Partial Foods must have once been a grand grocery store. It was not a grand grocery store for the duration of my stay in Stain’d-by-the-Sea. It looked like a grand grocery store that someone had thrown down the stairs. To enter the store, you walked through a pair of enormous glass doors with brass handles carved with images of fresh fruit and vegetables, but the doors were badly cracked and difficult to open. There were wide shelves and deep bins ready to hold enormous mountains of delicious food, but at least half of them were empty, and the rest held food that was unripe or stale, mushy or brittle, bruised or encased in too many layers of plastic, or something I didn’t like. The place was almost enormous and almost deserted, so it took some time wandering through the big, meager aisles until we found someone to talk to. The owner of Partial Foods was a woman who could look both very angry and very bored at the same time and in fact was doing so when we found her. On a stained smock, she was wearing a peeled name tag that read POLLY PARTIAL.
“Good day,” Theodora said to her.
“Who are you?” Polly Partial asked. She was standing next to a basket of honeydew melons. I do not like honeydew melons. I do not see the point of them.
“My name is S. Theodora Markson, and this is my apprentice,” Theodora said, and took the flyer from my hand. “We’re looking for this person.”
Polly Partial peered at the frowning girl. “That’s Cleo Knight,” she said, pointing to the words printed above the photograph.
“Yes, we know,” Theodora said. “I was wondering if you had seen her recently.”
“Hard to say,” Polly Partial said. “She looks like any other runaway girl, even if she is from a wealthy family. Is there a reward? With enough money, I could retire and devote myself to raising minks.”
The Knights had not said anything about a reward, but Theodora did not say anything about there not being one. “Only if you help us,” she said. “Have you seen this girl?”
The shopkeeper squinted at the flyer. “Yesterday morning,” she said, “about ten thirty. She hurried in here to buy that silly breakfast food she likes.” She led us down an aisle and pulled down a box for us to see. It was Schoenberg Cereal, the brand Zada and Zora had mentioned. TWELVE WHOLESOME GRAINS COMBINED IN A STRICT SEQUENCE, the label read. I could not imagine who would eat such a thing in a kitchen where fresh-baked cinnamon rolls could be had.
“The Knights are the only ones who buy it,” Polly Partial said, “although usually it’s one of those twin servants who does the shopping.”
“Did she say anything?” Theodora asked.
“She said thanks,” Polly said, “and then she said she was running away to join the circus.”
My chaperone scratched her hair. “The circus?”
“That’s what she said,” said Polly Partial.
“Aha! ” Theodora cried.
“Then she walked outside and got into a taxicab and went off.”
“Aha!”
I didn’t see anything to aha! about, but I’ve never been an aha! sort of person. “What was she wearing?” I asked.
Theodora gave me an exasperated sigh. “What did I tell you about your interest in fashion?” she said. “A young man who asks too much about clothing will find himself the subject of unflattering rumors.”
“You can see for yourself what she was wearing,” Polly Partial said, and handed me back the flyer. “The Knight family always wears black and white, to honor the family business and the paper it’s scrawled on. I remember the hat surprised me. It wasn’t black and it wasn’t white. It looked French.
“You’ve been very helpful, Ms Partial,” Theodora said. “I’m sure the Knights will thank you.”
“Of course, everything looks French when you stop to think about it.”
“You’re a very reliable witness,” I couldn’t help saying, and Polly Partial looked at me like she had never seen me before.
“Off with you,” she said. “I have canned smelt to stack.”
We left the store and stood in the street. Overhead the clouds talked with the wind about whether or not it should rain again. “Well, I’d say the case is solved,” Theodora said, and her hair ruffled in agreement. “Dr Flammarion was right. There is no crime. The Knight girl ran away from home. She drove into town, bought the supplies she needed, and took a taxi to join the circus. Do you have any questions?”
I had so many questions that they fought for a minute in my head over which one got to ask itself first. “Why didn’t she need more than cereal?” was the winner. “Why didn’t she leave a note?” was in second place, followed by “Why wouldn’t she run away in her car?”
Theodora waved her gloved hand at me like I was a bad smell. “Be sensible,” she said. “There is no indication of a crime. I’m going to write the report myself so I get full credit for solving the case.”
“We should investigate further,” I said.
“That’s what you said last time,” Theodora reminded me, putting on her helmet and opening the door of the roadster, “and the only thing you investigated was that silly girl. Girls and fashion, Snicket. You are too easily distracted.”
I felt myself blush. It is not a feeling I like. My ears get hot, and my face gets red, and it is no way to win an argument. “I’m going to walk back to the Lost Arms if you don’t mind,” I said. “It’s only a couple of blocks.”
“By all means,” Theodora said. “You’d only be a fifth wheel if you hung around our headquarters while I wrote my report. In fact, Snicket, why don’t you make yourself scarce until dinnertime?”
She shut the door of the roadster and drove off. I waited for the sound of the engine to fade, and then spent another minute looking once more at the Dilemma. I even put out a hand and rested my palm on one of the horns. “A fifth wheel” is an expression meaning someone who is of no help at all, the way a fifth wheel on an automobile doesn’t make it go any faster. It made no sense that Miss Knight would drive to Partial Foods and then take a taxi someplace else. She would never need a taxi at all, with an automobile like that. But she did. But she wouldn’t. But she did. Stop arguing with yourself, Snicket. You can’t win. I looked down at the ground and wished I’d looked there earlier. One of the tires of the Dilemma was deflated, so instead of looking round, it looked like an old potato. You couldn’t drive far like that. A Dilemma with a flat tire was a reminder that no matter how splendid and shiny the world might be, it could be spoiled by something you didn’t notice until the damage had been done.
I leaned down to get a closer look and found myself staring at a needle. It was the kind of needle doctors like to stick you with, and it was sticking out of the flattened tire.
“Hello,” I said to the needle.
The needle didn’t say anything, and neither did anybody else. I slipped the needle out of the tire. It didn’t smell like anything, but you wouldn’t have to inject a tire with laudanum. Flattening it would be enough. Carefully, so I wouldn’t get punctured, I put the needle in my pocket and stood up and looked this way and that. No one was around. Like most blocks in town, this block was nothing but boarded-up shops and homes and flyers with Cleo Knight staring back at me. But there was also someplace I’d been meaning to visit since my arrival in town. Why not now? I thought.
Hungry’s was a small and narrow place, and a large and wide woman was standing just inside the doors, polishing the counter with a rag. “Good afternoon,” she said.
I said the