A Series of Unfortunate Events: The Hostile Hospital by Lemony Snicket Page B

along the lines of "I think the H aisle might be a good place to look for the file," but this time she meant something more along the lines of "Be quiet! I think I hear someone walking into the anteroom of the Library of Records." Sure enough, when the Baudelaires listened closely, they could hear the clomping of some odd, teetering footsteps, as if someone were walking on very thin stilts. The footsteps grew closer and closer, and then stopped, and as the three children held their breath, the door to the Library rattled as someone tried to open the door. "Maybe it's Hal," Violet whispered, "trying to unlock the door with a paper clip." "Maybe it's Mattathias," Klaus whispered, "looking for us." "Janitor," Sunny whispered. "Well, whoever it is," Violet said, "we'd better hurry to the J aisle." The Baudelaires tiptoed across the low-ceilinged room to the J aisle, and walked down it quickly, reading the labels of the file cabinets. "Jabberwocky to Jackal." "Jacket to Jack-o'-Lanterns." "Nersai." "That's it!" Klaus whispered. "Jacques will be in Jackline to Jacutinga." "We hope," Violet said, as the door rattled again. Klaus hurried to find the right key, and the children opened the top drawer to look for Jacques. As Violet knew, jackline is a kind of rope used in sailing, and as Klaus knew, jacutinga is a sort of gold-bearing iron ore found in Brazil, and once again there were plenty of files between these two, but although the children found information on jack-o'-lanterns, Jack Russell terriers, and Jacobean drama, there was no file marked "Jacques." "Fire!" Klaus whispered, shutting and locking the file cabinet. "Let's head to the F aisle." "And hurry," Violet said. "It sounds like the person in the anteroom is picking the lock." It was true. The Baudelaires paused for a moment and heard a muffled scratching from behind the door, as if something long and thin were being stuck in the keyhole to try to unlock the lock. Violet knew, from when she and her siblings lived with Uncle Monty, that a lockpick can often take a long time to work properly, even if it has been made by one of the world's greatest inventors, but the children nonetheless moved to the F aisle as fast as their tiptoes could carry them. "Fabian to Fact." "Fainting to Fangs." "Fatalism to Faulkner." "Fear to Fermat." "Ficus to Filth." "Fin de Siecle to Fissle--here it is!" Once more, the Baudelaires hurried to find the proper key, and then the proper drawer and then the proper file. "Fin de siecle" is a term for a time in history when a century is drawing to a close, and "fissle" is a fancy word for a rustling noise, like the one that continued to come from behind the locked door as the children looked frantically for Fire. But the papers went right from Finland to Firmament, without a single word on Fire in between. "What will we do?" Violet asked, as the door began to rattle again. "Where else could the file be?" "Let's try to think," Klaus said. "What did Hal say about the file? We know it has to do with Jacques Snicket, and with fire." "Prem!" Sunny said, which meant "But we looked under Snicket, Jacques, and Fire already." "There must be something else," Violet said. "We have to find this file. It has crucial information about Jacques Snicket and V.F.D." "And about us," Klaus said. "Don't forget that." The three children looked at one another. "Baudelaire!" Sunny whispered. Without another word, the orphans ran to the B aisle, and hurried past Babbitt to Babylon, Bacteria to Ballet, and Bamboo to Baskerville, stopping at Bat Mitzvah to Bavarian Cream. As the door continued to fissle behind them, Klaus tried nine keys in a row before finally opening the cabinet, and there, between the Jewish coming-of-age ceremony for young women, and the delicious filling of certain doughnuts, the children found a folder marked "Baudelaire." "It's here," Klaus said, taking it out of the drawer with trembling hands. "What does it say? What does it say?" Violet asked in