The Candymakers and the Great Chocolate Chase Read online

  “Until we know if there will even be a Harmonicandy,” Logan said, “we shouldn’t talk about it more than necessary.”

  Philip grunted in agreement.

  “Hey, cheer up,” Daisy said, bumping him with her hip. “You made a friend tonight, too. That’s huge for you. What does that make, four in about thirteen years now?”

  “Sounds about right.”

  AJ had pulled down their beds for the night and was lounging on the couch, chomping on a sandwich when they filed in. He gestured to the computer screen in the lab. Another name had indeed popped up on the photograph. Evelyn Sheinblatt, the other woman in the photo.

  They all looked at Logan, who peered more closely at the picture. “I don’t remember meeting her,” he said. “But her name sounds familiar. I think my grandpa mentioned his friend Evy once or twice. That must be her.” He wished he’d paid more attention to everything his grandfather had ever said.

  Unable to hold it back, he yawned, feeling the weight of the long, insane day catch up with him. Had the Kickoff really only been that morning? Some days went by in the blink of an eye, and others felt like they lasted for a month. Today had lasted for a year.

  Daisy was about to suggest heading to bed, when they heard a dog barking outside the RV. It was too dark out to see anything.

  “Maybe the drone has arrived!” Miles suggested.

  AJ cautiously opened the main door and peered out. In a flash, a small, fat multicolored cat ran up the stairs and down the aisle before leaping into a stunned Philip’s arms.

  Daisy grinned. “Make that five friends in thirteen years.”

  CHAPTER EIGHT

  It felt like he’d only been asleep for five minutes, but when Logan checked the clock, it said 3:00 a.m. He wasn’t sure what had awoken him until he heard the scratching. It sounded like it was coming from the roof above him. His first, sleep-addled thought was… Santa? But he dismissed that one quickly.

  He peered over the side of his bunk bed to check whether Philip’s cat was scratching the furniture. But the cat lay curled up in the crook of Philip’s arm, both of them sound asleep.

  The light in the back bedroom flickered on, and AJ walked out a few seconds later. Logan sat up and saw that Daisy was also awake and standing in the middle of the RV. She was fully dressed. He had the feeling she slept with one eye open. She switched on a flashlight.

  “What’s going on?” he whispered, blinking.

  She pointed the beam of light at the sunroof over her head. “The drone is here.”

  “The drone is here?” Miles repeated, suddenly wide awake. He hopped out of bed.

  AJ pulled one of the levers on the climbing wall, and the sunroof slid open. Seconds later a steel-gray robot-bird thingy with four octopus-like tentacles flew inside and descended silently toward the floor. Logan thought it was about the size of one of the warming ovens in the Some More S’mores Room. Or maybe he just had s’mores on the brain!

  Philip woke up last and groggily propped himself up on one arm. The cat stretched and pushed her paws on his chest. Startled, Philip scooted backward in his bunk before looking down to find Aurora. Why had he allowed the others to talk him into letting the cat sleep in the RV with him? Then he saw the drone.

  “My violin?” he asked, squeezing himself around the cat and out of the bed. He ignored the rope ladder and landed on the floor at the same time as the drone.

  They all knelt around it. Instinctively, Logan and Miles reached out to touch it. “Warm!” Logan said. “Smooth!” Miles said at the same time.

  “Yes,” AJ said. “It is warm and smooth. It’s also worth more money than any of us—well, except maybe Philip—will ever earn in a lifetime, so let’s not touch it. Or, you know, breathe on it too much.”

  The boys backed up an inch. AJ turned the drone over and slid open a hidden compartment to reveal a small keypad. Daisy leaned over and typed in a series of numbers and letters. For a few seconds nothing happened, and then a whirring sound came from the drone’s belly, followed by a single click. Daisy could now easily lift the top off. She reached in and took out the candy bar, which Courtney had wrapped in tissues. She unwrapped it and handed it to Logan, who, out of all of them, was the closest to its rightful owner.

