"How doth the little busy bee--"
and he knew that bees made honey; but that was all he did know about
their habits, save that they lived in hives; and he stood and stared at
the cluster hanging outside.
"Why, they can't get in," he said to himself. "Hole's stopped up."
He stood still for a few minutes, and then, as he looked round, he
caught sight of some bean-sticks--tall thin pieces of oak sapling, and
drawing one of these out of the ground he rubbed the mould off the
pointed end, and, as soon as it was clean, took hold of it, and returned
to the hive, where he watched the clustering bees for a few minutes, and
then, reaching over, he inserted the thin end of the long stick just by
the opening to the hive, thrust it forward, and gave it a good rake to
right and left.
There was a tremendous buzz and a rush, and the next moment Dexter,
stick in hand, was running down the path toward the river, pursued by
quite a cloud of angry bees.
Dexter ran fast, of course, and as it happened, right down one of the
most shady paths, beneath the densely growing apple-trees, where the
bees could not fly, so that by the time he reached the river-side he was
clear of his pursuers, but tingling from a sting on the wrist, and from
two more on the neck, one being among the hair at the back, and the
other right down in his collar.
"Well, that's nice," he said, as he rubbed himself, and began mentally
to try and do a sum in the Rule of Three--if three stings make so much
pain, how much pain would be caused by the stings of a whole hiveful of
bees?
"Bother the nasty vicious little things!" he cried, as he had another
rub, and he threw the bean-stick angrily away.
"Don't hurt so much now," he said, after a few minutes' stamping about.
Then his face broke up into a merry smile. "How they did make me run!"
Just then there was a shout--a yell, and a loud call for help.
Dexter forgot his own pain, and, alarmed by the cries, ran as hard as he
could back again towards the spot from whence the sounds came, and to
his horror found that Old Dan'l was running here and there, waving his
arms, while Peter had come to his help, and was whisking his broom about
in all directions.
For a few moments Dexter could not comprehend what was wrong, then, like
a flash, he understood that the bees had attacked the old gardener, and
that it was due to his having irritated them with the stick.
Dexter knew how a wasp's nest had been taken in the fields by the boys
one day, and without a moment's hesitation he ran to the nearest shrub,
tore off a good-sized bough, and joined in the task of beating down the
bees.
It is pretty sport to fight either bees or wasps in this way, but it
requires a great deal of courage, especially as the insects are sure to
get the best of it, as they did in this case, putting their enemies to
flight, their place of refuge being the tool-house, into whose dark
recesses the bees did not attempt to come.
"Much stung, Dan'l!" said Peter.
"Much stung, indeed! I should think I am. Offle!"
"You got it much, youngster?" said Peter.
"I've got three stings," replied Dexter, who had escaped without further
harm.
"And I've got five, I think," said Peter. "What was you doing to 'em,
Dan'l!"
"Doin' to 'em!" growled Dan'l, who was stamping about and rubbing
himself, and looking exceedingly like the bear in the old fable. "I
wasn't doin' nothin' to 'em. One o' the hives have been threatenin' to
swarm again, and I was just goin' by, when they come at me like a swarm
o' savidges, just as if some one had been teasing them." Dexter was
rubbing the back of his neck, and feeling horribly guilty, as he asked
himself whether he had not better own to having disturbed the hive; but
there was something so unpleasantly repellent about the old gardener,
and he was looking so suspiciously from one to the other, that the boy
felt as if he could not speak to him.
If it had been Peter, who, with all his roughness, seemed to be tolerant
of his presence, he would have spoken out at once; but he could not to
Dan'l, and he remained silent.
"They stings pretty sharp," said Peter, laughing. "Blue-bag's best
thing. I shall go up and get Maria to touch mine up. Coming?"
"Nay, I'm not coming," growled Dan'l. "I can bear a sting or two of a
bee without getting myself painted up with blue-bags. Dock leaves is
good enough for me."
"And there aren't a dock left in the garden," said Peter. "You found
fault with me for not pulling the last up."
So Peter went up to the house to be blue-bagged, Dan'l remained like a
bear in his den, growling to himself, and Dexter, whose stings still
throbbed, went off across the lawn to walk off the pain, till it was
time to go to Sir James's.
"Who'd have thought that the little things could hurt so much!"
Then the pain began to diminish till it was only a tingle, and the spots
where the stings went in were round and hard, and now it was that
Dexter's conscience began to prick him as sharply as the bees' stings,
and he walked about the garden trying to make up his mind as to whether
he should go and confess to Dan'l that he stirred the bees up with a
long stick.
But as soon as he felt that he would do this, something struck him that
Dan'l would be sure to think he had done it all out of mischief, and he
knew that he could not tell him.
"Nobody will know," he said to himself; "and I won't tell. I didn't
mean to do any harm."
"Dexter! Dexter!"
He looked in the direction from whence the sounds came, and could see
Helen waving her handkerchief, as a signal for him to come in.
"Time to go," he said to himself as he set off to her. "Nobody will
know, so I shan't tell him."
And then he turned cold.
Only a few moments before he had left Dan'l growling in his den, and now
here he was down the garden, stooping and picking up something.
For a few moments Dexter could not see what the something was, for the
trees between them hindered the view, but directly after he made out
that Dan'l had picked up a long stick, which had been thrown among the
little apple-trees, and was carefully examining it.
The colour came into Dexter's cheeks as he wondered whether Dan'l would
know where that stick came from.
The colour would have been deeper still had he known that Dan'l had a
splendid memory, and knew exactly where every stick or plant should be.
In fact, Dan'l recognised that stick as having been taken from the end
of the scarlet-runner row.
"A young sperrit o' mischief! that's what he is," muttered the old man,
giving a writhe as he felt the stinging of the bees. "Now what's he
been up to with that there stick? making a fishing-rod of it, I s'pose,
and tearing my rows o' beans to pieces. I tell him what it is--"
Dan'l stopped short, and stared at the end of the stick--the thin end,
where there was something peculiar, betraying what had been done with
it.
It was a sight which made him tighten his lips up into a thin red line,
and screw up his eyes till they could be hardly seen, for upon the end
of that stick were the mortal remains of two crushed bees.