What Happens?
The Baudelaires learn they they are on board the
Queequeg, captained by Captain Widdershins and crewed by his
stepdaughter, Fiona, and a familiar face, Phil. The children learn about his
personal philosophy, are assigned jobs to do around the sub, and discovery that
they are now on the mission to find something important.
Thoughts as I read:
So our image which opens the chapter is of a bunch of pipes,
presumably inside the submarine. It’s rather worrying to see the number of drips
coming from these pipes. I’m not sure I’d want to be inside a leaky
submarine!
On with the story and the Baudelaires are following the mysterious
voice which inviting them into the mysterious submarine:
“Aye! Mind the ladder! Close the hatch behind you! Don’t
rush! No – take your time! Don’t fall! Mind your step! Aye! Don’t trip! Don’t
make noise! Don’t scare me! Don’t look down! No – look where you’re going! Don’t
bring any flammable liquids with you! Watch your feet! Aye! No – watch your
back! No – watch your mouth! No – watch yourselves! Aye!”
Sounds like someone who could’ve been friends with Aunt
Josephine!
The voice continues to give instructions/warnings. I’m not going
to repeat them all here since they go on for another page or so. Suffice to say
that the voice is not scary or menacing, we’re told that it sounds a little bit
‘scattered’ so I’m guessing we’re going to meet someone jovial and somewhat
absent-minded.
Sunny makes it into the room first of all and meets a man wearing
some sort of shiny suit with a big moustache. He announces the Baudelaires as
they come in, basically saying what he sees. I kind of like him already, he
seems like fun. Violet tries to introduce herself but he already knows all about
her and he doesn’t even believe the reports from The Daily Punctilio.
He’s definitely a good guy… I think.
Then the stranger takes off down the corridor and the Baudelaires
follow him because they don’t really have anywhere else to go, considering this
person doesn’t seem to think they’re murderers and until this moment they’ve
been travelling down a river on a sledge. The man is still burbling away to
himself, telling them about the submarine and the crew and the special suits
that they’re wearing.
And then he decides to introduce himself, he’s Captain
Widdershins. Oh, and we learn that the submarine is the Queequeg. See,
I knew there was going to be a Moby Dick reference in here somewhere!
He’s even given the place a funky little nickname ‘the Submarine Q and Its Crew
of Two’. And I had a funny feeling he’d know Josephine, he’s familiar with her
and Lake Lachrymose. He thinks about her every day ‘Except some days when it
slips my mind!’
Widdershins seems to speak entirely in exclamations, everything he
says is followed by an exclamation point. I have no idea why he does this, but I
like it. He’s a great character and I love him a little bit already.
Sunny finally speaks up and says ‘Nottooti?’ which Violet is quick
to translate as ‘she’s curious to know how you know so much about us.’ This is
because Widdershins has been receiving a ‘Volunteer Factual Dispatch’ about them
fairly regularly. We also learn his personal philosophy ‘He who hesitates is
lost’ and his stepdaughter has added ‘Or she’ because it’s important to be
politically correct when you’re composing your personal philosophy.
So without hesitation we continue along on the trek through the
submarine while Snicket waxes lyrical on the subject of personal
philosophies:
Having a personal philosophy is like having a pet marmoset,
because it may be very attractive when you acquire it, but there may be
situations when it will not come in handy at all.
They children have found hesitating quite useful on numerous
occasions so I think they’re hesitating about adopting this philosophy as their
own, preferring the more suitable “Sometimes he or she should hesitate and
sometimes he or she should not hesitate” which isn’t really a philosophy at
all.
Widdershins is telling them all about the problems they’ve been
having, which includes being attacked by leeches, realtors, girlfriends and
angry salmon. He’s quite pleased to have Violet on board since she might be able
to help with some repairs. But for now it’s time to meet Fiona, his
stepdaughter. She’s slightly older than Violet and has been working on repairs
herself since their telegram machine has stopped working. Violet is ordered to
get to it immediately, though he doesn’t mean it in a mean way, that’s just how
he speaks.
We have been told a couple of times that the suits the family are
wearing have a picture of a bearded man on the front, we now get to learn that
it’s a picture of Herman Melville. There’s Moby Dick again. Of course
Klaus loves him, because he’s weird and apparently likes reading books which are
frequently interrupted by excerpts from Wikipedia. Then again, Klaus is into
research and I suppose he’s into that. It’s convenient that Klaus is now aboard
because they need someone who can research stuff.
So Klaus is going to be put to work decoding the tidal charts, now
it’s just Sunny’s turn to get instructions. Obviously there’s not much cutting
needed to be done, so she’ll be allowed to take over the kitchen. She says
‘Sous’ meaning ‘I haven’t been cooking for very long’ but if this is how good
she is as a young girl, think how much better she’ll be as she grows.
And guess who’s been working as the cook on the submarine (the
person making the damp casseroles – aren’t casseroles somewhat damp anyway,
considering they’re kind of in gravy?) it’s Phil from Lucky Smells! He replaced
Fiona’s mum (killed in a manatee accident), and before that was Jacques and his
brother (whose name Widdershins can’t remember), and a woman who was a spy.
Considering the submarine is supposed to have a ‘Crew of Two’
they’re slightly overstaffed at the moment, lucky Phil is an optimist
considering he might be booted out of his job at some point.
We don’t have time to dwell on this, we’re heading for the V.F.D.
gathering at the Hotel Denouement but first the Queequeg has a mission
to perform.
And what’s that mission?
Why, they’ve got a sugar bowl to find!
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