Fiona Widdershins' life was plagued with abandonment issues. Her birth father is unaccounted for, her mother died when she was very young, her only sibling disappeared and her stepather left her stranded on the Queequeg without so much as an explanation. It's no wonder that Fiona snapped when she finally got her brother back and decided to stay with him at all costs. It's the tragic tale of a broken childhood, and a broken family.
But the topic of Mrs Widdershins' untimely demise is interesting from a narrative point of view. Why did Daniel Handler decide to make Fiona and Fernald's mother such a big deal in the first place? Surely the tension between the Captain and Fernald was enough to explain the trauma inherent to the Widdershins family drama. Adding a mysteriously departed mom on top of it is kind of overkill.
The Netflix adaptation attempted to give us some resolution by turning Fernald into a lab assistant at Anwhistle Aquatics and giving the Captain the subplot of his wife's disappareance. That's all well and good, and satisfying from a narrative perspective, but the books have their own separate canon.
Surely there's a reason why this subplot was included in the books. Daniel Handler probably had a resolution in mind but decided not to include it (just like he never confirmed that Lemony was the taxi driver from "The Penultimate Peril", for example). So why did he think Mrs. Widdershins was important? What's the missing story behind her death? Her demise looms in the background of the Widdershins family dynamic like the missing piece of a very important puzzle. It seems inoccuous, but it's probably the key to understanding everything. So what really happened to her? And how would it help us rationalizing the actions of Fernald and his stepfather?
Although the following hypothesis will mostly focus on Mrs. Widdershins, we will also try to answer a number of burning questions regarding the Widdershins family, including but not limited to:
How did Fernald lose his hands?
Who killed Gregor Anwhistle?
Who burned down Anwhistle Aquatics?
Why did Fernald betray his stepfather and join Olaf's troupe?
More after the cut.
There are some interesting tidbits of chronology to be found in the Widdershins legacy, so let's try to organize events in the right order.
We don't know anything about Fernald's and Fiona's birth father. Apparently Handler chose to make the Captain their stepfather to better explain why the relationship between Fernald and the Captain turned sour so quickly. Indeed if you look at the chronology it turns out that the Captain is only older than Fernald by a few years. So basically the Captain became Fernald's stepfather when he had barely entered adulthood. Fernald probably never saw him as a proper authority figure, which would explain why his bossy attitude particularly annoyed him.
For more details on Fernald and the Captain's age, please refer to this article : (Link).
Although not traditional, the family was originally a happy one:
"I found something else," Violet said, handing her brother a crumpled square of paper. "Look." Klaus looked at what his sister had given him. It was a photograph, blurred and faded with four people, grouped together like a family. In the center of the photograph was a large man with a long mustache that was curved at the end like a pair of parentheses – Captain Widdershins, of course, although he looked much younger and a great deal happier than the children had ever seen him. He was laughing, and his arm was around someone the two Baudelaires recognized as the hook-handed man, although he was not hook-handed in the photograph – both of his hands were perfectly intact, one resting on the captain's shoulder, and the other pointing at whoever was taking the picture – and he was young enough to still be called a teenager, instead of a man. On the other side of the captain was a woman who was laughing as hard as the captain, and in her arms was a young infant with a tiny set of triangular glasses.
[The Grim Grotto, Chapter Twelve]
This does beg the question: who took the photograph and towards whom is Fernald pointing? Who’s this assumed friend of the Widdershins family? More on that later.
Then the questionable death of Mrs Widdershins took place:
"Phil!" Violet cried. "What on earth are you doing here?"
"He's the second of our crew of two!" the captain cried. "Aye! The original second in the crew of two was Fiona's mother, but she died in a manatee accident quite a few years ago."
"I'm not so sure it was an accident," Fiona said.
[The Grim Grotto, Chapter Two]
The Captain and Fernald seemed to get along well when Mrs. Widdershins was alive. Then the relationship changed.
"You?" said Olaf's henchman. "What happened to Widdershins?"
"He disappeared from the submarine," Fiona replied. "We don't know where he is."
"I don't care where he is," the hook-handed man sneered. "I couldn't care less about that mustached fool! He's the reason I joined Count Olaf in the first place! The captain was always shouting 'Aye! Aye! Aye!' and ordering me around! So I ran away and joined Olaf's acting troupe!"
"But Count Olaf is a terrible villain!" Fiona cried. "He has no regard for other people. He dreams up treacherous schemes, and lures others into becoming his cohorts!"
"Those are just the bad aspects of him," the hook-handed man said. "There are many good parts, as well. For instance, he has a wonderful laugh."
