THE QUEEN'S FRIEND
The noise of battle awoke Maya out of a brief sleep. She jumped
up and straightway wanted to dash out to help defend the city,
but soon realized that she was too weak to be of any help.
A group of struggling combatants came rolling toward her. One of
them was a strong young hornet, an officer, Maya judged by his
badge, who was defending himself unaided against an overwhelming
number of bees. The struggling knot drew nearer. To Maya's
horror it left one dead bee after another in its wake. But
numbers finally told against the giant: whole clusters of bees,
ready to die rather than let go, hung to his arms and legs and
feelers, and their stings were beginning to pierce between the
rings of his breast. Maya saw him drop down exhausted. Without
cry or complaint, fighting to the very end, neither suing for
mercy nor reviling his opponents, he went down to his brigand's
death.
The bees left him and hurried back to the entrance to throw
themselves anew into the conflict.
Maya's heart was beating stormily. She slipped over to the
hornet. He lay curled up in the twilight, still breathing. She
counted about twenty stings, most of them in the fore part of
his body, leaving his golden armor quite whole and sound. Seeing
he was still alive, she hurried away to bring water and
honey--to cheer the dying man, she thought. But he shook his
head and waived her off with his hand.
"I _take_ what I want," he said proudly. "I don't care for
gifts."
"Oh," said Maya, "I only thought you might be thirsty."
The young officer smiled at her, then said, not sadly, but with
a strange earnestness:
"I must die."
The little bee could not reply. For the first time in her life
she seemed to comprehend what it meant to have to die; and death
seemed much closer when someone else was about to die than when
her own life had been imperiled in the spider's web.
"If there were only _some_thing I could do," she said, and burst
into tears.
The dying hornet made no answer. He opened his eyes once again
and heaved a deep breath--for the last time. Half an hour later
he was thrown down into the grass outside the hive along with
his dead comrades.
Little Maya never forgot what she had learned from this brief
farewell. She knew now for all time that her enemies were beings
like herself, loving life as she did and having to die a hard
death without succor. She thought of the flower sprite who had
told her of his rebirth when Nature sent forth her blossoms
again in the spring; and she longed to know whether the other
creatures would, like the sprite, come back to the light of life
after they had died the death of the earth.
"I will believe it is so," she said softly.
A messenger now came and summoned her to the queen's presence.
She found the full court assembled in the royal reception room.
Her legs shook, she scarcely dared to raise her eyes before her
monarch and so many dignitaries. A number of the officers of
the queen's staff were missing, and the gathering was unusually
solemn. Yet a gleam of exaltation seemed to light every brow--as
if the consciousness of triumph and new glory won encircled
everyone like an invisible halo.
The queen arose, made her way unattended through the assemblage,
went up to little Maya and took her in her arms.
This Maya had never expected, not this. The measure of her joy
was full to overflowing; she broke down and wept.
The bees were deeply stirred. There was not one among them who
did not share Maya's happiness, who was not deeply grateful for
the little bee's valiant deed.
Maya now had to tell her whole story. Everybody wanted to know
how she had learned of the hornets' plans and how she had
succeeded in breaking out of the awful prison from which no bee
had ever before escaped.
So Maya told of all the remarkable things she had seen and heard,
of Miss Loveydear with the glittering wings, of the grasshopper,
of Thekla the spider, of Puck, and of how splendidly Bobbie had
come to her rescue. When she told of the sprite and the human
beings, it was so quiet in the hall that you could hear the
generators in the back of the hive kneading the wax.
"Ah," said the queen, "who'd have thought the sprites were so
lovely?" She smiled to herself with a look of melancholy and
longing, as people will who long for beauty.
And all the dignitaries smiled the same smile.
"How did the song of the sprite go?" she asked. "Say it again.
I'd like to learn it by heart."
Maya repeated the song of the sprite.
My soul is that which breathes anew
From all of loveliness and grace;
And as it flows from God's own face,
It flows from his creations, too.
There was silence for a while. The only sound was a restrained
sobbing in the back of the hall--probably someone thinking of a
friend who had been killed.
Maya went on with her story. When she came to the hornets, the
bees' eyes darkened and widened. Each imagined himself in the
situation in which one of their number had been, and quivered,
and drew a deep breath.
"Awful," said the queen, "perfectly awful...."
The dignitaries murmured something to the same effect.
"And so," Maya ended, "I reached home. And I sue for your
Majesty's pardon--a thousand times."
Oh, no one bore the little bee any ill will for having run away
from the hive. You may imagine they did not.
The queen put her arm round Maya's neck.
"You did not forget your home and your people," she said kindly.
"In your heart you were loyal. So we will be loyal to you.
Henceforth you shall stay by my side and help me conduct the
affairs of state. In that way, I think, your experiences, all
the things you have learned, will be made to serve the greatest
good of your people and your country."
Cheers of approval greeted the queen's words.
So ends the story of the adventures of Maya the bee. They say
her work contributed greatly to the good and welfare of the
nation, and she came to be highly respected and loved by her
people. Sometimes on quiet evenings she went for a brief hour's
conversation to Cassandra's peaceful little room, where the
ancient dame lived now on pension honey. There Maya told the
young bees, who listened to her eagerly, stories of the
adventures which we have lived through with her.
[Illustration]
* * * * *
Errors and Inconsistencies
Every now and then, in the suddennest way [spelling unchanged]
the tree would turn sear and die [spelling unchanged]
the silvery chirp that filled the whole moonlit world with
melody. [unneeded close quote at end of paragraph]
"else the human beings would see me and be frightened ..."
[open quote missing]
I am Thomas of the family of millepeds [spelling unchanged]
"I'll set you free. You can fly wherever you want."
[open quote missing]
at work in feverish silence executing their orders [excuting]