Dr. Kemp had continued writing in his study until the shots
aroused him. Crack, crack, crack, they came one after the other.
“Hullo!” said Dr. Kemp, putting his pen into his mouth again
and listening. “Who’s letting off revolvers in Burdock? What are
the asses at now?”
He went to the south window, threw it up, and leaning out
stared down on the network of windows, beaded gas-lamps and shops, with its
black interstices of roof and yard that made up the town at night. “Looks
like a crowd down the hill,” he said, “by ‘The Cricketers,’” and remained
watching.
Thence his eyes wandered over the town to far away where the
ships’ lights shone, and the pier glowed a little illuminated, facetted
pavilion like a gem of yellow light. The moon in its first quarter hung
over the westward hill, and the stars were clear and almost tropically bright.
After five minutes, during which his mind had travelled into
a remote speculation of social conditions of the future, and lost itself at
last over the time dimension, Dr. Kemp roused himself with a sigh, pulled down
the window again, and returned to his writing desk.
It must have been about an hour after this that the
front-door bell rang. He had been writing slackly, and with intervals of
abstraction, since the shots. He sat listening. He heard the
servant answer the door, and waited for her feet on the staircase, but she did
not come. “Wonder what that was,” said Dr. Kemp.
He tried to resume his work, failed, got up, went downstairs
from his study to the landing, rang, and called over the balustrade to the housemaid
as she appeared in the hall below. “Was that a letter?” he asked.
“Only a runaway ring, sir,” she answered.
“I’m restless to-night,” he said to himself. He went
back to his study, and this time attacked his work resolutely. In a
little while he was hard at work again, and the only sounds in the room were
the ticking of the clock and the subdued shrillness of his quill, hurrying in
the very centre of the circle of light his lampshade threw on his table.
It was two o’clock before Dr. Kemp had finished his work for
the night. He rose, yawned, and went downstairs to bed. He had
already removed his coat and vest, when he noticed that he was thirsty.
He took a candle and went down to the dining-room in search of a syphon and
whiskey.
Dr. Kemp’s scientific pursuits have made him a very
observant man, and as he recrossed the hall, he noticed a dark spot on the
linoleum near the mat at the foot of the stairs. He went on upstairs, and
then it suddenly occurred to him to ask himself what the spot on the linoleum
might be. Apparently some subconscious element was at work. At any
rate, he turned with his burden, went back to the hall, put down the syphon and
whiskey, and bending down, touched the spot. Without any great surprise
he found it had the stickiness and colour of drying blood.
He took up his burden again, and returned upstairs, looking
about him and trying to account for the blood-spot. On the landing he saw
something and stopped astonished. The door-handle of his own room was
blood-stained.
He looked at his own hand. It was quite clean, and
then he remembered that the door of his room had been open when he came down
from his study, and that consequently he had not touched the handle at
all. He went straight into his room, his face quite calm perhaps a
trifle more resolute than usual. His glance, wandering inquisitively,
fell on the bed. On the counterpane was a mess of blood, and the sheet
had been torn. He had not noticed this before because he had walked
straight to the dressing-table. On the further side the bedclothes were
depressed as if someone had been recently sitting there.
Then he had an odd impression that he had heard a low voice
say, “Good Heavens! Kemp!” But Dr. Kemp was no believer in voices.
He stood staring at the tumbled sheets. Was that
really a voice? He looked about again, but noticed nothing further than
the disordered and blood-stained bed. Then he distinctly heard a movement
across the room, near the wash-hand stand. All men, however highly
educated, retain some superstitious inklings. The feeling that is called
“eerie” came upon him. He closed the door of the room, came forward to
the dressing-table, and put down his burdens. Suddenly, with a start, he
perceived a coiled and blood-stained bandage of linen rag hanging in mid-air,
between him and the wash-hand stand.
He stared at this in amazement. It was an empty
bandage, a bandage properly tied but quite empty. He would have advanced
to grasp it, but a touch arrested him, and a voice speaking quite close to him.
“Kemp!” said the Voice.
“Eh?” said Kemp, with his mouth open.
“Keep your nerve,” said the Voice. “I’m an Invisible
Man.”
Kemp made no answer for a space, simply stared at the
bandage. “Invisible Man,” he said.
“I am an Invisible Man,” repeated the Voice.
The story he had been active to ridicule only that morning
rushed through Kemp’s brain. He does not appear to have been either very
much frightened or very greatly surprised at the moment. Realisation came
later.
