The-Return-of-Sherlock-Holmes

“I have nothing more to say, Mr. Holmes, except that I was angry with my
wife that night for having held me back when I might have caught the skulking
rascal. She said that she feared that I might come to harm. For an instant it had
crossed my mind that perhaps what she really feared was that he might come to
harm, for I could not doubt that she knew who this man was, and what he meant
by these strange signals. But there is a tone in my wife’s voice, Mr. Holmes, and
a look in her eyes which forbid doubt, and I am sure that it was indeed my own
safety that was in her mind. There’s the whole case, and now I want your advice
as to what I ought to do. My own inclination is to put half a dozen of my farm
lads in the shrubbery, and when this fellow comes again to give him such a
hiding that he will leave us in peace for the future.”

“I fear it is too deep a case for such simple remedies,” said Holmes. “How
long can you stay in London?”

“I must go back to-day. I would not leave my wife alone all night for anything.
She is very nervous, and begged me to come back.”

“I daresay you are right. But if you could have stopped, I might possibly have
been able to return with you in a day or two. Meanwhile you will leave me these
papers, and I think that it is very likely that I shall be able to pay you a visit
shortly and to throw some light upon your case.”

Sherlock Holmes preserved his calm professional manner until our visitor had
left us, although it was easy for me, who knew him so well, to see that he was
profoundly excited. The moment that Hilton Cubitt’s broad back had
disappeared through the door my comrade rushed to the table, laid out all the
slips of paper containing dancing men in front of him, and threw himself into an
intricate and elaborate calculation. For two hours I watched him as he covered
sheet after sheet of paper with figures and letters, so completely absorbed in his
task that he had evidently forgotten my presence. Sometimes he was making
progress and whistled and sang at his work; sometimes he was puzzled, and
would sit for long spells with a furrowed brow and a vacant eye. Finally he
sprang from his chair with a cry of satisfaction, and walked up and down the
room rubbing his hands together. Then he wrote a long telegram upon a cable
form. “If my answer to this is as I hope, you will have a very pretty case to add
to your collection, Watson,” said he. “I expect that we shall be able to go down
to Norfolk tomorrow, and to take our friend some very definite news as to the
secret of his annoyance.”

I confess that I was filled with curiosity, but I was aware that Holmes liked to
make his disclosures at his own time and in his own way, so I waited until it
should suit him to take me into his confidence.

But there was a delay in that answering telegram, and two days of impatience
followed, during which Holmes pricked up his ears at every ring of the bell. On
the evening of the second there came a letter from Hilton Cubitt. All was quiet
with him, save that a long inscription had appeared that morning upon the
pedestal of the sundial. He inclosed a copy of it, which is here reproduced:

ELSIE-PREPARE-TO-MEET-THY-GOD

Holmes bent over this grotesque frieze for some minutes, and then suddenly
sprang to his feet with an exclamation of surprise and dismay. His face was
haggard with anxiety.

“We have let this affair go far enough,” said he. “Is there a train to North
Walsham to-night?”

I turned up the time-table. The last had just gone.

“Then we shall breakfast early and take the very first in the morning,” said
Holmes. “Our presence is most urgently needed. Ah! here is our expected
cablegram. One moment, Mrs. Hudson, there may be an answer. No, that is quite
as I expected. This message makes it even more essential that we should not lose
an hour in letting Hilton Cubitt know how matters stand, for it is a singular and a
dangerous web in which our simple Norfolk squire is entangled.”

So, indeed, it proved, and as I come to the dark conclusion of a story which
had seemed to me to be only childish and bizarre, I experience once again the
dismay and horror with which I was filled. Would that I had some brighter
ending to communicate to my readers, but these are the chronicles of fact, and I
must follow to their dark crisis the strange chain of events which for some days
made Riding Thorpe Manor a household word through the length and breadth of
England.

We had hardly alighted at North Walsham, and mentioned the name of our
destination, when the station-master hurried towards us. “I suppose that you are
the detectives from London?” said he.

A look of annoyance passed over Holmes’s face.

“What makes you think such a thing?”

“Because Inspector Martin from Norwich has just passed through. But maybe
you are the surgeons. She’s not dead—or wasn’t by last accounts. You may be in
time to save her yet—though it be for the gallows.”

Holmes’s brow was dark with anxiety.

“We are going to Riding Thorpe Manor,” said he, “but we have heard nothing

of what has passed there.”

“It’s a terrible business,” said the stationmaster. “They are shot, both Mr.
Hilton Cubitt and his wife. She shot him and then herself—so the servants say.
He’s dead and her life is despaired of. Dear, dear, one of the oldest families in
the county of Norfolk, and one of the most honoured.”

Without a word Holmes hurried to a carriage, and during the long seven miles’
drive he never opened his mouth. Seldom have I seen him so utterly despondent.
He had been uneasy during all our journey from town, and I had observed that he
had turned over the morning papers with anxious attention, but now this sudden
realization of his worst fears left him in a blank melancholy. He leaned back in
his seat, lost in gloomy speculation. Yet there was much around to interest us, for
we were passing through as singular a countryside as any in England, where a
few scattered cottages represented the population of to-day, while on every hand
enormous square-towered churches bristled up from the flat green landscape and
told of the glory and prosperity of old East Anglia. At last the violet rim of the
German Ocean appeared over the green edge of the Norfolk coast, and the driver
pointed with his whip to two old brick and timber gables which projected from a
grove of trees. “That’s Riding Thorpe Manor,” said he.

As we drove up to the porticoed front door, I observed in front of it, beside the
tennis lawn, the black tool-house and the pedestalled sundial with which we had
such strange associations. A dapper little man, with a quick, alert manner and a
waxed moustache, had just descended from a high dog-cart. He introduced
himself as Inspector Martin, of the Norfolk Constabulary, and he was
considerably astonished when he heard the name of my companion.

“Why, Mr. Holmes, the crime was only committed at three this morning. How
could you hear of it in London and get to the spot as soon as I?”

“I anticipated it. I came in the hope of preventing it.”

“Then you must have important evidence, of which we are ignorant, for they
were said to be a most united couple.”

“I have only the evidence of the dancing men,” said Holmes. “I will explain
the matter to you later. Meanwhile, since it is too late to prevent this tragedy, I
am very anxious that I should use the knowledge which I possess in order to
insure that justice be done. Will you associate me in your investigation, or will
you prefer that I should act independently?”

“I should be proud to feel that we were acting together, Mr. Holmes,” said the
inspector, earnestly.

“In that case I should be glad to hear the evidence and to examine the

premises without an instant of unnecessary delay.”

Inspector Martin had the good sense to allow my friend to do things in his
own fashion, and contented himself with carefully noting the results. The local
surgeon, an old, white-haired man, had just come down from Mrs. Hilton
Cubitt’s room, and he reported that her injuries were serious, but not necessarily
fatal. The bullet had passed through the front of her brain, and it would probably
be some time before she could regain consciousness. On the question of whether
she had been shot or had shot herself, he would not venture to express any
decided opinion. Certainly the bullet had been discharged at very close quarters.
There was only the one pistol found in the room, two barrels of which had been
emptied. Mr. Hilton Cubitt had been shot through the heart. It was equally
conceivable that he had shot her and then himself, or that she had been the
criminal, for the revolver lay upon the floor midway between them.

“Has he been moved?” asked Holmes.

“We have moved nothing except the lady. We could not leave her lying
wounded upon the floor.”

“How long have you been here, Doctor?”

“Since four o’clock.”

“Anyone else?”

“Yes, the constable here.”

“And you have touched nothing?”

“Nothing.”

“You have acted with great discretion. Who sent for you?”

“The housemaid, Saunders.”

“Was it she who gave the alarm?”

“She and Mrs. King, the cook.”

“Where are they now?”

“In the kitchen, I believe.”

“Then I think we had better hear their story at once.”

The old hall, oak-panelled and high-windowed, had been turned into a court of
investigation. Holmes sat in a great, old-fashioned chair, his inexorable eyes
gleaming out of his haggard face. I could read in them a set purpose to devote
his life to this quest until the client whom he had failed to save should at last be
avenged. The trim Inspector Martin, the old, grey-headed country doctor, myself,
and a stolid village policeman made up the rest of that strange company.

The two women told their story clearly enough. They had been aroused from
their sleep by the sound of an explosion, which had been followed a minute later
by a second one. They slept in adjoining rooms, and Mrs. King had rushed in to
Saunders. Together they had descended the stairs. The door of the study was
open, and a candle was burning upon the table. Their master lay upon his face in
the centre of the room. He was quite dead. Near the window his wife was
crouching, her head leaning against the wall. She was horribly wounded, and the
side of her face was red with blood. She breathed heavily, but was incapable of
saying anything. The passage, as well as the room, was full of smoke and the
smell of powder. The window was certainly shut and fastened upon the inside.
Both women were positive upon the point. They had at once sent for the doctor
and for the constable. Then, with the aid of the groom and the stable-boy, they
had conveyed their injured mistress to her room. Both she and her husband had
occupied the bed. She was clad in her dress—he in his dressing-gown, over his
night-clothes. Nothing had been moved in the study. So far as they knew, there
had never been any quarrel between husband and wife. They had always looked
upon them as a very united couple.

These were the main points of the servants’ evidence. In answer to Inspector
Martin, they were clear that every door was fastened upon the inside, and that no
one could have escaped from the house. In answer to Holmes, they both
remembered that they were conscious of the smell of powder from the moment
that they ran out of their rooms upon the top floor. “I commend that fact very
carefully to your attention,” said Holmes to his professional colleague. “And
now I think that we are in a position to undertake a thorough examination of the
room.”

The study proved to be a small chamber, lined on three sides with books, and
with a writing-table facing an ordinary window, which looked out upon the
garden. Our first attention was given to the body of the unfortunate squire,
whose huge frame lay stretched across the room. His disordered dress showed
that he had been hastily aroused from sleep. The bullet had been fired at him
from the front, and had remained in his body, after penetrating the heart. His
death had certainly been instantaneous and painless. There was no powder-
marking either upon his dressing-gown or on his hands. According to the
country surgeon, the lady had stains upon her face, but none upon her hand.

“The absence of the latter means nothing, though its presence may mean
everything,” said Holmes. “Unless the powder from a badly fitting cartridge
happens to spurt backward, one may fire many shots without leaving a sign. I
would suggest that Mr. Cubitt’s body may now be removed. I suppose, Doctor,

you have not recovered the bullet which wounded the lady?”

“A serious operation will be necessary before that can be done. But there are
still four cartridges in the revolver. Two have been fired and two wounds
inflicted, so that each bullet can be accounted for.”

“So it would seem,” said Holmes. “Perhaps you can account also for the bullet
which has so obviously struck the edge of the window?”

He had turned suddenly, and his long, thin finger was pointing to a hole which
had been drilled right through the lower window-sash, about an inch above the
bottom.

“By George!” cried the inspector. “How ever did you see that?”

“Because I looked for it.”

“Wonderful!” said the country doctor. “You are certainly right, sir. Then a
third shot has been fired, and therefore a third person must have been present.
But who could that have been, and how could he have got away?”

“That is the problem which we are now about to solve,” said Sherlock
Holmes. “You remember, Inspector Martin, when the servants said that on
leaving their room they were at once conscious of a smell of powder, I remarked
that the point was an extremely important one?”

“Yes, sir; but I confess I did not quite follow you.”

“It suggested that at the time of the firing, the window as well as the door of
the room had been open. Otherwise the fumes of powder could not have been
blown so rapidly through the house. A draught in the room was necessary for
that. Both door and window were only open for a very short time, however.”

“How do you prove that?”

“Because the candle was not guttered.”

“Capital!” cried the inspector. “Capital!

“Feeling sure that the window had been open at the time of the tragedy, I
conceived that there might have been a third person in the affair, who stood
outside this opening and fired through it. Any shot directed at this person might
hit the sash. I looked, and there, sure enough, was the bullet mark!”

“But how came the window to be shut and fastened?”

“The woman’s first instinct would be to shut and fasten the window. But,
halloa! What is this?”

It was a lady’s hand-bag which stood upon the study table—a trim little
handbag of crocodile-skin and silver. Holmes opened it and turned the contents

out. There were twenty fifty-pound notes of the Bank of England, held together
by an india-rubber band—nothing else.

