The Project Gutenberg eBook of The telling of the bees
    
This eBook is for the use of anyone anywhere in the United States and
most other parts of the world at no cost and with almost no restrictions
whatsoever. You may copy it, give it away or re-use it under the terms
of the Project Gutenberg License included with this eBook or online
at www.gutenberg.org. If you are not located in the United States,
you will have to check the laws of the country where you are located
before using this eBook.

Title: The telling of the bees

Author: Helen R. Hull


        
Release date: August 7, 2026 [eBook #79297]

Language: English

Original publication: New York: Macfadden Publications, 1940

Other information and formats: www.gutenberg.org/ebooks/79297

Credits: Jens Sadowski. This file was produced from images generously made available by The Internet Archive.


*** START OF THE PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK THE TELLING OF THE BEES ***




                        The Telling of the Bees


       A haunting tale of human hearts, and the tragic trail of a
                         woman’s outlawed love

                             Helen R. Hull

               Liberty, vol. 18, Jan. 4, 1941, pp. 22-27.




When Marcia woke, she thought at first that the week-long spring rain
still beat against the roof. But her eyes opened to brilliant sunlight
on the unpainted wooden partition which divided the cabin into two
rooms. It was wind she had heard, a gay wind out of the north, running a
rough hand over the new green of larches and birches, making a fragrant
snowstorm of petals from the apple trees. She drew a deep breath of
delight, shaking back dark hair from her full throat, straining the
cotton nightdress over her firm deep breasts. She was in haste to be
out, watching the wind dry the sodden furrows of the garden.

[Illustration: Marcia drew a deep breath of delight, shaking back her
hair.]

She laid a fire in the kitchen stove; she drew a bucket of water from
the well just outside the door, her toes curling against the cool
granite well curb. She was dressed before the kettle boiled, in a man’s
shirt, the sleeves rolled above her elbows, and faded denim overalls,
above which her heavy-lashed eyes looked almost purple. Standing in the
doorway she ate her breakfast, coffee with condensed milk, a thick slice
of bread.

Spring had been late this year, when her longing for it had been toxic
in her blood, so that time was a barred window against which she bruised
herself in vain. In spring, Stan had said. When the blueberries are in
flower again. It wouldn’t be decent sooner. That much I owe Dolly. That
was the day after Dolly had been buried.

Sitting in her kitchen that night, forgetting to build up the fire, so
that the cold crept up to her knees, to her heart, she had gone over his
words. Had he meant anything, about the blueberries? Oh, only that he
remembered, as she did, last spring! And now, standing in her doorway,
the north wind lifting her hair, the sun tingling at its roots, she
remembered last spring as she had remembered it since then, invoking it
deliberately, drifting into it in dreams, drinking it like wine.

She had gone up to the blueberry fields—it was in May, last year—to try
to spray the blossoms. She wanted to sell the fruit to the canning
factory, and the inspector condemned all unsprayed fruit. She had not
known how to work the blower. Bill, her husband, had been lazy enough,
but he had taken care of the berries. Only, Bill wasn’t taking care of
anything any more, having driven his truck into a ditch and smashed his
drunken skull on the way home from a New Year’s spree.

Marcia had sat down on a rock with the can between her knees, struggling
to free the pump, when she felt a shadow between her and the sun. There
was Stanley Douglas, grinning down at her, his long lean body relaxed,
his eyes amused. Had she been cursing out loud? She jumped to her feet,
indignant.

Stan was their neighbor. When Bill had moved her out here, into the
shack he had built on the site of the burned homestead, Stan had been
friendly. But Bill had resented him, feeling the contempt which a mean
man feels for an upright man, and Stan had stopped coming over. As his
wife, Dolly, never went out anywhere—Marcia didn’t know what ailed
her—the two families might have had an ocean between them instead of
only a mile of pasture and woods.

Marcia had thought about Stan, his easy graceful stride, his body with
its broad shoulders and slim flat thighs; his proud steady eyes, very
blue in his tanned thin face. What did a man like that do with a sick
wife, anyway? Bill was flabby and white like a mushroom. What had seemed
strength when he courted her had turned out to be pure meanness. Marcia
was bored, restless. (The night they brought Bill home, that doctor from
the town had said, “Well, are you satisfied now?” Had Bill lived long
enough to say anything? What could he say, anyway? She had told him he
was too drunk to drive. Bill wasn’t smart enough to guess she had known
that would send him off! The doctor, for all he was so smart, couldn’t
guess.)

After Bill’s death, Stan had come over a few times. He had offered to do
the spring plowing. Marcia had driven, Stan following, guiding the
plowshare, easy deft strength in every movement of his body, the smell
of the damp earth strong in her nostrils. It was a rite binding them
together, sweat, fatigue, the earth, the rhythm of the work. At the end
of the morning Stan had thrown the plow into the wagon, had backed the
horse into the shafts, adjusted a buckle or two, smiling at her as he
vaulted into the seat. Marcia had leaned against the wheel, her heart
beating urgently.

“Stan!” she had said, and reached a hand to his knee. He had looked at
it and lifted the reins.

“That’s nothing,” he said. “Glad to help you out.” He had driven off
with a great clatter.

He hadn’t come again, until that last spring morning when he laughed at
her ineptness with the blower. “Here, let me show you.”

“You needn’t laugh!” she had cried. “I can fix it myself!” Then they
were wrestling over the pump; he pried her arms apart, bent back her
fingers, the can rattled over the stones, and Marcia was in his arms,
her breasts pressed close under the strong arch of his chest, her mouth
on his, the earth whirling, her blood humming loud—or was it the steady,
monotonously sweet vibrations of the bees? He pulled away from her, and
when she moved toward him, made a barrier of his hands.

“No!” he had said. “No more of that.”

“Oh, love me, Stan! Love me!”

