Sophie's Halloo (12 page)

The door was opened by a respectable servant, who showed them into a bright, cheerful parlour and told them that her ladyship would be advised of their arrival. A fire was already burning in the grate, and early flowers had been arranged and distributed throughout the room. When Lady Corby admired them for their colour and variety, Tony explained that his mother was a skillful gardener and cultivated a wide assortment of bulbs.

They had sat conversing for no more than a few minutes, when the door to the garden burst open and a ghostly apparition with trailing white limbs entered.  Lady Corby so far forgot herself as to issue a startled “oh,” before covering her mouth in apology, for the spectre, on seeing them, let out with an enthusiastic cry of welcome.

“Tony! My dearest! And dear, dear Sophia, I’ll warrant!  And this must be Lady Corby. Welcome, my dears, welcome.” And with that, the startling creature, draped in layers of white gauze and lace, approached them with arms outstretched.

Tony went forward unperturbed to meet the apparition, who Sophie had guessed by now must be Lady Farnham, but he was frustrated in his attempt to plant a kiss on her cheek by all the layers of lace. Laughing at her own forgetfulness, Lady Farnham explained, “I don’t wonder that I scared you out of your wits, but you see I was only coming to see whether you had arrived and as soon as I saw you, I forgot how I was dressed.  I daresay Bacon is trying to find me to tell me you are here.”

Tony was smiling down affectionately at the diminutive ghost beside him, but Sophie and her mother still could not make out any features behind the as yet unexplained mask. Now Tony presented them, and they shook hands with her ladyship, who was fully gloved, as well.

 “I imagine you may be wondering what has possessed me to dress like a haunt at this time of the day and are too well-bred to ask—although saying ‘at this time of the day’ is rather ridiculous, I suppose,” bubbled Lady Farnham. “Well, I was simply outdoors tending my bees and I had forgotten exactly what time to expect you, even though Tony is always punctual. Or so he tells me. I do not pay that much attention to the hour, myself. But anyway, as I am already done up this way, I will not change just yet if Sophie would like to come outside with me to see the bees.”

Sophie, her eyes wide with delight, was finding herself more enchanted by the moment with Lady Farnham’s artless chatter, and she had already determined from which parent Sir Tony had got his open manner. Glancing once his way and seeing his satisfied expression she accepted eagerly, but was surprised soon after to hear her own mother’s voice asking wistfully,  “Might I come, too?”  Turning, she saw that Lady Corby had fallen under the spell of this strange warm creature as certainly as she had done herself.

“My dear Lady Corby, of course!” exclaimed Lady Farnham happily. “I did not mean to exclude you at all. You must understand that I am so used to being refused by so many of my friends that I have assumed only the young people will have the heart for it. But you are so pretty and young yourself, I daresay you fear nothing at all.”

Lady Corby accepted this strange reading of her character with no more than a flicker of the eyelids. She was surprised to find herself growing braver just upon hearing Lady Farnham’s assumption. And, in no more than a moment, they had followed their hostess out the door and around the side of the house to a sunny flower garden. Here and there they could see individual bees hovering and closing in on a bright flower. But before they could discover the location of the beehive, Lady Farnham remembered something.

“We must be very careful,” she told them quietly. “You see, I have just robbed them of their honey and they are not terribly pleased with me at the moment. But you must protect yourselves and if we do not threaten them again, I am certain they will forget all about it and let us watch them closely. Here,” she said, beginning to unravel a swath of gauze from around her head, “you must drape this over your head and shoulders loosely, not just your face, for they can just as well sting the top of your head or your ear. So I have learned to my discomfort.”

Sophie offered the first piece of material to her mother, who obediently placed it over her head and shoulders with Tony’s help. And Lady Corby continued to unwrap pieces from about her own head until they began to make out the outline of her face beneath.

“No, no dear,” said the now visible lady in response to Sophie’s protest that she did not want to strip her of her own protection. “I shall not need so much just to watch them, you see. I only wrapped myself so completely because I knew I was going to anger them.  But we shall all be perfectly safe with about two pieces of lace or gauze each. Just be certain not to leave any bare spots! Tony,” she asked as an afterthought, “shall I have Bacon bring you some or do you not intend to join us.”

