Part 6

Small laughed again, quite insultingly this time. “Gee, you hate yourself, don’t you, Kid? To hear you talk anybody’d think you were a John D. Rockefeller――until he thought again! I’ll bet I’ll have more money than you, Kid!”

Kid smiled patiently. “Piffle! A couple of piffles! You wait and see, Small; that’s all I ask you to do; just wait and see! I may not be any John D. Rockefeller, son, but I’ve got more business head than you ever thought of having.”

“Huh! You! Give me my drawing! You make me tired, you do!” Small was plainly incensed and Kid suddenly recalled the fact that it wouldn’t do to have Small angry if he was to be asked to purchase a box of the celebrated Tinkham’s Throat-Ease.

“Well, you needn’t get huffy,” said Kid. “I didn’t say anything, did I?”

“Yes, you did! You said this looked like a water pitcher!”

“Well, aren’t water pitchers all right, Small? Can’t there be――be beauty in a water pitcher? I didn’t say I didn’t like your drawing, did I?”

“You said maybe you’d have it changed, didn’t you?”

“Can’t you take a joke? Gee, you’re getting touchy! I guess it’s the artistic temper in you, Small. Artists are always touchy. I didn’t say I didn’t like it. I couldn’t say that, because I do like it――awfully.”

“Yes, you do!” growled Small, mollified nevertheless.

“I do, honest! Cross my heart, Small! I think it’s a dandy drawing. Wish I could draw like that.”

Small viewed him suspiciously, but Kid’s cherubic countenance seemed without guile. Small, much flattered and highly pleased, stammered that it wasn’t much and that he could show Kid how to do it if he, Kid, wanted him to. Kid thanked him and promised to give the matter thought. Then,

“Say, you’ve got a cough, haven’t you?” he said.

Small looked surprised. “Who? Me? No, I haven’t any cough.”

“Then what are you coughing for?” demanded Kid.

“I’m not! I haven’t coughed all winter.”

“Oh! Then I suppose I imagined it. You want to be careful of a cough this time of year. First thing you know you’ll have tonsilitis or――or pneumonia or something.”

Small looked concerned and promptly coughed. The cough surprised him and when Kid kindly thumped him on the back and asked where it hurt him, Small went into a regular paroxysm of coughing that left him crimson-faced and alarmed.

“Gee,” he exclaimed, when he could get his breath, “I didn’t know I had any cough! Funny how things kind of――kind of creep up on you, ain’t it?”

“Insidious, that’s the word for it,” replied Kid sympathetically. “Insidious. They say a cough’s the worst sort of a symptom. It leads to other things, you see, things like quinsy and diphtheria and bronchitis, Small. If I was you I’d take good care of myself for a while. Don’t ever get your feet wet, Small.”

“I guess they’re wet now,” muttered Small, feeling of his shoes. “They are! I guess I’ll get ’em off.” He coughed again, a truly alarming, hollow cough that produced a sad shake of the head from Kid.

“Haven’t anything you can take, have you?” he asked solicitously. Small, unhappy, shook his head.

“What――what’s good for it?” he asked huskily.

Kid reflected. “Well, if it was me, I’d most certainly take some Tinkham’s Throat-Ease. They’re the very best things I know of, Small, and they’re only a quarter a box.”

“Have you got any, Kid?”

“No, I always mean to have some on hand, but I’m all out of them just now. Maybe you might get some in the village, but I don’t know. They don’t have many up-to-date things there, and Tinkham’s Throat-Ease is a――a new remedy, a modern discovery.”

“I suppose something else would do,” reflected Small. “Sam Perkins has some licorice pastilles that are dandy――――”

“Keep away from them!” advised Kid, with a shake of his head. “They’re good to taste, Small, but they have no――no healing virtues. I tell you. I’ve sent for some Tinkham’s and they ought to be here in a day or so, and then I’ll let you have some.”

“Thanks,” said Small gratefully.

“Twenty-five cents a box is all they are,” continued Kid.

“Oh!” Small swallowed. Then he coughed. “Much obliged,” he murmured.

“That’s all right. I’d do it for you any day, Small. And they are large boxes, too. A quarter’s worth will last you a long time and cure the most stubborn cough. Meanwhile, though, you want to be awfully careful of yourself. If I was you I wouldn’t go out much, and I’d eat as little as I could――especially sweets.”

“I guess it ain’t that bad yet,” murmured Small.

