THAT evening Mr. Utterson came home to his bachelor house in sombre\u00a0spirits and sat down to dinner without relish. It was his custom of\u00a0a Sunday, when this meal was over, to sit close by the fire, a\u00a0volume of some dry divinity on his reading-desk, until the clock of\u00a0the neighbouring church rang out the hour of twelve, when he would\u00a0go soberly and gratefully to bed. On this night, however, as soon as\u00a0the cloth was taken away, he took up a candle and went into his\u00a0business-room. There he opened his safe, took from the most private\u00a0part of it a document endorsed on the envelope as Dr. Jekyll's Will,\u00a0and sat down with a clouded brow to study its contents. The will was\u00a0holograph, for Mr. Utterson, though he took charge of it now that it\u00a0was made, had refused to lend the least assistance in the making of\u00a0it; it provided not only that, in case of the decease of Henry\u00a0Jekyll, M.D., D.C.L., L.L.D., F.R.S., etc., all his possessions were\u00a0to pass into the hands of his \"friend and benefactor Edward Hyde,\"\u00a0but that in case of\u00a0Dr. Jekyll's \"disappearance or unexplained absence for any period\u00a0exceeding three calendar months,\" the said Edward Hyde should step\u00a0into the said Henry Jekyll's shoes without further delay and free\u00a0from any burthen or obligation, beyond the payment of a few small\u00a0sums to the members of the doctor's household. This document had\u00a0long been the lawyer's eyesore. It offended him both as a lawyer and\u00a0as a lover of the sane and customary sides of life, to whom the\u00a0fanciful was the immodest. And hitherto it was his ignorance of Mr.\u00a0Hyde that had swelled his indignation; now, by a sudden turn, it was\u00a0his knowledge. It was already bad enough when the name was but a\u00a0name of which he could learn no more. It was worse when it began to\u00a0be clothed upon with detestable attributes; and out of the shifting,\u00a0insubstantial mists that had so long baffled his eye, there leaped\u00a0up the sudden, definite presentment of a fiend.<\/p>\r\n
\"I thought it was madness,\" he said, as he replaced the obnoxious\u00a0paper in the safe, \"and now I begin to fear it is disgrace.\"<\/p>\r\n
With that he blew out his candle, put on a great-coat, and set\u00a0forth in the direction of Cavendish Square, that citadel of\u00a0medicine, where his friend, the great Dr. Lanyon, had his house and\u00a0received his crowding patients. \"If any one knows, it will be\u00a0Lanyon,\" he had thought.<\/p>\r\n
The solemn butler knew and welcomed him;\u00a0he was subjected to no stage of delay, but ushered direct from the\u00a0door to the dining-room where Dr. Lanyon sat alone over his wine.\u00a0This was a hearty, healthy, dapper, red-faced gentleman, with a\r\nshock of hair prematurely white, and a boisterous and decided\u00a0manner. At sight of Mr. Utterson, he sprang up from his chair and\u00a0welcomed him with both hands. The geniality, as was the way of the\u00a0man, was somewhat theatrical to the eye; but it reposed on genuine\u00a0feeling. For these two were old friends, old mates both at school\u00a0and college, both thorough respecters of themselves and of each\u00a0other, and, what does not always follow, men who thoroughly enjoyed\u00a0each other's company.<\/p>\r\n
After a little rambling talk, the lawyer led up to the subject\u00a0which so disagreeably pre-occupied his mind.<\/p>\r\n
\"I suppose, Lanyon,\" said he \"you and I must be the two oldest\u00a0friends that Henry Jekyll has?\"<\/p>\r\n
\"I wish the friends were younger,\" chuckled Dr. Lanyon. \"But I\u00a0suppose we are. And what of that? I see little of him now.\"<\/p>\r\n\"Indeed?\" said Utterson. \"I thought you had a bond of common\u00a0interest.\"\r\n
\"We had,\" was the reply. \"But it is more than ten years since Henry\u00a0Jekyll became too fanciful for me. He began to go wrong, wrong in\u00a0mind; and though of course I continue to take an interest in him for\u00a0old sake's sake, as they say,\u00a0I see and I have seen devilish little of the man. Such unscientific\u00a0balderdash,\" added the doctor, flushing suddenly purple, \"would have\u00a0estranged Damon and Pythias.\"<\/p>\r\n
This little spirit of temper was somewhat of a relief to Mr.\u00a0Utterson. \"They have only differed on some point of science,\" he\u00a0thought; and being a man of no scientific passions (except in the\u00a0matter of conveyancing), he even added: \"It is nothing worse than\u00a0that!\" He gave his friend a few seconds to recover his composure,\u00a0and then approached the question he had come to put. \"Did you ever\u00a0come across a protege of his\u2014one Hyde?\" he asked.<\/p>\r\n
