"The Invisible Man\n\nA Grotesque Romance\n\nBy H. G. Wells\n\n\n\nCONTENTS\n\n      I  The strange Man's Arrival\n     II  Mr. Teddy Henfrey's first Impressions\n    III  The thousand and one Bottles\n     IV  Mr. Cuss interviews the Stranger\n      V  The Burglary at the Vicarage\n     VI  The Furniture that went mad\n    VII  The Unveiling of the Stranger\n   VIII  In Transit\n     IX  Mr. Thomas Marvel\n      X  Mr. Marvel's Visit to Iping\n     XI  In the \"Coach and Horses\"\n    XII  The invisible Man loses his Temper\n   XIII  Mr. Marvel discusses his Resignation\n    XIV  At Port Stowe\n     XV  The Man who was running\n    XVI  In the \"Jolly Cricketers\"\n   XVII  Dr. Kemp's Visitor\n  XVIII  The invisible Man sleeps\n    XIX  Certain first Principles\n     XX  At the House in Great Portland Street\n    XXI  In Oxford Street\n   XXII  In the Emporium\n  XXIII  In Drury Lane\n   XXIV  The Plan that failed\n    XXV  The Hunting of the invisible Man\n   XXVI  The Wicksteed Murder\n  XXVII  The Siege of Kemp's House\n XXVIII  The Hunter hunted\n         The Epilogue\n\n\n\n\nCHAPTER I\n\nTHE STRANGE MAN'S ARRIVAL\n\n\nThe stranger came early in February, one wintry day, through a\nbiting wind and a driving snow, the last snowfall of the year, over\nthe down, walking from Bramblehurst railway station, and carrying a\nlittle black portmanteau in his thickly gloved hand. He was wrapped\nup from head to foot, and the brim of his soft felt hat hid every\ninch of his face but the shiny tip of his nose; the snow had piled\nitself against his shoulders and chest, and added a white crest to\nthe burden he carried. He staggered into the \"Coach and Horses\" more\ndead than alive, and flung his portmanteau down. \"A fire,\" he cried,\n\"in the name of human charity! A room and a fire!\" He stamped and\nshook the snow from off himself in the bar, and followed Mrs. Hall\ninto her guest parlour to strike his bargain. And with that much\nintroduction, that and a couple of sovereigns flung upon the table,\nhe took up his quarters in the inn.\n\nMrs. Hall lit the fire and left him there while she went to prepare\nhim a meal with her own hands. A guest to stop at Iping in the\nwintertime was an unheard-of piece of luck, let alone a guest who\nwas no \"haggler,\" and she was resolved to show herself worthy of her\ngood fortune. As soon as the bacon was well under way, and Millie,\nher lymphatic maid, had been brisked up a bit by a few deftly chosen\nexpressions of contempt, she carried the cloth, plates, and glasses\ninto the parlour and began to lay them with the utmost _eclat_.\nAlthough the fire was burning up briskly, she was surprised to see\nthat her visitor still wore his hat and coat, standing with his back\nto her and staring out of the window at the falling snow in the yard.\nHis gloved hands were clasped behind him, and he seemed to be lost\nin thought. She noticed that the melting snow that still sprinkled\nhis shoulders dripped upon her carpet. \"Can I take your hat and coat,\nsir?\" she said, \"and give them a good dry in the kitchen?\"\n\n\"No,\" he said without turning.\n\nShe was not sure she had heard him, and was about to repeat her\nquestion.\n\nHe turned his head and looked at her over his shoulder. \"I prefer to\nkeep them on,\" he said with emphasis, and she noticed that he wore\nbig blue spectacles with sidelights, and had a bush side-whisker\nover his coat-collar that completely hid his cheeks and face.\n\n\"Very well, sir,\" she said. \"_As_ you like. In a bit the room will\nbe warmer.\"\n\nHe made no answer, and had turned his face away from her again, and\nMrs. Hall, feeling that her conversational advances were ill-timed,\nlaid the rest of the table things in a quick staccato and whisked\nout of the room. When she returned he was still standing there, like\na man of stone, his back hunched, his collar turned up, his dripping\nhat-brim turned down, hiding his face and ears completely. She put\ndown the eggs and bacon with considerable emphasis, and called\nrather than said to him, \"Your lunch is served, sir.\"\n\n\"Thank you,\" he said at the same time, and did not stir until she\nwas closing the door. Then he swung round and approached the table\nwith a certain eager quickness.\n\nAs she went behind the bar to the kitchen she heard a sound repeated\nat regular intervals. Chirk, chirk, chirk, it went, the sound of a\nspoon being rapidly whisked round a basin. \"That girl!\" she said.\n\"There! I clean forgot it. It's her being so long!\" And while she\nherself finished mixing the mustard, she gave Millie a few verbal\nstabs for her excessive slowness. She had cooked the ham and eggs,\nlaid the table, and done everything, while Millie (help indeed!) had\nonly succeeded in delaying the mustard. And him a new guest and\nwanting to stay! Then she filled the mustard pot, and, putting it\nwith a certain stateliness upon a gold and black tea-tray, carried\nit into the parlour.\n\nShe rapped and entered promptly. As she did so her visitor moved\nquickly, so that she got but a glimpse of a white object disappearing\nbehind the table. It would seem he was picking something from the\nfloor. She rapped down the mustard pot on the table, and then she\nnoticed the overcoat and hat had been taken off and put over a chair\nin front of the fire, and a pair of wet boots threatened rust to her\nsteel fender. She went to these things resolutely. \"I suppose I may\nhave them to dry now,\" she said in a voice that brooked no denial.\n\n\"Leave the hat,\" said her visitor, in a muffled voice, and turning\nshe saw he had raised his head and was sitting and looking at her.\n\nFor a moment she stood gaping at him, too surprised to speak.\n\nHe held a white cloth--it was a serviette he had brought with\nhim--over the lower part of his face, so that his mouth and jaws\nwere completely hidden, and that was the reason of his muffled\nvoice. But it was not that which startled Mrs. Hall. It was the fact\nthat all his forehead above his blue glasses was covered by a white\nbandage, and that another covered his ears, leaving not a scrap of\nhis face exposed excepting only his pink, peaked nose. It was bright,\npink, and shiny just as it had been at first. He wore a dark-brown\nvelvet jacket with a high, black, linen-lined collar turned up about\nhis neck. The thick black hair, escaping as it could below and\nbetween the cross bandages, projected in curious tails and horns,\ngiving him the strangest appearance conceivable. This muffled and\nbandaged head was so unlike what she had anticipated, that for a\nmoment she was rigid.\n\nHe did not remove the serviette, but remained holding it, as she\nsaw now, with a brown gloved hand, and regarding her with his\ninscrutable blue glasses. \"Leave the hat,\" he said, speaking very\ndistinctly through the white cloth.\n\nHer nerves began to recover from the shock they had received. She\nplaced the hat on the chair again by the fire. \"I didn't know, sir,\"\nshe began, \"that--\" and she stopped embarrassed.\n\n\"Thank you,\" he said drily, glancing from her to the door and then\nat her again.\n\n\"I'll have them nicely dried, sir, at once,\" she said, and carried\nhis clothes out of the room. She glanced at his white-swathed head\nand blue goggles again as she was going out of the door; but his\nnapkin was still in front of his face. She shivered a little as she\nclosed the door behind her, and her face was eloquent of her surprise\nand perplexity. \"I _never_,\" she whispered. \"There!\" She went quite\nsoftly to the kitchen, and was too preoccupied to ask Millie what\nshe was messing about with _now_, when she got there.\n\nThe visitor sat and listened to her retreating feet. He glanced\ninquiringly at the window before he removed his serviette, and\nresumed his meal. He took a mouthful, glanced suspiciously at the\nwindow, took another mouthful, then rose and, taking the serviette\nin his hand, walked across the room and pulled the blind down to\nthe top of the white muslin that obscured the lower panes. This\nleft the room in a twilight. This done, he returned with an easier\nair to the table and his meal.\n\n\"The poor soul's had an accident or an op'ration or somethin',\" said\nMrs. Hall. \"What a turn them bandages did give me, to be sure!\"\n\nShe put on some more coal, unfolded the clothes-horse, and extended\nthe traveller's coat upon this. \"And they goggles! Why, he looked\nmore like a divin' helmet than a human man!\" She hung his muffler\non a corner of the horse. \"And holding that handkerchief over his\nmouth all the time. Talkin' through it! ... Perhaps his mouth was\nhurt too--maybe.\"\n\nShe turned round, as one who suddenly remembers. \"Bless my soul\nalive!\" she said, going off at a tangent; \"ain't you done them\ntaters _yet_, Millie?\"\n\nWhen Mrs. Hall went to clear away the stranger's lunch, her idea\nthat his mouth must also have been cut or disfigured in the accident\nshe supposed him to have suffered, was confirmed, for he was smoking\na pipe, and all the time that she was in the room he never loosened\nthe silk muffler he had wrapped round the lower part of his face to\nput the mouthpiece to his lips. Yet it was not forgetfulness, for\nshe saw he glanced at it as it smouldered out. He sat in the corner\nwith his back to the window-blind and spoke now, having eaten and\ndrunk and being comfortably warmed through, with less aggressive\nbrevity than before. The reflection of the fire lent a kind of red\nanimation to his big spectacles they had lacked hitherto.\n\n\"I have some luggage,\" he said, \"at Bramblehurst station,\" and he\nasked her how he could have it sent. He bowed his bandaged head\nquite politely in acknowledgment of her explanation. \"To-morrow?\" he\nsaid. \"There is no speedier delivery?\" and seemed quite disappointed\nwhen she answered, \"No.\" Was she quite sure? No man with a trap who\nwould go over?\n\nMrs. Hall, nothing loath, answered his questions and developed a\nconversation. \"It's a steep road by the down, sir,\" she said in\nanswer to the question about a trap; and then, snatching at an\nopening, said, \"It was there a carriage was upsettled, a year ago\nand more. A gentleman killed, besides his coachman. Accidents, sir,\nhappen in a moment, don't they?\"\n\nBut the visitor was not to be drawn so easily. \"They do,\" he said\nthrough his muffler, eyeing her quietly through his impenetrable\nglasses.\n\n\"But they take long enough to get well, don't they? ... There was\nmy sister's son, Tom, jest cut his arm with a scythe, tumbled on it\nin the 'ayfield, and, bless me! he was three months tied up sir.\nYou'd hardly believe it. It's regular given me a dread of a scythe,\nsir.\"\n\n\"I can quite understand that,\" said the visitor.\n\n\"He was afraid, one time, that he'd have to have an op'ration--he\nwas that bad, sir.\"\n\nThe visitor laughed abruptly, a bark of a laugh that he seemed to\nbite and kill in his mouth. \"_Was_ he?\" he said.\n\n\"He was, sir. And no laughing matter to them as had the doing for\nhim, as I had--my sister being took up with her little ones so\nmuch. There was bandages to do, sir, and bandages to undo. So that\nif I may make so bold as to say it, sir--\"\n\n\"Will you get me some matches?\" said the visitor, quite abruptly.\n\"My pipe is out.\"\n\nMrs. Hall was pulled up suddenly. It was certainly rude of him,\nafter telling him all she had done. She gasped at him for a moment,\nand remembered the two sovereigns. She went for the matches.\n\n\"Thanks,\" he said concisely, as she put them down, and turned his\nshoulder upon her and stared out of the window again. It was\naltogether too discouraging. Evidently he was sensitive on the\ntopic of operations and bandages. She did not \"make so bold as to\nsay,\" however, after all. But his snubbing way had irritated her,\nand Millie had a hot time of it that afternoon.\n\nThe visitor remained in the parlour until four o'clock, without\ngiving the ghost of an excuse for an intrusion. For the most part\nhe was quite still during that time; it would seem he sat in the\ngrowing darkness smoking in the firelight--perhaps dozing.\n\nOnce or twice a curious listener might have heard him at the coals,\nand for the space of five minutes he was audible pacing the room.\nHe seemed to be talking to himself. Then the armchair creaked as\nhe sat down again.\n\n\n\nCHAPTER II\n\nMR. TEDDY HENFREY'S FIRST IMPRESSIONS\n\n\nAt four o'clock, when it was fairly dark and Mrs. Hall was screwing\nup her courage to go in and ask her visitor if he would take some\ntea, Teddy Henfrey, the clock-jobber, came into the bar. \"My sakes!\nMrs. Hall,\" said he, \"but this is terrible weather for thin boots!\"\nThe snow outside was falling faster.\n\nMrs. Hall agreed, and then noticed he had his bag with him. \"Now\nyou're here, Mr. Teddy,\" said she, \"I'd be glad if you'd give th'\nold clock in the parlour a bit of a look. 'Tis going, and it strikes\nwell and hearty; but the hour-hand won't do nuthin' but point at\nsix.\"\n\nAnd leading the way, she went across to the parlour door and rapped\nand entered.\n\nHer visitor, she saw as she opened the door, was seated in the\narmchair before the fire, dozing it would seem, with his bandaged\nhead drooping on one side. The only light in the room was the red\nglow from the fire--which lit his eyes like adverse railway signals,\nbut left his downcast face in darkness--and the scanty vestiges of\nthe day that came in through the open door. Everything was ruddy,\nshadowy, and indistinct to her, the more so since she had just been\nlighting the bar lamp, and her eyes were dazzled. But for a second\nit seemed to her that the man she looked at had an enormous mouth\nwide open--a vast and incredible mouth that swallowed the whole of\nthe lower portion of his face. It was the sensation of a moment:\nthe white-bound head, the monstrous goggle eyes, and this huge yawn\nbelow it. Then he stirred, started up in his chair, put up his hand.\nShe opened the door wide, so that the room was lighter, and she saw\nhim more clearly, with the muffler held up to his face just as she\nhad seen him hold the serviette before. The shadows, she fancied,\nhad tricked her.\n\n\"Would you mind, sir, this man a-coming to look at the clock, sir?\"\nshe said, recovering from the momentary shock.