Ready About by Oliver Optic

Almost at the same moment, it came to the active mind of Dory Dornwood that the burglars might have gone to the bay, and embarked in a boat. They were as likely to do this as they were to take to the road. He had heard nothing since the sound of the voice startled him, and the villains might be two or three miles from him by this time. It would not be pleasant for him, at the breakfast-table the next morning, to relate that he had got on the track of the robbers, and then entirely lost the clew to them.

The thought of such a state of things annoyed him; and he decided that he should rather be shot, or at least be shot at, than subject himself to this degree of humiliation. But it was best to be prudent, even after he had decided to be shot at rather than be inactive any longer; and he walked some distance beyond the cart-path, to the northward.