“I thought it was all a lie,” he said. The thought
uppermost in his mind was the reiterated arguments of the morning. “Have
you a bandage on?” he asked.
“Yes,” said the Invisible Man.
“Oh!” said Kemp, and then roused himself. “I say!” he
said. “But this is nonsense. It’s some trick.” He stepped
forward suddenly, and his hand, extended towards the bandage, met invisible
fingers.
He recoiled at the touch and his colour changed.
“Keep steady, Kemp, for God’s sake! I want help
badly. Stop!”
The hand gripped his arm. He struck at it.
“Kemp!” cried the Voice. “Kemp! Keep steady!”
and the grip tightened.
A frantic desire to free himself took possession of
Kemp. The hand of the bandaged arm gripped his shoulder, and he was
suddenly tripped and flung backwards upon the bed. He opened his mouth to
shout, and the corner of the sheet was thrust between his teeth. The
Invisible Man had him down grimly, but his arms were free and he struck and
tried to kick savagely.
“Listen to reason, will you?” said the Invisible Man,
sticking to him in spite of a pounding in the ribs. “By Heaven! you’ll
madden me in a minute!
“Lie still, you fool!” bawled the Invisible Man in Kemp’s
ear.
Kemp struggled for another moment and then lay still.
“If you shout, I’ll smash your face,” said the Invisible
Man, relieving his mouth.
“I’m an Invisible Man. It’s no foolishness, and no
magic. I really am an Invisible Man. And I want your help. I
don’t want to hurt you, but if you behave like a frantic rustic, I must.
Don’t you remember me, Kemp? Griffin, of University College?”
“Let me get up,” said Kemp. “I’ll stop where I
am. And let me sit quiet for a minute.”
He sat up and felt his neck.
“I am Griffin, of University College, and I have made myself
invisible. I am just an ordinary man a man you have known made
invisible.”
“Griffin?” said Kemp.
“Griffin,” answered the Voice. A younger student than
you were, almost an albino, six feet high, and broad, with a pink and white
face and red eyes, who won the medal for chemistry.”
“I am confused,” said Kemp. “My brain is
rioting. What has this to do with Griffin?”
“I am Griffin.”
Kemp thought. “It’s horrible,” he said. “But
what devilry must happen to make a man invisible?”
“It’s no devilry. It’s a process, sane and
intelligible enough ”
“It’s horrible!” said Kemp. “How on earth ?”
“It’s horrible enough. But I’m wounded and in pain,
and tired ... Great God! Kemp, you are a man. Take it
steady. Give me some food and drink, and let me sit down here.”
Kemp stared at the bandage as it moved across the room, then
saw a basket chair dragged across the floor and come to rest near the
bed. It creaked, and the seat was depressed the quarter of an inch or
so. He rubbed his eyes and felt his neck again. “This beats
ghosts,” he said, and laughed stupidly.
“That’s better. Thank Heaven, you’re getting
sensible!”
“Or silly,” said Kemp, and knuckled his eyes.
“Give me some whiskey. I’m near dead.”
“It didn’t feel so. Where are you? If I get up
shall I run into you? There! all right. Whiskey? Here.
Where shall I give it to you?”
The chair creaked and Kemp felt the glass drawn away from
him. He let go by an effort; his instinct was all against it. It
came to rest poised twenty inches above the front edge of the seat of the
chair. He stared at it in infinite perplexity. “This is this must
be hypnotism. You have suggested you are invisible.”
“Nonsense,” said the Voice.
“It’s frantic.”
“Listen to me.”
“I demonstrated conclusively this morning,” began Kemp,
“that invisibility ”
“Never mind what you’ve demonstrated! I’m starving,” said
the Voice, “and the night is chilly to a man without clothes.”
“Food?” said Kemp.
The tumbler of whiskey tilted itself. “Yes,” said the
Invisible Man rapping it down. “Have you a dressing-gown?”
Kemp made some exclamation in an undertone. He walked
to a wardrobe and produced a robe of dingy scarlet. “This do?” he
asked. It was taken from him. It hung limp for a moment in mid-air,
fluttered weirdly, stood full and decorous buttoning itself, and sat down in his
chair. “Drawers, socks, slippers would be a comfort,” said the Unseen,
curtly. “And food.”
“Anything. But this is the insanest thing I ever was
in, in my life!”
