ompanied by her body-guard.

Maya nearly cried out loud.

"My country!" she sobbed, "my bees, my dear, dear bees!" She
pressed her hands to her mouth to keep herself from screaming.
She was in the depths of despair. "Oh, would that I had died
before I heard this. No one will warn my people. They will be
attacked in their sleep and massacred. O God, perform a miracle,
help me, help me and my people. Our need is great!"

In the hall the glow-worms were put out and devoured. Gradually
the fortress was wrapped in a hush. Maya seemed to have been
forgotten. A faint twilight crept into her cell, and she
thought she caught the strumming of the crickets' night song
outside.-- Was anything more horrible than this dungeon with
its carcasses strewn on the ground!

[Illustration]

[Illustration]

CHAPTER XIV

THE SENTINEL

Soon, however, the little bee's despair yielded to a definite
resolve. It was as though she once more called to mind that she
was a bee.

"Here I am weeping and wailing," she thought, "as if I had no
brains and as if I were a weakling. Oh, I'm not much of an honor
to my people and my queen. They are in danger. I am doomed
anyhow. So since death is certain one way or another, I may as
well be proud and brave and do everything I can to try to save
them."

It was as though Maya had completely forgotten the long time
that had passed since she left her home. More strongly than ever
she felt herself one of her people; and the great responsibility
that suddenly devolved upon her, through the knowledge of the
hornets' plot, filled her with fine courage and determination.

"If my people are to be vanquished and killed, I want to be
killed, too. But first I must do everything in my power to save
them."

"Long live my queen!" she cried.

"Quiet in there!" clanged harshly from the outside.

Ugh, what an awful voice!-- The watchman making his rounds.-- Then
it was already late in the night.

As soon as the watchman's footsteps had died away, Maya began to
widen the chink through which she had peeped into the hall. It
was easy to bite away the brittle stuff of the partition, though
it took some time before the opening was large enough to admit
her body. At length, in the full knowledge that discovery would
cost her her life, she squeezed through into the hall. From
remote depths of the fortress echoed the sound of loud snoring.

The hall lay in a subdued blue light that found its way in