McNab, seeing this, ran down to the water-side to aid the Commandant.
“Lift her over the Bar, men!” he shouted. “With a will—So!” And, raised in twelve strong arms, the pursuing craft slid across the isthmus.
“We've five minutes' start,” said Vetch coolly, as he saw the Commandant take his place in the stern sheets. “Pull away, my jolly boys, and we'll best 'em yet.”
The soldiers on the Neck fired again almost at random, but the blaze of their pieces only served to show the Commandant's boat a hundred yards astern of that of the mutineers, which had already gained the deep water of Pirates' Bay.
Then, for the first time, the six prisoners became aware that John Rex was not among them.
CHAPTER XXIV. IN THE NIGHT.
John Rex had put into execution the first part of his scheme.
At the moment when, seeing Burgess's boat near the sand-spit, he had uttered the warning cry heard by Vetch, he turned back into the darkness, and made for the water's edge at a point some distance from the Neck. His desperate hope was that, the attention of the guard being concentrated on the escaping boat, he might, favoured by the darkness and the confusion—swim to the peninsula. It was not a very marvellous feat to accomplish, and he had confidence in his own powers. Once safe on the peninsula, his plans were formed. But, owing to the strong westerly wind, which caused an incoming tide upon the isthmus, it was necessary for him to attain some point sufficiently far to the southward to enable him, on taking the water, to be assisted, not impeded, by the current. With this view, he hurried over the sandy hummocks at the entrance to the Neck, and ran backwards towards the sea. In a few strides he had gained the hard and sandy shore, and, pausing to listen, heard behind him the sound of footsteps. He was pursued. The footsteps stopped, and then a voice cried—
“Surrender!”