“This must be preserved, for it will figure in the trial,” said Holmes, as he
handed the bag with its contents to the inspector. “It is now necessary that we
should try to throw some light upon this third bullet, which has clearly, from the
splintering of the wood, been fired from inside the room. I should like to see
Mrs. King, the cook, again. You said, Mrs. King, that you were awakened by a
loud explosion. When you said that, did you mean that it seemed to you to be
louder than the second one?”

“Well, sir, it wakened me from my sleep, so it is hard to judge. But it did seem
very loud.”

“You don’t think that it might have been two shots fired almost at the same
instant?”

“I am sure I couldn’t say, sir.”

“I believe that it was undoubtedly so. I rather think, Inspector Martin, that we
have now exhausted all that this room can teach us. If you will kindly step round
with me, we shall see what fresh evidence the garden has to offer.”

A flower-bed extended up to the study window, and we all broke into an
exclamation as we approached it. The flowers were trampled down, and the soft
soil was imprinted all over with footmarks. Large, masculine feet they were,
with peculiarly long, sharp toes. Holmes hunted about among the grass and
leaves like a retriever after a wounded bird. Then, with a cry of satisfaction, he
bent forward and picked up a little brazen cylinder.

“I thought so,” said he, “the revolver had an ejector, and here is the third
cartridge. I really think, Inspector Martin, that our case is almost complete.”

The country inspector’s face had shown his intense amazement at the rapid
and masterful progress of Holmes’s investigation. At first he had shown some
disposition to assert his own position, but now he was overcome with
admiration, and ready to follow without question wherever Holmes led.

“Whom do you suspect?” he asked.

“I’ll go into that later. There are several points in this problem which I have
not been able to explain to you yet. Now that I have got so far, I had best proceed
on my own lines, and then clear the whole matter up once and for all.”

“Just as you wish, Mr. Holmes, so long as we get our man.”

“I have no desire to make mysteries, but it is impossible at the moment of
action to enter into long and complex explanations. I have the threads of this

affair all in my hand. Even if this lady should never recover consciousness, we
can still reconstruct the events of last night and insure that justice be done. First
of all, I wish to know whether there is any inn in this neighbourhood known as
‘Elrige’s’?”

The servants were cross-questioned, but none of them had heard of such a
place. The stable-boy threw a light upon the matter by remembering that a
farmer of that name lived some miles off, in the direction of East Ruston.

“Is it a lonely farm?”

“Very lonely, sir.”

“Perhaps they have not heard yet of all that happened here during the night?”

“Maybe not, sir.”

Holmes thought for a little, and then a curious smile played over his face.

“Saddle a horse, my lad,” said he. “I shall wish you to take a note to Elrige’s
Farm.”

He took from his pocket the various slips of the dancing men. With these in
front of him, he worked for some time at the study-table. Finally he handed a
note to the boy, with directions to put it into the hands of the person to whom it
was addressed, and especially to answer no questions of any sort which might be
put to him. I saw the outside of the note, addressed in straggling, irregular
characters, very unlike Holmes’s usual precise hand. It was consigned to Mr.
Abe Slaney, Elriges Farm, East Ruston, Norfolk.

“I think, Inspector,” Holmes remarked, “that you would do well to telegraph
for an escort, as, if my calculations prove to be correct, you may have a
particularly dangerous prisoner to convey to the county jail. The boy who takes
this note could no doubt forward your telegram. If there is an afternoon train to
town, Watson, I think we should do well to take it, as I have a chemical analysis
of some interest to finish, and this investigation draws rapidly to a close.”

When the youth had been dispatched with the note, Sherlock Holmes gave his
instructions to the servants. If any visitor were to call asking for Mrs. Hilton
Cubitt, no information should be given as to her condition, but he was to be
shown at once into the drawing-room. He impressed these points upon them with
the utmost earnestness. Finally he led the way into the drawing-room, with the
remark that the business was now out of our hands, and that we must while away
the time as best we might until we could see what was in store for us. The doctor
had departed to his patients, and only the inspector and myself remained.

“I think that I can help you to pass an hour in an interesting and profitable

manner,” said Holmes, drawing his chair up to the table, and spreading out in
front of him the various papers upon which were recorded the antics of the
dancing men. “As to you, friend Watson, I owe you every atonement for having
allowed your natural curiosity to remain so long unsatisfied. To you, Inspector,
the whole incident may appeal as a remarkable professional study. I must tell
you, first of all, the interesting circumstances connected with the previous
consultations which Mr. Hilton Cubitt has had with me in Baker Street.” He then
shortly recapitulated the facts which have already been recorded. “I have here in
front of me these singular productions, at which one might smile, had they not
proved themselves to be the forerunners of so terrible a tragedy. I am fairly
familiar with all forms of secret writings, and am myself the author of a trifling
monograph upon the subject, in which I analyze one hundred and sixty separate
ciphers, but I confess that this is entirely new to me. The object of those who
invented the system has apparently been to conceal that these characters convey
a message, and to give the idea that they are the mere random sketches of
children.

“Having once recognized, however, that the symbols stood for letters, and
having applied the rules which guide us in all forms of secret writings, the
solution was easy enough. The first message submitted to me was so short that it
was impossible for me to do more than to say, with some confidence, that the
symbol XXX stood for E. As you are aware, E is the most common letter in the
English alphabet, and it predominates to so marked an extent that even in a short
sentence one would expect to find it most often. Out of fifteen symbols in the
first message, four were the same, so it was reasonable to set this down as E. It is
true that in some cases the figure was bearing a flag, and in some cases not, but
it was probable, from the way in which the flags were distributed, that they were
used to break the sentence up into words. I accepted this as a hypothesis, and
noted that E was represented by

E

“But now came the real difficulty of the inquiry. The order of the English
letters after E is by no means well marked, and any preponderance which may be
shown in an average of a printed sheet may be reversed in a single short
sentence. Speaking roughly, T, A, O, I, N, S, H, R, D, and L are the numerical
order in which letters occur, but T, A, O, and I are very nearly abreast of each
other, and it would be an endless task to try each combination until a meaning
was arrived at. I therefore waited for fresh material. In my second interview with
Mr. Hilton Cubitt he was able to give me two other short sentences and one

message, which appeared—since there was no flag—to be a single word. Here
are the symbols. Now, in the single word I have already got the two E’s coming
second and fourth in a word of five letters. It might be ‘sever,’ or ‘lever,’ or
‘never.’ There can be no question that the latter as a reply to an appeal is far the
most probable, and the circumstances pointed to its being a reply written by the
lady. Accepting it as correct, we are now able to say that the symbols stand
respectively for N, V, and R.

N-V-R

“Even now I was in considerable difficulty, but a happy thought put me in
possession of several other letters. It occurred to me that if these appeals came,
as I expected, from someone who had been intimate with the lady in her early
life, a combination which contained two E’s with three letters between might
very well stand for the name ‘ELSIE.’ On examination I found that such a
combination formed the termination of the message which was three times
repeated. It was certainly some appeal to ‘Elsie.’ In this way I had got my L, S,
and I. But what appeal could it be? There were only four letters in the word
which preceded ‘Elsie,’ and it ended in E. Surely the word must be ‘COME.’ I
tried all other four letters ending in E, but could find none to fit the case. So now
I was in possession of C, O, and M, and I was in a position to attack the first
message once more, dividing it into words and putting dots for each symbol
which was still unknown. So treated, it worked out in this fashion:

.M .ERE ..E SL.NE.

“Now the first letter can only be A, which is a most useful discovery, since it
occurs no fewer than three times in this short sentence, and the H is also
apparent in the second word. Now it becomes:

AM HERE A.E SLANE.

Or, filling in the obvious vacancies in the name:

AM HERE ABE SLANEY.

I had so many letters now that I could proceed with considerable confidence to
the second message, which worked out in this fashion:

A. ELRI. ES.

Here I could only make sense by putting T and G for the missing letters, and
supposing that the name was that of some house or inn at which the writer was
staying.”

Inspector Martin and I had listened with the utmost interest to the full and
clear account of how my friend had produced results which had led to so
complete a command over our difficulties.

“What did you do then, sir?” asked the inspector.

“I had every reason to suppose that this Abe Slaney was an American, since
Abe is an American contraction, and since a letter from America had been the
starting-point of all the trouble. I had also every cause to think that there was
some criminal secret in the matter. The lady’s allusions to her past, and her
refusal to take her husband into her confidence, both pointed in that direction. I
therefore cabled to my friend, Wilson Hargreave, of the New York Police
Bureau, who has more than once made use of my knowledge of London crime. I
asked him whether the name of Abe Slaney was known to him. Here is his reply:
‘The most dangerous crook in Chicago.’ On the very evening upon which I had
his answer, Hilton Cubitt sent me the last message from Slaney. Working with
known letters, it took this form:

ELSIE .RE.ARE TO MEET THY GO.

The addition of a P and a D completed a message which showed me that the
rascal was proceeding from persuasion to threats, and my knowledge of the
crooks of Chicago prepared me to find that he might very rapidly put his words
into action. I at once came to Norfolk with my friend and colleague, Dr. Watson,
but, unhappily, only in time to find that the worst had already occurred.”

“It is a privilege to be associated with you in the handling of a case,” said the
inspector, warmly. “You will excuse me, however, if I speak frankly to you. You
are only answerable to yourself, but I have to answer to my superiors. If this Abe
Slaney, living at Elrige’s, is indeed the murderer, and if he has made his escape
while I am seated here, I should certainly get into serious trouble.”

“You need not be uneasy. He will not try to escape.”

“How do you know?”

“To fly would be a confession of guilt.”

“Then let us go arrest him.”

“I expect him here every instant.”

“But why should he come.”

“Because I have written and asked him.”

“But this is incredible, Mr. Holmes! Why should he come because you have
asked him? Would not such a request rather rouse his suspicions and cause him
to fly?”

“I think I have known how to frame the letter,” said Sherlock Holmes. “In
fact, if I am not very much mistaken, here is the gentleman himself coming up
the drive.”

A man was striding up the path which led to the door. He was a tall,
handsome, swarthy fellow, clad in a suit of grey flannel, with a Panama hat, a
bristling black beard, and a great, aggressive hooked nose, and flourishing a cane
as he walked. He swaggered up a path as if the place belonged to him, and we
heard his loud, confident peal at the bell.

“I think, gentlemen,” said Holmes, quietly, “that we had best take up our
position behind the door. Every precaution is necessary when dealing with such
a fellow. You will need your handcuffs, Inspector. You can leave the talking to
me.”

We waited in silence for a minute—one of those minutes which one can never
forget. Then the door opened and the man stepped in. In an instant Holmes
clapped a pistol to his head, and Martin slipped the handcuffs over his wrists. It
was all done so swiftly and deftly that the fellow was helpless before he knew
that he was attacked. He glared from one to the other of us with a pair of blazing
black eyes. Then he burst into a bitter laugh.

“Well, gentlemen, you have the drop on me this time. I seem to have knocked
up against something hard. But I came here in answer to a letter from Mrs.
Hilton Cubitt. Don’t tell me that she is in this? Don’t tell me that she helped to
set a trap for me?”

“Mrs. Hilton Cubitt was seriously injured, and is at death’s door.”

The man gave a hoarse cry of grief, which rang through the house.

“You’re crazy!” he cried, fiercely. “It was he that was hurt, not she. Who
would have hurt little Elsie? I may have threatened her—God forgive me!—but I
would not have touched a hair of her pretty head. Take it back—you! Say that
she is not hurt!”

“She was found badly wounded, by the side of her dead husband.”

He sank with a deep groan on the settee and buried his face in his manacled
hands. For five minutes he was silent. Then he raised his face once more, and
spoke with the cold composure of despair.

“I have nothing to hide from you, gentlemen,” said he. “If I shot the man he
had his shot at me, and there’s no murder in that. But if you think I could have
hurt that woman, then you don’t know either me or her. I tell you, there was
never a man in this world loved a woman more than I loved her. I had a right to
her. She was pledged to me years ago. Who was this Englishman that he should
come between us? I tell you that I had the first right to her, and that I was only
claiming my own.