\"Hyde?\" repeated Lanyon. \"No. Never heard of him. Since my time.\"<\/p>\r\n
That was the amount of information that the lawyer carried back\u00a0with him to the great, dark bed on which he tossed to and fro,\u00a0until the small hours of the morning began to grow large. It was a\u00a0night of little ease to his toiling mind, toiling in mere darkness\u00a0and besieged by questions.<\/p>\r\n
Six o'clock struck on the bells of the church that was so\u00a0conveniently near to Mr. Utterson's dwelling, and still he was\u00a0digging at the problem. Hitherto it had touched him on the\u00a0intellectual side alone; but now his imagination also was engaged,\u00a0or rather enslaved; and as he lay and tossed in the gross darkness\u00a0of the night and the curtained room, Mr. Enfield's tale went by\u00a0before his mind in a scroll of lighted pictures. He would be aware\u00a0of the great field of lamps of a nocturnal city; then of the figure\u00a0of a man walking swiftly; then of a child running from the doctor's;\u00a0and then these met, and that human Juggernaut trod the child down\u00a0and passed on regardless of her screams. Or else he would see a room\u00a0in a rich house, where his friend lay asleep, dreaming and smiling\u00a0at his dreams; and then the door of that room would be opened, the\u00a0curtains of the bed plucked apart, the sleeper recalled, and lo!\u00a0there would stand by his side a figure to whom power was given, and\u00a0even at that dead hour, he must rise and do its bidding. The figure\u00a0in these two phases haunted the lawyer all night; and if at any time\u00a0he dozed over, it was but to see it glide more stealthily through\u00a0sleeping houses, or move the more swiftly and still the more\u00a0swiftly, even to dizziness, through wider labyrinths of lamplighted\u00a0city, and at every street-corner crush a child and leave her\u00a0screaming. And still the figure had no face by which he might know\u00a0it; even in his dreams, it had no face, or one that baffled him and\u00a0melted before his eyes; and thus it was that there sprang up and\u00a0grew apace in the lawyer's mind a singularly strong, almost an\u00a0inordinate, curiosity to behold the features of the real Mr. Hyde.\u00a0If he could but once set eyes on him, he thought the mystery would\u00a0lighten and perhaps roll altogether away, as was the habit of\u00a0mysterious\u00a0things when well examined. He might see a reason for his friend's\u00a0strange preference or bondage (call it which you please) and even\u00a0for the startling clause of the will. At least it would be a face\u00a0worth seeing: the face of a man who was without bowels of mercy: a\u00a0face which had but to show itself to raise up, in the mind of the\u00a0unimpressionable Enfield, a spirit of enduring hatred.<\/p>\r\n
From that time forward, Mr. Utterson began to haunt the door in the\u00a0by-street of shops. In the morning before office hours, at noon when\u00a0business was plenty, and time scarce, at night under the face of the\u00a0fogged city moon, by all lights and at all hours of solitude or\u00a0concourse, the lawyer was to be found on his chosen post.<\/p>\r\n
\"If he be Mr. Hyde,\" he had thought, \"I shall be Mr. Seek.\"<\/p>\r\n
And at last his patience was rewarded. It was a fine dry night;\u00a0frost in the air; the streets as clean as a ballroom floor; the\u00a0lamps, unshaken, by any wind, drawing a regular pattern of light\u00a0and shadow. By ten o'clock, when the shops were closed, the\u00a0by-street was very solitary and, in spite of the low growl of\u00a0London from all round, very silent. Small sounds carried far;\r\ndomestic sounds out of the houses were clearly audible on either\u00a0side of the roadway; and the rumour of the approach of any\u00a0passenger preceded him by a long time. Mr. Utterson had been some\u00a0minutes at his post, when he was\u00a0aware of an odd, light footstep drawing near. In the course of his\u00a0nightly patrols, he had long grown accustomed to the quaint effect\r\nwith which the footfalls of a single person, while he is still a\u00a0great way off, suddenly spring out distinct from the vast hum and\u00a0clatter of the city. Yet his attention had never before been so\u00a0sharply and decisively arrested; and it was with a strong,\u00a0superstitious prevision of success that he withdrew into the entry\u00a0of the court.<\/p>\r\n
