nt acquisition to the school personnel whose
duties, according to the school board's orders, were to "Make daily
visits, morning and afternoon, to examine all cases of suspected
illness, and prescribe, if poverty makes it necessary, that epidemics be
safeguarded against."

"What do you mean?" asked John.

"Well, my throat felt funny and I told Miss Brown. She sent me up to the
office to see him. 'Stay home a day, my boy, until we see if it gets
worse,'" Albert quoted. "Was I glad?"

So that was what the new school doctor did. Thumped you around and
looked down your throat and prescribed a day's holiday as a cure. He
wished he'd been Albert. He'd a' stayed on the pier all morning and
hooked the big carp again. Some folks seemed to be born lucky, anyway.
Couldn't he fall sick too, not badly enough to go to bed, but just
nicely sick as Al was?

He startled his parents at supper that evening by a sudden and seemingly
morbid thirst for information about diseases.

"Mother," he queried, between mouthfuls of bread and homemade marmalade,
"what's measles and scarlet fever and diphtheria start out like?"

His father chortled with amusement. Mother, after the manner of women,
remembered his actions that noon and grew anxious.

"You're not feeling sick, are you, dear?"

He didn't feel exactly well. Could she tell him about any of the
foregoing? Perhaps he had one of them.

"Put that marmalade right down, then. It'll upset your stomach. Here,
let me look at your tongue!"

He demurred. Jam wouldn't hurt him. There was nothing really wrong,
anyway. Only one of the boys at school had gone home with the measles
and he was wondering what it was like. Then he subsided into silence.

Late that evening, Mr. Fletcher found the library gas burning and
discovered his son sitting beside the desk, his eyes glued to the
portly, green-bound _Family Doctor_. Beside him on a pad were scribbled
copious notes. Nor would he even hint, as his father ordered him to bed,
what he wanted them for.

[Illustration: Johnny and Louise]

CHAPTER III

HE PLAYS A TRICK ON THE DOCTOR

In the morning, John sneaked from the table as soon as the last forkfull
of fried potatoes had been devoured. When Mrs. Fletcher brought the
breakfast plates out to the kitchen sink, she found him on tiptoe, with
one hand fumbling among the spice tins and bottles in the top bureau
drawer. He turned guiltily, and yawned to hide his embarrassment.

"I was l