Wasp Season

by Jennifer Scoullar

  Beth carried the box and its contents into the kitchen. She then went to see Rick, to borrow the headlamp his father had given him for Christmas.

  “O.K. Mum. It’s in my wardrobe. But it’s got a loose connection or something. It keeps going on and off.”

  Beth went to find it, thinking how convenient it would be. She could strap it to her head like a miner’s torch, leaving her hands free to dust the nest. However Rick was right. The lamp only worked intermittently. She settled for a large hand-held torch she’d found in the laundry. Using sticky-tape, she covered the torch with red cellophane. This created a red filter for the light, a colour far less provoking to the insects.

  Full of dreadful impatience, Beth piled her tools of destruction into a bucket and headed out of the door to the wood pile. Leaving the bucket in the corner of the paddock, she ventured as close as she dared towards the nest, and tried to imagine the scene underground.

  There was Zenandra, now frail and aged, still laying eggs, fussing proudly about the royal brood cells as the last hatchling queen escaped the prison of her pupal case. As she emerged, her delighted sisters thronged around, eager for the opportunity to tend her. Unsteady on her new legs, she clambered clumsily about the comb. The old queen herself nudged her daughter towards a group of her recently emerged royal sisters. The new queens occupied an area to themselves. A cordon of worker wasps protected them from the attention of the young drones, whose aggression and tendency to mount any other wasp drove every member of the hive to distraction. This rowdy behaviour was heightened by the knowledge that tomorrow, they and their sisters were to embark upon their nuptial flight. They would each fly a predetermined distance from the colony and then seek a mate. Incest was discouraged, but the workers informed the now housebound Zenandra that there were ample numbers of unrelated European wasps in the local vicinity. Her children enjoyed good prospects of finding eligible suitors.

  The excited young royals caused mayhem by eagerly attempting to practice their flying within the overcrowded nest. The boldest ventured beyond the entrance, taking short flights into the baking air of the late-summer afternoon. Their devoted worker sisters were on hand to feed and water the exhausted youngsters upon their return. The nest took on a celebratory air, each wasp personally priding herself on the successful production of the next generation. After all, even the lowliest worker shared an identical genetic make-up with these young queens and drones. Through them, all hoped for immortality.

  Beth made a conscious effort to clear these disturbing visions from her mind. Turning away she hurried to the house, determined not to visit such thoughts again. She spent an uneasy and impatient afternoon trying to fill in time until the sun set.

  At three o’clock, Mark rang. Since finding out about his relationship problems, Beth no longer saw him as a threat to the children’s current living arrangements. In the circumstances he would be unable to successfully claim custody. But she was now privy to the secret of Helen’s affair and the rumours of his strange behaviour. In the light of this knowledge, Beth felt uncomfortable dealing with him. He’d not asked for a weekend with the kids since Christmas, although he still spoke to them frequently by phone. More and more, these phone chats included Beth. Mark seemed less self absorbed and more interested and affectionate towards his children. Although usually unwilling to engage him in conversation, she now felt a reluctant pity, which caused her to listen as he expressed his doubts about his private life and his career. He said that Helen and he, having grown apart, were jointly agreed upon an amicable separation. He talked of wanting a sea-change; of seeking a new, more satisfying path for his life. He questioned the value of the extravagant materialism he’d been chasing in recent years.

  In some ways Beth was pleasantly surprised by this apparent change in her husband. He reminded her of the Mark of long ago; less ruthless, whose ambition had not yet blinded him to the importance of integrity and compassion. Lulled by his changed attitude, on one occasion she almost unburdened herself of her guilty secret and blurted out her suspicions about Helen’s infidelity. But something in Mark’s manner stopped her. At times he spoke of his new partner and child in a cold, resentful tone that belied his words. Beth couldn’t quite believe that the bitter, tearful young woman who’d confided her loneliness and pain the day of the wasp attack on Chance, could so readily accept a decision to separate. So Beth remained unconvinced that Mark was being genuine, or even truthful. At the back of her mind lurked the admittedly unsubstantiated tales told to her by Irene. A niggling suspicion warned her that Mark might only be telling her what he thought she wanted to hear.