“She broke away from your influence when she found the man that you are,”
said Holmes, sternly. “She fled from America to avoid you, and she married an
honourable gentleman in England. You dogged her and followed her and made
her life a misery to her, in order to induce her to abandon the husband whom she
loved and respected in order to fly with you, whom she feared and hated. You
have ended by bringing about the death of a noble man and driving his wife to
suicide. That is your record in this business, Mr. Abe Slaney, and you will
answer for it to the law.”

“If Elsie dies, I care nothing what becomes of me,” said the American. He
opened one of his hands, and looked at a note crumpled up in his palm. “See
here, mister! he cried, with a gleam of suspicion in his eyes, “you’re not trying to
scare me over this, are you? If the lady is hurt as bad as you say, who was it that
wrote this note?” He tossed it forward on to the table.

“I wrote it, to bring you here.”

“You wrote it? There was no one on earth outside the Joint who knew the
secret of the dancing men. How came you to write it?”

“What one man can invent another can discover,” said Holmes. There is a cab
coming to convey you to Norwich, Mr. Slaney. But meanwhile, you have time to
make some small reparation for the injury you have wrought. Are you aware that
Mrs. Hilton Cubitt has herself lain under grave suspicion of the murder of her
husband, and that it was only my presence here, and the knowledge which I
happened to possess, which has saved her from the accusation? The least that
you owe her is to make it clear to the whole world that she was in no way,
directly or indirectly, responsible for his tragic end.”

“I ask nothing better,” said the American. “I guess the very best case I can
make for myself is the absolute naked truth.”

“It is my duty to warn you that it will be used against you,” cried the
inspector, with the magnificent fair play of the British criminal law.

Slaney shrugged his shoulders.

“I’ll chance that,” said he. “First of all, I want you gentlemen to understand

that I have known this lady since she was a child. There were seven of us in a
gang in Chicago, and Elsie’s father was the boss of the Joint. He was a clever
man, was old Patrick. It was he who invented that writing, which would pass as a
child’s scrawl unless you just happened to have the key to it. Well, Elsie learned
some of our ways, but she couldn’t stand the business, and she had a bit of
honest money of her own, so she gave us all the slip and got away to London.
She had been engaged to me, and she would have married me, I believe, if I had
taken over another profession, but she would have nothing to do with anything
on the cross. It was only after her marriage to this Englishman that I was able to
find out where she was. I wrote to her, but got no answer. After that I came over,
and, as letters were no use, I put my messages where she could read them.

“Well, I have been here a month now. I lived in that farm, where I had a room
down below, and could get in and out every night, and no one the wiser. I tried
all I could to coax Elsie away. I knew that she read the messages, for once she
wrote an answer under one of them. Then my temper got the better of me, and I
began to threaten her. She sent me a letter then, imploring me to go away, and
saying that it would break her heart if any scandal should come upon her
husband. She said that she would come down when her husband was asleep at
three in the morning, and speak with me through the end window, if I would go
away afterwards and leave her in peace. She came down and brought money
with her, trying to bribe me to go. This made me mad, and I caught her arm and
tried to pull her through the window. At that moment in rushed the husband with
his revolver in his hand. Elsie had sunk down upon the floor, and we were face
to face. I was heeled also, and I held up my gun to scare him off and let me get
away. He fired and missed me. I pulled off almost at the same instant, and down
he dropped. I made away across the garden, and as I went I heard the window
shut behind me. That’s God’s truth, gentlemen, every word of it, and I heard no
more about it until that lad came riding up with a note which made me walk in
here, like a jay, and give myself into your hands.”

A cab had driven up whilst the American had been talking. Two uniformed
policemen sat inside. Inspector Martin rose and touched his prisoner on the
shoulder.

“It is time for us to go.”

“Can I see her first?”

“No, she is not conscious. Mr. Sherlock Holmes, I only hope that if ever again
I have an important case, I shall have the good fortune to have you by my side.”

We stood at the window and watched the cab drive away. As I turned back,

my eye caught the pellet of paper which the prisoner had tossed upon the table. It
was the note with which Holmes had decoyed him.

“See if you can read it, Watson,” said he, with a smile.
It contained no word, but this little line of dancing men:

COME-HERE-AT-ONCE

“If you use the code which I have explained,” said Holmes, “you will find that
it simply means ‘Come here at once.’ I was convinced that it was an invitation
which he would not refuse, since he could never imagine that it could come from
anyone but the lady. And so, my dear Watson, we have ended by turning the
dancing men to good when they have so often been the agents of evil, and I think
that I have fulfilled my promise of giving you something unusual for your
notebook. Three-forty is our train, and I fancy we should be back in Baker Street
for dinner.”

Only one word of epilogue. The American, Abe Slaney, was condemned to
death at the winter assizes at Norwich, but his penalty was changed to penal
servitude in consideration of mitigating circumstances, and the certainty that
Hilton Cubitt had fired the first shot. Of Mrs. Hilton Cubitt I only know that I
have heard she recovered entirely, and that she still remains a widow, devoting
her whole life to the care of the poor and to the administration of her husband’s
estate.

THE ADVENTURE OF THE SOLITARY CYCLIST

From the years 1894 to 1901 inclusive, Mr. Sherlock Holmes was a very busy
man. It is safe to say that there was no public case of any difficulty in which he
was not consulted during those eight years, and there were hundreds of private
cases, some of them of the most intricate and extraordinary character, in which
he played a prominent part. Many startling successes and a few unavoidable
failures were the outcome of this long period of continuous work. As I have
preserved very full notes of all these cases, and was myself personally engaged
in many of them, it may be imagined that it is no easy task to know which I
should select to lay before the public. I shall, however, preserve my former rule,
and give the preference to those cases which derive their interest not so much
from the brutality of the crime as from the ingenuity and dramatic quality of the
solution. For this reason I will now lay before the reader the facts connected with
Miss Violet Smith, the solitary cyclist of Charlington, and the curious sequel of
our investigation, which culminated in unexpected tragedy. It is true that the
circumstance did not admit of any striking illustration of those powers for which
my friend was famous, but there were some points about the case which made it
stand out in those long records of crime from which I gather the material for
these little narratives.

On referring to my notebook for the year 1895, I find that it was upon
Saturday, the 23rd of April, that we first heard of Miss Violet Smith. Her visit
was, I remember, extremely unwelcome to Holmes, for he was immersed at the
moment in a very abstruse and complicated problem concerning the peculiar
persecution to which John Vincent Harden, the well-known tobacco millionaire,
had been subjected. My friend, who loved above all things precision and
concentration of thought, resented anything which distracted his attention from
the matter in hand. And yet, without a harshness which was foreign to his nature,
it was impossible to refuse to listen to the story of the young and beautiful
woman, tall, graceful, and queenly, who presented herself at Baker Street late in
the evening, and implored his assistance and advice. It was vain to urge that his
time was already fully occupied, for the young lady had come with the
determination to tell her story, and it was evident that nothing short of force
could get her out of the room until she had done so. With a resigned air and a

somewhat weary smile, Holmes begged the beautiful intruder to take a seat, and
to inform us what it was that was troubling her.

“At least it cannot be your health,” said he, as his keen eyes darted over her,
“so ardent a bicyclist must be full of energy.”

She glanced down in surprise at her own feet, and I observed the slight
roughening of the side of the sole caused by the friction of the edge of the pedal.

“Yes, I bicycle a good deal, Mr. Holmes, and that has something to do with
my visit to you to-day.”

My friend took the lady’s ungloved hand, and examined it with as close an
attention and as little sentiment as a scientist would show to a specimen.

“You will excuse me, I am sure. It is my business,” said he, as he dropped it.
“I nearly fell into the error of supposing that you were typewriting. Of course, it
is obvious that it is music. You observe the spatulate finger-ends, Watson, which
is common to both professions? There is a spirituality about the face,
however”—she gently turned it towards the light—“which the typewriter does
not generate. This lady is a musician.”

“Yes, Mr. Holmes, I teach music.”

“In the country, I presume, from your complexion.”

“Yes, sir, near Farnham, on the borders of Surrey.”

“A beautiful neighbourhood, and full of the most interesting associations. You
remember, Watson, that it was near there that we took Archie Stamford, the
forger. Now, Miss Violet, what has happened to you, near Farnham, on the
borders of Surrey?”

The young lady, with great clearness and composure, made the following
curious statement:

“My father is dead, Mr. Holmes. He was James Smith, who conducted the
orchestra at the old Imperial Theatre. My mother and I were left without a
relation in the world except one uncle, Ralph Smith, who went to Africa twenty-
five years ago, and we have never had a word from him since. When father died,
we were left very poor, but one day we were told that there was an advertisement
in The Times, inquiring for our whereabouts. You can imagine how excited we
were, for we thought that someone had left us a fortune. We went at once to the
lawyer whose name was given in the paper. There we met two gentlemen, Mr.
Carruthers and Mr. Woodley, who were home on a visit from South Africa. They
said that my uncle was a friend of theirs, that he had died some months before in
great poverty in Johannesburg, and that he had asked them with his last breath to

hunt up his relations, and see that they were in no want. It seemed strange to us
that Uncle Ralph, who took no notice of us when he was alive, should be so
careful to look after us when he was dead, but Mr. Carruthers explained that the
reason was that my uncle had just heard of the death of his brother, and so felt
responsible for our fate.”

“Excuse me,” said Holmes. “When was this interview?”

“Last December—four months ago.”

“Pray proceed.”

“Mr. Woodley seemed to me to be a most odious person. He was for ever
making eyes at me—a coarse, puffy-faced, red-moustached young man, with his
hair plastered down on each side of his forehead. I thought that he was perfectly
hateful—and I was sure that Cyril would not wish me to know such a person.”

“Oh, Cyril is his name!” said Holmes, smiling.

The young lady blushed and laughed.

“Yes, Mr. Holmes, Cyril Morton, an electrical engineer, and we hope to be
married at the end of the summer. Dear me, how did I get talking about him?
What I wished to say was that Mr. Woodley was perfectly odious, but that Mr.
Carruthers, who was a much older man, was more agreeable. He was a dark,
sallow, clean-shaven, silent person, but he had polite manners and a pleasant
smile. He inquired how we were left, and on finding that we were very poor, he
suggested that I should come and teach music to his only daughter, aged ten. I
said that I did not like to leave my mother, on which he suggested that I should
go home to her every week-end, and he offered me a hundred a year, which was
certainly splendid pay. So it ended by my accepting, and I went down to Chiltern
Grange, about six miles from Farnham. Mr. Carruthers was a widower, but he
had engaged a lady housekeeper, a very respectable, elderly person, called Mrs.
Dixon, to look after his establishment. The child was a dear, and everything
promised well. Mr. Carruthers was very kind and very musical, and we had most
pleasant evenings together. Every week-end I went home to my mother in town.

“The first flaw in my happiness was the arrival of the red-moustached Mr.
Woodley. He came for a visit of a week, and oh! it seemed three months to me.
He was a dreadful person—a bully to everyone else, but to me something
infinitely worse. He made odious love to me, boasted of his wealth, said that if I
married him I could have the finest diamonds in London, and finally, when I
would have nothing to do with him, he seized me in his arms one day after
dinner—he was hideously strong—and swore that he would not let me go until I
had kissed him. Mr. Carruthers came in and tore him from me, on which he

turned upon his own host, knocking him down and cutting his face open. That
was the end of his visit, as you can imagine. Mr. Carruthers apologized to me
next day, and assured me that I should never be exposed to such an insult again. I
have not seen Mr. Woodley since.

“And now, Mr. Holmes, I come at last to the special thing which has caused
me to ask your advice to-day. You must know that every Saturday forenoon I
ride on my bicycle to Farnham Station, in order to get the 12:22 to town. The
road from Chiltern Grange is a lonely one, and at one spot it is particularly so,
for it lies for over a mile between Charlington Heath upon one side and the
woods which lie round Charlington Hall upon the other. You could not find a
more lonely tract of road anywhere, and it is quite rare to meet so much as a cart,
or a peasant, until you reach the high road near Crooksbury Hill. Two weeks ago
I was passing this place, when I chanced to look back over my shoulder, and
about two hundred yards behind me I saw a man, also on a bicycle. He seemed
to be a middle-aged man, with a short, dark beard. I looked back before I
reached Farnham, but the man was gone, so I thought no more about it. But you
can imagine how surprised I was, Mr. Holmes, when, on my return on the
Monday, I saw the same man on the same stretch of road. My astonishment was
increased when the incident occurred again, exactly as before, on the following
Saturday and Monday. He always kept his distance and did not molest me in any
way, but still it certainly was very odd. I mentioned it to Mr. Carruthers, who
seemed interested in what I said, and told me that he had ordered a horse and
trap, so that in future I should not pass over these lonely roads without some
companion.

