“Well, but you need not reassure me, dear Mr. Brook! After this exhibition I shall not interfere with any bees whose acquaintance I may chance to make.”
“Don’t be too positive, my dear, don’t be too positive. You may have to change your mind.”
“Why, I thought our work lay among dead things, all these of your collection. I did not know that we were to hunt among new fields.”
“We are not; but you may, of your own accord, before I have done with you. I hope so. Yes, I foresee that you will often leave me in the midst of a very busy day just because of my friend Apis, alive and buzzing.”
Again that gay laugh, and again Beatrice’s utter mystification.
“Well, well, well. Suppose we read a bit of natural history this morning; or, rather, I will dictate to you and you take down what I have to say. I am writing a little treatise on the fellow Apis,—something quite apart from the collection, as a whole. I mean to publish it for the benefit of just such bright girls and boys as you and your brothers. Yes; I’ll give you a chapter now.”
There was more business in this arrangement, and it was business which Bonny had come for; so she rapidly made ready, and with fingers poised above the keys of her machine waited for the opening sentence.
“‘Foods for the Honey-bee.’ That is the chapter title, and its number is seven. The other half-dozen are already prepared, though in my own handwriting. You will have to copy them sometime, before publication; but—ready?”
“Quite.”
The dictation began. Mr. Brook found it a little difficult to keep his current of thought as clear as usual, for the racket of the typewriter was so foreign to his accustomed quiet; and besides this the frequent liftings of the typewritist’s head, the amused glances of her dark eyes, were so distracting to the lover of young folks that he felt more than half inclined to give up the task for a while and go out upon a search for the new “subjects” they two might find together. However, he did his best, and at the end of a few paragraphs Bonny sprang up from her chair in a state of great excitement.