The Keeper of the Bees
THERE came a stretch of days during which the awakening of each morning was a small miracle all by itself to Jamie. To awake rested, refreshed, to awake with hope in his heart, to look down the irregular stretch of the garden and on the ceaseless lapping of the sea and to say to himself, “To-day I will transplant the lilies. I will trim the poinsettias. I will plant some tomatoes.” To be able to tell himself that he would do something constructive with the knowledge in his heart that he would have the strength to do it and the uplift in his spirit that would give him joy in the doing; because from that period on, each morning awakening was in a way a new miracle. It seemed to him that he could feel the purity, the cleanliness of the blood that was flowing through his veins. He knew that the heart in his breast was calming down, was throbbing with a regularity and a surety that he had not known in a long time; it had ceased to flutter, even at a stiff climb. He knew that strength was gradually forging into his limbs and his hands, that his brain was clearing. He was no longer a pusillanimous creature creeping around wondering about how long he could live. He was an upright man with a hopeful outlook, with a definite purpose of beating the game if it lay in the power of himself and Margaret Cameron and California to win. It was a big game that he was playing.
It is in the blood of humanity to fight for life. Anything but death. Jamie sat on the side of the bed and meditated. upon how strange it was that human beings should complain of pain, of poverty, of disappointment, of defeat of every kind, and yet the instant death, death that the little Scout said was beautiful, became imminent, humanity armed against it and fought to the last ditch, as he was fighting. He admitted that he might be mistaken, that he might be over hopeful, that Margaret Cameron’s vision might even be coloured by her hopes for him. But one thing he could not be mistaken about. His body was not so lean; his hands were surer; he could walk without his legs bowing under him; and he had quit morbid introspection. He had reached the place where several times alone in the evening he had laid aside the bee books and picked up the greatest of all books and read chapter after chapter, and he realized that never once had he done this without closing the sacred volume with the feeling that in some way he had gained something; there had been possibly only one word, some thought, something that remained with him and helped him to fashion the coming day.
Then Jamie arose, picked up a pencil and drew a circle on the calendar around the previous day, and from the circle he ran a line to the margin and lettered it “M.C.” That meant Margaret Cameron and the date was the day on which she had found him better. Another month he would continue the same régime with even more exactitude and then she would look again, and he registered a vow as he put on his clothing that she should find him better.
As he arranged the dressings on his wounded side, he looked closely at the pad he had removed, and then suddenly Jamie found himself doing what the little person would have called pirouetting. There was barely a faint pinkish seeping. Hehad felt for days past that the stains were not so large and not so angry. That morning there was ocular evidence that could not be done away with. Too plain forwords to dispute it, lay the proof before him that Margaret had been right. Before Jamie realized fully what he was doing, he found that he was dancing around the bedroom with much less reserve and more enthusiasm than the little Scout had danced down the garden walk. Hewas actually laughing to himself as he drew on his clothing, and when he heard Margaret Cameron in the kitchen with his breakfast, he opened the door and called to her, “Lady of Scotland!”
His voice rang out with a tone Margaret Cameron had not previously noticed.
“Step this way,” said Jamie. “Yesterday you had Exhibit Number One. This morning cast your optics on Exhibit Number Two !” And Jamie picked up the pad from a basket that wasbeing filled for the incinerator and pulled it apart that Margaret Cameron might see.
“A month ago,” said Jamie, “those pads were pretty thoroughly soaked with brilliant colour. This one I just removed is barely damp and the faintest pink. Oh, Margaret, woman! I am going to make it! I am going to be a whole man again!”
“Sure you are!” said Margaret Cameron, and for the sake of a good cause she was willing to throw even more assurance into her tones than there was in her heart. But the boy was better. Any one could see that. There was noticeably more flesh on his bones. The skin over his face did not look so much like parchment. There was a faint colour creeping into his cheeks and his lips, and it might well be that half the battle lay in having him merely believe that he was better. At any rate, it was infinitely preferable to the doleful attitude of considering his days as numbered and spending most of his time deciding on the highest number.
That month both of them worked and held frequent consultations. They repeatedly revised the diet lists, making the food that they felt was right and beneficial recur most frequently, omitting things that were not helpful and sticking religiously to the tomato juice in the morning, the orange juice in the afternoon, and the best milk that could be found in as large quantities as Jamie could take it. That month was one in which they neatly walked. Sometimes they spoke softly. For Jamie it was a month filled to the brim with joyful thanksgiving. Every day he could positively see and feel the progress that he made. Each day he could accomplish slightly more in the garden. Each day he knew more about the bees.
That month he developed the habit every night of picking up the Bible the last thing before he went to bed and reading a few verses, and from thinking a prayer and from thinking thanksgiving, he advanced to the place where he boldly, in the silence and serenity of the little room, got down on his knees and prayed the prayer of thanksgiving. Then he followed it by the prayer of asking. He found himself asking God to take care of all the world, to help everyone who needed help; to put the spirit and courage into every heart to fare forth and to attempt the Great Adventure on its own behalf. When it came to cases, he asked for strength to keep the bees and the garden safely; he asked for help, physically and morally, to be a man of whom his father and mother could justly have been proud. Then he asked God to take care of Margaret Cameron; to ease whatever trouble it might be that seemed to be resting inher heart. Then, from the first time he actually had gone on his knees, and lifted his face to the throne, Jamie had included the little Scout. He told God about what a fine spirit he thought the little fellow had and what a bright mentality, how unselfish the child was and how overly developed the sense of fairness; and he asked that the little fellow be taken care of and guided right and given the opportunity to grow into such a citizen as would be a benefit to the nation.
