you don't play too hard. There are lots and
lots of things to do to help me."

First, the potatoes were to be washed for tomorrow's dinner. He filled
the dishpan full of water, dumped the sand-laden tubers in, and attacked
them with a brush in vigorous relief at the change from deadening
inactivity. Next, there were a hundred and one little errands to do
about the house, for his mother began sewing on his negligee blouses,
and the button-hole scissors, the missing "60" thread, and other mislaid
implements must be found for her. Lastly, he announced that it might be
well to go up to school and get the lessons for tomorrow.

"Then I won't miss anything," he explained.

Mrs. Fletcher nodded assent. "But come right back. I don't want you to
be sick again."

The afternoon passed without sign of John. At supper time, he approached
the house warily. His face was flushed, his school clothes begrimed and
rumpled, and a bruise on his right shin forced a perceptible limp as he
walked. He had been practicing with the "Tigers," and the scrimmage had
been most exciting. Silvey--who had not been put to bed--had bumped into
Red Brown in a manner which the latter regarded as unnecessarily rough.
There had been a fight between the two, while the other aspirants for
positions on the team stood around and yelled "Fi-i-i-ight" at the top
of their lungs.

Yes, everyone seemed to be inside the Fletcher house. The outlook was
reasonably safe. He tiptoed up on the porch and stretched out on the
swinging lounge. There his mother found him feigning a deep and
overwhelming sleep.

"John!"

Sleeping boys never wakened at the first summons. That wasn't natural.
So he waited until a maternal hand shook him vigorously.

"Yes, Mother?" With a doleful yawn.

"Is this the way you come straight home from school?"

He protested. There were some lessons to get from Miss Brown after,
dismissal and that had delayed him. "And I've been here ever so long."

"Nonsense!" she ejaculated. "Just look at the state of your clothing.
You've been playing football. Come into the house this instant!"

He obeyed meekly. The period of invalidism was over.

But to the harassed school doctor, it seemed on the following morning
that John Fletcher's case was but the beginning of a long and startling
outbreak of illness in the school.

Hardly had Miss Brown finished roll call before dark-haired Perry
Alford, her brightest and most guileless scholar, waved his ha