At this Dulnop broke down, and fell to sobbing.  Nothing could have told the investigators so well just how childlike the Sanusians really were.  Corrus had all he could do to hold in himself.

“Mownoth!” he exclaimed, his eyes raised fervently.  “If it be thy will to deliver us, give us the secret this night!”

Meanwhile, in Rolla’s hut, a similar scene was going on under the doctor’s projected eye.  Cunora lost her nerve, and Rolls came near to doing the same in her efforts to comfort the other.

“They are heartless things!” Rolla exclaimed with such bitterness as her nature would permit.  “They know not what love is:  They with their drones and their egg-babes!  What is family life to Them?  Nothing!

“Somehow I feel that Their reign is nearly at an end, Cunora.  Perhaps the great secret shall be given us to-night!”

The girl dried her tears.  “Why say ye that, Rolla?”

“Because the time be ripe for it.  Are not all our kind looking forward to it?  Are we not all expecting and longing for it?  Know we not that we shall, must, have what we all so earnestly desire?” It was striking, to hear this bit of modern psychology uttered by this primitive woman.  “Let me hear no more of thy weeping!  Ye shall not be made to wed Corrus!”

Nevertheless, at the speaking of her lover’s name, the older woman’s lips trembled despite themselves; and she said nothing further beyond a brief “Sleep well.”  After which the two women turned in, and shortly reached the drowsy point.

Thus it happened that Rolla, after a minute or two, once more aroused Cunora in great excitement, and after securely closing the entrance to the hut against all comers, proceeded to relate what she had seen.  She finished: 

“The seed of the flower can be grown in the heart of rotting wood!” And for hours afterward the two whispered excitedly in the darkness.  It was hard to have to wait till dawn.

As for Corrus and Dulnop, they even went so far as to search the heaps of stone in the mineral yards, although neither really expected to find what they sought.

But the four on the earth, not being able to do anything further until morning, proceeded to make themselves at home in the doctor’s house.  Smith and the doctor slept together, likewise Billie and Mrs. Kinney; Van Emmon occupied the guest-room in lonely grandeur.  When he came down to breakfast he said he had dreamed that he was Corrus, and that he had burned himself on a blazing cow.

Again in the trance state, the four found that Rolla and Cunora, after reaching an understanding with Corrus and Dulnop, had already left their huts in search of the required stone.  Five bees accompanied them.  Within a few minutes however, Corrus and Dulnop set out together in the opposite direction, as agreed upon; and shortly the guards were withdrawn.  This meant that the holiday was officially sanctioned, so long as the two couples kept apart; but if they were to join forces afterward, and be caught in the act, they would be severely punished.  Such was bee efficiency—­and sentiment.