“The horse and trap were to have come this week, but for some reason they
were not delivered, and again I had to cycle to the station. That was this
morning. You can think that I looked out when I came to Charlington Heath, and
there, sure enough, was the man, exactly as he had been the two weeks before.
He always kept so far from me that I could not clearly see his face, but it was
certainly someone whom I did not know. He was dressed in a dark suit with a
cloth cap. The only thing about his face that I could clearly see was his dark
beard. To-day I was not alarmed, but I was filled with curiosity, and I determined
to find out who he was and what he wanted. I slowed down my machine, but he
slowed down his. Then I stopped altogether, but he stopped also. Then I laid a
trap for him. There is a sharp turning of the road, and I pedalled very quickly
round this, and then I stopped and waited. I expected him to shoot round and
pass me before he could stop. But he never appeared. Then I went back and
looked round the corner. I could see a mile of road, but he was not on it. To make

it the more extraordinary, there was no side road at this point down which he
could have gone.”

Holmes chuckled and rubbed his hands. “This case certainly presents some
features of its own,” said he. “How much time elapsed between your turning the
corner and your discovery that the road was clear?”

“Two or three minutes.”
“Then he could not have retreated down the road, and you say that there are
no side roads?”
“None.”
“Then he certainly took a footpath on one side or the other.”
“It could not have been on the side of the heath, or I should have seen him.”
“So, by the process of exclusion, we arrive at the fact that he made his way
toward Charlington Hall, which, as I understand, is situated in its own grounds
on one side of the road. Anything else?”
“Nothing, Mr. Holmes, save that I was so perplexed that I felt I should not be
happy until I had seen you and had your advice.”
Holmes sat in silence for some little time.
“Where is the gentleman to whom you are engaged?” he asked at last.
“He is in the Midland Electrical Company, at Coventry.”
“He would not pay you a surprise visit?”
“Oh, Mr. Holmes! As if I should not know him!”
“Have you had any other admirers?”
“Several before I knew Cyril.”
“And since?”
“There was this dreadful man, Woodley, if you can call him an admirer.”
“No one else?”
Our fair client seemed a little confused.
“Who was he?” asked Holmes.
“Oh, it may be a mere fancy of mine; but it had seemed to me sometimes that
my employer, Mr. Carruthers, takes a great deal of interest in me. We are thrown
rather together. I play his accompaniments in the evening. He has never said
anything. He is a perfect gentleman. But a girl always knows.”
“Ha!” Holmes looked grave. “What does he do for a living?”
“He is a rich man.”

“No carriages or horses?”

“Well, at least he is fairly well-to-do. But he goes into the city two or three
times a week. He is deeply interested in South African gold shares.”

“You will let me know any fresh development, Miss Smith. I am very busy
just now, but I will find time to make some inquiries into your case. In the
meantime, take no step without letting me know. Good-bye, and I trust that we
shall have nothing but good news from you.”

“It is part of the settled order of Nature that such a girl should have
followers,” said Holmes, he pulled at his meditative pipe, “but for choice not on
bicycles in lonely country roads. Some secretive lover, beyond all doubt. But
there are curious and suggestive details about the case, Watson.”

“That he should appear only at that point?”

“Exactly. Our first effort must be to find who are the tenants of Charlington
Hall. Then, again, how about the connection between Carruthers and Woodley,
since they appear to be men of such a different type? How came they both to be
so keen upon looking up Ralph Smith’s relations? One more point. What sort of
a ménage is it which pays double the market price for a governess but does not
keep a horse, although six miles from the station? Odd, Watson—very odd!”

“You will go down?”

“No, my dear fellow, you will go down. This may be some trifling intrigue,
and I cannot break my other important research for the sake of it. On Monday
you will arrive early at Farnham; you will conceal yourself near Charlington
Heath; you will observe these facts for yourself, and act as your own judgment
advises. Then, having inquired as to the occupants of the Hall, you will come
back to me and report. And now, Watson, not another word of the matter until
we have a few solid stepping-stones on which we may hope to get across to our
solution.”

We had ascertained from the lady that she went down upon the Monday by the
train which leaves Waterloo at 9:50, so I started early and caught the 9:13. At
Farnham Station I had no difficulty in being directed to Charlington Heath. It
was impossible to mistake the scene of the young lady’s adventure, for the road
runs between the open heath on one side and an old yew hedge upon the other,
surrounding a park which is studded with magnificent trees. There was a main
gateway of lichen-studded stone, each side pillar surmounted by mouldering
heraldic emblems, but besides this central carriage drive I observed several
points where there were gaps in the hedge and paths leading through them. The
house was invisible from the road, but the surroundings all spoke of gloom and

decay.

The heath was covered with golden patches of flowering gorse, gleaming
magnificently in the light of the bright spring sunshine. Behind one of these
clumps I took up my position, so as to command both the gateway of the Hall
and a long stretch of the road upon either side. It had been deserted when I left it,
but now I saw a cyclist riding down it from the opposite direction to that in
which I had come. He was clad in a dark suit, and I saw that he had a black
beard. On reaching the end of the Charlington grounds, he sprang from his
machine and led it through a gap in the hedge, disappearing from my view.

A quarter of an hour passed, and then a second cyclist appeared. This time it
was the young lady coming from the station. I saw her look about her as she
came to the Charlington hedge. An instant later the man emerged from his
hiding-place, sprang upon his cycle, and followed her. In all the broad landscape
those were the only moving figures, the graceful girl sitting very straight upon
her machine, and the man behind her bending low over his handle-bar with a
curiously furtive suggestion in every movement. She looked back at him and
slowed her pace. He slowed also. She stopped. He at once stopped, too, keeping
two hundred yards behind her. Her next movement was as unexpected as it was
spirited. She suddenly whisked her wheels round and dashed straight at him. He
was as quick as she, however, and darted off in desperate flight. Presently she
came back up the road again, her head haughtily in the air, not deigning to take
any further notice of her silent attendant. He had turned also, and still kept his
distance until the curve of the road hid them from my sight.

I remained in my hiding-place, and it was well that I did so, for presently the
man reappeared, cycling slowly back. He turned in at the Hall gates, and
dismounted from his machine. For some minutes I could see him standing
among the trees. His hands were raised, and he seemed to be settling his necktie.
Then he mounted his cycle, and rode away from me down the drive towards the
Hall. I ran across the heath and peered through the trees. Far away I could catch
glimpses of the old grey building with its bristling Tudor chimneys, but the drive
ran through a dense shrubbery, and I saw no more of my man.

However, it seemed to me that I had done a fairly good morning’s work, and I
walked back in high spirits to Farnham. The local house agent could tell me
nothing about Charlington Hall, and referred me to a well-known firm in Pall
Mall. There I halted on my way home, and met with courtesy from the
representative. No, I could not have Charlington Hall for the summer. I was just
too late. It had been let about a month ago. Mr. Williamson was the name of the
tenant. He was a respectable, elderly gentleman. The polite agent was afraid he

could say no more, as the affairs of his clients were not matters which he could
discuss.

Mr. Sherlock Holmes listened with attention to the long report which I was
able to present to him that evening, but it did not elicit that word of curt praise
which I had hoped for and should have valued. On the contrary, his austere face
was even more severe than usual as he commented upon the things that I had
done and the things that I had not.

“Your hiding-place, my dear Watson, was very faulty. You should have been
behind the hedge, then you would have had a close view of this interesting
person. As it is, you were some hundreds of yards away and can tell me even
less than Miss Smith. She thinks she does not know the man; I am convinced she
does. Why, otherwise, should he be so desperately anxious that she should not
get so near him as to see his features? You describe him as bending over the
handle-bar. Concealment again, you see. You really have done remarkably badly.
He returns to the house, and you want to find out who he is. You come to a
London house agent!”

“What should I have done?” I cried, with some heat.

“Gone to the nearest public-house. That is the centre of country gossip. They
would have told you every name, from the master to the scullery-maid.
Williamson? It conveys nothing to my mind. If he is an elderly man he is not this
active cyclist who sprints away from that young lady’s athletic pursuit. What
have we gained by your expedition? The knowledge that the girl’s story is true. I
never doubted it. That there is a connection between the cyclist and the Hall. I
never doubted that either. That the Hall is tenanted by Williamson. Who’s the
better for that? Well, well, my dear sir, don’t look so depressed. We can do little
more until next Saturday, and in the meantime I may make one or two inquiries
myself.”

Next morning, we had a note from Miss Smith, recounting shortly and
accurately the very incidents which I had seen, but the pith of the letter lay in the
postscript:

“I am sure that you will respect my confidence, Mr. Holmes,
when I tell you that my place here has become difficult, owing
to the fact that my employer has proposed marriage to me. I am
convinced that his feelings are most deep and most honourable.
At the same time, my promise is of course given. He took my
refusal very seriously, but also very gently. You can understand,
however, that the situation is a little strained.”

“Our young friend seems to be getting into deep waters,” said Holmes,
thoughtfully, as he finished the letter. “The case certainly presents more features
of interest and more possibility of development than I had originally thought. I
should be none the worse for a quiet, peaceful day in the country, and I am
inclined to run down this afternoon and test one or two theories which I have
formed.”

Holmes’s quiet day in the country had a singular termination, for he arrived at
Baker Street late in the evening, with a cut lip and a discoloured lump upon his
forehead, besides a general air of dissipation which would have made his own
person the fitting object of a Scotland Yard investigation. He was immensely
tickled by his own adventures and laughed heartily as he recounted them.

“I get so little active exercise that it is always a treat,” said he. “You are aware
that I have some proficiency in the good old British sport of boxing.
Occasionally, it is of service, to-day, for example, I should have come to very
ignominious grief without it.”

I begged him to tell me what had occurred.

“I found that country pub which I had already recommended to your notice,
and there I made my discreet inquiries. I was in the bar, and a garrulous landlord
was giving me all that I wanted. Williamson is a white-bearded man, and he lives
alone with a small staff of servants at the Hall. There is some rumour that he is
or has been a clergyman, but one or two incidents of his short residence at the
Hall struck me as peculiarly unecclesiastical. I have already made some inquiries
at a clerical agency, and they tell me that there was a man of that name in orders,
whose career has been a singularly dark one. The landlord further informed me
that there are usually week-end visitors—‘a warm lot, sir’—at the Hall, and
especially one gentleman with a red moustache, Mr. Woodley by name, who was
always there. We had got as far as this, when who should walk in but the
gentleman himself, who had been drinking his beer in the tap-room and had
heard the whole conversation. Who was I? What did I want? What did I mean by
asking questions? He had a fine flow of language, and his adjectives were very
vigorous. He ended a string of abuse by a vicious backhander, which I failed to
entirely avoid. The next few minutes were delicious. It was a straight left against
a slogging ruffian. I emerged as you see me. Mr. Woodley went home in a cart.
So ended my country trip, and it must be confessed that, however enjoyable, my
day on the Surrey border has not been much more profitable than your own.”

The Thursday brought us another letter from our client.

You will not be surprised, Mr. Holmes (said she), to hear that

I am leaving Mr. Carruthers’s employment. Even the high pay
cannot reconcile me to the discomforts of my situation. On
Saturday I come up to town, and I do not intend to return. Mr.
Carruthers has got a trap, and so the dangers of the lonely road,
if there ever were any dangers, are now over.
As to the special cause of my leaving, it is not merely the
strained situation with Mr. Carruthers, but it is the reappearance
of that odious man, Mr. Woodley. He was always hideous, but he
looks more awful than ever now, for he appears to have had an
accident and he is much disfigured. I saw him out of the
window, but I am glad to say I did not meet him. He had a long
talk with Mr. Carruthers, who seemed much excited afterwards.
Woodley must be staying in the neighbourhood, for he did not
sleep here, and yet I caught a glimpse of him again this morning,
slinking about in the shrubbery. I would sooner have a savage
wild animal loose about the place. I loathe and fear him more
than I can say. How can Mr. Carruthers endure such a creature
for a moment? However, all my troubles will be over on
Saturday.