“No, thank you, Mother,” he said, as though grateful for the reprieve. “I shall just sit over here and enjoy the prospect of three lovely spirits in my mother’s garden.” He watched them off and took a seat on the ground beneath a spreading elm.

“Just as you like, love,” said Lady Farnham as they left him to cross the lawn. “But don’t let him fool you, my dears,” she said in an undervoice to her guests. “He would have you think he is too frightened of the bees, but he often helps me with them. That boy!” She tut-tutted affectionately.

Sophie smiled beneath her layers of gauze. She felt a bit ridiculous traipsing across the lawn this way in the wake of Tony’s mother, but at the same time she marvelled to think that but a few minutes ago they had not even made her acquaintance. Lady Farnham had the same gift of putting one at one’s ease as her son—or perhaps it was the other way around. At any rate, both Sophie and her mother felt remarkably at home, considering they were about to do something they had never done before.

“Is this what one always wears when tending bees, Lady Farnham?” asked Lady Corby. “It is odd that I have never noticed anyone dressed this way in the country, when I think of the quantity of honey we consume.”

Her hostess laughed delightedly. “Heavens, my dear! I do not have the faintest idea what anyone else wears to tend bees, but it is what I wear. And it works rather well, as you will see. One can see through the gauze or the lace, but the bees cannot penetrate them to sting. Now, here we are,” she said as they reached an aged tree trunk with a gaping hole in its side.

As Sophie and her mother could see and hear, they had now arrived at the hive, where an alarming number of bees were buzzing about the entrance. They slowed their pace instinctively and crept cautiously closer. Lady Farnham gestured to them to stop a few steps away and lowered her voice again before speaking.

“Tm afraid they are still rather upset about the theft of their honey, but I did think we should have some with our tea this afternoon. If we wait here, perhaps they will settle down a bit.”

Sophie peered rather anxiously at the bees, hoping that their anger would not extend to her and her mother, who were, after all, innocent of any wrongdoing. But after watching them for a while, she decided that their buzzings and hoverings were random and without harmful intent, and she began to relax and become curious. It occurred to her that for all the honey she had eaten, she had never much thought of the bees that produced it, and she began to wonder how they did it. She ventured a question in a cautious whisper.

“Lady Farnham, how do the bees make honey?”

“I really do not know, my dear,” answered that lady imperturbably. “But I can tell you what I do know. All of the bees that you see out here are called the workers. It is they who collect the nectar from the flowers with which to make the honey. And they keep the hive clean, take care of the baby bees and feed the queen. The queen does nothing more than have babies, but without her, the hive should die. There are no drones here now for you to see because it is not the swarming season yet.”

“What are the drones?”

“You may well ask, my dear,” said her ladyship with surprising emphasis. “They are the suitors of the queen bee. The one that is chosen to mate with the queen does so only once, and then she is able to produce baby bees indefinitely and keep the nest supplied with workers, as you well can see. She really is a remarkable creature.”

“Then what happens to the drones, the ones that do not succeed and the one who does?”

Lady Farnham replied firmly, “They are killed. And it is no wonder, really, for they are rather despicable creatures. They do not turn a hand in the hive, and they rob the babies of food. So the workers kill them. It is always a surprise to me that the queen chooses a drone for a husband. If it were me, I should prefer a worker. They are much more fascinating.”

“They certainly are,” agreed Sophie, wide-eyed. She watched the bees’ comings and goings with more attention now, but presently Lady Farnham spoke again.

“I really cannot like the drones,” she sighed. “They do so remind me of Sir Geoffrey.”

“Sir Geoffrey?” enquired both her visitors.

“Tony’s father,” she explained in a tone of great confidentiality. “You will think me horrid to say so, I know, but he really wasn’t so very different from a drone. My mother always did say that honesty was my worst fault. And I am only being truthful when I say it. Sir Geoffrey really did nothing for me but help me to produce Tony, and beyond that he served his own pleasure, and yes, robbed his own child, too. It was a miracle that anything of the estate survived him, but Tony has worked wonders in restoring it. He is such a dear boy.”

