A Series of Unfortunate Events: The Miserable Mill Read Online Free PDF

give you three a good deal as well. Now, I heard about what happened to your parents, which is really too bad. And I heard all about this Count Olaf fellow, who sounds like quite a jerk, and those odd-looking people who work for him. So when Mr. Poe gave me a call, I worked out a deal. The deal is this: I will try to make sure that Count Olaf and his associates never go anywhere near you, and you will work in my lumbermill until you come of age and get all that money. Is that a fair deal?" The Baudelaire orphans did not answer this question, because it seemed to them the answer was obvious. A fair deal, as everyone knows, is when both people give something of more or less equal value. If you were bored with playing with your chemistry set, and you gave it to your brother in exchange for his dollhouse, that would be a fair deal. If someone offered to smuggle me out of the country in her sailboat, in exchange for free tickets to an ice show, that would be a fair deal. But working for years in a lumbermill in exchange for the owner's trying to keep Count Olaf away is an enormously unfair deal, and the three youngsters knew it. "Oh, sir," Charles said, smiling nervously at the Baudelaires. "You can't be serious. A lumbermill is no place for small children to work." "Of course it is," the man said. He reached a hand up into his cloud to scratch an itch somewhere on his face. "It will teach them responsibility. It will teach them the value of work. And it will teach them how to make flat wooden boards out of trees." "Well, you probably know best," Charles said, shrugging. "But we could read about all of those things," Klaus said, "and learn about them that way." "That's true, sir," Charles said. "They could study in the library. They seem very well behaved, and I'm sure they would cause no trouble." "Your library!" the man said sharply. "What nonsense! Don't listen to Charles, you children. My partner has insisted that we create a library for the employees at the mill, and so I let him. But it is no substitute for hard work." "Please, sir," Violet pleaded. "At least let our little sister stay in the dormitory. She's only a baby." "I have offered you a very good deal," the man said. "As long as you stay within the gates of the Lucky Smells Lumbermill, this Count Olaf will not come near you. In addition, I'm giving you a place to sleep, a nice hot dinner, and a stick of gum for lunch. And all you have to do in return is a few years' work. That sounds like a pretty good deal to me. Well, it was nice to meet you. Unless you have any questions, I'll be going now. My pizza is getting cold, and if there's one thing I hate it's a cold lunch." "I have a question," Violet said, although the truth of the matter is she had many questions. Most of them began with the phrase "How can you." "How can you force small children to work in a lumbermill?" was one of them. "How can you treat us so horridly, after all we've been through?" was another. And then there was "How can you pay your employees in coupons instead of money?" and "How can you feed us only gum for lunch?" and "How can you stand to have a cloud of smoke covering your face?" But none of these seemed like questions that were proper to ask, at least not out loud. So Violet looked her new guardian right in his cloud and asked, "What is your name?" "Never mind what my name is," the man said. "No one can pronounce it anyway. Just call me Sir." "I'll show the children to the door, Sir," Charles said quickly, and with a wave of his hand, the owner of the Lucky Smells Lumber-mill was gone. Charles waited nervously for a moment, to make sure Sir was far enough away. Then he leaned in to the children and handed them the peach. "Never mind what he said about your already having your lunch," he said. "Have this peach." "Oh, thank you," Klaus cried, and hurriedly divided the peach among himself and his siblings, giving the biggest piece to Sunny because she hadn't even had her gum. The Baudelaire