Nuova Part 4

Nuova gazed fixedly after the following drones. Hero's delay with Nuova made him the last to spring into the air. But he flew so strongly that it seemed certain that he would quickly make up for this handicap in the great race. Indeed, some of the onlooking bees began to call out, "See how Hero is gaining! He will surely win! Hero will be King!"

Nuova had strained her gaze after Hero until he with all the others had pa.s.sed from sight far out and up in the bright sky. As she gazed she had lifted on tiptoe and had even spread out her wings as if she would fly after him, but now as he disappeared she collapsed and fell back heavily with closed eyes and a pitiful sob into Saggia's supporting embrace.

Just then Beffa came hopping and humming over to them and sang, as if mockingly, but really with sympathetic and comforting meaning: "Ha, ha, the sad attendant! Her champion is too slow. He'll never win the Princess, Her kiss he'll never know."

CHAPTER X.

Nuova in the Beautiful Garden.

When Nuova had recovered enough to face squarely the situation in her life and in the life of the hive, she found herself very weak and very sad. Above all, she found the thought of going again into the dark hive to work extremely repugnant to her. And almost the first thing she said to Saggia, who had remained faithfully by her, supporting and caring for her, was that she would not go back into the hive to nurse or make wax or do anything else that meant staying inside.

Saggia comforted her by saying that she would not have to work inside. The kindly old bee whispered to her that there was always so much confusion and such change in the hive arrangements whenever a new Princess was born, and either she or the old Queen went out with many of the workers, that she could easily change her kind of work now without any notice being taken of it. And to confirm this Saggia pointed to several of the nurses, among them Uno, Due, and Tre, making one after another the little trial flights that Saggia had told Nuova to make preparatory to going into the garden out of sight of the hive. These nurses were plainly intending to become foragers. Even as Saggia and Nuova watched them, one after another flew out higher and farther and disappeared into the garden.

It was a beautiful garden on the edge of which the hive was set. The owner of the garden was a great lover and student of flowers. He liked bees and beetles and birds, too; all kinds of live things, plant or animal. And no one was ever allowed to kill any creature, little or big, in his garden, so it was full to overflowing with life and animation. Birds made their nests in it; squirrels barked in the trees; even moles and gophers made their underground runways unmolested. There were open, sunny gra.s.s-plots for playing, and close little copses and coverts for hiding, and great trees for climbing to see out into the still wider world beyond the garden walls. But the garden itself was world enough for most of the creatures that lived in it. There were flowers enough for the bees; seeds and worms enough for the birds; nuts enough for the squirrels. And if some of the happy family in the garden had to live by eating some of the others, still that was the way of life, and the only thing was to hope and try to make sure that the end would not come too soon.

[Ill.u.s.tration: In the Garden]

Nuova already loved the garden, although so far she had not been in it; at least not been any more in it than standing on the entrance platform of the hive and looking into it from this vantage-ground. But now she was really to go out into it, and sad and tired though she was, she felt a little thrill of happiness as she thought of what she might see over there beyond the near-by bushes, out there among the brilliant flowers and the lush gra.s.ses. She turned to Saggia gratefully.

"Good-bye, dear Saggia," she said gently. "I am going to go into the garden now. I will make the little flights first as you told me, so as to be able to find my way back to the hive--but, I don't know, Saggia, I don't feel like ever coming back to the hive." Her eyes filled with tears. "He--he will never come back. He will win, and he will--will die." She shuddered and nearly collapsed again.

Saggia could say nothing. She believed, too, that Hero would win in the Great Courting Chase. And if he won, he would die. It was really, she thought with some anger, a very stupid sort of arrangement; very unfair to the King; to be crowned because he was the finest, strongest, and swiftest drone in the hive, or in any of the other near-by hives whose drones also joined in any Courting Chase they noticed going on, only to die at once. It was simply not only stupid; it was brutal.

She did not like to think of Nuova's going off alone into the garden so soon. And she could not put out of her mind the uneasy feeling that Nuova would never come back to the hive at all; not even as a forager who might go out and in as she pleased. Nuova had too plainly shown that her interest in living was gone, and her surrender to her impulses of the moment was likely at any time to be complete even though it might lead to death itself. Saggia decided that she and Beffa were needed in the garden. As Nuova left her to go to the edge of the platform for her first flights, Saggia scurried off in search of Beffa.

A number of bees were busy at a little group of flowers in the garden when one of them, Uno, who had just turned around facing the general direction of the hive, suddenly uttered an exclamation.

"Well, of all things!" she said. "Beffa in the garden!" The other bees turned and stared.

