What Happens?
Jacques has been mysteriously murdered and Officer Luciana has called in the talents of Detective Dupin, who is very familiar to the Baudelaires, and immediately pins the murder on Sunny with Klaus and Violet as accomplices. Murder is obviously against the rules so they are locked up ready to be burnt at the stake the following day. Then Olaf reveals that he still has a plan for one of them to ensure he doesn't miss out on their fortune.
Thoughts as I read:
This chapter opens with a picture of a dapper looking person. I
want to say it’s a man, but I’m not entirely sure, it might be a woman. They’re
wearing a big pendant and have kind of a frilly top on but we can’t see their
head. I’m wondering if it might be Olaf because I can see spindly fingers and I
think that’s one of Olaf’s trademarks. We’ll have to read on to find out exactly
who this is.
We jump straight in where we left off yesterday. Mrs Morrow
happily tells the children that ‘Count Omar’ was mysteriously murdered. Violet
corrects this to Olaf and Mrs Morrow believes that this means Violet had
accepted who the corpse really was. Luciana then fills in the rest of the
townspeople with the news, she’s the only one with a key to the jail therefore
the whole thing is a mystery. Or she was the one who killed him, y’know, one or
the other.
Everyone in the village seems very excited at the prospect of a
mystery in their little town. Sunny points out “Shoart!” meaning “A dead man is
not a thrill!” Luckily there is someone coming to investigate the situation:
Detective Dupin. Apparently he’s famous but no one has ever heard of him so
chances are he’s going to be one of Olaf’s cohorts.
The children have a bunch of questions about what has happened but
Luciana refuses to discuss it in front of the children, instead ordering Hector
to take the children away. At that moment they head a voice, one that is
instantly recognisable and which almost certainly belongs to Olaf. I’m going to
guess that the fancy outfit a couple of pages back is Olaf in his Detective
Dupin costume. That pendant thing is a detective’s badge, glad we cleared that
up.
The children aren’t allowed to leave the crime scene as he’s
decided that they are suspects. One of the Elders points out that they’re just
children but Olaf/Dupin doesn’t like anyone to disagree with him. Klaus chooses
this particular moment to point out that the person claiming to be a detective
is in fact Count Olaf while Violet points out all the items of clothing that are
hiding his distinguishing features.
Oh and you know how all of Olaf’s characters have a little verbal
tick, like saying ‘please’ at the end of every sentence, well the Dupin
character keeps on talking about things not being cool. He does go on to explain
some things that are cool, like his plastic shoes and sunglasses. If
you say so mate.
He goes on to tell the gathered crowd that the Baudelaires are
responsible for killing ‘Count Olaf’. Oh dear, this is going to get messy isn’t
it? Suddenly everyone is against them because they didn’t do a good enough job
on their chores, obviously not trimming hedges correctly is a key trigger in
future murderous tendencies.
Of course Dupin/Olaf does have some evidence, in the shape of a
hair ribbon covered in plastic flowers. It’s definitely not the sort of thing
that Violet would wear, but even when she produces her own hair ribbon no one
really believes her. Then Dupin/Olaf holds up the lens from a pair of glasses,
which proves that Klaus was there, despite the fact that the lenses in his
glasses are intact. Then Dupin/Olaf reveals that they’re not strictly speaking
murderers, they’re accomplices. Sunny is the actual murderer since she bit
Not-Olaf to death.
The children call on Hector to defend them, after all, he’s their
only hope of an alibi. But this is unlikely to work since Hector is so nervous
around the other townspeople so can’t say anything in their defence. Owing to
the fact that no one knows about the secret library or workshop they don’t
believe Violet when she tries to tell them what they were actually up to all
night. This also makes it look like they’re trying to pin other crimes on
Hector. As the children are clearly lying murderous little people the village
decides to disown them, which may actually be the best thing the villagers have
done for the children since they arrived.
They have to wait too long for Mr Poe to come and collect them
though, so someone suggests that they get burnt at the stake instead. Obviously
the Baudelaires are none too pleased with this suggestion. For a moment it looks
like they’re going to get away with it when one of the Elders says “We can’t
simply burn people at the stake whenever we want!” except they don’t mean that
they shouldn’t ever burn the Baudelaires, just that they shouldn’t burn
them right now because that Elder has other stuff to be doing. So this prompts a
discussion about a date and time which works for everyone in the town. Because
the townspeople are crazy.
With tomorrow afternoon being agreed upon as the best date for the
children’s demise Sunny yells “Glaji!” which I’m guessing means ‘help!’ or
‘don’t kill us’ or something. Dupin/Olaf reassures them that they’re not all
murderers, just Sunny, the other two are just accomplices. Not that this changes
their ultimate fate. And then they’re escorted off to jail.
Violet points out that if they are burned at the stake Olaf will
never get the Baudelaire fortune. And believe it or not, Olaf has some good news
for them. One of them will get to make an escape, after all, he only needs one
of them to inherit the fortune. He even gives them the choice of which one gets
away while the other two are burnt at the stake.
And then he leaves them to make that decision, promising he’ll be
back at lunch time to see what they’ve decided. He’s nice like that.
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