Unfortunately, the man had disappeared.
The Aldens came to a halt, scanning the area in every direction.
“Oh, no!” Violet cried. “We lost —”
“Shhh,” Henry said quietly, holding his hand up. He smiled at Violet and said in almost a whisper, “Don’t give up that easily. Listen.”
The four of them stood with their knees bent slightly, ready to take off at any moment. Only their eyes moved.
“Where did he go?” Henry asked, still whispering.
Violet pointed to the right. “Over there.”
Henry began stepping quietly in that direction. The pine needles crunched softly under his sneakers. “C’mon,” he said softly.
They crept in a line, oldest to youngest, tallest to smallest. Benny took up the rear, searching in every direction with eyes wide open.
About fifty feet ahead of them there came a whoosh sound, like the swipe of a rake through a big pile of autumn leaves. Henry put his hand up to call for silence.
Another whoosh, and then the man leaped out from behind a tree and took off like a rabbit.
“There he is!” Benny cried.
At the front of the line now, Jessie led them through a maze of trees, shrubs, and large stones. Still no one had gotten a good look at the man.
At last they began to close the gap. From behind they could see that he was wearing faded blue jeans and a black-and-white-checkered shirt with the sleeves rolled up. He wore a black hat and had dark hair.
The man tripped over something and crashed to the forest floor. The Aldens were still a good distance away, but the man glanced back long enough for Henry to get a good look at his face. He had a thick mustache that ran all the way down to his chin and deep lines in his face. The man scrambled to his feet and kept going. The Aldens, now out of breath, slowed to a halt.
“Okay, I saw him,” Henry said.
“I think we all did,” Jessie told him.
“So now what do we do?” Violet asked.
“We go back and tell the Shermans. Maybe they know him.”
“He’s got to have something to do with it,” Jessie said.
Henry nodded. “Yeah, most likely.”
“Hey, do you hear that?” Benny asked. They all fell silent, and then an engine started up in the distance.
“A truck?” Jessie wondered.
“It must be on that road Mr. Sherman mentioned.”
The vehicle shifted into gear, and then the sound of its engine faded into nothing.
“Okay, let’s get back,” Henry said. “And this time we walk. No running, okay?”
He received no argument from the others.
CHAPTER 6
Mascots
At dinner that evening, the children told Grandfather about the chase in the woods. They had returned home exhausted and were glad that Grandfather had ordered take-out chicken. “No reason why you should have to chase down supper tonight,” he joked.
“You should have been in the woods with us, Watch,” said Benny as he peered under the table at their dog. “You could’ve caught that man for sure.”
“We didn’t need to catch him,” reminded Henry. “We just needed to see who was sneaking around the farm and describe him to the Shermans.”
“But Mr. and Mrs. Sherman said he didn’t sound familiar at all,” said Jessie glumly.
“And we don’t know what to do next,” sighed Violet.
“Any news from Renee at the lab?” Henry asked Grandfather.
“No, not yet.” Grandfather shook his head. “It’s certainly not a good sign. I’m afraid it’s beginning to look as if we won’t find a cure for what the Menadrin has done to the bees.”
Jessie looked down at her plate. “I know. I just wish we knew who sprayed it on Clay Sherman’s wildflowers in the first place.”
“And why,” added Henry.
They went to bed early that night and returned to the Shermans’ farm early the next morning. Dottie had a breakfast feast waiting for them. And, like the day before, Jessie went out to see the animals after she’d finished eating.
As she stood by the fence that outlined the cow field, she was surprised to see Georgie Cooper, once again sneaking into the flowers.
“You must be kidding,” she whispered to herself, crouching down. He must know we’re on to him, she thought. How could he be so careless?
She wanted to run back to the house and tell the others what was happening. But then she thought, No, this time I’m going to follow him by myself and see what he’s up to. It’ll be easier for one person to trail him than four.
