The word has an
angry, malignant sound that brings the idea
of attack vividly into the mind. There is a vicious sting about
it somewhere -- even a foreigner, ignorant of the meaning, must
feel it. A hornet is wicked; it darts and stabs; it pierces,
aiming without provocation for the face and eyes. The name
suggests a metallic droning of evil wings, fierce flight, and
poisonous assault. Though black and yellow, it sounds scarlet.
There is blood in it. A striped tiger of the air in concentrated
form! There is no escape -- if it attacks.
In Egypt an ordinary bee is the size of an English hornet,
but the Egyptian hornet is enormous. It is truly monstrous -- an
ominous, dying terror. It shares that universal quality of the
land of the Sphinx and Pyramids -- great size. It is a
formidable insect, worse than scorpion or tarantula. The Rev.
James Milligan, meeting one for the first time, realized the
meaning of another word as well, a word he used prolifically in
his eloquent sermons -- devil.
One morning in April, when the heat began to bring the
insects out, he rose as usual betimes and went across the wide
stone corridor to his bath. The desert already glared in through
the open windows. The heat would be afflicting later in the day,
but at this early hour the cool north wind blew pleasantly down
the hotel passages. It was Sunday, and at half-past eight
o'clock he would appear to conduct the morning service for the
English visitors. The floor of the passage-way was cold beneath
his feet in their thin native slippers of bright yellow. He was
neither young nor old; his salary was comfortable; he had a
competency of his own, without wife or children to absorb it; the
dry climate had been recommended to him; and -- the big hotel
took him in for next to nothing. And he was thoroughly pleased
with himself, for he was a sleek, vain, pompous, well-advertised
personality, but mean as a rat. No worries of any kind were on
his mind as, carrying sponge and towel, scented soap and a bottle
of Scrubb's ammonia, he travelled amiably across the deserted,
shining corridor to the bathroom. And nothing went wrong with
the Rev. James Milligan until he opened the door, and his eye
fell upon a dark, suspicious-looking object clinging to the
window-pane in front of him.
And even then, at first, he felt no anxiety or alarm, but
merely a natural curiosity to know exactly what it was -- this
little clot of an odd-shaped, elongated thing that stuck there on
the wooden framework six feet before his aquiline nose. He went
straight up to it to see -- then stopped dead. His heart gave a
distinct, unclerical leap. His lips formed themselves into
unregenerate shape. He gasped: "Good God! What is it?" For
something unholy, something wicked as a secret sin, stuck there
before his eyes in the patch of blazing sunshine. He caught his
breath.
For a moment he was unable to move, as though the sight half
fascinated him. Then, cautiously and very slowly -- stealthily,
in fact -- he withdrew towards the door he had just entered.
Fearful of making the smallest sound, he retraced his steps on
tiptoe. His yellow slippers shuffled. His dry sponge fell, and
bounded till it settled, rolling close beneath the horribly
attractive object facing him. From the safety of the open door,
with ample space for retreat behind him, he paused and stared.
His entire being focussed itself in his eyes. It was a hornet
that he saw. It hung there, motionless and threatening, between
him and the bathroom door.
And at first he merely exclaimed -- below his breath --
"Good God! It's an Egyptian hornet!"
Being a man with a reputation for decided action, however,
he soon recovered himself. He was well schooled in self-control.
When people left his church at the beginning of the sermon, no
muscle of his face betrayed the wounded vanity and annoyance that
burned deep in his heart. But a hornet sitting directly in his
path was a very different matter. He realized in a flash that he
was poorly clothed -- in a word, that he was practically half
naked.
From a distance he examined this intrusion of the devil. It
was calm and very still. It was wonderfully made, both before
and behind. Its wings were folded upon its terrible body. Long,
sinuous things, pointed like temptation, barbed as well, stuck
out of it. There was poison, and yet grace, in its exquisite
presentment. Its shiny black was beautiful, and the yellow
stripes upon its sleek, curved abdomen were like the gleaming
ornaments upon some feminine body of the seductive world he
preached against. Almost, he saw an abandoned dancer on the
stage. And then, swiftly in his impressionable soul, the simile
changed, and he saw instead more blunt and aggressive forms of
destruction. The well-filled body, tapering to a horrid point,
reminded him of those perfect engines of death that reduce
hundreds to annihilation unawares -- torpedoes, shells,
projectiles, crammed with secret, desolating powers. Its wings,
its awful, quiet head, its delicate, slim waist, its stripes of
brilliant saffron -- all these seemed the concentrated prototype
of abominations made cleverly by the brain of man, and
beautifully painted to disguise their invisible freight of cruel
death.