“So I trust, Watson, so I trust,” said Holmes, gravely. “There is some deep
intrigue going on round that little woman, and it is our duty to see that no one
molests her upon that last journey. I think, Watson, that we must spare time to
run down together on Saturday morning and make sure that this curious and
inclusive investigation has no untoward ending.”

I confess that I had not up to now taken a very serious view of the case, which
had seemed to me rather grotesque and bizarre than dangerous. That a man
should lie in wait for and follow a very handsome woman is no unheard-of thing,
and if he has so little audacity that he not only dared not address her, but even
fled from her approach, he was not a very formidable assailant. The ruffian
Woodley was a very different person, but, except on one occasion, he had not
molested our client, and now he visited the house of Carruthers without
intruding upon her presence. The man on the bicycle was doubtless a member of
those week-end parties at the Hall of which the publican had spoken, but who he
was, or what he wanted, was as obscure as ever. It was the severity of Holmes’s
manner and the fact that he slipped a revolver into his pocket before leaving our
rooms which impressed me with the feeling that tragedy might prove to lurk
behind this curious train of events.

A rainy night had been followed by a glorious morning, and the heath-covered
countryside, with the glowing clumps of flowering gorse, seemed all the more
beautiful to eyes which were weary of the duns and drabs and slate greys of
London. Holmes and I walked along the broad, sandy road inhaling the fresh
morning air and rejoicing in the music of the birds and the fresh breath of the
spring. From a rise of the road on the shoulder of Crooksbury Hill, we could see
the grim Hall bristling out from amidst the ancient oaks, which, old as they were,
were still younger than the building which they surrounded. Holmes pointed
down the long tract of road which wound, a reddish yellow band, between the
brown of the heath and the budding green of the woods. Far away, a black dot,
we could see a vehicle moving in our direction. Holmes gave an exclamation of
impatience.

“I have given a margin of half an hour,” said he. “If that is her trap, she must
be making for the earlier train. I fear, Watson, that she will be past Charlington
before we can possibly meet her.”

From the instant that we passed the rise, we could no longer see the vehicle,
but we hastened onward at such a pace that my sedentary life began to tell upon
me, and I was compelled to fall behind. Holmes, however, was always in
training, for he had inexhaustible stores of nervous energy upon which to draw.
His springy step never slowed until suddenly, when he was a hundred yards in
front of me, he halted, and I saw him throw up his hand with a gesture of grief
and despair. At the same instant an empty dog-cart, the horse cantering, the reins
trailing, appeared round the curve of the road and rattled swiftly towards us.

“Too late, Watson, too late!” cried Holmes, as I ran panting to his side. “Fool
that I was not to allow for that earlier train! It’s abduction, Watson—abduction!
Murder! Heaven knows what! Block the road! Stop the horse! That’s right. Now,
jump in, and let us see if I can repair the consequences of my own blunder.”

We had sprung into the dog-cart, and Holmes, after turning the horse, gave it a
sharp cut with the whip, and we flew back along the road. As we turned the
curve, the whole stretch of road between the Hall and the heath was opened up. I
grasped Holmes’s arm.

“That’s the man!” I gasped.

A solitary cyclist was coming towards us. His head was down and his
shoulders rounded, as he put every ounce of energy that he possessed on to the
pedals. He was flying like a racer. Suddenly he raised his bearded face, saw us
close to him, and pulled up, springing from his machine. That coal-black beard
was in singular contrast to the pallor of his face, and his eyes were as bright as if

he had a fever. He stared at us and at the dog-cart. Then a look of amazement
came over his face.

“Halloa! Stop there!” he shouted, holding his bicycle to block our road.
“Where did you get that dog-cart? Pull up, man!” he yelled, drawing a pistol
from his side pocket. “Pull up, I say, or, by George, I’ll put a bullet into your
horse.”

Holmes threw the reins into my lap and sprang down from the cart.

“You’re the man we want to see. Where is Miss Violet Smith?” he said, in his
quick, clear way.

“That’s what I’m asking you. You’re in her dog-cart. You ought to know
where she is.”

“We met the dog-cart on the road. There was no one in it. We drove back to
help the young lady.”

“Good Lord! Good Lord! What shall I do?” cried the stranger, in an ecstasy of
despair. “They’ve got her, that hell-hound Woodley and the blackguard parson.
Come, man, come, if you really are her friend. Stand by me and we’ll save her, if
I have to leave my carcass in Charlington Wood.”

He ran distractedly, his pistol in his hand, towards a gap in the hedge. Holmes
followed him, and I, leaving the horse grazing beside the road, followed Holmes.

“This is where they came through,” said he, pointing to the marks of several
feet upon the muddy path. “Halloa! Stop a minute! Who’s this in the bush?”

It was a young fellow about seventeen, dressed like an ostler, with leather
cords and gaiters. He lay upon his back, his knees drawn up, a terrible cut upon
his head. He was insensible, but alive. A glance at his wound told me that it had
not penetrated the bone.

“That’s Peter, the groom,” cried the stranger. “He drove her. The beasts have
pulled him off and clubbed him. Let him lie; we can’t do him any good, but we
may save her from the worst fate that can befall a woman.”

We ran frantically down the path, which wound among the trees. We had
reached the shrubbery which surrounded the house when Holmes pulled up.

“They didn’t go to the house. Here are their marks on the left—here, beside
the laurel bushes. Ah! I said so.”

As he spoke, a woman’s shrill scream—a scream which vibrated with a frenzy
of horror—burst from the thick, green clump of bushes in front of us. It ended
suddenly on its highest note with a choke and a gurgle.

“This way! This way! They are in the bowling-alley,” cried the stranger,

darting through the bushes. “Ah, the cowardly dogs! Follow me, gentlemen! Too
late! too late! by the living Jingo!”

We had broken suddenly into a lovely glade of greensward surrounded by
ancient trees. On the farther side of it, under the shadow of a mighty oak, there
stood a singular group of three people. One was a woman, our client, drooping
and faint, a handkerchief round her mouth. Opposite her stood a brutal, heavy-
faced, red-moustached young man, his gaitered legs parted wide, one arm
akimbo, the other waving a riding crop, his whole attitude suggestive of
triumphant bravado. Between them an elderly, grey-bearded man, wearing a
short surplice over a light tweed suit, had evidently just completed the wedding
service, for he pocketed his prayer-book as we appeared, and slapped the sinister
bridegroom upon the back in jovial congratulation.

“They’re married!” I gasped.

“Come on!” cried our guide, “come on!” He rushed across the glade, Holmes
and I at his heels. As we approached, the lady staggered against the trunk of the
tree for support. Williamson, the ex-clergyman, bowed to us with mock
politeness, and the bully, Woodley, advanced with a shout of brutal and exultant
laughter.

“You can take your beard off, Bob,” said he. “I know you, right enough. Well,
you and your pals have just come in time for me to be able to introduce you to
Mrs. Woodley.”

Our guide’s answer was a singular one. He snatched off the dark beard which
had disguised him and threw it on the ground, disclosing a long, sallow, clean-
shaven face below it. Then he raised his revolver and covered the young ruffian,
who was advancing upon him with his dangerous riding-crop swinging in his
hand.

“Yes,” said our ally, “I am Bob Carruthers, and I’ll see this woman righted, if I
have to swing for it. I told you what I’d do if you molested her, and, by the Lord!
I’ll be as good as my word.”

“You’re too late. She’s my wife.”

“No, she’s your widow.”

His revolver cracked, and I saw the blood spurt from the front of Woodley’s
waistcoat. He spun round with a scream and fell upon his back, his hideous red
face turning suddenly to a dreadful mottled pallor. The old man, still clad in his
surplice, burst into such a string of foul oaths as I have never heard, and pulled
out a revolver of his own, but, before he could raise it, he was looking down the
barrel of Holmes’s weapon.

“Enough of this,” said my friend, coldly. “Drop that pistol! Watson, pick it up!
Hold it to his head. Thank you. You, Carruthers, give me that revolver. We’ll
have no more violence. Come, hand it over!”

“Who are you, then?”

“My name is Sherlock Holmes.”

“Good Lord!”

“You have heard of me, I see. I will represent the official police until their
arrival. Here, you!” he shouted to a frightened groom, who had appeared at the
edge of the glade. “Come here. Take this note as hard as you can ride to
Farnham.” He scribbled a few words upon a leaf from his notebook. “Give it to
the superintendent at the police-station. Until he comes, I must detain you all
under my personal custody.”

The strong, masterful personality of Holmes dominated the tragic scene, and
all were equally puppets in his hands. Williamson and Carruthers found
themselves carrying the wounded Woodley into the house, and I gave my arm to
the frightened girl. The injured man was laid on his bed, and at Holmes’s request
I examined him. I carried my report to where he sat in the old tapestry-hung
dining-room with his two prisoners before him.

“He will live,” said I.

“What!” cried Carruthers, springing out of his chair. “I’ll go upstairs and
finish him first. Do you tell me that that angel, is to be tied to Roaring Jack
Woodley for life?”

“You need not concern yourself about that,” said Holmes. “There are two very
good reasons why she should, under no circumstances, be his wife. In the first
place, we are very safe in questioning Mr. Williamson’s right to solemnize a
marriage.”

“I have been ordained,” cried the old rascal.

“And also unfrocked.”

“Once a clergyman, always a clergyman.”

“I think not. How about the license?”

“We had a license for the marriage. I have it here in my pocket.”

“Then you got it by trick. But, in any case a forced marriage is no marriage,
but it is a very serious felony, as you will discover before you have finished.
You’ll have time to think the point out during the next ten years or so, unless I
am mistaken. As to you, Carruthers, you would have done better to keep your
pistol in your pocket.”

“I begin to think so, Mr. Holmes, but when I thought of all the precaution I
had taken to shield this girl—for I loved her, Mr. Holmes, and it is the only time
that ever I knew what love was—it fairly drove me mad to think that she was in
the power of the greatest brute and bully in South Africa—a man whose name is
a holy terror from Kimberley to Johannesburg. Why, Mr. Holmes, you’ll hardly
believe it, but ever since that girl has been in my employment I never once let
her go past this house, where I knew the rascals were lurking, without following
her on my bicycle, just to see that she came to no harm. I kept my distance from
her, and I wore a beard, so that she should not recognize me, for she is a good
and high-spirited girl, and she wouldn’t have stayed in my employment long if
she had thought that I was following her about the country roads.”

“Why didn’t you tell her of her danger?”

“Because then, again, she would have left me, and I couldn’t bear to face that.
Even if she couldn’t love me, it was a great deal to me just to see her dainty form
about the house, and to hear the sound of her voice.”

“Well,” said I, “you call that love, Mr. Carruthers, but I should call it
selfishness.”

“Maybe the two things go together. Anyhow, I couldn’t let her go. Besides,
with this crowd about, it was well that she should have someone near to look
after her. Then, when the cable came, I knew they were bound to make a move.”

“What cable?”

Carruthers took a telegram from his pocket.

“That’s it,” said he.

It was short and concise:

The old man is dead.

“Hum!” said Holmes. “I think I see how things worked, and I can understand
how this message would, as you say, bring them to a head. But while you wait,
you might tell me what you can.”

The old reprobate with the surplice burst into a volley of bad language.

“By heaven!” said he, “if you squeal on us, Bob Carruthers, I’ll serve you as
you served Jack Woodley. You can bleat about the girl to your heart’s content,
for that’s your own affair, but if you round on your pals to this plain-clothes
copper, it will be the worst day’s work that ever you did.”

“Your reverence need not be excited,” said Holmes, lighting a cigarette. “The
case is clear enough against you, and all I ask is a few details for my private

curiosity. However, if there’s any difficulty in your telling me, I’ll do the talking,
and then you will see how far you have a chance of holding back your secrets. In
the first place, three of you came from South Africa on this game—you
Williamson, you Carruthers, and Woodley.”

“Lie number one,” said the old man; “I never saw either of them until two
months ago, and I have never been in Africa in my life, so you can put that in
your pipe and smoke it, Mr. Busybody Holmes!”