“You can’t tell,” said Kid darkly. “Lots and lots of folks have neglected a cough or a cold and been terribly ill. And over-eating is one of the worst things you can do. If I was you――”

“If you were me,” interrupted Small querulously, “I suppose you’d eat nothing but milk toast and give your puddings and preserves and things to the other fellows! Well, you don’t get ’em!”

Kid looked virtuously indignant. “I don’t want your pudding, Small; and if you think I do, why you go right on and eat it and see how sick you’ll be. Then don’t say I didn’t warn you; that’s all; don’t say I didn’t warn you, Small!”

“What’s the use of making so much fuss? I haven’t coughed but once since I came in here.”

“Three times, Small!”

“Well, all right; but I’m not coughing now, am I?”

“You’re going to,” responded Kid with uncanny certainty.

“Bet you I don’t!”

“Bet you you do! You’re trying not to, but you can’t keep it in for long, Small.”

“I’m not trying not to! I don’t want to cough; I couldn’t cough if I tried!”

“Then stop holding your breath. I don’t care if you want to be ill, Small; you don’t need to get waxy with me about it. Besides, a cough’s nothing to be ashamed of. If I wanted to cough I’d cough!”

“I don’t _want_ to cough, I tell you!” cried Small exasperatedly.

“And, anyhow,” went on Kid imperturbably, “I’ve heard it’s injurious to try to――to restrain coughter――I mean coughing.”

“I tell you――oh, you make me tired!”

“Go on, Small; let it out.”

“Let what out?”

“That cough. You’re only hurting your lungs.”

“There isn’t any cough!” Small shrieked. “If you say cough to me again――――”

He stopped there, not for lack of words, but because he was suddenly seized with a paroxysm of coughing that rendered speech impossible. Kid turned away, apparently with a delicate consideration for the other’s embarrassment, but in reality to grin triumphantly and wink wickedly at the doorknob. Small, with one hand clutching convulsively at his chest and the other accusingly outstretched toward Kid, rushed from the room, coughing and sputtering.

“Don’t forget!” admonished Kid. “Tinkham’s Throat-Ease! Twenty-five cents a box! _Accept――no――substitutes!_”

Kid had to yell the latter part of the injunction since Small’s footsteps were dying away down the corridor. Then came the sound of a slammed door――and silence. Silence, do I say? No, for, faint yet unmistakable above the silence of a Sunday afternoon, came the evidences of Small’s awful malady!

XI

AND STARTS IN BUSINESS

The Junior Four met again on Wednesday after morning school. The thaw had passed and the winter world was frozen hard again. Icicles hung from the gutters and the porches and even now, in the middle of the day, only an occasional drop pattered down under the faint ardor of the sun. In the harness room it was particularly cold. The sunlight created a little warmth by the window and Kid thoughtfully suggested to Lanny that it might be well if he changed places with Small.

“Let him have the sun on his back, Lanny. You don’t mind, do you? Go on, Small, sit over there; it’s warmer.”

So Small, by this time convinced that he was an object of pity and interest, took the upturned feed-pail with a sigh and coughed a hollow cough. Kid viewed him anxiously.

“I don’t like the sound of that, Small,” he observed, with a shake of his head. “Does it still hurt you?”

“Not much,” Small replied with an air of Christian fortitude. “Just a little here sometimes.” He laid a mittened hand on his chest. Kid nodded understandingly. It was evident to the rest that in spite of Small’s attempted cheerfulness he was suffering. Nan was deeply affected and was for throwing her ulster about his shoulders. But Small gallantly refused and Bert, remembering seeing a carriage robe in the Doctor’s buggy, fetched it and drew it solicitously about Small’s pathetic form. Small declared that he was quite warm and the meeting got down to business. The president requested information as to the present condition of the fund. Lanny reported fifty cents, Small a quarter, Nan thirty-five cents, Kid nothing and Bert himself a dollar.

“Two dollars and ten cents,” said Nan delightedly. “Why, it won’t take us any time at all to get the money, will it?”

“How much is the mug going to cost?” Lanny inquired.

“We don’t know that,” Bert said. “We’ve got to approve the design first and then send it to someone who makes such things.”

“I move that the design submitted by Small be approved and accepted,” said Lanny.

“Second the motion,” said Kid. Small looked across at him gratefully.

“It is moved and seconded,” announced Bert, “that the design be accepted. All in favor will signify it by saying Aye.”

There was a small chorus of Ayes.

“Contrary, No. It is a vote. Now the question is whether the cup is to be made of silver or pewter.”

“That’ll depend on how much money we raise, won’t it?” asked Lanny. “I think, though, it ought to be silver.”