When he reached the Bee Master, Jamie laid hold on the foot of the throne, and he begged the Almighty that if it were at all consistent with the divine plan of things, to spare the Bee Master, to let him come back to his home and the homely, simple things that comprise the spirit of home, to let him have a few more years in his garden with a brilliancy of colour to comfort his waking days and the song of the sea to scothe his pillow. Last of all he reached the Storm Girl and for her Jamie begged safety, mercy, and the power to give her help. Then he arose, in some way fortified,a trifle bigger, slightly prouder, more capable, more of a man than he had been the day before. He had asked for help and he knew that he was receiving help, and he knew that never again would he be ashamed to face any man, or any body of men, and tell them that he had asked for help and that help had been forthcoming, and that the same experience lay in the reach of every man if he would only take the Lord at His word; if he would only do what all men are so earnestly urged to do—believe.
That was a good month for Jamie. Before the close of it the pads covering his side were coming off dry and clean. He was using them now more as a protection to tender, freshly formed flesh covered with skin so thin it seemed as if a breath would rend it, than because of any seepage. When Jamie went into the sea, he stroked with his right arm only. When he lifted a heavy load, he protected his left side. Ifa high reach was to be made, he made it with his right hand. But never for an instant during the day or in a waking hour in the night did there cease in his soul a little low, murmuring song of thanksgiving. Over and over, all day, he sang it, but there were very few words, It ran, “Life! Life! A useful life! I thank thee, Lord, for a chance at Life, for a chance at beautiful work, for a chance at beautiful friends. I thank thee, Lord, for Life!”
Each time he went to the hospital he carried flowers from the garden and sometimes fruits and loving messages from the little Scout and quaint gifts ranging all the way from a battered jackknife and a stick to whittle to a well-worn deck of cards with which to play solitaire.
One day, as he went into the hospital, he met Margaret Cameron coming out; so he knew that she had been to visit the Bee Master and had not told him that she was going, and he knew by the whiteness of her face and the pain in her eyes that the Bee Master was not improving, that he was not gathering strength, that the chances might be slowly lessening, day by day, of his ever returning to the friendly house so beautifully encircled by a garden of love.
Jamie went up to the Bee Master’s room and read the truth for himself. The Master was scarcely able to speak. There was a white look across the noble brow that seemed to Jamie to indicate that the fine old soul before him was very near to being ready for transfiguration. When he arose to go he had extreme difficulty in keeping his voice even and his eyes clear.
“I want to tell you,” he said, “how much I thank you for the chance you’ve given me to get back my manhood and to learn work that each day I am growing to love more and more. I want to thank you for giving me in your home the opportunity to get back to a confidential understanding with God, to find out the peace and sustaining power that He is willing to give to every man who can muster the manhood to receive the gift.”
Jamie leaned over and kissed the Bee Master on the forehead once.
“That’s for the little Scout who sent you a truck load of love.”
Then he kissed him again and added whimsically: “And that’s for Jamie. He’s brought you the same amount.”
The Bee Master held Jamie’s hands very tight for a minute and then, in barely a whisper, he said: “Thank God that you’ve learned to lay hold on the promise of the Master. I am thankful that you have learned to accept His gifts, and I believe, too, that you have learned enough of life and enough of love in my house and in my garden that you will be ready to accept any gift which love and confidence may bring to you.”
Jamie went out wondering what that meant. The next day he learned. The call came early from the hospital. The Bee Master had found that beautiful crossing that the little Scout had so understandingly described. With his hands folded on his breast, in his sleep, he had answered the call so lightly given that the nurse found him as she had left him. His instructions had been that his remains were to be shipped immediately to an address he gave in the East. He wanted to be laid for his final sleep beside the two Marys, the one he had loved and married, and the one to whom their love had given life. All three of them were gone now, and Jamie put it into the next prayer he uttered that that hour might find them hand in hand wandering amid greater beauties than the little garden had ever contained, even among the splendours of the fields of Paradise.
In telling him, Doctor Grayson had asked that he come to the hospital for a conference, and when Jamie reached the hospital an hour later he was dumbfounded to have placed in his hands, ready for execution, the last will and testament of the Bee Master. It set forth that, on account of love and affection, the property therein described was given, devised and bequeathed to the present occupant and caretaker, James Lewis MacFarlane, and to his first assistant, Jean Meredith. Said property was to be equally divided between the two beneficiaries, the acre on the right hand facing the street with the beehives contained thereon to be the property of Jean Meredith. The acre on the left hand facing the street to be the property of James Lewis MacFarlane with all the improvements thereon. There followed the further provision that the two beneficiaries were to draw cuts for the possession of the residence, the one drawing the short cut to become the owner of the house, which was to be removed to the property of the winner, the expense of moving to be paid from funds in the bank belonging to the estate which were also devised, share and share alike, to the beneficiaries of the will. From these same funds there was to be drawn sufficient money to duplicate the house or build one having the same number of rooms, general appearance, and conveniences on the property of the loser. The remainder of the money in the bank, after these transactions were made, was to be equally divided between the parties benefiting by the will.
