Winning His "W" Part 24

"I hate to leave the fellow to himself," said Foster. "He'll go to the dogs as sure as you're born if he is."

"If he isn't there already."

"Well, if he's there we must help to get him out."

"You're the one to do it, Foster. You aren't working up your Greek."

Will had been working with even greater intensity than before and was beginning to see the results of his labors. With his disposition there was no comparative degree. Everything was at one extreme or the other and now he was giving himself but little rest and even Peter John's disgrace was not so keenly felt by him as at the time when it had occurred.

"I think I'll have to do something," a.s.sented Foster, "or at least try to."

But on the following day an excitement broke out among the students at Winthrop that speedily and completely banished from the minds of Will and Foster even their well-intended efforts to aid their weak and misguided cla.s.smate.

CHAPTER XVIII

AN ALARMING REPORT

The excitement first came to Will Phelps when one night he was returning to his room from his dinner in the fraternity house. The house, together with four or five other similar houses, was situated in the same street with the dormitory, but was distant a walk of seven or eight minutes, and there was usually a crowd of the college boys to be seen on the village street three times a day when they pa.s.sed to or from their boarding places.

On this particular evening Will chanced to be alone, and as he went on he perceived Mott approaching. He had had but little to say to the fellow since the escapade, and now as he recognized the soph.o.m.ore his feeling of anger or disgust arose once more, and he was inclined to pa.s.s him with only a light nod of recognition.

But Mott was not to be so lightly turned aside or ignored, and as he saw Will he stopped, and his manner at once betrayed the excitement under which he was laboring.

"Have you heard the news, Phelps?" he demanded.

"I haven't heard anything," replied Will coldly.

"You haven't? Well, you ought to. It's all over college now."

"What's all over college?"

"Why, the report of the typhoid."

"What?" demanded Will, instantly aroused.

"I mean what I say. And there are all sorts of reports about what's to be done. Some say the faculty have decided to shut up shop for a few weeks, and some say they've sent for experts, and I don't know what all."

"Who are the fellows that are down with it?"

"Schenck--"

"Peter John?" demanded Will sharply.

"Yes, and there are seven others. He's the only freshman; there are two sophs, two juniors, and one senior. Wagner is the senior."

"Where are they?"

"They're all in the infirmary, and the whole shop has been quarantined."

"When was it found out?"

"Only to-day, this afternoon, I think. You see all eight have been under the weather for a while, and the doctor here thought it was first one thing that ailed them and then another. Last night or this morning they had a consultation, and decided that every one of the eight had typhoid fever. It's a great go, isn't it?"

"And you say Peter John is one?"

"Sure."

"Is he in the infirmary?"

"Yes, every one of them is there."

"Is he very much sick?"

"Can't tell yet, but he's sick enough."

"Can anybody see him?" inquired Will thoughtfully.

"No. There isn't any one allowed in the building except the nurses, doctors, and the families of the fellows, that is, when they come. I understand that word has been sent to all the families, and nurses have already been engaged, and that some of them are on the ground now."

"It's terrible!" said Will with a shudder.

"I know what I'm going to do," said Mott glibly.

"What's that?"

"I'm going home. Of course, the governor won't believe me at first when I tell him why I've returned to the ancestral abode, but you may rest easy when he sees it in the papers, then he'll believe it all right enough. Fine to have your daddy believe a lying newspaper before he takes the word of his own offspring, isn't it?"

"May not be all his fault."

"Yes, it is. I'd have been as decent a fellow as you or any fellow in college if I'd been treated halfway decently. But I wasn't."

Will had his own ideas as to that, but he did not express them, for the full sense of the calamity of the college was now strongly upon him.

Even the shadows of the great hills seemed to him to be more sombre than usual, and in whichever direction he looked there was an outer gloom corresponding to the one within. In the first shock of the report a nameless fear swept over him, and already he was positive that in his own case he could discover certain symptoms that were the forerunners of the dreaded disease. He hastily bade Mott good-night and ran all the way back to his room.

Foster was already there, and at once he exclaimed:

"Foster, have you heard about it?"

"The typhoid?"

"Yes. They say Peter John and Wagner and six others are down with it."

"It's true."

"What's going to be done?"