Nor was this all, for two different men who had seen her come in, and afterwards had watched her go out, were absolutely sure that, though she went out a cutter, she came in a yawl. This was an important difference, and would so alter the appearance of the boat that the very skipper who had been sailing her might well have been pardoned for not knowing his own craft. I had played my cards sometimes wisely, but more often foolishly, while conducting my search for Captain Shannon, but the wisest and the luckiest deal I made throughout the business was my determination to spare no pains in ascertaining what step the fugitive had taken to cover up his tracks, before I set out to look for a five-ton yawl, painted white, picked out with gold, and bearing the name of the “Odd Trick.” But for that determination and the discoveries which resulted from it I should in all probability have passed unnoticed the little brown cutter that I saw lying at anchor to the west of Southend as I passed by in the small steam launch which I hired for the purpose of carrying on my investigation. And had I passed that cutter unnoticed Captain Shannon would in all probability have reached America or Australia in safety, and it is more than likely that this narrative would never have been written. To the comment “And small loss too!” which may rise--and not unreasonably--to the lips of some critics, I can only reply that I undertook my search for Captain Shannon to please myself, and in search of excitement. It is the plain story of the adventures which befell me, and not a literary study, which is here set forth, and I am quite content to have it written down as such, and nothing more. The one thing I can safely assert about it is that it is not a story dealing with the New Woman. If it has any peculiarity at all, it is that it tells of one of the few pieces of mischief which have happened in this world since the days of Eve, concerning which it may, without fear of contradiction, be affirmed that no woman had a hand in it; for, with the exception of the mere mention of Mrs. Stanley Burgoyne--who never once comes upon the scene in person--this is a story without a woman in it. CHAPTER XXIII HOW I GOT WEDGED IN A WINDOW, AND LEFT BEHIND