is not liable to
give serious trouble to a man of your stamina, endurance, and nerve."

The doctor's bill was paid, and then they sought a hotel, where they
found accommodations, and the wounded one was put into bed. Ere getting
into bed he shook hands with his two companions and said:

"It's not easy, senors, to kill one in whose veins runs the blood of
old Guerrero. They thought me dead, but the dog that fired the shot
shall pay the penalty of his treachery, and I swear I will yet crush
Frank Merriwell as the panther crushes the doe. That's the oath of
Porfias del Norte!"

CHAPTER II.

THE TERROR OF O'TOOLE.

Watson Scott, familiarly known as Old Gripper, was a man of great
hardihood and endurance, and, therefore, for all of his recent
experience with Frank Merriwell's enemies, for all that he had been
imprisoned by his captors in a natural well and had stood for hours in
water up to his hips, he rapidly recovered after arriving once more at
the cottage of his friend and business associate, Warren Hatch, on Lake
Placid.

But Old Gripper had been aroused, and he was determined to make it hot
for his recent captors, who, led by Porfias del Norte, had gone to
desperate lengths to obtain valuable papers which were the basis of a
business combination that threatened the interests of Del Norte and his
associates.

"Unless they move on the jump I'll have the bunch of them nipped before
long," Old Gripper declared.

To his vexation he found it was impossible to properly swear out a
warrant for the arrest of Del Norte's companions without making the
journey to Saranac Lake.

"I'll do that the first thing in the morning," he said.

In the morning, however, he found himself stiff and lame, and he was
induced to delay until noon.

During the forenoon he decided to return without further delay to New
York. Having settled on this, he sent a message to Saranac Lake, stating
his charges against Porfias del Norte's band of desperadoes, and asking
that the warrant be drawn up and brought to him at the station as he was
passing through. He also gave instructions that officers should be on
hand to immediately take up the work of running the gang down.

Before noon Belmont Bland, Old Gripper's private secretary, was
apparently taken ill, and when the time came for Scott to depart Bland
seemed unable to travel. He asserted that it was one of his usual
nervous attacks, and declared he would be all right by the next