When this amazing document was thoroughly explained to Jamie he sat looking rather bleakly at Doctor Grayson. He was not in the least ashamed of the big tears that were running down his cheeks.
“But I can’t do that,” he protested. “I haven’t earned that place. There must be someone who is nearer to the Bee Master than I.”
“Well,” said Doctor Grayson, “in case there is, don’t worry. You’ll hear from them. If there are people living who feel that they have a better right to that property than you, they will put in an appearance. In the meantime, we will go on the supposition that the Bee Master knew his own mind and his own business and that, in giving you the place, he wanted it to go into the hands of a man who would appreciate it, who would love it, who, in all probability, would keep it as the Master left it.”
Jamie sat staring, thinking deeply, and then he knew what the Bee Master had meant when he had said the night before that he should learn to accept any gift of love as well as the gifts of the Heavenly Father. The Bee Master had known that his time was imminent, that his crossing was near, and he had meant in a way to prepare Jamie for the fact that the little house and the bees and the bright garden were going to be, in part at least, a gift of love to him. Suddenly Jamie sat up and repeated a name slowly.“Jean Meredith.”
Then he realized that he was still in the dark. He didn’t know any more than he had before. Jean might be a boy or might be a girl. He looked at Doctor Grayson.
“Does Jean Meredith know about this?” he asked.
“The Bee Master gave me the telephone number and I called the parents. Yes, the Bee Master’s little friend knows.”
“And will the parents accept that gift on behalf of the child?” asked Jamie.
“Most assuredly,” said the Doctor. “Why not? There probably was no one on earth to whom the Bee Master was attached as to the little person he always referred to as his side partner. There is no reason, since he had no child of his own, as to why he should not leave his property to any one he chose. There was every reason as to why he should leave it to a man who had cared for it in his absence, in whom he had faith, and to a child who has perhaps relieved the tedium of more dark hours in the Master’s life than all the rest of the world put together. It seems to me eminently right and fitting that the Bee Master should do precisely what he has done. I forgot to call your attention to a last provision and an afterthought in the form of a codicil as to the furnishings of the house. Everything in the living room and the books go to the little Scout; the remainder of the furnishings are yours.”
Jamie arose. He offered his hand to Doctor Grayson.“I am going out in the air where I can walk and think,” he said. “But I’ll tell you right now, there’s no use to probate that document. It was made by a sick man——”
“It was made by a man fighting for life after an operation,” said the Doctor. “His mentality was as clear as yours or mine when I said good-night to him at ten o’clock last night. There isn’t a court in the land that can touch that will.”
“It’s simply impossible,” said Jamie. “I will not even consider it.”
“Oh, yes, you will,” said Doctor Grayson, “because if you don’t probate that will, I’ll do it for you and you can rest very largely assured that Mr. Meredith will see that his child’s interests in it are taken care of. You will take it whether you want it or not. If you don’t want to keep it, once it comes to your hands, if you’d rather see someone the Bee Master would have hated go into the little house and commercialize the garden, that’s up to you, so far as your half of it is concerned. You can make up your mind when the time comes. Since you are so in doubt about it, I think I had better turn the document over to Mr. Meredith, but the chances are he will want you to coöperate with him.”
“Well, I will not!” said Jamie, stubbornly. “I will not accept a thing I haven’t earned!”
“Oh, damn the Scots!” said Doctor Grayson, impatiently. “I’m glad I’m English and willi to take all I can get, and you’re the first Scotsman I ever saw who wasn’t willing to take all he could get, no matter if it did come as a gift. And as for not taking things you haven’t earned, you’d better stop breathing, you’d better stop soaking in sunshine, you’d better stop eating the fruits of the earth. They are all gifts that you have accepted, and were mighty glad to accept!”
“A gift from God is one thing,” said Jamie. “A gift from a man I have known such a short time is something different.”
“There is no difference in the gifts,” said the Doctor. “They are both gifts, and I reiterate, you are a fool if you don’t accept them with a thankful heart!”
Jamie shook his head and, turning from the office, went down to the street and then back to the house and to the blue garden that the love of flowers and the love of beauty in the heart of a sentimentalist had built around a home. He stepped softly as he entered the door. He carried his hat in his hand and looked around for some place not too intimately connected with the Bee Master where he might lay it.
What was it that amazing document had said? One acre of valuable soil crowded to the limit with wonderful planting, a row of white hives running the length of it, something in the bank, plenty of comfortable clothing that fitted him, a bed whereon to sleep, and they were his if he cared to stretch forth his hand and take them? Jamie suddenly discovered that he was not so strong as he had thought he was because he was shaking until his teeth chattered and the tears were rolling down his cheeks until he was exhausted. So he got up and went down the back 
“What else did he blab
about me?” said the
little scout.
walk the extreme length of it, and opened the gate and stepped into the footpath that led down to the white sands of the sea. There before him his eyes encountered an amazing sight.
Backed against a rock, making feeble efforts at self-defence, were a couple of children, and before them there was a small figure working a sand shovel with the precision of a rotary plough and the velocity of a whirlwind. The victims against the rock were clawing their eyes and gasping for breath and making an ineffectual effort to return the compliment. To Jamie it was evident that the flying sand was very nearly smothering both of them. A few long strides brought him to the rescue. He grabbed the little Scout by the belt and pulled hard.
“Gently, partner! Go gently!” he said. “You're smothering those children!”