He turned out his drawers for the articles, and then went
downstairs to ransack his larder. He came back with some cold cutlets and
bread, pulled up a light table, and placed them before his guest. “Never
mind knives,” said his visitor, and a cutlet hung in mid-air, with a sound of
gnawing.
“Invisible!” said Kemp, and sat down on a bedroom chair.
“I always like to get something about me before I eat,” said
the Invisible Man, with a full mouth, eating greedily. “Queer fancy!”
“I suppose that wrist is all right,” said Kemp.
“Trust me,” said the Invisible Man.
“Of all the strange and wonderful ”
“Exactly. But it’s odd I should blunder
into your house to get my bandaging. My first stroke of
luck! Anyhow I meant to sleep in this house to-night. You must
stand that! It’s a filthy nuisance, my blood showing, isn’t it?
Quite a clot over there. Gets visible as it coagulates, I see. It’s
only the living tissue I’ve changed, and only for as long as I’m
alive.... I’ve been in the house three hours.”
“But how’s it done?” began Kemp, in a tone of
exasperation. “Confound it! The whole business it’s unreasonable
from beginning to end.”
“Quite reasonable,” said the Invisible Man. “Perfectly
reasonable.”
He reached over and secured the whiskey bottle. Kemp
stared at the devouring dressing gown. A ray of candle-light penetrating
a torn patch in the right shoulder, made a triangle of light under the left
ribs. “What were the shots?” he asked. “How did the shooting
begin?”
“There was a real fool of a man a sort of confederate of
mine curse him! who tried to steal my money. Has done so.”
“Is he invisible too?”
“No.”
“Well?”
“Can’t I have some more to eat before I tell you all
that? I’m hungry in pain. And you want me to tell stories!”
Kemp got up. “You didn’t do any shooting?” he asked.
“Not me,” said his visitor. “Some fool I’d never seen
fired at random. A lot of them got scared. They all got scared at
me. Curse them! I say I want more to eat than this, Kemp.”
“I’ll see what there is to eat downstairs,” said Kemp.
“Not much, I’m afraid.”
After he had done eating, and he made a heavy meal, the
Invisible Man demanded a cigar. He bit the end savagely before Kemp could
find a knife, and cursed when the outer leaf loosened. It was strange to
see him smoking; his mouth, and throat, pharynx and nares, became visible as a
sort of whirling smoke cast.
“This blessed gift of smoking!” he said, and puffed
vigorously. “I’m lucky to have fallen upon you, Kemp. You must help
me. Fancy tumbling on you just now! I’m in a devilish scrape I’ve
been mad, I think. The things I have been through! But we will do
things yet. Let me tell you ”
He helped himself to more whiskey and soda. Kemp got
up, looked about him, and fetched a glass from his spare room. “It’s wild
but I suppose I may drink.”
“You haven’t changed much, Kemp, these dozen years.
You fair men don’t. Cool and methodical after the first collapse.
I must tell you. We will work together!”
“But how was it all done?” said Kemp, “and how did you get
like this?”
“For God’s sake, let me smoke in peace for a little
while! And then I will begin to tell you.”
But the story was not told that night. The Invisible
Man’s wrist was growing painful; he was feverish, exhausted, and his mind came
round to brood upon his chase down the hill and the struggle about the
inn. He spoke in fragments of Marvel, he smoked faster, his voice grew
angry. Kemp tried to gather what he could.
“He was afraid of me, I could see that he was afraid of me,”
said the Invisible Man many times over. “He meant to give me the slip he
was always casting about! What a fool I was!
“The cur!
“I should have killed him!”
“Where did you get the money?” asked Kemp, abruptly.
The Invisible Man was silent for a space. “I can’t
tell you to-night,” he said.
He groaned suddenly and leant forward, supporting his
invisible head on invisible hands. “Kemp,” he said, “I’ve had no sleep
for near three days, except a couple of dozes of an hour or so. I must
sleep soon.”
“Well, have my room have this room.”
“But how can I sleep? If I sleep he will get
away. Ugh! What does it matter?”
“What’s the shot wound?” asked Kemp, abruptly.
“Nothing scratch and blood. Oh, God! How I want
sleep!”
“Why not?”
The Invisible Man appeared to be regarding Kemp.
“Because I’ve a particular objection to being caught by my fellow-men,” he said
slowly.
Kemp started.
“Fool that I am!” said the Invisible Man, striking the table
smartly. “I’ve put the idea into your head.”
No comments:
Post a Comment