The Case of the Wilted Broccoli (10 page)

The streetcar slowly pulled away, Mr. Hutchins running alongside and banging on the door, until it outpaced him and left him behind.

Linden dropped onto a seat in exhaustion and shock. "Holy cow."

Willow and Elon plopped down next to him.

Willow's face had gone white. "I think I almost got us all killed."

Elon wiped tears away with one sleeve. "How are we going to get the drone back?"

Willow turned and hugged him. "We'll do everything we can. If we have to, we'll build it from scratch."

"But the science fair is this Friday!"
 

Willow shook her head. "I know you're just thinking about the drone, but look at the evidence we gathered. We have to go right to the principal's office. Once we get that taken of, we'll figure out what to do."
 

Elon hugged his legs and didn't speak for the rest of the way to school.

CHAPTER TWENTY

W
ILLOW
ARRIVED
AT
school with her brothers in tow. She had tried to comfort Elon, who was still despondent over the loss of the drone, and Linden, who was generally terrified, but she was so in shock herself, she felt drained.

As they walked up the stairs at the main entrance of Mt. Hood Elementary, parents and other kids stopped and stared at them.

Willow glanced down at herself and her brothers. They were sweaty, covered in grease and dirt from the parking lot, and completely disheveled from their long run from Mr. Hutchins. She'd somehow ripped her second-favorite pair of leggings.

She held her head up high, grabbed her brothers' hands, and stalked up the stairs to the main office.

She stood in the front of the long counter until the office manager noticed her and came over.

"We need to see Principal Winterson immediately," Willow said. "It's...a matter of life and death."

The manager looked the three of them up and down. "Come with me."

She led them through the room to the side door of the principal's office. She knocked twice, then opened the door. "Mrs. Winterson, these students need to see you right away."

"Send them in," Mrs. Winterson said.
 

They entered together and the door closed behind then. They stood standing in front of the principal's desk. She sat, fingers interlaced, and waited for them to talk.

 
The silence lingered on, but suddenly Willow was afraid to speak. What if the principal didn't believe her? What if Mr. Hutchins was waiting outside to kill them? What if they'd broken some law when they spied on the warehouse, and had to go to jail? What if they were wrong about everything? What were her parents going to say?

She opened her mouth, but no words would come to her.

Linden looked at her, then cleared his throat. "Mrs. Winterson, you may be aware that some students have been getting sick. Willow noticed that it was only certain kids and only on certain days."

"Is that so?" Mrs. Winterson looked directly at Willow.

"That's true," she said, in a whisper. She took a breath and forced herself to speak in a bigger voice. "Only those kids who ate hot lunch on Mondays and Thursdays."

"I know that we've had a stomach flu going around, but I'm sure that affects all children equally." Mrs. Winterson looked off in the distance for a second. "You're friends with Atlanta, aren't you? Are you concerned about her going to the hospital?"

"It's not that, Mrs. Winterson." Willow had to convince her. "I mean, I am worried about Atlanta. But we have evidence. Video evidence. It's here on my laptop."

She slid the computer out of her backpack and put it on the principal's desk without waiting for permission. She started the video they'd recorded that morning. "It shows that Bannon Foods, the food distributor who supplies our cafeteria food, received unrefrigerated food via a truck from California, then placed it in their refrigerator, and they'll be delivering it here this morning and claiming it's local food. It's not, Mrs. Winterson. I don't know exactly what's going on, but it's something weird."

The principal watched a few minutes of the video, then paused it, and hit a button on her desk phone. "Get me Miss Berry from the cafeteria and the assistant principal. Have them report to my office."

Soon the other adults arrived. "Start that from the beginning, Willow," the principal said.

At the end of the video, Willow was asked to explain everything. "It started with Mrs. Dozen's class on how food gets to us. We talked about local foods, and then I went to dinner one night at a restaurant and saw local food, real local food, and I knew what we were getting in the cafeteria wasn't it." She went on to explain all the steps of their investigation: visiting Bannon Foods, watching the truck delivery, and spying on the warehouse.

Miss Berry nodded throughout Willow's explanation.
 

"I told you, Miriam," she said to the principal. "I said something was wrong with our food delivery."