“What he says is true,” said Carruthers.

“Well, well, two of you came over. His reverence is our own homemade
article. You had known Ralph Smith in South Africa. You had reason to believe
he would not live long. You found out that his niece would inherit his fortune.
How’s that—eh?”

Carruthers nodded and Williamson swore.

“She was next of kin, no doubt, and you were aware that the old fellow would
make no will.”

“Couldn’t read or write,” said Carruthers.

“So you came over, the two of you, and hunted up the girl. The idea was that
one of you was to marry her, and the other have a share of the plunder. For some
reason, Woodley was chosen as the husband. Why was that?”

“We played cards for her on the voyage. He won.”

“I see. You got the young lady into your service, and there Woodley was to do
the courting. She recognized the drunken brute that he was, and would have
nothing to do with him. Meanwhile, your arrangement was rather upset by the
fact that you had yourself fallen in love with the lady. You could no longer bear
the idea of this ruffian owning her?”

“No, by George, I couldn’t!”

“There was a quarrel between you. He left you in a rage, and began to make
his own plans independently of you.”

“It strikes me, Williamson, there isn’t very much that we can tell this
gentleman,” cried Carruthers, with a bitter laugh. “Yes, we quarreled, and he
knocked me down. I am level with him on that, anyhow. Then I lost sight of him.
That was when he picked up with this outcast padre here. I found that they had
set up housekeeping together at this place on the line that she had to pass for the
station. I kept my eye on her after that, for I knew there was some devilry in the
wind. I saw them from time to time, for I was anxious to know what they were
after. Two days ago Woodley came up to my house with this cable, which

showed that Ralph Smith was dead. He asked me if I would stand by the bargain.
I said I would not. He asked me if I would marry the girl myself and give him a
share. I said I would willingly do so, but that she would not have me. He said,
‘Let us get her married first and after a week or two she may see things a bit
different.’ I said I would have nothing to do with violence. So he went off
cursing, like the foul-mouthed blackguard that he was, and swearing that he
would have her yet. She was leaving me this week-end, and I had got a trap to
take her to the station, but I was so uneasy in my mind that I followed her on my
bicycle. She had got a start, however, and before I could catch her, the mischief
was done. The first thing I knew about it was when I saw you two gentlemen
driving back in her dog-cart.”

Holmes rose and tossed the end of his cigarette into the grate. “I have been
very obtuse, Watson,” said he. “When in your report you said that you had seen
the cyclist as you thought arrange his necktie in the shrubbery, that alone should
have told me all. However, we may congratulate ourselves upon a curious and, in
some respects, a unique case. I perceive three of the county constabulary in the
drive, and I am glad to see that the little ostler is able to keep pace with them, so
it is likely that neither he nor the interesting bridegroom will be permanently
damaged by their morning’s adventures. I think, Watson, that in your medical
capacity, you might wait upon Miss Smith and tell her that if she is sufficiently
recovered, we shall be happy to escort her to her mother’s home. If she is not
quite convalescent you will find that a hint that we were about to telegraph to a
young electrician in the Midlands would probably complete the cure. As to you,
Mr. Carruthers, I think that you have done what you could to make amends for
your share in an evil plot. There is my card, sir, and if my evidence can be of
help in your trial, it shall be at your disposal.”

In the whirl of our incessant activity, it has often been difficult for me, as the
reader has probably observed, to round off my narratives, and to give those final
details which the curious might expect. Each case has been the prelude to
another, and the crisis once over, the actors have passed for ever out of our busy
lives. I find, however, a short note at the end of my manuscript dealing with this
case, in which I have put it upon record that Miss Violet Smith did indeed inherit
a large fortune, and that she is now the wife of Cyril Morton, the senior partner
of Morton & Kennedy, the famous Westminster electricians. Williamson and
Woodley were both tried for abduction and assault, the former getting seven
years the latter ten. Of the fate of Carruthers, I have no record, but I am sure that
his assault was not viewed very gravely by the court, since Woodley had the
reputation of being a most dangerous ruffian, and I think that a few months were

sufficient to satisfy the demands of justice.

THE ADVENTURE OF THE PRIORY SCHOOL

We have had some dramatic entrances and exits upon our small stage at Baker
Street, but I cannot recollect anything more sudden and startling than the first
appearance of Thorneycroft Huxtable, M.A., Ph.D., etc. His card, which seemed
too small to carry the weight of his academic distinctions, preceded him by a few
seconds, and then he entered himself—so large, so pompous, and so dignified
that he was the very embodiment of self-possession and solidity. And yet his first
action, when the door had closed behind him, was to stagger against the table,
whence he slipped down upon the floor, and there was that majestic figure
prostrate and insensible upon our bearskin hearth-rug.

We had sprung to our feet, and for a few moments we stared in silent
amazement at this ponderous piece of wreckage, which told of some sudden and
fatal storm far out on the ocean of life. Then Holmes hurried with a cushion for
his head, and I with brandy for his lips. The heavy, white face was seamed with
lines of trouble, the hanging pouches under the closed eyes were leaden in
colour, the loose mouth drooped dolorously at the corners, the rolling chins were
unshaven. Collar and shirt bore the grime of a long journey, and the hair bristled
unkempt from the well-shaped head. It was a sorely stricken man who lay before
us.

“What is it, Watson?” asked Holmes.

“Absolute exhaustion—possibly mere hunger and fatigue,” said I, with my
finger on the thready pulse, where the stream of life trickled thin and small.

“Return ticket from Mackleton, in the north of England,” said Holmes,
drawing it from the watch-pocket. “It is not twelve o’clock yet. He has certainly
been an early starter.”

The puckered eyelids had begun to quiver, and now a pair of vacant grey eyes
looked up at us. An instant later the man had scrambled on to his feet, his face
crimson with shame.

“Forgive this weakness, Mr. Holmes, I have been a little overwrought. Thank
you, if I might have a glass of milk and a biscuit, I have no doubt that I should
be better. I came personally, Mr. Holmes, in order to insure that you would return
with me. I feared that no telegram would convince you of the absolute urgency

of the case.”

“When you are quite restored——”

“I am quite well again. I cannot imagine how I came to be so weak. I wish
you, Mr. Holmes, to come to Mackleton with me by the next train.”

My friend shook his head.

“My colleague, Dr. Watson, could tell you that we are very busy at present. I
am retained in this case of the Ferrers Documents, and the Abergavenny murder
is coming up for trial. Only a very important issue could call me from London at
present.”

“Important!” Our visitor threw up his hands. “Have you heard nothing of the
abduction of the only son of the Duke of Holdernesse?”

“What! the late Cabinet Minister?”

“Exactly. We had tried to keep it out of the papers, but there was some rumour
in the Globe last night. I thought it might have reached your ears.”

Holmes shot out his long, thin arm and picked out Volume “H” in his
encyclopædia of reference.

“‘Holdernesse, 6th Duke, K.G., P.C.’—half the alphabet! ‘Baron Beverley,
Earl of Carston’—dear me, what a list! ‘Lord Lieutenant of Hallamshire since
1900. Married Edith, daughter of Sir Charles Appledore, 1888. Heir and only
child, Lord Saltire. Owns about two hundred and fifty thousand acres. Minerals
in Lancashire and Wales. Address: Carlton House Terrace; Holdernesse Hall,
Hallamshire; Carston Castle, Bangor, Wales. Lord of the Admiralty, 1872; Chief
Secretary of State for——’ Well, well, this man is certainly one of the greatest
subjects of the Crown!”

“The greatest and perhaps the wealthiest. I am aware, Mr. Holmes, that you
take a very high line in professional matters, and that you are prepared to work
for the work’s sake. I may tell you, however, that his Grace has already intimated
that a check for five thousand pounds will be handed over to the person who can
tell him where his son is, and another thousand to him who can name the man or
men who have taken him.”

“It is a princely offer,” said Holmes. “Watson, I think that we shall accompany
Dr. Huxtable back to the north of England. And now, Dr. Huxtable, when you
have consumed that milk, you will kindly tell me what has happened, when it
happened, how it happened, and, finally, what Dr. Thorneycroft Huxtable, of the
Priory School, near Mackleton, has to do with the matter, and why he comes
three days after an event—the state of your chin gives the date—to ask for my

humble services.”

Our visitor had consumed his milk and biscuits. The light had come back to
his eyes and the colour to his cheeks, as he set himself with great vigour and
lucidity to explain the situation.

“I must inform you, gentlemen, that the Priory is a preparatory school, of
which I am the founder and principal. Huxtable’s Sidelights on Horace may
possibly recall my name to your memories. The Priory is, without exception, the
best and most select preparatory school in England. Lord Leverstoke, the Earl of
Blackwater, Sir Cathcart Soames—they all have intrusted their sons to me. But I
felt that my school had reached its zenith when, weeks ago, the Duke of
Holdernesse sent Mr. James Wilder, his secretary, with intimation that young
Lord Saltire, ten years old, his only son and heir, was about to be committed to
my charge. Little did I think that this would be the prelude to the most crushing
misfortune of my life.

“On May 1st the boy arrived, that being the beginning of the summer term. He
was a charming youth, and he soon fell into our ways. I may tell you—I trust
that I am not indiscreet, but half-confidences are absurd in such a case—that he
was not entirely happy at home. It is an open secret that the Duke’s married life
had not been a peaceful one, and the matter had ended in a separation by mutual
consent, the Duchess taking up her residence in the south of France. This had
occurred very shortly before, and the boy’s sympathies are known to have been
strongly with his mother. He moped after her departure from Holdernesse Hall,
and it was for this reason that the Duke desired to send him to my establishment.
In a fortnight the boy was quite at home with us and was apparently absolutely
happy.

“He was last seen on the night of May 13th—that is, the night of last Monday.
His room was on the second floor and was approached through another larger
room, in which two boys were sleeping. These boys saw and heard nothing, so
that it is certain that young Saltire did not pass out that way. His window was
open, and there is a stout ivy plant leading to the ground. We could trace no
footmarks below, but it is sure that this is the only possible exit.

“His absence was discovered at seven o’clock on Tuesday morning. His bed
had been slept in. He had dressed himself fully, before going off, in his usual
school suit of black Eton jacket and dark grey trousers. There were no signs that
anyone had entered the room, and it is quite certain that anything in the nature of
cries or a struggle would have been heard, since Caunter, the elder boy in the
inner room, is a very light sleeper.

“When Lord Saltire’s disappearance was discovered, I at once called a roll of
the whole establishment—boys, masters, and servants. It was then that we
ascertained that Lord Saltire had not been alone in his flight. Heidegger, the
German master, was missing. His room was on the second floor, at the farther
end of the building, facing the same way as Lord Saltire’s. His bed had also been
slept in, but he had apparently gone away partly dressed, since his shirt and
socks were lying on the floor. He had undoubtedly let himself down by the ivy,
for we could see the marks of his feet where he had landed on the lawn. His
bicycle was kept in a small shed beside this lawn, and it also was gone.

“He had been with me for two years, and came with the best references, but he
was a silent, morose man, not very popular either with masters or boys. No trace
could be found of the fugitives, and now, on Thursday morning, we are as
ignorant as we were on Tuesday. Inquiry was, of course, made at once at
Holdernesse Hall. It is only a few miles away, and we imagined that, in some
sudden attack of homesickness, he had gone back to his father, but nothing had
been heard of him. The Duke is greatly agitated, and, as to me, you have seen
yourselves the state of nervous prostration to which the suspense and the
responsibility have reduced me. Mr. Holmes, if ever you put forward your full
powers, I implore you to do so now, for never in your life could you have a case
which is more worthy of them.”

Sherlock Holmes had listened with the utmost intentness to the statement of
the unhappy schoolmaster. His drawn brows and the deep furrow between them
showed that he needed no exhortation to concentrate all his attention upon a
problem which, apart from the tremendous interests involved must appeal so
directly to his love of the complex and the unusual. He now drew out his
notebook and jotted down one or two memoranda.

“You have been very remiss in not coming to me sooner,” said he, severely.
“You start me on my investigation with a very serious handicap. It is
inconceivable, for example, that this ivy and this lawn would have yielded
nothing to an expert observer.”