\n\n\"Look at the clock?\" he said, staring round in a drowsy manner,\nand speaking over his hand, and then, getting more fully awake,\n\"certainly.\"\n\nMrs. Hall went away to get a lamp, and he rose and stretched\nhimself. Then came the light, and Mr. Teddy Henfrey, entering, was\nconfronted by this bandaged person. He was, he says, \"taken aback.\"\n\n\"Good afternoon,\" said the stranger, regarding him--as Mr. Henfrey\nsays, with a vivid sense of the dark spectacles--\"like a lobster.\"\n\n\"I hope,\" said Mr. Henfrey, \"that it's no intrusion.\"\n\n\"None whatever,\" said the stranger. \"Though, I understand,\" he said\nturning to Mrs. Hall, \"that this room is really to be mine for my\nown private use.\"\n\n\"I thought, sir,\" said Mrs. Hall, \"you'd prefer the clock--\"\n\n\"Certainly,\" said the stranger, \"certainly--but, as a rule, I\nlike to be alone and undisturbed.\n\n\"But I'm really glad to have the clock seen to,\" he said, seeing a\ncertain hesitation in Mr. Henfrey's manner. \"Very glad.\" Mr. Henfrey\nhad intended to apologise and withdraw, but this anticipation\nreassured him. The stranger turned round with his back to the\nfireplace and put his hands behind his back. \"And presently,\" he\nsaid, \"when the clock-mending is over, I think I should like to\nhave some tea. But not till the clock-mending is over.\"\n\nMrs. Hall was about to leave the room--she made no conversational\nadvances this time, because she did not want to be snubbed in front\nof Mr. Henfrey--when her visitor asked her if she had made any\narrangements about his boxes at Bramblehurst. She told him she had\nmentioned the matter to the postman, and that the carrier could\nbring them over on the morrow. \"You are certain that is the\nearliest?\" he said.\n\nShe was certain, with a marked coldness.\n\n\"I should explain,\" he added, \"what I was really too cold and\nfatigued to do before, that I am an experimental investigator.\"\n\n\"Indeed, sir,\" said Mrs. Hall, much impressed.\n\n\"And my baggage contains apparatus and appliances.\"\n\n\"Very useful things indeed they are, sir,\" said Mrs. Hall.\n\n\"And I'm very naturally anxious to get on with my inquiries.\"\n\n\"Of course, sir.\"\n\n\"My reason for coming to Iping,\" he proceeded, with a certain\ndeliberation of manner, \"was ... a desire for solitude. I do not\nwish to be disturbed in my work. In addition to my work, an\naccident--\"\n\n\"I thought as much,\" said Mrs. Hall to herself.\n\n\"--necessitates a certain retirement. My eyes--are sometimes so\nweak and painful that I have to shut myself up in the dark for\nhours together. Lock myself up. Sometimes--now and then. Not at\npresent, certainly. At such times the slightest disturbance, the\nentry of a stranger into the room, is a source of excruciating\nannoyance to me--it is well these things should be understood.\"\n\n\"Certainly, sir,\" said Mrs. Hall. \"And if I might make so bold as\nto ask--\"\n\n\"That I think, is all,\" said the stranger, with that quietly\nirresistible air of finality he could assume at will. Mrs. Hall\nreserved her question and sympathy for a better occasion.\n\nAfter Mrs. Hall had left the room, he remained standing in front of\nthe fire, glaring, so Mr. Henfrey puts it, at the clock-mending. Mr.\nHenfrey not only took off the hands of the clock, and the face, but\nextracted the works; and he tried to work in as slow and quiet and\nunassuming a manner as possible. He worked with the lamp close to\nhim, and the green shade threw a brilliant light upon his hands,\nand upon the frame and wheels, and left the rest of the room\nshadowy. When he looked up, coloured patches swam in his eyes.\nBeing constitutionally of a curious nature, he had removed the\nworks--a quite unnecessary proceeding--with the idea of delaying his\ndeparture and perhaps falling into conversation with the stranger.\nBut the stranger stood there, perfectly silent and still. So still,\nit got on Henfrey's nerves. He felt alone in the room and looked up,\nand there, grey and dim, was the bandaged head and huge blue lenses\nstaring fixedly, with a mist of green spots drifting in front of\nthem. It was so uncanny to Henfrey that for a minute they remained\nstaring blankly at one another. Then Henfrey looked down again. Very\nuncomfortable position! One would like to say something. Should he\nremark that the weather was very cold for the time of year?\n\nHe looked up as if to take aim with that introductory shot. \"The\nweather--\" he began.\n\n\"Why don't you finish and go?\" said the rigid figure, evidently in\na state of painfully suppressed rage. \"All you've got to do is to\nfix the hour-hand on its axle. You're simply humbugging--\"\n\n\"Certainly, sir--one minute more. I overlooked--\" and Mr. Henfrey\nfinished and went.\n\nBut he went feeling excessively annoyed. \"Damn it!\" said Mr. Henfrey\nto himself, trudging down the village through the thawing snow; \"a\nman must do a clock at times, surely.\"\n\nAnd again, \"Can't a man look at you?--Ugly!\"\n\nAnd yet again, \"Seemingly not. If the police was wanting you you\ncouldn't be more wropped and bandaged.\"\n\nAt Gleeson's corner he saw Hall, who had recently married the\nstranger's hostess at the \"Coach and Horses,\" and who now drove\nthe Iping conveyance, when occasional people required it, to\nSidderbridge Junction, coming towards him on his return from that\nplace. Hall had evidently been \"stopping a bit\" at Sidderbridge,\nto judge by his driving. \"'Ow do, Teddy?\" he said, passing.\n\n\"You got a rum un up home!\" said Teddy.\n\nHall very sociably pulled up. \"What's that?\" he asked.\n\n\"Rum-looking customer stopping at the 'Coach and Horses,'\" said\nTeddy. \"My sakes!\"\n\nAnd he proceeded to give Hall a vivid description of his grotesque\nguest. \"Looks a bit like a disguise, don't it? I'd like to see a\nman's face if I had him stopping in _my_ place,\" said Henfrey. \"But\nwomen are that trustful--where strangers are concerned. He's took\nyour rooms and he ain't even given a name, Hall.\"\n\n\"You don't say so!\" said Hall, who was a man of sluggish apprehension.\n\n\"Yes,\" said Teddy. \"By the week. Whatever he is, you can't get rid\nof him under the week. And he's got a lot of luggage coming\nto-morrow, so he says. Let's hope it won't be stones in boxes, Hall.\"\n\nHe told Hall how his aunt at Hastings had been swindled by a\nstranger with empty portmanteaux. Altogether he left Hall vaguely\nsuspicious. \"Get up, old girl,\" said Hall. \"I s'pose I must see\n'bout this.\"\n\nTeddy trudged on his way with his mind considerably relieved.\n\nInstead of \"seeing 'bout it,\" however, Hall on his return was\nseverely rated by his wife on the length of time he had spent in\nSidderbridge, and his mild inquiries were answered snappishly and\nin a manner not to the point. But the seed of suspicion Teddy\nhad sown germinated in the mind of Mr. Hall in spite of these\ndiscouragements. \"You wim' don't know everything,\" said Mr. Hall,\nresolved to ascertain more about the personality of his guest at\nthe earliest possible opportunity. And after the stranger had gone\nto bed, which he did about half-past nine, Mr. Hall went very\naggressively into the parlour and looked very hard at his wife's\nfurniture, just to show that the stranger wasn't master there,\nand scrutinised closely and a little contemptuously a sheet of\nmathematical computations the stranger had left. When retiring\nfor the night he instructed Mrs. Hall to look very closely at\nthe stranger's luggage when it came next day.\n\n\"You mind your own business, Hall,\" said Mrs. Hall, \"and I'll mind\nmine.\"\n\nShe was all the more inclined to snap at Hall because the stranger\nwas undoubtedly an unusually strange sort of stranger, and she was\nby no means assured about him in her own mind. In the middle of the\nnight she woke up dreaming of huge white heads like turnips, that\ncame trailing after her, at the end of interminable necks, and with\nvast black eyes. But being a sensible woman, she subdued her\nterrors and turned over and went to sleep again.\n\n\n\nCHAPTER III\n\nTHE THOUSAND AND ONE BOTTLES\n\n\nSo it was that on the twenty-ninth day of February, at the beginning\nof the thaw, this singular person fell out of infinity into Iping\nvillage. Next day his luggage arrived through the slush--and very\nremarkable luggage it was. There were a couple of trunks indeed,\nsuch as a rational man might need, but in addition there were\na box of books--big, fat books, of which some were just in an\nincomprehensible handwriting--and a dozen or more crates, boxes,\nand cases, containing objects packed in straw, as it seemed to\nHall, tugging with a casual curiosity at the straw--glass bottles.\nThe stranger, muffled in hat, coat, gloves, and wrapper, came out\nimpatiently to meet Fearenside's cart, while Hall was having a word\nor so of gossip preparatory to helping bring them in. Out he came,\nnot noticing Fearenside's dog, who was sniffing in a _dilettante_\nspirit at Hall's legs. \"Come along with those boxes,\" he said.\n\"I've been waiting long enough.\"\n\nAnd he came down the steps towards the tail of the cart as if to\nlay hands on the smaller crate.\n\nNo sooner had Fearenside's dog caught sight of him, however, than\nit began to bristle and growl savagely, and when he rushed down the\nsteps it gave an undecided hop, and then sprang straight at his\nhand. \"Whup!\" cried Hall, jumping back, for he was no hero with\ndogs, and Fearenside howled, \"Lie down!\" and snatched his whip.\n\nThey saw the dog's teeth had slipped the hand, heard a kick, saw the\ndog execute a flanking jump and get home on the stranger's leg, and\nheard the rip of his trousering. Then the finer end of Fearenside's\nwhip reached his property, and the dog, yelping with dismay,\nretreated under the wheels of the waggon. It was all the business of\na swift half-minute. No one spoke, everyone shouted. The stranger\nglanced swiftly at his torn glove and at his leg, made as if he\nwould stoop to the latter, then turned and rushed swiftly up the\nsteps into the inn. They heard him go headlong across the passage\nand up the uncarpeted stairs to his bedroom.\n\n\"You brute, you!\" said Fearenside, climbing off the waggon with his\nwhip in his hand, while the dog watched him through the wheel.\n\"Come here,\" said Fearenside--\"You'd better.\"\n\nHall had stood gaping. \"He wuz bit,\" said Hall. \"I'd better go and\nsee to en,\" and he trotted after the stranger. He met Mrs. Hall in\nthe passage. \"Carrier's darg,\" he said \"bit en.\"\n\nHe went straight upstairs, and the stranger's door being ajar, he\npushed it open and was entering without any ceremony, being of a\nnaturally sympathetic turn of mind.\n\nThe blind was down and the room dim. He caught a glimpse of a most\nsingular thing, what seemed a handless arm waving towards him, and\na face of three huge indeterminate spots on white, very like the\nface of a pale pansy. Then he was struck violently in the chest,\nhurled back, and the door slammed in his face and locked. It was so\nrapid that it gave him no time to observe. A waving of indecipherable\nshapes, a blow, and a concussion. There he stood on the dark little\nlanding, wondering what it might be that he had seen.\n\nA couple of minutes after, he rejoined the little group that had\nformed outside the \"Coach and Horses.\" There was Fearenside telling\nabout it all over again for the second time; there was Mrs. Hall\nsaying his dog didn't have no business to bite her guests; there\nwas Huxter, the general dealer from over the road, interrogative;\nand Sandy Wadgers from the forge, judicial; besides women and\nchildren, all of them saying fatuities: \"Wouldn't let en bite\n_me_, I knows\"; \"'Tasn't right _have_ such dargs\"; \"Whad _'e_ bite\n'n for, then?\" and so forth.\n\nMr. Hall, staring at them from the steps and listening, found it\nincredible that he had seen anything so very remarkable happen\nupstairs. Besides, his vocabulary was altogether too limited to\nexpress his impressions.\n\n\"He don't want no help, he says,\" he said in answer to his wife's\ninquiry. \"We'd better be a-takin' of his luggage in.\"\n\n\"He ought to have it cauterised at once,\" said Mr. Huxter;\n\"especially if it's at all inflamed.\"\n\n\"I'd shoot en, that's what I'd do,\" said a lady in the group.\n\nSuddenly the dog began growling again.\n\n\"Come along,\" cried an angry voice in the doorway, and there stood\nthe muffled stranger with his collar turned up, and his hat-brim\nbent down. \"The sooner you get those things in the better I'll be\npleased.\" It is stated by an anonymous bystander that his trousers\nand gloves had been changed.\n\n\"Was you hurt, sir?\" said Fearenside. \"I'm rare sorry the darg--\"\n\n\"Not a bit,\" said the stranger. \"Never broke the skin. Hurry up\nwith those things.\"\n\nHe then swore to himself, so Mr. Hall asserts.\n\nDirectly the first crate was, in accordance with his directions,\ncarried into the parlour, the stranger flung himself upon it with\nextraordinary eagerness, and began to unpack it, scattering the\nstraw with an utter disregard of Mrs. Hall's carpet. And from it he\nbegan to produce bottles--little fat bottles containing powders,\nsmall and slender bottles containing coloured and white fluids,\nfluted blue bottles labeled Poison, bottles with round bodies and\nslender necks, large green-glass bottles, large white-glass bottles,\nbottles with glass stoppers and frosted labels, bottles with fine\ncorks, bottles with bungs, bottles with wooden caps, wine bottles,\nsalad-oil bottles--putting them in rows on the chiffonnier, on the\nmantel, on the table under the window, round the floor, on the\nbookshelf--everywhere. The chemist's shop in Bramblehurst could not\nboast half so many. Quite a sight it was. Crate after crate yielded\nbottles, until all six were empty and the table high with straw; the\nonly things that came out of these crates besides the bottles were\na number of test-tubes and a carefully packed balance.\n\nAnd directly the crates were unpacked, the stranger went to the\nwindow and set to work, not troubling in the least about the litter\nof straw, the fire which had gone out, the box of books outside,\nnor for the trunks and other luggage that had gone upstairs.