  Logan let the Magic Bar rest in his palm. It weighed more than he’d have expected—about as much as two Harmonicandies, and those had cookie harmonicas in the middle. He hadn’t seen a real Magic Bar since he was very small, in Spring Haven’s only candy shop. Miss Paulina of Miss Paulina’s Candy Palace had kept one as a souvenir on a high shelf. That one looked pretty banged up, and he hadn’t been allowed to touch it. Now that he thought of it, she must have gotten rid of it, because he hadn’t noticed it there in years. This one was in much better condition. Its shiny blue wrapper still shone, the edges only slightly frayed.

  He raised the Magic Bar to his nose but couldn’t smell anything. Not that he’d really expected to. Even though the wrapper had held up so well, after fifty years the chocolate itself would have long ago turned bad. The fat and sugar would have separated from the cocoa, covering it all in a dried-up gray-white slime called bloom. Any nuts inside would have gone rancid, and the bar would have crumbled into pieces. Keeping it at a cool temperature inside the safe would have protected it in the beginning, but at this point, the tight wrapper would be the only thing holding the bar together. He laid it gently on the laboratory counter, where he and Miles could admire it from afar.

  Philip grabbed for his violin. He turned his back to the others and opened the case. He slipped the passport into the waistband of his pajamas, then inspected the instrument and gave a grunt of satisfaction when he didn’t see any obvious injuries. He handed the case to AJ, commanded, “Put this somewhere safe,” and climbed up the rope ladder into bed. The cat climbed right up after him, turned in a tight circle, then lay down on Philip’s back. A few seconds later, they were both breathing steadily.

  “Wow,” Daisy exclaimed. “He’s even more charming in the middle of the night. Who’d have guessed it?”

  “Can we start analyzing the candy bar and the bean right now?” Miles asked.

  Daisy shook her head. “It’ll be delicate work, and waiting five more hours isn’t going to change anything.”

  Reluctantly, Logan and Miles returned to their beds. It took a while before either of them could stop thinking about that Magic Bar just sitting there on the counter, holding all its secrets inside.

  Miles woke first and headed straight for the Magic Bar. Daisy had put it on a paper plate, covered the plate with a plastic bowl, and stuck a sticky note on the side that read:

  Do not touch or the Magic Bar will self-destruct.

  He grumbled when he saw it but had to admit it was probably a good idea. The candy bar had to be incredibly fragile after all this time.

  Plus he was pretty sure Daisy could actually make it self-destruct if she wanted to.

  Aurora started pawing at the door to be let out. She turned and rubbed against Miles’s ankle. “Oh, I see how it is,” he whispered, bending down. “You’re only going to pay attention to me when you need something.” She let him scratch under her chin for a few seconds, and then when she’d had enough, he could swear she began glaring at him.

  “Okay, okay,” he said, pushing the door open wide enough for the cat to squeeze out. The fresh morning air blew in the open door like an invitation. He glanced back at his sleeping friends and reached over the side of the booth to grab his backpack. He hurried outside before he changed his mind.

  Even though the sun had already risen, most of the campground was still asleep. He knew AJ would have a cow if he wandered off, so he sat at the picnic table beside Harvey and pulled out Arthur’s geocaching book. The red envelope peeked out from inside the cover, and he realized that in all the excitement yesterday he’d never opened it.

  He traced the curves of the Aramaic letters that spelled out his name, then tore open the envelope. He smiled as he pulled out the hand
made card. Jade had drawn a picture of the two of them. (He knew it was them because of the arrows pointing at their heads, with their names written alongside.) Fluffernutter, whose name she’d shortened to FN, sat between them on a rock. They were all eating Pepsicles. It was the best picture anyone had ever made him. Probably the only one, too.

  Inside Arthur had printed a short poem:

  WE SHALL NOT CEASE FROM EXPLORATION

  AND THE END OF ALL OUR EXPLORING

  WILL BE TO ARRIVE WHERE WE STARTED

  AND KNOW THE PLACE FOR THE FIRST TIME.

  —T. S. ELIOT

  We are happy to know you and your family, and will look forward to hearing about your journey. Arthur, Tina, & Jade (& Fluffernutter)

  Miles read the card over again, then slipped it back in the envelope and carefully slid the envelope into the book. He wasn’t sure he fully understood the poem, but he liked the way it sounded.

  Aurora jumped onto the table and got right up in his face. A second later came the barking. Then she ran over to the RV door, looked over her shoulder, and waited.