“I won’t. Dolly—”

“She needn’t know.”

“I would know.” His face had an ashy hue under its tan. “No more of
that. You hear?” He strode away, not once looking back.

                   *       *       *       *       *

That had been last spring. A year ago. Summer, fall, winter, and now
another spring. Today, tomorrow, Stan would come! The summer would be
rich in delight and fulfillment. He had done his duty to the thin sharp
woman he had married; he could forget her now, and Marcia need no longer
dull her hunger for him with a dream. She, too, could forget the past
year; she need never think of it again. And yet, as she walked toward
the cleared slopes above the house, fragments of it darted across her
mind.

That day in November, for instance, when Stan’s housekeeper had come to
her door. (His wife never lifted a hand, so people said.) Her daughter
was sick, the housekeeper said, and she must go to town. Mis’ Douglas
thought maybe Mrs. Barrows, being a widow and having no one to do for,
she might be willing to come in for a few hours in the middle of the
day, when Mr. Douglas was away. Chopping pulpwood, he was. Mr. Douglas
thought she wouldn’t have time, the woman went on, but Mis’ Douglas said
just till they found some one else, maybe.

Marcia’s eyes grew bright. A way to see Stan! To learn things about him!
To see this ailing wife who held him away from her! “I’ll be glad to
help out,” she had said. “I don’t mind a few hours a day.”

If Dolly had been a different kind of woman—Marcia stopped, hands inert
at her sides, her nostrils pinched, her body caught in a web of
recollection so intricate, so intense that movement, except into the
past, was impossible. If she would walk, she might escape Dolly’s sallow
face, with the large hazel eyes, the petulant mouth; her voice, with its
queer overemphasis, its reiterations; her odor, perfume, orris root she
brushed into her hair, warm woolen smell from huddling near the stove,
heated rubber of the water bag she held always to an ache in her side or
her stomach or her shoulder.

Marcia drew a long shuddering breath. How had she held her tongue all
those days and weeks, simulating sympathy, listening to symptoms,
scalding her fingers as she filled the water bag, stifling as she piled
more wood into the stove? At first she had thought Dolly must have wind
of something, she boasted so of Stan’s devotion.

“You must always go home before he comes,” Dolly had said that first
day. “He doesn’t like any one in the house except me. He’s that way.
Mrs. Peasley always stayed in the kitchen.”

Presently Marcia had understood that Dolly had a consuming jealousy of
Stanley which included even the livestock on the place, and that her
boasting about his devotion covered her fear, and that Marcia was just
any female under eighty to be kept out of his sight.

Dolly’s bedroom was on the ground floor, opening from the dining room.
The door into the parlor was kept shut. Marcia moved from kitchen
through the dining room, into Dolly’s room, carrying wood for the
stoves, seeing tokens of Stan. Felt slippers under the range. The way he
whittled curls on sticks of kindling. The way he rinsed and stacked the
breakfast dishes. She began to leave tokens. A spray of orange
bittersweet berries over the kitchen clock. Scarlet-black alder branches
in a blue glass vase on the dining-room mantel above the sealed-up
fireplace. Even a clumsy darn in the thumb of a woolen glove dropped in
the woodshed.

The first week Dolly had talked incessantly about her people, her
childhood. Showing off, thought Marcia. How fine she is! She’d never
been strong; her father always said, “Some one must always take care of
my little Doll.” Why, she’d never even washed a dish until she married!

                   *       *       *       *       *

Dolly had been inquisitive about Marcia. “Where’d you live before you
came here? You aren’t from these parts, are you?” Farther down east, was
all Marcia would say. (She was through with her past; she’d run away and
left it. Dolly’s prying drew it close for a moment, herself ragged,
dirty, taking care of babies, one a year, spindly, rickety little brats
with diapers hanging down. “Be grateful you’ve got a home,” her mother
would say. “Not all men would have done it, but when I married him, I
said, ‘Now here’s Marcia.’ And he said, ‘Bring her along.’” Her mother’d
been just seventeen when she had Marcia, it’d been a year before she got
herself a husband, and Marcia had paid in hard labor for whatever fun
her mother may have once had. Until she was old enough to go out to
work. Then she didn’t go back.)

“I used to be awful pretty,” Dolly was saying fretfully. “The whitest
skin. And now look at me!”

Marcia, looking, felt her own vitality rise on a tide of exultance. You
haven’t got much now, she thought. You think you’ve got Stan? Wait and
see!

Dolly went on to talk about her lack of health. Stan was really to
blame, and he knew it; that was why he tried to make things easy for
her. She’d told him she wasn’t strong enough to have a baby, but you
know how men are. She’d been terribly sick, they’d had to operate, she’d
never had a well day since. She had grown animated and flushed as she
described the operation. Only now it was her stomach. Stan had taken her
to the hospital in October—last month—and they’d taken X-rays and
everything, and the doctor said there was nothing wrong, only her
nerves. She didn’t like the doctor. He sided with Stan, pretending
nothing was wrong with her.

To all this Marcia had listened, keeping her face humble and attentive,
moving about the house with her step leashed and quiet. And within her,
her passion had crouched, dark, feral, alert.

On some days Dolly would not get out of bed. Even then she would eat
greedily whatever Marcia brought on the varnished black tray and set
beside her. She craved sweets, frosted cakes, prunes in syrup, a bag of
cheap bright candy from the meat-and-grocery cart which came each week.
That she hid under her pillow, nibbling when she thought no one was
looking.

On other days she would get up when Marcia came, would choose one of the
warm gay bathrobes—the pink blanket robe or the red corduroy—mail-order
purchases, and then would sit for hours in front of the mirror at the
walnut dresser with the marble top, curling her hair, the room close
with the brash odor of scorched hair, with the sooty smell of the
kerosene lamp, smoking as Dolly held the curling tongs in the chimney.

