The boy staggered. Uttering hoarse exclamations, his assailants, like beasts of prey, sprang upon him.
"Give it to him!" cried a voice.
With new strength, Frank twisted and squirmed. In doing so, he threw his head from side to side, and it chanced that he succeeded in saving it from the blows which were intended to render him helpless.
Those blows, many of them, at least, fell on his shoulders and his back with benumbing force.
He forgot that his left hand was not yet well, but he used it as freely and as vigorously as his right.
And, once more, something like a laugh came from his lips.
"Hear him!" hissed one of the ruffians. "Why, he's a perfect young fiend!"
But Frank could not long hold his own against such odds. Some of the blows aimed at his head fell glancingly, but they were enough to rob him in a measure of his strength. He tried to tear away, and then he was felled to the ground.
Merriwell felt that "the jig was up" with him. They had him at their mercy, at last.