Wasp Season

by Jennifer Scoullar

  In a little while, she rose from her seat amidst the carnage. Several European wasps arrived to investigate the remains of their hapless competitors. Beth swiped angrily at the little vultures, but the smell of insecticide drove them swiftly off in any case. They were too wise to scavenge these contaminated corpses. Eventually her loud cries weakened, replaced by racking sobs that periodically shook her body.

  Her empathy with the wasps heightened her appreciation of her own position. She must not lose her children as the unfortunate wasps had lost theirs. The destruction of the nest contained powerful symbolism for Beth. She faced the same enemy. After all, Mark did not understand what he destroyed with his hasty, ill-thought custody grab. The deeply satisfying, loving relationship shared by Beth and her children was invisible to him. His search for happiness through acquiring things had damaged his ability to connect with people, even with his own kids, on any but the most superficial level. She had no doubt that he would carelessly ruin her life, as completely and thoughtlessly as he’d wiped out the wasps.

  Still seeking some comfort, Beth carefully inspected the eaves, hopeful of finding a nest that had escaped Mark’s ruinous rampage. Not a one. She felt the tears welling again in her eyes but choked them back. Taking some deep breaths she attempted to compose herself. Each time her thoughts wandered to the plight of the helpless wasplings, she checked them. Each time her eyes wandered towards the now empty stable eaves, she averted them. She tried not to ponder whether the insects died quickly or endured a slow, suffering death. These thoughts only served to hamper her ability to deal with her current situation – and deal with it she must. Mark was still at the house and it was imperative that she alienate him no further.

  It was a long time before Beth felt calm enough to return inside. She feared that if she took too long, Mark would come looking for her, and she wanted to encounter him on her own terms. Eventually she made her way slowly back up the path. Her heart broke at the sight of a foraging paper wasp, buzzing jauntily towards the stable with a fat blowfly gripped proudly in her jaws. Beth tried not to imagine the wasp’s confusion upon arrival at the nest site, only to find all sign of her home and family obliterated. Without the security and motivation of her mother and sisters, she too would soon die of despair. Beth shook her head as if to ward off such thoughts. As she reached the top of the path, she knew the worst thing about confronting Mark, was that he would be unaware that there was even a problem. She marvelled at the depth of the chasm between them which, despite its magnitude, was entirely invisible to Mark. It occurred to Beth that she might be able to use this to her advantage.

  On entering the house her face was a mask of control. Her self-discipline must be complete if she was to avoid a lapse into anger. Mark appeared at the kitchen doorway, an expectant look on his sun flushed face. Beth did not yet trust herself to speak. Silently she condemned him. Reaching for the kettle, she poured herself a strong coffee and checked to see if the children were about. They were holed-up in Rick’s room, waiting for the fire-works to begin. As minutes ticked by, Mark became puzzled by Beth’s silence.

  Finally Mark spoke. “Aren’t you even going to thank me?” he asked.

  “What for?” responded a measured Beth.

  “What for? For getting rid of those wasps of course. You and the kids could have been seriously hurt. Look how badly I was stung.”

  Mark proffered his forearm on which could be seen several painful looking, large, red welts. Beth was thrilled. Her wasp friends had not died without a fight. Mark then turned his back to her and pulled down his collar to reveal another angry-looking swelling on his neck. Beth knew she was expected to respond sympathetically, but could not quite bring herself to do so.

  “You killed the wrong wasps, you know,” she said.

  “Killed the wrong wasps? What do you mean? A wasp is a wasp.”

  Provoked by Mark’s foolish words, Beth’s mask momentarily fell away, and a look of loathing passed across her features. She turned suddenly aside to drink her coffee, hide her feelings and plan her words.

  Mark laid one hand on her shoulder and spun her round with force, showering them both with spilt coffee. Beth’s composure did not falter. After all, she had herself on a very tight rein.

  “I’m sorry you were stung,” she lied. “But you did kill the wrong wasps. The European wasp nest is in the wood pile. I’ve known where it was for some time. I’m going to need a professional pest exterminator to get rid of it.”

