SEARCH FOR MR. HYDE

That evening Mr. Utterson came home to his bachelor house in sombrernspirits and sat down to dinner without relish. It was his custom of arnSunday, when this meal was over, to sit close by the fire, a volume ofrnsome dry divinity on his reading desk, until the clock of thernneighbouring church rang out the hour of twelve, when he would gornsoberly and gratefully to bed. On this night however, as soon as therncloth was taken away, he took up a candle and went into his businessrnroom. There he opened his safe, took from the most private part of it arndocument endorsed on the envelope as Dr. Jekyll’s Will and sat downrnwith a clouded brow to study its contents. The will was holograph, forrnMr. Utterson though he took charge of it now that it was made, hadrnrefused to lend the least assistance in the making of it; it providedrnnot only that, in case of the decease of Henry Jekyll, M.D., D.C.L.,rnL.L.D., F.R.S., etc., all his possessions were to pass into the handsrnof his “friend and benefactor Edward Hyde,” but that in case of Dr.rnJekyll’s “disappearance or unexplained absence for any period exceedingrnthree calendar months,” the said Edward Hyde should step into the saidrnHenry Jekyll’s shoes without further delay and free from any burthen orrnobligation beyond the payment of a few small sums to the members of therndoctor’s household. This document had long been the lawyer’s eyesore.rnIt offended him both as a lawyer and as a lover of the sane andrncustomary sides of life, to whom the fanciful was the immodest. Andrnhitherto it was his ignorance of Mr. Hyde that had swelled hisrnindignation; now, by a sudden turn, it was his knowledge. It wasrnalready bad enough when the name was but a name of which he could learnrnno more. It was worse when it began to be clothed upon with detestablernattributes; and out of the shifting, insubstantial mists that had sornlong baffled his eye, there leaped up the sudden, definite presentmentrnof a fiend.rnrn“I thought it was madness,” he said, as he replaced the obnoxious paperrnin the safe, “and now I begin to fear it is disgrace.”rnrnWith that he blew out his candle, put on a greatcoat, and set forth inrnthe direction of Cavendish Square, that citadel of medicine, where hisrnfriend, the great Dr. Lanyon, had his house and received his crowdingrnpatients. “If anyone knows, it will be Lanyon,” he had thought.rnrnThe solemn butler knew and welcomed him; he was subjected to no stagernof delay, but ushered direct from the door to the dining-room where Dr.rnLanyon sat alone over his wine. This was a hearty, healthy, dapper,rnred-faced gentleman, with a shock of hair prematurely white, and arnboisterous and decided manner. At sight of Mr. Utterson, he sprang uprnfrom his chair and welcomed him with both hands. The geniality, as wasrnthe way of the man, was somewhat theatrical to the eye; but it reposedrnon genuine feeling. For these two were old friends, old mates both atrnschool and college, both thorough respectors of themselves and of eachrnother, and what does not always follow, men who thoroughly enjoyed eachrnother’s company.rnrnAfter a little rambling talk, the lawyer led up to the subject which sorndisagreeably preoccupied his mind.rnrn“I suppose, Lanyon,” said he, “you and I must be the two oldest friendsrnthat Henry Jekyll has?”rnrn“I wish the friends were younger,” chuckled Dr. Lanyon. “But I supposernwe are. And what of that? I see little of him now.”rnrn“Indeed?” said Utterson. “I thought you had a bond of common interest.”rnrn“We had,” was the reply. “But it is more than ten years since HenryrnJekyll became too fanciful for me. He began to go wrong, wrong in mind;rnand though of course I continue to take an interest in him for oldrnsake’s sake, as they say, I see and I have seen devilish little of thernman. Such unscientific balderdash,” added the doctor, flushing suddenlyrnpurple, “would have estranged Damon and Pythias.”rnrnThis little spirit of temper was somewhat of a relief to Mr. Utterson.