\n\nWhen Mrs. Hall took his dinner in to him, he was already so\nabsorbed in his work, pouring little drops out of the bottles into\ntest-tubes, that he did not hear her until she had swept away the\nbulk of the straw and put the tray on the table, with some little\nemphasis perhaps, seeing the state that the floor was in. Then he\nhalf turned his head and immediately turned it away again. But she\nsaw he had removed his glasses; they were beside him on the table,\nand it seemed to her that his eye sockets were extraordinarily\nhollow. He put on his spectacles again, and then turned and faced\nher. She was about to complain of the straw on the floor when he\nanticipated her.\n\n\"I wish you wouldn't come in without knocking,\" he said in the tone\nof abnormal exasperation that seemed so characteristic of him.\n\n\"I knocked, but seemingly--\"\n\n\"Perhaps you did. But in my investigations--my really very urgent\nand necessary investigations--the slightest disturbance, the jar\nof a door--I must ask you--\"\n\n\"Certainly, sir. You can turn the lock if you're like that, you\nknow. Any time.\"\n\n\"A very good idea,\" said the stranger.\n\n\"This stror, sir, if I might make so bold as to remark--\"\n\n\"Don't. If the straw makes trouble put it down in the bill.\" And he\nmumbled at her--words suspiciously like curses.\n\nHe was so odd, standing there, so aggressive and explosive, bottle\nin one hand and test-tube in the other, that Mrs. Hall was quite\nalarmed. But she was a resolute woman. \"In which case, I should\nlike to know, sir, what you consider--\"\n\n\"A shilling--put down a shilling. Surely a shilling's enough?\"\n\n\"So be it,\" said Mrs. Hall, taking up the table-cloth and beginning\nto spread it over the table. \"If you're satisfied, of course--\"\n\nHe turned and sat down, with his coat-collar toward her.\n\nAll the afternoon he worked with the door locked and, as Mrs. Hall\ntestifies, for the most part in silence. But once there was a\nconcussion and a sound of bottles ringing together as though the\ntable had been hit, and the smash of a bottle flung violently down,\nand then a rapid pacing athwart the room. Fearing \"something was\nthe matter,\" she went to the door and listened, not caring to\nknock.\n\n\"I can't go on,\" he was raving. \"I _can't_ go on. Three hundred\nthousand, four hundred thousand! The huge multitude! Cheated! All\nmy life it may take me! ... Patience! Patience indeed! ... Fool!\nfool!\"\n\nThere was a noise of hobnails on the bricks in the bar, and Mrs.\nHall had very reluctantly to leave the rest of his soliloquy.\nWhen she returned the room was silent again, save for the faint\ncrepitation of his chair and the occasional clink of a bottle.\nIt was all over; the stranger had resumed work.\n\nWhen she took in his tea she saw broken glass in the corner of the\nroom under the concave mirror, and a golden stain that had been\ncarelessly wiped. She called attention to it.\n\n\"Put it down in the bill,\" snapped her visitor. \"For God's sake\ndon't worry me. If there's damage done, put it down in the bill,\"\nand he went on ticking a list in the exercise book before him.\n\n\"I'll tell you something,\" said Fearenside, mysteriously. It was\nlate in the afternoon, and they were in the little beer-shop of\nIping Hanger.\n\n\"Well?\" said Teddy Henfrey.\n\n\"This chap you're speaking of, what my dog bit. Well--he's black.\nLeastways, his legs are. I seed through the tear of his trousers\nand the tear of his glove. You'd have expected a sort of pinky to\nshow, wouldn't you? Well--there wasn't none. Just blackness. I\ntell you, he's as black as my hat.\"\n\n\"My sakes!\" said Henfrey. \"It's a rummy case altogether. Why, his\nnose is as pink as paint!\"\n\n\"That's true,\" said Fearenside. \"I knows that. And I tell 'ee what\nI'm thinking. That marn's a piebald, Teddy. Black here and white\nthere--in patches. And he's ashamed of it. He's a kind of half-breed,\nand the colour's come off patchy instead of mixing. I've heard of\nsuch things before. And it's the common way with horses, as any one\ncan see.\"\n\n\n\nCHAPTER IV\n\nMR. CUSS INTERVIEWS THE STRANGER\n\n\nI have told the circumstances of the stranger's arrival in Iping\nwith a certain fulness of detail, in order that the curious\nimpression he created may be understood by the reader. But\nexcepting two odd incidents, the circumstances of his stay until\nthe extraordinary day of the club festival may be passed over very\ncursorily. There were a number of skirmishes with Mrs. Hall on\nmatters of domestic discipline, but in every case until late April,\nwhen the first signs of penury began, he over-rode her by the easy\nexpedient of an extra payment. Hall did not like him, and whenever\nhe dared he talked of the advisability of getting rid of him; but\nhe showed his dislike chiefly by concealing it ostentatiously, and\navoiding his visitor as much as possible. \"Wait till the summer,\"\nsaid Mrs. Hall sagely, \"when the artisks are beginning to come.\nThen we'll see. He may be a bit overbearing, but bills settled\npunctual is bills settled punctual, whatever you'd like to say.\"\n\nThe stranger did not go to church, and indeed made no difference\nbetween Sunday and the irreligious days, even in costume. He\nworked, as Mrs. Hall thought, very fitfully. Some days he would\ncome down early and be continuously busy. On others he would rise\nlate, pace his room, fretting audibly for hours together, smoke,\nsleep in the armchair by the fire. Communication with the world\nbeyond the village he had none. His temper continued very\nuncertain; for the most part his manner was that of a man suffering\nunder almost unendurable provocation, and once or twice things were\nsnapped, torn, crushed, or broken in spasmodic gusts of violence.\nHe seemed under a chronic irritation of the greatest intensity. His\nhabit of talking to himself in a low voice grew steadily upon him,\nbut though Mrs. Hall listened conscientiously she could make\nneither head nor tail of what she heard.\n\nHe rarely went abroad by daylight, but at twilight he would go out\nmuffled up invisibly, whether the weather were cold or not, and he\nchose the loneliest paths and those most overshadowed by trees and\nbanks. His goggling spectacles and ghastly bandaged face under the\npenthouse of his hat, came with a disagreeable suddenness out of\nthe darkness upon one or two home-going labourers, and Teddy\nHenfrey, tumbling out of the \"Scarlet Coat\" one night, at half-past\nnine, was scared shamefully by the stranger's skull-like head (he\nwas walking hat in hand) lit by the sudden light of the opened inn\ndoor. Such children as saw him at nightfall dreamt of bogies, and\nit seemed doubtful whether he disliked boys more than they disliked\nhim, or the reverse; but there was certainly a vivid enough dislike\non either side.\n\nIt was inevitable that a person of so remarkable an appearance and\nbearing should form a frequent topic in such a village as Iping.\nOpinion was greatly divided about his occupation. Mrs. Hall was\nsensitive on the point. When questioned, she explained very\ncarefully that he was an \"experimental investigator,\" going\ngingerly over the syllables as one who dreads pitfalls. When asked\nwhat an experimental investigator was, she would say with a touch\nof superiority that most educated people knew such things as that,\nand would thus explain that he \"discovered things.\" Her visitor had\nhad an accident, she said, which temporarily discoloured his face\nand hands, and being of a sensitive disposition, he was averse to\nany public notice of the fact.\n\nOut of her hearing there was a view largely entertained that he was\na criminal trying to escape from justice by wrapping himself up so\nas to conceal himself altogether from the eye of the police. This\nidea sprang from the brain of Mr. Teddy Henfrey. No crime of any\nmagnitude dating from the middle or end of February was known to\nhave occurred. Elaborated in the imagination of Mr. Gould, the\nprobationary assistant in the National School, this theory took the\nform that the stranger was an Anarchist in disguise, preparing\nexplosives, and he resolved to undertake such detective operations\nas his time permitted. These consisted for the most part in looking\nvery hard at the stranger whenever they met, or in asking people\nwho had never seen the stranger, leading questions about him. But\nhe detected nothing.\n\nAnother school of opinion followed Mr. Fearenside, and either\naccepted the piebald view or some modification of it; as, for\ninstance, Silas Durgan, who was heard to assert that \"if he chooses\nto show enself at fairs he'd make his fortune in no time,\" and\nbeing a bit of a theologian, compared the stranger to the man with\nthe one talent. Yet another view explained the entire matter by\nregarding the stranger as a harmless lunatic. That had the\nadvantage of accounting for everything straight away.\n\nBetween these main groups there were waverers and compromisers.\nSussex folk have few superstitions, and it was only after the\nevents of early April that the thought of the supernatural was\nfirst whispered in the village. Even then it was only credited\namong the women folk.\n\nBut whatever they thought of him, people in Iping, on the whole,\nagreed in disliking him. His irritability, though it might have\nbeen comprehensible to an urban brain-worker, was an amazing thing\nto these quiet Sussex villagers. The frantic gesticulations they\nsurprised now and then, the headlong pace after nightfall that\nswept him upon them round quiet corners, the inhuman bludgeoning\nof all tentative advances of curiosity, the taste for twilight\nthat led to the closing of doors, the pulling down of blinds,\nthe extinction of candles and lamps--who could agree with such\ngoings on? They drew aside as he passed down the village, and when\nhe had gone by, young humourists would up with coat-collars and\ndown with hat-brims, and go pacing nervously after him in imitation\nof his occult bearing. There was a song popular at that time called\n\"The Bogey Man\". Miss Statchell sang it at the schoolroom concert\n(in aid of the church lamps), and thereafter whenever one or two of\nthe villagers were gathered together and the stranger appeared, a\nbar or so of this tune, more or less sharp or flat, was whistled in\nthe midst of them. Also belated little children would call \"Bogey\nMan!\" after him, and make off tremulously elated.\n\nCuss, the general practitioner, was devoured by curiosity. The\nbandages excited his professional interest, the report of the\nthousand and one bottles aroused his jealous regard. All through\nApril and May he coveted an opportunity of talking to the stranger,\nand at last, towards Whitsuntide, he could stand it no longer, but\nhit upon the subscription-list for a village nurse as an excuse. He\nwas surprised to find that Mr. Hall did not know his guest's name.\n\"He give a name,\" said Mrs. Hall--an assertion which was quite\nunfounded--\"but I didn't rightly hear it.\" She thought it seemed\nso silly not to know the man's name.\n\nCuss rapped at the parlour door and entered. There was a fairly\naudible imprecation from within. \"Pardon my intrusion,\" said Cuss,\nand then the door closed and cut Mrs. Hall off from the rest of\nthe conversation.\n\nShe could hear the murmur of voices for the next ten minutes, then\na cry of surprise, a stirring of feet, a chair flung aside, a bark\nof laughter, quick steps to the door, and Cuss appeared, his face\nwhite, his eyes staring over his shoulder. He left the door open\nbehind him, and without looking at her strode across the hall and\nwent down the steps, and she heard his feet hurrying along the\nroad. He carried his hat in his hand. She stood behind the door,\nlooking at the open door of the parlour. Then she heard the\nstranger laughing quietly, and then his footsteps came across the\nroom. She could not see his face where she stood. The parlour door\nslammed, and the place was silent again.\n\nCuss went straight up the village to Bunting the vicar. \"Am I mad?\"\nCuss began abruptly, as he entered the shabby little study. \"Do I\nlook like an insane person?\"\n\n\"What's happened?\" said the vicar, putting the ammonite on the\nloose sheets of his forth-coming sermon.\n\n\"That chap at the inn--\"\n\n\"Well?\"\n\n\"Give me something to drink,\" said Cuss, and he sat down.\n\nWhen his nerves had been steadied by a glass of cheap sherry--the\nonly drink the good vicar had available--he told him of the\ninterview he had just had. \"Went in,\" he gasped, \"and began to\ndemand a subscription for that Nurse Fund. He'd stuck his hands in\nhis pockets as I came in, and he sat down lumpily in his chair.\nSniffed. I told him I'd heard he took an interest in scientific\nthings. He said yes. Sniffed again. Kept on sniffing all the time;\nevidently recently caught an infernal cold. No wonder, wrapped up\nlike that! I developed the nurse idea, and all the while kept my\neyes open. Bottles--chemicals--everywhere. Balance, test-tubes\nin stands, and a smell of--evening primrose. Would he subscribe?\nSaid he'd consider it. Asked him, point-blank, was he researching.\nSaid he was. A long research? Got quite cross. 'A damnable long\nresearch,' said he, blowing the cork out, so to speak. 'Oh,' said\nI. And out came the grievance. The man was just on the boil, and my\nquestion boiled him over. He had been given a prescription, most\nvaluable prescription--what for he wouldn't say. Was it medical?\n'Damn you! What are you fishing after?' I apologised. Dignified\nsniff and cough. He resumed. He'd read it. Five ingredients. Put it\ndown; turned his head. Draught of air from window lifted the paper.\nSwish, rustle. He was working in a room with an open fireplace, he\nsaid. Saw a flicker, and there was the prescription burning and\nlifting chimneyward. Rushed towards it just as it whisked up the\nchimney. So! Just at that point, to illustrate his story, out came\nhis arm.\"\n\n\"Well?\"\n\n\"No hand--just an empty sleeve. Lord! I thought, _that's_ a\ndeformity! Got a cork arm, I suppose, and has taken it off. Then, I\nthought, there's something odd in that. What the devil keeps that\nsleeve up and open, if there's nothing in it? There was nothing in\nit, I tell you. Nothing down it, right down to the joint. I could\nsee right down it to the elbow, and there was a glimmer of light\nshining through a tear of the cloth. 