  Mark’s anger abated. Now he understood. Beth wasn’t ungrateful. She was merely disappointed that he hadn’t disposed of all of the wasps. He drained his glass and gave her his most dazzling smile.

  “Oh well. No harm done then eh? Oh, except to me of course!”

  He was clearly still fishing for sympathy. Beth’s steely self control was slipping.

  “Actually, I really liked those native wasps,” she said, struggling to say no more.

  Mark was charmed. Why, this woman couldn’t harbour an unkind thought, not even for wasps and snakes. As he looked at her, he felt a surge of love and a desire to protect her. Beth met his gaze coolly, with her hatred still well concealed. But she realised that she could not keep up appearances for ever. Her anger was growing.

  “It’s not such a good idea that the kid’s go with you this afternoon,” angled Beth.

  “After all, you and Helen have got some things to sort out. Why don’t you just get going and give me a ring later in the week. You can borrow the old truck to get home if you like.”

  Beth’s mention of Helen shifted Mark’s attention in a most unpleasant way. Oh, yes, Helen. He supposed he had better go and talk to her, yet he was loath to leave Beth. Rick and Sarah emerged from the bedroom, amazed to find their parents being civil to each other. Reluctantly Mark kissed his children goodbye, apologising for changing their holiday plans. Beth took his cue and offered her own, gracious apologies for the lunch fiasco. The children watched, incredulous. Beth noted, in a detached kind of way that Mark was well on the way to being drunk. Under normal circumstances she would have discouraged him from getting behind the wheel. As it was she endured his clumsy kiss, stony faced, and watched him drive away with much relief.

  CHAPTER 16

  As Mark was leaving, Aureole, a tiny golden Honeybee, went about her business in Beth’s garden. She buzzed purposefully away from the yellow daisy bushes that bordered the driveway in a mass of gold. Her route took her directly into the path of the oncoming truck as Mark drove away from the house. Tired from the day’s foraging, and heavily laden with pollen and nectar, her flight was laboured and slow. Too late she became aware of the moving vehicle. In a clumsy attempt to avoid it, she changed direction and tried to fly away. But her brain did not accurately judge the speed of the approaching danger. Only the rush of displaced air preceding the old truck saved her. Caught-up in the mini maelstrom, she was hurtled aside in the nick of time.

  As the turbulent air settled, the frightened bee alighted on a nearby fence rail in order to steady her nerves. Her racing heartbeat slowed and she rested her aching wing muscles. For a little while she considered returning to the hive. After all, she already carried two large, slightly sticky baskets of pollen on her hind legs. Her crop too was almost fully-laden with nectar. However her enthusiasm got the better of her and shrugging off her weariness, she decided to continue.

  Aureole was a bee in the prime of her life. At one month old she’d only recently graduated to foraging, and she loved her new occupation. Until two weeks ago she was a house-bee, feeding on honey and pollen stored in the nest and tending to the queen, the drones and the larvae. As she grew stronger and more capable she began to produce wax and joined in comb-building activities. Often she greeted the older foraging bees near the entrance to the nest. They returned with delicious nectar, pollen, and water, which she helped to collect from them, freeing them to return to the field. With eager eyes she watched for their arrival.

  As each bee landed in the doorway
, a guard bee examined the newcomer with her antennae. If she passed inspection, she was allowed to enter the hive. Members of the colony had a particular odour that identified them as bees of good standing. Occasionally, bees lacking the correct odour passport attempted to enter. They were quickly identified as intruders by the guard bees, who grabbed them, mauled them, and dragged them away from the hive. Sometimes however, if the misguided foreigner was fully laden with food and acted in a confident manner, she would be allowed to pass unharmed.

  No such allowances were made when the interloper was a robber bee or wasp. Once discovered, the defending bees made a concerted effort to sting it to death immediately. Aureole observed these proceedings with barely contained envy and excitement. From the hive entrance she smelt the exciting scents of the great world beyond the colony. Her sense of smell was more acute than that of human beings. Her noses were located in her antennae, which were constantly searching the air. A returning worker carried with her the tempting aroma of honeysuckle and a crisp, clean hint of eucalyptus.