“I’d like to try a henna rinse,” she would say. “My hair used to be like
gold, real bright. But Stan won’t let me send for anything more.” She
combed out curls, softening them over her finger. “That’s the doctor’s
fault, too. He wants I should use just his medicine, so he can get a
rake-off. Some of the medicines you see advertised are certainly
wonderful.”

                   *       *       *       *       *

At the time Marcia scarcely listened to Dolly’s chatter; later it
repeated itself against her inner ear. “I used to send for some of them,
and they made me feel better, but I didn’t say anything about them,
because I knew the doctor would be mad. There was one, an Elixir of
Youth it was called. Glands, you know.” She primmed her mouth. “It makes
your skin white, your eyes bright, it gives you back allure. It said
that on the bottle. I took almost two bottles and I could see a big
difference. Only then I was sick and Stan found the bottles in the
closet, and the doctor just raved! He said it was pure poison, arsenic.
He couldn’t find out what’s the matter with me, and so he blamed that.”
She turned her head, her large eyes vindictive. “I sent for another
bottle, but it never came. If I thought Stan took it—”

One day, later, Dolly had said, “Stan wants to get a regular
housekeeper. He says you never meant to stay all winter; it was just a
favor as a stopgap.”

Marcia was sweeping the dining room. She stopped, her hands closing hard
over the broom handle, her heart swelling. He couldn’t stand it, the
thought of her in his house all day! Last night she had left on the
kitchen table the red handkerchief she tied over her hair. He had seen
it; perhaps he had touched it.

He is afraid, thought Marcia, if the fullness of her throat, the swift
running of her blood could be called thought. He knows we are coming
together! When he comes in at night, the house feels different because I
have been here loving him.

Was it that night, or later, that she had known what she would do? Or
had the knowledge lain coiled, waiting, in the dark center of her being
from the moment she had first walked into the house, and had that dark
self acted without a moment of conscious decision, of choice? And having
acted, had thrust back into darkness all thought of what she had done,
as if in achieving oblivion she achieved safety? For she was safe now,
and Stan was free, and spring had come. The blueberries were in bloom.

No one would ever know how clever she had been. That was a pity. It
would be fine, years from now, when all danger was outlawed, a worthless
debt, to jeer at Dr. Kirk; to say, “I outsmarted you, for all your smug
sureness!”

“Are you quite sure, Mrs. Barrows, that you didn’t send for this patent
medicine for Mrs. Douglas? You say she spoke about it. Did you ever see
her taking it?” His suave voice angered her, for all she knew just how
she must widen her eyes and let her lips part, meek, puzzled, ingenuous.

“Dolly told me about it,” she had said. “She said she had sent for it
and it hadn’t come. Weeks ago. Before Christmas. She told me you said it
was bad for her. Why would I send for it?”

“Why, indeed? And if she _did_ take it, where’s the bottle?” Dr. Kirk
had stared at her, and she had met, had endured his probing eyes with no
movement except a little troubled sigh.

                   *       *       *       *       *

Marcia heard a car, the sound of the motor irregular as the machine
slowed in spring ruts, climbed a rough hill, approached. She stepped
back into a growth of alders, and as the car passed, peered out. A black
coupé, and behind the wheel, slouched in the seat, the doctor, his
profile grim under the brim of a gray hat. Where had he been? To see
Stan? Marcia folded her arms under her breasts, lifting them, trying to
still the great jump her heart gave. Why should he want to see Stan
after all these months? He had signed the death certificate. Acute
indigestion.

Marcia walked on to the blueberry slopes. Long hillsides arched gently
against the brilliant blue of the June sky, a close cover of tawny,
rose-hued, green leaves, lustrous, with huge gray boulders, and lines of
darker gray ledges. She chose the boulder where she had sat last year,
and sank down, hugging her knees, her back turned to the road, not to
tear herself to pieces watching, straining her eyes for the glimpse of
Stan.

And again, as if she must finish the story before she could be rid of it
forever, she thought she heard Dolly’s thin voice, complaining of pains
in her stomach. That was in January, after a sleet storm, and the trees
about the house were brittle glass, cracking in the wind; the roads were
sheer ice. Marcia had telephoned the doctor, at Dolly’s urgency. “Take
her temperature,” he had said, in an exasperated voice. “She’s been
overeating again, that’s all. Call me back if she has any fever;
otherwise give her a good dose of castor oil. Keep her off sweets, if
you can. I can’t get out there unless it’s serious.”

Dolly had anxiously taken her own temperature, but she couldn’t coax any
fever reading no matter how she tried. So she had taken the tonic Dr.
Kirk had left, and after a few days stopped complaining.

In February Dolly had died, picking a blizzard to make things as bad as
possible for everybody. Stan had been at home, stormbound, for almost a
week, and Marcia had not been near the house. “I’ll send for you by the
stage when I want you again,” Dolly had said. She had smirked. “Stan and
I have just the cosiest time together.” That had been the afternoon the
storm began.

Marcia did not know how long the storm had lasted. The brief dim day
blurred into night; night, with its whirling snow catching lamplight
beyond the window, was almost as light as day. She had not gone to bed.
She had slept on a chair, her head down on the kitchen table, waiting,
waiting. She had been sitting there, unable any longer to sleep even for
a few minutes, when Stan’s fist beat against the door.

“Dolly’s sick.” He looked like an old man, the snow frosting his
eyebrows, his chin. “She’s awful sick. Can you get over? I’m driving out
to the end of the road to pick up the doctor. He can come along the
highway that far in his car—the plow’s coming through ahead of him. You
got a lantern? It’s drifting.”

Stan had gone on at once, not waiting. She plowed through drifts, some
of them deep enough to throw her, so that she squirmed along on her
belly until she could get a foot down to earth again. She found
wind-blown stretches where she could run, the lantern swinging crazily.

