The robbers, you may fancy, lost no time, bundled the pair on to a stout rhubarb leaf, and dragged them away to their own city as fast as they could go.
Now, scarcely had they got them there when the poison began to wear off—for ants’ poison is not very strong, you see—and pretty soon the Beetle’s wife sat up and pinched her husband. It was not long before he sat up, too; and by and by those two were as clear in their heads and as firm on their legs as any two beetles ever were.
And now there was an unpleasant surprise in store for the robber-ants. When the Beetle’s wife had looked round a bit, she said to her husband:
“Why, it seems comfortable enough here. I don’t think we’ll trouble to go back to Beechtown. I think this will suit us very well.”
“Well, well, we’ll just see what the cooking’s like,” said he, and went straight to the palace where the six queen-ants who ruled over the robbers lived. He just said: “How-d’ye-do?” to the queens in an off-hand way, and then he sat down and helped himself to all the dishes he could find in the larder.
His wife, she did the same, and between them they finished all the food there was.
And so they went on, just as they were used to doing in Beechtown, and it did not take the robbers long to find out the mistake they had made.
The Beetles had never done a day’s work in their lives, and they had no notion of beginning now, just because the robbers expected it.
When they heard how they had been carried off, and why, they thought the whole affair a very good joke, and laughed and laughed till they grew purple in the face, and had to slap each other on the back to keep from choking.
The robbers, you may believe me, were as angry as angry could be. They coaxed and they threatened, but neither the Beetle nor his wife would do a stroke of work. On the contrary, they took such a deal of waiting upon that the robbers were driven well-nigh crazy, and racked their brains for a way to get rid of them.