“No wonder you’re sick, if you took that stuff!”
“Why, I’ve often taken it,” asserted Sid. “It did me good.”
“Not ‘doped’ as this is,” declared Dr. Marshall. “I know this preparation. It is very good, but this has been tampered with. There’s enough ‘dope’ in there to make a score of you boys sick. Throw the stuff away, or, no, hold on, let me have it. I’ll look into this. There’s been underhand work somewhere. You say some girl friends sent it to you?”
“We thought so,” spoke Sid, “but if it’s been meddled with, of course, they didn’t. I begin to suspect something now.”
“Well, talk about it later,” advised the doctor crisply. “I’ve got a sick lad to look after now. Some of you get me a lot of hot water. I’ve got to use a stomach pump,” and he mixed Tom some medicine, while Sid hurried to rouse the housekeeper.
“Who you suppose could have sent that stuff?”
“Yes, we ought to tell Dr. Churchill, and have him help us.”
Phil, Sid and Frank thus expressed themselves in whispers, as they sat in their room. Tom had been moved to the infirmary, and Dr. Marshall was working over him with the assistance of Professor Langley, who, as physics instructor, knew something of medicine.
The three chums had just received word that Tom was practically out of danger, and would be all right in a day or so, but that he was still quite ill, and suffered much discomfort.
“Well, I don’t know how you fellows feel about it,” spoke Sid, “but I’ve got my own opinion as to how that stuff came to be fixed, so as to make Tom ill.”
“I mean Shambler, and I don’t care who knows it,” went on Sid, raising his voice. “He’s a cad--and he’ll never be anything else. He and Tom were on the outs from the first, partly over Miss Tyler, and for other reasons.
“Then came the charge against Shambler, and, though Tom had nothing to do with that, Shambler has probably heard that Tom has taken his place for the mile run. He hates Randall, and he wants to see her lose after what happened to him, and, he wants to make Tom, by slumping, bring it about. That’s why he tried to ‘dope’ him. Oh, if I had Shambler here!” and Sid clenched his fists with fierce energy.
“Do you really think Shambler did it?” asked Frank.
“I’m sure of it!” declared Sid. “He is the only one who would have an object.”
