Buck and I went to the bee tree, carrying a small handful of towels Ma had given us, an axe and a lard pail. I had just reluctantly put my fawn into the shed where I had placed his bed. I didn’t want him to miss retrieving honey from the tree, but I didn’t want him getting stung either. I hated being separated from my young fawn, even for honey-hunting. Then it felt lonely. Pa had his eyes on the comb all spring, waiting for the proper time to allow the honeybees to gather nectar from the all the flowers. I just didn’t feel right, leaving him cooped up in a bed while we were doing what he waited all spring to do.
The bee tree was a dead pine up near the sink-hole where Pa and I would fetch water for Ma. We climbed up another tree to gather green Spanish moss. At the base of the pine was a pile of dry grass and bundles of feathers. Buck explained it was probably wood-ducks that had tried to nest in the cavity of the bees. The bees drove them out with sharp stings. I felt chills roll down my spine, I had never been stung before, according to Ma, but her grandfather was in bed for a fortnight when he got stung. I wouldn’t stand a day without my fawn, and two weeks would be a nightmare of teas and concoctions from Ma herself. Buck began to chop the dead tree. Further up where the cavity hung, buzzing turned into humming of irritation with the hack of the axe, and the humming transformed into a roar of angry bees. Buck directed me to start a fire on the cloth with flint and steel in his bag. I was in a panic. The bees would be out any minute, and even though I had seen Pa start a fire with his tinder-horn, I had never successfully done it myself!! I tried, smacking the two rock-like pieces toward the cloth, but every spark would die when I blew too violently for them to spark into a flame. Buck left the axe in the tree and hurled himself next to me, grabbing the supplies from my clutch. He pounded the rocks as vigorously as I had, but he blew much softer. The cloth burned and Buck scrambled for a piece of moss. He placed it on top of the scorching cloth, and removed it. My eyes felt they had been tricked somehow, because the moss didn’t burn, it only smoked. He ran back to the tree and hacked the final splint on the tree off, causing it to topple down and rush the bees to fly out in a swarm. Buck threw the moss into the bee cavity in one forceful throw. He turned and ran, slapping his shoulders and stomach. I laughed so hard, Buck looked like a cowardly bear, feeling the true pain of the multiple stings. I stopped when a thin, stabbing pine needle like feeling stung me on the back of my neck. Buck screamed and shouted for me to scramble my way down to the sink-hole, so I ran my way down the steep hill to the water. The water wasn’t deep enough to cover us completely, so Buck began caking me with gooey mud from head to toe. It got all entangled in my hair and face; this was probably as close to a mud bath as I was ever going to get myself in. Yuck!!!! The bees quieted and zoomed back to their knocked bee hive, while Buck and I headed to the south side of the sink hole to wash ourselves and clothes in the wash-troughs. We submerged our clothes in one trough and ourselves in another. Buck had half a dozen stings, while I had escaped with only two. We, again, approached the tree with care. Luckily, Buck had thrown the moss in the right place in the cavity—all the bees were drugged with the smoke of the moss. I stood apprehensive and excited behind Buck. I didn’t want to be running for the low water of the sink-hole again or be stung trying to get there, but I really wanted some honey in my grumbling belly, really badly. Buck took his knife and cut away splinters and the edges of the cavity. He stuck his hand right in and turned to stare at me with amazement. He took out his hand and it rained syrupy golden honey from his fingers. We extracted more of it, and took turns carrying the lard pail back to the house. When we returned, Ma gave us a cypress tub to retrieve the rest that was still in the cavity. When we came back the second time, the tub, too, was full of the golden deliciousness. Buck said it was the largest amount he had ever seen from a bee tree. I was glad. Hanging around with Buck was like with having an older brother! And dinner tasted sweet that night.