'Good God!' I said. Then he\nstopped. Stared at me with those black goggles of his, and then\nat his sleeve.\"\n\n\"Well?\"\n\n\"That's all. He never said a word; just glared, and put his sleeve\nback in his pocket quickly. 'I was saying,' said he, 'that there\nwas the prescription burning, wasn't I?' Interrogative cough.\n'How the devil,' said I, 'can you move an empty sleeve like that?'\n'Empty sleeve?' 'Yes,' said I, 'an empty sleeve.'\n\n\"'It's an empty sleeve, is it? You saw it was an empty sleeve?' He\nstood up right away. I stood up too. He came towards me in three\nvery slow steps, and stood quite close. Sniffed venomously. I\ndidn't flinch, though I'm hanged if that bandaged knob of his, and\nthose blinkers, aren't enough to unnerve any one, coming quietly\nup to you.\n\n\"'You said it was an empty sleeve?' he said. 'Certainly,' I said.\nAt staring and saying nothing a barefaced man, unspectacled, starts\nscratch. Then very quietly he pulled his sleeve out of his pocket\nagain, and raised his arm towards me as though he would show it to\nme again. He did it very, very slowly. I looked at it. Seemed an\nage. 'Well?' said I, clearing my throat, 'there's nothing in it.'\n\n\"Had to say something. I was beginning to feel frightened. I could\nsee right down it. He extended it straight towards me, slowly,\nslowly--just like that--until the cuff was six inches from my\nface. Queer thing to see an empty sleeve come at you like that!\nAnd then--\"\n\n\"Well?\"\n\n\"Something--exactly like a finger and thumb it felt--nipped my\nnose.\"\n\nBunting began to laugh.\n\n\"There wasn't anything there!\" said Cuss, his voice running up into\na shriek at the \"there.\" \"It's all very well for you to laugh, but\nI tell you I was so startled, I hit his cuff hard, and turned\naround, and cut out of the room--I left him--\"\n\nCuss stopped. There was no mistaking the sincerity of his panic.\nHe turned round in a helpless way and took a second glass of the\nexcellent vicar's very inferior sherry. \"When I hit his cuff,\" said\nCuss, \"I tell you, it felt exactly like hitting an arm. And there\nwasn't an arm! There wasn't the ghost of an arm!\"\n\nMr. Bunting thought it over. He looked suspiciously at Cuss. \"It's\na most remarkable story,\" he said. He looked very wise and grave\nindeed. \"It's really,\" said Mr. Bunting with judicial emphasis, \"a\nmost remarkable story.\"\n\n\n\nCHAPTER V\n\nTHE BURGLARY AT THE VICARAGE\n\n\nThe facts of the burglary at the vicarage came to us chiefly\nthrough the medium of the vicar and his wife. It occurred in the\nsmall hours of Whit Monday, the day devoted in Iping to the Club\nfestivities. Mrs. Bunting, it seems, woke up suddenly in the\nstillness that comes before the dawn, with the strong impression\nthat the door of their bedroom had opened and closed. She did not\narouse her husband at first, but sat up in bed listening. She then\ndistinctly heard the pad, pad, pad of bare feet coming out of the\nadjoining dressing-room and walking along the passage towards the\nstaircase. As soon as she felt assured of this, she aroused the\nRev. Mr. Bunting as quietly as possible. He did not strike a light,\nbut putting on his spectacles, her dressing-gown and his bath\nslippers, he went out on the landing to listen. He heard quite\ndistinctly a fumbling going on at his study desk down-stairs, and\nthen a violent sneeze.\n\nAt that he returned to his bedroom, armed himself with the most\nobvious weapon, the poker, and descended the staircase as\nnoiselessly as possible. Mrs. Bunting came out on the landing.\n\nThe hour was about four, and the ultimate darkness of the night was\npast. There was a faint shimmer of light in the hall, but the study\ndoorway yawned impenetrably black. Everything was still except the\nfaint creaking of the stairs under Mr. Bunting's tread, and the\nslight movements in the study. Then something snapped, the drawer\nwas opened, and there was a rustle of papers. Then came an\nimprecation, and a match was struck and the study was flooded with\nyellow light. Mr. Bunting was now in the hall, and through the\ncrack of the door he could see the desk and the open drawer and a\ncandle burning on the desk. But the robber he could not see. He\nstood there in the hall undecided what to do, and Mrs. Bunting, her\nface white and intent, crept slowly downstairs after him. One thing\nkept Mr. Bunting's courage; the persuasion that this burglar was a\nresident in the village.\n\nThey heard the chink of money, and realised that the robber had\nfound the housekeeping reserve of gold--two pounds ten in half\nsovereigns altogether. At that sound Mr. Bunting was nerved to\nabrupt action. Gripping the poker firmly, he rushed into the room,\nclosely followed by Mrs. Bunting. \"Surrender!\" cried Mr. Bunting,\nfiercely, and then stooped amazed. Apparently the room was\nperfectly empty.\n\nYet their conviction that they had, that very moment, heard somebody\nmoving in the room had amounted to a certainty. For half a minute,\nperhaps, they stood gaping, then Mrs. Bunting went across the room\nand looked behind the screen, while Mr. Bunting, by a kindred\nimpulse, peered under the desk. Then Mrs. Bunting turned back the\nwindow-curtains, and Mr. Bunting looked up the chimney and probed it\nwith the poker. Then Mrs. Bunting scrutinised the waste-paper basket\nand Mr. Bunting opened the lid of the coal-scuttle. Then they came\nto a stop and stood with eyes interrogating each other.\n\n\"I could have sworn--\" said Mr. Bunting.\n\n\"The candle!\" said Mr. Bunting. \"Who lit the candle?\"\n\n\"The drawer!\" said Mrs. Bunting. \"And the money's gone!\"\n\nShe went hastily to the doorway.\n\n\"Of all the strange occurrences--\"\n\nThere was a violent sneeze in the passage. They rushed out, and as\nthey did so the kitchen door slammed. \"Bring the candle,\" said Mr.\nBunting, and led the way. They both heard a sound of bolts being\nhastily shot back.\n\nAs he opened the kitchen door he saw through the scullery that\nthe back door was just opening, and the faint light of early dawn\ndisplayed the dark masses of the garden beyond. He is certain that\nnothing went out of the door. It opened, stood open for a moment,\nand then closed with a slam. As it did so, the candle Mrs. Bunting\nwas carrying from the study flickered and flared. It was a minute\nor more before they entered the kitchen.\n\nThe place was empty. They refastened the back door, examined the\nkitchen, pantry, and scullery thoroughly, and at last went down\ninto the cellar. There was not a soul to be found in the house,\nsearch as they would.\n\nDaylight found the vicar and his wife, a quaintly-costumed little\ncouple, still marvelling about on their own ground floor by the\nunnecessary light of a guttering candle.\n\n\n\nCHAPTER VI\n\nTHE FURNITURE THAT WENT MAD\n\n\nNow it happened that in the early hours of Whit Monday, before\nMillie was hunted out for the day, Mr. Hall and Mrs. Hall both rose\nand went noiselessly down into the cellar. Their business there was\nof a private nature, and had something to do with the specific\ngravity of their beer. They had hardly entered the cellar when Mrs.\nHall found she had forgotten to bring down a bottle of sarsaparilla\nfrom their joint-room. As she was the expert and principal operator\nin this affair, Hall very properly went upstairs for it.\n\nOn the landing he was surprised to see that the stranger's door was\najar. He went on into his own room and found the bottle as he had\nbeen directed.\n\nBut returning with the bottle, he noticed that the bolts of the\nfront door had been shot back, that the door was in fact simply on\nthe latch. And with a flash of inspiration he connected this with\nthe stranger's room upstairs and the suggestions of Mr. Teddy\nHenfrey. He distinctly remembered holding the candle while Mrs.\nHall shot these bolts overnight. At the sight he stopped, gaping,\nthen with the bottle still in his hand went upstairs again. He\nrapped at the stranger's door. There was no answer. He rapped\nagain; then pushed the door wide open and entered.\n\nIt was as he expected. The bed, the room also, was empty. And what\nwas stranger, even to his heavy intelligence, on the bedroom chair\nand along the rail of the bed were scattered the garments, the only\ngarments so far as he knew, and the bandages of their guest. His\nbig slouch hat even was cocked jauntily over the bed-post.\n\nAs Hall stood there he heard his wife's voice coming out of the\ndepth of the cellar, with that rapid telescoping of the syllables\nand interrogative cocking up of the final words to a high note,\nby which the West Sussex villager is wont to indicate a brisk\nimpatience. \"George! You gart whad a wand?\"\n\nAt that he turned and hurried down to her. \"Janny,\" he said, over\nthe rail of the cellar steps, \"'tas the truth what Henfrey sez.\n'E's not in uz room, 'e en't. And the front door's onbolted.\"\n\nAt first Mrs. Hall did not understand, and as soon as she did she\nresolved to see the empty room for herself. Hall, still holding the\nbottle, went first. \"If 'e en't there,\" he said, \"'is close are.\nAnd what's 'e doin' 'ithout 'is close, then? 'Tas a most curious\nbusiness.\"\n\nAs they came up the cellar steps they both, it was afterwards\nascertained, fancied they heard the front door open and shut, but\nseeing it closed and nothing there, neither said a word to the other\nabout it at the time. Mrs. Hall passed her husband in the passage\nand ran on first upstairs. Someone sneezed on the staircase. Hall,\nfollowing six steps behind, thought that he heard her sneeze. She,\ngoing on first, was under the impression that Hall was sneezing.\nShe flung open the door and stood regarding the room. \"Of all the\ncurious!\" she said.\n\nShe heard a sniff close behind her head as it seemed, and turning,\nwas surprised to see Hall a dozen feet off on the topmost stair.\nBut in another moment he was beside her. She bent forward and put\nher hand on the pillow and then under the clothes.\n\n\"Cold,\" she said. \"He's been up this hour or more.\"\n\nAs she did so, a most extraordinary thing happened. The bed-clothes\ngathered themselves together, leapt up suddenly into a sort of peak,\nand then jumped headlong over the bottom rail. It was exactly as if\na hand had clutched them in the centre and flung them aside.\nImmediately after, the stranger's hat hopped off the bed-post,\ndescribed a whirling flight in the air through the better part of\na circle, and then dashed straight at Mrs. Hall's face. Then as\nswiftly came the sponge from the washstand; and then the chair,\nflinging the stranger's coat and trousers carelessly aside, and\nlaughing drily in a voice singularly like the stranger's, turned\nitself up with its four legs at Mrs. Hall, seemed to take aim at her\nfor a moment, and charged at her. She screamed and turned, and then\nthe chair legs came gently but firmly against her back and impelled\nher and Hall out of the room. The door slammed violently and was\nlocked. The chair and bed seemed to be executing a dance of triumph\nfor a moment, and then abruptly everything was still.\n\nMrs. Hall was left almost in a fainting condition in Mr. Hall's\narms on the landing. It was with the greatest difficulty that Mr.\nHall and Millie, who had been roused by her scream of alarm,\nsucceeded in getting her downstairs, and applying the restoratives\ncustomary in such cases.\n\n\"'Tas sperits,\" said Mrs. Hall. \"I know 'tas sperits. I've read in\npapers of en. Tables and chairs leaping and dancing...\"\n\n\"Take a drop more, Janny,\" said Hall. \"'Twill steady ye.\"\n\n\"Lock him out,\" said Mrs. Hall. \"Don't let him come in again.\nI half guessed--I might ha' known. With them goggling eyes and\nbandaged head, and never going to church of a Sunday. And all\nthey bottles--more'n it's right for any one to have. He's put the\nsperits into the furniture.... My good old furniture! 'Twas in\nthat very chair my poor dear mother used to sit when I was a\nlittle girl. To think it should rise up against me now!\"\n\n\"Just a drop more, Janny,\" said Hall. \"Your nerves is all upset.\"\n\nThey sent Millie across the street through the golden five o'clock\nsunshine to rouse up Mr. Sandy Wadgers, the blacksmith. Mr.\nHall's compliments and the furniture upstairs was behaving most\nextraordinary. Would Mr. Wadgers come round? He was a knowing man,\nwas Mr. Wadgers, and very resourceful. He took quite a grave view\nof the case. \"Arm darmed if thet ent witchcraft,\" was the view of\nMr. Sandy Wadgers. \"You warnt horseshoes for such gentry as he.\"\n\nHe came round greatly concerned. They wanted him to lead the way\nupstairs to the room, but he didn't seem to be in any hurry. He\npreferred to talk in the passage. Over the way Huxter's apprentice\ncame out and began taking down the shutters of the tobacco window.\nHe was called over to join the discussion. Mr. Huxter naturally\nfollowed over in the course of a few minutes. The Anglo-Saxon\ngenius for parliamentary government asserted itself; there was a\ngreat deal of talk and no decisive action. \"Let's have the facts\nfirst,\" insisted Mr. Sandy Wadgers. \"Let's be sure we'd be acting\nperfectly right in bustin' that there door open. A door onbust is\nalways open to bustin', but ye can't onbust a door once you've\nbusted en.\"\n\nAnd suddenly and most wonderfully the door of the room upstairs\nopened of its own accord, and as they looked up in amazement,\nthey saw descending the stairs the muffled figure of the stranger\nstaring more blackly and blankly than ever with those unreasonably\nlarge blue glass eyes of his. He came down stiffly and slowly,\nstaring all the time; he walked across the passage staring, then\nstopped.\n\n\"Look there!\" he said, and their eyes followed the direction of his\ngloved finger and saw a bottle of sarsaparilla hard by the cellar\ndoor. Then he entered the parlour, and suddenly, swiftly,\nviciously, slammed the door in their faces.\n\nNot a word was spoken until the last echoes of the slam had died\naway. They stared at one another. \"Well, if that don't lick\neverything!\" said Mr. Wadgers, and left the alternative unsaid.