The Sting of Death

by Rebecca Tope

  Laurie Millan was never very comfortable in his own company. He paced the living room restlessly, waiting for Roma to come home from the shops. ‘Got herself arrested this time, for driving with the dog on her lap,’ he muttered. He didn’t know what to do with himself while he waited. He’d already carefully laid out a pad and pen on the dining table, to make it look as if he were about to write a letter. The moment Roma’s car turned in through the gate, he would sit down and start writing, glancing up as if distracted from something absorbing, as she came in. It was important that she should never realise just how needy he was at times like this.

  She was taking much longer than expected. Even if she stopped to natter with one or two women she knew, she wouldn’t be as late as this. Fiercely he quashed the idea that she’d had an accident. Somebody would have phoned him by now, if that was the case. She was just thoughtless, dawdling around the country lanes, maddeningly self-sufficient, not considering him at all. It made him angry and very frustrated because he could never reveal his anger. This was one of their many unspoken agreements.

  When Pereira had buggered off, after years of towering arguments and broken crockery, Roma had rapidly discovered the many pleasures of living alone. It had been a revelation. Life became peaceful and easy, and she vowed, loudly and often, that nothing would ever induce her to live with a man again. For thirteen years, she stuck to her vow. Then Laurie had come along, and slowly persuaded her that he would never get in her way, would give her company without making demands; would listen to her complaints, and make no attempt to change her views. He would cook for her, and sleep with her, and go on holiday with her. All he wanted in return was someone to accompany him on his dream retirement to the country. Someone who would make the house feel alive, and give him something on which to fix his attention. Roma had protested that it was unfair; that all the benefit accrued to her, but he’d insisted, and eventually she could not resist the offer.

  His persona was of a mild, harmless chap, in a tweedy jacket and carpet slippers; that was why Roma had married him. He was a sort of glorified servant, a butler-cum-gardener, who also provided reliable companionship and a listening ear. Nobody paused to ask themselves what was in it for him. Or if they did, they found easy answers in the present-day balance between the sexes. Men were essentially drones, after all. They earned their billet by being affable, pleasant company, keeping out of the way, and never ever showing the slightest hint of violence. This last was punishable by the most cruel sanctions. One thoughtless slap, and they were cast into the outer darkness, sans virtue, sans money, sans hope, sans everything. Laurie never forgot that. He would never never slap Roma, that much was certain. The fact that she had slapped that horrible little beast in her school carried no implications for how she behaved towards him. He wholeheartedly supported her in her view of the matter – that society had gone mad, that there was no justice, and it was a perpetual unforgiving scandal that she had lost her job over it.

  She arrived eventually, breezy and liberally besmirched with black smudges on hands and face. Laurie looked up from his writing pad, a questioning smile on his lips. ‘Did something happen?’ he asked mildly.

  ‘Oh, not really. There was a man with a flat tyre, on the bypass, and I stopped to help him. It was raining,’ she added, as if that explained everything. ‘He had no idea where the doings were. It was like my old Renault – remember? You had to turn a bolt from inside the boot, and that released the spare tyre from underneath. Impossible to guess, if you didn’t have the handbook. Poor chap was going mental, bashing the thing with a club hammer he happened to have with him.’

  She spoke breathlessly, good cheer sparking from her, at her piece of charity. Laurie sighed. ‘It could only happen to you,’ he said fondly. ‘Was he grateful?’

  ‘I suppose so. A bit embarrassed, me being a woman. The old habits aren’t quite dead yet, more’s the pity.’

  ‘Did you get my stamps? And the lightbulbs?’

  ‘Of course. Everything that was on the list.’ She was unstoppable in this mood; so proud of herself, so sure she had life by the ears and could make it go any way she wanted. Laurie could only hope that it would last. ‘I’ll go and get some soup started, shall I? Must be nearly lunchtime.’

  ‘It is,’ he agreed, slowly packing away his small collection of writing materials. ‘And it looks as if the rain’s stopping at last.’

  Sheena Renton had been late home on Monday; so late that Philip was already in bed and made only a token grunt in greeting. Tuesday morning, however, seemed unusually relaxed, given her normally hectic schedule.