"Bah!" he exclaimed, ashamed of his prolific imagination.
"It's only a hornet after all -- an insect!" And he contrived a
hurried, careful plan. He aimed a towel at it, rolled up into a
ball -- but did not throw it. He might miss. He remembered that
his ankles were unprotected. Instead, he paused again, examining
the black and yellow object in safe retirement near the door, as
one day he hoped to watch the world in leisurely retirement in
the country. It did not move. It was fixed and terrible. It
made no sound. Its wings were folded. Not even the black
antennae, blunt at the tips like clubs, showed the least stir or
tremble. It breathed, however. He watched the rise and fall of
the evil body; it breathed air in and out as he himself did. The
creature, he realized, had lungs and heart and organs. It had a
brain! Its mind was active all this time. It knew it was being
watched. It merely waited. Any second, with a whiz of fury, and
with perfect accuracy of aim, it might dart at him and strike.
If he threw the towel and missed -- it certainly would.
There were other occupants of the corridor, however, and a
sound of steps approaching gave him the decision to act. He
would lose his bath if he hesitated much longer. He felt ashamed
of his timidity, though "pusillanimity" was the word thought
selected owing to the pulpit vocabulary it was his habit to
prefer. He went with extreme caution towards the bathroom door,
passing the point of danger so close that his skin turned hot and
cold. With one foot gingerly extended, he recovered his sponge.
The hornet did not move a muscle. But -- it had seen him pass.
It merely waited. All dangerous insects had that trick. It knew
quite well he was inside; it knew quite well he must come out a
few minutes later; it also knew quite well that he was -- naked.
Once inside the little room, he closed the door with
exceeding gentleness, lest the vibration might stir the fearful
insect to attack. The bath was already filled, and he plunged to
his neck with a feeling of comparative security. A window into
the outside passage he also closed, so that nothing could
possibly come in. And steam soon charged the air and left its
blurred deposit on the glass. For ten minutes he could enjoy
himself and pretend that he was safe. For ten minutes he did so.
He behaved carelessly, as though nothing mattered, and as though
all the courage in the world were his. He splashed and soaped
and sponged, making a lot of reckless noise. He got out and
dried himself. Slowly the steam subsided, the air grew clearer,
he put on dressing-gown and slippers. It was time to go out.
Unable to devise any further reason for delay, he opened the
door softly half an inch -- peeped out -- and instantly closed it
again with a resounding bang. He had heard a drone of wings.
The insect had left its perch and now buzzed upon the floor
directly in his path. The air seemed full of stings; he felt
stabs all over him; his unprotected portions winced with the
expectancy of pain. The beast knew he was coming out, and was
waiting for him. In that brief instant he had felt its sting all
over him, on his unprotected ankles, on his back, his neck, his
cheeks, in his eyes, and on the bald clearing that adorned his
Anglican head. Through the closed door he heard the ominous,
dull murmur of his striped adversary as it beat its angry wings.
Its oiled and wicked sting shot in and out with fury. Its deft
legs worked. He saw its tiny waist already writhing with the
lust of battle. Ugh! That tiny waist! A moment's steady nerve
and he could have severed that cunning body from the directing
brain with one swift, well-directed thrust. But his nerve had
utterly deserted him.
Human motives, even in the professedly holy, are an involved
affair at any time. Just now, in the Rev. James Milligan, they
were inextricably mixed. He claims this explanation, at any
rate, in excuse of his abominable subsequent behaviour. For,
exactly at this moment, when he had decided to admit cowardice by
ringing for the Arab servant, a step was audible in the corridor
outside, and courage came with it into his disreputable heart.
