Olive's mouth gaped wider than the hole in the wall. "Y'all mean someone in the men's room was watching me un-powder my nose?!"

"Not only that," I said curtly. "But watching and waiting to take the most unglamorous shot of you!"

Olive's eye twitched and her lip trembled. "But why would someone have it out for me? It's not like I'm the daughter of a famous tycoon with wealth, power and fame? Oh wait I am, duh!"

I rolled my eyes and leaned in towards the hole in the wall. Our peeping tom friend had left a hole big enough to fit a camera through. He clearly wanted a big scoop at Olive's dainty snoz.

"What are y'all looking for, Jacky?" Olive asked leaning in too.

The wooden crack in the wall seemed to be lubricated with some kind of strange substance. It was brown and sticky to touch. Seems our friend had left some of his own secrets crawling out of the woodwork.

I raised an eyebrow and sniffed it. "I'm so close to a lead, I can practically taste it…" I muttered

Olive quickly muttered. "What are you doing–"

I crammed a handful of the liquid in my mouth.

"Jacky you're crazy!!!" Olive said holding her hands to her face.

It tasted sweet and viscous. Sweet like the lips of the last person I kissed. The person who pulverized my heart and ground it into a fine power.

Yum," I replied. "I guessed right. This is syrup of the sapwood variety. Ideal for pancakes, but crimes, now that's another story. When they made off with that wretched photo of you, Olive, the culprit had sticky fingers."

Olive's mouth hung open stupidly. "I still can't get over that you put that in yer mouth, Jacky. Y'all are crazy."

"Like a fox," I winked. "Now let's get to the bottom of this," I answered. "If you recall, the Crystal Swan was serving Dreakfast last night."

"Ah yes," Olive replied. "That sweet combination of Breakfast and Dinner. I know that one, Jacky."

"Precisely," I replied with a knowing smile. "So let's pay the caterer a visit!"

"The caterer?" Olive gasped. "You mean Mable's Syrup and Pastries?"

"Yes, indeed," I said with a composed look on my face. "I've been tossing ideas at the wall and it seems something finally stuck!"

PAL discreeted parked my hovering carriage between two transport trucks. Maintenance men carried boxes of syrup jugs, carefully lining them up from front to back. Our peeping tom friend clearly had no problem drizzling syrup all the way to the truth. And it was about to be breakfast time.

The brisk chill nipped us on the frozen sidewalks. My metal leg, none to stealthy, clanked along the pavement and Olive followed close behind, trying not to scuff up her shoes.

"Why'd we come here?" Olive asked from behind. "I'm not sure my daddy would like me at a competitor's restaurant. I already feel guilty for stepping in here for my daily begniets!"

"Nothing wrong with a bit of friendly competition," I said. "Except when it goes south."

We stood outside a cozy, cafe resturant with an older aesthetic–an aesthetic that time forgot in its prolonged dementia. Inside the building were filled with tables covered in the red-and-white patchwork quilts of picnic blankets and walls were painted verdant green with blue skies and yellow dafodils–an idyllic world that never existed outside the smog choked city of Noirberg. This was an apt setting for me, because this whole mystery was quite a picnic

I knocked on the door and was greeted by an older, grey haired woman in a frumpy but fitting yellow dress and circular daisy shaped earrings. In a giddy, sugary voice like the inside of a honey comb, the woman greeted us. "Welcome to Mable's Syrup and Pastries, the sweetest restaurant in the south side of town. I'm Mabeline the owner. How may I help you, dears?"

I inhaled, summoning as much air as I could, but she cut me off. "Though I must say, you girls missed breakfast a few hours ago."

"Oh we're not hungry for breakfast," I said. "Only just desserts."

My metal leg stomped forward, driving the old woman back. "What do you want sweetheart?!" Mabeline exclaimed, shivering. "I'm nothin' but a sweet old lady running a humble shop."

"As sweet as poisoned honey," I answered. "You did cater to the Crystal Swan last night, didn't you?"

"Why yes, I–"

"Because," I said, cutting her off, "when you catered for the Crystal Swan, you had an ulterior motive. You wished to cater the doom of your competitor, Moe's Lasses, owned by this girl's father."

Mabeline's eyes shot open, her scalera cracked with red lines. I guess she wasn't caught red handed, but rather, red eyed.

"Big Daddy Sutherland is the most ruthless business man in town…" I said "and I can attest, I'm friends with his daughter and he even treats that like a business deal."

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Olive's shoulders slumped in agreement. I nodded. "I can guarentee you that he treats his business rivals even worse, and if a hostile takeover wasn't in your future, then it was bankruptcy."

Mabel's voice wobbled. "And what if that's true. What's it to you?"

"Well," I said. "I don't run a small business. But if I did, I wouldn't want either of those things to happen. So, what's the only thing left to do against a big business titan? Play dirty."

Mabel took a step back as I advanced again, my metal leg driving her further away. "You knew that Sutherland's daughter, who is a bit of an airhead, was going to be at the Crystal Swan. And you are well aware of her fondness for powdery pastries. She stops in here every day, right?"

"Don't deny it," Olive said with a wide grin. Your begniets make me say Ben-yay!"

"So…" I said. "You offered to cater at the momentous event in an attempt to catch her with a powdered nose… To ensure your success, you even hired a handyman to modify the bathrooms so you could photograph her up close and personal!"

Sweat poured down Mabel's forehead, glistening and soaking it like sugar water. She gasped loudly. Was an admission of guilt in her future, or merely an asthma attack?

"You did just that!" I said with a wink. "And you sold the photo to the highest bidder!"