Once he was out of sight, Jessie followed the cow fence until she came to the opposite side of the field. She could just see the top of Georgie Cooper’s head as he moved toward the end of it. Quietly she bent low and began pushing her way through the flowers.
She reached the end and stopped. Georgie was standing in a little clearing that someone had used as a dumping ground for old farm machinery. Everything was heavily rusted and covered with twining vines and weeds. Jessie remembered searching around it the day before with Violet, but they hadn’t seen anything unusual. From where she stood, Jessie had a perfect view of Georgie — she could see him clearly, but he wasn’t able to see her.
He walked over to an old overturned steel watering trough, bent down, and lifted it about a foot off the ground with one hand. Jessie was amazed — that trough must have weighed about three hundred pounds. That was more than the combined weight of her, Henry, Violet, and Benny, even after Benny ate dinner, she thought with a grin.
Georgie looked around carefully, then reached into the pocket of his overalls and took something out. Again Jessie couldn’t see it.
Whatever it was, he slipped it under the trough before setting it back down again.
He’s trying to be quiet so no one will know, Jessie thought. Whatever he put under there, he doesn’t want anyone to know about it.
There was a small hole at the rim of the trough right where Georgie had put whatever it was he’d had in his pocket. It would be perfect for bees, Jessie thought. What had Renee said? Menadrin attracts bees? This was a perfect way to get them to go after it — hide an open bottle of it under something heavy, something that looks like it hasn’t been moved in a hundred years. Who would ever think of looking there? Maybe Georgie decided to do this after he realized they had found the dried Menadrin on the dead flowers.
Georgie looked around one last time, then headed back to the farmyard. Jessie waited a few minutes to make sure he was gone. Then she poked her head out of the sea of flowers. When she was sure he was out of sight, she crept back to the house.
“I’ll fire him today!” Clay howled when Jessie explained what she’d seen. His face was as red as a boiled ham. “That double-crossing —”
“Clay,” Dottie said calmly, “we’re not even sure what he put under there.”
The Aldens nodded. “That’s right, Mr. Sherman,” Jessie agreed. “I said it would be the perfect place to put more Menadrin, but I couldn’t see anything clearly.”
“What else could it be?” Clay barked, peering out the window over the kitchen sink, watching Georgie in the farmyard as he polished a leather saddle. “Why else would he be back there?”
“We should go find out, just to be sure,” Henry said.
“But let’s wait until Georgie goes to lunch,” Dottie suggested. “That way he won’t see us and get nervous.”
Clay looked at his wife in surprise. “Why are you worried about him being nervous? You’re the one who doesn’t like him.”
“I just don’t want to do anything before we have the facts, that’s all. The man should still be treated fairly.”
Clay turned back to the window and frowned. “I guess,” he grumbled.
So they waited, and as soon as Georgie Cooper went to town on his lunch break, the Aldens and the Shermans ambled through the flowers to the farm-equipment graveyard.
“He lifted this with one hand?” Cla
y said, looking down at the old overturned trough.
Jessie nodded. “Uh-huh. Lifted it as if it were made of cardboard.”
“How can one man do that?”
Henry got a hand under it and said, “Okay, I’m going to need some help here.”
The Aldens lined up next to one another and wiggled their fingers underneath. When they were ready, Henry said, “Okay, here we go. One … two … three!”
They moaned and groaned and pulled their hardest, and slowly the trough began rising. Once it was high enough, Clay and Dottie wedged wooden poles under it to keep it up.
Wiping his hands off, Henry said, “Whew, that was pretty heav —”
“Oh, my goodness, look!” Violet said, pointing underneath.
There was no bottle of Menadrin anywhere in sight, nor any other kind of chemical that could stop bees from making honey. Instead there was one large gray-and-white cat with a family of tiny kittens attached to her belly, drinking her milk. The mother cat’s eyes were wide with fear.
Benny smiled brightly. “Look at the kitties!” he cried delightedly.
“Oh, they’re beautiful!” Violet declared.