The steps drew swiftly nearer, and swelled out suddenly louder as\u00a0they turned the end of the street. The lawyer, looking forth from\u00a0the entry, could soon see what manner of man he had to deal with.\u00a0He was small and very plainly dressed, and the look of him, even at\u00a0that distance, went somehow strongly against the watcher's\u00a0inclination. But he made straight for the door, crossing the\u00a0roadway to save time; and as he came, he drew a key from his pocket\u00a0like one approaching home.<\/p>\r\n
Mr. Utterson stepped out and touched him on the shoulder as he\u00a0passed. \"Mr. Hyde, I think?\"<\/p>\r\n
Mr. Hyde shrank back with a hissing intake of the breath. But his\u00a0fear was only momentary; and though he did not look the lawyer in\u00a0the face, he answered coolly enough: \"That is my name. What do you\u00a0want?\"<\/p>\r\n
\"I see you are going in,\" returned the lawyer. \"I am an old friend\u00a0of Dr. Jekyll's\u2014Mr. Utterson of Gaunt Street\u2014you must have heard my name; and meeting you\u00a0so conveniently, I thought you might admit me.\"<\/p>\r\n
\"You will not find Dr. Jekyll; he is from home,\" replied Mr. Hyde,\u00a0blowing in the key. And then suddenly, but still without looking up,\u00a0\"How did you know me?\" he asked.<\/p>\r\n
\"On your side,\" said Mr. Utterson, \"will you do me a favour?\"<\/p>\r\n
\"With pleasure,\" replied the other. \"What shall it be?\"<\/p>\r\n
\"Will you let me see your face?\" asked the lawyer.<\/p>\r\n
Mr. Hyde appeared to hesitate, and then, as if upon some sudden\u00a0reflection, fronted about with an air of defiance; and the pair\u00a0stared at each other pretty fixedly for a few seconds. \"Now I shall\u00a0know you again,\" said Mr. Utterson. \"It may be useful.\"<\/p>\r\n
\"Yes,\" returned Mr. Hyde, \"it is as well we have, met; and a\u00a0propos, you should have my address.\" And he gave a number of a\u00a0street in Soho.<\/p>\r\n
\"Good God!\" thought Mr. Utterson, \"can he, too, have been thinking\u00a0of the will?\" But he kept his feelings to himself and only grunted\u00a0in acknowledgment of the address.<\/p>\r\n
\"And now,\" said the other, \"how did you know me?\"<\/p>\r\n
\"By description,\" was the reply.<\/p>\r\n
\"Whose description?\"<\/p>\r\n
\"We have common friends,\" said Mr. Utterson.<\/p>\r\n
\"Common friends?\" echoed Mr. Hyde, a little hoarsely. \"Who are\u00a0they?\"<\/p>\r\n
\"Jekyll, for instance,\" said the lawyer.<\/p>\r\n
\"He never told you,\" cried Mr. Hyde, with a flush of anger. \"I did\u00a0not think you would have lied.\"<\/p>\r\n
\"Come,\" said Mr. Utterson, \"that is not fitting language.\"<\/p>\r\nThe other snarled aloud into a savage laugh; and the next moment,\u00a0with extraordinary quickness, he had unlocked the door and\u00a0disappeared into the house.\r\n
The lawyer stood awhile when Mr. Hyde had left him, the picture of\u00a0disquietude. Then he began slowly to mount the street, pausing\u00a0every step or two and putting his hand to his brow like a man in\u00a0mental perplexity. The problem he was thus debating as he walked,\u00a0was one of a class that is rarely solved. Mr. Hyde was pale and\u00a0dwarfish, he gave an impression of deformity without any nameable\u00a0malformation, he had a displeasing smile, he had borne himself to\u00a0the lawyer with a sort of murderous mixture of timidity and\u00a0boldness, and he spoke with a husky, whispering and somewhat broken\u00a0voice; all these were points against him, but not all of these\u00a0together could explain the hitherto unknown disgust, loathing, and\u00a0fear with which Mr. Utterson regarded him. \"There must be something else,\" said the perplexed gentleman. \"There is something\u00a0more, if I could find a name for it. God bless me, the man seems\u00a0hardly human! Something troglodytic, shall we say? or can it be the\u00a0old story of Dr. Fell? or is it the mere radiance of a foul soul\u00a0that thus transpires through, and transfigures, its clay continent?\u00a0The last, I think; for, O my poor old Harry Jekyll, if ever I read\u00a0Satan's signature upon a face, it is on that of your new friend.\"<\/p>\r\n
Round the corner from the by-street, there was a square of ancient,\u00a0handsome houses, now for the most part decayed from their high\u00a0estate and let in flats and chambers to all sorts and conditions of\u00a0men: map-engravers, architects, shady lawyers, and the agents of\u00a0obscure enterprises. One house, however, second from the corner, was\u00a0still occupied entire; and at the door of this, which wore a great\u00a0air of wealth and comfort, though it was now plunged in darkness\u00a0except for the fan-light, Mr. Utterson stopped and knocked. A\u00a0well-dressed, elderly servant opened the door.<\/p>\r\n
\"Is Dr. Jekyll at home, Poole?\" asked the lawyer.<\/p>\r\n
