus asked again, and the Baudelaires turned to look at her.

  But the mycologist was not looking at the siblings. She was looking past them, and her eyes were wide with fear behind her triangular glasses.

  "Fiona?" Klaus said, sounding a bit worried. "What have you found?"

  Fiona swallowed, and pointed back down at the slope of sand. "Mycelium," she said finally, in a faint whisper, and the Baudelaires turned to see that she had spoken the truth. Sprouting out of the sand, quickly and silently, were the stalks and caps of the Medusoid Mycelium, the fungus Fiona had described back on the Queequeg.

  The invisible threads of the mycelium, according to her mycological book, waxed and waned, and had been waning when the volunteers drifted ashore, which meant that the mushrooms had been hiding underground when the children had arrived at this strange room. But now, as time passed, they were waxing, and sprouting up all over the beach and even along the smooth, tiled walls.

  At first just a handful were visible – each one a dark, gray color, with black splotches on the caps as if they were spattered with ink – and then more and more, like a silent, deadly crowd that had gathered on the beach and was staring blindly at the terrified children. The mushrooms only ventured halfway up the slope of sand, so it seemed that the poisonous fungus was not going to engulf them – not yet, anyway. But as the mycelium continued to wax, the entire beach sprouted in sinister mushrooms, and until it waned the Baudelaires had to huddle on the sand, in the light of the floorlamps, and stare back at the venomous mycological crowd.

  More and more mushrooms appeared, crowding the strange shore and piling up on top of one another as if they were pushing and shoving to get a good look at the trapped and frightened children.

  Looking for the sugar bowl may have been half the battle, but now the Baudelaire orphans were trapped, and that half was much, much more troubling.

  Chapter Seven

  The word "lousy," like the word "volunteer," the word "fire," the word "department," and many other words found in dictionaries and other important documents, has a number of different definitions depending on the exact circumstances in which it is used. There is the common definition of the word "lousy," meaning "bad," and this definition of "lousy" has described many things in my history of the Baudelaire orphans, from the sinister smells of Lousy Lane, along which the children traveled long ago, to their lousy journey up and down the Mortmain Mountains in search of the V.F.D. headquarters. There is the medical definition of the word "lousy," meaning "infested with lice," and this definition of "lousy" has not appeared in my work at all, although as Count Olaf's hygiene gets worse and worse I may find occasion to use it. And then there is a somewhat obscure definition of the word "lousy," meaning "abundantly supplied," the way Count Olaf is lousy with treacherous plans, or the Queequeg is lousy with metal pipes, or the entire world is lousy with unfathomable secrets, and it is this definition that the Baudelaire orphans pondered, as they huddled with Fiona underneath the mysterious floorlamps of the Gorgonian Grotto, and watched more and more mushrooms sprout from the sand.

  As their surroundings became lousy with the Medusoid Mycelium, the children thought of all the other things in their lives with which they were abundantly supplied. The children's lives were lousy with mystery, from the mysteries of V.F.D. to the mysteries of their own futures, with each mystery crowding the others like th
e stalks and caps of the poisonous fungi. Their lives were lousy with danger, from the dangers they had encountered above mountains and underneath buildings, to the dangers they had faced inside the city and out in the hinterlands, from the dangers of villainous people to the dangers of kind people who did not know any better. And their lives were lousy with lousiness, from terrible people to horrible meals, from terrifying locations to horrifying circumstances, and from dreadful inconveniences to inconvenient dreads, so that it seemed that their lives would always be lousy, lousy with lousy days and lousy with lousy nights, even if all of the lousy things with which their lives were lousy became less lousy, and less lousy with lousiness, over the lousy course of each lousy-with-lousiness moment, and with each new lousy mushroom, the cave lousier and lousier with lousiness, it was almost too much for the Baudelaire orphans to hear.

  "Lousy," Sunny said.

  "This is not good news," Klaus agreed. "Fiona, do you think we've been poisoned already?"

  "No," Fiona said firmly. "The spores shouldn't reach us here. As long as we stay here at the far end of the cavern, and the mushrooms don't advance any further, we should be safe."