“Of course it ought,” declared Nan. “We wouldn’t want to present a pewter cup, would we?”

“The hockey cup is only pewter,” said Bert.

“I know, but we wouldn’t want to present anything to the school that we’d be ashamed of,” responded Nan. “Besides, a silver one wouldn’t cost more than ten or twelve dollars, would it, Bert?”

“I shouldn’t think so. It would depend on how big it was. How big had you figured it to be, Small?”

Small shook his head. “I didn’t think about that. I guess it could be any size.”

“About six inches high?” suggested Lanny.

“Eight would be better,” said Bert. “Let’s say eight, shall we? We can get a――an estimate on it right away and then we’ll know how much money we’ll need. How’s that ten dollar contribution of yours getting on, Kid?”

“I’ll have it when you’re ready for it,” responded Kid calmly. “You can count on that all right. If the rest of you fellows do half as well we won’t have any trouble.”

“Kid, you never can get ten dollars,” said Nan reproachfully, “and you know it. Why, how could you?”

“You leave it to me, Nan,” replied Kid with a swagger. “I’ve said I’d get it. All you’ve got to do is to sit tight and wait. Pull that rug around you, Small.”

“Well, somebody ought to send the drawing somewhere and find out how much it’s going to be. I suppose that’s the secretary’s job, isn’t it?”

Kid viewed Lanny reproachfully. “I wasn’t elected corresponding secretary,” he said. “I’m just plain secretary.”

“Yes, you’re plain enough, all right.”

“Of course it’s your place to do it,” said Bert. “Don’t be so lazy. Here, you take the drawing and get busy. We ought to get an estimate by this time next week surely.”

“But where’ll I send it?” demanded Kid. “I don’t know anyone who makes silver cups.”

“Well, find out; ask someone. Mr. Crane can tell you, I guess.”

“Who’s going to pay for the postage stamp?” asked Kid.

“It will be paid for out of the fund, of course.”

“Oh, all right.” Kid looked about inquiringly. “Come across, someone. Two cents, please.”

“Haven’t you got two cents?” asked Lanny disgustedly.

Kid cheerfully shook his head. “I have not. And if I had I wouldn’t waste it on stamps.”

Bert supplied two pennies and Kid dropped them into his pocket. “You see that you buy a stamp with them, though, and not candy,” admonished Lanny. Kid grinned.

On Thursday a small package arrived by mail for Kid. The other fellows evinced a good deal of curiosity regarding it, and Harold Cupples asserted that he smelled candy. Kid declared that Harold was mistaken, and was finally allowed to bear the package away. He was a little bit disappointed in the size of it. He had unconsciously expected it to arrive by express and be more of the dimensions of a packing case. As Stanley was in the room, Kid bore the bundle downstairs to the laboratory, which was empty at that hour, and opened it. First of all there was a whole lot of advertising matter; a banner which when unrolled was nearly a foot and a half long and proportionately wide, a dozen circulars and an equal number of cards, all extolling the merits of Tinkham’s Throat-Ease. The banner was enticingly colored in black and red and its legend was: “Take a Tablet――Tinkham’s Throat-Ease Never Fails――Cure That Cough Now.” The circulars contained many testimonials which Kid postponed reading for the present. The cards held the picture of a little black imp tickling the throat of an agonized gentleman with a straw and the inscription: “Stop that Tickling! Use Tinkham’s Throat-Ease! Fifty Tasty Tablets for Twenty-five Cents! All Druggists Everywhere! If You Can’t Find Them Write to Us! Tinkham Chemical Co., Waterloo, Ill.”

The tablets were put up in little square pasteboard boxes, and in Kid’s judgment lacked attractiveness. He pushed open one box and viewed the contents. The tablets were very tiny, dark brown in color, and smelled like a drug store. Selecting one, Kid tasted it tentatively. It was distinctly unpleasant.

“All the better, though,” he reflected. “A fellow always thinks more of a medicine that tastes ugly. Gee, those things ought to scare a cough to death!”

He replaced the tablet in its box, carefully putting the damp side down, and considered the advertising matter. The black and red banner ought to be hung prominently somewhere, but where? Over the mantel in the hall would be the best place, but he was sure that they wouldn’t allow it to remain there. Why not in the gymnasium, then? Brilliant idea!

