The Reptile Room

Back in the Reptile Room, Mr. Poe asks Stephano to explain why he lied about his level of snake knowledge. Stephano says he was being bashful before. Klaus says Stephano is a murderer, but Stephano says they don’t have any proof. At that moment, Violet appears with the items she found in Stephano’s suitcase: the syringe/needle, an empty vial of snake venom, and makeup.

Stephano objects that his suitcase was locked and the children shouldn’t have tampered with it. Mr. Poe says “nice girls” should not possess knowledge about lockpicking; Klaus retorts that Violet is nice and also possesses knowledge of many topics.

Klaus explains why the Mamba du Mal couldn’t have been the culprit: Uncle Monty’s body was pale, with no bruises. Violet then presents the evidence from the suitcase, demonstrating how Stephano must have drained the empty vial of snake poison into Monty’s body using the syringe and poked a second hole to resemble a snakebite. The boat tickets and Uncle Monty’s identification papers were also in Stephano’s bag, proving he was planning to pose as Uncle Monty and take the children to Peru. Lastly, Violet explains that the makeup was probably used to hide Count Olaf’s tattoo.