main road and take another, a by-lane, that would lead me down by the old
ruin, close by which Till and Tweed meet. Hot as the night was, and
unpleasant for riding, I had plenty and to spare of time in hand, and
when I came to the cross-ways between Norham and Grindon, I got off my
machine and sat down on the bank at the roadside to rest a bit before
going further. It was a quiet and a very lonely spot that; for three
miles or more I had not met a soul along the road, and there being next
to nothing in the way of village or farmstead between me and Cornhill, I
did not expect to meet one in the next stages of my journey. But as I sat
there on the bank, under a thick hedge, my bicycle lying at my side, I
heard steps coming along the road in the gloom--swift, sure steps, as of
a man who walks fast, and puts his feet firmly down as with determination
to get somewhere as soon as he may. And hearing that--and to this day I
have often wondered what made me do it--I off with my cap, and laid it
over the bicycle-lamp, and myself sat as still as any of the wee
creatures that were doubtless lying behind me in the hedge.

The steps came from the direction in which I was bound. There was a bit
of a dip in the road just there: they came steadily, strongly, up it. And
presently--for this was the height of June, when the nights are never
really dark--the figure of a man came over the ridge of the dip, and
showed itself plain against a piece of grey sky that was framed by the
fingers of the pines and firs on either side of the way. A strongly-built
figure it was, and, as I said before, the man put his feet, evidently
well shod, firmly and swiftly down, and with this alternate sound came
the steady and equally swift tapping of an iron-shod stick. Whoever this
night-traveller was, it was certain he was making his way somewhere
without losing any time in the business.

The man came close by me and my cover, seeing nothing, and at a few