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I fetch a hammer and a nail from the workshop and do the job myself. And I do it right, Snicket. Don't think it's my fault they keep falling.
 

Marguerite Gracq is a young miner living in Stain'd-by-the-Sea. She appears in File Under: 13 Suspicious Incidents in the first incident, "Inside Job." 

Biography[]

Early Life[]

Marguerite Gracq: There's just one small mine in Stain'd-by-the-Sea, and it's in my front yard. My father says we've gotten all the gold we're going to get from it. He's out of town for a few weeks finding us a better place to live. I'm staying here to close up the mine and make sure nothing happens to the gold.
Lemony Snicket: He left you here all alone?
File Under: 13 Suspicious Incidents, "Inside Job"

Marguerite was raised in Stain'd-by-the-Sea, in a house in front of the only mine in town. She became a miner, like her father.  

Sometime after the economy crash, her father believed they'd gotten all the gold out of the mine, and left town to find his family a better place to live, leaving Marguerite to watch the mines and the gold; she was given the only key to his workshop, where the gold was supposedly kept, though she didn't know where. He hired a woman named Dagmar to watch her, but they didn't get along and all Dagmar did was sit and listen to polka music on the radio. 

After Dagmar arrived, several of her mother's paintings of finnish poets began to fall, but they fell too neatly to be on accident, and only when Marguerite was in the mines.[1] 

File Under: 13 Suspicious Incidents[]

Inside Job[]

Lemony Snicket: Do you leave the workshop door open while you rehang them?
Marguerite Gracq: Of course not. The gold is somewhere in that room, and it's my responsibility to keep it locked up.
File Under: 13 Suspicious Incidents, "Inside Job"

Marguerite goes to meet Lemony Snicket at the Lost Arms, having heard that he was a detective. She brings him to her home. She explains to Snicket about the fallen paintings and Dagmar. When Snicket suspects that the woman watching her is after the gold, Marguerite explains that her father always melts down their gold and hides it somewhere in his workshop, and even though she's not sure where, Marguerite is the only one who has the key to the room, which she always keeps on her. 

Insidejobillustation

Marguerite and Lemony Snicket

Marguerite leads Snicket into her house, and after informing Dagmar that she was going to make her friend a poached egg, she takes him to the living room to investigate the paintings. While Marguerite say she suspects Dagmar is knocking them down- as they only fall while Marguerite is in the mines and Dagmar is in the house- nothing seemed to have been stolen. Snicket inspects a painting of Larin Paraske, and then asks Marguerite if there are nails in the workshop. She informs him that there are several jars full, and that her father always uses his special black nail, which curve slightly so they do less damage to the wall. Snicket then tells Marguerite he's going upstairs to talk to Dagmar, and then he's going to call the police. 

Black Paint[]

Snicket explains to Marguerite over a breakfast of very fluffy eggs that Dagmar had beeen removing the paintings to steal the nails, which had been painted black like her home's floor, so that the gold could be hidden. Dagmar is arrested for attempting to steal the Gracq gold, nail by nail. 

Figure in Fog[]

Though she does not appear, Snicket thinks about Marguerite as he walks, and he wonders about her mother, "who had left her beloved portraits on the walls but was nowhere to be found."

Later Life[]

Marguerite Gracq is not mentioned by name after the events of File Under: 13 Suspicious Incidents. It is possible that she was still in town when the Inhumane Society gathered up the students of Stain'd Secondary School and other children of the town and held them hostage at Wade Academy; Snicket mentions that he recognized some of the children at school "from [his] time in town," which could potentially indicate the children of the thirteen suspicious incidents.[2]

Should she have been there, she would have likely been drugged by Laudanum at Wade Academy and forced to steal honeydew melons for the Inhumane Society,[2] before the students managed to revolt and turn the society out of the school.[3]

Physical Appearance[]

Marguerite is described as wearing a helmet with a light attached to it (which seems a little big on her), along with work gloves and boots. She wears the "skinny" key to her father's workshop on a thick cord, which she wears as a necklace and hides under her overalls. In the illustration she appears in, she has short, light-colored hair, dark-colored overalls, and a short-sleeved shirt.

Quotes[]

File Under: 13 Suspicious Incidents[]

I'm Marguerite Gracq. I spell it the French way.
 
— "Inside Job"
Marguerite Gracq: Around town they say you're something of a detective.
Lemony Snicket: Around town they're wrong. I'm something else.
—"Inside Job"
Follow me to my home, and I'll explain everything and poach you an egg, besides. I put a little vinegar in the poaching water, so my eggs turn out nice and fluffy.
 
— "Inside Job"
Marguerite Gracq: He hired a woman named Dagmar to watch over me. She doesn't do much but sit and listen to the radio. I don't like her.
Lemony Snicket: What does she listen to?
Marguerite Gracq: Polkas.
Lemony Snicket: No wonder you don't like her.
—"Inside Job"
I keep thinking she's after something, but nothing has been stolen.
 
— "Inside Job"
I'm the only one who's been in the workshop since my father left, and I can see that nothing has been touched. The problem's not with the gold, Snicket. It's with the pictures in my living room.
 
— "Inside Job"
Marguerite Gracq: I'm back, Dagmar! I have a friend with me! I'm going to make him a poached egg!
Dagmar: Do whatever you want.
Marguerite Gracq: The kitchen's right over here, but if you don't mind, I'd like to show you the living room first.
Lemony Snicket: Of course.
—"Inside Job"
I admit I'm suspicious of Dagmar, but I can't say she's committed any kind of crime. The paintings just keep falling and then we hang them back up.
 
— "Inside Job"

Trivia[]

  • Marguerite says that her mother was interested in Finnish poets; all her portraits of them used to belong to her.[1] 
  • She specifies to Snicket that her name is spelled "the French way."[1] 
  • She informs Snicket that while making poached eggs, she puts "a little vinegar" in the poaching water, to make her eggs turn out "nice and fluffy."[1] 
  • Her surname, "Gracq", is probably a reference to the French writer Julien Gracq.


Family[]

 
 
 
Mr. Gracq
 
 
 
Ms. Gracq (†?)
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
Marguerite Gracq


Appearances[]


Gallery[]

Sources[]

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