The Book of Volunteers

Klaus Baudelaire

My memories of my guardians are slowly fading, much like my only photograph of them and me, pasted to the front page of my journal. The morning of their disappearance, however, will remain forever in my mind, much like how the root beer stain obscuring Violet and part of Klaus' face, in the photograph, will forever remain an immovable blemish on a very special piece of card paper. The night before was ordinary in the sense that it was anything but. Violet had prepared a simple dinner, or maybe it was Sunny. No, if it were Sunny, it wouldn't have been simple, and it certainly couldn't have been Klaus. He would have been distracted. At the time we had a temporary arrangement with the surviving half of Lucky Smells Lumber Mill's ownership, to live in the neighbouring optometrist's office, in exchange for my guardians' services (Sunny served as a cook, Klaus a bookkeeper, and Violet a mechanic). They had yet to have been definitively cleared of the many charges for which they had been placed on trial at the Hotel Denouement, and though the papers had long since moved on from their sensationalized coverage of the Baudelaires' lives, my guardians chose to live a life of bare essentials, outside of the public eye. Even in our seclusion, Klaus' paranoia ensured we remained on our toes. That night, we ate in the dark. Worn-out ottomans and cobweb-infested cabinets sufficed as tables, as we huddled in the cold exam room closet amidst whatever trinkets and keepsakes we decided to spare from storage beneath the floorboards, and a portable electric stove nursing a pot of soup or stew or some other wet, sloppy concoction. A safety officer had been scheduled to inspect the premises (apparently, by means of some outrageous legal loophole, for the first time in over a decade). Klaus insisted we erase any evidence of our staying there, and make ourselves hidden, during the inspection. This kind of last-minute panicked cover-up wasn't new to any of us. I had learned to always do my part, whether it be cleaning up after myself at dinner or cleaning up every conceivable trace of my existence before a search. Well, come to think of it, Violet helped out a lot. Her assurance always made me feel like I did more to help than I might have.

This time, we could at least find peace in the fact that we weren't the subject of the search. Violet, Sunny, and myself, at least. Klaus was not one for peace. He uttered something strange to me that night, between mouthfuls of goulash, or lentil soup, or gumbo, and only to me.

"It is not down on any map; true places never are."

I recognized the quote, though only vaguely. In fact, it took me until the next morning to realize I misheard Klaus, and that he did not in fact say "blue places never are".

I awoke in the closet, having fallen asleep on Sunny's shoulder, though, notable, as I awoke, was the absence of Sunny and her siblings. I called out to them, to no avail. I searched for them all throughout the office and its quarters, even beneath the floorboards as I tore away the clothes and bedding we had hidden the night prior. As reality set in, I began to feel like I was sinking. It was too early for them to have gone to work. On that notion, I thought to seek out the lumber mill's owner. Any familiar face would be a small relief. I knocked on the door of his office twice before he answered. I braced myself to be beset with a cloud of cigar smoke, before remembering he had quit. When he answered, he seemed distracted.

"Good morn-"

"Beatrice, what a-"

Our greetings overlapped.

"You first, dear."

"Oh, well, I was wondering if you'd seen my guardians around? I woke up to find them gone, and wondered if perhaps they were meeting with you, Sir, or otherwise notified you of their departure someplace."

"Hm. Strange. I was going to ask if you had seen the Baudelaires. I was hoping to negotiate our contract with them. I'm... hesitant, though pleasantly surprised to admit that your guardians' service has, well, proven such a help with efficiency and morale here at Lucky Smells, I thought perhaps we could arrange for you to stay longer." Sir appeared embarrassed, almost, but sincere. He was hard on my guardians, but never unfair. They had a complicated history. This, I understood, He was always patient with me, though, which I never really did.
"Suffice it to say you won't know any more than I do. Why don't you take a seat at my desk, young Beatrice, and we can get to the bottom of this mystery together."