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IN CONTEXT

TYPE

Short story

FIRST PUBLICATION

US: December 1903

UK: January 1904

COLLECTION

The Return of Sherlock Holmes, 1905

CHARACTERS

Violet Smith Cyclist and music teacher.

Bob Carruthers Former prospector in South Africa, and widower with a daughter.

Jack Woodley Ruffian, recently returned from South Africa.

Mr. Williamson Disgraced former clergyman.

Cyril Morton Violet’s fiancé and electrical engineer.

This tale opens with Watson telling the reader about Holmes’s professional success, and ponders the difficulty in deciding which of his hundreds of cases should be presented to the public. Watson concludes that he will give “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 their solution.” “The Adventure of the Solitary Cyclist” is certainly dramatic—with guns brandished and shots fired—and Holmes is at his most chivalrous and physical as he rescues the damsel in distress.

The mysterious stalker

It is April 1895 and Violet Smith arrives at 221B Baker Street. She is a beautiful, upright young woman, who is devoted to both her widowed mother and her fiancé, Cyril Morton. Holmes immediately identifies Violet as being an avid cyclist (from the roughening of the side of her sole caused by the friction of the pedal) and a musician (from her “spatulate finger-end”).

She had recently responded to a newspaper advertisement from two men—Woodley and Carruthers—who claim to have known her uncle Ralph in South Africa. They told her of Ralph’s death, and said that he had asked them both to tend to the needs of his relations. Woodley, she said, kept “making eyes” at her, but she found him “odious” and repellent. Carruthers, a widower, offered her a live-in job as a music tutor to his daughter at a remote house near Farnham. Since the position was well paid, and he seemed kind, she accepted. Each weekend, Violet cycles to Farnham station to take a train to see her mother but has noticed that she is always followed, at a distance, by another lone cyclist. Unnerved by her silent stalker, she is seeking advice from Holmes.

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One of Holmes’s many skills is boxing, which he puts to use when defending himself against a drunken Woodley. “It was a straight left against a slogging ruffian,” he tells Watson.

Uncovering the plot

Watson is sent to investigate but, predictably, Holmes is disappointed by his meager observations, which do little more than confirm the girl’s story. So Holmes goes to Farnham himself, where he makes “discreet inquiries” at the local pub. There, he becomes embroiled in a brawl with Woodley, who wants to know why Holmes is snooping into his affairs.

A dramatic denouement ensues when Watson and Holmes conceal themselves on the country lane. For safety, Violet has begun traveling by dog-cart, but as it draws near they see it is empty. Violet has been abducted, and her stalker is cycling fast behind. The stalker turns out to be Carruthers in disguise, but he is desperately looking for Violet and entreats Holmes to help him “save” her. Alerted by Violet’s screams, they find her, gagged and faint, and learn she has been forcibly married to Woodley by Mr. Williamson—a notorious defrocked priest.

At the heart of this crime is, of course, money. Carruthers and Woodley, who knew each other from South Africa, were aware that Violet was about to inherit a fortune from her uncle, and devised a plot to entrap her, enlisting Williamson’s help. The plan was for Woodley to marry her and for Carruthers to have a share in the “plunder.” The plan misfired when Carruthers fell in love with Violet and became her protector, cycling behind her each week to Farnham station in case of an attack by Woodley.

Carruthers is horrified Woodley has succeeded in marrying Violet, and shoots him in rage—Woodley is injured but survives. Holmes asserts that Mr. Williamson’s right to conduct a marriage ceremony is questionable and that no forced marriage would be legally valid.

The dramatic conclusion, with a swooning girl, two brutal rogues, and an unscrupulous clergyman, forms a classic tableau of Gothic storytelling. And in spite of the fact that the heroine is an independent individual, she still needs saving from “the worst fate that can befall a woman” by the knight in shining armour—Sherlock Holmes.

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In Edwardian times, women cyclists were considered independent, modern, and daring. Cycling really emancipated women, because for the first time they could travel without male supervision.

FORTUNE-SEEKING IN SOUTH AFRICA

The wealth that fuels the crime in this story was generated in South Africa, which became a magnet for fortune-seekers in the late 19th century. In 1866, a child of a Dutch farmer found a diamond measuring 22 carats near the Vaal River. The next year, huge diamond deposits were discovered in Kimberley, and in 1884 the world’s largest gold deposits were discovered in Witwatersrand. As news of the vast mineral wealth spread, thousands of immigrants from all over the world made their way to the Transvaal. The huge influx of prospectors, laborers, and entrepreneurs had a huge impact on the region, leading to the foundation of cities—Johannesburg grew out of a mining camp named Langlaagte—and the development of a transportation infrastructure, such as improved roads and rails. Prospectors who became super-wealthy (as was the case with Violet Smith’s uncle) were known as “randlords.”

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