Luckily it was possible to get to the gymnasium from the laboratory without passing through the hall. Kid secured a tack and ascended the stairs. The gymnasium was empty and it took but a moment to hang the banner on the wall under the clock, reaching the place by climbing onto the dumb-bell rack. Jumping down, he viewed it critically. It certainly looked well there and added a much-needed note of color to the room. Then he distributed a few circulars about and retired. He managed to get the tablets up to his room without being seen by anyone, and was relieved to find that Stanley had gone out, probably for hockey practice. In fact, the sleeping floor seemed utterly deserted, and Kid decided that he could have no better opportunity for disposing of his cards. So he went from room to room and placed a card in plain sight on every bureau, usually leaning it against a hair brush. That done, he put six boxes of the tablets in his pocket and started out on the track of his prey.

The hockey teams were hard at work on the rinks, and Small, Bert and Lanny were watching the House players. Kid drew Small aside.

“You’d better button your coat up around your throat,” he advised him. Small obeyed. “How are you feeling? Is the cough any better?” Small coughed so that Kid might judge for himself. Evidently Kid found the cough not at all reassuring, for he looked troubled. “Feet warm?” he asked next. Small assured him that they were, likening their condition to toast. As a matter of fact, since Small had been standing in the snow for twenty minutes, his feet were decidedly cold and numb, but he wasn’t going to acknowledge it for fear that Kid would bully him into returning indoors. “Well, you’ll be all right now,” said Kid, brightening. “They’ve come.” He slapped Small reassuringly on the back.

Small immediately went off into another fit of coughing. When he could speak he demanded: “Who’s come?”

“The Tinkham’s Throat-Ease,” returned Kid triumphantly. “They came half an hour ago.”

“Oh! Was that what was in the package you got?”

Kid assented. “They didn’t get here any too soon, either,” he said. “That cough of yours is getting pretty bad, Small. Well, here you are.” He pulled forth one of the boxes. “Take one tablet every half hour until relieved.” Then he had a better idea. “The best way, though, is to take one whenever you feel that you want to cough. Take plenty of them. They won’t hurt you. They’re quite harmful.”

“What!”

“I mean harmless. Here you are.”

Small accepted the box and viewed the contents. Then he smelled of it and made a face. “Gee, but they smell awful, don’t they?” he asked.

Kid nodded. “Sure. That’s the drugs in them. That’s what does the business. Better take one now, Small.”

Small selected one of the little tablets, viewed it distastefully and finally put it into his mouth. Kid watched interestedly. For a moment Small gazed blankly across the rink. Then, with a gurgle of disgust he spat the tablet into the snow.

“What are you doing?” cried Kid. “Don’t waste them like that!”

“Gee, they’re awful, Kid! I can’t eat those things! I――I’d rather have the cough!”

“What did you think?” demanded Kid indignantly. “You don’t expect medicine to taste like candy, do you?”

“No, but I don’t expect it to taste like that, either. Why, they’re the worst things I ever put in my mouth. I’d rather go on coughing.” He thrust the box back at Kid. Kid refused to see it.

“Yes, go on coughing and get pneumonia or something like that and die,” he said disgustedly. “Don’t be a silly chump, Small. Why, those things aren’t anything to what you may have to taste if you don’t cure that cough! I wish you could taste the stuff they gave me when I had scarlet fever last year! These things are fine compared with that, Small!”

“I’d rather take those licorice pastilles that――――”

“I dare say you would! But they won’t help you a bit. They just taste good, that’s all. You might as well eat sweet chocolate or gum drops! These things will cure you, don’t you see? Go on now, Small, be sensible, can’t you? Try another one. Honest, after you’ve got used to them you’ll like them awfully!”

“I don’t believe I need ’em,” muttered Small, viewing the box doubtfully. “My cough’s a good deal better than it was, and――――”

“Better! It’s a whole lot worse, Small. I’ve been noticing it. You think it’s better, I dare say, but that’s just one of the symptoms. Why, folks that have tuburcu――tub――that have consumption don’t ever realize how sick they are, Small! They keep on thinking all the time that they’re getting better.”

Small looked genuinely uncomfortable. He laughed a hollow laugh and coughed.

“Quick!” cried Kid. “Now’s the time! Take one!”

Small made a wild dash at the box, spilled several of the tablets in the snow and finally got one into his mouth. Almost at once, after a few choking sounds, the coughing stopped. Small looked at Kid in alarm.

“Gee!” he muttered hoarsely. “I swallowed it whole!”

Kid was equal to the emergency. “Fine!” he exclaimed. “You get the effect quicker that way. Have another!”

But Small shook his head and hastily dropped the box of tablets in his pocket. “I don’t believe I want any more just yet,” he said.

“Well, it’s a good plan to keep one dissolving in your mouth all the time.”

“You said I was to take them only when I felt like coughing,” charged Small.