[The Grim Grotto, Chapter Ten]
It’s jarring that Fernald cites the Captain’s behavior as the main reason he joined Count Olaf’s troupe. Why would he suddenly resent his stepfather when he used to actually like him? In fact, he seems to think so little of him that he considers Olaf an upgrade. What made Fernald change his mind about his stepfather so quickly? There could be three explanations for this: either the Captain’s behavior changed dramatically after his wife’s death, or Fernald learned something about the Captain which redefined the relationship entirely. The third option is that Mrs. Widdershins’ death was so traumatic an ordeal that it severed any affection between Fernald and the Captain.
As one can imagine, it’s easy to posit that these three hypotheses could combine themselves. There are things about Mrs. Widdershins’ death which Fiona does not know and which severely damaged the bond between a stepfather and his stepson. A huge disagreement occurred over her untimely end, and feelings were hurt. Now there’s one legitimate reason for Fernald to be upset at the Captain: he’s lying about the true circumstances of his wife’s death. Fiona was already questioning the official version while she was devoted to V.F.D. and her stepdad, so it’s safe to assume that Fernald does not believe this story either.
Although Fernald's eventual defection clearly has much to do with what happened at Anwhistle Aquatics, it's clear that the death of Mrs Widdershins is equally important in the matter. Is it possible that the two events are linked? In fact, it's likely. The composition of the Queequeg's crew of two is especially revealing:
"Aye! The original second in the crew of two was Fiona's mother, but she died in a manatee accident quite a few years ago." [...] "Then we had Jacques!" the captain continued. "Aye, and then what's-his-name, Jacques's brother, and then a dreadful woman who turned out to be a spy, and finally we have Phil! Although I like to call him Cookie! I don't know why!"
[The Grim Grotto, Chapter Two]
Now there is someone apparently missing from this list: Fernald. After his mother died, it would seem likely that her son would replace her as the second-in-command in the crew of two. Fernald remembers the Captain bossing him around. It's possible that Fernald was indeed a member of the Crew of Two and that the Captain is omitting him out of shame, but that’s unlikely. You see, Fiona is in the room with the Captain while he is listing these people. If he had “forgotten” to name Fernald, she would have corrected him immediately. But no, the list appears to be correct in Fiona’s own assessment. For some reason, Fernald was NEVER considered a member of the Crew of Two, even though he was old enough and had the qualifications. The Captain immediately replaced Mrs. Widdershins with Jacques Snicket.
And that’s really telling, because we know Jacques was occupying this position at a time where Fernald was already part of Count Olaf’s troupe. Here’s a passage from a letter which Jacques sent Lemony from the Queequeg. At that point in time, Fernald was probably starring in Olaf’s play “One last warning to those who try to stand in my way”:
Under normal circumstances, new volunteers like ourselves would not receive disguise training until our years of apprenticeship were finished, but we have not been under normal circumstances for quite some time. For instance, currently I am under sixty feet of water, rather than under normal circumstances.
[Lemony Snicket’s un-Authorized Autobiography, p.96]
The two actresses playing the Defenders of Liberty now have their faces painted a ghastly white color, and the part of the Little Snicket Lad, once played by the young actor pictured here, has been replaced by a sinister-looking person far too old for the part (also pictured here).
[Lemony Snicket’s un-Authorized Autobiography, p.78]
[NB: The picture in question depicts a young man in a fedora who looks eerily similar to the way Brett Helquist draws Fernald in the official illustrations of the original editions]
And that means something very significant: that Fernald left the Queequeg a short time after his mother’s death, to the point that he was never considered a second in the Crew of Two. As we know, Fiona is barely older than Violet even though she was born before Lemony’s and Beatrice’s break-up (that is, before Jacques became a secon-in-command in the Crew of Two).
So we've established, chronologically, that the fire at Anwhistle Aquatics and Mrs. Widdershins' demise are part of the same debacle. Is there a reason for a second in the Queequeg's Crew of Two to be involved in Gregor Anwhistle's research?
Potentially yes. Anwhistle Aquatics, for some reason, was built upon a subterranean grotto which could only be accessed by deep-sea divers. You'd need a submarine to get there. The grotto was arranged to conceal specimens of the Medusoid Mycellium securely: the spores can't travel by water, so making sure that only deep-sea divers can access it makes complete sense. Shortly after they visit the grotto, Violet and Klaus are able to safely contain the infestation in a submarine helmet. It's probably the only way safe for the fungus to be handled. Therefore, in order to make his experiments on the Medusoid Mycelium securely, Gregor Anwhistle would need constant access to a V.F.D. submarine and its crew, making long trips from the research center to the grotto.