“Food,” Jessie said flatly, hands on her hips. “That had to be what he had in his pocket both times. He’s been feeding them.”
“And giving them milk,” Dottie added. “Look at the bowl.”
There was a small plastic bowl nearby filled with milk.
Clay took off his farmer’s hat and scratched the top of his head. “Well, I’ll be darned. Kittens. He was sneaking down here to feed them!” He looked at his wife. “I wonder why he hid them.”
“He seems to have thought he’d get in trouble if we knew about them,” Dottie said. “First I didn’t like him, and then you didn’t like him. He probably didn’t want to take a chance that we’d be mad about the kittens.”
Clay looked back at the furry family and shook his head. “We’ve had him figured all wrong, Dot. Both of us.”
Dottie nodded reluctantly. “Yeah, we sure have.”
CHAPTER 7
More Spying Eyes
When Georgie came back from lunch, the Aldens and the Shermans met with him in the farmyard and told him they found the mother cat and her kittens. For a moment he looked worried.
“Aw, gee, I’m sorry, Mr. Sherman.…” he said, in a voice that was surprisingly soft for a man of his size. “I was going to try and find a home for them myself, but the mama wouldn’t budge, so I had to feed her, and check on her, and get her milk … and then I was worried you’d think I wasn’t doing the job you hired me to do.”
“Oh, Georgie, we’re not mad at all,” said Dottie, and the children could see that she and Clay felt bad about doubting Georgie. “In fact,” she said, smiling at the kittens, “we’re happy to have these new residents at Sherman Farm.”
“I know a spot in the barn where we can set up a crate for them,” said Clay. He showed Georgie a warm corner near the horse stalls, and before long they had carefully moved the cat family to their new home.
It would be part of Georgie’s daily chores to make sure they had plenty of milk, food, and clean hay to sleep on. The Aldens thought they’d never seen anyone as happy as Georgie was when he heard all this.
In the Shermans’ kitchen afterward, however, the good mood quickly drifted away.
“Okay, so if it wasn’t Georgie, then it has to be Hennessey,” Clay said, arms folded, leaning against the sink.
“How can you be so sure, Clay?” Dottie demanded.
“Because he’s the only one left with a motive.” He turned to the children. “Back me up on this. It has to be Hennessey, doesn’t it?”
“Well …” Jessie began. She looked at Dottie. “He really does have the best motive.”
Henry nodded. “Yeah, he’s at the top of the suspect list.”
“I’ll bet that guy we chased through the woods the other day works for Mr. Hennessey,” Benny suggested.
Clay snapped his fingers. “Hey, that’s right! He did go back toward Hennessey’s farm. I’ll bet he does!”
“What we should do,” Jessie said, “is the same thing he did — we should take a peek at their farm.”
“If that guy was working for Mr. Hennessey, I wonder what he was doing here,” Violet said.
“Probably spraying some more Menadrin,” Clay replied.
Jessie shook her head. “I don’t think so. I looked around when I was coming back from watching Georgie. I didn’t see anything.”
“I think he was just spying,” Benny offered. “That’s what it looked like he was doing.”
Henry nodded. “That’s what I thought, too.”
“Then we should do a little spying of our own,” Jessie said firmly.
Dottie sighed. “Well, I guess it won’t hurt. Better to have some real evidence that it’s them than to let you go over there yelling your head off,” she said to Clay.
Clay smiled and put a hand lightly onto his chest. “Me? Yell my head off?”
“Oh, I forgot,” Dottie replied, rolling her eyes. “You’re such a cool-headed person.”
The Aldens were enjoying this peculiar form of affection between the Shermans.
“Let’s go check it out,” Henry said, sliding out of his seat. The others got up and followed him out the door.
“Good luck,” Clay said.
“And be careful,” Dottie called through the window screen as they crossed into the farmyard. A chicken zoomed through their marching line, right between Jessie and Violet, clucking madly.
“We will,” Jessie assured her.
