The next morning it was Grandfather, not Mrs. McGregor, who dropped Mr. Yee and Henry, Jessie, Violet, and Benny off at the community gardens. Grandfather then drove away and the five gardeners walked past Sections E, D, C, and B, saying hello to all the other gardeners.
And once again, as the children and Mr. Yee left these sections behind and walked toward Section A, they saw trouble.
Taylor Harris and Alex Kirk were standing in front of Taylor’s fenced-in garden, shouting at each other. A big American blue rabbit hopped past Alex and into Mr. Yee’s garden.
“You’re the one!” shouted Taylor. “You’re the garden thief!”
“I am not!” shouted Alex. “You don’t know what you’re talking about!”
The children ran up to Taylor and Alex. Mr. Yee hurried into his garden, after the rabbit.
Just then Roger came out of his garden and walked up to Taylor and Alex.
“What’s wrong?” Henry and Roger asked the question at the same time.
“Alex Kirk has been vandalizing our gardens—that’s what’s wrong,” snapped Taylor.
Roger took a step backward. He looked confused.
“You don’t know what you’re talking about,” Alex replied angrily. “I would never vandalize anything, especially a garden!”
“Then explain your footprints,” said Taylor, pointing at the ground.
Everybody looked down at the grass they were standing on. It was dusted with a white powder. At first it was hard to notice that there was something on the grass, but after Taylor pointed downward, it became clear.
Jessie looked at the trail of whitish powder. It started at the outside of Alex’s garden, went past Taylor’s garden, past Mr. Yee’s garden, and stopped at the end of Roger’s garden.
And: there was one set of footprints in the powder. The footprints came from the direction of Lucasta’s empty garden and stopped about halfway to Mr. Yee’s garden. It was clear to Jessie that whoever had been walking there walked right into Mr. Yee’s garden.
“I came here late last night,” said Taylor, “and sprinkled some bonemeal fertilizer across the grass. I wanted to see who was walking around here breaking Mr. Yee’s tomato towers.” She folded her arms across her chest. “And now I’ve caught the vandal. Those footprints match Alex Kirk’s shoes,” she said, pointing down to Alex’s feet.
Everybody could see that the footprints leading up to where Alex was standing were the same as the footprints that walked down the row of gardens and turned into Mr. Yee’s plot.
Taylor pointed to Alex’s hands. “He has a hammer in his hand, to smash tomato towers with.”
“I don’t smash tomato towers!” Alex shouted. “I was coming to fix something.”
Roger Walski rubbed his chin with a hand. He started to say something, then stopped.
Henry spoke up loudly, so that Taylor and Alex would stop shouting. “Alex isn’t the vandal!” said Henry.
Taylor stopped shouting at Alex and turned toward Henry. “What do you mean?” she asked.
Henry looked at Roger. “Don’t you have something to tell us?” he asked.
“What?” sputtered Roger. “Me?” He backed away another step. “No, I don’t have anything to say. Except … except that I don’t think Alex is a vandal.”
“I’m not,” said Alex.
“We think you do have something to tell us,” Jessie said, looking at Roger.
“What?” asked Roger.
“We know you’re trying to buy the land the community gardens are on,” said Jessie. “We think you want the town of Greenfield to build an exercise center on this land.”
“What?” said Taylor. “Build a gym on the community garden land?”
Mr. Yee came out of his garden and joined them. He was holding the big bluish-gray rabbit in his arms and feeding it leaves of lettuce.
“That is why you want people to sign your petition,” said Mr. Yee, nodding his head. “You want to buy this land and then sell it to the town.”
Alex spoke up. “That’s right,” he said. “Roger has been trying to buy this land from my father, but my father won’t sell.”
“What’s wrong with a gym?” demanded Roger. “Exercise is good. Greenfield could use a nice new exercise center. And this land is so close to the center of town.”
“But this land is our garden,” said Taylor. “It’s good, rich land, meant for growing food.”
“That’s right,” said Alex.
“Are you the vandal?” demanded Taylor. “Did you break Mr. Yee’s tomato posts? Did you run over everybody’s kale and lettuce plants?”
Roger didn’t say anything.
“You drive a three-wheel ATV,” said Henry. “And yesterday you had a tool kit with you, with a hammer and saw. You were going to use it to break down more trellises and towers.”
Roger looked sad. He stared at the ground. “I’m sorry,” he said at last. “It was wrong to damage people’s gardens. But I really want this land! I thought if gardeners left, Mr. Kirk would sell it to me.”
“It doesn’t matter how much you want this land” said Taylor, “it’s very wrong to do what you did.”
Roger looked ashamed. “I shouldn’t have done it,” he admitted. “I won’t do it again.”
“I think you should help the people whose gardens you vandalized,” said Violet softly.
Roger looked at Violet. He sighed. “You’re right,” he said. “I have to apologize to each person I hurt. And I have to fix what I broke.”
Roger turned to Mr. Yee. “Albert, I’m sorry I broke your tomato stakes. I’ll put in new ones for you tomorrow.”
Mr. Yee scowled. “That was very wrong of you, Roger. But I don’t need your help because Henry has already fixed the tomato stakes.” Mr. Yee stroked the rabbit and fed it more lettuce. “You go help the other people, Roger.”
“And you owe everybody for all the vegetables you stole,” said Taylor.
“But I didn’t steal any vegetables!” shouted Roger. “I’m not a thief!”
Taylor looked at Roger. “Then Alex must be the thief,” she said.
But when everybody turned to look at Alex, he was no longer there. |