  The young bee was impatient for the opportunity to explore. In the hive’s dim interior, she watched the breathtakingly beautiful dances of her sisters. On the surface of one of the combs they performed intricate pirouettes, which were full of meaning for their hive mates. Aureole gazed at one particular bee as she commenced to dance. The bee turned rhythmically in graceful circles, alternately clockwise and counter-clockwise, forming a precise figure of eight. Soon her loops overlapped in a complicated pattern that entranced her audience. As she performed amidst the mass of admiring bees, the excitement became palpable. The others began following her actions as if to learn her dance, all the while touching her with their feelers. Occasionally she paused and regurgitated some of the nectar she had collected to a lucky member of the crowd. Soon her movements became more elaborate; she ran in a straight line and then executed a 360-degree turn to the left. Another straight line ended in a 360-degree turn to the right. As she swirled and twirled she waggled her abdomen in a precise form of body language. She had that day discovered a patch of flowering Christmas Bush. Prompted by the new food source, this mesmerising performance provided her sisters with vital information about the location of the beautiful, nectar laden, bell-shaped flowers. In this way she accurately communicated their distance and direction from the hive. The length and vigour of her display indicated to the assembly that her find was of great value.

  After the dance was over, many of the bees left the hive, keen to search for the new nectar source. Aureole wistfully watched them leave. Impulsively she followed the foragers to the entrance and longingly buzzed her wings. To her astonishment, this action caused her to rise several centimetres into the air. She was delighted. Tentatively she experimented with her new ability, clumsily practicing changes of elevation and direction. After a few minutes she became bolder, flying all around the hive entrance, thrilled with this new freedom. Her senses were bombarded with different colours, sounds and smells. But Aureole, in common with a young wasp, was not born knowing the area about her home. She needed to learn about it, using distinctive landmarks observed on these early orientation flights.

  In order to interpret the dance of her sisters and to navigate, Aureole also needed to memorise the sun’s path across the sky. It took almost five hundred foraging trips before she was confident of the ecliptic. Just as with humans, the bee world had its slow and fast learners, its average, dependable workers and its explorers. Aureole was proud to be an explorer, or ‘scout’ bee. She often left the hive simply to search for new flowers, returning if successful to advertise her find. There were few such bees in the hive. Like humans, most were followers, who worked steadily under direction, but never took the initiative themselves.

  The beehive was situated in a Gum tree hollow, ten metres above the ground. The bee’s tree grew in a gully bordering Beth’s stable paddock. Earlier that season, a pair of Yellow Tailed Black Cockatoos chose the hollow to raise their family. They successfully hatched a pair of healthy chicks. When the chicks were only two days old, Honeybees invaded the nest. The swarm escaped from the neglected hives of a neighbour. Few people realised that the damage wrought on the native Australian environment by these highly successful European invader bees was on a par to that caused by the European wasps. The Honeybees poured into the nest en masse, attacking the helpless little chicks. The parent birds desperately tried to defend their offspring but were driven back by the insect’s vicious stings. One of the tiny chicks managed to escape the hollow, only to fall injured to the ground. The unfortunate baby bird died within hours from dehydration and shock. The remaining chick was ruthlessly slain within its nest. Heartbroken, the parent birds flew off nursing many painful stings, their chances of successfully breeding shattered for another year.