  Rick answered the phone and regaled his father, including much embellishment, with the story of his Bull-ant bite. After a few minutes he called out, “He wants you, Mum.”

  She took the phone.

  “Hello?”

  “Hi. I was wondering if I could come over and see the kids?”

  “What. Now?”

  “If it’s O.K. I haven’t seen them in such a long time.”

  A pause. ‘Whose fault is that?’ thought Beth uncharitably.

  “You know things are kind of up in the air between Helen and me at the moment. I was hoping to spend some time with them at your place?”

  Beth thought of her mission to destroy the wasps. She imagined Mark offering to help, and then gloating over the exterminated nest. How ignorant he would be of her ambivalence. How painful it would be to witness his callous satisfaction with the completed task. No. If there was ever a time that Mark was not welcome, it was now. After checking that Rick was out of earshot, Beth lied rather unconvincingly about having to go out that night. She was surprised to hear real disappointment in his voice.

  “Why don’t you come to see them on Saturday,” she heard herself say. His voice brightened.

  “Great. I look forward to seeing you. You know I never stopped loving you Beth, don’t you. Goodbye until Saturday.”

  Mark hung up. Beth stood, still holding the phone, too amazed to move. He loved her? This wouldn’t do at all. She realised that her offer of a sympathetic ear had been mistaken for something else. In an effort to facilitate Mark’s visit with his children, she’d unwittingly agreed to some sort of absurd date. The back of her neck began to prickle. For a moment she contemplated ringing him back to retract the offer, but then she thought better of it. It was only Wednesday after all. In a day or two she would ring him and make some excuse. There was plenty of time for that later.

  CHAPTER 25

  Mark felt enormously relieved to say out loud, that he loved Beth. It provided him with a tremendous emotional release. From now on there would be no more hidden agenda. He knew for certain that he wanted to reclaim his old life. It seemed to him, thinking back to the desperate misery of the last few months, that his very sanity depended upon it. Such was his overwhelming impatience to see her, that he decided to go home early, change out of his suit and tie, and pay her a surprise visit. Beth deserved to know. It was time to get this romance on the road.

  As he prepared to leave, his secretary popped her head around the door.

  “Mr. Gray would like to see you. He says it’s urgent.” Irritated by the delay, Mark almost decided to ignore the summons. After all, he was a Partner, not an employee subject to anybody’s beck and call. As he tossed-up whether or not to respond, Steven Gray and another senior Partner entered the office, shutting the door behind them. They looked unusually stern.

  “Mark, I’ll get straight to the point. There is a serious discrepancy involving one of your corporate client’s investment accounts. I’ve just taken a very disturbing call from Christopher Tyler. He claims that more than eighty percent of his funds are missing.”

  Mark’s irritation level rose another notch. This was ridiculous. Did he really have to waste his valuable time proving his professional competence to these morons?

  “That’s nonsense, Steven, and you know it. Here. I’ll show you. Sitting back down at his desk, he accessed the Tyler
account. Thunderstruck, he saw that it was true. A massive unauthorised withdrawal had been made that morning. Fighting a rising feeling of panic, Mark tracked the funds. It wasn’t possible. The final destination of the missing moneys was his own personal bank account. Steven, looking over his shoulder, was equally flabbergasted.

  “I had nothing to do with this, Steven, you must believe me!”

  There was silence.

  “Someone’s obviously hacked-in to the system. See this log on at 8.05 this morning? I never accessed this file then. I was still driving to work!”

  Before Mark finished his sentence, an ashen faced Steven dialled the police. After a brief conversation he turned his attention to the shell-shocked Mark.