The little Scout lifted the shovel and raised a face of outrage with the offered explanation: “They began it! They picked on me! I wasn’t doing a thing until they threw sand on me half-a-dozen times!”
“No doubt,” said Jamie. “No doubt, but that is not any sufficient reason as to why you should smother them. You're going at them like a whirlwind!”
The little Scout drew to full height. A deep breath filled a heaving chest. There was no disputing the argument offered; “Again I threw as much on each one of them as both of them could throw on me, I had to be goin’ some!”
Jamie took that in slowly.“Perhaps you did,” he said. “Is that shovel yours or theirs?”
“It’s theirs,” answered the little Scout. “I took it from the biggest one, and you will notice he is taller and huskier than I am. So that’s that.”
“You come with me,” said Jamie. “Let’s go up here to the rock and sit down and look out on the ocean. When were you home last?”
“Left right after breakfast,” said the little Scout. “It’s Saturday, you know. I was comin’ to help you with the bees this morning, but you wasn’t there, and so I came on down to the sand and thought I’d look around and see if I could start anything, and right away those kids began picking on me, so I thought I’d better show ’em a few.”
Jamie headed toward the throne and the little Scout scuffed along beside him.
“If you’ve not been home since breakfast,” said Jamie, when they were finally seated facing the ocean, “if you haven’t been home since breakfast, Jean——”
“Who told you my name was Jean?” cut in the little Scout.
“Doctor Grayson,” said Jamie. “He told me at the hospital this morning that your name was Jean Meredith.”
“What else did he blab about me?” inquired the little Scout. It was evident to Jamie that the whole of the small figure beside him was suddenly imbued with defiance, drawn up for battle.
“He didn’t say anything,” said Jamie, “except that you would have the sense to accept a very wonderful gift that’s going to be offered to you.”
“Is it a horse?” asked the little Scout instantly, the defiance beginning to fade.
“No,” said Jamie, “it’s something worth more than a great many horses. Never mind that right now. There is something else I want to tell you. I just came from the hospital.”
Slowly the little person drew away from Jamie. Slowly the gray eyes widened. Slowly the hands clenched. Slowly the narrow chest heaved up and sank back again.
“Aw!” said the youngster, harshly, “aw! he ain’t gone and slept the beautiful sleep, has he?”
Jamie sat still and looked out across the ocean. It was a blow he found himself powerless to deliver. Slowly his eyes turned to the horrified face of the child beside him, and suddenly the little Scout launched a quivering figure into his arms and buried a twisted face on his breast and for a short time Jamie had difficulty in holding the writhing body in his arms together. A curious thought struck him. That rock that he had called the throne was not very well named. It seemed to be a place where people brought their troubles. In an earlier experience with it he had held the body of a woman tortured to the extreme limit of endurance. Now he was holding the body of a child so lean and slight that he could scarcely manage his long arms to give the support that was needed.
“Don’t!” begged Jamie. “Don’t take it like that! Let me tell you. It was like your Aunt Beth. It was in the night without even awakening the Bee Master. His hands were folded on his breast, too. There was a wonderful smile on his face, exactly the smile that you described, the smile that seemed as if there were a great secret that those closed lips could tell if they could open.”
Jamie fumbled for his handkerchief and turned the little Scout’s head and wiped the streaming eyes and cupped a big hand under the quivering cheeks and held on tight.
“Don’t cry like that,” he begged. “You are tearing yourself to pieces! The Master wouldn’t like it. Don’t you know that you said all the angels would be glad when they saw your Aunt Beth coming marching, straight and tall, with a sure step, down the flower ways of Heaven? It’s going to be like that with the Bee Master. You are selfish when you cry like that. You are not thinking about him; about his going home to Mary and his wee girl; you are thinking about yourself.”
Instantly the little figure straightened.
“Sure, I’m thinking about myself! Why shouldn’t I think about myself? I got myself to live with, haven’t I? Who’s going to be hurt when I’ve got a pain or ain’t strong enough to handle Ole Fat Bill, or when I can’t make anybody understand any of the things that he always did understand? He ain’t the only one that spilt the beans. When he told me all there was to tell about things that went wrong with him and the people who ruined him, he didn’t do all the talking. He knew just as much about me as I did about him, and now I ain’t got a living soul to go to that’ll understand! What am I goin’ to do? Just answer me that! What am I goin’ to do!”
Suddenly Jamie found himself taking the woebegone face before him between his hands; he found himself laying it against his face, first on one side and then on the other; he found himself hugging the frail body until he knew he was almost cracking the bones in it, and deep and husky he heard his own voice saying: “You come straight to me! When you’ve got a secret you want kept, when any one doesn’t seem to understand and some of the bunch will not play fair and things go wrong, you come to me!”
Instantly the little Scout struggled away from him. Jamie met a level gaze of such depth and appeal as he never before had encountered in human eyes.
“Honest to God?” said the little Scout. “Tear out your heart, cut it in pieces, and cast it to the four winds of the heavens?”
“Whose lodge ritual have you been reading?” asked Jamie.
“Dad’s,” said the little Scout, calmly, “only we made ours as much worse as we could.” Then his fingers tightened again.
“Honest? On the level, do you really mean it?”
“Honest. On the level. Swear over my heart,” said Jamie. “Hold up my right hand and take the oath before the Almighty! I’ll always be your friend. I’ll keep any secret you tell me. I’ll do anything in all the world that I can at any time, at any place, to help you.”A steady hand was thrust at him.
