CHAPTER XIX
HIVING THE BEES
Bert Bobbsey did not understand what Sam Porter’s excitement was all about. But he could tell, by the way Sam acted and by the way he called, that it was something serious. So he dropped his fish and his pole and made ready to follow his new chum.
“Come on! Come on!” called Sam, peering out from his shelter in the bushes, as he saw that Bert was not hurrying as much as he might. “Run for it, if you don’t want to get stung!”
“Stung!” exclaimed Bert.
“Yep,” answered the country lad. “Don’t you see? That’s a bunch of bees with the queen bee in the middle, and they’re looking for a place to settle so they can start a new home. I only hope they don’t ’light on this bush,” he added, as Bert crawled in the shelter with him. “If they do—oh, boy! Look out for yourself! The best thing to do will be to leg it for the creek and jump in. Just let your nose stick out—that’s all! I hope they don’t decide to settle here where we are!”
But the swarm of humming, busy little insects, following their queen, suddenly turned and made for a tree not far away. There the bees clustered in a bunch on one of the low branches.
“That’s good!” cried Sam. “Mr. Watson can easily get them from there. Come on, we’ll go tell him!”
The boys picked up their fish and their poles, and soon they were at Cloverbank.
“Oh, what a fine lot of fish!” exclaimed Mrs. Bobbsey as she saw the two boys with their strings.