  “Of course we don’t think you’re responsible. But the fact remains that the money from Tyler’s account has somehow found its way into yours. If the system has been compromised we need to find out why and by whom. I’d like you to check on your other client files, while we’re here, just in case.”

  It was the same story right across his client portfolio. Substantial, unauthorised withdrawals had been made from all of the client accounts and the funds transferred directly to Mark’s account.

  The men looked at each other. There was a prolonged silence as the enormity of the scandal hit home. Finally Mark spoke.

  “You must know it wasn’t me! I wouldn’t be that stupid. Why would I embezzle all my client’s funds, on one day, in one hit, put them in my own account where they could be easily traced, and then come in to work as if nothing’s happened? I couldn’t hope to get away with it. I’d have to be an idiot!”

  “You’re right,” said Steven soothingly.

  “You would have to be either stupid, or unbalanced in some way. And to be honest, we’ve all noticed that you’ve been acting a little odd of late. Stressed, you know. Not that any of us think that you had anything to do with this, of course. But it is only fair to tell you that we will have to mention to the fraud squad that you seem to have been under a great deal of strain lately. Look. Why don’t you just go and wait in the boardroom. Try to calm down a bit. I expect the police will want to interview you later this afternoon. And remember Mark, we’re behind you all the way.”

  Mark remained unconvinced. Shaking a little, he collected his things and left the room. But instead of taking the lift up to the boardroom, he took the lift down to the street.

  A growing fear gripped him. What if Beth believed these lies? He needed to discover the truth so that he could prove his innocence. If he could just have some time in the privacy of his home-office before the police came, he felt sure he could find an explanation for what had happened.

  Breaking every speed limit, he arrived home to find a removal-van parked outside his house. The moving men were just putting up the tailgate, but Mark managed to glimpse several pieces of his own furniture inside before the door slammed shut. In a state of confusion he approached the men and asked them what was going on.

  “This your house?” asked a short middle aged man in overalls.

  Mark nodded.

  “Well you’d better ask the lady inside. We’ve been told to take this stuff to an address in Kingston. If you’ve got any problems, just ring head office.”

  The man handed him a business card, and a copy of the job sheet. Bewildered, Mark watched the truck drive away. After a moment, he walked up to the front door and turned the key. He almost collided with Helen coming out. She was struggling with Chance under one arm, and a suitcase under the other. When she saw Mark she made a valiant attempt to push past him, but he blocked her exit, wedged himself between her and the door, and managed to slam it shut. Helen stood in the hall, defiant and uncertain.

  “What’s all this?” asked Mark, his tone measured and menacing. Helen remained silent, unsure of the best way to proceed. Chance saw his father, and gave him a hopeful smile.

  “I said, what’s all this then?” repeated Mark fiercely.

  The baby’s smile dissolved and he began to cry. Helen thought she might bluff her way through.

  “What does it look like? I’m leaving you. That’s all you need to know. Now, get out of my way!”

  Once again she attempted to push past him. He hit her hard in the face. Caught off guard, she lost her balance and fell, dropping Chance onto the hard parquet floor. Crying, the child tried to crawl to his mother. Mark picked him up roughly and shut him in the dining room. His cries intensified, although the sound was partly muffled by the heavy timber door.

  “Give him to me!” screamed Helen, running to the dining room and trying to wrench open the door.

  Mark hit her again, hard, in the mouth. This time she managed to stay on her feet, reeling into the wall, and wiping blood away from her lip.

  “Where were you going?” yelled Mark again. He was surprised to see a look of triumph on her battered face.

  “I’m going to live with my new boyfriend, that’s where. You know. The guy that punched you in the car park? I’ve been screwing him for months.”

  Helen observed him closely, hoping to see some sign of distress. His expression remained impassive. Mark took in the information slowly, trying to make some sense of it all. So she had a lover. Though his pride was wounded, Helen’s infidelity caused him no great pain. After all he was ditching her anyway. It might be convenient for him if she moved on quickly.