\n\n\"I'd go in and ask'n 'bout it,\" said Wadgers, to Mr. Hall. \"I'd\nd'mand an explanation.\"\n\nIt took some time to bring the landlady's husband up to that pitch.\nAt last he rapped, opened the door, and got as far as, \"Excuse me--\"\n\n\"Go to the devil!\" said the stranger in a tremendous voice, and\n\"Shut that door after you.\" So that brief interview terminated.\n\n\n\nCHAPTER VII\n\nTHE UNVEILING OF THE STRANGER\n\n\nThe stranger went into the little parlour of the \"Coach and Horses\"\nabout half-past five in the morning, and there he remained until\nnear midday, the blinds down, the door shut, and none, after Hall's\nrepulse, venturing near him.\n\nAll that time he must have fasted. Thrice he rang his bell, the\nthird time furiously and continuously, but no one answered him.\n\"Him and his 'go to the devil' indeed!\" said Mrs. Hall. Presently\ncame an imperfect rumour of the burglary at the vicarage, and two\nand two were put together. Hall, assisted by Wadgers, went off to\nfind Mr. Shuckleforth, the magistrate, and take his advice. No one\nventured upstairs. How the stranger occupied himself is unknown.\nNow and then he would stride violently up and down, and twice came\nan outburst of curses, a tearing of paper, and a violent smashing\nof bottles.\n\nThe little group of scared but curious people increased. Mrs. Huxter\ncame over; some gay young fellows resplendent in black ready-made\njackets and _pique_ paper ties--for it was Whit Monday--joined\nthe group with confused interrogations. Young Archie Harker\ndistinguished himself by going up the yard and trying to peep\nunder the window-blinds. He could see nothing, but gave reason\nfor supposing that he did, and others of the Iping youth\npresently joined him.\n\nIt was the finest of all possible Whit Mondays, and down the\nvillage street stood a row of nearly a dozen booths, a shooting\ngallery, and on the grass by the forge were three yellow and\nchocolate waggons and some picturesque strangers of both sexes\nputting up a cocoanut shy. The gentlemen wore blue jerseys, the\nladies white aprons and quite fashionable hats with heavy plumes.\nWodger, of the \"Purple Fawn,\" and Mr. Jaggers, the cobbler, who\nalso sold old second-hand ordinary bicycles, were stretching a\nstring of union-jacks and royal ensigns (which had originally\ncelebrated the first Victorian Jubilee) across the road.\n\nAnd inside, in the artificial darkness of the parlour, into which\nonly one thin jet of sunlight penetrated, the stranger, hungry we\nmust suppose, and fearful, hidden in his uncomfortable hot wrappings,\npored through his dark glasses upon his paper or chinked his dirty\nlittle bottles, and occasionally swore savagely at the boys, audible\nif invisible, outside the windows. In the corner by the fireplace\nlay the fragments of half a dozen smashed bottles, and a pungent\ntwang of chlorine tainted the air. So much we know from what was\nheard at the time and from what was subsequently seen in the room.\n\nAbout noon he suddenly opened his parlour door and stood glaring\nfixedly at the three or four people in the bar. \"Mrs. Hall,\" he\nsaid. Somebody went sheepishly and called for Mrs. Hall.\n\nMrs. Hall appeared after an interval, a little short of breath, but\nall the fiercer for that. Hall was still out. She had deliberated\nover this scene, and she came holding a little tray with an\nunsettled bill upon it. \"Is it your bill you're wanting, sir?\" she\nsaid.\n\n\"Why wasn't my breakfast laid? Why haven't you prepared my meals\nand answered my bell? Do you think I live without eating?\"\n\n\"Why isn't my bill paid?\" said Mrs. Hall. \"That's what I want to\nknow.\"\n\n\"I told you three days ago I was awaiting a remittance--\"\n\n\"I told you two days ago I wasn't going to await no remittances.\nYou can't grumble if your breakfast waits a bit, if my bill's been\nwaiting these five days, can you?\"\n\nThe stranger swore briefly but vividly.\n\n\"Nar, nar!\" from the bar.\n\n\"And I'd thank you kindly, sir, if you'd keep your swearing to\nyourself, sir,\" said Mrs. Hall.\n\nThe stranger stood looking more like an angry diving-helmet than\never. It was universally felt in the bar that Mrs. Hall had the\nbetter of him. His next words showed as much.\n\n\"Look here, my good woman--\" he began.\n\n\"Don't 'good woman' _me_,\" said Mrs. Hall.\n\n\"I've told you my remittance hasn't come.\"\n\n\"Remittance indeed!\" said Mrs. Hall.\n\n\"Still, I daresay in my pocket--\"\n\n\"You told me three days ago that you hadn't anything but a\nsovereign's worth of silver upon you.\"\n\n\"Well, I've found some more--\"\n\n\"'Ul-lo!\" from the bar.\n\n\"I wonder where you found it,\" said Mrs. Hall.\n\nThat seemed to annoy the stranger very much. He stamped his foot.\n\"What do you mean?\" he said.\n\n\"That I wonder where you found it,\" said Mrs. Hall. \"And before I\ntake any bills or get any breakfasts, or do any such things\nwhatsoever, you got to tell me one or two things I don't understand,\nand what nobody don't understand, and what everybody is very anxious\nto understand. I want to know what you been doing t'my chair\nupstairs, and I want to know how 'tis your room was empty, and how\nyou got in again. Them as stops in this house comes in by the\ndoors--that's the rule of the house, and that you _didn't_ do, and\nwhat I want to know is how you _did_ come in. And I want to know--\"\n\nSuddenly the stranger raised his gloved hands clenched, stamped his\nfoot, and said, \"Stop!\" with such extraordinary violence that he\nsilenced her instantly.\n\n\"You don't understand,\" he said, \"who I am or what I am. I'll show\nyou. By Heaven! I'll show you.\" Then he put his open palm over his\nface and withdrew it. The centre of his face became a black cavity.\n\"Here,\" he said. He stepped forward and handed Mrs. Hall something\nwhich she, staring at his metamorphosed face, accepted automatically.\nThen, when she saw what it was, she screamed loudly, dropped it, and\nstaggered back. The nose--it was the stranger's nose! pink and\nshining--rolled on the floor.\n\nThen he removed his spectacles, and everyone in the bar gasped. He\ntook off his hat, and with a violent gesture tore at his whiskers\nand bandages. For a moment they resisted him. A flash of horrible\nanticipation passed through the bar. \"Oh, my Gard!\" said some one.\nThen off they came.\n\nIt was worse than anything. Mrs. Hall, standing open-mouthed and\nhorror-struck, shrieked at what she saw, and made for the door of\nthe house. Everyone began to move. They were prepared for scars,\ndisfigurements, tangible horrors, but nothing! The bandages and\nfalse hair flew across the passage into the bar, making a\nhobbledehoy jump to avoid them. Everyone tumbled on everyone else\ndown the steps. For the man who stood there shouting some incoherent\nexplanation, was a solid gesticulating figure up to the coat-collar\nof him, and then--nothingness, no visible thing at all!\n\nPeople down the village heard shouts and shrieks, and looking up\nthe street saw the \"Coach and Horses\" violently firing out its\nhumanity. They saw Mrs. Hall fall down and Mr. Teddy Henfrey jump\nto avoid tumbling over her, and then they heard the frightful\nscreams of Millie, who, emerging suddenly from the kitchen at the\nnoise of the tumult, had come upon the headless stranger from\nbehind. These increased suddenly.\n\nForthwith everyone all down the street, the sweetstuff seller,\ncocoanut shy proprietor and his assistant, the swing man, little\nboys and girls, rustic dandies, smart wenches, smocked elders\nand aproned gipsies--began running towards the inn, and in a\nmiraculously short space of time a crowd of perhaps forty people,\nand rapidly increasing, swayed and hooted and inquired and\nexclaimed and suggested, in front of Mrs. Hall's establishment.\nEveryone seemed eager to talk at once, and the result was Babel. A\nsmall group supported Mrs. Hall, who was picked up in a state of\ncollapse. There was a conference, and the incredible evidence of a\nvociferous eye-witness. \"O Bogey!\" \"What's he been doin', then?\"\n\"Ain't hurt the girl, 'as 'e?\" \"Run at en with a knife, I believe.\"\n\"No 'ed, I tell ye. I don't mean no manner of speaking. I mean _marn\n'ithout a 'ed_!\" \"Narnsense! 'tis some conjuring trick.\" \"Fetched\noff 'is wrapping, 'e did--\"\n\nIn its struggles to see in through the open door, the crowd formed\nitself into a straggling wedge, with the more adventurous apex\nnearest the inn. \"He stood for a moment, I heerd the gal scream,\nand he turned. I saw her skirts whisk, and he went after her.\nDidn't take ten seconds. Back he comes with a knife in uz hand and\na loaf; stood just as if he was staring. Not a moment ago. Went in\nthat there door. I tell 'e, 'e ain't gart no 'ed at all. You just\nmissed en--\"\n\nThere was a disturbance behind, and the speaker stopped to step\naside for a little procession that was marching very resolutely\ntowards the house; first Mr. Hall, very red and determined, then\nMr. Bobby Jaffers, the village constable, and then the wary Mr.\nWadgers. They had come now armed with a warrant.\n\nPeople shouted conflicting information of the recent circumstances.\n\"'Ed or no 'ed,\" said Jaffers, \"I got to 'rest en, and 'rest en I\n_will_.\"\n\nMr. Hall marched up the steps, marched straight to the door of the\nparlour and flung it open. \"Constable,\" he said, \"do your duty.\"\n\nJaffers marched in. Hall next, Wadgers last. They saw in the dim\nlight the headless figure facing them, with a gnawed crust of bread\nin one gloved hand and a chunk of cheese in the other.\n\n\"That's him!\" said Hall.\n\n\"What the devil's this?\" came in a tone of angry expostulation from\nabove the collar of the figure.\n\n\"You're a damned rum customer, mister,\" said Mr. Jaffers. \"But 'ed\nor no 'ed, the warrant says 'body,' and duty's duty--\"\n\n\"Keep off!\" said the figure, starting back.\n\nAbruptly he whipped down the bread and cheese, and Mr. Hall just\ngrasped the knife on the table in time to save it. Off came the\nstranger's left glove and was slapped in Jaffers' face. In another\nmoment Jaffers, cutting short some statement concerning a warrant,\nhad gripped him by the handless wrist and caught his invisible\nthroat. He got a sounding kick on the shin that made him shout, but\nhe kept his grip. Hall sent the knife sliding along the table to\nWadgers, who acted as goal-keeper for the offensive, so to speak,\nand then stepped forward as Jaffers and the stranger swayed and\nstaggered towards him, clutching and hitting in. A chair stood in\nthe way, and went aside with a crash as they came down together.\n\n\"Get the feet,\" said Jaffers between his teeth.\n\nMr. Hall, endeavouring to act on instructions, received a sounding\nkick in the ribs that disposed of him for a moment, and Mr.\nWadgers, seeing the decapitated stranger had rolled over and got\nthe upper side of Jaffers, retreated towards the door, knife in\nhand, and so collided with Mr. Huxter and the Sidderbridge carter\ncoming to the rescue of law and order. At the same moment down came\nthree or four bottles from the chiffonnier and shot a web of\npungency into the air of the room.\n\n\"I'll surrender,\" cried the stranger, though he had Jaffers down,\nand in another moment he stood up panting, a strange figure,\nheadless and handless--for he had pulled off his right glove now\nas well as his left. \"It's no good,\" he said, as if sobbing for\nbreath.\n\nIt was the strangest thing in the world to hear that voice coming\nas if out of empty space, but the Sussex peasants are perhaps the\nmost matter-of-fact people under the sun. Jaffers got up also and\nproduced a pair of handcuffs. Then he stared.\n\n\"I say!\" said Jaffers, brought up short by a dim realization of the\nincongruity of the whole business, \"Darn it! Can't use 'em as I can\nsee.\"\n\nThe stranger ran his arm down his waistcoat, and as if by a miracle\nthe buttons to which his empty sleeve pointed became undone. Then\nhe said something about his shin, and stooped down. He seemed to be\nfumbling with his shoes and socks.\n\n\"Why!\" said Huxter, suddenly, \"that's not a man at all. It's just\nempty clothes. Look! You can see down his collar and the linings of\nhis clothes. I could put my arm--\"\n\nHe extended his hand; it seemed to meet something in mid-air, and\nhe drew it back with a sharp exclamation. \"I wish you'd keep your\nfingers out of my eye,\" said the aerial voice, in a tone of savage\nexpostulation. \"The fact is, I'm all here--head, hands, legs, and\nall the rest of it, but it happens I'm invisible. It's a confounded\nnuisance, but I am. That's no reason why I should be poked to\npieces by every stupid bumpkin in Iping, is it?\"\n\nThe suit of clothes, now all unbuttoned and hanging loosely upon\nits unseen supports, stood up, arms akimbo.\n\nSeveral other of the men folks had now entered the room, so that it\nwas closely crowded. \"Invisible, eh?\" said Huxter, ignoring the\nstranger's abuse. \"Who ever heard the likes of that?\"\n\n\"It's strange, perhaps, but it's not a crime. Why am I assaulted by\na policeman in this fashion?\"\n\n\"Ah! that's a different matter,\" said Jaffers. \"No doubt you are a\nbit difficult to see in this light, but I got a warrant and it's\nall correct. What I'm after ain't no invisibility,--it's burglary.\nThere's a house been broke into and money took.\"\n\n\"Well?\"\n\n\"And circumstances certainly point--\"\n\n\"Stuff and nonsense!\" said the Invisible Man.\n\n\"I hope so, sir; but I've got my instructions.\"\n\n\"Well,\" said the stranger, \"I'll come. I'll _come_. But no\nhandcuffs.\"\n\n\"It's the regular thing,\" said Jaffers.\n\n\"No handcuffs,\" stipulated the stranger.\n\n\"Pardon me,\" said Jaffers.\n\nAbruptly the figure sat down, and before any one could realise was\nwas being done, the slippers, socks, and trousers had been kicked\noff under the table. Then he sprang up again and flung off his coat.\n\n\"Here, stop that,\" said Jaffers, suddenly realising what was\nhappening. He gripped at the waistcoat; it struggled, and the shirt\nslipped out of it and left it limp and empty in his hand. \"Hold\nhim!\" said Jaffers, loudly. \"Once he gets the things off--\"\n\n\"Hold him!\" cried everyone, and there was a rush at the fluttering\nwhite shirt which was now all that was visible of the stranger.