\"I will see, Mr. Utterson,\" said Poole, admitting the visitor, as\u00a0he spoke, into a large, low-roofed, comfortable hall, paved with\u00a0flags, warmed (after the fashion of a country house) by a bright,\u00a0open fire, and furnished with costly cabinets of oak. \"Will you\u00a0wait here by the\u00a0fire, sir? or shall I give you a light in the dining room?\"<\/p>\r\n
\"Here, thank you,\" said the lawyer, and he drew near and leaned on\u00a0the tall fender. This hall, in which he was now left alone, was a\u00a0pet fancy of his friend the doctor's; and Utterson himself was wont\u00a0to speak of it as the pleasantest room in London. But to-night there\u00a0was a shudder in his blood; the face of Hyde sat heavy on his\u00a0memory; he felt (what was rare with him) a nausea and distaste of\u00a0life; and in the gloom of his spirits, he seemed to read a menace in\u00a0the flickering of the firelight on the polished cabinets and the\u00a0uneasy starting of the shadow on the roof. He was ashamed of his\u00a0relief, when Poole presently returned to announce that Dr. Jekyll\u00a0was gone out.<\/p>\r\n
\"I saw Mr. Hyde go in by the old dissecting-room door, Poole,\" he\u00a0said. \"Is that right, when Dr. Jekyll is from home?\"<\/p>\r\n
\"Quite right, Mr. Utterson, sir,\" replied the servant. \"Mr. Hyde\u00a0has a key.\"<\/p>\r\n
\"Your master seems to repose a great deal of trust in that young\u00a0man, Poole,\" resumed the other musingly.<\/p>\r\n
\"Yes, sir, he do indeed,\" said Poole. \"We have all orders to obey\u00a0him.\"<\/p>\r\n
\"I do not think I ever met Mr. Hyde?\" asked Utterson.<\/p>\r\n\"O, dear no, sir. He never dines here,\" replied the butler. \"Indeed\u00a0we see very little of him on this side of the house; he mostly comes and goes by the\u00a0laboratory.\"\r\n
\"Well, good-night, Poole.\"<\/p>\r\n
\"Good-night, Mr. Utterson.\" And the lawyer set out homeward with a\u00a0very heavy heart. \"Poor Harry Jekyll,\" he thought, \"my mind\u00a0misgives me he is in deep waters! He was wild when he was young; a\u00a0long while ago to be sure; but in the law of God, there is no\u00a0statute of limitations. Ay, it must be that; the ghost of some old\u00a0sin, the cancer of some concealed disgrace: punishment coming, PEDEC LAUDO, years after memory has forgotten and self-love condoned the\u00a0fault.\" And the lawyer, scared by the thought, brooded a while on\u00a0his own past, groping in all the corners of memory, lest by chance\u00a0some Jack-in-the-Box of an old iniquity should leap to light there.\u00a0His past was fairly blameless; few men could read the rolls of their\u00a0life with less apprehension; yet he was humbled to the dust by the\u00a0many ill things he had done, and raised up again into a sober and\u00a0fearful gratitude by the many that he had come so near to doing, yet\u00a0avoided. And then by a return on his former subject, he conceived a\u00a0spark of hope. \"This Master Hyde, if he were studied,\" thought he,\u00a0\"must have secrets of his own; black secrets, by the look of him;\u00a0secrets compared to which poor Jekyll's worst would be like\u00a0sunshine. Things cannot continue as they are. It turns me cold to\u00a0think of this creature stealing like a\u00a0thief to Harry's bedside; poor Harry, what a wakening! And the\u00a0danger of it; for if this Hyde suspects the existence of the will,\u00a0he may grow impatient to inherit. Ay, I must put my shoulder to the\u00a0wheel if Jekyll will but let me,\" he added, \"if Jekyll will only let\u00a0me.\" For once more he saw before his mind's eye, as clear as a\u00a0transparency, the strange clauses of the will.<\/p>","rendered":"
THAT evening Mr. Utterson came home to his bachelor house in sombre\u00a0spirits and sat down to dinner without relish. It was his custom of\u00a0a Sunday, when this meal was over, to sit close by the fire, a\u00a0volume of some dry divinity on his reading-desk, until the clock of\u00a0the neighbouring church rang out the hour of twelve, when he would\u00a0go soberly and gratefully to bed. On this night, however, as soon as\u00a0the cloth was taken away, he took up a candle and went into his\u00a0business-room. There he opened his safe, took from the most private\u00a0part of it a document endorsed on the envelope as Dr. Jekyll’s Will,\u00a0and sat down with a clouded brow to study its contents. The will was\u00a0holograph, for Mr. Utterson, though he took charge of it now that it\u00a0was made, had refused to lend the least assistance in the making of\u00a0it; it provided not only that, in case of the decease of Henry\u00a0Jekyll, M.D., D.C.L., L.L.D., F.R.S., etc., all his possessions were\u00a0to pass into the hands of his “friend and benefactor Edward Hyde,”\u00a0but that in case of\u00a0Dr. Jekyll’s “disappearance or unexplained absence for any period\u00a0exceeding three calendar months,” the said Edward Hyde should step\u00a0into the said Henry Jekyll’s shoes without further delay and free\u00a0from any burthen or obligation, beyond the payment of a few small\u00a0sums to the members of the doctor’s household. This document had\u00a0long been the lawyer’s eyesore. It offended him both as a lawyer and\u00a0as a lover of the sane and customary sides of life, to whom the\u00a0fanciful was the immodest. And hitherto it was his ignorance of Mr.