and huge projecting bones. It walked slowly across the lawn and vanished into

the shadow upon the other side. That dreadful sentinel sent a chill to my heart

which I do not think that any burglar could have done.


“And now I have a very strange experience to tell you. I had, as you

know, cut off my hair in London, and I had placed it in a great coil at the

bottom of my trunk. One evening, after the child was in bed, I began to amuse

myself by examining the furniture of my room and by rearranging my own little

things. There was an old chest of drawers in the room, the two upper ones empty

and open, the lower one locked. I had filled the first two with my linen, and

as I had still much to pack away I was naturally annoyed at not having the use

of the third drawer. It struck me that it might have been fastened by a mere

oversight, so I took out my bunch of keys and tried to open it. The very first

key fitted to perfection, and I drew the drawer open. There was only one thing

in it, but I am sure that you would never guess what it was. It was my coil of

hair.


“I took it up and examined it. It was of the same peculiar tint, and the

same thickness. But then the impossibility of the thing obtruded itself upon

me. How could my hair have been locked in the drawer? With trembling hands I

undid my trunk, turned out the contents, and drew from the bottom my own hair.

I laid the two tresses together, and I assure you that they were identical. Was

it not extraordinary? Puzzle as I would, I could make nothing at all of what it

meant. I returned the strange hair to the drawer, and I said nothing of the

matter to the Rucastles as I felt that I had put myself in the wrong by opening

a drawer which they had locked.


“I am naturally observant, as you may have remarked, Mr. Holmes, and I

soon had a pretty good plan of the whole house in my head. There was one wing,

however, which appeared not to be inhabited at all. A door which faced that