\n\nThe shirt-sleeve planted a shrewd blow in Hall's face that stopped\nhis open-armed advance, and sent him backward into old Toothsome\nthe sexton, and in another moment the garment was lifted up and\nbecame convulsed and vacantly flapping about the arms, even as a\nshirt that is being thrust over a man's head. Jaffers clutched at\nit, and only helped to pull it off; he was struck in the mouth out\nof the air, and incontinently threw his truncheon and smote Teddy\nHenfrey savagely upon the crown of his head.\n\n\"Look out!\" said everybody, fencing at random and hitting at\nnothing. \"Hold him! Shut the door! Don't let him loose! I got\nsomething! Here he is!\" A perfect Babel of noises they made.\nEverybody, it seemed, was being hit all at once, and Sandy Wadgers,\nknowing as ever and his wits sharpened by a frightful blow in the\nnose, reopened the door and led the rout. The others, following\nincontinently, were jammed for a moment in the corner by the\ndoorway. The hitting continued. Phipps, the Unitarian, had a front\ntooth broken, and Henfrey was injured in the cartilage of his ear.\nJaffers was struck under the jaw, and, turning, caught at something\nthat intervened between him and Huxter in the melee, and prevented\ntheir coming together. He felt a muscular chest, and in another\nmoment the whole mass of struggling, excited men shot out into the\ncrowded hall.\n\n\"I got him!\" shouted Jaffers, choking and reeling through them all,\nand wrestling with purple face and swelling veins against his\nunseen enemy.\n\nMen staggered right and left as the extraordinary conflict swayed\nswiftly towards the house door, and went spinning down the\nhalf-dozen steps of the inn. Jaffers cried in a strangled\nvoice--holding tight, nevertheless, and making play with his\nknee--spun around, and fell heavily undermost with his head on\nthe gravel. Only then did his fingers relax.\n\nThere were excited cries of \"Hold him!\" \"Invisible!\" and so forth,\nand a young fellow, a stranger in the place whose name did not come\nto light, rushed in at once, caught something, missed his hold,\nand fell over the constable's prostrate body. Half-way across the\nroad a woman screamed as something pushed by her; a dog, kicked\napparently, yelped and ran howling into Huxter's yard, and with\nthat the transit of the Invisible Man was accomplished. For a space\npeople stood amazed and gesticulating, and then came panic, and\nscattered them abroad through the village as a gust scatters dead\nleaves.\n\nBut Jaffers lay quite still, face upward and knees bent, at the foot\nof the steps of the inn.\n\n\n\nCHAPTER VIII\n\nIN TRANSIT\n\n\nThe eighth chapter is exceedingly brief, and relates that Gibbons,\nthe amateur naturalist of the district, while lying out on the\nspacious open downs without a soul within a couple of miles of him,\nas he thought, and almost dozing, heard close to him the sound as\nof a man coughing, sneezing, and then swearing savagely to himself;\nand looking, beheld nothing. Yet the voice was indisputable. It\ncontinued to swear with that breadth and variety that distinguishes\nthe swearing of a cultivated man. It grew to a climax, diminished\nagain, and died away in the distance, going as it seemed to him in\nthe direction of Adderdean. It lifted to a spasmodic sneeze and\nended. Gibbons had heard nothing of the morning's occurrences, but\nthe phenomenon was so striking and disturbing that his philosophical\ntranquillity vanished; he got up hastily, and hurried down the\nsteepness of the hill towards the village, as fast as he could go.\n\n\n\nCHAPTER IX\n\nMR. THOMAS MARVEL\n\n\nYou must picture Mr. Thomas Marvel as a person of copious, flexible\nvisage, a nose of cylindrical protrusion, a liquorish, ample,\nfluctuating mouth, and a beard of bristling eccentricity. His figure\ninclined to embonpoint; his short limbs accentuated this inclination.\nHe wore a furry silk hat, and the frequent substitution of twine and\nshoe-laces for buttons, apparent at critical points of his costume,\nmarked a man essentially bachelor.\n\nMr. Thomas Marvel was sitting with his feet in a ditch by the\nroadside over the down towards Adderdean, about a mile and a half\nout of Iping. His feet, save for socks of irregular open-work, were\nbare, his big toes were broad, and pricked like the ears of a\nwatchful dog. In a leisurely manner--he did everything in a\nleisurely manner--he was contemplating trying on a pair of boots.\nThey were the soundest boots he had come across for a long time, but\ntoo large for him; whereas the ones he had were, in dry weather, a\nvery comfortable fit, but too thin-soled for damp. Mr. Thomas Marvel\nhated roomy shoes, but then he hated damp. He had never properly\nthought out which he hated most, and it was a pleasant day, and\nthere was nothing better to do. So he put the four shoes in a\ngraceful group on the turf and looked at them. And seeing them there\namong the grass and springing agrimony, it suddenly occurred to him\nthat both pairs were exceedingly ugly to see. He was not at all\nstartled by a voice behind him.\n\n\"They're boots, anyhow,\" said the Voice.\n\n\"They are--charity boots,\" said Mr. Thomas Marvel, with his head\non one side regarding them distastefully; \"and which is the ugliest\npair in the whole blessed universe, I'm darned if I know!\"\n\n\"H'm,\" said the Voice.\n\n\"I've worn worse--in fact, I've worn none. But none so owdacious\nugly--if you'll allow the expression. I've been cadging boots--in\nparticular--for days. Because I was sick of _them_. They're sound\nenough, of course. But a gentleman on tramp sees such a thundering\nlot of his boots. And if you'll believe me, I've raised nothing in\nthe whole blessed country, try as I would, but _them_. Look at 'em!\nAnd a good country for boots, too, in a general way. But it's just\nmy promiscuous luck. I've got my boots in this country ten years or\nmore. And then they treat you like this.\"\n\n\"It's a beast of a country,\" said the Voice. \"And pigs for people.\"\n\n\"Ain't it?\" said Mr. Thomas Marvel. \"Lord! But them boots! It beats\nit.\"\n\nHe turned his head over his shoulder to the right, to look at the\nboots of his interlocutor with a view to comparisons, and lo! where\nthe boots of his interlocutor should have been were neither legs\nnor boots. He was irradiated by the dawn of a great amazement.\n\"Where _are_ yer?\" said Mr. Thomas Marvel over his shoulder and\ncoming on all fours. He saw a stretch of empty downs with the wind\nswaying the remote green-pointed furze bushes.\n\n\"Am I drunk?\" said Mr. Marvel. \"Have I had visions? Was I talking\nto myself? What the--\"\n\n\"Don't be alarmed,\" said a Voice.\n\n\"None of your ventriloquising _me_,\" said Mr. Thomas Marvel, rising\nsharply to his feet. \"Where _are_ yer? Alarmed, indeed!\"\n\n\"Don't be alarmed,\" repeated the Voice.\n\n\"_You'll_ be alarmed in a minute, you silly fool,\" said Mr. Thomas\nMarvel. \"Where _are_ yer? Lemme get my mark on yer...\n\n\"Are yer _buried_?\" said Mr. Thomas Marvel, after an interval.\n\nThere was no answer. Mr. Thomas Marvel stood bootless and amazed,\nhis jacket nearly thrown off.\n\n\"Peewit,\" said a peewit, very remote.\n\n\"Peewit, indeed!\" said Mr. Thomas Marvel. \"This ain't no time for\nfoolery.\" The down was desolate, east and west, north and south;\nthe road with its shallow ditches and white bordering stakes, ran\nsmooth and empty north and south, and, save for that peewit, the\nblue sky was empty too. \"So help me,\" said Mr. Thomas Marvel,\nshuffling his coat on to his shoulders again. \"It's the drink!\nI might ha' known.\"\n\n\"It's not the drink,\" said the Voice. \"You keep your nerves\nsteady.\"\n\n\"Ow!\" said Mr. Marvel, and his face grew white amidst its patches.\n\"It's the drink!\" his lips repeated noiselessly. He remained staring\nabout him, rotating slowly backwards. \"I could have _swore_ I heard\na voice,\" he whispered.\n\n\"Of course you did.\"\n\n\"It's there again,\" said Mr. Marvel, closing his eyes and clasping\nhis hand on his brow with a tragic gesture. He was suddenly taken\nby the collar and shaken violently, and left more dazed than ever.\n\"Don't be a fool,\" said the Voice.\n\n\"I'm--off--my--blooming--chump,\" said Mr. Marvel. \"It's no good.\nIt's fretting about them blarsted boots. I'm off my blessed blooming\nchump. Or it's spirits.\"\n\n\"Neither one thing nor the other,\" said the Voice. \"Listen!\"\n\n\"Chump,\" said Mr. Marvel.\n\n\"One minute,\" said the Voice, penetratingly, tremulous with\nself-control.\n\n\"Well?\" said Mr. Thomas Marvel, with a strange feeling of having\nbeen dug in the chest by a finger.\n\n\"You think I'm just imagination? Just imagination?\"\n\n\"What else _can_ you be?\" said Mr. Thomas Marvel, rubbing the back of\nhis neck.\n\n\"Very well,\" said the Voice, in a tone of relief. \"Then I'm going\nto throw flints at you till you think differently.\"\n\n\"But where _are_ yer?\"\n\nThe Voice made no answer. Whizz came a flint, apparently out of\nthe air, and missed Mr. Marvel's shoulder by a hair's-breadth.\nMr. Marvel, turning, saw a flint jerk up into the air, trace a\ncomplicated path, hang for a moment, and then fling at his feet\nwith almost invisible rapidity. He was too amazed to dodge. Whizz\nit came, and ricochetted from a bare toe into the ditch. Mr. Thomas\nMarvel jumped a foot and howled aloud. Then he started to run,\ntripped over an unseen obstacle, and came head over heels into a\nsitting position.\n\n\"_Now_,\" said the Voice, as a third stone curved upward and hung in\nthe air above the tramp. \"Am I imagination?\"\n\nMr. Marvel by way of reply struggled to his feet, and was\nimmediately rolled over again. He lay quiet for a moment. \"If you\nstruggle any more,\" said the Voice, \"I shall throw the flint at\nyour head.\"\n\n\"It's a fair do,\" said Mr. Thomas Marvel, sitting up, taking his\nwounded toe in hand and fixing his eye on the third missile. \"I\ndon't understand it. Stones flinging themselves. Stones talking.\nPut yourself down. Rot away. I'm done.\"\n\nThe third flint fell.\n\n\"It's very simple,\" said the Voice. \"I'm an invisible man.\"\n\n\"Tell us something I don't know,\" said Mr. Marvel, gasping with\npain. \"Where you've hid--how you do it--I _don't_ know. I'm beat.\"\n\n\"That's all,\" said the Voice. \"I'm invisible. That's what I want\nyou to understand.\"\n\n\"Anyone could see that. There is no need for you to be so confounded\nimpatient, mister. _Now_ then. Give us a notion. How are you hid?\"\n\n\"I'm invisible. That's the great point. And what I want you to\nunderstand is this--\"\n\n\"But whereabouts?\" interrupted Mr. Marvel.\n\n\"Here! Six yards in front of you.\"\n\n\"Oh, _come_! I ain't blind. You'll be telling me next you're just\nthin air. I'm not one of your ignorant tramps--\"\n\n\"Yes, I am--thin air. You're looking through me.\"\n\n\"What! Ain't there any stuff to you. _Vox et_--what is it?--jabber.\nIs it that?\"\n\n\"I am just a human being--solid, needing food and drink, needing\ncovering too--But I'm invisible. You see? Invisible. Simple idea.\nInvisible.\"\n\n\"What, real like?\"\n\n\"Yes, real.\"\n\n\"Let's have a hand of you,\" said Marvel, \"if you _are_ real. It won't\nbe so darn out-of-the-way like, then--_Lord_!\" he said, \"how you made\nme jump!--gripping me like that!\"\n\nHe felt the hand that had closed round his wrist with his disengaged\nfingers, and his fingers went timorously up the arm, patted a\nmuscular chest, and explored a bearded face. Marvel's face was\nastonishment.\n\n\"I'm dashed!\" he said. \"If this don't beat cock-fighting! Most\nremarkable!--And there I can see a rabbit clean through you, 'arf\na mile away! Not a bit of you visible--except--\"\n\nHe scrutinised the apparently empty space keenly. \"You 'aven't been\neatin' bread and cheese?\" he asked, holding the invisible arm.\n\n\"You're quite right, and it's not quite assimilated into the system.\"\n\n\"Ah!\" said Mr. Marvel. \"Sort of ghostly, though.\"\n\n\"Of course, all this isn't half so wonderful as you think.\"\n\n\"It's quite wonderful enough for _my_ modest wants,\" said Mr. Thomas\nMarvel. \"Howjer manage it! How the dooce is it done?\"\n\n\"It's too long a story. And besides--\"\n\n\"I tell you, the whole business fairly beats me,\" said Mr. Marvel.\n\n\"What I want to say at present is this: I need help. I have come to\nthat--I came upon you suddenly. I was wandering, mad with rage,\nnaked, impotent. I could have murdered. And I saw you--\"\n\n\"_Lord_!\" said Mr. Marvel.\n\n\"I came up behind you--hesitated--went on--\"\n\nMr. Marvel's expression was eloquent.\n\n\"--then stopped. 'Here,' I said, 'is an outcast like myself. This is\nthe man for me.' So I turned back and came to you--you. And--\"\n\n\"_Lord_!\" said Mr. Marvel. \"But I'm all in a tizzy. May I ask--How\nis it? And what you may be requiring in the way of help?--Invisible!\"\n\n\"I want you to help me get clothes--and shelter--and then, with\nother things. I've left them long enough. If you won't--well! But\nyou _will--must_.\"\n\n\"Look here,\" said Mr. Marvel. \"I'm too flabbergasted. Don't knock\nme about any more. And leave me go. I must get steady a bit. And\nyou've pretty near broken my toe. It's all so unreasonable. Empty\ndowns, empty sky. Nothing visible for miles except the bosom of\nNature. And then comes a voice. A voice out of heaven! And stones!\nAnd a fist--Lord!\"\n\n\"Pull yourself together,\" said the Voice, \"for you have to do the\njob I've chosen for you.\"\n\nMr. Marvel blew out his cheeks, and his eyes were round.\n\n\"I've chosen you,\" said the Voice. \"You are the only man except\nsome of those fools down there, who knows there is such a thing as\nan invisible man. You have to be my helper. Help me--and I will\ndo great things for you. An invisible man is a man of power.\" He\nstopped for a moment to sneeze violently.\n\n\"But if you betray me,\" he said, \"if you fail to do as I direct you--\"\nHe paused and tapped Mr. Marvel's shoulder smartly. Mr. Marvel\ngave a yelp of terror at the touch. \"I don't want to betray you,\"\nsaid Mr. Marvel, edging away from the direction of the fingers.