As he spoke, Mizumachi Tomoaki checked his watch. "It should be nearly finished spraying by now."
Conan froze. "It's almost four already?"
But on second thought, they had met up in Tokyo that morning, driven all the way here, eaten lunch, waited half the day for the mysterious president, had drinks, and spent quite a while looking over the contract... It was about time.
The leader of The Organization had been missing all this time. He had not even shown up for the meal. Wasn't that a little strange?
A certain Fake Elementary School Student belatedly frowned.
Unlike him, the others had not paid much attention to the time. Mouri Ran and Suzuki Sonoko were practically treating this as a sightseeing trip.
"There are so many roses planted here. They're beautiful." Suzuki Sonoko looked at the chest-high wall of roses and poked at the blooming petals, inspiration rising in her mind once again. "I thought wineries only grew grapes. I never expected you to decorate the place so deliberately. Are you planning to develop tourism?"
Mizumachi Tomoaki smiled. "These roses aren't for viewing. They're for dealing with pests."
The two high school girls looked at each other. They had never heard of roses serving that purpose.
Mizumachi Tomoaki walked over and fiddled with one of the rose bushes. "Compared with grapes, roses are more susceptible to pests and disease. So we plant them here—if something seems wrong with the roses, we can deal with it in time."
Hashimoto Maya: "..." So they were Scapegoats.
Conan looked at the delicate pink roses beside him, then at the yellow roses across the irrigation channel. "But if they're for detection, why plant two different kinds of roses?"
Mizumachi Tomoaki froze. "They're the same kind of rose. The different colors are because..."
Before he