Chapter Text
To My Kind Editor,
If you have ever heard the phrase "taking the bull by the horns" used in everyday conversation by yourself, the person seated next to you on a boat who is clutching a life preserver, a motivational speaker at a community center, or two mysterious individuals wearing fencing masks at the far end of a long, narrow, torchlit corridor, then you will probably know that it does not actually refer to taking hold of any part of the anatomy of an adult male of the bovine species, but is in fact simply a figure of speech which here means "to engage in an activity in which one would normally rather not engage, because it seems both extremely unpleasant and awful, such as darning a pair of unwashed socks, attending a family reunion, taking hold of part of the anatomy of an adult male of the bovine species, or confronting a criminal disguised as a caterer, who is actually a notorious villain with something sinister up his sleeve" -- unless of course you are a professional matador, an animal rights activist, a rodeo announcer, or a bull, in which case the phrase "taking the bull by the horns" probably has a much more literal meaning for you.
If you are a bull, and are reading this story from the rodeo, farm, bull ring, or internet café in which you are located, then you may find the following story to be pleasantly vindicating, as I am happy to report that it does not feature any adult males of the bovine species being taken hold of by any parts of their anatomy. But if you are not a bull, then I suggest that you stop reading this story immediately, and leave the office, bedroom, or internet café where you are located -- particularly if there is an adult male member of the bovine species seated at the computer next to yours -- and avoid any further contact with the internet, as I am sorry to say that the unwashed socks which appear in this story are not at any time darned, and the very unfortunate orphans who also appear in this story do not take part in any family reunions whatsoever, although all of them would have very much liked to. I suggest that you have a cup of bitter tea or a root beer float, peruse traditional codebooks of secret organizations, such as Roget's Thesaurus and The Oxford English Dictionary, and decipher the message encrypted on the barcode of the can of Mr. Pibb which is on the bottom shelf of your refrigerator before 7 pm this Sunday. Otherwise, you may find that reading this story is a bit like "taking the bull by the horns," because as any professional matador of your acquaintance can tell you about their experiences with the adult male of the bovine species, the details of this story are also both extremely unpleasant and awful.
With All Due Respect,
Lemony Snicket
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If you have ever been on an extended sea voyage on a small boat, then you may be familiar with the feeling of wishing you were back upon land, surrounded by the company of all your closest friends and associates, where there is plenty of fodder for conversation -- a phrase which here means “something to talk about other than saltwater, the weather, the narrow dimensions of the boat, or which fins a shark might wear shoes on, if it wore them” -- where the food is freshly prepared and where, so far as you are able to tell, the floor remains mostly where you left it. For example, during the weeks that the Baudelaires spent at sea, after setting off from the island along the coastal shelf where they had lived for just over a year, each of the Baudelaires found themselves wishing for just such a circumstance. When Violet Baudelaire tied her hair up in a ribbon to begin repairing the compass she had made back on the island, she found herself wishing for the company of one of her closest friends, Quigley Quagmire, who was an expert mapmaker and would doubtless have been eager to help navigate the boat. When Klaus Baudelaire cleaned off his glasses after rereading Opportune (and Otherwise) Occurrences on the Ocean for the fourteenth time, he found himself wishing that he was someplace larger and more interesting, such as, perhaps, a library, where there would’ve been room to take more books with them, and thus a bit more to talk about that the orange-tailed ocean otter or the omnivorous offshore orca, neither of which had ever been seen by anyone but the author of the book. When Sunny Baudelaire ran out of the many delicious perishable foods she had packed for the journey, and they were down to only what she could make from the few non-perishable foods left on board, she began to wish that she were back on land, in a well-stocked kitchen, where there was a spice rack that would’ve helped her to make the meal she was preparing more flavorful. And when Beatrice Baudelaire, who was only a year and a few weeks old, looked over the side of the boat into the teetering and uneven depths of the ocean, she found herself wishing that she, too, was back on land and with someone she cared about very much but had never met -- with Kit Snicket, who had died and was buried on the island where Beatrice was born. By the time that the Beatrice shipwrecked itself in treacherous shallows near shore, the Baudelaires were very nearly relieved to find themselves thrown from the wreckage and among the rocky shoals, because at least it meant that they had found land, and they would not have to hear any more about the outstanding olfactory senses of the omnivorous offshore orca, or eat any more cured meats, or nurse bruises from times when they had been caught off-guard by a strong wave and had toppled straight into one of the railings of the boat.
By the time they had regained land, the Baudelaires were exhausted from their travels, and stretched out on the lumpy pebbles of the beach beneath them -- a beach where, once, long ago, a man with a slight cough had stepped out of a fog and given three of the four Baudelaires the worst news of their lives.
I have spent many years researching the lives of the Baudelaire children, and while, in that time, I have not been able to discover the precise time of day at which they returned to Briny Beach, or the location of a certain signet ring, or whether it sank with the remains of the Beatrice on that day, or whether the figurehead of the Beatrice, depicting an octopus fighting a headless diver, was ever salvaged and put into service on another boat to be sailed by another volunteer or villain, in my research I have managed to learn the weather forecast for that day at Briny Beach, and that it was true. And so I imagine that, as the surviving Baudelaire family lay with smooth pebbles digging into their backs, catching their breath, the weather that day provided some comfort and reassurance of the times to come. For the first time that they had ever visited Briny Beach -- and they have not been there many times, as far as I know -- and for the first time in their unfortunate lives -- the fog had lifted, and the skies were bright and clear.