“I know, but it stands to reason that the more often you take them the sooner they’re going to cure you, don’t it?”

That sounded reasonable, and Small had to agree. So he put another one into his mouth and proceeded to make faces at the landscape. Kid stifled a chuckle.

“Well, I must be going,” he said. “I want to see Lanny. Have you got that quarter with you, Small?”

“What quarter?” asked Small innocently.

“For the tablets. They’re a quarter a box. I told you that. Don’t you remember? They’re cheap, too. If you had to have a doctor he’d charge you a dollar just for looking at you and then your medicine would be extra.”

“Oh!” Small became very intent on the practice game. “I haven’t got it right now, Kid, but I’ll give it to you soon.”

Kid shook his head. “I’m willing to trust you, Small, but you see I have to pay cash for these. You’d better give me that quarter in your pocket and then you won’t have to think about it again.”

“What quarter?” asked Small blankly.

“Why, the quarter you saved for the Fund. You know you told us you had a quarter, Small.”

“Well, I know, Kid, but I can’t give you that! That’s――that’s owing to the Fund!”

“I know, but you won’t have to pay up for a month or more. You give me that quarter and put the next one into the Fund; see?”

Small didn’t seem to see at first, and it took a lot of eloquence on Kid’s part to separate Small from his twenty-five cent piece. But finally persistence prevailed and Kid strolled off, the quarter jingling cheerfully against a hitherto lonely penny in his trousers pocket, leaving Small to scowl upon his retreating back and surreptitiously remove the remains of Tinkham’s Throat-Ease tablet from his mouth.

Lanny was the next victim marked for despoliation. Kid took up a position beside him and watched practice for a minute. Then,

“Gee, Lanny,” he said, “aren’t your feet frozen?”

Lanny acknowledged that they were, and, being reminded of physical discomforts, took out a handkerchief at the cost of much trouble, and applied it to his nose. “Did you see that goal of Ben’s a minute ago, Kid?” he asked with a sniffle. “It was a peach!”

“Yes,” Kid nodded gravely. “Say, you’re getting a cold, aren’t you?” he asked more solicitously.

“No, I guess not. George is skating a good deal better than he did the first of the winter, isn’t he?”

“Lots. The trouble with me is that when I get to sniffling like you are my throat feels funny. Sort of raw and――and scrapy. Does yours get that way?”

Lanny experimented with his throat and nodded. “Yes, it feels sort of that way now.”

“I thought it did. I can tell. I’ve got something that’s wonderful for sore throat, Lanny. Ever use Tinkham’s Throat-Ease?”

“Ever use what?”

“Tinkham’s Throat-Ease. They’re tablets and you just hold them in your mouth, you know, and they make your throat feel fine. They’ll cure hoarseness or cough or most anything like that.”

“Never heard of them. Taste good, do they? Where do you get them?”

“Any first-class drug store. Of course, you can’t get them around here, though.”

“What’s the good of talking about them then? Did you say you had some?”

“I think so.” Kid searched laboriously in his pocket. “I think I’ve got a box left somewhere, if I can find it. Here it is.” He held it out and Lanny accepted it. Trustingly he pushed the box open, took out a tablet and put it into his mouth. Kid edged away.

“_Jee-rusalem!_” Lanny swung around and gazed menacingly at Kid. “What are they made of?”

“I don’t know, but they’re the best remedy there is for sore throat. You can have that box, Lanny.”

“Hm; much obliged.” Lanny sucked at the tablet and scowled. “Maybe they’re good for your throat, but they’re mighty unpleasant to your taster, Kid. I guess they’ve got wild cherry in them, haven’t they?”

“That’s one of the things,” answered Kid. “Wild cherry and――and paregoric, I think. Paregoric’s a very powerful drug, you know. Puts you to sleep if you take too much of it.”

“I know.” Lanny nodded wisely. “And wild cherry’s awfully good for throats. They don’t taste very nice, but you can tell they’re powerful. Much obliged, Kid.”

“Don’t mention it. Maybe I can get another box. They’re only twenty-five cents, you see.”

Lanny started. “What’s twenty-five cents?” he demanded.

“Why, those tablets. Twenty-five cents a box. There are fifty in a box and they last a long time――――”

“Look here, Kid, do you mean you expect me to pay you a quarter for these things?”

“Sure! That’s the regular price. I’m not trying to cheat you, Lanny, honest!”

“But I thought you were giving them to me!” Lanny searched hurriedly for the box which he had dropped into a cavernous pocket of his ulster. “I don’t want them that bad.”