“Matter?” howled Jack. “Ghost of Cæsar! that thing was red-hot! It’s burned the lining out of my mouth!”
“Well, it had some kind of stuff on it that was hotter than the hottest red pepper! Woosh! Oh, my mouth! Water――give me water, or I perish!”
Tears were running down his checks and he was gasping for breath. Somebody handed him what seemed to be a glass of water. He seized it and took two big swallows. Then he flung the glass and its contents crashing against the wall, with another howl fully as loud as the first.
“Gods of the Egyptians!” he almost shrieked. “What is that stuff? I’m poisoned!”
“Poisoned?” they cried, in apparent alarm.
“I guess so! That stuff was bitter as the bitterest gall, and it has puckered my mouth so I can hardly get it open to speak!”
“Bitter――he says it was bitter!” cried one man. “Where did it come from?”
“I brought it from the black chamber,” answered one of the students.
“Then he is poisoned!” roared the master. “It is the fatal drink which every candidate swears to take if he reveals any of the secrets of our sacred order! Good heavens! gentlemen, this matter is serious! If that liquid is not removed from his stomach within five minutes, he dies!”
Jack Ready uttered a groan and dropped down on his chair, his mouth seeming puckered and drawn up.
“Death,” he said thickly, and with a great effort, “I shall welcome as sweet relief! Let it come!”
“Bring the stomach-pump!” thundered the master.
Somebody came rushing from another room with a queer-looking arrangement in his hands. Another fellow brought a huge bucket. A rubber tube was thrust into Ready’s mouth, while he was held and kept from struggling by half a dozen persons.
“Work fast if you hope to save his life!” shouted the master. “Even now the poison seems working upon him! He is turning black in the face! He is about to have convulsions! If he dies, we are in an awful scrape!”
Everybody seemed wildly excited. They packed about the chair upon which Ready was being held, climbing upon each other’s shoulders to get a good look at him.
“How fearfully pale he is about the mouth!”
These exclamations came from their lips, and they were not calculated to soothe the feelings of the struggling freshman. Ready succeeded in spitting out the rubber tube.