  ‘Good God, it’s eight fifteen!’ Philip cried, on waking. ‘Why are you still here?’

  She stretched lazily. ‘Nigel said we could take a few hours off after last night. The meeting didn’t finish till past ten. We got everything sorted, though. I feel great.’ She looked at him through her lashes and pouted. ‘You haven’t got to be anywhere, have you?’

  He couldn’t pretend to miss her meaning, although he really didn’t like sex in the morning. Too sober, too relaxed, too much light streaming through the window. But Sheena was deftly determined and her conjugal rights were satisfactorily claimed.

  ‘Isn’t it great without Georgia,’ she purred afterwards. ‘At least for a few days.’

  ‘Mm,’ he concurred, before rolling back the duvet and flopping heavily out of bed. ‘Cup of tea?’ he offered.

  ‘Okay.’

  By the time he got back with two mugs of tea and a few rounds of buttered toast, she was asleep again, rather to his relief. He quickly dressed and left her to it, the tea cooling beside her.

  He wandered aimlessly out of the house and stood in the empty yard. It was eighteen months or more since there’d been any animals on the farm, but he could still hear the ghostly sounds of cows and calves and pigs. They’d been culled as ‘dangerous contacts’ with a foot-and-mouth-infected pig farm, because Philip’s father had bought in three new sows just at the wrong moment. He hadn’t been able to forgive himself for it, despite everyone insisting he couldn’t possibly have known the risk. He’d forced himself to participate in the slaughter, as some kind of penance. But not penance enough, it seemed. Only self-destruction had relieved him of his misery and remorse, his helpless rage and loss of hope.

  Philip had watched impotently, his own memories just as terrible. He too had taken part in the cull. The cows had gone passively enough, but the pigs had been frantic. He still heard their screams in the night and supposed he always would.

  Sheena used the whole catastrophe as justification for returning to her full-time-plus job, even though Georgia had been barely a year old at the time. Philip had wanted to talk her out of it, but could never find a convincing argument. He’d thought it was obvious: a mother’s place was with her child. But Georgia made no complaint, despite a gruelling routine under the care of a day nursery where the staff seemed to change every week. Gloria, the blowsy woman in charge, never seemed to remember which one Georgia was when Philip turned up to collect her. He knew it wasn’t the right way for a child to grow up; she was so quiet and withdrawn it was often as if she wasn’t in the house at all. The only times she seemed animated and happy were when Justine was around.

  The household became a haphazard business, with food snatched at odd times and Justine drafted in to babysit at short notice much more often than originally intended. It had begun to feel as if they were mere automata, running round in mechanical circles, with no idea of why, until Philip had woken up one morning uncomfortably convinced that it couldn’t go on like that any longer.

  Sheena was right that it was much more relaxed without Georgia; in some ways, at least. Never an attentive mother, she had jumped at the suggestion that the child spend a week or two with her granny on the Isle of Wight. Leaving all the arrangements to Philip – after all, it was his mother, who had moved to the island with a close woman friend after she was widowed – Sheena hardly seemed to notice the absence of her l
ittle girl. Philip observed this with a painful knot of tangled feelings, but made no comment. Time enough for all that when his wife decided Georgia should come home again.

  At least he’d dealt with those people looking for Justine without rocking any boats. He was pleased with himself about that. The next problem was going to be Penn. But Philip’s policy was always to take things one step at a time. It was surprising what you could do, how much you could bear, if you broke it all down into manageable slices. It had been like that through the foot and mouth nightmare. He’d gone through the daily motions, inventing routines for himself, slowly incorporating ideas for the new business, making new contacts, until it came to Christmas and he could look back and feel he’d triumphed over the horror of it all. He’d done it then; he could do it again now.