"I'm sorry, Ada," Mrs. Winterson said. "I just figured the food wasn't quite up to snuff. I didn't realize the situation was so bad." She turned to face the kids. "I'm going to call the police, and then we're going to visit Bannon Foods."

Soon they were driving to Bannon Foods in the back of Mrs. Winterson's car, with Miss Berry in the passenger seat. The principal had a grim look on her face the whole drive over.
 

A police car was parked in the lot at Bannon Foods, a uniformed officer waiting next to the door.

"I'm Officer Whitmarsh," she said, one hand held out.

"You'll accompany me inside," Mrs. Winterson said, without breaking stride.

They entered the building, trailing Mrs. Winterson.

"Do you know what's going on?" Officer Whitmarsh asked Willow, turning in beside her.
 

"They're giving our school cafeteria bad food," she said. "The evidence is here on my laptop."
 

Linden and Elon followed so close behind they kept giving her flat tires.

"Sorry," Linden said to Willow. Then he turned to the police officer and held out a scrap of paper. "We've got the license plate for the truck that delivered the spoiled food."
 

Officer Whitmarsh took the paper, scooped up her radio from her belt, and asked for a license-plate check.
 

Mrs. Winterson stormed passed Brett's desk and went right into Tom Bannon's office. Miss Berry, Officer Whitmarsh, Elon, Linden, and Willow all followed.

CHAPTER TWENTY-ONE

T
OM
B
ANNON
SAT
at his desk, his phone held to one ear. The door to his office blew open and the crowd entered.

"Bob, I'm going to have to get back to you. I think I have an emergency." Mr. Bannon hung up, and stood. "Hello? How can I help you?"

Elon realized that if Mr. Hutchins saw them all here, he might try to make a getaway. He reached out for Officer Whitmarsh, and pulled her down close, even as he heard Mrs. Winterson explaining what happened.

"We think Mr. Hutchins, the warehouse foreman, is in on it. He's in the back," Elon said, and went on to explain what he looked like.

Officer Whitmarsh listened for a moment more, then rushed out through the office door.

Mr. Bannon was pale and his hands shook. As Miss Berry and Mrs. Winterson continued their accusations, Mr. Bannon sank into his seat.

"We've never done anything wrong," Mr. Bannon said. "I inherited this company from my father and grandfather. We've been in business for over fifty years. There just has to be a mistake."

Willow cleared her throat and everyone looked at her. "The Monday delivery to the school is supposed to include our local food, right?"

Mr. Bannon nodded. "Yes, we discussed this when you visited."

"Then what do you make of this?" Willow turned her laptop around so that it faced Mr. Bannon. It was that morning's video feed, paused on an image of a sheet of paper. "The photo is blurry, but you can see white paper on a tan folder--the same folder we saw Mr. Hutchins receive this morning from the workers unloading the blue truck. The food from that truck then got loaded onto the truck for Mt. Hood Elementary."

"I can't read the text," Mr. Bannon said. "It's too blurry."

"But can you read the company letterhead at the top?" Willow asked.

"Los Angeles Distribution Services." Mr. Bannon's voice was weak.

"Los Angeles, California is not within four hundred miles of Portland," Willow said. "So that food is not local. It also wasn't refrigerated, even though it's a fourteen-hour drive from LA."

Mr. Bannon shook his head. "It doesn't make sense. I've never even heard of them, let alone done business with them."

"Maybe he has," Officer Whitmarsh said, accompanied by Mr. Hutchins.

"What's going on here, Tom?" Mr. Hutchins said, nodding politely to each of the adults in the room. When he laid eyes on the kids, he stopped smiling and clenched his jaw.
 

Elon was ready for Mr. Hutchins to mention the spying that morning. But when seconds passed and Mr. Hutchins said nothing, he realized it was further evidence that Mr. Hutchins was guilty. He didn't want to say anything.

"Jack, has there been any problems with the Mt. Hood Elementary orders?" Mr. Bannon asked. "They're here because the food they've been receiving hasn't been fresh."

Miss Berry snorted at this understatement.

"No, it's been fine, Tom. We sent out the order this morning."

