1921 



AMERICAN BEE JOURNAL 



319 



himself a wife, Jim was young and 

 probably felt the same way. Jim would 

 get it all knocked out of him in a 

 season or two and settle down to 

 working the old farm and fox-get the 

 bees and orchard and small fruits he 

 was so enthusiastic about. 



Ma Jones, however, declared Helen 

 a smart girl. She helped her new 

 daughter fix up a suit of white cot- 

 ton for working along with Jim 

 among the bees. Helen's enthusiasm, 

 coupled with Jim's knowledge, which 

 had that .spring been reinforced by 

 the work of the short course at the 

 college where he had met her, accom- 

 plished wonders in the old apiary. 



The honey house was also over- 

 hauled and new equipment added. Jim 

 tapped the rural electric power and 

 light line and wired the farm build- 

 ings for light, put a new motor in 

 the extracting room, another in the 

 basement where the laundering was 

 done and an electric iron in the 

 kitchen. Pa winced a little, but paid. 



"Jim's got new-fangled ideas," said 

 Ma Jones, "and everyone of them fits 

 in with my feelings. It's a wonder 

 we ever kept him here on the farm 

 as long as we have. Pa." 



Helen's desk and typewriter in the 

 sitting room gave an appearance of 

 business-like activity to the room in 

 which she kept the records of the api- 

 ary and orchard and the farm work. 



"Time will tell the whole story," 

 mused Pa Jones. "He grins loudest 

 who smiles last." 



Ill 



"Dad, I want $500 more capital to 

 put into the business," declared Jim, 

 one evening, when he and his father 

 were alone. Ma Jones and Helen had 

 fliwered to town for the last number 

 of the season's entertainment course. 

 "I need a couple of dozen Modified 

 Dadant hives, more supers, and I want 

 to buy Charlie Waite's twenty colo- 

 nies and Mellberg's bees, too, and 

 clean them up. Then we'll control 

 evei-ything within our range. They'll 

 pay for themselves this season. Our 

 queens then will be purely mated. 

 We've got to re-queen every year or 

 two and it'll be a big expense to buy. 

 We'll breed them ourselves, now that 

 I've got some good breeding queens." 



"Don't forget, young man, that I 

 sold the crop last winter for 15 cents 

 and was glad to get it. Five hundred 

 dollars is a lot of money! Look at 

 these times." 



"That's just what I'm doing," Jim 

 replied, earnestly. "I'm looking the 

 times square in the eye, and that's 

 why I want to go ahead. With Helen's 

 new marketing plan, we are done with 

 15-cent honey." 



That was a new one on Pa. "What's 

 the plan?" he asked. 



"I must not give it away now," Jim 

 answered. 



"Going to hook me with the mys- 

 tery, eh?" 



"No, only going to convince you 

 this fall that it works. If I had 

 thought that 15-cent or 10-cent honey 

 was all there was left for us after 

 a hard season's work, I'd never have 

 gone into honey production. We 

 have the foundation for a big, profit- 



able business and we are going to 

 make it go. Getting away and find- 

 ing out how the business honey pro- 

 ducers solve their problems has given 

 Helen and me an idea. We are going 

 to try to get two or three times what 

 you got for the honey crop last win- 

 ter, but it will pay to try. We have 

 always made a fair honey crop when 

 you had time to build the colonies up 

 in the spring. Our range is one of 

 the best. Plenty of maple, basswood, 

 white clover, wild raspbenies and 

 generally a good fall flow." 



"That'll be more for a pound of 

 honey than a bushel of corn's worth 

 now. Are you sure you can do it?" 

 Pa was skeptical. 



"Be patient and see. That's all we 

 ask." And in seven minutes Jim had 

 persuaded his father to yield on the 

 additional investment. Please notice 

 that I say "persuaded," not convinced. 



"I can make $500 do over $600 

 worth of buying," said Jim. "We are 

 members of the State Association and 

 buy through the Secretary's office and 

 save 20 per cent on supplies." 



"You better stretch it all you can," 

 said Pa Jones, as he wrote the check. 

 "It will put off the big bump just 25 

 per cent further." 

 IV 



Knowledge and planning and work- 

 ing always perform near-miracles. 

 And it was Jim's idea to be a miracle 

 man. Helen was also determined on 

 making good. In fact, Helen and Jim 

 worked together as efficiently as Pa 

 Jones' best team, Dick and Dolly. 



