"You look just like your father." Kit sighed. "He wore the same frown whenever he was confused, although he almost never tied his hair up in a ribbon when he solved a problem. Please, Baudelaires, eat your brunch, and I'll try to catch you up on our current predicament. By the time you're eating your second pastry I hope your questions will be answered."
The Baudelaires sat down, spread their monogrammed napkins on their laps, and began to eat, surprised to find that they were just as hungry for brunch as they were curious for information. Violet took two slices of dark wheat bread and made herself a sandwich of smoked fish, deciding to try the chocolate spread afterward if she still had room. Klaus served himself some quiche and took a custard eclair, and Sunny rooted through the tray of fruit until she found a grapefruit, which she began to peel with her unusually sharp teeth. Kit smiled at the children, dabbed at her own mouth with a napkin embroidered with K. S., and began to speak.
"The building at the other end of the pond is the Hotel Denouement," she began. "Have you ever stayed there?"
"No," Violet said. "Our parents took us to the Hotel Preludio once for the weekend."
"That's right," Klaus said. "I'd almost forgotten."
"Carrots for breakfast," Sunny said, remembering the weekend with a smile.
"Well, the Hotel Preludio is a lovely place," Kit said, "but the Hotel Denouement is more than that. For years, it's been a place where our volunteers can gather to exchange information, discuss plans to defeat our enemies, and return books we've borrowed from one another. Before the schism, there were countless places that served such purposes. Bookstores and banks, restaurants and stationery stores, cafes and laundromats, opium dens and geodesic domes- people of nobility and integrity could gather nearly everywhere."
"Those must have been wonderful times," Violet said.
"So I'm told," Kit said. "I was four years old when everything changed. Our organization shattered, and it was as if the world shattered, too, and one by one the safe places were destroyed.
There was a large scientific laboratory, but the volunteer who owned the place was murdered. There was an enormous cavern, but a treacherous team of realtors claimed it for themselves. And there was an immense headquarters high in the Mortmain Mountains, but-"
"It was destroyed," Klaus said quietly. "We were there shortly after the fire."
"Of course you were," Kit said. "I'd forgotten. Well, the headquarters was the penultimate safe place."
"Penulhoo?" Sunny asked.
"'Penultimate' means 'next-to-last,'" Kit explained. "When the mountain headquarters was destroyed, only the Hotel Denouement was left. In every other place on Earth, nobility and integrity are vanishing quickly." She sighed, and gazed out at the still, flat surface of the pond. "If we're not careful, they'll vanish completely. Can you imagine a world in which wickedness and deception were running rampant?"
"Yes," Violet said quietly, and her siblings nodded in agreement. They knew that the word "rampant" meant "without anyone to stop it," and they could imagine such a world very easily, because they had been living in one. Since their first encounter with Count Olaf, the villain's wickedness and deception had run rampant all over the Baudelaires' lives, and it had been very difficult for the children to keep from becoming villains themselves. In fact, when they considered all of their recent actions, they weren't entirely sure they hadn't performed a few acts of villainy, even if they'd had very good reasons for doing so.
"When we were in the mountains," Klaus said, "we found a message one of the volunteers had written. It said that V.F.D. would be gathering at the Hotel Denouement on Thursday."
Kit nodded, and reached to pour herself some more coffee. "Was the message addressed to J. S.?" she asked.
"Yes," Violet said. "We assumed the initials stood for Jacques Snicket."
"Brother?" Sunny asked.
Kit looked sadly down at her pastry. "Yes, Jacques was my brother. Because of the schism, I haven't seen either of my brothers for years, and it was only recently that I learned of his murder."
"We met Jacques very briefly," Violet said, referring to the time the Baudelaires had spent in the care of an entire village. "You must have been shocked to receive the news."
"Saddened," Kit said, "but not shocked. So many good people have been slain by our enemies." She reached across the blanket and patted the hands of all three Baudelaires in turn. "I know I don't have to tell you how terrible it feels to lose a family member. I felt so terrible that I vowed I would never leave my bed."
"What happened?" Klaus said.
Kit smiled. "I got hungry," she said, "and when I opened the refrigerator, I found another message waiting for me."
"Verbal Fridge Dialogue," Violet said, "the same code as the message we found in the mountains."
"Yes," Kit said. "You three had been spotted by another volunteer. We knew, of course, that you children had nothing to do with my brother's death, no matter what that ridiculous reporter wrote in The Daily Punctilio"
The Baudelaires looked at one another. They had almost forgotten about Geraldine Julienne, a journalist who had caused them much inadvertent trouble, a phrase which here means "published in the newspaper that the Baudelaire orphans had murdered Jacques Snicket, whom she mistakenly identified as Count Olaf." The siblings had found it necessary to disguise themselves several times so as not to be captured by the authorities. "Who spotted us?" Klaus asked.
"Quigley Quagmire, of course," she said. "He found you in the Mortmain Mountains, and then managed to contact me when you were separated from him. He and I managed to meet each other in an abandoned bathrobe emporium, where we disguised ourselves as mannequins while we figured out what to do next. Finally, we managed to send a Volunteer Factual Dispatch to Captain Widdershins's submarine."
"Queequeg" Sunny said, naming the underwater vehicle where she and her siblings had recently spent a dreadful few days.
"Our plan was to meet up with you at Briny Beach," Kit said, "and proceed to the Hotel Denouement for the V.F.D. gathering."
"But where is Quigley?" Violet asked.
Kit sighed, and took a sip of her coffee. "He was very eager to see you," she said, "but he received word from his siblings."
"Duncan and Isadora!" Klaus cried. "We haven't seen them for quite some time. Are they safe?"
"I hope so," Kit answered. "The message they sent was incomplete, but it sounded as if they were being attacked in midair while flying over the sea. Quigley went to help them immediately in a helicopter we stole from a nearby botanist. If all goes well, you'll see all three Quagmire triplets on Thursday. That is, unless you cancel the gathering."