\n\"Don't you go a-thinking that, whatever you do. All I want to do is\nto help you--just tell me what I got to do. (Lord!) Whatever you\nwant done, that I'm most willing to do.\"\n\n\n\nCHAPTER X\n\nMR. MARVEL'S VISIT TO IPING\n\n\nAfter the first gusty panic had spent itself Iping became\nargumentative. Scepticism suddenly reared its head--rather nervous\nscepticism, not at all assured of its back, but scepticism\nnevertheless. It is so much easier not to believe in an invisible\nman; and those who had actually seen him dissolve into air, or felt\nthe strength of his arm, could be counted on the fingers of two\nhands. And of these witnesses Mr. Wadgers was presently missing,\nhaving retired impregnably behind the bolts and bars of his own\nhouse, and Jaffers was lying stunned in the parlour of the \"Coach\nand Horses.\" Great and strange ideas transcending experience often\nhave less effect upon men and women than smaller, more tangible\nconsiderations. Iping was gay with bunting, and everybody was in\ngala dress. Whit Monday had been looked forward to for a month or\nmore. By the afternoon even those who believed in the Unseen were\nbeginning to resume their little amusements in a tentative fashion,\non the supposition that he had quite gone away, and with the\nsceptics he was already a jest. But people, sceptics and believers\nalike, were remarkably sociable all that day.\n\nHaysman's meadow was gay with a tent, in which Mrs. Bunting and\nother ladies were preparing tea, while, without, the Sunday-school\nchildren ran races and played games under the noisy guidance of the\ncurate and the Misses Cuss and Sackbut. No doubt there was a slight\nuneasiness in the air, but people for the most part had the sense\nto conceal whatever imaginative qualms they experienced. On the\nvillage green an inclined strong [rope?], down which, clinging\nthe while to a pulley-swung handle, one could be hurled violently against\na sack at the other end, came in for considerable favour among the\nadolescents, as also did the swings and the cocoanut shies. There\nwas also promenading, and the steam organ attached to a small\nroundabout filled the air with a pungent flavour of oil and with\nequally pungent music. Members of the club, who had attended\nchurch in the morning, were splendid in badges of pink and green,\nand some of the gayer-minded had also adorned their bowler hats\nwith brilliant-coloured favours of ribbon. Old Fletcher, whose\nconceptions of holiday-making were severe, was visible through the\njasmine about his window or through the open door (whichever way\nyou chose to look), poised delicately on a plank supported on two\nchairs, and whitewashing the ceiling of his front room.\n\nAbout four o'clock a stranger entered the village from the direction\nof the downs. He was a short, stout person in an extraordinarily\nshabby top hat, and he appeared to be very much out of breath. His\ncheeks were alternately limp and tightly puffed. His mottled face\nwas apprehensive, and he moved with a sort of reluctant alacrity. He\nturned the corner of the church, and directed his way to the \"Coach\nand Horses.\" Among others old Fletcher remembers seeing him, and\nindeed the old gentleman was so struck by his peculiar agitation\nthat he inadvertently allowed a quantity of whitewash to run down\nthe brush into the sleeve of his coat while regarding him.\n\nThis stranger, to the perceptions of the proprietor of the cocoanut\nshy, appeared to be talking to himself, and Mr. Huxter remarked the\nsame thing. He stopped at the foot of the \"Coach and Horses\" steps,\nand, according to Mr. Huxter, appeared to undergo a severe internal\nstruggle before he could induce himself to enter the house. Finally\nhe marched up the steps, and was seen by Mr. Huxter to turn to the\nleft and open the door of the parlour. Mr. Huxter heard voices from\nwithin the room and from the bar apprising the man of his error.\n\"That room's private!\" said Hall, and the stranger shut the door\nclumsily and went into the bar.\n\nIn the course of a few minutes he reappeared, wiping his lips with\nthe back of his hand with an air of quiet satisfaction that somehow\nimpressed Mr. Huxter as assumed. He stood looking about him for\nsome moments, and then Mr. Huxter saw him walk in an oddly furtive\nmanner towards the gates of the yard, upon which the parlour window\nopened. The stranger, after some hesitation, leant against one of\nthe gate-posts, produced a short clay pipe, and prepared to fill\nit. His fingers trembled while doing so. He lit it clumsily, and\nfolding his arms began to smoke in a languid attitude, an attitude\nwhich his occasional glances up the yard altogether belied.\n\nAll this Mr. Huxter saw over the canisters of the tobacco window,\nand the singularity of the man's behaviour prompted him to maintain\nhis observation.\n\nPresently the stranger stood up abruptly and put his pipe in his\npocket. Then he vanished into the yard. Forthwith Mr. Huxter,\nconceiving he was witness of some petty larceny, leapt round his\ncounter and ran out into the road to intercept the thief. As he did\nso, Mr. Marvel reappeared, his hat askew, a big bundle in a blue\ntable-cloth in one hand, and three books tied together--as it proved\nafterwards with the Vicar's braces--in the other. Directly he saw\nHuxter he gave a sort of gasp, and turning sharply to the left,\nbegan to run. \"Stop, thief!\" cried Huxter, and set off after him.\nMr. Huxter's sensations were vivid but brief. He saw the man just\nbefore him and spurting briskly for the church corner and the hill\nroad. He saw the village flags and festivities beyond, and a face or\nso turned towards him. He bawled, \"Stop!\" again. He had hardly gone\nten strides before his shin was caught in some mysterious fashion,\nand he was no longer running, but flying with inconceivable rapidity\nthrough the air. He saw the ground suddenly close to his face. The\nworld seemed to splash into a million whirling specks of light, and\nsubsequent proceedings interested him no more.\n\n\n\nCHAPTER XI\n\nIN THE \"COACH AND HORSES\"\n\n\nNow in order clearly to understand what had happened in the inn, it\nis necessary to go back to the moment when Mr. Marvel first came\ninto view of Mr. Huxter's window.\n\nAt that precise moment Mr. Cuss and Mr. Bunting were in the parlour.\nThey were seriously investigating the strange occurrences of the\nmorning, and were, with Mr. Hall's permission, making a thorough\nexamination of the Invisible Man's belongings. Jaffers had partially\nrecovered from his fall and had gone home in the charge of his\nsympathetic friends. The stranger's scattered garments had been\nremoved by Mrs. Hall and the room tidied up. And on the table under\nthe window where the stranger had been wont to work, Cuss had hit\nalmost at once on three big books in manuscript labelled \"Diary.\"\n\n\"Diary!\" said Cuss, putting the three books on the table. \"Now, at\nany rate, we shall learn something.\" The Vicar stood with his hands\non the table.\n\n\"Diary,\" repeated Cuss, sitting down, putting two volumes to\nsupport the third, and opening it. \"H'm--no name on the fly-leaf.\nBother!--cypher. And figures.\"\n\nThe vicar came round to look over his shoulder.\n\nCuss turned the pages over with a face suddenly disappointed.\n\"I'm--dear me! It's all cypher, Bunting.\"\n\n\"There are no diagrams?\" asked Mr. Bunting. \"No illustrations\nthrowing light--\"\n\n\"See for yourself,\" said Mr. Cuss. \"Some of it's mathematical and\nsome of it's Russian or some such language (to judge by the\nletters), and some of it's Greek. Now the Greek I thought _you_--\"\n\n\"Of course,\" said Mr. Bunting, taking out and wiping his spectacles\nand feeling suddenly very uncomfortable--for he had no Greek\nleft in his mind worth talking about; \"yes--the Greek, of course,\nmay furnish a clue.\"\n\n\"I'll find you a place.\"\n\n\"I'd rather glance through the volumes first,\" said Mr. Bunting,\nstill wiping. \"A general impression first, Cuss, and _then_, you\nknow, we can go looking for clues.\"\n\nHe coughed, put on his glasses, arranged them fastidiously, coughed\nagain, and wished something would happen to avert the seemingly\ninevitable exposure. Then he took the volume Cuss handed him in a\nleisurely manner. And then something did happen.\n\nThe door opened suddenly.\n\nBoth gentlemen started violently, looked round, and were relieved\nto see a sporadically rosy face beneath a furry silk hat. \"Tap?\"\nasked the face, and stood staring.\n\n\"No,\" said both gentlemen at once.\n\n\"Over the other side, my man,\" said Mr. Bunting. And \"Please shut\nthat door,\" said Mr. Cuss, irritably.\n\n\"All right,\" said the intruder, as it seemed in a low voice\ncuriously different from the huskiness of its first inquiry. \"Right\nyou are,\" said the intruder in the former voice. \"Stand clear!\" and\nhe vanished and closed the door.\n\n\"A sailor, I should judge,\" said Mr. Bunting. \"Amusing fellows, they\nare. Stand clear! indeed. A nautical term, referring to his getting\nback out of the room, I suppose.\"\n\n\"I daresay so,\" said Cuss. \"My nerves are all loose to-day. It quite\nmade me jump--the door opening like that.\"\n\nMr. Bunting smiled as if he had not jumped. \"And now,\" he said with\na sigh, \"these books.\"\n\nSomeone sniffed as he did so.\n\n\"One thing is indisputable,\" said Bunting, drawing up a chair next\nto that of Cuss. \"There certainly have been very strange things\nhappen in Iping during the last few days--very strange. I cannot\nof course believe in this absurd invisibility story--\"\n\n\"It's incredible,\" said Cuss--\"incredible. But the fact remains\nthat I saw--I certainly saw right down his sleeve--\"\n\n\"But did you--are you sure? Suppose a mirror, for instance--\nhallucinations are so easily produced. I don't know if you\nhave ever seen a really good conjuror--\"\n\n\"I won't argue again,\" said Cuss. \"We've thrashed that out,\nBunting. And just now there's these books--Ah! here's some of\nwhat I take to be Greek! Greek letters certainly.\"\n\nHe pointed to the middle of the page. Mr. Bunting flushed slightly\nand brought his face nearer, apparently finding some difficulty\nwith his glasses. Suddenly he became aware of a strange feeling at\nthe nape of his neck. He tried to raise his head, and encountered\nan immovable resistance. The feeling was a curious pressure, the\ngrip of a heavy, firm hand, and it bore his chin irresistibly to\nthe table. \"Don't move, little men,\" whispered a voice, \"or I'll\nbrain you both!\" He looked into the face of Cuss, close to his own,\nand each saw a horrified reflection of his own sickly astonishment.\n\n\"I'm sorry to handle you so roughly,\" said the Voice, \"but it's\nunavoidable.\"\n\n\"Since when did you learn to pry into an investigator's private\nmemoranda,\" said the Voice; and two chins struck the table\nsimultaneously, and two sets of teeth rattled.\n\n\"Since when did you learn to invade the private rooms of a man in\nmisfortune?\" and the concussion was repeated.\n\n\"Where have they put my clothes?\"\n\n\"Listen,\" said the Voice. \"The windows are fastened and I've taken\nthe key out of the door. I am a fairly strong man, and I have the\npoker handy--besides being invisible. There's not the slightest\ndoubt that I could kill you both and get away quite easily if I\nwanted to--do you understand? Very well. If I let you go will you\npromise not to try any nonsense and do what I tell you?\"\n\nThe vicar and the doctor looked at one another, and the doctor\npulled a face. \"Yes,\" said Mr. Bunting, and the doctor repeated it.\nThen the pressure on the necks relaxed, and the doctor and the\nvicar sat up, both very red in the face and wriggling their heads.\n\n\"Please keep sitting where you are,\" said the Invisible Man.\n\"Here's the poker, you see.\"\n\n\"When I came into this room,\" continued the Invisible Man, after\npresenting the poker to the tip of the nose of each of his visitors,\n\"I did not expect to find it occupied, and I expected to find, in\naddition to my books of memoranda, an outfit of clothing. Where is\nit? No--don't rise. I can see it's gone. Now, just at present,\nthough the days are quite warm enough for an invisible man to run\nabout stark, the evenings are quite chilly. I want clothing--and\nother accommodation; and I must also have those three books.\"\n\n\n\nCHAPTER XII\n\nTHE INVISIBLE MAN LOSES HIS TEMPER\n\n\nIt is unavoidable that at this point the narrative should break off\nagain, for a certain very painful reason that will presently be\napparent. While these things were going on in the parlour, and\nwhile Mr. Huxter was watching Mr. Marvel smoking his pipe against\nthe gate, not a dozen yards away were Mr. Hall and Teddy Henfrey\ndiscussing in a state of cloudy puzzlement the one Iping topic.\n\nSuddenly there came a violent thud against the door of the parlour,\na sharp cry, and then--silence.\n\n\"Hul-lo!\" said Teddy Henfrey.\n\n\"Hul-lo!\" from the Tap.\n\nMr. Hall took things in slowly but surely. \"That ain't right,\" he\nsaid, and came round from behind the bar towards the parlour door.\n\nHe and Teddy approached the door together, with intent faces. Their\neyes considered. \"Summat wrong,\" said Hall, and Henfrey nodded\nagreement. Whiffs of an unpleasant chemical odour met them, and\nthere was a muffled sound of conversation, very rapid and subdued.\n\n\"You all right thur?\" asked Hall, rapping.\n\nThe muttered conversation ceased abruptly, for a moment silence,\nthen the conversation was resumed, in hissing whispers, then a\nsharp cry of \"No! no, you don't!\" There came a sudden motion and\nthe oversetting of a chair, a brief struggle. Silence again.\n\n\"What the dooce?\" exclaimed Henfrey, _sotto voce_.\n\n\"You--all--right thur?\" asked Mr. Hall, sharply, again.\n\nThe Vicar's voice answered with a curious jerking intonation:\n\"Quite ri-right. Please don't--interrupt.\"\n\n\"Odd!\" said Mr. Henfrey.\n\n\"Odd!\" said Mr. Hall.\n\n\"Says, 'Don't interrupt,'\" said Henfrey.\n\n\"I heerd'n,\" said Hall.\n\n\"And a sniff,\" said Henfrey.\n\nThey remained listening. The conversation was rapid and subdued.\n\"I _can't_,\" said Mr. Bunting, his voice rising; \"I tell you, sir,\nI _will_ not.\"\n\n\"What was that?\" asked Henfrey.\n\n\"Says he wi' nart,\" said Hall. \"Warn't speaking to us, wuz he?\"\n\n\"Disgraceful!