"'One, two, three!
The humble-bee!
The rooster crows,
And away she goes!'"
And down from the low railing of the piazza jumped Betty into the soft
heap of new-mown grass that seemed to have been especially placed where
it could tempt her and make her forget--or, at least, "not
remember"--that she was wanted indoors to help amuse the baby for an
hour.
It was a hot summer day, and Betty had been running and jumping and
skipping and prancing all the morning, so she was now rather tired; and
after she had jumped from the piazza-rail into the heap of grass she
did not hop up nimbly at once, but lay quite still, burying her face in
the sweet-smelling hay and fragrant clover, feeling very comfortable
and contented.
"Betty! Betty!"
"Oh dear!" thought the little maid, diving still deeper into the light
grass, "there's Olga calling me to take care of Roger while she gets
his bread and milk ready. I don't see why she can't wait a minute till
I rest. It's too hot now. Baby can do without his dinner for a
minute, I should think,--just a minute or so. He won't mind. He 's
glad to wait if only you give him Mamma's chain and don't take away her
watch. Ye-es, Olga,--I 'll come--by and by."
A big velvety humble-bee came, boom! against Betty's head, and got
tangled in her hair. He shook himself free and went reeling on his way
in quite a drunken fashion, thinking probably that was a very
disagreeable variety of dandelion he had stumbled across,--quite too
large and fluffy for comfort, though it was such a pretty yellow.
Betty lazily raised her head and peered after him. "I wonder where
you're going," she said, half aloud.
The humble-bee veered about and came bouncing back in her direction
again, and when he reached the little grass-heap in which she lay,
stopped so suddenly that he went careering over in the most ridiculous
fashion possible, and Betty laughed aloud. But to her amazement the
humble-bee righted himself in no time at all, and then remarked in
quite a dignified manner and with some asperity,--
"If I were a little girl with gilt hair and were n't doing what I
ought, and if I had wondered where a body was going and the body had
come back expressly to tell me, I think I 'd have the politeness not to
laugh if the body happened to lose his balance and fall,--especially
when the body was going to get up in less time than it would take me to
wink,--I being only a little girl, and he being a most respected member
of the Busy-bee Society. However, I suppose one must make allowances
for the way in which children are brought up nowadays. When I was a
little--"
"Now, _please_ don't say, 'When I was a little girl,'--for you never
were a little girl, you know," interrupted Betty, not intending to be
saucy, but feeling rather provoked that a mere humble-bee should
undertake to rebuke her. "Mamma always says, 'When I was a little
girl,' and so does Aunt Louie, and so does everybody; and I 'm tired of
hearing about it, so there!"
The humble-bee gave his gorgeous waistcoat a pull which settled it more
smoothly over his stout person, and remarked shortly,--
"In the first place, I was n't going to say, 'When I was a little
girl.' I was going to say, 'When I was a little _leaner_,' but you
snapped me up so. However, it's true, isn't it? Everybody was a
little girl once, were n't she?--was n't they?--hem!--confusing weather
for talking, very! And what is true one ought to be glad to hear, eh?"
"But it is n't true that everybody was once a little girl; some were
little boys. There!"
"Do you know," whispered the humble-bee, in a very impressive
undertone, as if it were a secret that he did not wish any one else to
hear, "that you are a very re-mark-a-ble young person to have been able
to remind me, at a moment's notice, that some were little boys?
Why-ee!"
Betty was a trifle uncomfortable. She had a vague idea the humble-bee
was making sport of her. The next moment she was sure of it; for he
burst into a deep laugh, and shook so from side to side that she
thought he would surely topple off the wisp of hay on which he was
sitting.
"I think you 're real mean," said Betty, as he slowly recovered
himself; "I don't like folks to laugh at me, now!"
"I 'm not laughing at you _now_," explained the humble-bee, gravely; "I
was laughing at you _then_. Do you object to that?"
Betty disdained to reply, and began to pull a dry clover-blossom to
pieces.
"Tut, tut, child! Don't be so touchy! A body can laugh, can't he, and
no harm done? You 'd better be good-tempered and jolly, and then I 'll
tell you where I 'm going,--which, I believe, was what you wished to
know in the first place, was n't it?"
Betty nodded her head, but did not speak.
"Oho!" said the humble-bee, rising and preparing to take his departure.
