"A swarm, without much question, though it dawned an unlikely day for an old queen to leave the hive. Still, the weather came over splendid enough by noon, and they knew it was going to. Where are your butts? You see, young maiden queens go further afield than old ones. The latter take but a short flight for choice." "There they are," said Grimbal, pointing to a row of thatched hives not far off. "So that should be an old queen, by your showing. Is she there?" "I fancy so by the look of them. If the queen doesn't join, the bees break up, of course, and go back to the butt. But I've brought a couple of queens with me." "I've seen a good few drones about the board lately." "Sure sign of swarming at this season. Inside, if you could look, you'd find plenty of queen cells, and some capped over. You'd come across a murder or two as well. The old queens make short work of the young ones sometimes." "Woman-like." Hicks admitted the criticism was just. Then, being now upon his own ground, he continued to talk, and talk well, until he won a surly compliment from his employer. "You're a bee-master, in truth! Nobody'll deny you that." Clement laughed rather bitterly. "Yes, a king of bees. Not a great kingdom for man to rule." The other studied his dark, unhappy face. Trouble had quickened Grimbal's own perceptions, and made him a more accurate judge of sorrow when he saw it than of yore. "You've tried to do greater things and failed, perhaps," he said. "Why, perhaps I have. A man's a hive himself, I've thought sometimes--a hive of swarming, seething thoughts and experiences and passions, that come and go as easily as any bees, and store the heart and brain." "Not with honey, I'll swear." "No--gall mostly." "And every hive's got a queen bee too, for that matter," said Grimbal, rather pleased at his wit responsible for the image. "Yes; and the queens take each other's places quick enough, for we're fickle brutes." "A strange swarm we hive in our hearts, God knows." "And it eats out our hearts for our pains." "You've found out that, have you?" asked John curiously. "Long ago." "Everybody does, sooner or later." There was a pause. Overhead the multitude dwindled while the great glimmering cluster on the tree correspondingly increased, and the fierce humming of the bees was like the sound of a fire. Clement feared nothing, but he had seen few face a hiving without some distrust. The man beside him, however, stood with his hands in his pockets, indifferent and quite unprotected. "You will be wiser to stand farther away, Mr. Grimbal. You're unlikely to come off scot-free if you keep so close." "What do I care? I've been stung by worse than insects." "And I also," answered Clement, with such evident passion that the other grew a little interested. He had evidently pricked a sore point in this moody creature. "Was it a woman stung you?" "No, no; don't heed me."