Nuova was among the fallen
But Nuova was not among them. She was among the fallen. Not far from the body of the dead leader of the Black Bees whom she had so brilliantly overcome, Nuova lay huddled. Saggia, who had been hustled out of the press and into the entrance of the hive while the battle was going on, now hurried to her fallen friend. Beffa, also, came hopping anxiously to her, and Hero, who knew now that Nuova was no coward, and had, indeed, been seized with a great admiration and at the same time a great solicitude for his extraordinary little worker-bee friend, also hastened to her side and bent over her. Other bees, too, came crowding around, and Nuova's body would almost have been trampled under foot by the surging crowd if Hero had not angrily cleared a little space about her. Saggia, who had found already to her great joy that Nuova showed no lance wound, but had only been stunned by a glancing blow, was lifting her gently to her feet. And just as Hero came to her side, Nuova, dazed and faint, first opened her eyes.
CHAPTER IX
Hero and Nuova once more, and the Great Courting Chase
"My brave little Nuova," said Saggia, joyfully and tenderly. And Beffa hopped happily about, singing softly to her:
"For a new bee
A new way;
From nurse to warrior
All in a day.
What's for to-morrow?
Who can say?
For the newest bee,
The newest way."
The other bees about her were all talking confusedly together. "She saved our stores! Who is she?" they cried. "She is Nuova, the nurse! Nuova, the wax-maker! She is Nuova, the honey-gatherer! She was not even an Amazon! Is she hurt? She is killed! She is wounded! What a brave bee!"
Hero had said nothing yet, but now, as he leaned over her with his face close to hers and her eyes opened slowly, he murmured tenderly, "Little Nuova!"
Nuova looked languidly up at him and around at Saggia and Beffa; then closed her eyes again with a weak but happy smile, and spoke in a low, trembling voice: "She struck me, but I hit her back; I hit her harder."
"You killed her, Nuova," broke in Hero, proudly. "You were wonderful."
Nuova shuddered. "Killed her!" she said sadly. "Dreadful! I am sorry."
"Sorry?" cried Saggia. "You silly! You saved us! You won the victory by killing her!"
"Who was she?" asked Nuova, still sadly.
"Why, the Chief of the Black Bees," said Hero, proudly and tenderly. "Their greatest fighter! And you, little Nuova, alone, killed her."
Nuova looked up at him thoughtfully. "Are you glad?" she asked.
Hero turned with stupefaction to Saggia. She could only lift her hands in amazement. Nuova's mental processes were too much for them, although Beffa, hopping near, nodded his head wisely to himself.
"Glad? I glad? Of course, you absurd warrior!" said Hero. "We are all glad, aren't we?" he asked of the others about.
"Glad? Of course, we are glad! You saved us!" said they all.
"Well," said Nuova, smiling gently, and looking up at Hero, "if you are glad, I am glad." And then she let her head sink down again and closed her eyes.
While Saggia and Beffa and Hero had been caring for Nuova and talking to her, most of the other bees had gradually resumed their normal occupations, the guards moving watchfully about over the platform, the foragers coming and going, and two or three cleaners scrubbing the floor here and there to remove all stains of the battle.
But Uno, Due, and Tre had not yet gone back into the hive to resume their nursing work, but with a few other bees had formed a group standing a little way off from the group about Nuova. They were whispering and looking and pointing toward Nuova. Uno finally left her group and came over and joined the bees about Nuova. She whispered to a few of them, and finally spoke out loud enough to be generally heard.
"Nuova was not an Amazon," she said. "Why should she fight? Is this the way of bees?"
Due and Tre shook their heads vigorously and murmured, "No, no."
And several other bees of their group shook their heads dubiously.
"No," spoke up Due, "this is not the bee custom. A good bee does the thing she is set to do. For a nurse to use a lance! No, that is unheard of."
"No, no, it isn't done, you know," said a drone near by, wagging his head wisely.
"If it hadn't been done, you loafer," cried Saggia angrily, "you would have starved to death before we could have refilled our pantries again after the Black Bees had taken all our food!"
"But it is not the bee way," interjected Tre; then adding boldly and tauntingly to Saggia, "Are you a new bee, too?"
"No," replied Saggia vigorously, "I am an old bee—old enough to have learned a little more than I knew when I was a nurse bee—a loafing nurse bee," she added, looking significantly and hard at Uno, Due, and Tre in turn.
They all started guiltily and began to move slowly toward the entrance, but all the time looking back malevolently at Saggia and Nuova.
"It's not the right bee way," they muttered. "It isn't the usual way."
Several other bees joined them in their muttering and head-shaking.
Just then, however, a new excitement became manifest at the hive entrance. Those drones who had gone back into the hive were issuing now post-haste, while those still outside joined those coming out. To them hastened their attendants, and in a moment all was busy preparation and expectation again.
Beffa, who had moved over to the entrance as the drones began to come out, now came hopping and humming across the platform toward Saggia, Nuova, and Hero. As he came near he was singing:
"She comes; she comes;
Principessa now would wed;
She seeks the sky for marriage-bed.
Let drones aside their languor fling;
Bethink the prize; to be a King."
Hero started up, infected by the excitement and driven by the still potent bee tradition. "She is coming," he murmured, "the Princess."
All the bees were growing more and more excited. The drones began to form in a line. Their attendants worked feverishly at cleaning and preparing them. The other bees cleared a space near the entrance, in front of the drones, whose eagerness was betrayed by their bending forward like runners on the starting-line. Hero started forward to take his place at the nearest end of the line. Nuova tried to stand, Saggia helping her. She tottered as if to fall, but regained her balance. Her face was drawn and tears welled from her eyes. She pushed Saggia to one side and totteringly followed Hero. As he moved to his place, as if in a sort of daze and hypnotized and driven by another will than his, Nuova staggered into place behind him, as attendant, and made feeble attempts to brush his wings. He did not seem to see her nor even to realize her presence, but kept his eyes fixed on the entrance.
The commotion among the bees increased. All watched incessantly the opening of the hive. Suddenly the Princess was seen to be coming slowly and proudly out, still cold and set of face, but beautiful in figure and carriage, truly queenly in all her seeming.
Three or four attendants were busy behind her, brushing her long, slender wings, and removing every speck or stain from her body. The drones all leaned farther forward, their eagerness infecting her. For she became more animated and began spreading out and fluttering her wings. The drones did the same.
Beffa was hopping about with ridiculous activity and awkwardness, humming inaudible words. Suddenly, with a jerk, Hero turned his eyes from the Princess and let them wander about as if seeking something. They rested on Beffa, who in response made motions in his dancing that unmistakably directed Hero to look behind him. He did so and saw Nuova. He stared fixedly at her a moment. Then he leaned toward her and said in a curious, tense, but almost appealing tone, as if he were asking her for advice or help:
"The Great Courting Chase is on! A Queen is to be won! The prize is to be a King!"
Nuova called on all her strength, physical and spiritual.
"Yes, yes," she gasped. "Be ready! Lean forward! They are starting! You will win!" Her voice broke a little. "You can't lose, Hero—wonderful Hero. You will be King—our King—my King. Good-bye!" She stifled a sob. "Good luck! Good-bye!"
She could say no more. She turned her face away from his, sobbing unrestrainedly. Saggia, who had come to her side, caught her and supported her just as the Princess, with wings outspread and eyes fixed outward and upward, ran quickly to the outer edge of the platform, followed a little way behind by the drones in a group. As the Princess reached the platform's edge, she launched herself beautifully into the air and flew swiftly, first straight out and up and then curving gently away to the left. One after another the drones flew after her.
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 passed 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 grass-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.
