"Toward the harbor, sir," the sentry replied.
The harbor could be reached in twenty minutes' fast driving. Without a word the colonel sprang on his horse; I imitated him, and we galloped as hard as we could, everyone making way before our furious charge. Alas! we were too late. As we drew rein on the quay we saw, half a mile out to sea and sailing before a stiff breeze, Johnny Carr's little yacht, with the Aureataland flag floating defiantly at her masthead.
We gazed at it blankly, with never a word to say, and turned our horses' heads. Our attention was attracted by a small group of men standing round the storm-signal post. As we rode up, they hastily scattered, and we saw pinned to the post a sheet of note-paper. Thereupon was written in a well-known hand:
"I, Marcus W. Whittingham, President of the Republic of Aureataland, hereby offer a REWARD of FIVE THOUSAND DOLLARS and a FREE PARDON to any person or persons assisting in the CAPTURE, ALIVE or DEAD, of GEORGE MCGREGOR (late Colonel in the Aureataland Army) and JOHN MARTIN, Bank Manager, and I do further proclaim the said George McGregor and John Martin to be traitors and rebels against the Republic, and do pronounce their lives forfeited. Which sentence let every loyal citizen observe at his peril.
The habit of reading having penetrated, as we are told, to all classes of the community, I am not without hope that some who peruse this chronicle will be able, from personal experience, to understand the feelings of a man when he first finds a reward offered for his apprehension. It is true that our police are not in the habit of imitating the President's naked brutality by expressly adding "Alive or Dead," but I am informed that the law, in case of need, leaves the alternative open to the servants of justice. I am not ashamed to confess that my spirits were rather dashed by his Excellency's Parthian shot, and I could see that the colonel himself was no less perturbed. The escape of _Fleance_ seemed to _Macbeth_ to render his whole position unsafe, and no one who knew General Whittingham will doubt that he was a more dangerous opponent than _Fleance_. We both felt, in fact, as soon as we saw the white sail of _The Songstress_ bearing our enemy out of our reach, that the revolution could not yet be regarded as safely accomplished. But the uncertainty of our tenure of power did not paralyze our energies; on the contrary, we determined to make hay while the sun shone, and, if Aureataland was doomed to succumb once more to tyranny, I, for one, was very clear that her temporary emancipation might be turned to good account.