“Shake!” said the little Scout. “All that goes for me. All what you said about me, I’ll say about you. I’ll come to you like I been goin’ to the Bee Master. We’ll be partners like him and me was. I’ll help you all I can. But, say, what’s going to become of the bees? What’s going to become of the garden? What’s going to become of that nice house?”
Jamie hesitated. Someone had to tell the child. They were there. It was his opportunity. He wanted a childish viewpoint. Why not?
So he said quietly: “Would you believe there was any one in all this world that the Bee Master loved any better than he did you?”
“I don’t have to waste any breath on explaining beliefs on that point,” said the little Scout. “I got acshal information, and I got it from the Great Mogul; I got it from the Man Higher Up; I got it right up against the Bee Master’s heart; I got it with a tight kiss and it’s a sekert I ain’t tellin’ anybody except the man that takes his place. Reckermember you’re under oath and this is the first one I’m goin’ to tell you because it was our sekert between us. There might have been folks that wouldn’t have liked it if they’d known it. There was folks that wouldn’t have liked it. Margaret Cameron wouldn’t have liked it, for one, ’cause I’ve got my doubts if she cared any more about Lolly than she did about the Bee Master. What I know about her, the way she cleaned after him and waited on him! I guess I seen Mother cottoning up to Dad. I guess I know a little about married folks, and what I know about her is that she’d have been tickled to pieces if the Bee Master had said to her, ‘Wilt thou?’ You just bet she’d have ‘wilted’! She’d have ‘wilted’ all over him! But he didn’t ever ask her, and he didn’t ever intend to ask her. He never loved any woman in all the world but Highland Mary, and he let one other woman make a fool of him when he was so lonesome after she was gone, like a chicken tryin’ to peruse around with its head cut off.—Say! That’s a sekert, too! I seem to be spillin’ all I know on you all at once. You might get ’em in line better and hold on to ’em tighter if I told ’em one at a time, and it’d be more sense if I’d tell my own, anyway. He might not like it if I told his. I didn't mean to, either. Just sayin’ that about Margaret Cameron made me think how I could’ve told her any time she was whirling like a button on a barn door that there wasn’t nothin’ to it except that he thought she was clean, and he thought she was fine, and he’d rather play cribbage or checkers with her than to sit and think about the awful thing that happened to the woman he liked best and to his little Mary. No, she needn’t ever thought it was her he liked best, ’cause it wasn’t. It was just ‘as is’ little old me! And why I know it is like I told you before. ’Cause he said so! And he wouldn’t have to say so if he didn’t want to. Nobody asked him. Nobody pushed him off the springboard. He took the high dive all by himself.”
“Well, then,” said Jamie, “if he loved you like that, and you know he loved you like that, and if he was going on his long journey and had something very dear to him to leave, who do you think would be the person to whom he would leave it?”
So long as he lives Jamie will remember the reaction of the little Scout to that question. The flat shoulders squared. The head lifted to an extreme height. The chin drew in. The eyes batted. A hand was laid on the chest at the base of the throat; the mouth opened and the eyes closed, and the little Scout went through the pantomime of swallowing the biggest morsel that could, by any possibility, be forced down a small æsophagus. Then it came straight from the shoulder, as Jamie was beginning to learn that everything came with the little Scout.
“Why, he’d just naturally leave it to me!”
Calmly, casually, convincingly, the words came from lips of assurance. “He’d leave it to me, and maybe he’d leave some to you, because you stuck on the job when you wasn’t hardly able, and you faced down the bees like a real man would, and you been square about taking care of things. You can write down my answer to that question: He’d leave some to me, and if he played the game square, like he always did, he’d leave some to you!”
“Well,” said Jamie, “you’re a good guesser, Jean! That’s exactly what the Bee Master has done. He’s left a writing that Doctor Grayson thinks will hold in the courts, and this writing says that the west acre of the garden of wonder up there, and the hives that are on it, are yours; and the east acre and the hives that are on it, are mine. For yourself, you are free to do whatever you and your parents think best. For me, it seems to be a gift that I cannot accept.”
“How come?”
The little Scout shot the phrase at Jamie forcefully.
“Why, I haven’t done anything to earn it,” said Jamie. “All I’ve done here is not a drop in the bucket compared with the value of an acre of land down that slope, planted as it is, peopled with the bees. It’s simply stepping into a home and a comfortable living and a profession that I feel sure I have brains enough to master with a few years of loving and painstaking work, and there are all the books I need and all the material I need, and the name of a man who will help me. It’s too easy! It’s a fairy tale! It’s a dream! Things don’t happen that way in real life.”
The little person thought that over.
“Look here,” said a confident voice, and a small hand was laid on Jamie’s cheek and his face was turned straightly to meet the gaze of the speaker. “Look here! Maybe you think the bandages you’re wearing don’t show through the shirt on your back; but when you stoop over, they do. You’re pretty game about it and you don’t bellyache, but, of course, you wouldn’t be all harnessed up like that if you didn’t have to be. And that means that wrong things and things that hurt you and hit you awful hard came your way, and it was for all of us, for ‘Our country ’tis of thee.’ But you bucked up and you stood your hurts, and you didn’t complain, and you pulled through ’em. And you just know, all by yourself, that ugly things, and mean things, and maybe things you didn’t deserve at all happened to you. Now, why ain’t that just the same as if something that was wonderful and lovely happened to you? Why couldn’t a beautiful thing happen to you just as well as a bad thing? Why couldn’t gettin’ an acre of land with beehives and flowers, happen to you just as well as gettin’ a rip-snorter that nearly tore your heart out? Laugh that off, will you?”
