Baby was silent for a little while; then answered thoughtfully. "Why, yes; I had forgotten for the moment. He does have most of it in. But I think not that about killing off the fathers so soon. I'd hate to think of killing my father. He is such good fun sometimes; besides being no end of good to me all the time. He is especially good, I think, because I am not very strong, you know. I guess I shan't ever be able to walk. It's my back or something. Nobody tells me much, but I have heard them talk. And then always father comes and kisses me; and he cries a little."
The bee looked earnestly up into the baby's face. "It seems to me," it said after a moment, "that your father isn't very consistent. If you can never walk, he ought to kill you now, hadn't he? Excuse me, I didn't mean to say anything dreadful, but isn't that what the welfare of your race demands? Only strong well people to live; especially the women, the mothers of the race?"
The baby had recovered from her start at the bee's first words, and kept silent, evidently very thoughtful. Then a slow smile came over her face.
"I guess it's just because my father is a human being and not a bee or any other lower animal that he isn't consistent. Excuse me, but you know we have to call them that from our point of view. We are animals; science is right about that. And we do animal things. But there are so many different animal things. Not all animals are alike, are they? There are big differences between you and a starfish, aren't there; or just a stupid polyp that can only shut up and open like a plant, and eat, and bud off little polyps and jellyfishes. And probably there are big differences between a man and, well, even a bee or an ant. It's the scientific fashion just now to be awfully economical about explanations. What will explain a polyp is tried on the bees; and what explains the successful life of the bees and ants is made to do for human beings. I sometimes think my father's training is too much for his head. I know it contradicts his heart. Do you know, though, he isn't so inconsistent as he seems. For he says to mother that, weak as I am, I may sometime do more for the world than the strongest washerwoman that ever bore ten children. He says," and the baby dropped her voice to a soft whisper, "that I may write a beautiful poem or a great book that teaches faith and love, and do the world a lot of good by it. And mother says that whether I write it or not, I am a poem of beauty and a book that teaches love. So I suppose that is why father is so inconsistent about—about killing me, you know."
Just then a step sounded from the path around the corner.
"Oh, that is the nurse," cried the baby. "She will take me in. And she is so stupid; she won't let me have you in the house."
"Oh, well, anyway I have to be dying so soon now," said the bee, also a little sadly. "I am sorry that I can never see you again. It has all been so interesting. And you have taught me some things, and besides, and more than all, you have been good to me. I—I think you are going to be worth while to your race. I think you are already. You are worth while to all of us; to the whole world. You have given me ten minutes of happy living. Could you do just one little thing more for me? Will you drop me down under the lilac bush, so I can have our flowers, that we both like so well, over me when I am dead?" And one antenna rubbed slowly over one of the bee's eyes, as if this approach to humanness had engendered the impossible, a bee's tear.
The baby twisted her infirm little body about again, stretched out her hands, and gently lifted the bee. "Good-bye, dear Bee," she whispered; "Good-bye, dear Baby," answered the bee. Then the baby carried the bee to her lips, and kissed it.
At that very moment the nurse leaned over the carriage with an indulgent smile on her face, which changed swiftly to horrified dismay as she saw the bee at baby's lips. She cried aloud, while baby with a quick flirt of little hands lightly tossed the bee under the lilac. As the nurse saw the tears streaming down the baby's face she believed her worst fears realized, and catching the child to her bosom, she ran into the house saying over and over:
"Did a bad bee sting my itty bitty sweetie angel?" And as she ran she was amazed to hear among the baby's sobs what sounded like a spoken word repeated again and again. Baby really seemed to be saying, "No, No, No, No!"