                   *       *       *       *       *

When she finally reached the Douglas house she had to dig away snow with
her hands before she could get up the steps to the kitchen door. Dolly
was dead, her eyes peering under discolored half-closed lids with an
opaque maliciousness. Marcia had stood looking down at her, and the fire
in the round black stove made a cackling sound. “_Cosy_,” said Marcia.

She had gone back to the kitchen, to strip off mackinaw and boots, to
wipe sweat from throat and face, to lay birch sticks on the coals in the
range, to set a kettle of water forward where it would heat. She tried,
now, to stop her recollection at that moment, but for all she lifted her
head to look across at the sunlit varicolored slope, she saw instead
that supper table, with dishes on the red-checked cloth, she felt in her
muscles the wary haste with which she had cleared the table, she felt on
her cheeks the heat from the fire as she scraped remnants of food from
the plates into the blaze. She could feel the knot, a kind of
concentrated nausea, at the pit of her stomach when, as she dropped the
lid into place, the door opened, and the doctor and Stan came stamping
in.

“She—is she—” Stan had cried out. Marcia had nodded. “Oh, my poor Dolly!
I shouldn’t have left her. I didn’t know what to do!”

The men had hurried into the bedroom, and Marcia had gone stolidly on
clearing up the kitchen, not even trying to overhear. It wasn’t till the
next morning that Dr. Kirk had asked her that question about the patent
medicine. “_Are you quite sure, Mrs. Barrows?_” Some symptoms of arsenic
poisoning, he had said. “She had an idiosyncrasy for arsenic,” he had
added, to Stan not to Marcia. “I tried it in her tonic and discovered
she couldn’t take it. I thought I’d made it clear about that damned
nostrum.”

Marcia lifted her head again, she pressed the palms of her hands against
the warm granite, her throat swelled in a deep breath of the sweet air.
She had heard a twig snap underfoot. She listened. He was coming at
last! She moved to her feet, a swift supple upflowing of her body,
shaking off the past, and turned.

She had thought, in all her dreaming of this day, that he would come
striding toward her with an ardor to match her own, with the swift rush
of wind and water and high spring tides. Her first glimpse of him, as he
emerged from the shadow of the pines, altered the rhythm of her body;
her nostrils widened, she lifted her head apprehensively. He walked as
if he dragged a weight, no resilience in his step, no eager searching
for her in the angle of his head. He was sick, or overtired, or—had Dr.
Kirk said something? What was there to say? Oh, it must be only her
fancy, because she had let herself brood over what was dead and done
with. Not any feeling of guilt. Whatever she had done was justified.

Now he stood beside Marcia, beautiful, looking at her, and Marcia
clenched her fingers into her palms because she was weak with longing to
lay her hand against his chest, there where the fair hair curled crisp
in the V of his open shirt.

“Well,” he said deliberately, looking away from her over the blueberry
land. “Fine day, isn’t it?”

“Did you come out here to tell me that?”

“No.” He was frowning, brows drawn down. “Let’s sit here, on this rock.”
He sat beside her, not touching her. He leaned forward to pick a sprig
of blueberry, small creamy bells of blossoms hanging along the stem
between new coppery leaves.

“They’re in bloom,” said Marcia. “Oh, what is it, Stan?”

“All winter I’ve been waiting for today. It might be I was too eager.
Your skin’s like that blossom, smooth and creamy, your eyes are the
color of a ripe blueberry.”

                   *       *       *       *       *

Marcia made a quick movement, sliding nearer to him, reaching for his
lean brown hand.

“No!” He did not move, but she drew back, holding her breath, every
sense alert. “When I woke up, I said today’s the day! I was r’aring to
come! I went rushing through the chores. I’d ’a’ been here hours ago,
waiting for you, but the doctor drove in just as I was starting.”

“Oh, him!” Marcia’s fear lashed out as scorn.

“I hadn’t seen him since Dolly went.” Stan spoke slowly, as if the
words, or the thoughts behind them, were so strange to him that he could
only fumble over them, wondering at their possible use. “He said he
wasn’t ever satisfied about her dying. He’d got in touch with the firm
that makes that patent medicine, that elixir poor Dolly sent for. He
threatened trouble for them. They wrote him Dolly never ordered any
more, not after that bottle I kept from her last fall, and I busted
that. And they said they never had any order from Marcia Barrows.”

“He suspected I’d sent for it?” cried Marcia.

“He said somebody gave her that—or something else with arsenic. He said
he had no proof. He wouldn’t make a scandal of it. He knows I’d have
died before I’d let Dolly be hurt.”

“He’s trying to turn you against me! Don’t you see? Filling your head—”

“But why should he?”

“Why?” Marcia’s thoughts whirled on padded feet, swift, fugitive,
seeking escape. “Because he’s jealous, that’s why! I never told you—Do
you think he liked it when I wouldn’t have him? He thinks he can get any
woman he wants. It was after Bill died—”

Stan turned his face toward Marcia, the vein swelling on his forehead,
the cords of his throat taut. “Is that it?” he asked hoarsely.

Marcia nodded, teeth set in her lower lip, tears brimming her eyes.

“‘Keep your hands off me,’ I said. He tried to frighten me. You’d never
suspect the kind of man he is, Stan. You’re _good_. He said he’d spread
it around that I goaded Bill into starting off that night with the truck
when he was drunk. Maybe he told you that, too!” She let the tears roll
down her flushed cheeks, she was innocence and helplessness.

“He said you were unscrupulous,” said Stan slowly. Marcia could see the
way his anger washed against the foundations of an old loyalty. “He’s
done so much for me all these years Dolly’s been sick. If he—even if he
couldn’t have you, why should he try to do this to us? He was my
friend.”

“What else did he say? Tell me,” urged Marcia.

