Turkey Trouble on the National Mall Read Online Free PDF Page A

in front of Yvonne. “This lady,” she said, putting a finger on Marie Le Roi’s name in the story about the bird flu.
    Yvonne quickly read the story. “I’m not sure I understand,” she said. “This Marie Le Roi owns a hat shop in Paris, but because of the bird flu, she can’t get feathers, right?”
    KC put the printout on top of the newspaper. “It’s the same lady,” she said. “She sent this e-mail!”
    KC and Marshall took turns explaininghow they went into the craft shop, and how the owner gave KC the paper to draw on. “I think he stole the turkeys!” KC said.
    Yvonne studied the newspaper story and the e-mail. “Oh my goodness!” she said. “These two are brother and sister. She calls him
mon frère
, which means
my brother
. And she signed it
votre soeur, your sister
!”
    Yvonne looked at the paper again. “Her last name is Le Roi, and his is Leroy,” she said. “I’ll bet he changed the spelling of his name when he came to this country.”
    Marshall added, “He knew she needed feathers, so when he heard about all the turkeys on the National Mall, he figured out how to steal them.”
    “But how was he going to get the feathers to his sister?” KC asked.
    “I don’t know,” Yvonne said. “But she says she will e-mail him again on Friday. That’s tomorrow.”

    “So let’s get the police to arrest the guy in the craft store!” KC said. “Then he’ll have to give the turkeys back!”
    “But we can’t prove he took them, KC,” Marshall said. “All he has to do is deny it.”
    Yvonne stood up. “We have to tell the vice president what you kids have dug up!”
    Before long, the vice president knew the whole story. “This craft-store fellow is pretty bold, stealing all those turkeys,” she said. “But he and his sister stand to make a lot of money. Because of the flu, bird feathers are in demand.”
    Mary Kincaid hit some keys on her laptop and brought up Google. She hit a few more keys. “Goodness,” she said. “Some people in the hat business are willing to pay ten dollars for one perfect white turkey feather, and even more for some darker ones.”
    KC tried to do the math in her head. How many perfect feathers did Cloud have?How many perfect feathers on 117 turkeys?
    “Meanwhile, the turkeys are still missing,” Yvonne said.
    “Yes,” the vice president said. “If you own a small craft shop, where do you hide nearly ten dozen turkeys?”
    “Marsh and I think they must have used a truck,” KC said. “I saw one parked at the National Mall yesterday. I thought you had it sent there, Ms. Kincaid.”
    The vice president looked at KC with wide eyes. “Goodness, I totally forgot!” she said. “Getting a truck to take the turkeys to Mount Vernon was on my list. It completely slipped my mind!”
    “So maybe the truck KC saw was there for stealing the turkeys!” Marshall said.
    “You could be right,” the vice president said. “But where is it now?”
    “I have a toy truck with remote control,” Marshall said. “When I push a button, thetruck comes back to me. Wouldn’t it be cool if we could just push something and get the truck with the turkeys to come to us?”
    Something clicked in KC’s brain. She picked up the e-mail. “What if we e-mailed him back?” she asked.
    “I don’t get it,” Marsh said. “E-mail the craft guy?”
    KC nodded. “We could set up an e-mail account that’s almost the same as his sister’s. The e-mail would tell Mr. Leroy to sell the turkeys,” she said. “Only he’d sell them to us. I mean to an FBI guy. After getting the turkeys, the FBI guy would arrest him!”
    Everyone stared at KC.
    “The e-mail would be from us, but Mr. Leroy would think it was from his sister,” KC went on. She could feel butterfly wings flapping in her stomach.
    “It would be an awesome trick!” Marshall crowed.
    Yvonne plucked the printout out of KC’s fingers. “We have her name and e-mail address and her brother’s e-mail address right