The Clue at Black Creek Farm (Nancy Drew Diaries #9)(17)

How to say this? “It . . . sounds like Jack doesn’t feel the same way,” I said carefully.

Julie was bringing her tea back to the table, and she and Abby met eyes and exchanged a knowing look as she pulled back her chair and sat down.

“I wish I could say that wasn’t true,” Abby said. “But . . .”

Julie carefully sipped her tea. “They’re so much alike,” she said simply, “Jack and Sam.”

“They always have been,” Abby agreed, her eyes growing warm with the memory. “Sometimes, I think that’s why they butt heads.”

Julie turned back to me and Bess. “They’re both so stubborn,” she said, rolling her eyes. “Men!”

Abby laughed.

“So unreasonable,” Julie added with a smile, sipping her tea again. She leaned back in her chair and added, “And I think Jack was a little hurt when Sam decided to give up practicing law.”

“Why?” Bess asked curiously.

“Because Jack is a lawyer too. He followed in his father’s footsteps,” Abby explained.

“And I think,” Julie went on, “that when Sam announced that he didn’t want to be a lawyer anymore—that he no longer saw value in that—Jack viewed it as a rebuke.”

Abby nodded slowly. “On some level,” she said, “I think Jack thinks his father has chosen this farm over him.”

Julie looked uncomfortable. “In some ways that’s true,” she said quietly, gazing down at her tea.

Abby glanced over at her. “What do you mean?”

Julie shrugged, still not meeting her gaze. “Oh, you know,” she said lightly. “I don’t feel this way. But you could argue that Sam’s spending money on the farm that Jack might have inherited someday. Anyway, I’m sure Jack will come around.”

Abby stared at Julie in surprise, and Bess met my eye with an Oh no, she didn’t sort of expression. Everything got really quiet. But Julie just kept sipping her tea, as if nothing incredibly awkward had just been said.

Thank goodness my phone beeped right at that moment, cutting the silence. I reached into my pants pocket and pulled it out, excited to see a text from George.

“Oh! This is from my friend who had the vegetables tested,” I said eagerly. “She says . . .”

I read the text out loud.

“?‘Rashid says the veggies were “crawling with” E. coli. So the bad guy is working on the farm? Ugh, wish I weren’t working!’?”

I lowered my phone and looked up at the faces around me. Bess looked thoughtful; Julie and Abby looked confused.

“She means the vegetables we picked here on the farm already had E. coli on them,” I explained. “Which would seem to imply . . .”

“. . . whoever’s contaminating the vegetables is doing it here,” Bess finished for me.

I nodded. “Right.”

Abby and Julie still looked mystified. “So they’re doing it on purpose,” Abby said, not sounding entirely sure.

“It looks that way,” I said, taking a deep breath. “Do you know anyone—anyone at all—who might wish the farm ill? Who’s had access to the plants?”

Abby seemed to think for a while. “No,” she said finally.

“Do you have any farmhands?” Bess asked. “Anyone besides Lori and Bob who regularly work on the farm?”

Abby shook her head. “We can’t afford them on what we’re making,” she said. “Lori comes on weekends, and Bob helps out a few times a week, but other than them it’s just me and Sam tending the crops. And Jack, since he’s been staying here,” she added. She straightened up. “Sometimes we get volunteers from the CSA,” she said, “but we haven’t had anyone out here in weeks.”

Everyone was quiet for a minute.

“How would you even do it?” Julie asked.

Bess nodded. “Contaminating a whole farm full of produce—in broad daylight? It seems impossible.”

I stood up, an idea taking root. “It probably is,” I said, walking toward the window and looking out over the rows of crops. Whoever’s doing this is doing it at night, I realized, and suddenly our next step became clear. I turned to Bess with a grin.

Alarm brightened her eyes. “I know that grin,” Bess said. “I hate that grin. That’s the ‘Nancy has an idea Bess is going to hate’ grin.”

I shrugged, glancing at the crops again and back.

“So what is it?” Bess went on.

I smiled, gesturing toward the planted fields. “Feel like camping out tonight, Bess?”





CHAPTER SEVEN





Trouble in the Barn


“I HATE THIS,” BESS GRUMPED as she laid out one of the sleeping bags Sam and Abby had loaned us in the tent they’d also loaned us.

“Come on, Bess,” I chided, bumping her shoulder playfully (which was super easy to do, since the tent was only about five feet across). “We got to have a hot dog cookout for dinner!”

She rolled her eyes. “Yeah, that really made my day, Nancy. Because I am nine years old.”

“Anyway,” I said, fluffing my pillow, “I thought you were invested in the case now?”