  “I should have known that you were nothing but a tramp. Go on then, get out of here.”

  Stung by his indifference, and feeling the effect of her smashed lip, she began to sob. How could he be so cold! An overwhelming desire came over her to penetrate his defences and find a vulnerable spot.

  “I suppose you think you’ll just go back to your darling Beth. But guess what?” she spat out through swollen, split lips, “She doesn’t want you. It’s true. She told me so, and after she finds out that you’re a thief, she’ll hate you even more.”

  To his astonishment, all of the extraordinary surprises of the day were fitting together in an unlikely way. The fog of confusion began to lift. Helen had set him up. But how? She was as good as computer illiterate. She’d need help. The pennies just kept dropping. Of course; the boyfriend. Bewilderment turned to rage. She’d said that Beth didn’t love him, didn’t want him. Helen finally got her wish. A mask of pure suffering crossed his face. Closing his eyes tight, he gulped to try to release the grip that tension had on his throat. When he opened them, they shone with pure malice.

  “That’s a damned lie!” he shouted.

  Crossing the room to where Helen stood, he punched his clenched fist into her face with all his might. The terrified girl managed to avoid the full force of the blow by turning and ducking. She felt an excruciating pain as her right cheekbone cracked. Mark caught her by the shoulders before she fell, shaking her violently and repeating, “It’s a lie! Tell me it’s a lie! Beth still loves me. She does!”

  Through her swollen cheek and split lip, Helen managed to speak.

  “It’s not a lie,” she whispered.

  Her intolerable words wounded Mark to his core. To the surprise of them both, tears welled-up in Mark’s eyes as he was forced to contemplate that she might be telling the truth. With one final back-handed slap, he hurled her to the ground. She remained slumped in a heap on the floor, too overcome by fear and the pain in her fractured cheek to move. Behind the solid dining room door, Chance kept up a lonely, frightened wail.

  Mark stared down at the crumpled girl, surprised, but not appalled by his actions. He knew she had only herself to blame for deliberately goading him like that. And with such a wicked lie! The prospect of a new life with Beth, was all that stood between him and total despair. He tried to reassure himself that such a future was secure. But first it was necessary to expose the true identity of the embezzler. He looked in his pocket and found the job sheet given to him by the removalist. Bingo, there it was. An address in nearby Kingston. Leaving his injured girlfriend and screaming baby to fend for themselves, he drove off to
confront Jason.

  CHAPTER 26

  Jason wiped the beads of sweat from his forehead, as he helped move the final item from the van into the house. Paying the men, he watched the truck drive away and then retreated inside, away from the heat of the late afternoon sun. Peering through the curtained window back along the street he still saw no sign of Helen. Disappointed, he went to the kitchen to pour himself another shot of scotch and ice. The trepidation he felt over the bank fraud caused him to have a drink that morning, to calm his jangled nerves. One drink turned into another, and he was by now more than a little under the weather.

  A hundred metres away, on the other side of the road, Mark also watched the van drive off. He’d arrived some time ago, driving past Jason’s house, unseen by the busy men. Parking a short distance away, he waited for the moving truck to leave. Inside the house an increasingly frustrated and impatient Jason was trying to find his mobile phone. With no landline, he needed it to ring Helen and find out why she was so late. He hoped it was under a cushion somewhere, but a nagging suspicion told him he’d left it at Helen’s house that morning. He was still looking for it when he heard a knock on the door. Helen! She’d never need to knock again. He’d had a key cut for her that morning. Full of booze-heightened anticipation, Jason almost ran down the hall. Flinging open the door, he was staggered to see Mark. His unexpected guest shoved the open door hard, back into his face. Caught off guard, Jason allowed Mark to push past him into the flat.

  They stood in the hallway, regarding each other warily, neither one quite sure what to do next, although Jason somehow knew he would live to regret all those scotches. Finally Mark spoke.