  Helen Strabinski was losing the battle against her curiosity. Something was obviously going on, to do with Roma and Justine and Penn, and she wanted to know what it was. The drizzle was depressing, thwarting the plan she’d had to do some outdoor work. She’d promised she’d have a dozen stills for the tie-in book the BB C were producing, to accompany a gardening series. The garden in August was supposed to be full of lush sunlit borders, dahlias and gladioli and red hot pokers, all epitomising high summer. Instead, everything was damp and bedraggled and completely unsuitable. She could get on with a few indoor mock-ups, but she wasn’t in the mood. It never really worked, anyway.

  Instead, she resolved on paying an unannounced visit on her sister. If she took her camera, she could claim to be searching for a cover shot for a new Glorious Gardens magazine; yet another glossy monthly to squeeze onto the shelves. A number of photographers had been invited to submit possible shots for the cover, and Helen was determined that they’d choose one of hers. She thought Roma’s beehives might add an original touch – if she could pluck up the nerve to approach them.

  It was a forty-mile drive, but there wasn’t a lot of traffic on the small roads she chose. Twice she stopped to take pictures: first of an old barn with its roof falling in, and later of a field full of glossy-looking red-and-white cattle. Made a change from the ubiquitous black-and-white ones, she judged.

  Roma had always been one for dramas, of course, since they were children. Six years older than Helen, she’d forged her way through school, making enough of a mark for teachers to shudder slightly at the name of Willowfield. ‘Not Roma’s sister?’ they’d asked hopefully, only to sigh when she nodded. ‘But I’m not at all like her,’ Helen had learnt to say, brightly.

  It was true – she was nothing at all like her sister. Roma had been fearless, argumentative, noisy. Helen was altogether different. And their brother had been different again – older than them, neurotic even in his teens, and very poor company.

  Laurie was standing in the doorway, before she was even out of her car, as if he’d been watching out for her. There was no car in the driveway, suggesting that Roma was out. ‘Hiya!’ she greeted him cheerily. ‘Thought I’d drop in for a bit. Sorry to arrive so late. Must be nearly teatime, but you don’t have to feed me.’

  His face looked dark, somehow, as if in shadow, and yet he was standing in the open. He smiled a welcome, but nothing changed in his eyes. ‘Helen,’ he said, as if he hadn’t been able to remember her name at first. ‘Haven’t seen you for a while.’

  ‘Roma writes to me,’ she said. ‘I gather things are a bit frazzled at the moment.’

  ‘Are they?’ Laurie looked alarmed. ‘Not that I’ve noticed.’

  ‘Well, Penn said …’ She stopped herself. Something in Laurie’s face made her insides clench for a moment. A bleakness, mixed with a flash of anger, told her to shut up and wait for Roma.

  But she had to talk about something. ‘Is Roma well? No more of that sciatica?’

  ‘That was ages ago,’ he dismissed. ‘It only lasted a week or so. She hasn’t got time for anything like that. She’s insanely busy all the time.’

  ‘She always has been. It makes her feel important,’ Helen said automatically. ‘Though it’s a bit difficult to see how she manages it, stuck in this quiet spot.’

  ‘Bees, shopping, garden, gossip, reading circle—’ he rattled off, marking each on his fingers. ‘And there’s much more. Every time she comes home, she’s made a new friend, and heard their entire life story. I can’t keep up with it all. She makes me feel old.’

  ‘Poor Laurie. Isn’t it like you expected?’

  He forced a laugh, and raised his eyes to the hills beyond the garden. ‘Oh, it’s fine. It’s a lovely spot, and I don’t let anything disturb me. She’s getting me a greenhouse for my birthday. That’ll be fun.’

  Helen found herself wishing the weather was better. ‘I did wonder whether I could take a few pictures of the hives,’ she ventured.

  ‘Oh?’ He didn’t seem very interested. ‘Bit murky for that. There won’t be many bees working with it like this. House-cleaning weather, Roma calls it. The workers knuckle down to making new cells, mucking out debris, that sort of thing. I assume you’d like a few actual bees in the pictures?’

  Helen shivered. ‘Not particularly,’ she said.

  Laurie looked at her. ‘Oh, that’s right – you’re scared of them, aren’t you. Roma mentions it from time to time. Seems funny, her being so fearless with them. Did something happen to put you off them?’