“They have only differed on some point of science,” he thought; andrnbeing a man of no scientific passions (except in the matter ofrnconveyancing), he even added: “It is nothing worse than that!” He gavernhis friend a few seconds to recover his composure, and then approachedrnthe question he had come to put. “Did you ever come across a _protégé_rnof his—one Hyde?” he asked.rnrn“Hyde?” repeated Lanyon. “No. Never heard of him. Since my time.”rnrnThat was the amount of information that the lawyer carried back withrnhim to the great, dark bed on which he tossed to and fro, until thernsmall hours of the morning began to grow large. It was a night ofrnlittle ease to his toiling mind, toiling in mere darkness and besiegedrnby questions.rnrnSix o’clock struck on the bells of the church that was so convenientlyrnnear to Mr. Utterson’s dwelling, and still he was digging at thernproblem. Hitherto it had touched him on the intellectual side alone;rnbut now his imagination also was engaged, or rather enslaved; and as hernlay and tossed in the gross darkness of the night and the curtainedrnroom, Mr. Enfield’s tale went by before his mind in a scroll of lightedrnpictures. He would be aware of the great field of lamps of a nocturnalrncity; then of the figure of a man walking swiftly; then of a childrnrunning from the doctor’s; and then these met, and that humanrnJuggernaut trod the child down and passed on regardless of her screams.rnOr else he would see a room in a rich house, where his friend layrnasleep, dreaming and smiling at his dreams; and then the door of thatrnroom would be opened, the curtains of the bed plucked apart, thernsleeper recalled, and lo! there would stand by his side a figure tornwhom power was given, and even at that dead hour, he must rise and dornits bidding. The figure in these two phases haunted the lawyer allrnnight; and if at any time he dozed over, it was but to see it glidernmore stealthily through sleeping houses, or move the more swiftly andrnstill the more swiftly, even to dizziness, through wider labyrinths ofrnlamplighted city, and at every street corner crush a child and leavernher screaming. And still the figure had no face by which he might knowrnit; even in his dreams, it had no face, or one that baffled him andrnmelted before his eyes; and thus it was that there sprang up and grewrnapace in the lawyer’s mind a singularly strong, almost an inordinate,rncuriosity to behold the features of the real Mr. Hyde. If he could butrnonce set eyes on him, he thought the mystery would lighten and perhapsrnroll altogether away, as was the habit of mysterious things when wellrnexamined. He might see a reason for his friend’s strange preference orrnbondage (call it which you please) and even for the startling clause ofrnthe will. At least it would be a face worth seeing: the face of a manrnwho was without bowels of mercy: a face which had but to show itself tornraise up, in the mind of the unimpressionable Enfield, a spirit ofrnenduring hatred.rnrnFrom that time forward, Mr. Utterson began to haunt the door in thernby-street of shops. In the morning before office hours, at noon whenrnbusiness was plenty and time scarce, at night under the face of thernfogged city moon, by all lights and at all hours of solitude orrnconcourse, the lawyer was to be found on his chosen post.rnrn“If he be Mr. Hyde,” he had thought, “I shall be Mr. Seek.”rnrnAnd at last his patience was rewarded. It was a fine dry night; frostrnin the air; the streets as clean as a ballroom floor; the lamps,rnunshaken by any wind, drawing a regular pattern of light and shadow. Byrnten o’clock, when the shops were closed, the by-street was veryrnsolitary and, in spite of the low growl of London from all round, veryrnsilent. Small sounds carried far; domestic sounds out of the housesrnwere clearly audible on either side of the roadway; and the rumour ofrnthe approach of any passenger preceded him by a long time. Mr. Uttersonrnhad been some minutes at his post, when he was aware of an odd lightrnfootstep drawing near. In the course of his nightly patrols, he hadrnlong grown accustomed to