“Well,” said Jamie, “come to think of it, I have heard of the law of compensation. The law of compensation means that when things have gone about as far as they can go in one direction, sometimes they turn around and go equally far in the other direction.”
“Sure!” said the small person. “That’s the dope! That’s the way to look at it! Don’t sit there and talk about not understanding things and not being worth things. Course you’re worth ’em, or you wouldn’t have got ’em! All your life there’s been something in you, and I expect it was born in you just like it was born in our baby. Ever since they brought him home from the hospital you can see there’s things about him that’s like Dad, and you can see things about him that’s like Mother, and I hope to goodness there’ll be one thing about him that’ll be like me! When I went on a boat past the cave in the rock where, if you look through, you can see the light, Molly said, when I saw the light, if I’d wish for the thing I wanted most in the world, it would come true. So I made a wish and Molly wanted to know what I wished, and I wasn’t goin’ to tell her. I like Molly, but everything ain’t all of her business. I like her, but she ain’t the keeper of my sekerts like the Bee Master was and like you’re going to be now in his place. So I’ll tell you what I wished for my little brother when I saw the light that makes wishing come true. I thought of it just the minute I saw, the light, ’cause even worse than I want a horse, I want the thing I wished for my little brother. So just as quick and just as hard as ever I could say it, right in my heart and looking straight at the light, I said: ‘I wish that our Jimmy will not ever grow up to be a cad!’”
Jamie arose and took the little Scout by the hand. “Come on, Jean,” he said, “let’s go home.”
The little Scout bounded expertly from crag to crag down the rock in front of him and waited for him at the base.
“You seem to like my name.”
“Well,” said Jamie, “there couldn’t be a lovelier name. It’s something to know about you definitely, and at that it doesn’t tell me whether you’re a boy or a girl.”
Jamie saw the mutiny that instantly dawned in the eyes raised to his.
“Still harpin’ on that old no-sense thing, are you?” demanded the little person. “Still fussin’ over trifles when you are satisfied with the big thing. If I’m your partner and you’re the keeper of my sekerts, and we’re goin’ home together, ain’t that enough for you?”
“That ought to be almost enough for any man,” answered Jamie.
So they started up the path toward the back gate. Halfway there the little Scout paused and looked at Jamie speculatively.
“Am I to call you the Bee Master now?”
“No,” said Jamie. “You aren’t going to call me the Bee Master, maybe not for long years yet. The Bee Master is a title that has to be won by painstaking work and fine thought and delicate operations. It’s a title that properly belonged to the man who’s sleeping now. He could wear it with grace and dignity. It’s too big to fit my case. We’ll have to find a title for me that means stumbling along plainly and simply, every day studying my job and making the most of it, going at things with all my heart and putting the best I have to give to them, just sticking on the job because I like it, as you told me I would.”
Registering among the mental pictures that endured, there registered on Jamie’s consciousness the upward lift of the shoulders, the backward slant of the head, the elevation of the chin, the outward gesture of both hands, and on his ears fell the dictum: “Oh, well, then, if you want to be plain and simple, if you want to get right down to brass tacks, you better just answer to what you are—the Keeper of the Bees. That’s a good enough name for any man.”
“I heartily agree with you,” said Jamie. “That’s a fine title. That satisfies me fully and completely, better, in fact, than any title possibly could that was of German origin.”
“Is the ‘Bee Master’ of German origin?” queried the little Scout.“Yes,” said Jamie, “that title is of German origin.”
“Was the Bee Master a German?”
“No,” said Jamie. “Never! The Bee Master was British by breeding and training. He happened to be located in our country, but he was of British ancestry if he didn’t go farther and be of British birth.”
“Well, he didn’t go that far,” said the small person. “That’s another thing he told me himself. He was born in Pennsylvania and he found Mary there and he was married there, and he lived there, and the awful tilting rock was in the mountains there.”
“The tilting rock?” asked Jamie.
The little Scout looked down.
“I guess I’m kind of broke up to-day,” was the conclusion reached. “I guess I’ve said two or three things I’d better kept still about. We won’t talk about that rock to-day. Maybe some day I’ll tell you. It’s pretty awful and I don’t sleep well if I get to thinking about it. If I get to thinking hard about it, I can’t very well quit. I want to see him before they send him away. I want to straighten his hair and fix his tie and fold his hands myself, I want to fix his feet comfortable and easy and I would like to put his slippers on him, too.”
Right there Jamie broke down. By that time they had reached the bench under the jacqueranda. He sat down on it and buried his face in his hands and sobbed aloud. The little person stood beside him and put stout arms around his neck.
“Aw,” said the voice, roughened with emotion, “they didn’t go and send him right away? They didn’t put him on a morning train? They didn’t not give me a chance? They didn’t let somebody else fix him?”
Jamie straightened up.
“Honey,” he said, “I’m afraid they did.”
“Well, I call that a dirty gyp!” sobbed the little Scout.
