He pursued this policy, left Princetown for Plymouth on the
following day, took a room at a sailors' inn on the Barbican and
with the help of the harbour authority followed the voyages of a
dozen small vessels which had been berthing at Plymouth during the
critical days.

A month of arduous work he devoted to this stage of the inquiry, and
his investigation produced nothing whatever. Not a skipper of any
vessel involved could furnish the least information and no man
resembling Robert Redmayne had been seen by the harbour police, or
any independent person at Plymouth, despite sharp watchfulness.

A time came when the detective was recalled to London and heartily
chaffed for his failure; but his own unusual disappointment
disarmed the amusement at his expense. The case had presented such
few apparent difficulties that Brendon's complete unsuccess
astonished his chief. He was content, however, to believe Mark's own
conviction: that Robert Redmayne had never left England but
destroyed himself--probably soon after the dispatch of his letter to
Bendigo from Plymouth.

Much demanded attention and Brendon was soon devoting himself to a
diamond robbery in the Midlands. Months passed, the body of Michael
Pendean had not been recovered, and the little world of Scotland
Yard pigeon-holed the mystery, while the larger world forgot all
about it.

Meantime, with a sense of secret relief, Mark Brendon prepared to
face what had sprung out of these incidents, while permitting the
events themselves to pass from his present interests. There remained