“I am not to blame, Mr. Holmes. His Grace was extremely desirous to avoid
all public scandal. He was afraid of his family unhappiness being dragged before
the world. He has a deep horror of anything of the kind.”

“But there has been some official investigation?”

“Yes, sir, and it has proved most disappointing. An apparent clue was at once
obtained, since a boy and a young man were reported to have been seen leaving
a neighbouring station by an early train. Only last night we had news that the

couple had been hunted down in Liverpool, and they prove to have no
connection whatever with the matter in hand. Then it was that in my despair and
disappointment, after a sleepless night, I came straight to you by the early train.”

“I suppose the local investigation was relaxed while this false clue was being
followed up?”

“It was entirely dropped.”
“So that three days have been wasted. The affair has been most deplorably
handled.”
“I feel it and admit it.”
“And yet the problem should be capable of ultimate solution. I shall be very
happy to look into it. Have you been able to trace any connection between the
missing boy and this German master?”
“None at all.”
“Was he in the master’s class?”
“No, he never exchanged a word with him, so far as I know.”
“That is certainly very singular. Had the boy a bicycle?”
“No.”
“Was any other bicycle missing?”
“No.”
“Is that certain?”
“Quite.”
“Well, now, you do not mean to seriously suggest that this German rode off
upon a bicycle in the dead of the night, bearing the boy in his arms?”
“Certainly not.”
“Then what is the theory in your mind?”
“The bicycle may have been a blind. It may have been hidden somewhere, and
the pair gone off on foot.”
“Quite so, but it seems rather an absurd blind, does it not? Were there other
bicycles in this shed?”
“Several.”
“Would he not have hidden a couple, had he desired to give the idea that they
had gone off upon them?”
“I suppose he would.”
“Of course he would. The blind theory won’t do. But the incident is an

admirable starting-point for an investigation. After all, a bicycle is not an easy
thing to conceal or to destroy. One other question. Did anyone call to see the boy
on the day before he disappeared?”

“No.”

“Did he get any letters?”

“Yes, one letter.”

“From whom?”

“From his father.”

“Do you open the boys’ letters?”

“No.”

“How do you know it was from the father?”

“The coat of arms was on the envelope, and it was addressed in the Duke’s
peculiar stiff hand. Besides, the Duke remembers having written.”

“When had he a letter before that?”

“Not for several days.”

“Had he ever one from France?”

“No, never.

“You see the point of my questions, of course. Either the boy was carried off
by force or he went of his own free will. In the latter case, you would expect that
some prompting from outside would be needed to make so young a lad do such a
thing. If he has had no visitors, that prompting must have come in letters; hence I
try to find out who were his correspondents.”

“I fear I cannot help you much. His only correspondent, so far as I know, was
his own father.”

“Who wrote to him on the very day of his disappearance. Were the relations
between father and son very friendly?”

“His Grace is never very friendly with anyone. He is completely immersed in
large public questions, and is rather inaccessible to all ordinary emotions. But he
was always kind to the boy in his own way.”

“But the sympathies of the latter were with the mother?”

“Yes.”

“Did he say so?”

“No.”

“The Duke, then?”

“Good Heavens, no!”

“Then how could you know?”

“I have had some confidential talks with Mr. James Wilder, his Grace’s
secretary. It was he who gave me the information about Lord Saltire’s feelings.”

“I see. By the way, that last letter of the Duke’s—was it found in the boy’s
room after he was gone?”

“No, he had taken it with him. I think, Mr. Holmes, it is time that we were
leaving for Euston.”

“I will order a four-wheeler. In a quarter of an hour, we shall be at your
service. If you are telegraphing home, Mr. Huxtable, it would be well to allow
the people in your neighbourhood to imagine that the inquiry is still going on in
Liverpool, or wherever else that red herring led your pack. In the meantime I
will do a little quiet work at your own doors, and perhaps the scent is not so cold
but that two old hounds like Watson and myself may get a sniff of it.”

That evening found us in the cold, bracing atmosphere of the Peak country, in
which Dr. Huxtable’s famous school is situated. It was already dark when we
reached it. A card was lying on the hall table, and the butler whispered
something to his master, who turned to us with agitation in every heavy feature.

“The Duke is here,” said he. “The Duke and Mr. Wilder are in the study.
Come, gentlemen, and I will introduce you.”

I was, of course, familiar with the pictures of the famous statesman, but the
man himself was very different from his representation. He was a tall and stately
person, scrupulously dressed, with a drawn, thin face, and a nose which was
grotesquely curved and long. His complexion was of a dead pallor, which was
more startling by contrast with a long, dwindling beard of vivid red, which
flowed down over his white waistcoat with his watch-chain gleaming through its
fringe. Such was the stately presence who looked stonily at us from the centre of
Dr. Huxtable’s hearthrug. Beside him stood a very young man, whom I
understood to be Wilder, the private secretary. He was small, nervous, alert with
intelligent light-blue eyes and mobile features. It was he who at once, in an
incisive and positive tone, opened the conversation.

“I called this morning, Dr. Huxtable, too late to prevent you from starting for
London. I learned that your object was to invite Mr. Sherlock Holmes to
undertake the conduct of this case. His Grace is surprised, Dr. Huxtable, that you
should have taken such a step without consulting him.”

“When I learned that the police had failed——”

“His Grace is by no means convinced that the police have failed.”

“But surely, Mr. Wilder——”

“You are well aware, Dr. Huxtable, that his Grace is particularly anxious to
avoid all public scandal. He prefers to take as few people as possible into his
confidence.”

“The matter can be easily remedied,” said the brow-beaten doctor; “Mr.
Sherlock Holmes can return to London by the morning train.”

“Hardly that, Doctor, hardly that,” said Holmes, in his blandest voice. “This
northern air is invigorating and pleasant, so I propose to spend a few days upon
your moors, and to occupy my mind as best I may. Whether I have the shelter of
your roof or of the village inn is, of course, for you to decide.”

I could see that the unfortunate doctor was in the last stage of indecision, from
which he was rescued by the deep, sonorous voice of the red-bearded Duke,
which boomed out like a dinner-gong.

“I agree with Mr. Wilder, Dr. Huxtable, that you would have done wisely to
consult me. But since Mr. Holmes has already been taken into your confidence,
it would indeed be absurd that we should not avail ourselves of his services. Far
from going to the inn, Mr. Holmes, I should be pleased if you would come and
stay with me at Holdernesse Hall.”

“I thank your Grace. For the purposes of my investigation, I think that it
would be wiser for me to remain at the scene of the mystery.”

“Just as you like, Mr. Holmes. Any information which Mr. Wilder or I can
give you is, of course, at your disposal.”

“It will probably be necessary for me to see you at the Hall,” said Holmes. “I
would only ask you now, sir, whether you have formed any explanation in your
own mind as to the mysterious disappearance of your son?”

“No, sir, I have not.”

“Excuse me if I allude to that which is painful to you, but I have no
alternative. Do you think that the Duchess had anything to do with the matter?”

The great minister showed perceptible hesitation.

“I do not think so,” he said, at last.

“The other most obvious explanation is that the child has been kidnapped for
the purpose of levying ransom. You have not had any demand of the sort?”

“No, sir.”

“One more question, your Grace. I understand that you wrote to your son
upon the day when this incident occurred.”

“No, I wrote upon the day before.”

“Exactly. But he received it on that day?”

“Yes.”

“Was there anything in your letter which might have unbalanced him or
induced him to take such a step?”

“No, sir, certainly not.”

“Did you post that letter yourself?”

The nobleman’s reply was interrupted by his secretary, who broke in with
some heat.

“His Grace is not in the habit of posting letters himself,” said he. “This letter
was laid with others upon the study table, and I myself put them in the post-
bag.”

“You are sure this one was among them?”

“Yes, I observed it.”

“How many letters did your Grace write that day?”

“Twenty or thirty. I have a large correspondence. But surely this is somewhat
irrelevant?”

“Not entirely,” said Holmes.

“For my own part,” the Duke continued, “I have advised the police to turn
their attention to the south of France. I have already said that I do not believe
that the Duchess would encourage so monstrous an action, but the lad had the
most wrong-headed opinions, and it is possible that he may have fled to her,
aided and abetted by this German. I think, Dr. Huxtable, that we will now return
to the Hall.”

I could see that there were other questions which Holmes would have wished
to put, but the nobleman’s abrupt manner showed that the interview was at an
end. It was evident that to his intensely aristocratic nature this discussion of his
intimate family affairs with a stranger was most abhorrent, and that he feared lest
every fresh question would throw a fiercer light into the discreetly shadowed
corners of his ducal history.

When the nobleman and his secretary had left, my friend flung himself at once
with characteristic eagerness into the investigation.

The boy’s chamber was carefully examined, and yielded nothing save the

absolute conviction that it was only through the window that he could have
escaped. The German master’s room and effects gave no further clue. In his case
a trailer of ivy had given way under his weight, and we saw by the light of a
lantern the mark on the lawn where his heels had come down. That one dint in
the short, green grass was the only material witness left of this inexplicable
nocturnal flight.

Sherlock Holmes left the house alone, and only returned after eleven. He had
obtained a large ordnance map of the neighbourhood, and this he brought into
my room, where he laid it out on the bed, and, having balanced the lamp in the
middle of it, he began to smoke over it, and occasionally to point out objects of
interest with the reeking amber of his pipe.

“This case grows upon me, Watson,” said he. “There are decidedly some
points of interest in connection with it. In this early stage, I want you to realize
those geographical features which may have a good deal to do with our
investigation.

Holmes'-map

HOLMES’ MAP OF THE NEIGHBOURHOOD OF THE SCHOOL.

“Look at this map. This dark square is the Priory School. I’ll put a pin in it.
Now, this line is the main road. You see that it runs east and west past the school,
and you see also that there is no side road for a mile either way. If these two folk
passed away by road, it was this road.”

“Exactly.”

“By a singular and happy chance, we are able to some extent to check what
passed along this road during the night in question. At this point, where my pipe
is now resting, a county constable was on duty from twelve to six. It is, as you
perceive, the first cross-road on the east side. This man declares that he was not
absent from his post for an instant, and he is positive that neither boy nor man
could have gone that way unseen. I have spoken with this policeman to-night
and he appears to me to be a perfectly reliable person. That blocks this end. We
have now to deal with the other. There is an inn here, the Red Bull, the landlady
of which was ill. She had sent to Mackleton for a doctor, but he did not arrive
until morning, being absent at another case. The people at the inn were alert all
night, awaiting his coming, and one or other of them seems to have continually
had an eye upon the road. They declare that no one passed. If their evidence is
good, then we are fortunate enough to be able to block the west, and also to be

able to say that the fugitives did not use the road at all.”

“But the bicycle?” I objected.

“Quite so. We will come to the bicycle presently. To continue our reasoning: if
these people did not go by the road, they must have traversed the country to the
north of the house or to the south of the house. That is certain. Let us weigh the
one against the other. On the south of the house is, as you perceive, a large
district of arable land, cut up into small fields, with stone walls between them.
There, I admit that a bicycle is impossible. We can dismiss the idea. We turn to
the country on the north. Here there lies a grove of trees, marked as the ‘Ragged
Shaw,’ and on the farther side stretches a great rolling moor, Lower Gill Moor,
extending for ten miles and sloping gradually upward. Here, at one side of this
wilderness, is Holdernesse Hall, ten miles by road, but only six across the moor.
It is a peculiarly desolate plain. A few moor farmers have small holdings, where
they rear sheep and cattle. Except these, the plover and the curlew are the only
inhabitants until you come to the Chesterfield high road. There is a church there,
you see, a few cottages, and an inn. Beyond that the hills become precipitous.
Surely it is here to the north that our quest must lie.”

“But the bicycle?” I persisted.

“Well, well!” said Holmes, impatiently. “A good cyclist does not need a high
road. The moor is intersected with paths, and the moon was at the full. Halloa!
what is this?”

There was an agitated knock at the door, and an instant afterwards Dr.
Huxtable was in the room. In his hand he held a blue cricket-cap with a white
chevron on the peak.

“At last we have a clue!” he cried. “Thank heaven! at last we are on the dear
boy’s track! It is his cap.”

“Where was it found?”

“In the van of the gipsies who camped on the moor. They left on Tuesday. To-
day the police traced them down and examined their caravan. This was found.”

