Winning His "W"

A Story of Freshman Year at College

BY

Everett T. Tomlinson

M.A. DONOHUE & COMPANY
CHICAGO NEW YORK

1904

PREFACE

In this book I have endeavored to relate the story of a boy's early experiences in college life—a boy who was neither unnaturally good nor preternaturally bad, wholesome, earnest, impulsive, making just such mistakes as a normal boy would make, and yet earnest, sincere, and healthy. We all have known just such boys and are grateful that they are neither uncommon nor unknown.

Perhaps it may add a little to the interest of this tale if it is stated that many of the events described in it actually occurred. I have not tagged a "moral" upon it, for if the story itself shall not bear its own moral, then the addition will not add to it.

Everett T. Tomlinson.

Elizabeth, New Jersey.

CONTENTS

1. The Opening Term
2. Peter John's Arrival
3. New Friends and New Experiences
4. A Cloud of Witnesses
5. Unsought Attentions
6. A Race in the Darkness
7. Splinter's Questions
8. The Parade
9. The Walk with Mott
10. A Visitor
11. The Perpetual Problem
12. The Meet
13. Wagner's Advice
14. The Advice Followed
15. A Reversed Decision
16. Telegrams
17. Peter John's Downfall
18. An Alarming Report
19. A Rare Interview
20. A Crisis
21. The Examination
22. A Fresh Excitement
23. The Rush to Coventry Center
24. The Mystery of the Canes
25. On the Trail
26. St. Patrick's Day
27. Conclusion

WINNING HIS "W"

CHAPTER I

THE OPENING TERM

"I've got a letter from Peter John."

"What's the trouble with him? He ought to have been here yesterday or the day before."

"I'm afraid Peter John never'll be on time. He doesn't seem to have taken that in his course. He'd never pass an 'exam' in punctuality."

"What does he want?"

"The poor chap begs us to meet him at the station."

"What train?"

"The two-seventeen."

"Then we've no time to waste. Is he afraid he'll be lost?"

"He's afraid, all right."

"What's he afraid of?"

"Everything and everybody, I guess. Poor chap."

Will Phelps laughed good-naturedly as he spoke, and it was evident that his sympathy for "Peter John" was genuine. His friend and room-mate, Foster Bennett, was as sympathetic as he, though his manner was more quiet and his words were fewer; their fears for their friend were evidently based upon their own personal knowledge.

For four years the three young men had been classmates in the Sterling High School, and in the preceding June had graduated from its course of study, and all three had decided to enter Winthrop College. The entrance examinations had been successfully passed, and at the time when this story opens all had been duly registered as students in the incoming class of the college.

Foster Bennett and Will Phelps were to be room-mates, and for several days previous to the September day on which the conversation already recorded had taken place they had been in the little college town, arranging their various belongings in the room in Perry Hall, one of the best of all the dormitory buildings. The first assembling of the college students was to occur on the morrow, and then the real life upon which they were about to enter was to begin.

The two boys had come to