Some two months before the murder of Sir Danvers, I had been out\u00a0for one of my adventures, had returned at a late hour, and woke\u00a0the next day in bed with somewhat odd sensations. It was in vain\u00a0I looked about me; in vain I saw the decent furniture and tall\u00a0proportions of my room in the square; in vain that I recognised\u00a0the pattern of the bed-curtains and the design of the mahogany\u00a0frame; something still kept insisting that I was not where I was,\u00a0that I had not wakened where I seemed to be, but in the little\u00a0room in Soho where I was accustomed to sleep in the body of\u00a0Edward Hyde. I smiled to myself, and, in my psychological way\u00a0began lazily to inquire into the elements of this illusion,\u00a0occasionally, even as I did so, dropping back into a comfortable\u00a0morning doze. I was still so engaged when, in one of my more\u00a0wakeful moments, my eyes fell upon my hand. Now the hand of Henry\u00a0Jekyll (as you have often remarked) was professional in shape and\u00a0size: it was large, firm, white, and comely. But the hand which I\u00a0now saw, clearly enough, in the yellow light of a mid-London\u00a0morning, lying half shut on the bed-clothes, was lean, corded,\u00a0knuckly, of a dusky pallor and thickly shaded with a swart growth\u00a0of hair. It was the hand of Edward Hyde.<\/p>\r\n
I must have stared upon it for near half a minute, sunk as I was\u00a0in the mere stupidity of wonder, before terror woke up in my\u00a0breast as sudden and startling as the crash of cymbals; and\u00a0bounding from my bed, I rushed to the mirror. At the sight that\u00a0met my eyes, my blood was changed into something exquisitely thin\u00a0and icy. Yes, I had gone to bed Henry Jekyll, I had awakened\u00a0Edward Hyde. How was this to be explained? I asked myself, and\u00a0then, with another bound of terror--how was it to be remedied?\u00a0It was well on in the morning; the servants were up; all my drugs\u00a0were in the cabinet--a long journey down two pairs of stairs, through the\u00a0back passage, across the open court and through the anatomical\u00a0theatre, from where I was then standing horror-struck. It might\u00a0indeed be possible to cover my face; but of what use was that,\u00a0when I was unable to conceal the alteration in my stature? And\u00a0then with an overpowering sweetness of relief, it came back upon\u00a0my mind that the servants were already used to the coming and\u00a0going of my second self. I had soon dressed, as well as I was\u00a0able, in clothes of my own size: had soon passed through the\u00a0house, where Bradshaw stared and drew back at seeing Mr. Hyde at\u00a0such an hour and in such a strange array; and ten minutes later,\u00a0Dr. Jekyll had returned to his own shape and was sitting down,\u00a0with a darkened brow, to make a feint of breakfasting.<\/p>","rendered":"
Some two months before the murder of Sir Danvers, I had been out\u00a0for one of my adventures, had returned at a late hour, and woke\u00a0the next day in bed with somewhat odd sensations. It was in vain\u00a0I looked about me; in vain I saw the decent furniture and tall\u00a0proportions of my room in the square; in vain that I recognised\u00a0the pattern of the bed-curtains and the design of the mahogany\u00a0frame; something still kept insisting that I was not where I was,\u00a0that I had not wakened where I seemed to be, but in the little\u00a0room in Soho where I was accustomed to sleep in the body of\u00a0Edward Hyde. I smiled to myself, and, in my psychological way\u00a0began lazily to inquire into the elements of this illusion,\u00a0occasionally, even as I did so, dropping back into a comfortable\u00a0morning doze. I was still so engaged when, in one of my more\u00a0wakeful moments, my eyes fell upon my hand. Now the hand of Henry\u00a0Jekyll (as you have often remarked) was professional in shape and\u00a0size: it was large, firm, white, and comely. But the hand which I\u00a0now saw, clearly enough, in the yellow light of a mid-London\u00a0morning, lying half shut on the bed-clothes, was lean, corded,\u00a0knuckly, of a dusky pallor and thickly shaded with a swart growth\u00a0of hair. It was the hand of Edward Hyde.<\/p>\n
I must have stared upon it for near half a minute, sunk as I was\u00a0in the mere stupidity of wonder, before terror woke up in my\u00a0breast as sudden and startling as the crash of cymbals; and\u00a0bounding from my bed, I rushed to the mirror. At the sight that\u00a0met my eyes, my blood was changed into something exquisitely thin\u00a0and icy. Yes, I had gone to bed Henry Jekyll, I had awakened\u00a0Edward Hyde. How was this to be explained? I asked myself, and\u00a0then, with another bound of terror–how was it to be remedied?\u00a0It was well on in the morning; the servants were up; all my drugs\u00a0were in the cabinet–a long journey down two pairs of stairs, through the\u00a0back passage, across the open court and through the anatomical\u00a0theatre, from where I was then standing horror-struck. It might\u00a0indeed be possible to cover my face; but of what use was that,\u00a0when I was unable to conceal the alteration in my stature? And\u00a0then with an overpowering sweetness of relief, it came back upon\u00a0my mind that the servants were already used to the coming and\u00a0going of my second self. I had soon dressed, as well as I was\u00a0able, in clothes of my own size: had soon passed through the\u00a0house, where Bradshaw stared and drew back at seeing Mr. Hyde at\u00a0such an hour and in such a strange array; and ten minutes later,\u00a0Dr. Jekyll had returned to his own shape and was sitting down,\u00a0with a darkened brow, to make a feint of breakfasting.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":251,"menu_order":1,"template":"","meta":{"pb_show_title":"on","pb_short_title":"","pb_subtitle":"","pb_authors":["robert-louis-stevenson"],"pb_section_license":"public-domain"},"chapter-type":[48],"contributor":[60],"license":[50],"class_list":["post-5","chapter","type-chapter","status-publish","hentry","chapter-type-numberless","contributor-robert-louis-stevenson","license-public-domain"],"part":3,"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/pressbooks.library.torontomu.ca\/victoriananthology\/wp-json\/pressbooks\/v2\/chapters\/5","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/pressbooks.library.torontomu.ca\/victoriananthology\/wp-json\/pressbooks\/v2\/chapters"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/pressbooks.library.torontomu.ca\/victoriananthology\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/chapter"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/pressbooks.library.torontomu.ca\/victoriananthology\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/251"}],"version-history":[{"count":8,"href":"https:\/\/pressbooks.library.torontomu.ca\/victoriananthology\/wp-json\/pressbooks\/v2\/chapters\/5\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":80,"href":"https:\/\/pressbooks.library.torontomu.ca\/victoriananthology\/wp-json\/pressbooks\/v2\/chapters\/5\/revisions\/80"}],"part":[{"href":"https:\/\/pressbooks.library.torontomu.ca\/victoriananthology\/wp-json\/pressbooks\/v2\/parts\/3"}],"metadata":[{"href":"https:\/\/pressbooks.library.torontomu.ca\/victoriananthology\/wp-json\/pressbooks\/v2\/chapters\/5\/metadata\/"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/pressbooks.library.torontomu.ca\/victoriananthology\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=5"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"chapter-type","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/pressbooks.library.torontomu.ca\/victoriananthology\/wp-json\/pressbooks\/v2\/chapter-type?post=5"},{"taxonomy":"contributor","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/pressbooks.library.torontomu.ca\/victoriananthology\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/contributor?post=5"},{"taxonomy":"license","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/pressbooks.library.torontomu.ca\/victoriananthology\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/license?post=5"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}