“We’ll send Travers back with a little collection, to fix it up with the farmer, and blarney him out of taking any action.”

* * * * *

In the morning I had a roaring headache ... as long as I lay quiet there was only the slow, deep regular pulse of pain driving through my head, but when I made an effort to get up, my eyeballs throbbed with such torment that they seemed to be starting out of my head....

I fell asleep in the broad day again, waking to find Jack Travers standing by my bed, pale and cynical, dusting off the ashes from the end of his eternal cigarette.

“How are you feeling this morning?”

“Rotten,” I answered.  I sat up and triphammers of pain renewed their pounding inside my racked head.

—­“thought you would, so’s soon as I got up, I came down to see you.”

—­“lot of good that’ll do.”

He whipped a flask out of his hip pocket.  “Take a nip of this and it will set you right in a jiffy.”

“No, I’ll never drink another drop.”

“Don’t be a fool.  Just a swallow and you’ll be on your feet again.”

I took a big swallow and it braced me up instantly.

“Now, come on with me, Johnnie, I’m taking you in tow for to-day!  A fellow who’s not used to getting drunk always mopes around after a good time like we had....  I’m seeing you through the day after ... you’re going to lunch with me at the frat-house and this afternoon there’s a sacred concert on in Aeolian Hall that I have two tickets for.”

“I’ll never drink another drop as long as I live.”

“That’s what they all say.”

* * * * *

At the Sig Kappas I met Black Jim, the first one, at the door.  He shook hands shyly, laughingly.

“You sure fetched that rube a wallop ... he let one croak out of him and flopped flat ... it would have made a good comic picture.”

“Lunch is ready, boys!”

I was made into a sort of hero—­“a real, honest-to-God guy.”

“You’ll have to come to some of our frat jamborees ...  Jack’ll bring you up.”

“We and the Sigma Deltas are Southern fraternities ... we have a hell of a sight more fun than the others ... there’s the Sigma Pis—­though they have some live birds, they’re mostly dead ... and the Phi Nus put on too much side ... the Beta Omicrons are right there with the goods, though.”

“I see.”

A little freshman made an off-colour remark.

“You’d better go and see Jennie!” advised a genial young senior, who, for all his youth, was entirely bald.

“Jennie, who’s Jennie?” I asked, curious.

“Our frat woman!” answered Travers casually.

“Frat woman?” I was groping for further information, puzzled.

“Yes, often a fraternity keeps a woman for the use of its members ... when a kid comes to us so innocent he’s annoying, we turn him over to Jennie to be made a man of.”