Meanwhile, “Bear Castle” rang with the signals of alarm and assault. At the first sound of danger, Elijah Fields dashed forward in the direction which Coulter had taken. But the private signal which he sounded for the other was unanswered, and the assailants were now breaking through the swamp, and were to be heard on every hand. To retreat, to rally his comrades, to mount their steeds, dash into the river and take the stream was all the work of an instant. From the middle of the sweeping current the shouts of hate and defiance came to the ears of the tories as they broke from the copse and appeared on the banks of the river. A momentary glimpse of the dark bulk of one or more steeds as they whirled round an interposing headland, drew from them the remaining bullets in their pistols, but without success; and, ignorant of the effect of a random bullet upon the very person whom, of all, he most desired to destroy, Mat Dunbar felt himself once more foiled in a pursuit which he had this time undertaken with every earnest of success. “That d—d African!” was his exclamation. “But he shall hang for it now, though he never hung before!” With this pious resolution, having, with torches, made such an exploration of Bear Castle as left them in no doubt that all the fugitives had escaped, our tory captain called his squad together, and commenced their return. The fatigue of passing through the dry swamp on their backward route was much greater than when they entered it. They were then full of excitement, full of that rapture of the strife which needs not even the feeling of hate and revenge to make it grateful to an eager and impulsive temper. Now, they were baffled—the excitement was at an end—and with the feeling of perfect disappointment came the full feeling of all the toils and exertions they had undergone. They had but one immediate consolation in reserve, and that was the hanging of Brough, which Dunbar promised them. The howl of the African had defeated their enterprise. The African must howl no longer. Bent on murder, they hastened to the tree where they had left him bound, only to meet with a new disappointment. The African was there no longer! CHAPTER VI.