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.