“USDA contracts with you for the school lunch program?”
“USDA contracts with us, but I don’t know about the school lunch program. We don’t really know where all our products end up. We ship to state warehouses or other processors who might repackage and put their brand name on it for retail sale. Some of the product is bought by hospitals. And yeah, some is sent to school distribution centers.”
“You don’t have records of where your products end up?” Bix asked.
“No, sir. We only have records of which state warehouses we ship to. Those warehouses would probably have records of where they shipped the products.”
“What about the slaughterhouses?” Platt asked. “Do they provide you with test samples for bacteria or do you do your own testing?”
“They provide their test results but we pull routine samples after we grind the meat.”
“What happens when you get a positive back?”
“We’re supposed to shut the line. Clean everything. Pull another sample.”
“Every time?” Bix asked.
“Yup, every time.”
Platt was concerned that the supervisor had said “we’re supposed to” rather than “we do.” Grinding beef that might already be contaminated usually ended up spreading it. Taking random samplings was a crapshoot at best.
They moved on to another area, and again Platt ventured off on his own. He noticed two workers entering one of the security doors. As they changed their shoe covers Platt noticed the old covers looked wet. One of the men carried a clean plastic bucket that he took over to the grinding line and filled with ground beef.
Curious, Platt went to check if this particular door actually led to the outside, wondering why a worker would be allowed to bring in an unsterile container, but he saw through the glass window that the door didn’t lead outside. It led to what looked like a small warehouse.
Platt used his key card to open the door. Bix saw him and hurried over, bringing the other two men with him.
“I was just curious,” Platt said.
Without going into the room he saw what had made the shoe covers wet. A drain in the middle of the floor was filled with murky sludge that gave off a rancid smell.
“Oh yeah, it backs up sometimes when it rains,” the supervisor explained. “We’ve talked about that before.” He exchanged looks with Alfred like it was okay since they had talked about it. “George,” he called to a worker sorting supplies on the back shelves. “Clean this up.”
Platt watched as George complied, going to a stack of plastic buckets exactly like the one Platt had seen taken inside the production area and filled with ground beef. George took one off the same stack to mop up the floor.
“Are those disposable?” Platt asked.
“Not to worry. We send them through a special rinse cycle.”
“Plastic?” Platt said and looked over at Bix, who was already trying not to scream.
CHAPTER 48
NEBRASKA
Wesley Stotter had done his homework. It was something his fans expected. He knew almost everything there was to know about the Nebraska National Forest. He could list every type of tree and every species of bird. He knew the forest was ninety thousand acres—fifteen miles wide and eleven miles from north to south. Twenty thousand of those acres were covered by trees, the rest, rolling pasture land. He had visited the campgrounds, climbed the observation tower, and been inside the nursery. But he didn’t have a clue what went on inside the field house between the Dismal River and the forest.
Ordinarily he wouldn’t care. But when the sun came up after his sleepless night in his stranded Roadmaster with his Colt .45 cradled in his hands, the first thing he noticed was the sunlight hitting the tin roof below. Where his vehicle had stalled had given him a bird’s-eye view of the field house. Tucked between sand dunes with the Dismal River winding behind it and the forest ridge on the other side, the complex remained shielded from view of the main road. It was easy to forget it existed. No one took an interest in something they couldn’t see.