“It ain’t giving the Bee Master any show, and it ain’t giving me any show! When he liked me the best, he would have wanted me to fix him. Mother would have come with me and so would Dad. Doctor Grayson knew all about me, and I’m goin’ to tell him what I think of that kind of business! I’ve called him on the ’phone maybe half-a-dozen times and got him here and run as tight as I could lick to get what he wanted and to heat water and to help him. He knew darn well who the Bee Master would want to fix him up to go to see God! It ain’t fair!”
Then the little person collapsed and Jamie had his chance at comforting. By and by, when both of them were calmer, they sat on the bench side by side and dried their eyes on the same handkerchief.
“Did he divide things the way you’d like to have ’em?” asked the small person, in abrupt change, as was habitual. “Did he give you the side of the garden you’d most rather have?”
“Why, I’m perfectly satisfied,” said Jamie. “I don’t see any difference.”
“I do,” said the little Scout. “If I’d got to take my choice, I’d ’a’ said the east side.”“What difference does it make?” asked Jamie. “There are as many hives on the west side as there are on the east. If there aren’t, we'll count them and make them exactly even. I’m perfectly willing to move the Black Germans over and give you them as a bonus. Was it the Black Germans you wanted?”
“No,” said the little person, “it wasn’t the Black Germans I wanted. It was the Madonna lilies, I can beat the bees to em every crack. I just love to suck the honey out of ’em! It’s the real thing, straight from the fountain, and I like the real thing! And that panel of fence where we make the Redskins bite the dust, I’d like to have had that mighty well.”
“But won’t a west panel do as well?”
“Oh, I reckon it’ll do as well. The only difference is that I ain’t used to the west panel and I am used to the east and so is Ole Fat Bill and the Nice Child and Angel Face. All of us are used to the east, but I reckon we could use the west just as well.”
Then the little person looked at Jamie speculatively.
“I’m kind of disappointed in you.”
Jamie sat straight.
“I don’t know what I’ve done,” he said.
“That’s just edsactly it,” said the little fellow. “’Tain’t anything you done. It’s something you didn’t do. When you said it didn’t make any difference to you, and I showed you good and plain that it made the difference of the Madonna lilies and our Indian ambush to me, you might have offered to trade sides with me! Prodibly I wouldn’t a-done it. Prodibly I wouldn’t a-had anything but what the Bee Master wanted me to have. Prodibly I would a-saved up my money and got some Madonna lilies and planted ’em on my side for myself, but I thought you’d offer to trade.”
Slowly Jamie digested this.
“I beg your pardon,” he said. “That must have been a thoughtless streak in me. My head is a lot older than yours and I knew that we couldn’t trade without going to court and having measurements and making out deeds and paying officers for making the change, and I suspect that knowledge kept me from saying that I’d trade when it really wouldn’t make any difference to me which side you had or any particular difference if you had both of them.”
“But I wouldn’t have both of them,” said the small person, promptly. “If the Bee Master had said both of them were for me, I wouldn’t have taken but half, because it wouldn’t be square, when I asked you to stay and did all I could to get you to stay. It wouldn’t be fair to take all of it.”
The little person looked at Jamie again inquiringly. “What’s goin’ to become of all the money he had in the bank?”
“Well,” said Jamie, “according to the word of the will, after his funeral expenses and his just debts are paid, whatever remains in the bank is subject to provisions in the will that your dad will explain to you when he has thoroughly studied the document. I can tell you this: that there is money provided to pay the cost of moving the house on to the grounds of whichever one of us draws it, and there’s money to build another little house that will cost the same as the value of this one, and whatever is left is to be divided evenly between us.”
“Hm-m-m-m,” said the small party, slowly. “You think it’s likely the Bee Master gave me some money as well as the bees and the flowers?”
“I know he did,” said Jamie, “if that will holds good. If there doesn’t turn out to be some blood relatives, somewhere, who can prove that they are relatives and are entitled by law to have possession. You mustn’t set your heart too hard. You must go at this with the feeling that the Bee Master intended you to have it, but there is a large possibility that somewhere in the world there may be a man or a woman who can take it from you, and who very probably will when they learn about it, because, after all, blood is thicker than water, and in this case any one related to the Bee Master would be blood and you and I would be water.”
“Yes, I get that,” said the little person. “I follow through. But in case the Bee Master knew his business and the judge would say things were ours, then would there be money coming to me?”
“Yes,” said Jamie, “I think there would be, but I doubt if it could come to you before you are of legal age. I think probably your father would have to handle it for you and conserve it for you until the law says you are old enough to have it yourself.”“Aw!” said the little person, “aw! There it goes again!” and the small feet kicked the pebbles of the walk until they flew yards away. “There it goes again! Always havin’ to wait and wait, always havin’ to be disappointed!”
“What was it you especially wanted?” asked Jamie.
“What’s the use to tell if I don’t get it?” said the disgruntled little person. “What would you think I’d want?”
“Well,” said Jamie, “if I was taking a random shot at it,I’d say that you would want a horse.”
“You said it, son!”
The little Scout Master leaped in the air.
“You said it! If I ever wanted anything, if I ever really wanted anything in all this world, I want a horse! I want my own horse! Queen’s wonderful and Hans is wonderful, but I want my own horse! I want to put my arms around his neck and love him personal. I want him to know me and follow me like Dad’s dog. I want him to come when I call. I want him to learn my way. And I don’t want anybody else, not Nannette, not little brother, not anybody, to ride him ever but just me! I want him for one thing that’s mine and nobody else’s. I want to be just as selfish as ever I can be with him!”
