Telling the Bees by Peggy Hesketh Read Free Book Online Page A

you heard something odd?”
    “Nothing that morning that I can recall,” I said. “My number sixteen hive is at the rear of my property, well beyond either eye- or earshot of the Straussmans’ house.”
    “Well, how about the night before? Anything out of the ordinary then?”
    “Nothing more or less extraordinary than the squeaks of the unhatched queen eager to break out of her cell,” I replied.
    Like most people, Detective Grayson knew nothing of the sounds bees make other than the familiar buzz of flight. I enumerated the range of chirps and whines and hums and squeaks emanating from a hive on any given occasion. The prudent beekeeper learns to distinguish which sounds mean what.
    “The young queens, for instance, make a high-pitched squeal, not unlike the note of a distant trumpet, shortly before they emerge from their sealed cells,” I said. “When I hear this clarion call in the evening, I can predict with a fair degree of certainty that a new queen will be born the following morning.”
    This is not the only thing I can predict, but I did not say as much as I watched the good detective sketch crude renderings of cartoonish bees wearing crowns upon their heads in his notebook that he’d laid open on the table between us.
    So many people have come to me over the years to inquire about the best way to get into beekeeping, and, once in, how to refine their beekeeping techniques, that I find myself automatically evaluating the personalities of nearly everyone I meet for their suitability to such an endeavor. Observing Detective Grayson’s careless doodles, I suspected then that he had neither the patience nor the desire to care for bees. I also suspected that while he strove mightily to appear calm and unruffled, there was an aura of excitability beneath his pragmatic manner that was far too easily aroused. Such passions generally render one incompatible with bees. Claire Straussman had been one of the few exceptions to this rule, for while she had a mercurial personality that could set off more sparks than a Fourth of July celebration, she had an uncanny ability to read the nuances of pitch and tone by which bees communicate to one another and, by extension, to anyone outside the hive who cares to listen. This more than offset her unpredictable nature.
    I noticed that Detective Grayson had allowed a small, self-amused smile to creep across his face as he added a trumpet-playing bee to his sketch before setting his pen down and folding his hands atop his notebook. Taking another deliberate breath, he let the corners of his mouth drift back into practiced neutrality.
    “Okay, so you heard your bees squeaking last Thursday night?” he said at last.
    “Indeed I did. Stronger—and louder, as I recall—than any I had ever heard before.”
    I recalled—though I kept this to myself—how once upon a time the anticipated birth of a new queen, especially one heralded by such an uncommon racket, would have sent me hurrying next door to share the glorious news with my neighbors. Claire, in particular, took keen delight in observing the inner lives of our hives, and I had been for many years equally fond of imparting to her the finer points of beekeeping that had been passed on to me by my own father and mother. Sadly, however, such conviviality was no longer the norm between us, and so I had waited in solitude the previous Friday morning for the first young queen to break free from her cell. Detective Grayson did not appear to notice my retreat into private reverie as he returned his attention to the large picture window behind me.
    “I see you can look right across to the Straussmans’ front porch from this window here.”
    “Indeed I can.”
    “So, once again, Mr. Honig . . .”
    “Albert.”
    “Mr. Honig,” he insisted, perhaps more brusquely than even he had intended, as his shoulders seemed to tighten as if to brace for a blow that didn’t come. Slowly, he curled his hand across his mouth and exhaled