  “Did anyone ever tell you you’re not actually a dog?” Miles asked Aurora as he opened the door for her.

  “There you are!” Logan said, pulling Miles inside. “You’re not going to believe this!”

  “What is it?” he asked, trying not to stumble on the steps as Logan dragged him.

  “You’ve got to see the Magic Bar!”

  “It didn’t self-destruct, did it?” Miles said, only half kidding.

  “No,” Logan said, “it’s, like, the opposite of that.”

  “It un-destructed?”

  “Exactly!” Logan said.

  “Huh?”

  Logan held up the plate with the unwrapped Magic Bar on it. “It looks like the day it came off the belt!”

  “How is that possible?” Miles asked. “I’ve found many a Halloween candy bar a few months later, and they’d already turned wonky.” He looked at the wrapper, which had been taken off in one piece and laid beside it. Inside the shiny foil lay a thin sheet of wax paper. Miles pointed to it. “Could the wax paper have helped it stay fresh?”

  “To a degree, yes,” Logan said. “But maybe it would have given it an extra five months of freshness. Not five decades.”

  “Maybe it’s not real,” Philip suggested. “It could be a rubber prototype, or just some kind of material made to look like chocolate.”

  Logan had to admit that made sense. After all, he’d never seen a real Magic Bar before. Maybe they had never really looked this shiny and smooth. Philip’s theory would certainly explain why it didn’t even have any bloom on it.

  He brought it to his nose and sniffed. The faint chocolate smell rose up. “It’s real,” he said. “I can’t tell what’s in it from the smell, though.”

  “We’ll find that out when we analyze it,” Daisy reminded them. She reached for the plate, but Logan was gripping it tight.

  “But how can the lab tell us if the Magic Bar used the same chocolate as the original Harmonicandy?” he asked.

  “It can’t,” Daisy said. “There’s only one way to do that.”

  Logan shuddered. “I’m going to have to taste a fifty-year-old candy bar, aren’t I?”

  “’Fraid so,” Daisy said.

  Miles nodded gravely. “If you keel over and start frothing at the mouth, we’ll save you.”

  “Good to know,” Logan said, meaning it. “Okay, here goes.” He took a deep breath and lifted the Magic Bar. Never in his life had he thought he’d get to even see a Magic Bar, let alone taste one. Even a fifty-year-old one.

  AJ joined them, placing a metal first-aid kit at his side. “Just in case,” he said when they all turned to stare at it. “If you have a bad reaction, we can give you an injection that will destroy any dangerous bacteria. I warn you, it is not a small needle.”

  Logan gulped but nodded.

  “Stop freaking him out,” Daisy said, but she looked worried, too.

  Logan pushed away the image of a needle as long as his arm and took a small bite. He was aiming for a big enough sample that he’d be able to fully taste the ingredients, but not so much that he wouldn’t be able to spit it out if it was awful.

  The group moved closer as Logan chewed, swished the chocolate around in his mouth, and swallowed. When his expression froze, Daisy grabbed the metal kit, ready to flip it open.

  “Well?” Miles shouted.

  Logan only stared straight ahead, his eyes unfocused. Philip held his hand in front of Logan’s mouth until he felt warm air. “He’s still breathing.”

  “Are you okay?” Daisy asked, gripping Logan’s arm and giving him a shake.

  Calmly and carefully, Logan formed his words. “I know why they stopped selling the Magic Bar.”

  CHAPTER NINE

  After Logan’s cryptic comment about knowing why the factory stopped making the Magic Bar, he’d asked for privacy and had been holed up in the bedroom ever since. Once AJ was convinced Logan wouldn’t implode, pass out, or sprout wings from eating something made in the middle of the last century, he got them back on the road. They had two hours to get to The Candy Basket, and if he didn’t prove he could get them there on time and in one piece, he had no doubt their trip would be cut short.

  “Can’t this giant hunk of metal go any faster?” Philip asked, coming up to bug AJ for the third time in thirty minutes.

  AJ groaned. It turned out they couldn’t run the lab tests while the RV was in motion—some sort of safety precaution shut down the power to the sensitive equipment. The kids weren’t being very patient about having to wait. In fact, they were being totally impatient and, frankly, highly annoying. “Can’t you entertain yourselves for a little while longer?” he asked.

