"This is a strange note," said Mr. Utterson; and then sharply, "How do you come to have it open?"
"The man at Maw"s was main angry, sir, and he threw it back to me like so much dirt," returned Poole.
"This is unquestionably the doctor"s hand, do you know?" resumed the lawyer.
"I thought it looked like it," said the servant rather sulkily; and then, with another voice, "But what matters hand-of-write?"
he said. "I"ve seen him!"
"Seen him?" repeated Mr. Utterson. "Well?"
"That"s it!" said Poole. "It was this way. I came suddenly into the theatre from the
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garden. It seems he had slipped out to look for this drug or whatever it is; for the cabinet door was open, and there he was at the far end of the room digging among the crates. He looked up when I came in, gave a kind of cry, and whipped up-stairs into the cabinet. It was but for one minute that I saw him, but the hair stood upon my head like quills. Sir, if that was my master, why had he a mask upon his face? If it was my master, why did he cry out like a rat, and run from me? I have served him long enough. And then..." The man paused and pa.s.sed his hand over his face.
"These are all very strange circ.u.mstances," said Mr. Utterson, "but I think I begin to see daylight. Your master, Poole, is plainly seized with one of those maladies that both torture and deform the sufferer; hence, for aught I know, the alteration of his voice; hence the mask and the avoidance of his friends; hence his eagerness to find this drug, by means of which the poor soul retains some hope of ultimate recovery--G.o.d grant that he be not deceived! There is my explanation; it is sad enough, Poole, ay, and appalling to consider; but it is plain and natural, hangs well together, and delivers us from all exorbitant alarms."
"Sir," said the butler, turning to a sort of mottled pallor, "that thing was not my master, and there"s the truth. My master"
here he looked round him and began to whisper--"is
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a tall, fine build of a man, and this was more of a dwarf."
Utterson attempted to protest. "O, sir," cried Poole, "do you think I do not know my master after twenty years? Do you think I do not know where his head comes to in the cabinet door, where I saw him every morning of my life? No, Sir, that thing in the mask was never Dr. Jekyll--G.o.d knows what it was, but it was never Dr. Jekyll; and it is the belief of my heart that there was murder done."
"Poole," replied the lawyer, "if you say that, it will become my duty to make certain. Much as I desire to spare your master"s feelings, much as I am puzzled by this note which seems to prove him to be still alive, I shall consider it my duty to break in that door."
"Ah Mr. Utterson, that"s talking!" cried the butler.
"And now comes the second question," resumed Utterson: "Who is going to do it?"
"Why, you and me," was the undaunted reply.
"That"s very well said," returned the lawyer; "and whatever comes of it, I shall make it my business to see you are no loser."
"There is an axe in the theatre," continued Poole; "and you might take the kitchen poker for yourself."
The lawyer took that rude but weighty instrument into his hand, and balanced it. "Do you know, Poole," he said, looking up, "that
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you and I are about to place ourselves in a position of some peril?"
"You may say so, sir, indeed," returned the butler.
"It is well, then, that we should be frank," said the other. "We both think more than we have said; let us make a clean breast.
This masked figure that you saw, did you recognise it?"
"Well, sir, it went so quick, and the creature was so doubled up, that I could hardly swear to that," was the answer. "But if you mean, was it Mr. Hyde?--why, yes, I think it was! You see, it was much of the same bigness; and it had the same quick, light way with it; and then who else could have got in by the laboratory door? You have not forgot, sir that at the time of the murder he had still the key with him? But that"s not all. I don"t know, Mr. Utterson, if ever you met this Mr. Hyde?"
"Yes," said the lawyer, "I once spoke with him."
"Then you must know as well as the rest of us that there was something queer about that gentleman--something that gave a man a turn--I don"t know rightly how to say it, sir, beyond this: that you felt it in your marrow kind of cold and thin."
"I own I felt something of what you describe," said Mr. Utterson.
"Quite so, sir," returned Poole. "Well, when
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that masked thing like a monkey jumped from among the chemicals and whipped into the cabinet, it went down my spine like ice. Oh, I know it"s not evidence, Mr. Utterson. I"m book-learned enough for that; but a man has his feelings, and I give you my Bible-word it was Mr. Hyde!"
"Ay, ay," said the lawyer. "My fears incline to the same point.
Evil, I fear, founded--evil was sure to come--of that connection. Ay, truly, I believe you; I believe poor Harry is killed; and I believe his murderer (for what purpose, G.o.d alone can tell) is still lurking in his victim"s room. Well, let our name be vengeance. Call Bradshaw."
The footman came at the summons, very white and nervous.
"Pull yourself together, Bradshaw," said the lawyer. "This suspense, I know, is telling upon all of you; but it is now our intention to make an end of it. Poole, here, and I are going to force our way into the cabinet. If all is well, my shoulders are broad enough to bear the blame. Meanwhile, lest anything should really be amiss, or any malefactor seek to escape by the back, you and the boy must go round the corner with a pair of good sticks and take your post at the laboratory door. We give you ten minutes to get to your stations."
As Bradshaw left, the lawyer looked at his watch. "And now, Poole, let us get to ours,"
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he said; and taking the poker under his arm, led the way into the yard. The scud had banked over the moon, and it was now quite dark. The wind, which only broke in puffs and draughts into that deep well of building, tossed the light of the candle to and fro about their steps, until they came into the shelter of the theatre, where they sat down silently to wait. London hummed solemnly all around; but nearer at hand, the stillness was only broken by the sounds of a footfall moving to and fro along the cabinet floor.
"So it will walk all day, sir," whispered Poole; "ay, and the better part of the night. Only when a new sample comes from the chemist, there"s a bit of a break. Ah, it"s an ill conscience that"s such an enemy to rest! Ah, sir, there"s blood foully shed in every step of it! But hark again, a little closer--put your heart in your ears, Mr. Utterson, and tell me, is that the doctor"s foot?"
The steps fell lightly and oddly, with a certain swing, for all they went so slowly; it was different indeed from the heavy creaking tread of Henry Jekyll. Utterson sighed. "Is there never anything else?" he asked.
Poole nodded. "Once," he said. "Once I heard it weeping!"
"Weeping? how that?" said the lawyer, conscious of a sudden chill of horror.
"Weeping like a woman or a lost soul," said
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the butler. "I came away with that upon my heart, that I could have wept too."
But now the ten minutes drew to an end. Poole disinterred the axe from under a stack of packing straw; the candle was set upon the nearest table to light them to the attack; and they drew near with bated breath to where that patient foot was still going up and down, up and down, in the quiet of the night.
"Jekyll," cried Utterson, with a loud voice, "I demand to see you." He paused a moment, but there came no reply. "I give you fair warning, our suspicions are aroused, and I must and shall see you," he resumed; "if not by fair means, then by foul! if not of your consent, then by brute force!"
"Utterson," said the voice, "for G.o.d"s sake, have mercy!"