\u00a0Hyde that had swelled his indignation; now, by a sudden turn, it was\u00a0his knowledge. It was already bad enough when the name was but a\u00a0name of which he could learn no more. It was worse when it began to\u00a0be clothed upon with detestable attributes; and out of the shifting,\u00a0insubstantial mists that had so long baffled his eye, there leaped\u00a0up the sudden, definite presentment of a fiend.<\/p>\n
“I thought it was madness,” he said, as he replaced the obnoxious\u00a0paper in the safe, “and now I begin to fear it is disgrace.”<\/p>\n
With that he blew out his candle, put on a great-coat, and set\u00a0forth in the direction of Cavendish Square, that citadel of\u00a0medicine, where his friend, the great Dr. Lanyon, had his house and\u00a0received his crowding patients. “If any one knows, it will be\u00a0Lanyon,” he had thought.<\/p>\n
The solemn butler knew and welcomed him;\u00a0he was subjected to no stage of delay, but ushered direct from the\u00a0door to the dining-room where Dr. Lanyon sat alone over his wine.\u00a0This was a hearty, healthy, dapper, red-faced gentleman, with a
\nshock of hair prematurely white, and a boisterous and decided\u00a0manner. At sight of Mr. Utterson, he sprang up from his chair and\u00a0welcomed him with both hands. The geniality, as was the way of the\u00a0man, was somewhat theatrical to the eye; but it reposed on genuine\u00a0feeling. For these two were old friends, old mates both at school\u00a0and college, both thorough respecters of themselves and of each\u00a0other, and, what does not always follow, men who thoroughly enjoyed\u00a0each other’s company.<\/p>\n
After a little rambling talk, the lawyer led up to the subject\u00a0which so disagreeably pre-occupied his mind.<\/p>\n
“I suppose, Lanyon,” said he “you and I must be the two oldest\u00a0friends that Henry Jekyll has?”<\/p>\n
“I wish the friends were younger,” chuckled Dr. Lanyon. “But I\u00a0suppose we are. And what of that? I see little of him now.”<\/p>\n
“Indeed?” said Utterson. “I thought you had a bond of common\u00a0interest.”<\/p>\n
“We had,” was the reply. “But it is more than ten years since Henry\u00a0Jekyll became too fanciful for me. He began to go wrong, wrong in\u00a0mind; and though of course I continue to take an interest in him for\u00a0old sake’s sake, as they say,\u00a0I see and I have seen devilish little of the man. Such unscientific\u00a0balderdash,” added the doctor, flushing suddenly purple, “would have\u00a0estranged Damon and Pythias.”<\/p>\n
This little spirit of temper was somewhat of a relief to Mr.\u00a0Utterson. “They have only differed on some point of science,” he\u00a0thought; and being a man of no scientific passions (except in the\u00a0matter of conveyancing), he even added: “It is nothing worse than\u00a0that!” He gave his friend a few seconds to recover his composure,\u00a0and then approached the question he had come to put. “Did you ever\u00a0come across a protege of his\u2014one Hyde?” he asked.<\/p>\n
“Hyde?” repeated Lanyon. “No. Never heard of him. Since my time.”<\/p>\n
That was the amount of information that the lawyer carried back\u00a0with him to the great, dark bed on which he tossed to and fro,\u00a0until the small hours of the morning began to grow large. It was a\u00a0night of little ease to his toiling mind, toiling in mere darkness\u00a0and besieged by questions.<\/p>\n