This is why we need to understand what truly happened during the fire. The Queequeg's crew didn't just have access to Gregor Anwhistle's research center: they were heavily involved in it. They knew exactly what he was doing and the Widdershins family perhaps even had a hand in it.
So let's imagine that Mrs Widdershins wasn't just a submarine operator. She was a scholar. She was one of Gregor Anwhistle's assistants, and, more importantly, one of his accomplices. Gregor Anwhistle took the photograph of the Widdershins family.
"I think the ruby ring is very in," Esmé purred. "It would look wonderful with my flame-imitating dress."
"That was my mother's," Fiona said quietly.
"She would have wanted me to have it Esmé said quickly. "We were close friends at school."
[The Grim Grotto, Chapter Thirteen]
And if you think that's doubtful, ask yourself this: why is Fiona a mycologist? And why does the Queequeg's library contains so much information on mushrooms in general and the Medusoid Mycellium in particular? This library is a legacy of Mrs Widdershin's works on the Medusoid Mycellium. She knew everything. And that is exactly why Kit Snicket targetted the Widdershins family when she reached a disagreement with Gregor Anwhistle. Kit definitely had Gregor Anwhistle murdered. The reason she specifically asked the Captain and Fernald to commit this crime is because they had easy access to Anwhistle Aquatics (through their submarine) and to Gregor (through Mrs Widdershins).
Violet smiled. "Precisely," she said. "A Hobson 's choice is something that's not a choice at all. It's an expression our mother used to use. She'd say, 'I'll give you a Hobson's choice, Violet – you can clean your room or I will stand in the doorway and sing your least favorite song over and over.' "
Fiona grinned. "What was your least favorite song?" she asked.
" 'Row, Row, Row Your Boat,' " Violet said. "I hate the part about life being but a dream."
"She'd offer me the Hobson's choice of doing the dishes or reading the poetry of Edgar Guest," Klaus said. "He's my absolute least favorite poet."
"Bath or pink dress," Sunny said.
"Did your mother always joke around like that?" Fiona asked. "Mine used to get awfully mad if I didn't clean my room."
"Our mother would get mad, too," Klaus said. "Remember, Violet, when we left the window of the library open, and that night it rained?"
[The Grim Grotto, Chapter Seven]
We may never know what truly happened at Anwhistle Aquatics that terrible night. We can only makes hypotheses. But here's our proposition.
Kit Snicket eventually realized Gregor wouldn't listen to reason. In order to stop his bioweapon project, she needed to come up with a way to burn down Anwhistle Aquatics and murder Gregor. That way, the research would be lost forever. Kit then reached out to the Captain, who had both access to the research center and a wife who was part of Gregor's inner circle. The Captain accepted the mission and even enlisted the help of his stepson. He told Fernald that his mother was under a corrupting influence and that she had been brainwashed by Gregor. She needed to be saved from herself.
In the final analysis – a phrase which here means "after much thought, and some debate with my colleagues" – Captain Widdershins was wrong about a great many things. He was wrong about his personal philosophy, because there are plenty of times when one should hesitate. He was wrong about his wife's death, because as Fiona suspected, Mrs. Widdershins did not die in a manatee accident. He was wrong to call Phil "Cookie" when it is more polite to call someone by their proper name, and he was wrong to abandon the Queequeg, no matter what he heard from the woman who came to fetch him. Captain Widdershins was wrong to trust his stepson for so many years, and wrong to participate in the destruction of Anwhistle Aquatics, and he was wrong to insist, as he did so many years ago, that a story in The Daily Punctilio was completely true, and to show this article to so many volunteers, including the Baudelaire parents, the Snicket siblings, and the woman I happened to love. But Captain Widdershins was right about one thing. He was right to say that there are secrets in this world too terrible for young people to know, for the simple reason that there are secrets in this world too terrible for anyone to know, whether they are as young as Sunny Baudelaire or as old as Gregor Anwhistle, secrets so terrible that they ought to be kept secret, which is probably how the secrets became secrets in the first place, and one of those secrets is the long, strange shape the Baudelaire orphans saw, first on the Queequeg's sonar, and then as they held the porthole in place and stared out into the waters of the sea.
[The Grim Grotto, Chapter Thirteen]
The Captain betrayed his wife's confidence by sneaking into the research center to set a fire while Fernald murdered Gregor. Then they retreated to the safety of the Queequeg. However things didn't go as planned. Instead of fleeing the flames, Mrs Widdershins threw herself into them. She was desperately trying to save Gregor's research in order to duplicate it. In spite of her family's insistence, she never came back to the Queequeg. She died in the fire. Fernald and the Captain agreed to never tell Fiona what had transpired.
