Page:Stanwood Pier--Harding of St Timothys.djvu/216

188 Harry acknowledged to himself that this was reasonable, and they walked on for a time in gloomy silence. Then Herrick suddenly broke out:—

"Oh, I feel as if it was all my fault! If I only had n't tripped him up that day, this might never have happened!"

"What nonsense!" Harry exclaimed. "What had that to do with his getting sick now?"

"You can't tell; it might have everything to do with it. I suppose maybe he got all run down being laid up so long without exercise. Oh, honestly, Harry, if I could, I 'd take his place now!"

"It will do him almost as much good to hear that you felt that way," said Harry. In the afternoon Harry went again to the infirmary, told the matron what Joe Herrick had wished, and asked her to repeat it to Rupert.

She promised to do this, but perhaps the message was never quite clearly understood in the boy's fever-burning brain. For typhoid