“I’d like to show you something. May I?”
She opened it without waiting for an answer.
“It’s something I’ve been working on for a long time.”
I tried to focus, but the ink marks crawled like worms on the paper.
“Wait.” She took off my glasses, polished them quickly with the fabric of her dress and put them back on my nose. They were cleaner, but that wasn’t the main reason why I straightened up my back and tried to take in what she wanted to show me. The small gesture had given me a lump in my throat. I was so grateful that it had been she who had come, that she in particular had found me, seen me like this, and nobody else. I swallowed and directed my attention towards what she wanted to show me.
A drawing. A hive. But completely different from mine.
“I thought that if we turn it upside down, it will all be completely different,” she said. “If we insert the boards downwards from above, instead of hanging them from the ceiling, we’ll have much better control.”
I stared at the drawings she showed me. They slowly came into focus on the page.
“No,” I said and cleared my throat. “No. It won’t work.” I searched for the words. “They will get stuck on the sides of the box.” I straightened up. I was, after all, an authority. “The bees will attach them with propolis and wax, it will be impossible to get them out.”
Then she smiled.
“If they’re too close together, yes. Five millimeters or less.”
“And if they are too far apart, the bees will build brace comb,” I said. “Regardless, it doesn’t work from above. I’ve already considered the possibility.” I spoke the last words with an indulgent smile.
“I know, but you haven’t tried different alternatives. It’s just a matter of finding the right dimensions.”
“I don’t understand.”
She pointed at the drawings again. “There must be an inbetween point, Father. A point where they will stop producing wax and propolis, and start producing brace comb. What if we find the inbetween point? If we determine exactly the right distance between the outer edge on the molding and the inner wall, they will produce neither wax nor brace comb.”
I just had to look at her. Look at her properly. She sat with complete calm, but her eyes were shining, revealing her enthusiasm. What was it she said? Wax. Brace comb. Was there something in between?
My energy returned, I got on my feet.
The inbetween point!
Chapter 47
GEORGE
After the meeting at the stupid bank, I went out to the field by the Alabast River. It was empty now. Just a few hives were left in one corner near the end. There was still life in them, but I didn’t know for how long. There was nothing to set them apart from the others. There was no explanation for why they should survive.
I walked in a circle. The hives had left marks behind all over the grass. Flattened, dead grass. But between the dead blades of grass there were new shoots. Soon the marks would be gone and there would no longer be any trace of all the bee colonies that had lived here.
I walked closer to the buzzing. Suddenly I yearned to be stung. For the stinging pain. The swelling. An excuse to curse loudly and with a vengeance.
Once, just once, I’d been severely stung. I was eight years old. I remember I was sitting in the kitchen. My mother came home from the store. I don’t know why, but on this particular day she’d brought me something. Yes, actually, it was to cheer me up because I was going to be a big brother for the third time, and she obviously knew the news wouldn’t sit well with me. I never got toys except on my birthday and Christmas, but today she had nonetheless bought me something. A toy car. But not just any toy car. Hot Wheels. I had wanted one for ages. I was so happy it felt like my head would burst into flames. And I picked up the car and ran out to the field before she even had a chance to tell me about her tummy.
My dad was there. With his head in a hive. I didn’t think twice. Ran straight towards him. Look! Look what I got! Look, Daddy! Then I noticed his eyes behind the veil. Stay away from here! Turn back! But it was too late to stop.
I was bedridden for several days. Nobody counted, but there must have been more than a hundred bee stings. I developed a high fever. The doctor came. He gave me some pills that were so strong they could have knocked out a bear. And I didn’t learn about the child in Mom’s tummy until much later.
After that I avoided bee stings at all costs.
I used to think of bee stings as punishment. Like a sign that I hadn’t done my job properly. Hadn’t protected myself. Hadn’t been careful enough. A season without a bee sting was the goal, but there were always a few, no beekeeper manages to avoid stings for an entire summer. Except for this year. So far I hadn’t had a single sting, but for reasons completely different from those I would have liked. I walked in a circle. Close and closer. They droned listlessly. I stopped and did a count of the density. Not enough. And at the very least not 2.5 per square yard.
I stomped hard on the ground. A single bee flew up.
Sting me. Sting me!
It sailed through the air, swerved away from me. Wouldn’t do me the favor.
I turned and walked towards the barn.
I hadn’t bought new materials. The spring’s last order still lay in a fresh-smelling pile in a corner. It frightened me. Time stood between me and that pile. Hours and hours, all the work that would be required to build all the hives. And after that, even more. It was just a matter of getting around to ordering more planks. Because I was gonna build them myself. As long as I was working with bees, I was gonna build the hives myself.
I picked up a two-by-four, testing the weight in my hand. Felt the wood against my bare skin. Still damp. Suitably pliant. Alive.
Then I put on my gloves. Through them the wood was nothing but dead material. I took out the safety earmuffs. Turned on the saw.
Then light fell in across the floor through the doorway. The strip grew larger, a shadow filled it. Then it disappeared.
I turned around.
It was Emma.
She looked at the woodpile and then at me. Shook her head gently.
“What are you up to?”
She asked, even though she knew the answer.
She took a few steps towards me.
“This is madness.”
She nodded at the planks.
“You have to build so many. We need so many.”
As if I didn’t know. As if I wasn’t completely aware of it.
I shrugged my shoulders, was about to put the earmuffs back on, when something in her eyes stopped me.
“We could have sold,” she said.
I dropped the earmuffs. They fell to the floor with a loud bang.
“We could have sold last winter. Moved. Already been down there.”
She didn’t say another word, not a word of what she was thinking. While we’d had the chance. While the farm was still worth something.
I bent over, picked up the safety earmuffs, lifting them with both hands, as if one hand wasn’t enough, as if I were a child.
Then I put them on my head and turned away.
I didn’t hear her leave. Just saw the strip of light on the floor, how it grew larger, how her shadow filled it, then it grew smaller, and disappeared.
We didn’t speak of it again. She didn’t say anything else. The days passed. I kept building until I got blisters, till my back hurt and my fingers were bleeding with cuts. I don’t know what Emma was doing. But at least she didn’t talk about it anymore. Just looked at me from time to time, with watery eyes, a gaze that said: It’s your fault.
We tried to live like before. Do the same things. Dinner together every day. TV in the evening. She followed many shows. Laughed and wept in front of the TV. Gasped. Talked about them with me. Have you ever! No, it isn’t possible. But he doesn’t deserve it. And her, she’s so sweet. No, no, good heavens.