"And Saggia!" exclaimed one of them. "Beffa and Saggia! Beffa in the garden! What can he do here?"

Beffa, hearing them, released himself from Saggia's support, and began to make weak little hoppings and to sing. Poor Beffa; he was sadly tired, for because of his deformed wings he had had to walk all the way from the hive. And Saggia was tired, too, because she had walked with him, and not only that, but had helped him over some of the rougher places.

Beffa sang: "Beffa in the garden; The prisoner in the sun; No Queen in the palace; No jesting to be done."

He stopped to rest, and Saggia went slowly to a flower, where she busied herself putting a little pollen into her pollen baskets.

Due turned to Beffa. "Hi, Beffa, you can sing and dance for us while we gather pollen and honey. And you can watch for Bee-Bird to see that he doesn't surprise us. Oh, you can be useful. Hop, hop, hop-la!" And she made a little hop or two, in mimicry of Beffa.

Tre had been looking sharply at Saggia. "And Saggia doesn't seem to be doing much," she said, with asperity. "Foraging again, is she? That is rather a dangerous business for such an old bee, isn't it?" she said malevolently. "The two-legged man giant that owns this garden likes the two-legged bird giants. He is a brute! He protects the birds! And they eat the insects! He might protect us, rather. Brute!"

"Brute!" cried the other bees. "Protect the horrid birds, indeed! Sting him if you see him."

Just then a big blue-bottle fly that had been buzzing about the flowers ventured too near a dark corner lower down in the bush, and was lunged at by a big black spider, which barely missed it. The blue-bottle dashed excitedly away with a tremendous buzzing, and all the bees jumped about nervously a little.

Beffa began to sing without rising from the ground, just moving his feet as if dancing: "Bee-birds in the tree-tops, Spiders in the gra.s.s; Death rides down the sunbeam, Death leaps as you pa.s.s."

"Ugh!" said Uno. "Can't you sing something more cheerful? Be funny, can't you?"

Beffa got up and hopped about a little. Then he sang: "Out among the flower-cups, Dancing in the sun; Now a drink of nectar, Then another one. Brushing up the pollen, Hurry 'gainst the gloam, Pail and basket over-full, Off to hive and home!"

All the bees skipped and danced and sang after him: "Pail and baskets over-full, Off to hive and home!"

After singing this refrain several times and dancing happily about a few moments, the bees set at their work again industriously. It was so beautiful and so bright and so warm in the garden that one could not help being happy in it.

And yet just then Nuova stepped out from behind a flowering bush looking very weary and very sad. Saggia, who had been glancing around for her all the time, slipped quickly and quietly over to her without attracting the attention of any of the bees, and before any other one had seen her.

Saggia led Nuova around to the side of the bush where they would be out of sight of the other bees, and then spoke to her in a low tone.

"Are you all right, Nuova?" she asked anxiously.

Nuova smiled wearily and sadly. "Of course, I am all right," she said gently; "who would not be out here in this wonderful world, this golden sunshine, this fragrant air? It's a place to be all right in all the time. I am going to stay here."

"Stay here? What do you mean?" asked Saggia.

"Simply that, dear Saggia," she replied gently, smiling; "stay right here in the warm sun, near the beautiful flowers. Do you think I am going back into the dark hive to die like that poor forager and be dragged off and tossed out like a piece of dirty wax?" She shuddered. "No, no; I am going to die out here, and lie in the soft gra.s.s under that heliotrope there."

Saggia spoke anxiously but sternly. "Die? Die? Why do you talk of dying? Have you a right to die yet? Have you done all you should do for the hive? Are you going to shirk your duty? Anyway"--and her voice grew more kindly--"do you really want to die? Don't you want to do first all the things a bee can do, to nurse--"

"I have nursed," Nuova interrupted.

"And make wax--" Saggia went on.

"I have made wax," Nuova broke in.

Saggia persisted, "And build cells--"

"I have built cells," interrupted Nuova again.

"And gather honey--" Saggia continued.

Nuova touched a near-by flower. "I am gathering honey," she said.

Saggia hesitated a moment, then began again. "And--and--" she stammered; then exclaimed suddenly and triumphantly--"and clean floors!"

Nuova smiled at Saggia's anticlimax. "No, I haven't scrubbed the floor yet. I suppose I ought to enjoy that a little before I die. But you see I am not really old enough to have had time for everything."

"That's it," broke in Saggia warmly. "You are not old enough yet. It is nonsense to talk of dying so young. You must live a long time yet. Look at me! Think how old I am!"

