The Language of Bees - Laurie R. King [42]
inventing techniques known by the painters who
have gone before?
Testimony, I:8
DAMIAN? DAMIAN, WAKE UP! DA—”
“Bloody bastard, watch out for the—oh, I'll bloody murder you, you son of a—”
“Damián!”
“What? What is it?”
“The light burnt out, you were having a dream. A nightmare.”
“Don't be an idiot. I don't have nightmares.”
“Then you were locked in battle against invisible foes. Here, I've turned on the other lamp. Are you all right?”
“Of course I'm all right. I just need some air.”
“The window is open.”
“I have to get out.”
“Damian—”
“If you try and stop me, I'll hit you.”
“I wasn't going to stop you. But tomorrow? We'll divide up.”
“Now there's a pity.”
“And, Damian? Take your coat. You're dripping with sweat.”
The Seeker (2): Every man, however god-like and gifted,
requires a Guide to set him upon the path, to show him
how other artists have achieved their results, to show how
other Seekers have found their answers.
Testimony, I:8
FRIDAY MORNING, I SAT AT THE KITCHEN TABLE, reading Thursday's papers, drinking strong coffee, and eating slices of stale bread covered with butter and jam—I'd become somewhat tired of honey, and had decided that a more substantial breakfast was not worth the effort of clearing smoke and scraping pans. Mrs Hudson would be back tomorrow, and life would return, at least in part, to normality.
I stood at the door looking over the terrace and the Downs, and thought about what to do with my last full day of solitude. There was no telling where Holmes was or when he might appear, but when he did so, it would be satisfying to have solved his mystery for him.
I put on my boots, locked up, and set off once more in the direction of the mad beehive.
Once there, I left my rucksack in the shade of the emptied Langstroth box and walked due east, going nearly half a mile before turning back to where I had started. I walked slowly, searching the ground, the air, the surroundings in general, to see what was different about this particular hive.
Back and forth I went, my senses open to that one lonely patch of downland. I climbed over stone walls, poked about in holes looking for poison bait, wrote down the name of every plant in the vicinity, the presence of sheep, the lack of trees.
After three hours, the sun was scorching and I was thoroughly fed up with the entire puzzle. I drained my last drop of warm lemonade and tried to put my thoughts in order.
There was nothing I could see that set this hive apart from the others. Except that it was, in fact, apart, this being the furthest of Holmes' hives. As yesterday's blistered palms could well testify.
Plenty of food—the honey in the frames had told me that. A fertile queen—any number of fertile queens. So what was it? Why dislike this place? What had so infected the community with alarm and despondency that they had deserted their brood?
With a sigh of resignation at my own unwillingness to let go of the conundrum, I got down on my hands and knees at the front of the hive and picked through the grass with my fingertips.
There were dead bees there, of course—workers only live a few weeks, and a sentimental burial is not in the hive's interest. Still, I dutifully gathered up those that were not dried to a husk, taking care not to impale myself on the stingers, and folded them into a sheet of paper. Perhaps examination under a microscope would reveal a parasite.
When I was finished, I climbed onto the wall and gazed at the slopes running down to the Channel. The water was blue today beneath the summer's sun; I counted twenty-three vessels, from light sail-boat to heavy steamer, in the patch immediately before me.
Not so this piece of hillside. Even in August, this was away from the shoes of long-distance ramblers and day-tourists alike. The nearest house was almost a mile away, the grassland was broken by nothing larger than gorse bushes.
A small and tentative idea, born of the loneliness of the place and three days of my own solitude, crept into the side of my mind. I looked speculatively down at the packet of bees.