"Our stepfather knew Jacques Snicket," Fiona said. "He was a good man, but Count Olaf murdered him. Are you a murderer, too? Did you kill Gregor Anwhistle?"
In grim silence, the hook-handed man held his hooks in front of the children.
"The last time you saw me," he said to Fiona, "I had two hands, instead of hooks. Our stepfather probably didn't tell you what happened to me – he always said there were secrets in this world too terrible for young people to know. What a fool!"
"Our stepfather isn't a fool," Fiona said. "He's a noble man. Aye!"
"People aren't either wicked or noble," the hook-handed man said. "They're like chef's salads, with good things and bad things chopped and mixed together in a vinaigrette of confusion and conflict."
[The Grim Grotto, Chapter Ten]
This is why the relationship between the Captain and Fernald never recovered. Fernald could never forgive the Captain for starting the fire which killed his mother. Although the Captain certainly never intended for Mrs Widdershins to die, his responsability in his wife's death was inevitable.
Interestingly this tragic death would explain A LOT about Fernald's decision to join Olaf's troupe. After all, one can understand why killing Gregor Anwhistle was necessary. It's morally ambiguous, for sure, but it's not a good enough reason to join a criminal gang. But if you add the trauma of losing a mother on top of this shady assassination, things start to make more sense. You see, Fernald and Olaf had a big thing in common: both lost parental figures in a shady assassination scheme orchestrated by members of V.F.D. The Baudelaire parents killed Olaf's parents at a opera house. Count Olaf used this connection, this proximity in background, to warp Fernald's feelings. He turned him against his stepfather and V.F.D. in general by sharing some aspects of his own backstory.
"Fiona!" the hook-handed man cried. "Is it really you?"
"Aye," the mycologist said, taking off her triangular glasses to wipe away her tears. "I never thought I would see you again, Fernald. What happened to your hands?"
"Never mind that," the hook-handed man said quickly. "Why are you here? Did you join Count Olaf, too?"
[The Grim Grotto, Chapter Ten]
It would also explain why Fernald is reluctant to share some aspects of his past with Fiona (such as the way he lost his hands, for example) even though she knows about the Anwhistle fire. Although she's begun to scratch the surface, there are simply aspects of the murder which are worse than she thinks and which Fernald is not ready to divulge. Indeed Fiona could very much blame both Fernald and the Captain for her mother's death. Her stepbrother fears that. It's likely that the reason he lost his hands has as much to do with their mother than it has to do with Gregor. If we had to guess, we'd say he burned his hands trying to rescue his mother at Anwhistle Aquatics.
What makes this theory credible is the cover story which the Captain used to explain away his wife's disappearance. More specifically, it involves a manatee. And a manatee shows up in another dubious disappearance story :
"Have you lived your whole life on this island?" Klaus said.
"Yes," Friday said. "My mother and father took an ocean cruise while she was pregnant, and ran into a terrible storm. My father was devoured by a manatee, and my mother was washed ashore when she was pregnant with me. You'll meet her soon. Now please hurry up and change."
[The End, Chapter Three]
"Oh, Ish," he said, his eyes shining bright, "I told you many years ago that I would triumph over you someday, and at last that day has arrived. My associate with the weekday for a name told me that you were still hiding out on this island, and–"
"Thursday," Mrs. Caliban said.
Olaf frowned, and blinked at the freckled woman. "No," he said.
"Monday. She was trying to blackmail an old man who was involved in a political scandal."
[The End, Chapter Eleven]
However this story is later proven to be untrue: Miranda Caliban and her husband were on opposite side of the schism which divided the island. Thursday left with the Baudelaire parents, while Miranda remained on the Island with their daughter. She made up the entire story. It's a little too much of a coincidence that two different disappareance cover-up stories share the exact same weird detail about a manatee.
"Have you been here before?" Violet asked. "No," Kit said, "but I've heard about this place. My associates have told me stories of its mechanical wonders, its enormous library, and the gourmet meals the islanders prepare. Why, the day before I met you, Baudelaires, I shared Turkish coffee with an associate who was saying that he'd never had better Oysters Rockefeller than during his time on the island. You must be having a wonderful time here."
"Janiceps," Sunny said, restating an earlier opinion.
"I think this place has changed since your associate was here," said Klaus.
"That's probably true," Kit said thoughtfully. "Thursday did say that the colony had suffered a schism, just as V.F.D. did."
"Another schism?" Violet asked.
"Countless schisms have divided the world over the years," Kit replied in the darkness. "Do you think the history of V.F.D. is the only story in the world? Bu: let's not talk of the past, Baudelaires. Tell me how you made your way to these shores."