It was the step of the man he cordially "disapproved of," using
the pulpit version of "hated and despised." He had overstayed
his time, and the bath was in demand by Mr. Mullins. Mr. Mullins
invariably followed him at seven-thirty; it was now a quarter to
eight. And Mr. Mullins was a wretched drinking man -- "a sot."
In a flash the plan was conceived and put into execution.
The temptation, of course, was of the devil. Mr. Milligan hid
the motive from himself, pretending he hardly recognized it. The
plan was what men call a dirty trick; it was also irresistibly
seductive. He opened the door, stepped boldly, nose in the air,
right over the hideous insect on the floor, and fairly pranced
into the outer passage. The brief transit brought a hundred
horrible sensations -- that the hornet would rise and sting his
leg, that it would cling to his dressing-gown and stab his spine,
that he would step upon it and die, like Achilles, of a heel
exposed. But with these, and conquering them, was one other
stronger emotion that robbed the lesser terrors of their potency
-- that Mr. Mullins would run precisely the same risks five
seconds later, unprepared. He heard the gloating insect buzz and
scratch the oilcloth. But it was behind him. He was
safe!
"Good morning to you, Mr. Mullins," he observed with a
gracious smile. "I trust I have not kept you waiting."
"Mornin'!" grunted Mullins sourly in reply, as he passed him
with a distinctly hostile and contemptuous air. For Mullins,
though depraved, perhaps, was an honest man, abhorring parsons
and making no secret of his opinions -- whence the bitter
feeling.
All men, except those very big ones who are supermen, have
something astonishingly despicable in them. The despicable thing
in Milligan came uppermost now. He fairly chuckled. He met the
snub with a calm, forgiving smile, and continued his shambling
gait with what dignity he could towards his bedroom opposite.
Then he turned his head to see. His enemy would meet an
infuriated hornet -- an Egyptian hornet! -- and might not notice
it. He might step on it. He might not. But he was bound to
disturb it, and rouse it to attack. The chances were enormously
on the clerical side. And its sting meant death.
"May God forgive me!" ran subconsciously through his mind.
And side by side with the repentant prayer ran also a recognition
of the tempter's eternal skill: "I hope the devil it will sting
him!"
It happened very quickly. The Rev. James Milligan lingered
a moment by his door to watch. He saw Mullins, the disgusting
Mullins, step blithely into the bathroom passage; he saw him
pause, shrink back, and raise his arm to protect his face. He
heard him swear aloud: "What's the d_____d thing doing here?
Have I really got 'em again?" And then he heard him laugh -- a
hearty, guffawing laugh of genuine relief -- "It's real!"
The moment of revulsion was overwhelming. It filled the
churchly heart with anguish and bitter disappointment. For a
space he hated the whole race of men.
For the instant Mr. Mullins realized that the insect was not
a fiery illusion of his disordered nerves, he went forward
without the smallest hesitation. With his towel he knocked down
the flying terror. Then he stooped. He gathered up the venomous
thing his well-aimed blow had stricken so easily to the floor.
He advanced with it, held at arm's length, to the window. He
tossed it out carelessly. The Egyptian hornet flew away
uninjured, and Mr. Mullins -- the Mr. Mullins who drank, gave
nothing to the church, attended no services, hated parsons, and
proclaimed the fact with enthusiasm -- this same Mr. Mullins went
to his unearned bath without a scratch. But first he saw his
enemy standing in the doorway across the passage, watching him --
and understood. That was the awful part of it. Mullins would
make a story of it, and the story would go the round of the
hotel.
The Rev. James Milligan, however, proved that his reputation
for self-control was not undeserved. He conducted morning
service half an hour later with an expression of peace upon his
handsome face. He conquered all outward sign of inward spiritual
vexation; the wicked, he consoled himself, ever flourished like
green bay trees. It was notorious that the righteous never have
any luck at all! That was bad enough. But what was worse -- and
the Rev. James Milligan remembered for very long -- was the
superior ease with which Mullins had relegated both himself and
hornet to the same level of comparative insignificance. Mullins
ignored them both -- which proved that he thought himself
superior. Infinitely worse than the sting of any hornet in the
world: he really was superior.
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