And now Betty discovered, on seeing him more closely, that he was not a
humble-bee at all, but just a very corpulent old gentleman dressed in
quite an antique fashion, with black knee-breeches, black silk
stockings, black patent-leather pumps with large buckles, a most
elaborate black velvet waistcoat with yellow and orange stripes across,
and a coat of black velvet to correspond with the breeches; while in
his hand he carried a very elegant three-cornered hat, which, out of
respect to her, he had removed from his head at the first moment of
their meeting. "So we are sulky?" he went on. "Dear, dear! That is a
very disagreeable condition to allow one's self to relapse into. H'm,
h'm! very unpleasant, very! Under the circumstances I think I 'd
better be going; for if you 'll believe me, I 'm pressed for time, and
have none to waste, and only came back to converse with you because you
addressed a civil question to me, which, being a gentleman, I was bound
to answer. Good--"
He would have said "by;" but Betty sprang to her feet and cried:
"Please don't leave me. I 'll be good and pleasant, only please don't
go. _Please_ tell me where you 're going, and if--if you would be so
good, I 'd like ever and ever so much to go along. Don't--do--may I?"
The little gentleman looked her over from head to foot, and then
replied in a hesitating sort of way: "You may not be aware of it, but
you are extremely incautious. What would you do if I were to whisk you
off and never bring you back, eh?"
"You don't look like a kidnapper, sir," said Betty, respectfully.
"A what?" inquired the little gentleman.
"A kidnapper," repeated Betty.
"What's that?" questioned her companion.
"Oh, a person who steals little children. Don't you know?"
"But why _kidnapper_?" insisted the little old man.
"I suppose because he naps kids. My uncle Will calls Roger and me
'kids.' It is n't very nice of him, is it?" she asked, glad to air her
grievance.
"Child-stealer would be more to the point, I think, or
infant-abductor," remarked the old gentleman, who saw, perhaps, how
anxious Betty was for sympathy, and was determined not to give her
another opportunity of considering herself injured.
He seemed to be very busy considering the subject for a second or so,
and then he said suddenly: "But if you want to go, why, come along, for
I must be off. But don't make a practice of it, mind, when you get
back."
"You have n't told me where yet," suggested Betty.
"True; so I have n't," said the old gentleman, setting his
three-cornered hat firmly on his head and settling the fine laces at
his wrists. "It's to By-and-by. And now, if you 're ready, off we go!"
He took Betty's hand, and she suddenly found herself moving through the
air in a most remarkable manner,--not touching the ground with her
feet, but seeming to skim along quite easily and with no effort at all.
"If you please, Mr.--" She paused because she suddenly remembered that
she did not know the name of the gentleman who was conducting her on so
delightful a journey.
"Bombus," said he, cheerfully,--"B. Bombus, Esq., of Clovertop Manse,
Honeywell."
"But you 're not a minister, are you?" inquired Betty.
"No; why?" returned the gentleman, quickly.
"Because you said 'Manse.' A manse is a minister's house, is n't it?"
asked Betty.
"No, not always," Bombus replied. "But I call my place Clovertop Manse
because it belongs to me and not to my wife, do you see? I call it
Manse because it _is_ a man's. It is perfectly plain. If it was a
woman's, I 'd say so."
"Well, I don't think you 're much of a _humble_-bee--" began Betty, and
then caught herself up short and stopped.
Mr. Bombus gave her a severe look from under his three-cornered hat,
but did not reply at once, and they advanced on their way for some
little time in silence. Then the gentleman said:
"I 've been thinking of what you said about my not being a humble-bee.
Of course I am not a humble-bee, but you seemed to lay considerable
stress on the first part of the word, as if you had a special meaning.
Explain!"
Poor Betty blushed very red with shame and confusion; but the gentleman
had a commanding way with him and she dared not disobey.
"I only meant, sir," she stammered,--"I only meant--I--did n't think
you were very humble, because you seemed very proud about the place
being yours. I thought you were 'stuck up,' as my brother says."
"Stuck up? Where?" queried Mr. Bombus, anxiously. "Pray don't make
such unpleasant insinuations. They quite set my heart to throbbing.
I knew--I mean I saw a humble-bee once," he remarked impressively, "and
would you believe it, a little boy caught him and impaled him on a pin.
It was horrible. He died in the most dreadful agony,--the bee, not the
boy,--and then the boy secured him to the wall; made him fast there.
So he was stuck up. You surely can't mean--"
"Oh, no, indeed! I meant only proud," replied Betty, contritely; for
Mr. Bombus's face had really grown pale with horror at the remembrance
of the bee's awful fate, and she was very sorry she had occasioned him
such discomfort.
"Then why did n't you say only 'proud'?" asked her companion, sharply.
"You said 'proud,' and then added 'stuck up.'"
Betty thought it was about time to change the subject, so she observed
quietly that By-and-by seemed a long way off.
"Of course it is a long way off," replied her companion. "Don't you
wish it to be a long way off?"
Betty hesitated. "Well, I don't think I ever wished much about it.
Can you tell me how many miles it is from some place I know about? You
see, Mr. Bombus, I am pretty sure it is n't in the geography. At
least, I don't remember that I ever saw it on the map. Could n't you
tell me where it is?"
Mr. Bombus considered a moment, And then asked, "Do you know where Now
is?"