the quaint effect with which the footfalls ofrna single person, while he is still a great way off, suddenly spring outrndistinct from the vast hum and clatter of the city. Yet his attentionrnhad never before been so sharply and decisively arrested; and it wasrnwith a strong, superstitious prevision of success that he withdrew intornthe entry of the court.rnrnThe steps drew swiftly nearer, and swelled out suddenly louder as theyrnturned the end of the street. The lawyer, looking forth from the entry,rncould soon see what manner of man he had to deal with. He was small andrnvery plainly dressed and the look of him, even at that distance, wentrnsomehow strongly against the watcher’s inclination. But he madernstraight for the door, crossing the roadway to save time; and as herncame, he drew a key from his pocket like one approaching home.rnrnMr. Utterson stepped out and touched him on the shoulder as he passed.“Mr. Hyde, I think?”rnrnMr. Hyde shrank back with a hissing intake of the breath. But his fearrnwas only momentary; and though he did not look the lawyer in the face,rnhe answered coolly enough: “That is my name. What do you want?”rnrn“I see you are going in,” returned the lawyer. “I am an old friend ofrnDr. Jekyll’s—Mr. Utterson of Gaunt Street—you must have heard of myrnname; and meeting you so conveniently, I thought you might admit me.”rnrn“You will not find Dr. Jekyll; he is from home,” replied Mr. Hyde,rnblowing in the key. And then suddenly, but still without looking up,“How did you know me?” he asked.rnrn“On your side,” said Mr. Utterson “will you do me a favour?”rnrn“With pleasure,” replied the other. “What shall it be?”rnrn“Will you let me see your face?” asked the lawyer.rnrnMr. Hyde appeared to hesitate, and then, as if upon some suddenrnreflection, fronted about with an air of defiance; and the pair staredrnat each other pretty fixedly for a few seconds. “Now I shall know yournagain,” said Mr. Utterson. “It may be useful.”rnrn“Yes,” returned Mr. Hyde, “it is as well we have met; and _à propos_,rnyou should have my address.” And he gave a number of a street in Soho.rnrn“Good God!” thought Mr. Utterson, “can he, too, have been thinking ofrnthe will?” But he kept his feelings to himself and only grunted inrnacknowledgment of the address.rnrn“And now,” said the other, “how did you know me?”rnrn“By description,” was the reply.rnrn“Whose description?”rnrn“We have common friends,” said Mr. Utterson.rnrn“Common friends,” echoed Mr. Hyde, a little hoarsely. “Who are they?”rnrn“Jekyll, for instance,” said the lawyer.rnrn“He never told you,” cried Mr. Hyde, with a flush of anger. “I did notrnthink you would have lied.”rnrn“Come,” said Mr. Utterson, “that is not fitting language.”rnrnThe other snarled aloud into a savage laugh; and the next moment, withrnextraordinary quickness, he had unlocked the door and disappeared intornthe house.rnrnThe lawyer stood awhile when Mr. Hyde had left him, the picture ofrndisquietude. Then he began slowly to mount the street, pausing everyrnstep or two and putting his hand to his brow like a man in mentalrnperplexity. The problem he was thus debating as he walked, was one of arnclass that is rarely solved. Mr. Hyde was pale and dwarfish, he gave anrnimpression of deformity without any nameable malformation, he had arndispleasing smile, he had borne himself to the lawyer with a sort ofrnmurderous mixture of timidity and boldness, and he spoke with a husky,rnwhispering and somewhat broken voice; all these were points againstrnhim, but not all of these together could explain the hitherto unknownrndisgust, loathing and fear with which Mr. Utterson regarded him. “Therernmust be something else,” said the perplexed gentleman. “There _is_rnsomething more, if I could find a name for it. God bless me, the manrnseems hardly human! Something troglodytic, shall we say? or can it bernthe old story of Dr. Fell? or is it the mere radiance of a foul soulrnthat thus transpires through, and transfigures, its clay continent? Thernlast, I think; for, O my poor old Harry Jekyll, if ever I