  "It looks like they've stopped advancing," Violet said, pointing at the line of gray mushrooms, and the other volunteers saw that she was right. There were still new mushrooms popping up, but the fungus didn't seem to be getting any closer to the four children.

  "I guess the mycelium has only grown that far," Fiona said. "We're very lucky."

  "I don't feel very lucky," Klaus said. "I feel trapped. How will we get out of here?"

  "There's only one way," Violet said. "The only path back to the Queequeg leads through those mushrooms."

  "If we go through the mushrooms," Fiona said, "we'll most likely be poisoned. One spore could easily slip through our suits."

  "Antidote?" Sunny asked.

  "I might find the recipe for a cure," Fiona replied, "someplace in my mycological library. But we don't want to take that chance. We'll have to exit another way."

  For a moment, all four children looked up, into the blackness of the passage above their heads. Violet frowned, and put one hand on the damp and slippery tiles of the wall. With the other hand she reached into the waterproof pocket of her uniform, and drew out a ribbon to tie up her hair.

  "Can we go out that way?" Klaus asked. "Can you invent something to help us climb up that passageway?"

  "Tingamebob," Sunny said, which meant "There's plenty of materials here in the sand."

  "Materials aren't the problem," Violet said, and peered up into the blackness. "We're far below the surface of the water. It must be miles and miles to the surface. Even the best climbing device would wear out over the journey, and if it did we'd fall all the way down."

  "But someone must use that passageway, Klaus said. "Otherwise it wouldn't have been built."

  "It doesn't matter," Fiona said. "We can't go out that way. We need to get to the Queequeg. Otherwise, my stepfather will wonder what's become of us. Eventually he'd put on his diving helmet and go investigate..."

  "And the tide would carry him right into the poisonous fungus," Klaus finished. "Fiona's right. Even if we could climb all the way up, it'd be the wrong way to go."

  "But what else can we do?" Violet said, her voice rising. "We can't spend the rest of our lives in this miserable place!"

  Fiona looked at the mushrooms and sighed. "Mushroom Minutiae said that this fungus waxes and wanes. Right now it's waxing. We'll have to wait until it wanes again, and then run quickly over the sand and swim back down to the submarine."

  "But how long will it be until it starts waning?" Klaus said. "I don't know," Fiona admitted. "It could be just a few minutes, or a few hours. It could even be a few days."

  "A few days?" Violet said. "In a few days your stepfather will give up on us! In a few days we'll miss the V.F.D. gathering! We can't wait a few days!"

  "It's our only choice," Klaus said, putting a comforting hand on Violet's shoulder. "We can wait until the mushrooms disappear, or we can find ourselves poisoned."

  "That's not a choice at all," Violet replied bitterly.

  "It's a Hobson's choice," Klaus said. "Remember?"

  The eldest Baudelaire looked down at her brother and gave him a small smile. "Of Course I remember," she said.

  "Mamasan," Sunny said. Her siblings looked down at her, and Violet picked her up in her arms.

  "Who's Hobson?" Fiona asked. "What was his choice?"

  Klaus smiled. "Thomas Hobson lived in Britain in the seventeenth century," he said. "He was in charge of a stable, and according to legend, he always told his customers they had a choice: they could take the horse closest to the door, or no horse at all."

  "That's not really a choice," Fiona said.

  Violet smiled. "Precisely," she said. "A Hobson 's choice is something that's not a choice at all. It's an expression our mother used to use. She'd say, 'I'll give you a Hobson's choice, Violet – you can clean your room or I will stand in the doorway and sing your least favorite song over and over.' " Fiona grinned. "What was your least favorite song?" she asked.

  " 'Row, Row, Row Your Boat,' " Violet said. "I hate the part about life being but a dream."

  "She'd offer me the Hobson's choice of doing the dishes or reading the poetry of Edgar Guest," Klaus said. "He's my absolute least favorite poet."

  "Bath or pink dress," Sunny said.