  It was Helen’s turn to stare. ‘Surely she told you?’

  He cocked his head questioningly. ‘Told me what?’

  ‘Our brother, Conrad. He died of bee stings when he was small. I was only a few weeks old. Roma must have been six. She was there at the time. If there’s anything odd, it’s her becoming a beekeeper now. Some people might think it very perverse.’

  ‘I’m certain she’s never uttered a word about that,’ he said wonderingly. ‘Poor little chap. How did it happen?’

  ‘He was playing with a dog from next door. A great big daft thing, an Old English sheepdog. It knocked the hive over and the bees came charging out, furiously angry. He had a hundred stings, and died of shock. My mother was distraught, of course.’

  ‘How awful for you,’ Laurie said, passionately. ‘She can’t have had much emotion to spare for a baby after that.’

  ‘Oh, well, I think I was a sort of haven. If anything, she over-protected me, hung over me in case some other dreadful accident happened. It was far worse for our older brother. I don’t think he was ever quite right afterwards.’

  ‘You mean the invisible Ninian? The one who went off to Japan and was never heard of again?’

  Helen laughed. ‘That’s the one.’ She was quiet for a few moments, and then went on, ‘You can imagine the frenzy every time a flying insect came into the house. Bee, wasp, bluebottle, they all caused havoc. The whole family behaved as if they were the most lethal objects imaginable. Like poison darts, or something.’

  ‘Well, Roma’s not a bit scared of them now. Not bees or wasps.’

  ‘No, well. Roma regards fear as an intolerable weakness.’

  ‘That’s true,’ Laurie agreed quietly.

  Roma arrived home to find them sitting in the small conservatory with tea and biscuits. ‘Oh, it’s you!’ she breezed. ‘Couldn’t think whose car it was. Giving yourself a day off?’

  ‘Something like that,’ Helen smiled. ‘Laurie’s been looking after me.’

  ‘So I see.’

  ‘This place is lovely, even when it’s raining. You were clever to find it.’ Helen gazed over the garden and field, much as Laurie had done earlier.

  ‘It suits us,’ Roma nodded. ‘It feels much more remote than it really is. You can’t hear any traffic – have you noticed?’

  ‘What about people? Have you made any friends? Laurie says you get plenty of chance for a gossip.’

  ‘I never gossip,’ said Roma stiffly. ‘But I do discuss things with people in the village. I joined the Probus Club, and we have very interesting meetings. There are two or three women I get on fairly well with.’

  ‘You always wer
e one for women friends,’ said Helen. ‘Do you still keep up with Caroline? And Fenella Frobisher. I used to hate Fenella Frobisher when she came to our house.’

  ‘We write two or three times a year,’ said Roma. ‘They’ve got quite boring, to be honest. All about grandchildren and Caribbean cruises. They don’t seem to care about things any more.’

  ‘Getting old,’ said Helen unfeelingly. ‘Though I did think you and Caroline would go on marching and protesting till you dropped. I’ll never forget seeing you on telly when there was all that carry-on at Greenham Common.’

  Roma sighed. ‘A million years ago,’ she murmured.

  Laurie disappeared into the kitchen for ten minutes, before inviting the sisters to join him for an early supper. He’d laid out an impressive assortment of salads, with cold chicken and hard-boiled eggs. ‘Wow!’ said Helen. ‘You’re a magician!’

  ‘He’s very good with food,’ said Roma complacently. ‘We’ll eat in an hour or so. Come and see the garden first. You’ve got your camera, I see.’

  Helen remembered her picture ideas and glanced at the sky. ‘Can I do a few shots with the beehives in the background?’ she said. ‘I don’t need to get too close, with the long lens.’

  ‘They won’t hurt you,’ Roma said coolly.

  Helen spent twenty minutes trying to capture the roses and mallow and potentilla in the foreground, with the hives still visible in the distance. She seemed to be having problems. ‘What’s the matter?’ Roma demanded.

  ‘The depth of field’s all wrong,’ Helen muttered. ‘The hives are so out of focus, nobody’s going to know what they are.’