[The End, Chapter Eight]
"Occasionally someone leaves," Ishmael said, and looked down at the Incredibly Deadly Viper, who gave him a brief hiss. "Some time ago, two women sailed off with this very snake, and a few years later, a man named Thursday left with a few comrades."
"So Thursday is alive," Klaus said, "just like Kit said."
"Yes," Ishmael admitted, "but at my suggestion, Miranda told her daughter that he died in a storm, so she wouldn't worry about the schism that divided her parents."
"Electra," Sunny said, which meant "A family shouldn't keep such terrible secrets," but Ishmael did not ask for a translation.
"Except for those troublemakers," he said, "everyone has stayed here. And why shouldn't they? Most of the castaways are orphans, like me, and like you.
[The End, Chapter Ten]
At this point, it seems more likely to be one of those memetic code phrases which V.F.D. likes to use. "Eaten by a manatee" is a slang term that adult volunteers use to hide something horrible from their children. So what does "eaten by a manatee" mean, exactly? Surely it doesn't mean "dead", as Thursday was clearly alive and well when Miranda started spouting those lies. "Eaten by a manatee" is not used to cover up deaths, it's used to cover up betrayals. Instead of telling young volunteers that someone went to the other side of the schism, parents tell them the person was "eaten by a manatee". It's the ultimate way to sever the parental bond. It's common to tell someone who betrayed you: "you're dead to me". V.F.D. takes the expression to its literal extreme.
So when the Captain affirms that his wife was eaten by a manatee, he means that she actually betrayed the organization. It's not obvious because she didn't go to Olaf's side of the schism (as Fernald did later) but rather to the other side of another schism: that is, she chose Gregor's side in his feud against Kit Snicket. There are indeed multiple schisms within the history of V.F.D. The schism between the "noble" and "villainous" side is the first one and the most important one, but the "noble" side suffered other disagreements: Ishmael vs the Baudelaire parents on the Island, Kit vs Gregor, Lemony vs his mentors in "All The Wrong Questions", Dashiell and Theodora vs Gifford and Ghede, etc.
And on that topic, the newspaper clipping which Violet Baudelaire found in the grotto is especially revealing:
" 'VERIFYING FERNALD'S DEFECTION,' " she said, reading the headline out loud, and then continued by reading the byline, a word which here means "name of the person who wrote the article."
"By Jacques Snicket. It has now been confirmed that the fire that destroyed Anwhistle Aquatics, and took the life of famed ichnologist Gregor Anwhistle, was set by Fernald Widdershins, the son of the captain of the Queequeg submarine. The Widdershins family's participation in a recent schism has raised several questions regarding..." Violet looked up and met the glare of Olaf's henchman. "The rest of the article is blurry," she said, "but the truth is clear. You defected – you abandoned V.F.D. and joined up with Olaf!"
[The Grim Grotto; Chapter Ten]
Violet missed the point of the article entirely. The text clearly mentions a “recent” schism; that is, not the original one which happened while Dewey and Kit were about four years old and which split the organization into two. The “recent” schism is clearly the one which divided the “noble” volunteers into Gregor’s followers and Gregor’s adversaries. And note that this is the “Widdershins family” who is involved in that particular schism; not just Fernald.
"You should have seen the fire," he said quietly. "From a distance, it looked like an enormous black plume of smoke, rising straight out of the water. It was like the entire sea was burning down."
"You must have been proud of your handiwork," Fiona said bitterly.
"Proud?" the hook-handed man said. "It was the worst day of my life. That plume of smoke was the saddest thing I ever saw." He speared the newspaper with his other hook and ripped the article into shreds. "The Punctilio got everything wrong," he said. "Captain Widdershins isn't my father. Widdershins isn't my last name. And there's much more to the fire than that. You should know that the Daily Punctilio doesn't tell the whole story, Baudelaires. Just as the poison of a deadly fungus can be the source of some wonderful medicines, someone like Jacques Snicket can do something villainous, and someone like Count Olaf can do something noble. Even your parents –"
[The Grim Grotto; Chapter Ten]
As Fernald warns the Baudelaire orphans, the newspaper clipping is propaganda meant to disguise the volunteer’s more questionable behaviours. It purposedly fails to mention that the Captain helped start the destruction of Anwhistle Aquatics, for example. So the author clearly wants us to question the official narrative. And for some reason, as Fernald starts defending his own version of the events, he starts spewing unsavory revelations about the Baudelaire parents. Why would he do that? Is he projecting his own family issues on the Baudelaire legacy? That would be fitting. We already know that the Captain did morally questionable things for V.F.D. It’s not a big leap to assume that his wife committed some crimes of her own.