  "Did your mother always joke around like that?" Fiona asked. "Mine used to get awfully mad if I didn't clean my room."

  "Our mother would get mad, too," Klaus said. "Remember, Violet, when we left the window of the library open, and that night it rained?"

  "She really flew off the handle," Violet said, using a phrase which here means "became extremely angry."

  "We spoiled an atlas that she said was irreplaceable."

  "You should have heard her yell," Klaus said. "Our father came down from his study to see what was the matter."

  "And then he started yelling, too," Violet said, and the Baudelaires paused and looked at one another uncomfortably.

  Everyone yells, of course, from time to time, but the Baudelaire children did not like to think about their parents yelling, particularly now that they were no longer around to apologize or explain themselves. It is often difficult to admit that someone you love is not perfect, or to consider aspects of a person that are less than admirable.

  To the Baudelaires it felt almost as if they had drawn a line after their parents died – a secret line in their memories, separating all the wonderful things about the Baudelaire parents from the things that perhaps were not quite so wonderful. Since the fire, whenever they thought of their parents, the Baudelaires never stepped over this secret line, preferring to ponder the best moments the family had together rather than any of the times when they had fought, or been unfair or selfish.

  But now, suddenly, in the gloom of the Gorgonian Grotto, the siblings had stumbled across that line and found themselves thinking of that angry afternoon in the library, and in moments other angry afternoons and evenings had occurred to them until their brains were lousy with memories of all stripes, a phrase which here means "both good and bad."

  It gave the siblings a queasy feeling to cross this line in their memories, and admit that their parents were sometimes difficult, and it made them feel all the queasier to realize they could not step back, and pretend they had never remembered these less-than-perfect moments, any more than they could step back in time, and once again find themselves safe in the Baudelaire home, before fire and Count Olaf had appeared in their lives.

  "My brother used to get angry, too," Fiona said. "Before he disappeared, he would have awful fights with my stepfather – late at night, when they thought I was asleep."

  "Your stepfather didn't mention that," Violet said. "He said your brother was a charming man."

  "Maybe he only remembers the charming parts," Fiona replied. "Maybe he doesn't want to remember everything. Maybe he wants to keep tho
se parts secret."

  "Do you think your stepfather knew about this place?" Klaus asked, looking around the eerie room. "He mentioned that we might find a place to take off our diving helmets, remember? It seemed strange at the time."

  "I don't know," Fiona said. "Maybe that's another secret he was keeping."

  "Like the sugar bowl," Violet said.

  "Speaking which," Sunny said.

  "Sunny's right," Klaus said. "We should keep looking for the sugar bowl."

  "It must be here someplace," Fiona agreed, "and besides, we need some way to pass the time until the fungus wanes. Everyone should spread out, and give a shout if you find the sugar bowl."

  The Baudelaires nodded in agreement, and the four volunteers took distant positions on the sand, taking care not to step any closer to the Medusoid Mycelium. For the next few hours, they dug through the sand floor of the grotto and examined what they found by the light of the two floorlamps. Each layer of sand uncovered several items of interest, but no matter how many objects the children encountered, no one gave a shout.

  Violet found a butter dish, a length of electrical wire, and an odd, square stone with messages carved in three languages, but not what she was looking for, and so the eldest Baudelaire remained silent. Klaus found a box of toothpicks, a small hand puppet, and a ring made of dull metal, but not what he had come to the cave to find, and so the middle Baudelaire merely sighed. And Sunny found two cloth napkins, a broken telephone receiver, and a fancy wineglass filled with holes, but when she finally opened her mouth to speak, the youngest Baudelaire merely said, "Snack!" which meant something like, "Why don't we stop for a bite to eat?" and quickly opened the crackers and peanut butter she had found.

  "Thanks, Sunny," Fiona said, taking a cracker spread with peanut butter. "I must say, Baudelaires, I'm getting frustrated. My hands ache from all that digging, but there's no sign of the sugar bowl."

  "I'm beginning to think this is a fool's errand," Violet said, using a phrase which here means "errand performed by a fool."