"What!" he exclaimed, horrified. "Look out what you're doing, child! Don't you dare try that on me!"
"I've got to," she insisted. "Please dod bake be dervous or we bay have ad accidend——"
"Take that stuff away!" he yelled. "You'll give me too much and then I won't wake up at all!"
"I'll be as careful as I cad," she promised him. "Dow be still——"
"But this is monstrous!" he retorted, flopping about in the leaves like a stranded fish and frantically endeavouring to dodge the wet and reeking handkerchief.
"Let go of my nose! Help! He—he—hah—h—um! bz-z-z-z——" and he suddenly relaxed and fell back a limp, loose-limbed mass among the leaves.
Pale and resolute the girl knelt beside him, freed him from the net, and, bending nearer, gazed earnestly into his unconscious features. Still gazing, she drew a postman's whistle from her satchel, set it to her lips, and was about to summon the student on duty at the distant gate to help bring in the quarry, when something about the features of the recumbent young man arrested her attention.
The postman's whistle fell from her pretty lips; her startled eyes widened as she bent closer to examine the perfections which had captivated her from a scientific standpoint.
At that instant consciousness began to return; he gave a sudden spasmodic and comprehensive flop; there was a report like a pistol. His chest improver had exploded.
Terrified, trembling, she dropped on her knees beside him; never before had she heard of a young man being blown to pieces by chloroform. Then, almost hysterical, she ran to the stream, filled her leather satchel with water, and, running back again, emptied it upon his upturned countenance.
