"My, my, but you are a good guesser," then calling loudly, "Nickel Plate, Drone--here is Billy Bounce." "Ha-ha-ha-ha!" laughed Nickel Plate, striding through the corn. "So Billy Bounce is once more in our power, eh! This time he shall not escape us." "Yaw-haw," yawned a sleepy-looking Bee, coming slowly out of the factory. "Come, wake up, Drone!" cried Bumbus. "Aw-ri," yawned Drone. Here Billy thought he saw an opportunity to run, and giving a sharp twist he broke from Bumbus and started away to get room to jump. But alas for his hopes! the cornstalks suddenly intertwined their tops all about and over him and he found himself again a prisoner. "How impolite!" laughed Bumbus, "how very impolite of you to think of going away without saying good-by!" "To the factory with him," said Nickel Plate in a loud voice. And Billy was pulled and hauled through the cornfield up to the factory which bore the sign "Nickel Plate, Bumbus and Glucose." Inside past the grinding machinery and the great vats of boiling syrup and finally thrust into a little room marked "Office." "Honey Girl!" he cried, catching sight of a young girl seated at the typewriter. "Billy Bounce!" she cried, starting to her feet with a peculiar smile; but the sound of her voice and something about her eyes told him that it was not Honey Girl at all, but Glucose, that stood before him. "I, I beg your pardon," he stammered; "I thought you were the Princess." "Well?" she said questioningly. "But I see now I was mistaken; you are Glucose." "Beware, Billy Bounce, how you anger a woman--hereafter address me as Honey Girl, or take the consequences." So saying, Glucose closed down her desk and hurriedly left the room. "I suppose I've made another enemy--but I don't care; she's proved now that she is not Honey Girl, and this knowledge may prove useful some day." Billy was seated in a chair near the door when suddenly through the keyhole and above the hum of machinery came the sound of voices. "We must get the note from him and prevent his seeing Bogie Man," said the voice of Bumbus. "Yes," said Nickel Plate, "but I fear that so long as he lives he will be in our way." "Throw him in the grinder," suggested Drone. "Or boil him in a syrup vat," added Bumbus. "Too sweet a death," said Nickel Plate. "Of one thing I am certain--he must die." Then their voices died away, showing that they had moved off. "I suppose it's all up with me," said Billy, looking about him for some means of escape. "Oh! how I wish I had Mr. Gas here--I'll try Umberufen: perhaps he can carry the message." You can imagine that it did not take him long to touch wood, and "Zip!" Umberufen stood before him. "Well, so you need me again, do you?" "Yes, sir," said Billy. "The last time you treated me very badly." "I'm very sorry." "Humph! that won't pay for a ruined suit of clothes--everything I had on warped dreadfully. But I suppose I shall have to forgive you--what is it?"