“How do they account for it?”

“They shuffled and lied—said that they found it on the moor on Tuesday
morning. They know where he is, the rascals! Thank goodness, they are all safe
under lock and key. Either the fear of the law or the Duke’s purse will certainly
get out of them all that they know.”

“So far, so good,” said Holmes, when the doctor had at last left the room. “It
at least bears out the theory that it is on the side of the Lower Gill Moor that we

must hope for results. The police have really done nothing locally, save the arrest
of these gipsies. Look here, Watson! There is a watercourse across the moor. You
see it marked here in the map. In some parts it widens into a morass. This is
particularly so in the region between Holdernesse Hall and the school. It is vain
to look elsewhere for tracks in this dry weather, but at that point there is
certainly a chance of some record being left. I will call you early to-morrow
morning, and you and I will try if we can throw some little light upon the
mystery.”

The day was just breaking when I woke to find the long, thin form of Holmes
by my bedside. He was fully dressed, and had apparently already been out.

“I have done the lawn and the bicycle shed,” said he. “I have also had a
rumble through the Ragged Shaw. Now, Watson, there is cocoa ready in the next
room. I must beg you to hurry, for we have a great day before us.”

His eyes shone, and his cheek was flushed with the exhilaration of the master
workman who sees his work lie ready before him. A very different Holmes, this
active, alert man, from the introspective and pallid dreamer of Baker Street. I
felt, as I looked upon that supple figure, alive with nervous energy, that it was
indeed a strenuous day that awaited us.

And yet it opened in the blackest disappointment. With high hopes we struck
across the peaty, russet moor, intersected with a thousand sheep paths, until we
came to the broad, light-green belt which marked the morass between us and
Holdernesse. Certainly, if the lad had gone homeward, he must have passed this,
and he could not pass it without leaving his traces. But no sign of him or the
German could be seen. With a darkening face my friend strode along the margin,
eagerly observant of every muddy stain upon the mossy surface. Sheep-marks
there were in profusion, and at one place, some miles down, cows had left their
tracks. Nothing more.

“Check number one,” said Holmes, looking gloomily over the rolling expanse
of the moor. “There is another morass down yonder, and a narrow neck between.
Halloa! halloa! halloa! what have we here?”

We had come on a small black ribbon of pathway. In the middle of it, clearly
marked on the sodden soil, was the track of a bicycle.

“Hurrah!” I cried. “We have it.”

But Holmes was shaking his head, and his face was puzzled and expectant
rather than joyous.

“A bicycle, certainly, but not the bicycle,” said he. “I am familiar with forty-
two different impressions left by tires. This, as you perceive, is a Dunlop, with a

patch upon the outer cover. Heidegger’s tires were Palmer’s, leaving longitudinal
stripes. Aveling, the mathematical master, was sure upon the point. Therefore, it
is not Heidegger’s track.”

“The boy’s, then?”

“Possibly, if we could prove a bicycle to have been in his possession. But this
we have utterly failed to do. This track, as you perceive, was made by a rider
who was going from the direction of the school.”

“Or towards it?”

“No, no, my dear Watson. The more deeply sunk impression is, of course, the
hind wheel, upon which the weight rests. You perceive several places where it
has passed across and obliterated the more shallow mark of the front one. It was
undoubtedly heading away from the school. It may or may not be connected with
our inquiry, but we will follow it backwards before we go any farther.”

We did so, and at the end of a few hundred yards lost the tracks as we emerged
from the boggy portion of the moor. Following the path backwards, we picked
out another spot, where a spring trickled across it. Here, once again, was the
mark of the bicycle, though nearly obliterated by the hoofs of cows. After that
there was no sign, but the path ran right on into Ragged Shaw, the wood which
backed on to the school. From this wood the cycle must have emerged. Holmes
sat down on a boulder and rested his chin in his hands. I had smoked two
cigarettes before he moved.

“Well, well,” said he, at last. “It is, of course, possible that a cunning man
might change the tires of his bicycle in order to leave unfamiliar tracks. A
criminal who was capable of such a thought is a man whom I should be proud to
do business with. We will leave this question undecided and hark back to our
morass again, for we have left a good deal unexplored.”

We continued our systematic survey of the edge of the sodden portion of the
moor, and soon our perseverance was gloriously rewarded. Right across the
lower part of the bog lay a miry path. Holmes gave a cry of delight as he
approached it. An impression like a fine bundle of telegraph wires ran down the
centre of it. It was the Palmer tires.

“Here is Herr Heidegger, sure enough!” cried Holmes, exultantly. “My
reasoning seems to have been pretty sound, Watson.”

“I congratulate you.”

“But we have a long way still to go. Kindly walk clear of the path. Now let us
follow the trail. I fear that it will not lead very far.”

We found, however, as we advanced that this portion of the moor is
intersected with soft patches, and, though we frequently lost sight of the track,
we always succeeded in picking it up once more.

“Do you observe,” said Holmes, “that the rider is now undoubtedly forcing the
pace? There can be no doubt of it. Look at this impression, where you get both
tires clear. The one is as deep as the other. That can only mean that the rider is
throwing his weight on to the handle-bar, as a man does when he is sprinting. By
Jove! he has had a fall.”

There was a broad, irregular smudge covering some yards of the track. Then
there were a few footmarks, and the tire reappeared once more.

“A side-slip,” I suggested.

Holmes held up a crumpled branch of flowering gorse. To my horror I
perceived that the yellow blossoms were all dabbled with crimson. On the path,
too, and among the heather were dark stains of clotted blood.

“Bad!” said Holmes. “Bad! Stand clear, Watson! Not an unnecessary footstep!
What do I read here? He fell wounded—he stood up—he remounted—he
proceeded. But there is no other track. Cattle on this side path. He was surely not
gored by a bull? Impossible! But I see no traces of anyone else. We must push
on, Watson. Surely, with stains as well as the track to guide us, he cannot escape
us now.”

Our search was not a very long one. The tracks of the tire began to curve
fantastically upon the wet and shining path. Suddenly, as I looked ahead, the
gleam of metal caught my eye from amid the thick gorse-bushes. Out of them we
dragged a bicycle, Palmer-tired, one pedal bent, and the whole front of it
horribly smeared and slobbered with blood. On the other side of the bushes a
shoe was projecting. We ran round, and there lay the unfortunate rider. He was a
tall man, full-bearded, with spectacles, one glass of which had been knocked out.
The cause of his death was a frightful blow upon the head, which had crushed in
part of his skull. That he could have gone on after receiving such an injury said
much for the vitality and courage of the man. He wore shoes, but no socks, and
his open coat disclosed a nightshirt beneath it. It was undoubtedly the German
master.

Holmes turned the body over reverently, and examined it with great attention.
He then sat in deep thought for a time, and I could see by his ruffled brow that
this grim discovery had not, in his opinion, advanced us much in our inquiry.

“It is a little difficult to know what to do, Watson,” said he, at last. “My own
inclinations are to push this inquiry on, for we have already lost so much time

that we cannot afford to waste another hour. On the other hand, we are bound to
inform the police of the discovery, and to see that this poor fellow’s body is
looked after.”

“I could take a note back.”

“But I need your company and assistance. Wait a bit! There is a fellow cutting
peat up yonder. Bring him over here, and he will guide the police.”

I brought the peasant across, and Holmes dispatched the frightened man with
a note to Dr. Huxtable.

“Now, Watson,” said he, “we have picked up two clues this morning. One is
the bicycle with the Palmer tire, and we see what that has led to. The other is the
bicycle with the patched Dunlop. Before we start to investigate that, let us try to
realize what we do know, so as to make the most of it, and to separate the
essential from the accidental.”

“First of all, I wish to impress upon you that the boy certainly left of his own
free-will. He got down from his window and he went off, either alone or with
someone. That is sure.”

I assented.

“Well, now, let us turn to this unfortunate German master. The boy was fully
dressed when he fled. Therefore, he foresaw what he would do. But the German
went without his socks. He certainly acted on very short notice.”

“Undoubtedly.”

“Why did he go? Because, from his bedroom window, he saw the flight of the
boy, because he wished to overtake him and bring him back. He seized his
bicycle, pursued the lad, and in pursuing him met his death.”

“So it would seem.”

“Now I come to the critical part of my argument. The natural action of a man
in pursuing a little boy would be to run after him. He would know that he could
overtake him. But the German does not do so. He turns to his bicycle. I am told
that he was an excellent cyclist. He would not do this, if he did not see that the
boy had some swift means of escape.”

“The other bicycle.”

“Let us continue our reconstruction. He meets his death five miles from the
school—not by a bullet, mark you, which even a lad might conceivably
discharge, but by a savage blow dealt by a vigorous arm. The lad, then, had a
companion in his flight. And the flight was a swift one, since it took five miles
before an expert cyclist could overtake them. Yet we survey the ground round

the scene of the tragedy. What do we find? A few cattle-tracks, nothing more. I
took a wide sweep round, and there is no path within fifty yards. Another cyclist
could have had nothing to do with the actual murder, nor were there any human
foot-marks.”

“Holmes,” I cried, “this is impossible.”

“Admirable!” he said. “A most illuminating remark. It is impossible as I state
it, and therefore I must in some respect have stated it wrong. Yet you saw for
yourself. Can you suggest any fallacy?”

“He could not have fractured his skull in a fall?”

“In a morass, Watson?”

“I am at my wits’ end.”

“Tut, tut, we have solved some worse problems. At least we have plenty of
material, if we can only use it. Come, then, and, having exhausted the Palmer, let
us see what the Dunlop with the patched cover has to offer us.”

We picked up the track and followed it onward for some distance, but soon the
moor rose into a long, heather-tufted curve, and we left the watercourse behind
us. No further help from tracks could be hoped for. At the spot where we saw the
last of the Dunlop tire it might equally have led to Holdernesse Hall, the stately
towers of which rose some miles to our left, or to a low, grey village which lay in
front of us and marked the position of the Chesterfield high road.

As we approached the forbidding and squalid inn, with the sign of a game-
cock above the door, Holmes gave a sudden groan, and clutched me by the
shoulder to save himself from falling. He had had one of those violent strains of
the ankle which leave a man helpless. With difficulty he limped up to the door,
where a squat, dark, elderly man was smoking a black clay pipe.

“How are you, Mr. Reuben Hayes?” said Holmes.

“Who are you, and how do you get my name so pat?” the countryman
answered, with a suspicious flash of a pair of cunning eyes.

“Well, it’s printed on the board above your head. It’s easy to see a man who is
master of his own house. I suppose you haven’t such a thing as a carriage in your
stables?”

“No, I have not.”

“I can hardly put my foot to the ground.”

“Don’t put it to the ground.”

“But I can’t walk.”

“Well, then hop.”

Mr. Reuben Hayes’s manner was far from gracious, but Holmes took it with
admirable good-humour.

“Look here, my man,” said he. “This is really rather an awkward fix for me. I
don’t mind how I get on.”

“Neither do I,” said the morose landlord.

“The matter is very important. I would offer you a sovereign for the use of a
bicycle.”

The landlord pricked up his ears.

“Where do you want to go?”

“To Holdernesse Hall.”

“Pals of the Dook, I suppose?” said the landlord, surveying our mud-stained
garments with ironical eyes.

Holmes laughed good-naturedly.

“He’ll be glad to see us, anyhow.”

“Why?”

“Because we bring him news of his lost son.”

The landlord gave a very visible start.

“What, you’re on his track?”

“He has been heard of in Liverpool. They expect to get him every hour.”

Again a swift change passed over the heavy, unshaven face. His manner was
suddenly genial.

“I’ve less reason to wish the Dook well than most men,” said he, “for I was
head coachman once, and cruel bad he treated me. It was him that sacked me
without a character on the word of a lying corn-chandler. But I’m glad to hear
that the young lord was heard of in Liverpool, and I’ll help you to take the news
to the Hall.”

“Thank you,” said Holmes. “We’ll have some food first. Then you can bring
round the bicycle.”

“I haven’t got a bicycle.”

Holmes held up a sovereign.

“I tell you, man, that I haven’t got one. I’ll let you have two horses as far as
the Hall.”

“Well, well,” said Holmes, “we’ll talk about it when we’ve had something to