  Although the bees had escaped from a domestic hive, they were in no real sense domesticated in the way of a dog or a horse. Apis Mellifera, the Western Honeybee, could only be induced to nest in a conveniently located artificial hive so that humans could more easily rob her of her honey. Bees have been considered valuable since the time of the stone ages. Honey was probably first collected from hives deep in the wild forests of ancient Europe. White colonists introduced the species to Australia. Being highly adaptable, these bees had no trouble exploiting potential nesting sites in their new habitat. Native Australian hollow-dwellers could not compete when faced with this aggressive newcomer. Encounters with gentle, stingless, native bees, served as no preparation for dealings with the agonising stings of the Honeybees. Each time a Honeybee stung a larger animal, it caused her to be fatally injured, her abdomen torn and her entrails cruelly ripped from her body, along with the venomous barb. The disembodied sting embedded in the flesh of the victim continued to pump poison by means of attached muscles. The brave bee soon died. But like a fanatical suicide-bomber, no sacrifice was ever too great for the protection of queen and colony. Once a hollow was colonised by the European Honeybee, it would remain unoccupied by native fauna, even well after the bees vacated their hive. The Honeybees also threatened the survival of native species by competing for available blossoms with maximum efficiency.

  Aureole, of course, neither knew nor cared that the legitimate tenants of the hollow were displaced by such acts of robbery and murder. She only knew that the welfare of the colony was paramount. As she became acquainted with the location of the hive, she gradually extended her orientation flights to include the dusty dry paddocks and verdant gardens. She learned to slake her thirst at the bird-bath that miraculously remained brimming with cool, fresh water even after days of relentless heat. She learned to recognise the brightly coloured blooms that yielded the most prized pollen and most copious amounts of nectar. She now not only accurately interpreted her sister’s dances, but also began to perform those of her own. Swelling with pride, she twirled about the golden honeycomb, passing-on the mysterious secrets of ancient bee-lore to another generation. Within a few weeks of her maiden flight, Aureole became a skilful forager, revelling in the freedom and satisfaction of her new life. She was blissfully unaware that foraging was both strenuous and dangerous work and that her life would soon come to an end.

  After her near-miss with Mark’s car, Aureole remained resting for some minutes on the fence rail until her mind was calm and focused once more. She dismissed any thought of returning directly to the hive. She wished to impress her younger hive sisters with a crop brimful of honey and this desire helped her to overcome her weariness and fear. With an at first faltering flight, she buzzed off to the canopy of a scarlet flowering Gum tree that stood at Beth’s front gate. She had almost used up the supply of honey in her stomach. Soon she would be hungry and need to replenish her energy from the hive’s honey stores. But for the moment, she concentrated on the task at hand.

  Landing on the vivid Ficofolia blossoms, she moved about them, scraping off pollen with her mouthparts and legs. Her plump body was covered with hairs that trapped the loose pollen grains. Before long she
looked as if she had been sprinkled with gold dust. With remarkable speed, she scraped the sweet powder into the pollen combs on the inside of her hind legs. When these combs were filled, she rubbed one hind leg against the other, forcing the pollen mass into the basket on the outside of her leg. These too were soon full. Finally she used her long proboscis to suck nectar from the flowers until her crop also was full to bursting. Satisfied at last, she returned home as the late afternoon sun beat down upon the thirsty garden.

  CHAPTER 17

  Driving home from Beth’s, Mark felt his mood lighten for the first time in many months. A plan was forming in his mind to win back the affections of his wife. This was something concrete to strive for and his life no longer lacked direction. How long had it been since he’d experienced any real sense of satisfaction? He could barely remember. His mind roamed back through time in a restless search.

  Mentally he donned rose-coloured glasses and tried to recall his happiest memories. The birth of his first child. Landing his first great job. Buying his first home. Falling in love for the first time. He recalled his first sight of Beth. She’d been sitting in a bar in southern France. Her copper coloured hair fell in a bronze mane down her shapely back. Her sparkling emerald eyes flashed with fun, as she regaled her friends with some silly, funny story. He couldn’t help staring. Then she noticed him too. As their eyes met, he felt an incredible sense of connection. He felt he had known her forever. Wrenching his thoughts back to the present, it hit him that all the significant moments of his past were linked inextricably to Beth.

  Mark had no real doubts that he could get Beth back. It was only a matter of time. After all, he had never failed at anything before. Except for his marriage of course and he would soon fix that. Still he conceded that certain obstacles that lay in his path. There was Helen, for one thing. What on earth was he to do about her? Buoyed by the optimism of his new mood, Mark felt confident he would come up with something.