“ 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 whe
