They were all in the lab when Auckland arrived: Amelia, Shirley,
Burleigh, James, Edholm, and Ekem-ve. The latter stood apart gravely,
while the rest were gathered around the body which was sprawled on the
floor by the table. Glamis was dressed as Auckland had last seen him in
the recreation room the night before, although stains indicated that he
had been outside in various postures of ease. Edholm was down on one
knee, examining the deceased.
He looked up as Auckland joined the group. "Hello, Roy," he said.
"Things seem to have taken a different turn than we expected. It's
ironic that for all his care in wearing a protective suit outside, Ken
still had to be stung by an insect and that finished him."
"Are you sure about that?" Auckland asked, looking down at the body.
Edholm stooped and, lifting Glamis's right hand, rolled his short
sleeves back. "Puncture in index finger," he said. "Black indicating
poison. Entire hand and arm swollen. Very much like snake bite, you
see. Ekem-ve tells me that little animals stung by the wild bees look a
lot like this when you find them afterward. There's a dead bee on the
table," he nodded to his left, "and it's pretty clear that it stung
Ken, and Ken swatted it before he succumbed. It hit him fast; he didn't
have time to call for help or get to an antidote himself, if that would
have done any good."
"But--but how did the bee get in here?" Amelia asked. She was shaken
by the event, but there was no sign of grief about her. He glanced
at Shirley, whose face was white--no sorrow there, either. James had
an abstract, somewhat puzzled air about him, as if he was not quite
sure whether he was dreaming this or not. Only Burleigh seemed to be
affected with anything like regret.
"A native box was brought in here and it is on the table now." He
pointed to the open artifact. "Ken was photographing it, as you see
from the pictures there, and he must have opened it. And the natives
make pets of the bees and often carry them around with them." He turned
to Ekem-ve and said softly, "Why was a bee left in this box, Ekem-ve?
And I thought you said they wouldn't sting us."
"Wild bees told not to sting excellent Earthmen," Ekem-ve replied. "No
Vaec tell wild bee to sting for mirth. Bad joke, not mirthful. Pet bees
not able to sting. May examine remains of unfortunate insect, excellent
Calvin?"
Edholm and Burleigh nodded, and the Carolinian came forward and picked
up the dead insect gently. He held the small body in his fingers and
pressed the abdomen.
"This is pet bee," he said. "Unfortunate insect cannot sting because
Vaec give pets gentle operation for own protection. When wild bee
sting, stinger remain in wound of victim and insect soon die from loss
of stinger. Is stinger in wound, excellent Walter?"
Edholm took a magnifying glass from the drawer and bent over Glamis's
body again. The breath whistled through his teeth as he said, "No. I
should have noticed that before. There's no stinger."
"If you will please observe stinger of unfortunate insect under
magnifying glass, while this one press abdomen."
Edholm held the glass on the dead bee as Ekem-ve repeated the
operation. Auckland peered over the captain's shoulder and it was
evident enough. The stinger was ridiculously short and blunted. It
could not have penetrated Glamis's skin.
"Then," began Amelia, her eyes wide, "it wasn't an accident."
"Very unlikely." There was a pencil-light on the table. Auckland picked
it up and played it around the inside of the Vaec box. "Dr. Glamis
pricked his finger on something sharp, something pointed, something
coated with an alkaloid poison, very possibly. He was examining a box
which ordinarily you would have been examining. It's empty now. You
two saw him working on it?"
"Yes," said James. "I opened the shutters to see if he was in the lab.
I was going over to ask him something--can't recall what it was now. He
was photographing an object on the table, and I couldn't be sure what
it was since I didn't have my glasses on. I asked Amelia to look."
"What did you see?" Auckland asked.
"This box," she answered.
"I mean, what did it look like from your window?"
"Oh." Amelia blinked and thought a moment. "The light was clear and I
could see a cubical object with designs in black around the outside on
a pale blue background. The designs looked like the designs I'm looking
at right now, although I could not see them all as clearly."
"And Dr. Glamis waved to you, and you waved back?"
"Yes," said James. "I was a little miffed, I'll admit, as I wanted to
examine the box, then I realized I was being silly. There was no reason
why he should not take photographs of it. He'd finished one roll--just
torn off the last one--and was about to put another roll of film into
the camera when he looked up and saw me. He waved, and I waved back
just to show there were no hard feelings. Then I closed the shutters
and went to bed."
Auckland picked up the camera and examined it. "There's a fresh roll in
here," he said. "So we know it happened before he could take any more
photos. Was the box closed when you saw it?"
Amelia nodded.
"There are a lot of questions, then. I take it the box was open when
you found him?"
"Yes, it was open," James said. "I came in here and saw the box open,
the first thing. Thought that he'd gone to bed--he didn't always put
things in order, you know." Auckland nodded. "Then I saw him lying on
the floor and I called everyone."
"Did you see the bee then?"
"No," James replied. "I didn't see it at all until Edholm examined the
body. He called our attention to it. It was on the floor just a little
under the table. He picked it up and put it where you saw it when you
came in."
Auckland nodded. "You can see this much clearly: someone did not know
about the Vaec pet bees--the only person I can now be sure did not know
is Roy Auckland--and this party thought that if Ken were found thus,
we would assume that he had been stung. We all knew that he was very
allergic to insect stings. The indications were all there."
He turned to Burleigh. "I remember you said something about being stung
by the wild ones and it not being very serious."
Calvin Burleigh shook his head. "Not the large bees. No one here has
been stung by them."
"Then that kills one theory," said Auckland. "I was about to say this
indicated that Glamis was not an accidental victim of murder aimed at
someone else. If it hasn't been established whether the bee stings
might be fatal to anyone...."
"A couple of Leitfred's men were stung by bees," said Edholm. "One
died. The other didn't."
A stricken look crossed Burleigh's face. "I didn't know that," he said
to Auckland. "And I misinformed you, quite unintentionally, when I told
you that a couple of us had been stung, but that it wasn't at all bad.
It wasn't the bees like this one," he nodded toward the table, "but the
smaller type, and we'd bothered them. I assumed that this kind wouldn't
be much worse, except to Ken of course."
"What about this, Ekem-ve?" asked Auckland. "Why should any bee sting
one of us unless we were trying to harm it? I thought you had control
over them."
The Carolinian blinked rapidly, the Vaec manner of shaking one's head
or nodding. One had to guess which, in each instance. "Unfortunate
insects not large in intelligence, excellent Roy. Cannot be told not
to sting, can only be told to keep away from excellent Earthmen. Very
easily frightened. If wild bee put in box then released with suddenness
to see stranger bending over, unfortunate insect follow instinct;
perhaps fly away, perhaps sting."
"That makes a difference," said Shirley. "Why, I might have tried to
capture or pick up one of the bees, particularly one that came out of a
box and I thought was tame."
Ekem-ve's single hair straightened, then drooped slightly. "This
thoughtless person overcome by remorse at stupidity. Did not think of
such contingency."