sorrows and woes - klaus baudelaire

⮑ lachrymose leeches

"'VIOLET, KLAUS, SUNNY, AND NATALIA. By the time you read this note, my life will be at it's end. My heart is as cold as Ike, and I find my life inbearable. I know your children may not understand the sad life of a dowadger, or what would have leadled me to this desperate akt. But please know that I am much happier this way. As my last will and testament, I leave you four in the care of Captain Sham, a kind and honorable men. Please think of me kindly, even though I'd done this terrible thing. Josephine Anwhistle.'"

Natalia read the note after she stopped sobbing. She still cried as she looked from the words on the small piece of paper to dark waters of Lake Lachrymose. She couldn't believe it. Aunt Josephine was dead too.

"It can't be," Violet uttered in disbelief.

But it was. Aunt Josephine wrote a note, threw herself out the window, and left the four miserable orphans, and their inheritances, in the care of their worst enemy.

•••••••••••••

Violet read the note to Mr. Poe over the phone and Klaus and Natalia watched. Natalia was anxiously playing with her fingernails. She hoped that Mr. Poe wouldn't place them in Captain Sham's care and that there was another relative of Baudelaire's they could live with. Violet hung up the phone and informed, "Mr. Poe says we can always rely on Mulctuary Money Management."

Klaus took the note from his sisters' hands, "I just can't believe it."

"It's all there in ink and shaky handwriting. Aunt Josephine is dead and she's left us in the care of Count Olaf," Violet sadly explained.

"It's not right. There's something funny about this note."

Violets' eyes widened at her brothers' words, "There's nothing about a woman throwing herself out a window."

"Not funny as in funny joke. Funny as in a funny... smell," Klaus corrected.

Natalia nodded in agreement, "Klaus is right. This note seems weird."

Klaus studied the note for a moment before his eyes lit up realization. He ran to the library with the two girls following behind. He turned on the light and pointed to the handwriting, "In the very first sentence, she says, 'My life will be at it's end.'"

"And now it is," Violet replied.

"That's not what I mean," Klaus shook his head. "She says 'it's,' I-T-apostrophe-S, meaning 'it is.' She means I-T-S. That's a sizable grammatical error."

"Who cares about grammatical errors when she jumped out a window?" Violet asked.

"Aunt Josephine would've cared," Natalia mumbled as she caught on to what Klaus was saying. "She told us that grammar was the greatest joy in life."

"That's not enough," Violet argued. "No matter how much she liked grammar, she says she found her life unbearable."

"That's another error," Klaus spoke. "She didn't say she found her life unbearable, with a U."