There was a town, and there was a librarian, and there was a fire. While I was in town I was hired to investigate this fire, and I thought the librarian could help me bring a villain to justice. I was almost thirteen and I was wrong. I was wrong about all of it. I should have asked the question, "Why would someone destroy one building when they really wanted to destroy another?" Instead, I asked the wrong questions-four wrong questions, more or less. This is the account of the third. Young apprentice Lemony Snicket is trying to smoke out an arsonist but soon finds himself enveloped in a thickening haze of mystery that has settled upon the town of Stain'd-by-the-Sea. Who is setting the fires? What secrets are hidden in the Department of Education? Why are so many schoolchildren in danger? Is it all the work of the notorious villain Hangfire? How could you even ask that? Maybe you should be in school.