Ten-year-old Varvara Smorodina is a real child prodigy, an unusually smart and well-read girl. She knows everything about criminology and dreams of becoming an outstanding detective like her grandfather. "Curious!" - Varvara's signature word. Arriving for the summer to visit her grandparents in the village of Verkhovoy, Varya encounters a mass of mysterious crimes and takes up investigations together with her new friend, a simple-minded rural boy Vasya. At the very beginning, Varvara will have to deal with a mysterious scarecrow that comes to life at night and frightens local children.