“I said to him that I meant to marry you. And he said, ‘Ask her first
why she was in such a hurry to clear away the supper table. Ask her what
she burned up in the stove that night.’”

Marcia pressed her knees together, tight; under them, in the hollows of
the sockets, the skin crawled. But her voice was clear, almost mocking.
“Was he hinting I put poison in the tea, maybe? I hope you told him I
hadn’t been near your place for days.”

“I told him. I told him what we had for supper, pancakes and sausages
and Dolly wanted something sweet, and the syrup jug was empty, so I got
her a comb of honey from the cellar. A fresh comb; it hadn’t been
broken, I was sure of that.”

“Did he think I should have saved a cold pancake?” asked Marcia boldly.

“He said didn’t you keep bees, and I said yes, I guessed so, but I
didn’t know as the honey was yours, and anyway it was a fresh comb.”
Stanley stared at her, his face contorted in a queer despairing rage.
“Why would he do this, trying to come between us? He has his own wife—My
head will burst, trying to—” He twisted his long body suddenly, flinging
himself to his knees beside her, thrusting his head down on her lap.

Marcia bent over him, drawing him up a little so that his face pressed
her breast, laying her hand strongly against his neck, and her eyes were
wide and brilliant with triumph.

“There,” she murmured. “There!”

                   *       *       *       *       *

He shivered once, and then was quiet. Very quiet. The wind had dropped
as the sun rose, and all about them was quiet. Not a sound, not even a
bird’s call. Marcia felt a change in the pressure of his body against
her knees, a slight lifting of his head, a tension, a listening, and
then he pushed away from her, his face white and strained.

“A year ago,” he said, “when I kissed you, the air sang with bees, there
was a humming like a thousand violin strings in the air around us, and
now it is as still—as still as death.” His face was level with hers, his
eyes had a premonition of horror. “All last summer,” he said, “I’d sworn
I wouldn’t think of you, I’d get you out of my blood. And then—bees in
the clover as I worked the garden, bees in the syringa bush outside the
bedroom window, in the hollyhocks at the door, and before I knew I’d
heard them, I’d be sick with longing. I came to dread the sound, it
stirred me up just when I’d got hold—This spring, when I heard the bees
first in the apple trees, I wanted to shout! I had been faithful, I had
given Dolly a few months extra.” He got to his feet, retreating. “And
now—as still as death!”

“Must you have bees buzzing before you can kiss me?” Marcia stumbled up
from the rock. She wanted to throw herself against him, to warm his hard
cold mouth; but her body was pinned to the earth with the bright lance
of fear. “Are you crazy?” she shrilled.

“I’m troubled. What makes you look so scared?”

“All these months I’ve waited for you, not complaining. And when you
come, instead of loving me, you talk about dreadful hints the doctor
spoke, you talk about Dolly, and now bees! What woman could stand it?”

“A woman could wait till I figure out what’s troubling me,” Stan
answered, his face set in stubbornness. “It’s not natural, the
stillness. Marcia, where are your bees?”

(She should not have met him here. Ah, if he could hear the blood roar
in her ears he would not miss the bees! If she was careful—there was no
proof, no way for him to know!)

“Why, I guess they’re all dead,” she said, and made her voice plaintive.
“Bill always took care of them. I didn’t know what to do. Most of the
swarms died that winter after Bill was killed. I had just one hive left.
That was winter-killed.” She smiled at him, her hands pulled the overall
away from her aching breast. “You—you don’t hold that against me, do
you?”

“Bees—and honey—and death,” said Stan slowly. “It begins to fit
together, like a puzzle in a nightmare, only I don’t know how. Let’s
look at the hives. Maybe I could find out—”

“I burned them,” said Marcia hurriedly. “The bees were dead. I didn’t
want the hives around—”

“You burned them? ‘Ask her what she burned up in the stove that night.’
What was it? The frame of the honeycomb Dolly had eaten? Was that it?”

“The doctor has pois—has turned you against me! Oh, don’t let him!
You’re free now, free to love me—”

“Were you afraid to speak that word aloud? Poisoned?”

“It was a fresh comb, untouched, unbroken. You said so!”

“You had emptied the syrup jug, hadn’t you? So I’d give it to her. The
bees died, Dolly died. It’s monstrous! I can’t believe it! Marcia, what
have you done?”

“I didn’t know the honey was poisoned.” Marcia was babbling now, trying
with frantic words to draw him back from irrevocable knowledge. “How
could I know? I took it out early—to give Dolly—she liked sweets. Later,
when the bees died, I was frightened.” (No one could prove she had
known. No one had heard Bill say, two years ago, when they lost the
first hives, “Damn the law! The honey’s not fit to use. It’s that
arsenate we dust the blossoms with—the bees die as they eat. Arsenic
honey, a fine note! The law, interfering with a man so his honey’s
ruined, or he can’t sell his berries.” No one could prove she had known.
She hadn’t planned it when she went out to blow the poison over the
blueberry fields. She didn’t know just when she had seen what she could
do so cleverly, so surely.) “Stan, you can’t think—” Her hands were
restless, not daring to touch him. “Who would have dreamed that bees
could carry home enough of the powder with the pollen—”

“My heaven, so that’s it! Why, you sprayed these barrens last spring
yourself! You knew!”

“You can’t prove anything!” For a moment Marcia hated him, hated him for
the dreadful revulsion in his face, for the fear which so shook her.

He was silent. When at last his lips moved stiffly, he said, “My poor
Dolly! I ought to give you over to the law.”

“Give me over?” Marcia’s lips drew back from her strong teeth. “Who fed
her the honey? I wasn’t even in the house! I’ll tell them we were
lovers, you wanted to get her out of the way. They’d believe me!”

“If they hanged us both,” said Stan grimly, “I might be better off than
I will be, knowing what I know.”

