“When they were all made helpless the angel bade me hold my hand near the bloom; and I was vastly surprised to feel a great warmth.  ’Twas like the heat of a stone which has stood all day in the sun, only much greater.  Once my finger touched the bloom, and it gave me a sharp pain.”

Cunora was studying her friend very closely.  “Ye could not have devised this tale, Rolla.  ’Tis too unlikely.  Is there more of it?”

“A little.  The angel once more took me by the hand, and shortly set me down again in this hut.  Then he said something which seemed to mean, ’With this magic bloom thou shalt be freed from the masters.  They fear it; but ye, and all like ye, do not.  Be ye ready to find the blossom when I bid thee.’  With that he disappeared, and I awoke.

“Tell me; do I look mad, to thine eyes?” Rolla was beginning to feel a little anxious herself.

Cunora got up and led Rolla to the entrance.  The glow of “the Silvery Way” was all the help that the girl’s catlike eyesight needed; she seemed reassured.

“Ye look very strange and excited, Rolla, but not mad.  Tell me again what thou didst see and hear, that I may compare it with what ye have already told.”

Rolla began again; and meanwhile, on the earth, the doctor’s companions telepathically congratulated him on his success.  He had put the great idea into a fertile mind.

Presently they began to look for other minds.  It seemed wise to get the notion into as many Sanusian heads as possible.  For some hours this search proceeded; but in the end, after getting in touch with some forty or fifty individuals in as many different parts of the planet, they concluded that they had first hit upon the most advanced specimens that Sanus afforded; the only ones, in fact, whose intellect were strong enough to appreciate the value of what they were told.  The investigators were obliged to work with Rolla, Dulnop, and Corrus only; upon these three depended the success of their unprecedented scheme.

Rolla continued to keep watch upon Supreme; and toward morning—­that is, morning in that particular part of Sanus—­the architect was rewarded by catching the bee in a still drowsy condition.  Using the same method Kinney had chosen, Billie succeeded in giving the soldier bee a very vivid idea of fire.  And judging by the very human way in which the half-asleep insect tossed about, thrashing her wings and legs and making incoherent sounds, Billie succeeded admirably.  The other bees in the hive came crowding around, and Supreme had some difficulty in maintaining her dignity and authority.  In the end she confided in the subordinate next in command: 

“I have had a terrible dream.  One of our slaves, or a woman much like one, assaulted me with a new and fearful weapon.”  She described it more or less as Rolla had told Cunora.  “It was a deadly thing; but how I know this, I cannot say, except that it was exceedingly hot.  So long as the woman held it in her hand, I dared not go near her.