The Aldens found the old back road to Hennessey’s farm with no problem; it was just a little farther on from where they’d stopped chasing the spy the day before. It cut between the trees and was covered with gravel, coming to an end where the trees were too thick to cut through any farther. A little mound of dirt stood at the end of it.
Shortly the forest began to thin out on the right side, and they eventually came upon the Hennessey farm. It was just like the Shermans’ in many ways — a large main house, a barn, and some fenced-in animal pastures.
The Aldens crept out of the sparse forest to get a closer look. The first thing they saw was another collection of ancient farm equipment. More rusty plows, water basins, and broken-down trucks.
“I guess all farms have a place like this,” Benny said.
“Seems that way,” Henry agreed.
They walked over to an old shed. The windows were either broken or missing completely, and there was no door. They peered inside and saw that the wooden floor was rotted through, giving way to sprouts of ugly weeds and moss. The odor was moldy, like the dark corner of a wet basement.
“Probably used for storage,” Henry said. “Tools, bags of seed, stuff like that.”
They moved closer to the farm, staying close to the trees and tall shrubs. Soon the beekeeping area came into view. The first thing about it the Aldens noticed was that there were fewer hives than on the Shermans’ farm.
“No wonder Mr. Hennessey never gets Mr. Price’s contract,” Jessie said. “He doesn’t have half as many bees as the Shermans.”
“I’ll bet he’s not too happy about that,” Benny commented.
“No,” Henry agreed, “I’ll bet he’s not. That could be a motive. After all these years of losing the contract just because the Shermans have more bees, what better way to even things out than to make it so the Shermans’ bees don’t make as much honey as they usually do?”
Violet was studying the whole farm. “Hey, I don’t see a field of wildflowers anywhere.”
“There must be some flowers around here somewhere,” Benny said. “Or else the bees wouldn’t be able to survive, would they?”
“No, they wouldn’t,” Henry said. “But obviously that’s another way the Shermans have an edge. It’s hard for bees to produce honey when there isn’t much nectar to gather.”
“But they do have plenty of crops,” Violet pointed out, which was tr
ue. Hennessey had many more crop fields than the Shermans. Plus, far in the distance, the Aldens saw what appeared to be a few rows of apple trees.
“You know something?” Henry said, stroking his chin thoughtfully. “I think I’m starting to understand what the Shermans were saying about once having been in business with Hennessey. It all fits together perfectly if you think about it. The Shermans have what Hennessey doesn’t, and Hennessey has what the Shermans don’t. Together, they’ve got it all.”
“I wonder why they split up,” Benny said.
Jessie shook her head. “Who knows? Doesn’t seem like something the Shermans are too eager to talk about.”
“Maybe we should —”
“Look!” Violet said, pointing.
On the road leading from the house, four men appeared — two in front and two behind them. One of the men in front was wearing a suit and tie. He had a briefcase in one hand and a glass in the other, probably iced tea or lemonade.
The man walking alongside him was old and thin and, judging by the way he moved his hands all around, very irritated about something. Like Clay and Georgie Cooper, he wore a pair of overalls.
“I’ll bet that’s Mr. Hennessey,” Henry said. “He looks like he’s in charge, and he’s about the right age.”
As the four men came closer, the two in the back came into view. One of them was a tall blond-haired boy who looked to be in his mid to late teens. And the other …
“Oh, wow!” Benny said excitedly. “That’s …”
Henry nodded. “That’s the guy we chased yesterday.”
“Right,” Jessie said.
“So he was sent to the Shermans’ farm by Mr. Hennessey,” Violet guessed.
“It appears so,” Henry replied.
“I wonder who the man with the briefcase is,” Benny said.
“I have no idea,” Jessie answered. But that wasn’t strictly true — she did have an idea, but didn’t want to say anything just yet.
The four men stopped at the beekeeping area. “Let’s try to get a little closer so we can hear them,” Jessie suggested.