read Satan’srnsignature upon a face, it is on that of your new friend.”rnrnRound the corner from the by-street, there was a square of ancient,rnhandsome houses, now for the most part decayed from their high estaternand let in flats and chambers to all sorts and conditions of men;rnmap-engravers, architects, shady lawyers and the agents of obscurernenterprises. One house, however, second from the corner, was stillrnoccupied entire; and at the door of this, which wore a great air ofrnwealth and comfort, though it was now plunged in darkness except forrnthe fanlight, Mr. Utterson stopped and knocked. A well-dressed, elderlyrnservant opened the door.rnrn“Is Dr. Jekyll at home, Poole?” asked the lawyer.rnrn“I will see, Mr. Utterson,” said Poole, admitting the visitor, as hernspoke, into a large, low-roofed, comfortable hall paved with flags,rnwarmed (after the fashion of a country house) by a bright, open fire,rnand furnished with costly cabinets of oak. “Will you wait here by thernfire, sir? or shall I give you a light in the dining-room?”rnrn“Here, thank you,” said the lawyer, and he drew near and leaned on therntall fender. This hall, in which he was now left alone, was a pet fancyrnof his friend the doctor’s; and Utterson himself was wont to speak ofrnit as the pleasantest room in London. But tonight there was a shudderrnin his blood; the face of Hyde sat heavy on his memory; he felt (whatrnwas rare with him) a nausea and distaste of life; and in the gloom ofrnhis spirits, he seemed to read a menace in the flickering of thernfirelight on the polished cabinets and the uneasy starting of thernshadow on the roof. He was ashamed of his relief, when Poole presentlyrnreturned to announce that Dr. Jekyll was gone out.rnrn“I saw Mr. Hyde go in by the old dissecting room, Poole,” he said. “Isrnthat right, when Dr. Jekyll is from home?”rnrn“Quite right, Mr. Utterson, sir,” replied the servant. “Mr. Hyde has arnkey.”rnrn“Your master seems to repose a great deal of trust in that young man,rnPoole,” resumed the other musingly.rnrn“Yes, sir, he does indeed,” said Poole. “We have all orders to obeyrnhim.”rnrn“I do not think I ever met Mr. Hyde?” asked Utterson.rnrn“O, dear no, sir. He never _dines_ here,” replied the butler. “Indeedrnwe see very little of him on this side of the house; he mostly comesrnand goes by the laboratory.”rnrn“Well, good-night, Poole.”rnrn“Good-night, Mr. Utterson.”rnrnAnd the lawyer set out homeward with a very heavy heart. “Poor HarryrnJekyll,” he thought, “my mind misgives me he is in deep waters! He wasrnwild when he was young; a long while ago to be sure; but in the law ofrnGod, there is no statute of limitations. Ay, it must be that; the ghostrnof some old sin, the cancer of some concealed disgrace: punishmentrncoming, _pede claudo_, years after memory has forgotten and self-loverncondoned the fault.” And the lawyer, scared by the thought, broodedrnawhile on his own past, groping in all the corners of memory, lest byrnchance some Jack-in-the-Box of an old iniquity should leap to lightrnthere. His past was fairly blameless; few men could read the rolls ofrntheir life with less apprehension; yet he was humbled to the dust byrnthe many ill things he had done, and raised up again into a sober andrnfearful gratitude by the many he had come so near to doing yet avoided.rnAnd then by a return on his former subject, he conceived a spark ofrnhope. “This Master Hyde, if he were studied,” thought he, “must havernsecrets of his own; black secrets, by the look of him; secrets comparedrnto which poor Jekyll’s worst would be like sunshine. Things cannotrncontinue as they are. It turns me cold to think of this creaturernstealing like a thief to Harry’s bedside; poor Harry, what a wakening!rnAnd the danger of it; for if this Hyde suspects the existence of thernwill, he may grow impatient to inherit. Ay, I must put my shoulders tornthe wheel—if Jekyll will but let me,” he added, “if Jekyll will onlyrnlet me.” For once more he saw before his mind’s eye, as clear asrntransparency, the strange clauses of the will.