I was so afraid we were gonna spook the old lady into an early death, but instead, she snarled. "So what if I did?! You told me the exact reason why I would do such a thing. But that matters not! For blowing my cover…I'm gonna blow you away!"

Mabel produced a revolver from her apron and pointed it directly at me.

"Is that a gun?" I said with a calm swagger. "Or are you happy to see me?"

"Why aren't you scared…honey?" the old woman growled, her hands trembling.

"Because that's my job," I said. "And if a criminal points a gun at me, that means I'm doing a good job."

I narrowed my eyes. "Now it all boils down to this question: are you ready to kill me and throw your life away…or come clean?"

Mabel's eyes bulged. I had a poker face as steely as my iron leg itself.

"Well then," Mabel said. "I'll shoot the child who brought me to this instead."

She turned the gun on Olive. "Oh good lord above!" The southcity belle screamed.

A wry smile curled on my lips. With a roundhouse kick, I sent the gun flying out of her shaking hands. It clattered to the floor. I threw a follow-up punch and sent the old woman tumbling to the floor.

"Thanks for being target practice, Olive," I said with a grin. "Again…"

Olive, looking extremely frazzled, brushed the sweat off her face. "Everytime I work with y'all, Jacky, someone always wants to fry me like chicken!"

Lying on the ground, Mabel looked defeated and deflated.

"Are you surprised that I did what I did, dears?" the old woman pathetically laughed. " I'm quite surprised, I haven't seen this kind of sleuthing in a racoon's age."

"No," I replied. "This whole scheme was child's play. And you ruined an innocent person's life in the process."

"She's not innocent," Mabel exclaimed pointing at Olive. "She's rich and powerful!"

"What?! I am innocent, y'all," Olive remarked. "And even if I am guilty, there's nothing that doesn't grease the wheels like a cash settlement."

I rolled my eyes. "Not helping here, Olive."

"Sorry–"

"Dears, I'm not giving up my business without a fight," she said, and crawled over to her gun."Even if I have to…kill for it!"

I kicked it away before she even got the chance.

"And to think," I said, "I was completely sympathetic for you until you pulled out that gun"

"Oh, and I was supposed to believe it?"

"Yes. It's never easy for the little woman in the world of big business. I learned that in my business management class."

"I suppose, it is never easy," Mabel clenched her fist. "Who would have thought, even textbooks tells me I'm pathetic. I only have one last resort..."

She flashed a grin on face.

"Perhaps...HE can help me..."

In an unbelievably strange turn of events, the pupils in her eyes dilated like a particularly odd rorschach test into something unnatural. They resembled the hooked shape of question marks."And I'm not ready to go down without a fight."

I had no time to ask if those were strange contacts or her real eyes, because Mabel drew a weapon that silenced me.

The seemingly inconspicuous old lady unveiled a large knife from her blouse. The sheer length muffled us in amazement and horror.

With unusual strength, she leapt to her feet. Her grin was as wide as her sinister kitchen utensil and her leering eyes were even more disturbing. She brandished the knife expertly. Unless granny had a secret weightlifting regiment, she was moving with a hidden strength.

I narrowly avoided a swing of the knife, but it brushed up against my jacket, tearing the fabric and my skin. "Gonna need a smoke later," I groaned, wincing as I clutched my arm.

But as my esteemed mentor Archie Bald always said, don't let a minor ding keep you down. I dodged the blade again. My steam powered leg helped keep me out of further trouble.

But when as I turned around, I was backed up the wall. There was nowhere to go; only my flight or fight instincts left to kick in.

"Next time," the old lady hissed. "Don't stick your nose where it doesn't belong!"

Was it the end?

Or just the beginning of my next brilliant plan? I crouched and pressed a button on the top of my thigh. The lady's hand began to wobble. "What the–"

The knife flew out of her hand and stuck straight to my leg along the with all kinds of other silverware. With another roundhouse kick, I knocked her straight to the floor.

"Magnets…" she growled. "What are you?"

"Just a girl with an attraction to danger," I winked.

A siren whirled from outside. The front of the door clattered to the floor. "Sweeties!" a theatrical voice exclaimed. "I have arrived!"

Several men dressed in uniform ran inside and pointed their guns at Mabel. At last, the well painted face of Captain Cornberry entered and smiled. His outfit differed from the other officers in that it was bright pink. His pants puffed out around his torso in pink and white checkerboards. He was truly the Queen's finest."My-my darlings," he marveled in his foppish voice. "Having trouble with a little old lady?!"

"She tried to kill us," I shouted. "She pulled a knife and gun on our arses."

Cornberry stopped his irritating antics long enough to send two officers to cuff Mabel. His announcement was suprisingly refined in the name of the law. "Darling, in the name of the king's royal police force, I am placing you under arrest. Anything you say will be used against you in a court of law. Though, even if you don't speak, threatening to shoot and stab people will be good enough."

Mabel was handcuffed, and as she made her exit, there was a look of remorse on her face.

"And here," Cornberry chortled. "I thought the Sutherland's butler did it."

"My stars," Olive gasped in her lily-light voice. "You too? I knew we should have vetted him before we hired him."

As she was escorted out of the door, Olive, ever the bright and chipper one, offered a kind final word to the likes of Mabel Syrup: "Even if you blackmailed me and tried to murder us, y'all still made the best begniets ever!"

"You're too nice, Olive," I answered. "People who do these things, deserve nothing but scorn."

One of the officers returned from upstairs. He greeted us with a look of bewilderment on his face. "Cornbury sir," he said. "What we found upstairs, you're not gonna believe."