Sophie was fascinated by these disclosures and could only guess at the shock on her mother’s countenance underneath all her draperies. But, in truth, Lady Corby was listening with more sympathy than censure.

“It’s no wonder you find them so interesting, Lady Farnham,” was all she said.

“Aren’t they?” agreed Tony’s mother, happy to have her enthusiasm shared. “You can have no idea how hard the workers do work. They live for only a short time during the summer months because they work so hard. And it is a great mystery how they are able to find the sources for their honey. But if I were a bee, I should much rather be a worker than a drone, or even the queen—her life is really quite boring—for in spite of their short lives they taste all the richest things in life. They sample all the flowers and still manage to care for the young. I do so admire the workers.”

They watched for a while longer, and Lady Farnham explained more of the bees’ activities until something in their behaviour set her to thinking. She lowered her voice again and spoke in a pensive tone. “If you will excuse me ladies, I am beginning to think that it would be wiser for us to retire. I do not like the look of that group swarming over there. If it were summer, I should say that they were about to search for a new hive, but since it is not, I think they may have recognized me and decided that I have brought two more accomplices to rob them.”

Sophie and her mother retired hastily, with Lady Farnham courageously protecting their rear until they were safely away from the hive. “Tony would never forgive me if I invited you here for tea and then subjected you to bee stings,” she said, laughing. “But I am so glad you came with me to see them. You will enjoy your teacakes and honey all the more for seeing where it is come from.  And the dear bees, though they are frightfully clever, will have forgotten me by the time I go back for more,” she added gaily.

They rejoined Tony, who had been watching them lazily from a semi-reclining position under the tree. Sophie watched him rise effortlessly as they approached and noted with pleasure that his coat looked as fresh as if he had not just been lying on the open ground. He seemed as at home in the country as he was on the dance floor at Almack’s, and she found it an attractive quality, and one of which he seemed totally unaware.

“Have the ‘dear bees’ chased you off?” he asked, his eyes twinkling at the sight of the three apparitions.

“Of course not, silly boy,” his mother said untruthfully. “It is time for our tea, though, so perhaps you would help Sophia off with her drapes, and I shall help her mother.”

Strangely absorbed in watching Tony rise to meet them, Sophie had forgotten the ridiculous picture the three of them must make, but now she hastily set to work to remove her layers of gauze and found them caught on the small buttons of her gown in back. With a grin, Tony came to her assistance.

“Hold still,” he commanded her cheerfully and then added in an eerie voice, “‘and I shall extract you from my mother’s web,’ said the spider to the fly.” But instead of working from one end of the material, he began near her head, slowly lifting the drapes from around her face and rearranging them toward the back. She felt the gentleness of his hands as they freed her eyes, nose, cheeks and ears, and a curious thrill shot through her. And knowing these sensations to be most improper, still she dared not move, so rapt was she by the tenderness in his movements. When Tony was done liberating her face, he stepped back and looked at her approvingly.

“Ah,” he said with slow satisfaction. “That is much better.” Sophie was aware that the layers of material had now taken the appearance of billowing clouds framing her face. She felt herself blush from her cheeks down to the tips of her toes, but was so spellbound she could do nothing to avoid his admiring gaze. He stood there a moment more, smiling down at Sophie, seemingly unhampered by her mother’s presence, until Lady Farnham came to her rescue.

“Let me see what you have done, Tony,” she said, coming around to face Sophie. Looking her over critically, she nodded her head in agreement. “Yes, she looks absolutely divine. But you must not tease her, you naughty boy. Turn around, dear,” she said to Sophie, “and let me free your buttons. You must not mind Tony. He has a good eye for beauty, but I will not let him do you up like a posy.”

Sophie laughed as the spell was broken. She was grateful that Tony’s mother had not been offended by the scene that had just taken place before her. On the contrary, Lady Farnham seemed quite happy with her two guests, and Sophie suspected that she had come to her assistance with the generous intention of sparing her blushes.