"You sure?" Mr. Bannon said. "Then what's this about an early-morning delivery from Los Angeles Distribution Services? A delivery that got loaded onto the school's truck."

Mr. Hutchins's eyes opened wide and his nose flared. "I don't know what that is. We delivered the same thing we always do to the school. Produce from two farms on Sauvie Island and meat from the Oregon Co-Op.

"No way," Willow said. "I went out for dinner with my parents, and we ate real local food and it is NOTHING like what's being served at school."

"Yeah," Elon said. "You're probably taking the food for the school and selling it to fancy restaurants!"

"Then you got some really cheap food," Linden said, "and delivered the cheap stuff to school, figuring that nobody would know the difference."
 

"What the--" Mr. Hutchins cut himself off, looking nervous. "Look, I have to get back to work in the back. I've got trucks to unload." He turned toward the door.

Officer Whitmarsh stepped in front, blocking his way. "I think you should wait right here until we're done."

Mr. Hutchins turned to face Elon, Willow, and Linden, nervousness turning to anger. "You nosy kids are making a big deal out of nothing."
 

Mrs. Winterson spoke up. "My students have laboriously gathered evidence to the contrary. They show the delivery this morning, the packing of the foods onto the truck, the paperwork. What are you trying to hide, Mr. Hutchins?"

Tom Bannon reached up and smacked his forehead with one hand. "Hutchins, does this have anything to do with Better Business Bureau complaints filed against us since my father died? We had other customers complain. How could I be so foolish? You took advantage of me, because I didn't know as much about the business as my father."

Mr. Hutchins nearly shook with anger and his face grew a dark red. He looked like he was going to say something, then shook his head slightly, and changed his mind. His shoulders slumped. "I want to speak to my lawyer," he said.

Officer Whitmarsh smiled at that. "Fine. You can call your lawyer down at the police station. I'll need you to come with me." She turned to Mr. Bannon. "I'll call for a couple of detectives to come down and look at the warehouse, so touch as little as possible."

Mr. Bannon nodded, then turned to the rest of the group. He rubbed one hand through his hair.

"I am real sorry for whatever has happened. You've been our customer for years, and I will do whatever it takes to make it up to you. I'll get a truck loaded right now with our best stuff."

"Thank you, Mr. Bannon," Miss Berry said. "That would be very nice."

"Mr. Bannon?" Elon asked.

"Yes?"

"Our drone, which we used to take the video, is here in your warehouse. Mr. Hutchins attacked it with a broom. Can we look for it? It's our science-fair project."

"Of course," Mr. Bannon said, and led them into the warehouse.

They found the Silver Dragon in Mr. Hutchins's office in the back. They could see it laying there on his desk, the rotor broken and the case cracked.

Elon wanted to run to it, but Mr. Bannon blocked his way with one arm, gentle but firm.

"The police are probably going to want to go in there, so we shouldn't touch a thing."

Elon's heart sank. Willow put one arm around him and Linden took his hand.

"We'll figure something out," Linden said.

CHAPTER TWENTY-TWO

T
HE
WEEK
UNTIL
the science fair passed quickly.
 

On Monday, they got back to school with Mrs. Winterson by the middle of the morning. Before lunch, a new Bannon Foods truck showed up along with two chefs that Mr. Bannon had hired himself to help Miss Berry. Lunch was an enormous Italian meal, with fresh-made local pasta, meatballs, and right-out-of-the-oven Italian bread and garlic bread. The pasta was so good that even Linden abandoned the lunch he'd brought to get the hot lunch. And there was cake for dessert, even though the school wasn't really supposed to provide dessert.

Mrs. Winterson called Elon, Linden and Willow to her office right before the end of the day. She was sitting behind her desk, just as intimidating as usual. "Mr. Hutchins has been officially arrested by the police."

They nodded solemnly, not sure of what to say.

"You did a good job investigating the crime," the principal said.

"Thank you," they said in unison, then smiled at each other.

"More importantly," Mrs. Winterson went on, taking a deep breath, "you did the
right
thing. You investigated when no one else believed anything was wrong, and you kept investigating even when we didn't believe you, until you had the evidence. You may have saved people's lives and at least saved them from missing any more school."