Nuova smiled again, but grew earnest as she spoke. "It is not how long you live, Saggia; it is how much you live. I have not done everything, but I have done most things. You, you dear wise, old, sensible bee, you have done the things calmly one after another as it came time for you to do them. But I have tried everything that was interesting and for only as long as it was. You have lived a long and useful life with much in it. I have lived a short and useless one; but also with much in it. You have lived mostly for others, and have been mostly happy. I have lived mostly for myself, and been mostly unhappy. But that is the way I am, Saggia. That is my way of living and really I suppose, my way of being happy; happily unhappy. And, Saggia"--and Nuova bent close over to her, as if to tell her a secret--"you know, don't you, that if I have missed cleaning floors, I have done something else in place of it; something you haven't done. I have loved! And that is the happiest unhappiness I have had."

Saggia was truly shocked. "Nuova," she exclaimed, "haven't I told you before not to say such things! You have not loved," she added, firmly, "because you cannot love. Poor little Nuova, you have much to learn yet about bee life."

"There is much about it I don't want to learn," muttered Nuova.

"There is much you must learn," replied Saggia sternly, but kindly. "And some of it you must learn now. When I say you cannot love, I mean exactly that; not that you ought not or must not, because other bees do not, but simply that you cannot. Bee loving is not just liking and sighing and laughing and dancing and crying, and being always happy and unhappy at once, but it is becoming the mother of babies, many babies, and that only Princesses can become. And when they are the mothers of babies, they are Queens. In bee land to be a mother is to be a Queen, and to be a Queen is only to be a mother."

Nuova was silent. She felt compelled to believe Saggia, who surely knew about the life of bees if any one did, and who had always spoken truthfully to her. And yet she had a feeling within her that seemed some way to contradict Saggia's knowledge.

"Well, then, Saggia," she said slowly, "I haven't loved, but I have wished to love." And she added in a whisper, "I want to love!"

"You cannot love," repeated Saggia firmly. "Only Princesses can love. You should not think of it any more."

Nuova looked up into the sky. And when she spoke it was as if she were speaking in a dream. "I want to love and I cannot love! Only a Princess can love. And I am not a Princess. What can I do? Clean floors?" She turned to Saggia and smiled sadly. "No, I cannot clean floors, either," she said softly. "I am an unfortunate sort of bee, Saggia, a worthless sort. A new bee, but not new enough to love, and too new to clean floors. Just a bee to lie under the heliotrope bush."

Just then Beffa, who had come hopping and gently humming up to them unperceived by either, and who had overheard Nuova's last words, began to sing: "A heliotrope or a rose-bush, A pale-blue flower or pink, But a dead bee sees no colors Nor smells sweet smells, I think. An old world for old bees, A new world for the new, And, ah, who knows the real truth? The untrue may be true."

Nuova was delighted, in her sadness, to see Beffa again. "Beffa, you dear, funny Beffa!" she cried. "But how did you get out here in the garden?"

"He couldn't come, And so he came. Can or cannot, All's a name,"

sang Beffa in reply, hopping about more vigorously than ever.

As Beffa finished, Saggia saw some of the other bees looking scowlingly toward them. She touched Nuova with an antenna.

"Nuova," she said in a low voice, "we must get to work. The other bees are noticing us. We are idling. We must go to work. Beffa can sit here in the sunshine and watch us." She moved off toward a flower.

Nuova looked after her a moment, and then she turned to Beffa.

"Good old Saggia," she said. "She is an example of industry, isn't she? But I don't like her to work just because others are noticing us. That makes me want not to work." She stood loitering by him.

Beffa deliberately stretched himself, with a yawn, and settling down comfortably near a dandelion, he hummed, as if half-asleep already: "Some work because others talk; Some talk because others work; The wisest bee keeps wisest way, He--goes--to--sleep!"

And as he finished he closed his eyes.

[Ill.u.s.tration: Beffa settled down comfortably]

Nuova saw through Beffa's transparent means of sending her off to work, and was as much amused as vexed. "Oh," she said, "I much prefer working to talking with bees whose wisdom might put me to sleep, too. Good-bye." She made a mocking curtsy and went off slowly to a small group of flowers which was hidden by a large bush from the rest of the bees.

As soon as she had started, Beffa opened one eye to spy on her, and as she disappeared behind the bush he slowly straightened up, very much awake and evidently strongly possessed by some idea. He let his eyes roam over all of the garden he could see, and he even scanned the air in all directions. Apparently not finding what he sought, he remained quiet, but alert, on the flat dandelion leaf. The bees at the flowers worked industriously. The garden was fragrant and quiet in the sun.