  Philip leaned on the arm of the passenger seat. “Did you know the cat from the campground is currently curled up on your pillow?”

  “What?” AJ said, tightening his grip on the wheel so they wouldn’t swerve. “I told you this morning to leave her at the campground.”

  “Yes, you did,” Philip agreed. “The cat apparently had other plans. She refused to leave the RV.” A more accurate explanation would be that she’d refused to leave him, but Philip couldn’t bring himself to say that.

  “We don’t have any cat food,” AJ pointed out. “Or a litter box.”

  “The outside world is her litter box,” Philip said. “And Miles found some canned tuna in that giant hidden closet. It stinks, but the cat likes it. Surprised you can’t smell it.” He waved his hand in front of his nose. “It reeks.”

  “Has Logan come out yet?” AJ asked, changing the subject. The last thing he wanted to talk about was his inability to smell.

  Philip shook his head. “Don’t worry, though. We’ve been taking turns checking on him. He’s deep in thought.”

  “Go,” AJ said. “Now go play a game. Enjoy the scenery. Read a book.”

  “Fine,” Philip said, getting up. “But you drive like an old lady.”

  AJ ignored the insult. He knew plenty of old ladies who drove very fast. Well, one, anyway. Daisy’s grandmother could beat anyone in a drag race.

  Philip was only gone a minute before Miles plopped down in the passenger seat. AJ groaned again.

  “Is it true Harvey will float if we go into a body of water?” Miles asked.

  “Yes,” AJ replied with a sidelong glance.

  “Cool.” Miles looked out the huge windshield. “If we fall off a cliff, would we fly?”

  “Of course. There are jet propulsion rockets next to the wheels. If the wheels sense we’ve lost traction with the road, the rockets will kick in.”

  “Seriously?” Miles asked, his eyes widening.

  “No. You really are too gullible.”

  Miles grumbled in response. But he bounced back quickly. “Can we play video games while Harvey’s moving?”

  “If I don’t say yes, will you continue to ask me really annoying questions?”

  “Very likely,” Miles
said.

  “Fine. Just use the seat belts on the couch.”

  Miles jumped up and patted AJ on the shoulder. “You’re a very good guardian. Chaperone. Whatever you call yourself.”

  AJ muttered something about the RV being a pet-free zone as Miles left to join Philip and Daisy.

  It turned out Daisy had only played spy-training video games that tested coordination, and Philip had never played any video games at all, which pretty much blew Miles’s mind. But they found a role-playing game called Role with It that everyone could agree on. They got to scan in their heads to become part of the game. Miles’s head went onto a cowboy’s body, Daisy became a rock star, and Philip got stuck as a half man, half goat. Miles had to work hard not to cry from laughter when he saw how seamlessly their heads melded together with their animated counterparts.

  The three of them spent the next hour trying to save their Wild West city from an alien attack. Miles and Daisy giggled whenever Philip had to use one of his goat legs to kick an alien in its large, squishy head. “Sorry,” Philip grunted each time. He might be competitive to a fault, but he wasn’t the violent type. As much fun as the game was, they couldn’t help glancing at the bedroom door every few minutes.

  Finally, just as Miles thought he couldn’t stand the suspense anymore, Logan came out and joined them on the couch. They laid down their gaming devices.

  “The Magic Bar contains only two ingredients,” Logan announced. “The majority—at least eighty percent—is pure cocoa. That’s a mixture of cocoa paste and cocoa butter. The only other ingredient I can taste is sugar, and only a pinch.”

  “That’s it?” Miles asked, surprised. “No caramel, marshmallow, nougat? Nuts? Wafer? Fruit?”

  “No vanilla to add depth?” Philip asked. “No lecithin to keep it smooth? Don’t all chocolate candies need those?”

  Logan still had a hard time accepting the fact that Philip knew a lot about the chocolate-making process now. “Most do,” he agreed. “But trust me, this didn’t need anything else. The best word I can think of to describe the taste is pure. Like I was eating the soul of chocolate itself.” He reached over to the counter and picked up the blue bean. “Like I was eating the soul of this.” He placed the bean in his palm and held it out to them.