Six o’clock struck on the bells of the church that was so\u00a0conveniently near to Mr. Utterson’s dwelling, and still he was\u00a0digging at the problem. Hitherto it had touched him on the\u00a0intellectual side alone; but now his imagination also was engaged,\u00a0or rather enslaved; and as he lay and tossed in the gross darkness\u00a0of the night and the curtained room, Mr. Enfield’s tale went by\u00a0before his mind in a scroll of lighted pictures. He would be aware\u00a0of the great field of lamps of a nocturnal city; then of the figure\u00a0of a man walking swiftly; then of a child running from the doctor’s;\u00a0and then these met, and that human Juggernaut trod the child down\u00a0and passed on regardless of her screams. Or else he would see a room\u00a0in a rich house, where his friend lay asleep, dreaming and smiling\u00a0at his dreams; and then the door of that room would be opened, the\u00a0curtains of the bed plucked apart, the sleeper recalled, and lo!\u00a0there would stand by his side a figure to whom power was given, and\u00a0even at that dead hour, he must rise and do its bidding. The figure\u00a0in these two phases haunted the lawyer all night; and if at any time\u00a0he dozed over, it was but to see it glide more stealthily through\u00a0sleeping houses, or move the more swiftly and still the more\u00a0swiftly, even to dizziness, through wider labyrinths of lamplighted\u00a0city, and at every street-corner crush a child and leave her\u00a0screaming. And still the figure had no face by which he might know\u00a0it; even in his dreams, it had no face, or one that baffled him and\u00a0melted before his eyes; and thus it was that there sprang up and\u00a0grew apace in the lawyer’s mind a singularly strong, almost an\u00a0inordinate, curiosity to behold the features of the real Mr. Hyde.\u00a0If he could but once set eyes on him, he thought the mystery would\u00a0lighten and perhaps roll altogether away, as was the habit of\u00a0mysterious\u00a0things when well examined. He might see a reason for his friend’s\u00a0strange preference or bondage (call it which you please) and even\u00a0for the startling clause of the will. At least it would be a face\u00a0worth seeing: the face of a man who was without bowels of mercy: a\u00a0face which had but to show itself to raise up, in the mind of the\u00a0unimpressionable Enfield, a spirit of enduring hatred.<\/p>\n
From that time forward, Mr. Utterson began to haunt the door in the\u00a0by-street of shops. In the morning before office hours, at noon when\u00a0business was plenty, and time scarce, at night under the face of the\u00a0fogged city moon, by all lights and at all hours of solitude or\u00a0concourse, the lawyer was to be found on his chosen post.<\/p>\n
“If he be Mr. Hyde,” he had thought, “I shall be Mr. Seek.”<\/p>\n
And at last his patience was rewarded. It was a fine dry night;\u00a0frost in the air; the streets as clean as a ballroom floor; the\u00a0lamps, unshaken, by any wind, drawing a regular pattern of light\u00a0and shadow. By ten o’clock, when the shops were closed, the\u00a0by-street was very solitary and, in spite of the low growl of\u00a0London from all round, very silent. Small sounds carried far;
\ndomestic sounds out of the houses were clearly audible on either\u00a0side of the roadway; and the rumour of the approach of any\u00a0passenger preceded him by a long time. Mr. Utterson had been some\u00a0minutes at his post, when he was\u00a0aware of an odd, light footstep drawing near. In the course of his\u00a0nightly patrols, he had long grown accustomed to the quaint effect
\nwith which the footfalls of a single person, while he is still a\u00a0great way off, suddenly spring out distinct from the vast hum and\u00a0clatter of the city. Yet his attention had never before been so\u00a0sharply and decisively arrested; and it was with a strong,\u00a0superstitious prevision of success that he withdrew into the entry\u00a0of the court.<\/p>\n
The steps drew swiftly nearer, and swelled out suddenly louder as\u00a0they turned the end of the street. The lawyer, looking forth from\u00a0the entry, could soon see what manner of man he had to deal with.\u00a0He was small and very plainly dressed, and the look of him, even at\u00a0that distance, went somehow strongly against the watcher’s\u00a0inclination. But he made straight for the door, crossing the\u00a0roadway to save time; and as he came, he drew a key from his pocket\u00a0like one approaching home.<\/p>\n
Mr. Utterson stepped out and touched him on the shoulder as he\u00a0passed. “Mr. Hyde, I think?”<\/p>\n
Mr. Hyde shrank back with a hissing intake of the breath. But his\u00a0fear was only momentary; and though he did not look the lawyer in\u00a0the face, he answered coolly enough: “That is my name. What do you\u00a0want?”<\/p>\n
“I see you are going in,” returned the lawyer. “I am an old friend\u00a0of Dr. Jekyll’s\u2014Mr. Utterson of Gaunt Street\u2014you must have heard my name; and meeting you\u00a0so conveniently, I thought you might admit me.”<\/p>\n
“You will not find Dr. Jekyll; he is from home,” replied Mr. Hyde,\u00a0blowing in the key. And then suddenly, but still without looking up,\u00a0“How did you know me?” he asked.<\/p>\n
“On your side,” said Mr. Utterson, “will you do me a favour?”<\/p>\n