“What’s done was done for love of you.” Marcia was desperate now. “To
set you free. You wanted her dead, but you wouldn’t admit it. You
wouldn’t dare _do_ anything.”

“I wouldn’t dare murder,” said Stan. “If I would, I might choke you now,
for being what you are. I never wished for Dolly to die. You couldn’t
understand how I felt about Dolly. I—I wanted to take care of her.”

“But you loved me! And you fought it down! That’s why—”

“That’s why you murdered Dolly. The crime is mine, too. There must be
evil in me that would hunger for your touch! But you look like a woman,
living, beautiful, warm—”

“No one will ever know, Stan! We can forget it!” Marcia flung her arms
wide, swaying toward him, her face flushed.

“Don’t touch me,” said Stan sharply. He ground a fist against a wry
mouth and went stumbling away from her, back toward the road.

Marcia watched him go, her face sagging into blankness. Around her in
the sunlit blueberry barrens was the stillness of death.

                                THE END




                               HELEN HULL


   lives in New York in winter and in her old Maine farmhouse in
   summer. Most of her time is spent in writing and in helping
   others to write in short-story classes at Columbia. She likes
   cooking, motorboating, gardening, bicycling, and owning a
   wire-haired terrier.




                          Transcriber’s Notes


Transcribed from Liberty, vol. 18, Jan. 4, 1941, pp. 22-27.

The unabridged latest version of this text was published in: Octave.
Coward-McCann, New York, 1947, pp. 259-278.

New original cover art included with this eBook is granted to the public
domain.

The original spelling and punctuation were mostly preserved. Minor
typesetting mistakes were silently corrected.



*** END OF THE PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK THE TELLING OF THE BEES ***


    

Updated editions will replace the previous one—the old editions will
be renamed.

Creating the works from print editions not protected by U.S. copyright
law means that no one owns a United States copyright in these works,
so the Foundation (and you!) can copy and distribute it in the United
States without permission and without paying copyright
royalties. Special rules, set forth in the General Terms of Use part
of this license, apply to copying and distributing Project
Gutenberg™ electronic works to protect the PROJECT GUTENBERG™
concept and trademark. Project Gutenberg is a registered trademark,
and may not be used if you charge for an eBook, except by following
the terms of the trademark license, including paying royalties for use
of the Project Gutenberg trademark. If you do not charge anything for
copies of this eBook, complying with the trademark license is very
easy. You may use this eBook for nearly any purpose such as creation
of derivative works, reports, performances and research. Project
Gutenberg eBooks may be modified and printed and given away—you may
do practically ANYTHING in the United States with eBooks not protected
by U.S. copyright law. Redistribution is subject to the trademark
license, especially commercial redistribution.


START: FULL LICENSE

THE FULL PROJECT GUTENBERG™ LICENSE

PLEASE READ THIS BEFORE YOU DISTRIBUTE OR USE THIS WORK

To protect the Project Gutenberg™ mission of promoting the free
distribution of electronic works, by using or distributing this work
(or any other work associated in any way with the phrase “Project
Gutenberg”), you agree to comply with all the terms of the Full
Project Gutenberg License available with this file or online at
www.gutenberg.org/license.

Section 1. General Terms of Use and Redistributing Project Gutenberg
electronic works

1.A. By reading or using any part of this Project Gutenberg
electronic work, you indicate that you have read, understand, agree to
and accept all the terms of this license and intellectual property
(trademark/copyright) agreement. If you do not agree to abide by all
the terms of this agreement, you must cease using and return or
destroy all copies of Project Gutenberg electronic works in your
possession. If you paid a fee for obtaining a copy of or access to a
Project Gutenberg electronic work and you do not agree to be bound
by the terms of this agreement, you may obtain a refund from the person
or entity to whom you paid the fee as set forth in paragraph 1.E.8.

1.B. “Project Gutenberg” is a registered trademark. It may only be
used on or associated in any way with an electronic work by people who
agree to be bound by the terms of this agreement. There are a few
things that you can do with most Project Gutenberg electronic works
even without complying with the full terms of this agreement. See
paragraph 1.C below. There are a lot of things you can do with Project
Gutenberg electronic works if you follow the terms of this
agreement and help preserve free future access to Project Gutenberg
electronic works. See paragraph 1.E below.

1.C. The Project Gutenberg Literary Archive Foundation (“the
Foundation” or PGLAF), owns a compilation copyright in the collection
of Project Gutenberg electronic works. Nearly all the individual
works in the collection are in the public domain in the United
States. If an individual work is unprotected by copyright law in the
United States and you are located in the United States, we do not
claim a right to prevent you from copying, distributing, performing,
displaying or creating derivative works based on the work as long as
all references to Project Gutenberg are removed. Of course, we hope
that you will support the Project Gutenberg mission of promoting
free access to electronic works by freely sharing Project Gutenberg
works in compliance with the terms of this agreement for keeping the
Project Gutenberg name associated with the work. You can easily
comply with the terms of this agreement by keeping this work in the
same format with its attached full Project Gutenberg License when
you share it without charge with others.

1.D. The copyright laws of the place where you are located also govern
what you can do with this work. Copyright laws in most countries are
in a constant state of change. If you are outside the United States,
check the laws of your country in addition to the terms of this
agreement before downloading, copying, displaying, performing,
distributing or creating derivative works based on this work or any
other Project Gutenberg work. The Foundation makes no
representations concerning the copyright status of any work in any
country other than the United States.

