The Strange Case of Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde by Robert Louis Stevenson (best free e book reader txt) 📖

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 you ever 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 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 that masked

thing like a monkey jumped from among the chemicals and whipped

into the cabinet, it went down my spine like ice. O, 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, God 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.

 

“Put 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,” 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 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 God’s sake, have mercy!”

 

“Ah, that’s not Jekyll’s voice—it’s Hyde’s!” cried

Utterson. “Down with the door, Poole!”

 

Poole swung the axe over his shoulder; the blow shook the

building, and the red baize door leaped against the lock and

hinges. A dismal screech, as of mere animal terror, rang from the

cabinet. Up went the axe again, and again the panels crashed and

the frame bounded; four times the blow fell; but the wood was

tough and the fittings were of excellent workmanship; and it was

not until the fifth, that the lock burst and the wreck of the door

fell inwards on the carpet.

 

The besiegers, appalled by their own riot and the stillness

that had succeeded, stood back a little and peered in. There lay

the cabinet before their eyes in the quiet lamplight, a good fire

glowing and chattering on the hearth, the kettle singing its thin

strain, a drawer or two open, papers neatly set forth on the

business table, and nearer the fire, the things laid out for tea;

the quietest room, you would have said, and, but for the glazed

presses full of chemicals, the most commonplace that night in

London.

 

Right in the middle there lay the body of a man sorely

contorted and still twitching. They drew near on tiptoe, turned

it on its back and beheld the face of Edward Hyde. He was dressed

in clothes far too large for him, clothes of the doctor’s bigness;

the cords of his face still moved with a semblance of life, but

life was quite gone: and by the crushed phial in the hand and the

strong smell of kernels that hung upon the air, Utterson knew that

he was looking on the body of a self-destroyer.

 

“We have come too late,” he said sternly, “whether to save or

punish. Hyde is gone to his account; and it only remains for us

to find the body of your master.”

 

The far greater proportion of the building was occupied by

the theatre, which filled almost the whole ground storey and was

lighted from above, and by the cabinet, which formed an upper

story at one end and looked upon the court. A corridor joined the

theatre to the door on the by-street; and with this the cabinet

communicated separately by a second flight of stairs. There were

besides a few dark closets and a spacious cellar. All these they

now thoroughly examined. Each closet needed but a glance, for all

were empty, and all, by the dust that fell from their doors, had

stood long unopened. The cellar, indeed, was filled with crazy

lumber, mostly dating from the times of the surgeon who was

Jekyll’s predecessor; but even as they opened the door they were

advertised of the uselessness of further search, by the fall of a

perfect mat of cobweb which had for years sealed up the entrance.

No where was there any trace of Henry Jekyll dead or alive.

 

Poole stamped on the flags of the corridor. “He must be

buried here,” he said, hearkening to the sound.

 

“Or he may have fled,” said Utterson, and he turned to examine

the door in the by-street. It was locked; and lying near by on

the flags, they found the key, already stained with rust.

 

“This does not look like use,” observed the lawyer.

 

“Use!” echoed Poole. “Do you not see, sir, it is broken?

much as if a man had stamped on it.”

 

“Ay,” continued Utterson, “and the fractures, too, are rusty.”

The two men looked at each other with a scare. “This is beyond

me, Poole,” said the lawyer. “Let us go back to the cabinet.”

 

They mounted the stair in silence, and still with an

occasional awestruck glance at the dead body, proceeded more

thoroughly to examine the contents of the cabinet. At one table,

there were traces of chemical work, various measured heaps of some

white salt being laid on glass saucers, as though for an

experiment in which the unhappy man had been prevented.

 

“That is the same drug that I was always bringing him,” said

Poole; and even as he spoke, the kettle with a startling noise

boiled over.

 

This brought them to the fireside, where the easy-chair was

drawn cosily up, and the tea things stood ready to the sitter’s

elbow, the very sugar in the cup. There were several books on a

shelf; one lay beside the tea things open, and Utterson was amazed

to find it a copy of a pious work, for which Jekyll had several

times expressed a great esteem, annotated, in his own hand with

startling blasphemies.

 

Next, in the course of their review of the chamber, the

searchers came to the cheval-glass, into whose depths they looked

with an involuntary horror. But it was so turned as to show them

nothing but the rosy glow playing on the roof, the fire sparkling

in a hundred repetitions along the glazed front of the presses,

and their own pale and fearful countenances stooping to look in.

 

“This glass has seen some strange things, sir,” whispered

Poole.

 

“And surely none stranger than itself,” echoed the lawyer in

the same tones. “For what did Jekyll”—he caught himself up at

the word with a start, and then conquering the weakness—“what

could Jekyll want with it?” he said.

 

“You may say that!” said Poole.

 

Next they turned to the business table. On the desk, among

the neat array of papers, a large envelope was uppermost, and

bore, in the doctor’s hand, the name of Mr. Utterson. The lawyer

unsealed it, and several enclosures fell to the floor. The first

was a will, drawn in the same eccentric terms as the one which he

had returned six months before, to serve as a testament in case of

death and as a deed of gift in case of disappearance; but in place

of the name of Edward Hyde, the lawyer, with indescribable

amazement read the name of Gabriel John Utterson. He looked at

Poole, and then back at the paper, and last of all at the dead

malefactor stretched upon the carpet.

 

“My head goes round,” he said. “He has been all these days in

possession; he had no cause to like me; he must have raged to see

himself displaced; and he has not destroyed this document.”

 

He caught up the next paper; it was a brief note in the

doctor’s hand and dated at the top. “O Poole!” the lawyer cried,

“he was alive and here this day. He cannot have been disposed of

in so short a space; he must be still alive, he must have fled!

And then, why fled? and how? and in that case, can we venture to

declare this suicide? O, we must be careful. I foresee that we

may yet involve your master in some dire catastrophe.”

 

“Why don’t you read it, sir?” asked Poole.

 

“Because I fear,” replied the lawyer solemnly. “God grant I

have no cause for it!” And with that he brought the paper to his

eyes and read