“With pleasure,” replied the other. “What shall it be?”<\/p>\n
“Will you let me see your face?” asked the lawyer.<\/p>\n
Mr. Hyde appeared to hesitate, and then, as if upon some sudden\u00a0reflection, fronted about with an air of defiance; and the pair\u00a0stared at each other pretty fixedly for a few seconds. “Now I shall\u00a0know you again,” said Mr. Utterson. “It may be useful.”<\/p>\n
“Yes,” returned Mr. Hyde, “it is as well we have, met; and a\u00a0propos, you should have my address.” And he gave a number of a\u00a0street in Soho.<\/p>\n
“Good God!” thought Mr. Utterson, “can he, too, have been thinking\u00a0of the will?” But he kept his feelings to himself and only grunted\u00a0in acknowledgment of the address.<\/p>\n
“And now,” said the other, “how did you know me?”<\/p>\n
“By description,” was the reply.<\/p>\n
“Whose description?”<\/p>\n
“We have common friends,” said Mr. Utterson.<\/p>\n
“Common friends?” echoed Mr. Hyde, a little hoarsely. “Who are\u00a0they?”<\/p>\n
“Jekyll, for instance,” said the lawyer.<\/p>\n
“He never told you,” cried Mr. Hyde, with a flush of anger. “I did\u00a0not think you would have lied.”<\/p>\n
“Come,” said Mr. Utterson, “that is not fitting language.”<\/p>\n
The other snarled aloud into a savage laugh; and the next moment,\u00a0with extraordinary quickness, he had unlocked the door and\u00a0disappeared into the house.<\/p>\n
The lawyer stood awhile when Mr. Hyde had left him, the picture of\u00a0disquietude. Then he began slowly to mount the street, pausing\u00a0every step or two and putting his hand to his brow like a man in\u00a0mental perplexity. The problem he was thus debating as he walked,\u00a0was one of a class that is rarely solved. Mr. Hyde was pale and\u00a0dwarfish, he gave an impression of deformity without any nameable\u00a0malformation, he had a displeasing smile, he had borne himself to\u00a0the lawyer with a sort of murderous mixture of timidity and\u00a0boldness, and he spoke with a husky, whispering and somewhat broken\u00a0voice; all these were points against him, but not all of these\u00a0together could explain the hitherto unknown disgust, loathing, and\u00a0fear with which Mr. Utterson regarded him. “There must be something else,” said the perplexed gentleman. “There is something\u00a0more, if I could find a name for it. God bless me, the man seems\u00a0hardly human! Something troglodytic, shall we say? or can it be the\u00a0old story of Dr. Fell? or is it the mere radiance of a foul soul\u00a0that thus transpires through, and transfigures, its clay continent?\u00a0The last, I think; for, O my poor old Harry Jekyll, if ever I read\u00a0Satan’s signature upon a face, it is on that of your new friend.”<\/p>\n
Round the corner from the by-street, there was a square of ancient,\u00a0handsome houses, now for the most part decayed from their high\u00a0estate and let in flats and chambers to all sorts and conditions of\u00a0men: map-engravers, architects, shady lawyers, and the agents of\u00a0obscure enterprises. One house, however, second from the corner, was\u00a0still occupied entire; and at the door of this, which wore a great\u00a0air of wealth and comfort, though it was now plunged in darkness\u00a0except for the fan-light, Mr. Utterson stopped and knocked. A\u00a0well-dressed, elderly servant opened the door.<\/p>\n
“Is Dr. Jekyll at home, Poole?” asked the lawyer.<\/p>\n
“I will see, Mr. Utterson,” said Poole, admitting the visitor, as\u00a0he spoke, into a large, low-roofed, comfortable hall, paved with\u00a0flags, warmed (after the fashion of a country house) by a bright,\u00a0open fire, and furnished with costly cabinets of oak. “Will you\u00a0wait here by the\u00a0fire, sir? or shall I give you a light in the dining room?”<\/p>\n
“Here, thank you,” said the lawyer, and he drew near and leaned on\u00a0the tall fender. This hall, in which he was now left alone, was a\u00a0pet fancy of his friend the doctor’s; and Utterson himself was wont\u00a0to speak of it as the pleasantest room in London. But to-night there\u00a0was a shudder in his blood; the face of Hyde sat heavy on his\u00a0memory; he felt (what was rare with him) a nausea and distaste of\u00a0life; and in the gloom of his spirits, he seemed to read a menace in\u00a0the flickering of the firelight on the polished cabinets and the\u00a0uneasy starting of the shadow on the roof. He was ashamed of his\u00a0relief, when Poole presently returned to announce that Dr. Jekyll\u00a0was gone out.<\/p>\n
“I saw Mr. Hyde go in by the old dissecting-room door, Poole,” he\u00a0said. “Is that right, when Dr. Jekyll is from home?”<\/p>\n
