Douglas Harper's Etymology Dictionary
WordNet
v. retreat at full speed; "The actress haigh-tailed to her villa when reporters began to follow her to the restaurant"
Usage examples of "high-tail".
He also stepped on my face when he jumped up, and the next instant he was high-tailing it through the bresh in the general direction of Bear Creek.
To keep Monro busy, I said, 'We can wait here until the bears go away, then I think we should high-tail it outta here.
We were just about to high-tail it over here when Yoshima busted in with his guards and started yakking about he was going to search this hut - one of you was supposed to have a radio in a water bottle - how crazy can you get?
It consisted of nearly three tons of steel stamped into a massively mawed, high-tailed beast, lined with enough chrome to build a Terminator and still have parts left over -- most of it in long, sharp strips that peeled off on impact and became lethal scythes to flay away pedestrian flesh.
As the small group of young black men walked single file along the forest path, a burly nineteen-year-old Negro named Sebbie called to Tim at the front of the line, 'How's your Ma putting up with fancy pants Alphonse St Cloude since Miss Chloe high-tailed it to Dragonard Hill to shack up with Master Peter?