Jim had taken a few of the weaker 

 colonies and what he had purchased, 

 and made increase which he had 

 found a ready market for by notify- 

 ing the bigger supply manufacturers 

 that he could properly fill their orders. 

 Good management and publicity 

 brought more orders than he could 

 fill. And the income brought more 

 confidence to Pa Jones. 



The supers began to pile up high 

 as the honey flow advanced. Jim's 

 work was bringing results that Pa 

 Jones had never before seen. Jim 

 was experiencing the wonderful exal- 

 tation of work that counted. The 

 fruition of his plans gave him a splen- 

 did feeling of pride. The work in 

 the open with bees and fruit, the time 

 to herself that Helen had always 

 craved, when working at the adver- 

 tising offices from 8 till 6, was now a 

 reality. Her flower beds brightened 

 up the lawn. Other touches about the 

 old Jones place told the neighbors and 

 passers-by that new life had been put 

 behind the Joneses' home affairs. 



Helen and Jim worked during the 

 evening on form letters, prepainng 

 mailing lists and advertising plans to 

 sell the now assured honey crop, and 

 were laboring over the marketing, all 

 of which they mysteriously concealed 

 from Pa Jones, who more than once 

 tried to tune up his ear to catch the 

 subdued conversation around Helen's 

 desk. Failing in this he would steal 

 opportune moments to peer over the 

 journals he perused, trying to ravel 

 the mystery by sight, much as a bea- 

 gle which has lost the scent wll cast 

 his eyes about looking for the run- 



ning rabbit that has craftily thrown 

 him off the track. 



One morning as the maples along 

 the border of timberland in the hill- 

 side pastures began coloring the land- 

 scape with a wealth of reds and yel- 

 lows, it was discovered that Helen and 

 the flivver had disappeared from the 

 farm. 



"That's your city gal for you," Pa 

 declared. "She's tired of the pretty 

 country home and flowers and bees 

 and things that she's been raving 

 about. I been thinking all the time 

 that she's been acting queer. Looks 

 to me as though she's gone back to 

 mother and the movies and town." 



"Now you hush yourself," Ma Jones 

 demanded. "Evei-ything happens the 

 worst in your life. 1 should have dis- 

 appeared myself, years ago. Thir- 

 teen months more and my naturally 

 sweet and sunny disposition will be 

 ruined and I'll be in a sanitarium." 

 Ma delivered herself of this in a man- 

 ner that convinced the head of the 

 house and its check signer that the 

 better part of valor would be to hush 

 — and lots of it! 



Ma Jones telephoned and wi-ote let- 

 tei's without finding a clew. Pa just 

 looked his part. Jim said nothing and 

 went on vidth the extracting. "Evei. 

 at that," he told his mother, "it's the 

 sweetest business in the world." 



And so endeth the chapter of the 

 disappearing bride, as much as I 

 hated to write it. 



A week passed, as weeks will, if 

 nothing stops it. 



The telephone rang and Ma an- 

 swered. "There's a crate o' glassware 

 — -two of 'em here at the freight 

 house. Tell Jim to get 'em, will you 

 please, Mrs. Jones?" 



When Jim got this word he trucked 

 into town, then locked up the crates 

 in the honey house. 



"There's dirty work going on 

 around here," Pa Jones, kidded Ma, 

 when he came in 10 minutes early for 

 dinner. "I ain't going to be surprised 

 if somebody's murdered in the next 

 chapter." 



"You better be careful — it may be 

 you," Ma rejoined, a tint of acidity in 

 her throat. "I've been learning 

 things and putting two and two to- 

 gether and — " 



She was going to expend a very 

 carefully-thought-out theory that 

 would explain everything, when the 

 west door opened and Helen rushed 

 in, bundle-laden. She had driven in 

 from the west unseen. 



Ma Jones bounded to embrace her 

 daughter, her theory generously fly- 

 ing out the window. "Well for the 

 land sakes!" she exclaimed. "Where 

 have you been, honey?" 



Pa Jones sheepishly got up and said 

 he was glad to see Helen back, too. 



"I didn't think it would take near 

 as long to see all those folks," Helen 

 began, "but once I'd started I knew 

 I might as well finish. Where's Jim?" 



"Extracting," announced Ma. 



"We'll need all that honey, and 

 more, I think, to fill these orders." 

 Helen opened a package. "Look them 

 over. Pa. There's one from the big- 

 gest hotel in Strongville ; here's one 

 from the steward of a chain of small 