“Quite right, Mr. Utterson, sir,” replied the servant. “Mr. Hyde\u00a0has a key.”<\/p>\n
“Your master seems to repose a great deal of trust in that young\u00a0man, Poole,” resumed the other musingly.<\/p>\n
“Yes, sir, he do indeed,” said Poole. “We have all orders to obey\u00a0him.”<\/p>\n
“I do not think I ever met Mr. Hyde?” asked Utterson.<\/p>\n
“O, dear no, sir. He never dines here,” replied the butler. “Indeed\u00a0we see very little of him on this side of the house; he mostly comes and goes by the\u00a0laboratory.”<\/p>\n
“Well, good-night, Poole.”<\/p>\n
“Good-night, Mr. Utterson.” And the lawyer set out homeward with a\u00a0very heavy heart. “Poor Harry Jekyll,” he thought, “my mind\u00a0misgives me he is in deep waters! He was wild when he was young; a\u00a0long while ago to be sure; but in the law of God, there is no\u00a0statute of limitations. Ay, it must be that; the ghost of some old\u00a0sin, the cancer of some concealed disgrace: punishment coming, PEDEC LAUDO, years after memory has forgotten and self-love condoned the\u00a0fault.” And the lawyer, scared by the thought, brooded a while on\u00a0his own past, groping in all the corners of memory, lest by chance\u00a0some Jack-in-the-Box of an old iniquity should leap to light there.\u00a0His past was fairly blameless; few men could read the rolls of their\u00a0life with less apprehension; yet he was humbled to the dust by the\u00a0many ill things he had done, and raised up again into a sober and\u00a0fearful gratitude by the many that he had come so near to doing, yet\u00a0avoided. And then by a return on his former subject, he conceived a\u00a0spark of hope. “This Master Hyde, if he were studied,” thought he,\u00a0“must have secrets of his own; black secrets, by the look of him;\u00a0secrets compared to which poor Jekyll’s worst would be like\u00a0sunshine. Things cannot continue as they are. It turns me cold to\u00a0think of this creature stealing like a\u00a0thief to Harry’s bedside; poor Harry, what a wakening! And the\u00a0danger of it; for if this Hyde suspects the existence of the will,\u00a0he may grow impatient to inherit. Ay, I must put my shoulder to the\u00a0wheel if Jekyll will but let me,” he added, “if Jekyll will only let\u00a0me.” For once more he saw before his mind’s eye, as clear as a\u00a0transparency, the strange clauses of the will.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":251,"menu_order":2,"template":"","meta":{"pb_show_title":"on","pb_short_title":"","pb_subtitle":"","pb_authors":[],"pb_section_license":""},"chapter-type":[48],"contributor":[],"license":[],"class_list":["post-73","chapter","type-chapter","status-publish","hentry","chapter-type-numberless"],"part":3,"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/pressbooks.library.torontomu.ca\/jekyllandhyde\/wp-json\/pressbooks\/v2\/chapters\/73","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/pressbooks.library.torontomu.ca\/jekyllandhyde\/wp-json\/pressbooks\/v2\/chapters"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/pressbooks.library.torontomu.ca\/jekyllandhyde\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/chapter"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/pressbooks.library.torontomu.ca\/jekyllandhyde\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/251"}],"version-history":[{"count":4,"href":"https:\/\/pressbooks.library.torontomu.ca\/jekyllandhyde\/wp-json\/pressbooks\/v2\/chapters\/73\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":124,"href":"https:\/\/pressbooks.library.torontomu.ca\/jekyllandhyde\/wp-json\/pressbooks\/v2\/chapters\/73\/revisions\/124"}],"part":[{"href":"https:\/\/pressbooks.library.torontomu.ca\/jekyllandhyde\/wp-json\/pressbooks\/v2\/parts\/3"}],"metadata":[{"href":"https:\/\/pressbooks.library.torontomu.ca\/jekyllandhyde\/wp-json\/pressbooks\/v2\/chapters\/73\/metadata\/"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/pressbooks.library.torontomu.ca\/jekyllandhyde\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=73"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"chapter-type","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/pressbooks.library.torontomu.ca\/jekyllandhyde\/wp-json\/pressbooks\/v2\/chapter-type?post=73"},{"taxonomy":"contributor","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/pressbooks.library.torontomu.ca\/jekyllandhyde\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/contributor?post=73"},{"taxonomy":"license","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/pressbooks.library.torontomu.ca\/jekyllandhyde\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/license?post=73"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}