1.E. Unless you have removed all references to Project Gutenberg:

1.E.1. The following sentence, with active links to, or other
immediate access to, the full Project Gutenberg License must appear
prominently whenever any copy of a Project Gutenberg work (any work
on which the phrase “Project Gutenberg” appears, or with which the
phrase “Project Gutenberg” is associated) is accessed, displayed,
performed, viewed, copied or distributed:

    This eBook is for the use of anyone anywhere in the United States and most
    other parts of the world at no cost and with almost no restrictions
    whatsoever. You may copy it, give it away or re-use it under the terms
    of the Project Gutenberg™ License included with this eBook or online
    at www.gutenberg.org. If you
    are not located in the United States, you will have to check the laws
    of the country where you are located before using this eBook.
  
1.E.2. If an individual Project Gutenberg electronic work is
derived from texts not protected by U.S. copyright law (does not
contain a notice indicating that it is posted with permission of the
copyright holder), the work can be copied and distributed to anyone in
the United States without paying any fees or charges. If you are
redistributing or providing access to a work with the phrase “Project
Gutenberg” associated with or appearing on the work, you must comply
either with the requirements of paragraphs 1.E.1 through 1.E.7 or
obtain permission for the use of the work and the Project Gutenberg
trademark as set forth in paragraphs 1.E.8 or 1.E.9.

1.E.3. If an individual Project Gutenberg electronic work is posted
with the permission of the copyright holder, your use and distribution
must comply with both paragraphs 1.E.1 through 1.E.7 and any
additional terms imposed by the copyright holder. Additional terms
will be linked to the Project Gutenberg License for all works
posted with the permission of the copyright holder found at the
beginning of this work.

1.E.4. Do not unlink or detach or remove the full Project Gutenberg
License terms from this work, or any files containing a part of this
work or any other work associated with Project Gutenberg.

1.E.5. Do not copy, display, perform, distribute or redistribute this
electronic work, or any part of this electronic work, without
prominently displaying the sentence set forth in paragraph 1.E.1 with
active links or immediate access to the full terms of the Project
Gutenberg License.

1.E.6. You may convert to and distribute this work in any binary,
compressed, marked up, nonproprietary or proprietary form, including
any word processing or hypertext form. However, if you provide access
to or distribute copies of a Project Gutenberg work in a format
other than “Plain Vanilla ASCII” or other format used in the official
version posted on the official Project Gutenberg website
(www.gutenberg.org), you must, at no additional cost, fee or expense
to the user, provide a copy, a means of exporting a copy, or a means
of obtaining a copy upon request, of the work in its original “Plain
Vanilla ASCII” or other form. Any alternate format must include the
full Project Gutenberg License as specified in paragraph 1.E.1.

1.E.7. Do not charge a fee for access to, viewing, displaying,
performing, copying or distributing any Project Gutenberg works
unless you comply with paragraph 1.E.8 or 1.E.9.

1.E.8. You may charge a reasonable fee for copies of or providing
access to or distributing Project Gutenberg electronic works
provided that:

    • You pay a royalty fee of 20% of the gross profits you derive from
        the use of Project Gutenberg works calculated using the method
        you already use to calculate your applicable taxes. The fee is owed
        to the owner of the Project Gutenberg trademark, but he has
        agreed to donate royalties under this paragraph to the Project
        Gutenberg Literary Archive Foundation. Royalty payments must be paid
        within 60 days following each date on which you prepare (or are
        legally required to prepare) your periodic tax returns. Royalty
        payments should be clearly marked as such and sent to the Project
        Gutenberg Literary Archive Foundation at the address specified in
        Section 4, “Information about donations to the Project Gutenberg
        Literary Archive Foundation.”
    
    • You provide a full refund of any money paid by a user who notifies
        you in writing (or by e-mail) within 30 days of receipt that s/he
        does not agree to the terms of the full Project Gutenberg™
        License. You must require such a user to return or destroy all
        copies of the works possessed in a physical medium and discontinue
        all use of and all access to other copies of Project Gutenberg™
        works.
    
    • You provide, in accordance with paragraph 1.F.3, a full refund of
        any money paid for a work or a replacement copy, if a defect in the
        electronic work is discovered and reported to you within 90 days of
        receipt of the work.
    
    • You comply with all other terms of this agreement for free
        distribution of Project Gutenberg™ works.
    

1.E.9. If you wish to charge a fee or distribute a Project
Gutenberg™ electronic work or group of works on different terms than
are set forth in this agreement, you must obtain permission in writing
from the Project Gutenberg Literary Archive Foundation, the manager of
the Project Gutenberg™ trademark. Contact the Foundation as set
forth in Section 3 below.

1.F.

1.F.1. Project Gutenberg volunteers and employees expend considerable
effort to identify, do copyright research on, transcribe and proofread
works not protected by U.S. copyright law in creating the Project
Gutenberg™ collection. Despite these efforts, Project Gutenberg™
electronic works, and the medium on which they may be stored, may
contain “Defects,” such as, but not limited to, incomplete, inaccurate
or corrupt data, transcription errors, a copyright or other
intellectual property infringement, a defective or damaged disk or
other medium, a computer virus, or computer codes that damage or
cannot be read by your equipment.

1.F.2. LIMITED WARRANTY, DISCLAIMER OF DAMAGES - Except for the “Right
of Replacement or Refund” described in paragraph 1.F.3, the Project
Gutenberg Literary Archive Foundation, the owner of the Project
Gutenberg™ trademark, and any other party distributing a Project
Gutenberg™ electronic work under this agreement, disclaim all
liability to you for damages, costs and expenses, including legal
fees. YOU AGREE THAT YOU HAVE NO REMEDIES FOR NEGLIGENCE, STRICT
LIABILITY, BREACH OF WARRANTY OR BREACH OF CONTRACT EXCEPT THOSE
PROVIDED IN PARAGRAPH 1.F.3. YOU AGREE THAT THE FOUNDATION, THE
TRADEMARK OWNER, AND ANY DISTRIBUTOR UNDER THIS AGREEMENT WILL NOT BE
LIABLE TO YOU FOR ACTUAL, DIRECT, INDIRECT, CONSEQUENTIAL, PUNITIVE OR
INCIDENTAL DAMAGES EVEN IF YOU GIVE NOTICE OF THE POSSIBILITY OF SUCH
DAMAGE.

