Its abdomen dilated and twisted, and the tiny sting was thrust out, vainly searching the enemy; but the Messenger, drawing a pin from her jacket, deftly released the two white encumbrances from the insect's thighs--two thin cylinders of finest tissue paper, and flung the angry insect high into the air. It circled, returned to the hive, and she let it in. There was a groan from the manacled man under the trees; she gave him a rapid glance, shook her head in warning, and, leaning forward, deftly lifted a second white-thighed bee from the hive over which it was scrambling in a bewildered sort of way. A third, fourth, and fifth bee arrived in quick succession; she robbed them all of their tissue-paper cylinders. Then for a while no more arrived, and she wondered whether her guess had been correct, that the nine peaches and wet pits meant to John Deal that nine bees were to be expected--eager home-comers, which he had sent to his mistress and which, as she required their services, she released, certain that they would find their old hives on John Deal's farm and carry to him the messages she sent. And they came at last--the sixth, seventh--then after a long interval the eighth--and, finally, the ninth bee whizzed up to the hive and fell, scrambling, its movements embarrassed by the tiny, tissue cylinders. The Messenger waited another hour; there were no more messengers among the bees that arrived. Then she opened every hive door, rose, walked over to the closed hive that stood apart and opened the door of that. A _black_ honeybee crawled out, rose into the air, and started due south; another followed, then three, then a dozen; and then the hive vomited a swarm of _black_ bees which sped southward. Sandy River lay due south; also, the home-hive from which they had been taken and confined as prisoners; also, a certain famous officer lingered at Sandy River--one, General J. E. B. Stuart, very much interested in the beehives belonging to a friend of his, a Mr. Enderly. When she had relieved each messenger-bee of its tissue-paper dispatch, she had taken the precaution to number each tiny cylinder, in order of its arrival, from one to nine. Now she counted them, looked over each message, laid them carefully away between the leaves of a pocket notebook, slipped it into the breast of her jacket, and, rising, walked over to John Deal. "Here is the key to those handcuffs," she said, hanging it around his neck by the bit of cord on which it was dangling. "Somebody at Sandy River will unlock them for you. But it would be better, Mr. Deal, if you remained outside our lines until this war is ended. I don't blame you--I'm sorry for you--and for your mistress." She set toe to stirrup, mounted easily, fastened her cloak around her. "I'm really sorry," she said. "I hope nobody will injure your pretty farm. Good-by."