ly chance
for escape offered him, plunged head-foremost into the bushes. He barely
missed being run down, for Roderick flew by before he was fairly out of
the path, and, by the time he had recovered his feet, Frank was out of
sight.

When Frank reached home, he shed a great many tears over Marmion's
untimely death; but, as it happened, it was grief wasted. One morning,
about a week after his adventure with the highwayman, while Frank and
Archie were out for their morning's ride, a sorry-looking object crawled
into the court, and thence into the office, where Mr. Winters was busy
at his desk. "Mad dog!" shouted the gentleman, when he discovered the
intruder; and, springing to his feet, he lifted his chair over his head,
and was in the very act of extinguishing the last spark of life left in
the poor brute, when the sight of a collar he wore around his neck
arrested his hand. It was no wonder that Uncle James had not recognized
the animal, for he looked very unlike the lively, well-conditioned dog
which Frank was wont to regard as the apple of his eye. But,
nevertheless, it was Marmion, or, rather, all that was left of him. He
had been severely wounded, and was nearly starved; but he received the
best of care, and it was not long before he was as savage and full of
fight as ever. Although he had failed to capture the robber, he had
rendered his master a most important service, and no one ever heard him
find fault with Marmion after that.

Frank's reputation was by this time firmly established, and he was the
lion of the settlement. Dick Lewis was prouder than ever of him. Of
course, he called him a "keerless feller," and read him several long
lectures, illustrating them by incidents drawn from his own experience.
He related the story of Frank's adventures with the robber every time he
could induce any one to listen to it, and ever afterward called him "the
boy that fit that ar' Greaser." Old Bob Kelly beamed benevolently upon
him every time they met, and more than once told his companion that the
"youngster would make an amazin' trapper;" and that, in Dick's
estimation, was a compliment worth all the rest.

Meanwhile, the country had been made exceedingly unsafe for Pierre
Costello. The neighbors had turned out in force, every nook and corner
of the mountains for miles around had been searched, and a large reward
offered for the robber's apprehension; but it was all in vain. Nothing
more had been heard of Pierre, and F