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But she lays an egg now and then." "Does she so?" Melissa backed out of the next bell with a jerk. "Suppose now, we sound workers tried to raise a Princess in some clean corner?" "You'd be put to it to find one. The Hive's all Wax-moth and muckings. But well?" "A Princess might help us in the time of the Voice behind the Veil that the Queen talks of.
Our dear sister in grey says so." "Yes. Pillars are un-English and provocative, and a waste of wax that is needed for higher and more practical ends," said the Wax-moth from an empty store-cell. "The safety of the Hive is the highest thing I've ever heard of. You mustn't teach us to refuse work," Melissa began. "You misunderstand me, as usual, love.
Laying at every sob, the Wax-moth backed into a crowd of young bees, and left Melissa bewildered and annoyed. So she lifted up her little voice in the darkness and cried, "Stores!" till a gang of cell-fillers hailed her, and she left her load with them. "I'm afraid I foul-brooded you just now," said a voice over her shoulder.
They lived from day to day on the efforts of the few sound bees, while the Wax-moth fretted and consumed again their already ruined wax. But the sound bees never mentioned these matters. They knew, if they did, the Oddities would hold a meeting and ball them to death. "Now you see what we have done," said the Wax-moths.
Another set of bees clean out the cells after the young bees are born, and make them fit to receive honey, while others guard the entrance of the hive to keep away the destructive wax-moth, which tries to lay its eggs in the comb so that its young ones may feed on the honey.
Behind her came the bee who had been slanged by the Guard. "What is the world like, Melissa?" said a companion. "Cruel! I brought in a full load of first-class stuff, and the Guard told me to go and be foul-brooded!" She sat down in the cool draught across the combs. "If you'd only heard," said the Wax-moth silkily, "the insolence of the Guard's tone when she cursed our sister.
"You hear?" said the Queen. "I know the Hive!" "Quite between ourselves, I taught them that," cried the Wax-moth. "Wait till my principles develop, and you'll see the light from a new quarter." "You speak truth for once," the Queen said suddenly, for she recognized the Wax-moth. "That Light will break into the top of the Hive.
The little grey Wax-moth, pressed close in a crack in the alighting-board, had waited this chance all day. She scuttled in like a ghost, and, knowing the senior bees would turn her out at once, dodged into a brood-frame, where youngsters who had not yet seen the winds blow or the flowers nod discussed life. Here she was safe, for young bees will tolerate any sort of stranger.
They are all so delightfully clever and unusual and interesting," piped the Wax-moth from a crack above them. "Come here, you dear, downy duck, and tell us all about your feelings." "I wish she'd go!" Sacharissa lowered her voice. "She meets these er oddities as they dry out, and cuddles 'em in corners." "I suppose the truth is that we're over-stocked and too well fed to swarm," said Melissa.
"Why do they call each other 'ducky' and 'darling'? Must be the weather." She sniffed suspiciously. "Horrid stuffy smell here. Like stale quilts. Not Wax-moth, I hope, Melissa?" "Not to my knowledge," said Melissa, who, of course, only knew the Wax-moth as a lady with principles, and had never thought to report her presence. She had always imagined Wax-moths to be like blood-red dragon-flies.
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