CHAPTER XI.

Hero finds Nuova in the Garden.

Saggia had joined a group of foragers at work, among whom were Uno and Tre. These two bees at first moved away a little as Saggia came over, but in their foraging work they gradually came close to her again. Pretty soon Uno, after glancing toward Beffa sitting quietly by the dandelion, spoke to Saggia.

"The garden is not a place for jesting," she said sharply; "nor for listening to jesting. Beffa is not a good example for bees who work." As she said this she looked significantly at Saggia, and several of the other bees, overhearing her, smiled maliciously.

Saggia said nothing at first, but busied herself at her flowers. As she changed, however, from one flower to another one near by, she said quietly: "Beffa works harder than most of us."

"Do you call jesting work?" asked Tre indignantly.

"I call Beffa's work hard work--for Beffa; and useful work," Saggia replied.

"What other hive has a jester, a bee that does no work, that just hops and sings?" demanded Uno angrily.

"We are more fortunate than other hives," said Saggia evenly. "We have a bee who has time to think, and a clever tongue to say what he thinks."

No one spoke for a moment, then Tre said mechanically, as if repeating by rote: "Bees ought not to think; and if they do they ought to keep their thoughts to themselves." Then she added maliciously: "I think I learned that from you, Saggia."

The other bees turned and smiled.

"One lives and learns," said Saggia, a little confused.

"Oh, worse yet!" exclaimed Uno. "'Bees do not learn: they know.' That also is from Saggia," she said, turning to the other bees.

They all smiled again enjoying Saggia's discomfiture.

"Well," said Saggia desperately, "bees do know most things, but--not--everything."

Just then Beffa came hopping toward them hurriedly. He was singing loudly, too, and was evidently much excited about something. As he reached the group of foraging bees he did not stop, but kept hopping right on by them singing loudly as he pa.s.sed: "Hoptoad squats beneath the flower; Waits that pleasant fateful hour When honey-bee on food intent Comes within his leafy tent; Open! Shut! Poor bee, good-bye; An ugly, horrid way to die!"

As the bees heard this, they all became much frightened and excited, skipping about and peering in all directions.

"The Toad!" they cried. "Where? There! I don't see him! Where, Beffa? Beffa, where?"

Beffa's movements plainly indicated the direction of danger to be toward where he had come from, and the way of safety correspondingly in the direction of his hopping. All the bees, therefore, with much buzzing and jumping about, moved along with the hopping and singing Beffa. Only Saggia seemed a little slow to take alarm or to follow him closely. She watched him curiously, and kept turning to look in the direction from which he had come. She remembered that Nuova was back there somewhere, and she could not believe that Beffa would leave her in danger in order to warn ever so many other bees. Saggia knew well poor Beffa's hopeless love for Nuova.

As a matter of fact, Beffa had seen not a toad, but something else, which, under the circ.u.mstances of bee life and tradition, was much more extraordinary, and he had come hopping over to lead off the other bees that they might not also see it.

What he had seen was something that his keen wits had told him all along he might see: in fact, he had been looking for it all the time since he had been in the garden; it was something that made him happy and unhappy at the same time. It was something that would make Nuova the happiest bee in the world, for a little while at least, though it might mean something very dreadful to her in the end. And what could make Nuova happy made him happy--even though her happiness should come from seeing somebody else who would almost make her forget that Beffa ever lived. What Beffa had seen was Hero flying slowly down into the garden near where Nuova was. It was certain that they would see each other in a moment.

In fact, Nuova, turning away from the flower which she had been slowly and listlessly rifling of nectar, saw Hero just a moment after he alighted. Her heart gave a great jump, and her first impulse was to slip away before he could see her; but when she saw how dejected and sad he seemed, she felt a great pity for him and wanted to comfort him. Just then he lifted his eyes and saw her. He started, then controlled himself and came to her. "Nuova," he said quietly but earnestly; "Nuova, I am glad you are here."

Nuova could hardly speak. She was so tense with excitement, with wonder, with happiness that they were together again. But what had happened? How could this be?

"You did not win?" she stammered. "You are not dead?" She stared at him with painful intentness.

"I did not go on," said Hero slowly and somberly.

Nuova did not understand. "An accident?" she cried. "You could not fly? Your wings were not--" she stopped, alarmed and almost in tears at her thought. "Surely I did not hurt them when I--I--pulled them?"

Hero did not understand clearly what she meant. In fact, he was too intent on the overwhelming fact of what he had just done, of the absolute break he had just made with bee tradition, to think, for the moment, of anything else.