The Bees: A Novel (26 page)

Epilogue

T
HE APPLE TREES WERE IN FULL BLOOM AS THE MAN, HIS
wife, and their two teenage children came through the orchard. They paused near the old hive. The man let a long coil of black ribbon unspool from his hand.

“So, this is a condition of Grandpa’s will. It’s from the olden days, when people thought the bees needed to be told important family news. Births, deaths, and marriages.” The man unfolded a piece of paper. “He even wrote it all out.”

Then he stepped forward to the hive and tied the black ribbon around it, before knocking on it softly, three times.

“It is my sad duty to inform you,” he read, “that your beekeeper, my father, has died. He will no longer be taking care of you, and he asks you to be patient with your new custodian.”

The tone in his voice made his wife put her arms around him. He held her as he folded the paper back into his pocket, then addressed the hive again.

“And I have something else to say, for myself. I am very sorry that I have sold this orchard, and—I ask your forgiveness for what will happen.” He wiped his eyes.

“Dad.” His daughter crouched down and put her ear against the hive. “Listen.”

“Careful!” But he too crouched down and put his ear to the wood. They looked at each other. Then he moved around and looked into the hole on the landing board. His wife drew back.

“Please, both of you, be careful—”

“I can’t hear a thing,” he said. “I cannot see a single bee.”

His son smiled. “Dad! They went with him!”

The family looked up into the bright and empty sky.

Acknowledgments

For making it happen: my agents Simon Trewin, in London, and Dorian Karchmar, in New York. Thank you both so much.

For making it better: my editor, Lee Boudreaux—an education and a pleasure to work with you; my thanks also to Clare Reihill for her insight, and to Iris Tupholme for her support.

My thanks to all the teams at Ecco, 4th Estate, and HarperCollins Canada, and to my foreign rights agent at WME, Annemarie Blumenhagen. For the two superb covers: Steve Attardo and Alison Saltzman for Ecco, and Jo Walker for 4th Estate.

For good fellowship: Richard Skinner and the Faber group of 2012, with honorable mention to the most generous polymath that is Cal Moriarty.

For sharing her knowledge and guiding my research: Dr. Margaret Couvillon. I am also indebted to the work of biologists Dr. Francis Ratnieks, Dr. Thomas Seeley, and Bert Holldobler and E. O. Wilson. All mistakes are my own.

For support in many forms: Isabelle Grey, Heidi Berry, Kate Duthie, Sasha Slorer, Debs Shuter, Debra Gonzalez, Maggie Doherty, Linda King, Emmy Minton, Megan and Danis Dauksta, Janet Lyon, Emerald-Jane Turner, Sarah Kowitz, and for his words
dronewood
and
dronesong,
Sean Borodale.

For lighting my path: Professor Julia Briggs and beekeeper Angie Biltcliffe.

Love and thanks to my family, including early reader Gordon Paull; early listener Rider Peacock (who advised more violence); Jackson Peacock (for his sketch of the hive); and most of all to my daughter, India Rose, for all the ways in which she has enabled me to write this book.

Finally, my love and gratitude to my husband, Adrian Peacock: for everything.

About the Author

LALINE PAULL
studied English at Oxford, screenwriting in Los Angeles, and theater in London. She lives in England with her husband, photographer Adrian Peacock, and their three children.

Visit
www.AuthorTracker.com
for exclusive information on your favorite HarperCollins authors.

Credits

Cover design by Steve Attardo

Cover artwork: detail of “Bees and Bee-keeping,” from
The Young Landsman
, (Vienna, 1845), photographed by Matthias Trentsensky © by the Bridgeman Art Library/Getty Images

Copyright

This book is a work of fiction. The characters, incidents, and dialogue are drawn from the author’s imagination and are not to be construed as real. Any resemblance to actual events or persons, living or dead, is entirely coincidental.

THE BEES.
Copyright © 2014 by Laline Paull. All rights reserved under International and Pan-American Copyright Conventions. By payment of the required fees, you have been granted the nonexclusive, nontransferable right to access and read the text of this e-book on-screen. No part of this text may be reproduced, transmitted, downloaded, decompiled, reverse-engineered, or stored in or introduced into any information storage and retrieval system, in any form or by any means, whether electronic or mechanical, now known or hereinafter invented, without the express written permission of HarperCollins e-books.

FIRST EDITION

Frontispiece: Bee illustrations from Meyers Konversations-Lexikon 1897 / Shutterstock, Inc.

Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data has been applied for.

ISBN 978-0-06-233115-1

EPUB Edition MAY 2014 ISBN 9780062331168

14  15  16  17  18    
OV/RRD
    10  9  8  7  6  5  4  3  2  1