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If you have ever been to a cocktail party, surrounded by the company of your closest friends and associates, where there is endless fodder for conversation, then you may be familiar with the feeling of wishing that you were on a small boat, far out to sea, where the number of distractions that one might run into are relatively limited, and so long as one is not remarkably unlucky and the sea voyage is not remarkably brief, one may be assured of at least a few moments of uninterrupted peace and quiet.
Although it had been six years since any of the Baudelaires had made their voyage from the island where Beatrice had been born back to the city where Violet, Klaus, and Sunny had been born, all four Baudelaires now found themselves wishing, just for a few moments, that they were back aboard the Beatrice, where the world was quiet, if somewhat repetitive, tedious, and uncertain. While the Baudelaires had enjoyed several years of somewhat clear skies, the weather over their lives had hardly been reliable and monotonous enough to say that they had spent much time in the doldrums, a word which here means that the Baudelaires had spent their six years on the run from the law, hiring a capable lawyer, exposing their capable lawyer as a dangerous villain, replacing the villainous lawyer with a noble, but tragically incapable, lawyer, and ultimately donning disguises in order to pass the bar exam and seeking justice for themselves as well as the death of their lawyer, rebuilding a home for themselves on the charred foundations of the decoy Hotel Denouement, raising a small child, and entering the workforce in order to provide financially for her education, when they might have liked to spend this time sitting at the side of a pool and enjoying a tall glass of grapefruit-lemonade and a pleasant book.
Now, surrounded by a party filled with their closest friends and associates, struggling to pick out one thread of conversation from the next, the Baudelaires felt as though they were standing on a very foggy beach once more, and I am sorry to say that, in a way, they were more correct than they knew -- because once again, a man was about to step through this fog and deliver some terrible news of a tragic and deadly accident.
A man stepped through the crowd and up to the elbow of the eldest, Violet Baudelaire. “Ichabod,” she said quietly, remembering how easily flustered the waiter was, “what is it?”
Ichabod O’hara quailed visibly, a phrase which here means that Violet had difficulty hearing his response among the noise of the crowd, because he had turned his head towards the scuffed shoes on his feet, and was mumbling barely above a whisper. “Well, I wouldn’t like to make a scene,” he said, which is a phrase that people use when they would like you to risk possibly looking silly if you should raise a fuss over the bull rampaging throughout the china shop down the street, and it turns out that the bull was actually an irate customer in a viking costume, and the china shop was actually a store which only sells photographs of china, and not the genuine article. “But a man in the front room is asking for you, and I believe he may not be a certified food service employee at all, but actually a notorious villain in disguise. I thought I should ask if I should offer him some hors d’oeuvres, since everyone here is either a guest or a food service employee. If he isn’t a food service employee, I wouldn’t like to snub him.”
All four Baudelaires nearly immediately looked at one another. I say ‘nearly immediately’ because, as you know if you have ever tried it, it is nearly impossible for one person to look at three other people at the same time, particularly if each pair of people would like to be looking at each other simultaneously. So when Violet first looked at Sunny, Sunny was looking at Beatrice, and by the time Beatrice had turned to look at Sunny, Sunny was looking at Klaus, and by the time Klaus looked over at Sunny, Sunny was looking back at Beatrice again, who was looking at Violet, who was looking at Sunny also, who turned to Klaus, who blinked, and then finally met eyes with Beatrice, who was getting a bit of a stiff neck, since she was only seven years old and not terribly tall. After a few more minutes in this vein, which is a figure of speech here meaning “spent looking cross-eyed at one another,” the Baudelaires looked back at Ichabod with their answer, which fortunately they did not need to try to discuss in the middle of a fog of other conversations.
“Why don’t we go with you,” said Klaus, putting a reassuring hand on Ichabod’s shoulder, “and have a look.”
When you are feeling apprehensive, it is very difficult to force oneself to complete a task which seems extremely unpleasant and awful, such as cleaning one’s room after a venomous spider has just gotten loose from its tank, or having a conversation with someone who once put pencil shavings in your hair at primary school and has just made eye contact with you at a soda shop, or going to the front room to see whether the man in the caterer’s uniform is actually a notorious villain in disguise, or simply a caterer who got into a fight with his barber. In these situations, there is a phrase in the English language which is commonly given as motivational advice, and that phrase is “taking the bull by the horns.” The phrase “taking the bull by the horns” is a figure of speech, which means that it does not actually mean that one should find a bull and attempt to manhandle it, particularly if one is not a trained professional, but that the idea of literally doing this is enough to explain what it actually means -- in this case, that one should do the very thing one least wishes to do in the situation and get it overwith, like ripping off a very sticky bandaid. The phrase “a figure of speech” is also a figure of speech, in a way, because although I cannot think of any figures of speech which involve an individual who is actually made out of language, rather than flesh and bone, or artificial body parts, if you picture it, you have gotten the general idea.
“We may as well take the bull by the horns,” said Sunny -- and, hand in hand in hand in hand, that is just what the four Baudelaires did.
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