1.F.3. LIMITED RIGHT OF REPLACEMENT OR REFUND - If you discover a
defect in this electronic work within 90 days of receiving it, you can
receive a refund of the money (if any) you paid for it by sending a
written explanation to the person you received the work from. If you
received the work on a physical medium, you must return the medium
with your written explanation. The person or entity that provided you
with the defective work may elect to provide a replacement copy in
lieu of a refund. If you received the work electronically, the person
or entity providing it to you may choose to give you a second
opportunity to receive the work electronically in lieu of a refund. If
the second copy is also defective, you may demand a refund in writing
without further opportunities to fix the problem.

1.F.4. Except for the limited right of replacement or refund set forth
in paragraph 1.F.3, this work is provided to you ‘AS-IS’, WITH NO
OTHER WARRANTIES OF ANY KIND, EXPRESS OR IMPLIED, INCLUDING BUT NOT
LIMITED TO WARRANTIES OF MERCHANTABILITY OR FITNESS FOR ANY PURPOSE.

1.F.5. Some states do not allow disclaimers of certain implied
warranties or the exclusion or limitation of certain types of
damages. If any disclaimer or limitation set forth in this agreement
violates the law of the state applicable to this agreement, the
agreement shall be interpreted to make the maximum disclaimer or
limitation permitted by the applicable state law. The invalidity or
unenforceability of any provision of this agreement shall not void the
remaining provisions.

1.F.6. INDEMNITY - You agree to indemnify and hold the Foundation, the
trademark owner, any agent or employee of the Foundation, anyone
providing copies of Project Gutenberg™ electronic works in
accordance with this agreement, and any volunteers associated with the
production, promotion and distribution of Project Gutenberg™
electronic works, harmless from all liability, costs and expenses,
including legal fees, that arise directly or indirectly from any of
the following which you do or cause to occur: (a) distribution of this
or any Project Gutenberg work, (b) alteration, modification, or
additions or deletions to any Project Gutenberg work, and (c) any
Defect you cause.

Section 2. Information about the Mission of Project Gutenberg

Project Gutenberg is synonymous with the free distribution of
electronic works in formats readable by the widest variety of
computers including obsolete, old, middle-aged and new computers. It
exists because of the efforts of hundreds of volunteers and donations
from people in all walks of life.

Volunteers and financial support to provide volunteers with the
assistance they need are critical to reaching Project Gutenberg’s
goals and ensuring that the Project Gutenberg collection will
remain freely available for generations to come. In 2001, the Project
Gutenberg Literary Archive Foundation was created to provide a secure
and permanent future for Project Gutenberg and future
generations. To learn more about the Project Gutenberg Literary
Archive Foundation and how your efforts and donations can help, see
Sections 3 and 4 and the Foundation information page at www.gutenberg.org.

Section 3. Information about the Project Gutenberg Literary Archive Foundation

The Project Gutenberg Literary Archive Foundation is a non-profit
501(c)(3) educational corporation organized under the laws of the
state of Mississippi and granted tax exempt status by the Internal
Revenue Service. The Foundation’s EIN or federal tax identification
number is 64-6221541. Contributions to the Project Gutenberg Literary
Archive Foundation are tax deductible to the full extent permitted by
U.S. federal laws and your state’s laws.

The Foundation’s business office is located at 41 Watchung Plaza #516,
Montclair NJ 07042, USA, +1 (862) 621-9288. Email contact links and up
to date contact information can be found at the Foundation’s website
and official page at www.gutenberg.org/contact

Section 4. Information about Donations to the Project Gutenberg
Literary Archive Foundation

Project Gutenberg™ depends upon and cannot survive without widespread
public support and donations to carry out its mission of
increasing the number of public domain and licensed works that can be
freely distributed in machine-readable form accessible by the widest
array of equipment including outdated equipment. Many small donations
($1 to $5,000) are particularly important to maintaining tax exempt
status with the IRS.

The Foundation is committed to complying with the laws regulating
charities and charitable donations in all 50 states of the United
States. Compliance requirements are not uniform and it takes a
considerable effort, much paperwork and many fees to meet and keep up
with these requirements. We do not solicit donations in locations
where we have not received written confirmation of compliance. To SEND
DONATIONS or determine the status of compliance for any particular state
visit www.gutenberg.org/donate.

While we cannot and do not solicit contributions from states where we
have not met the solicitation requirements, we know of no prohibition
against accepting unsolicited donations from donors in such states who
approach us with offers to donate.

International donations are gratefully accepted, but we cannot make
any statements concerning tax treatment of donations received from
outside the United States. U.S. laws alone swamp our small staff.

Please check the Project Gutenberg web pages for current donation
methods and addresses. Donations are accepted in a number of other
ways including checks, online payments and credit card donations. To
donate, please visit: www.gutenberg.org/donate.

Section 5. General Information About Project Gutenberg electronic works

Professor Michael S. Hart was the originator of the Project
Gutenberg concept of a library of electronic works that could be
freely shared with anyone. For forty years, he produced and
distributed Project Gutenberg eBooks with only a loose network of
volunteer support.

Project Gutenberg eBooks are often created from several printed
editions, all of which are confirmed as not protected by copyright in
the U.S. unless a copyright notice is included. Thus, we do not
necessarily keep eBooks in compliance with any particular paper
edition.

Most people start at our website which has the main PG search
facility: www.gutenberg.org.

This website includes information about Project Gutenberg,
including how to make donations to the Project Gutenberg Literary
Archive Foundation, how to help produce our new eBooks, and how to
subscribe to our email newsletter to hear about new eBooks.