“Well,” said Jamie, “never having met your father and your mother, I don’t know, but it seems to me, from the tones of your mother’s voice when she talked with me over the ’phone——”“Yes, I know her telephone voice,” said the small person. “I like it myself. I stand and listen sometimes when she’s talkin’ just to see how much sweetness can be put into the way she says things.”
“And about your father, because he is your father, I’d think, it would be my judgment, that if this money and this land is a gift to you from the Bee Master, I should think——”
“Of course you should!” interrupted the little Scout Master. “Anybody would think that they’d let me have a horse out of it. Couldn’t we keep him here?”
“I don’t know how far the city limits extend,” said Jamie, “but we’ll investigate. We’ll keep that a secret between us and we’ll investigate it. We’ll see what we can do. If you think it isn’t likely that they would agree to your having a horse in town, don’t say anything about it. Let’s just keep it under our hats and see what we can figure out ourselves.”
“All right,” said the little person. “I won’t say a word to them. We’ll see what we can figure out. And I believe now that I’d better go home. Maybe Doctor Grayson telephoned Dad, Maybe he’s waiting for me. Maybe Mother would like to see me. And just maybe they haven’t taken him away yet.”
“I’m sorry,” said Jamie. “I’m awfully sorry, but I happen to know that they have. You mustn’t build any hopes on that. I happen to know that he’s gone.”
The little person stood still staring hard at the zinnia bed, struggling hard to hold steady lips and to keep dryeyed. Then came the habitual lightning-like change of subject.
“I hope,” said the little Scout, “I just hope that the Bee Master didn’t have very much money in the bank. I hope there’s only going to be a little of it.”
“But why?” said Jamie.”
“Oh,” said the little Scout, “I can’t see the use of people havin’ so much money. It don’t seem to do anything but make a lot of trouble. I been lookin’ on for a good many years, and seems to me most of the fightin’ and the fussin’ and the lawsuits and things going wrong is among the people that’ve got a whole lot of money. Why can’t folks be satisfied with a reasonable amount?”
“Well,” said Jamie, glad to change the subject, “what would you say was enough? What would you think would be about the right amount for us to have?”
The little Scout thought that over and then announced conclusively: “I’d say that anybody that’s got the east acre or the west acre of this place, and a long row of beehives and lots of fruit trees, and flowers and flowers and worlds of flowers, and the sand and the sea, and a little house that yells ‘Come on in!’ clear across the road to you, I’d say if they had enough to own that, and get the bread and butter and the strawberry pop and the hot dogs, I’d say they didn’t need another thing on earth—clothes, of course, I forgot about enough clothes to cover ’em up with——”
“And didn’t you forget about a horse?” said Jamie.“Oh, well, now, of course, I meant a horse. I meant a horse most before anything else except a place to keep him. You can’t have a horse without a place to keep him. That’s been my trouble for years. I could a-had a horse almost any time. There wasn’t any stable for him and not any alfalfa or oats or anybody to keep the stable clean. That’s been my trouble all along. A horse, of course!”
“And a boat, of course,” suggested Jamie. “The ocean isn’t very much good without a boat now, is it?”
The little Scout hesitated. “Oh, well, of course, with the ocean at our back door, of course, now, we could use a boat. The Bee Master told me once why he put the fence where he did, but he said he owned clear down to the water. A man wanted to buy his shore line and put a hot-dog stand there and he decided he couldn’t have it because we could get hot dogs down at the corner. The Bee Master said that one of the finest men who ever lived in England, one of the biggest credits to that fine old land was a man, and his name was William Blackstone. He made me say over and over about the hot-dog stand what William Blackstone said. I’ll tell you now.”
The little Scout stepped in front of Jamie, brought small heels together, squared lean shoulders, lifted a chin, and accomplished a nobility of countenance that was startling. Jamie did not understand how it happened that a tear-smeared face, that sand-filled tow hair, sanded brows and ears could take on the look of dignity and serenity that was on the face of the youngster in the delivery of this sentence: “‘Thou shalt not obstruct thy neighbour’s ancient light!’”
Suddenly, with the flashing change habitual to the little Scout, the entire figure slumped; came back to the bench, sat down beside Jamie and leaned against him.
“That means,” said the little Scout, “that ‘ancient light’ means the sunshine and the moonshine and the clean air clear from China. The Bee Master used to go down and lie on the sand by the hour and let the ocean tell him things that comforted him. He said if he sold that, the man adjoining him would be the owner, and he would be the neighbour, and he didn’t want his ‘ancient light’ all mussed up with a hot-dog stand, and he didn’t want his inheritance of well-salted, dustless air right fresh off the sea all toggea up with hot dogs. Didn’t make any difference if they did make your mouth water, we could get ours down at the corner.”
Then the little Scout put a pair of arms tight around Jamie’s neck and closed in almost to the point of suffocation, and the Keeper of the Bees got his second little hot kiss firm on his lips.
The little Scout said: “Thank you for taking his place with me, and I’m glad that you’ve got the Madonna lilies and the fighting ground, and I’m glad you’ve got the east acre and half the bees. I’ll take the Black Germans, if you don’t want ‘em. And I’m glad, if the Bee Master had to go, I’m gladder than I can tell you that you are goin’ to stay and keep the bees!”