\" said Mr. Bunting, within.\n\n\"'Disgraceful,'\" said Mr. Henfrey. \"I heard it--distinct.\"\n\n\"Who's that speaking now?\" asked Henfrey.\n\n\"Mr. Cuss, I s'pose,\" said Hall. \"Can you hear--anything?\"\n\nSilence. The sounds within indistinct and perplexing.\n\n\"Sounds like throwing the table-cloth about,\" said Hall.\n\nMrs. Hall appeared behind the bar. Hall made gestures of silence and\ninvitation. This aroused Mrs. Hall's wifely opposition. \"What yer\nlistenin' there for, Hall?\" she asked. \"Ain't you nothin' better to\ndo--busy day like this?\"\n\nHall tried to convey everything by grimaces and dumb show, but Mrs.\nHall was obdurate. She raised her voice. So Hall and Henfrey, rather\ncrestfallen, tiptoed back to the bar, gesticulating to explain to\nher.\n\nAt first she refused to see anything in what they had heard at\nall. Then she insisted on Hall keeping silence, while Henfrey told\nher his story. She was inclined to think the whole business\nnonsense--perhaps they were just moving the furniture about. \"I\nheerd'n say 'disgraceful'; _that_ I did,\" said Hall.\n\n\"_I_ heerd that, Mrs. Hall,\" said Henfrey.\n\n\"Like as not--\" began Mrs. Hall.\n\n\"Hsh!\" said Mr. Teddy Henfrey. \"Didn't I hear the window?\"\n\n\"What window?\" asked Mrs. Hall.\n\n\"Parlour window,\" said Henfrey.\n\nEveryone stood listening intently. Mrs. Hall's eyes, directed\nstraight before her, saw without seeing the brilliant oblong of the\ninn door, the road white and vivid, and Huxter's shop-front\nblistering in the June sun. Abruptly Huxter's door opened and Huxter\nappeared, eyes staring with excitement, arms gesticulating. \"Yap!\"\ncried Huxter. \"Stop thief!\" and he ran obliquely across the oblong\ntowards the yard gates, and vanished.\n\nSimultaneously came a tumult from the parlour, and a sound of\nwindows being closed.\n\nHall, Henfrey, and the human contents of the tap rushed out at once\npell-mell into the street. They saw someone whisk round the corner\ntowards the road, and Mr. Huxter executing a complicated leap in\nthe air that ended on his face and shoulder. Down the street people\nwere standing astonished or running towards them.\n\nMr. Huxter was stunned. Henfrey stopped to discover this, but Hall\nand the two labourers from the Tap rushed at once to the corner,\nshouting incoherent things, and saw Mr. Marvel vanishing by the\ncorner of the church wall. They appear to have jumped to the\nimpossible conclusion that this was the Invisible Man suddenly\nbecome visible, and set off at once along the lane in pursuit. But\nHall had hardly run a dozen yards before he gave a loud shout of\nastonishment and went flying headlong sideways, clutching one of\nthe labourers and bringing him to the ground. He had been charged\njust as one charges a man at football. The second labourer came\nround in a circle, stared, and conceiving that Hall had tumbled\nover of his own accord, turned to resume the pursuit, only to be\ntripped by the ankle just as Huxter had been. Then, as the first\nlabourer struggled to his feet, he was kicked sideways by a blow\nthat might have felled an ox.\n\nAs he went down, the rush from the direction of the village green\ncame round the corner. The first to appear was the proprietor of\nthe cocoanut shy, a burly man in a blue jersey. He was astonished\nto see the lane empty save for three men sprawling absurdly on the\nground. And then something happened to his rear-most foot, and he\nwent headlong and rolled sideways just in time to graze the feet\nof his brother and partner, following headlong. The two were then\nkicked, knelt on, fallen over, and cursed by quite a number of\nover-hasty people.\n\nNow when Hall and Henfrey and the labourers ran out of the house,\nMrs. Hall, who had been disciplined by years of experience,\nremained in the bar next the till. And suddenly the parlour door\nwas opened, and Mr. Cuss appeared, and without glancing at her\nrushed at once down the steps toward the corner. \"Hold him!\" he\ncried. \"Don't let him drop that parcel.\"\n\nHe knew nothing of the\nexistence of Marvel. For the Invisible Man had handed over the\nbooks and bundle in the yard. The face of Mr. Cuss was angry and\nresolute, but his costume was defective, a sort of limp white kilt\nthat could only have passed muster in Greece. \"Hold him!\" he\nbawled. \"He's got my trousers! And every stitch of the Vicar's\nclothes!\"\n\n\"'Tend to him in a minute!\" he cried to Henfrey as he passed the\nprostrate Huxter, and, coming round the corner to join the tumult,\nwas promptly knocked off his feet into an indecorous sprawl.\nSomebody in full flight trod heavily on his finger. He yelled,\nstruggled to regain his feet, was knocked against and thrown on all\nfours again, and became aware that he was involved not in a capture,\nbut a rout. Everyone was running back to the village. He rose again\nand was hit severely behind the ear. He staggered and set off back\nto the \"Coach and Horses\" forthwith, leaping over the deserted\nHuxter, who was now sitting up, on his way.\n\nBehind him as he was halfway up the inn steps he heard a sudden\nyell of rage, rising sharply out of the confusion of cries, and a\nsounding smack in someone's face. He recognised the voice as that\nof the Invisible Man, and the note was that of a man suddenly\ninfuriated by a painful blow.\n\nIn another moment Mr. Cuss was back in the parlour. \"He's coming\nback, Bunting!\" he said, rushing in. \"Save yourself!\"\n\nMr. Bunting was standing in the window engaged in an attempt to\nclothe himself in the hearth-rug and a _West Surrey Gazette_. \"Who's\ncoming?\" he said, so startled that his costume narrowly escaped\ndisintegration.\n\n\"Invisible Man,\" said Cuss, and rushed on to the window. \"We'd\nbetter clear out from here! He's fighting mad! Mad!\"\n\nIn another moment he was out in the yard.\n\n\"Good heavens!\" said Mr. Bunting, hesitating between two horrible\nalternatives. He heard a frightful struggle in the passage of the\ninn, and his decision was made. He clambered out of the window,\nadjusted his costume hastily, and fled up the village as fast as\nhis fat little legs would carry him.\n\nFrom the moment when the Invisible Man screamed with rage and Mr.\nBunting made his memorable flight up the village, it became\nimpossible to give a consecutive account of affairs in Iping.\nPossibly the Invisible Man's original intention was simply to cover\nMarvel's retreat with the clothes and books. But his temper, at no\ntime very good, seems to have gone completely at some chance blow,\nand forthwith he set to smiting and overthrowing, for the mere\nsatisfaction of hurting.\n\nYou must figure the street full of running figures, of doors\nslamming and fights for hiding-places. You must figure the tumult\nsuddenly striking on the unstable equilibrium of old Fletcher's\nplanks and two chairs--with cataclysmic results. You must figure\nan appalled couple caught dismally in a swing. And then the whole\ntumultuous rush has passed and the Iping street with its gauds and\nflags is deserted save for the still raging unseen, and littered\nwith cocoanuts, overthrown canvas screens, and the scattered stock\nin trade of a sweetstuff stall. Everywhere there is a sound of\nclosing shutters and shoving bolts, and the only visible humanity\nis an occasional flitting eye under a raised eyebrow in the corner\nof a window pane.\n\nThe Invisible Man amused himself for a little while by breaking all\nthe windows in the \"Coach and Horses,\" and then he thrust a street\nlamp through the parlour window of Mrs. Gribble. He it must have\nbeen who cut the telegraph wire to Adderdean just beyond Higgins'\ncottage on the Adderdean road. And after that, as his peculiar\nqualities allowed, he passed out of human perceptions altogether,\nand he was neither heard, seen, nor felt in Iping any more. He\nvanished absolutely.\n\nBut it was the best part of two hours before any human being\nventured out again into the desolation of Iping street.\n\n\n\nCHAPTER XIII\n\nMR. MARVEL DISCUSSES HIS RESIGNATION\n\n\nWhen the dusk was gathering and Iping was just beginning to peep\ntimorously forth again upon the shattered wreckage of its Bank\nHoliday, a short, thick-set man in a shabby silk hat was marching\npainfully through the twilight behind the beechwoods on the road to\nBramblehurst. He carried three books bound together by some sort\nof ornamental elastic ligature, and a bundle wrapped in a blue\ntable-cloth. His rubicund face expressed consternation and fatigue;\nhe appeared to be in a spasmodic sort of hurry. He was accompanied\nby a voice other than his own, and ever and again he winced under\nthe touch of unseen hands.\n\n\"If you give me the slip again,\" said the Voice, \"if you attempt to\ngive me the slip again--\"\n\n\"Lord!\" said Mr. Marvel. \"That shoulder's a mass of bruises as it\nis.\"\n\n\"On my honour,\" said the Voice, \"I will kill you.\"\n\n\"I didn't try to give you the slip,\" said Marvel, in a voice that\nwas not far remote from tears. \"I swear I didn't. I didn't know the\nblessed turning, that was all! How the devil was I to know the\nblessed turning? As it is, I've been knocked about--\"\n\n\"You'll get knocked about a great deal more if you don't mind,\"\nsaid the Voice, and Mr. Marvel abruptly became silent. He blew out\nhis cheeks, and his eyes were eloquent of despair.\n\n\"It's bad enough to let these floundering yokels explode my little\nsecret, without _your_ cutting off with my books. It's lucky for some\nof them they cut and ran when they did! Here am I ... No one knew I\nwas invisible! And now what am I to do?\"\n\n\"What am _I_ to do?\" asked Marvel, _sotto voce_.\n\n\"It's all about. It will be in the papers! Everybody will be\nlooking for me; everyone on their guard--\" The Voice broke off\ninto vivid curses and ceased.\n\nThe despair of Mr. Marvel's face deepened, and his pace slackened.\n\n\"Go on!\" said the Voice.\n\nMr. Marvel's face assumed a greyish tint between the ruddier\npatches.\n\n\"Don't drop those books, stupid,\" said the Voice, sharply--overtaking\nhim.\n\n\"The fact is,\" said the Voice, \"I shall have to make use of you....\nYou're a poor tool, but I must.\"\n\n\"I'm a _miserable_ tool,\" said Marvel.\n\n\"You are,\" said the Voice.\n\n\"I'm the worst possible tool you could have,\" said Marvel.\n\n\"I'm not strong,\" he said after a discouraging silence.\n\n\"I'm not over strong,\" he repeated.\n\n\"No?\"\n\n\"And my heart's weak. That little business--I pulled it through,\nof course--but bless you! I could have dropped.\"\n\n\"Well?\"\n\n\"I haven't the nerve and strength for the sort of thing you want.\"\n\n\"_I'll_ stimulate you.\"\n\n\"I wish you wouldn't. I wouldn't like to mess up your plans, you\nknow. But I might--out of sheer funk and misery.\"\n\n\"You'd better not,\" said the Voice, with quiet emphasis.\n\n\"I wish I was dead,\" said Marvel.\n\n\"It ain't justice,\" he said; \"you must admit.... It seems to me I've\na perfect right--\"\n\n\"_Get_ on!\" said the Voice.\n\nMr. Marvel mended his pace, and for a time they went in silence\nagain.\n\n\"It's devilish hard,\" said Mr. Marvel.\n\nThis was quite ineffectual. He tried another tack.\n\n\"What do I make by it?\" he began again in a tone of unendurable\nwrong.\n\n\"Oh! _shut up_!\" said the Voice, with sudden amazing vigour. \"I'll\nsee to you all right. You do what you're told. You'll do it all\nright. You're a fool and all that, but you'll do--\"\n\n\"I tell you, sir, I'm not the man for it. Respectfully--but\nit _is_ so--\"\n\n\"If you don't shut up I shall twist your wrist again,\" said the\nInvisible Man. \"I want to think.\"\n\nPresently two oblongs of yellow light appeared through the trees,\nand the square tower of a church loomed through the gloaming. \"I\nshall keep my hand on your shoulder,\" said the Voice, \"all through\nthe village. Go straight through and try no foolery. It will be the\nworse for you if you do.\"\n\n\"I know that,\" sighed Mr. Marvel, \"I know all that.\"\n\nThe unhappy-looking figure in the obsolete silk hat passed up the\nstreet of the little village with his burdens, and vanished into\nthe gathering darkness beyond the lights of the windows.\n\n\n\nCHAPTER XIV\n\nAT PORT STOWE\n\n\nTen o'clock the next morning found Mr. Marvel, unshaven, dirty, and\ntravel-stained, sitting with the books beside him and his hands deep\nin his pockets, looking very weary, nervous, and uncomfortable, and\ninflating his cheeks at infrequent intervals, on the bench outside\na little inn on the outskirts of Port Stowe. Beside him were the\nbooks, but now they were tied with string. The bundle had been\nabandoned in the pine-woods beyond Bramblehurst, in accordance with\na change in the plans of the Invisible Man. Mr. Marvel sat on the\nbench, and although no one took the slightest notice of him, his\nagitation remained at fever heat. His hands would go ever and again\nto his various pockets with a curious nervous fumbling.\n\nWhen he had been sitting for the best part of an hour, however, an\nelderly mariner, carrying a newspaper, came out of the inn and sat\ndown beside him. \"Pleasant day,\" said the mariner.\n\nMr. Marvel glanced about him with something very like terror.\n\"Very,\" he said.\n\n\"Just seasonable weather for the time of year,\" said the mariner,\ntaking no denial.\n\n\"Quite,\" said Mr. Marvel.\n\nThe mariner produced a toothpick, and (saving his regard) was\nengrossed thereby for some minutes. His eyes meanwhile were at\nliberty to examine Mr. Marvel's dusty figure, and the books beside\nhim. As he had approached Mr. Marvel he had heard a sound like the\ndropping of coins into a pocket. He was struck by the contrast of\nMr. Marvel's appearance with this suggestion of opulence. Thence\nhis mind wandered back again to a topic that had taken a curiously\nfirm hold of his imagination.\n\n\"Books?\" he said suddenly, noisily finishing with the toothpick.\n\nMr. Marvel started and looked at them. \"Oh, yes,\" he said. \"Yes,\nthey're books.\"\n\n\"There's some extra-ordinary things in books,\" said the mariner.\n\n\"I believe you,\" said Mr. Marvel.\n\n\"And some extra-ordinary things out of 'em,\" said the mariner.\n\n\"True likewise,\" said Mr. Marvel. He eyed his interlocutor, and\nthen glanced about him.\n\n\"There's some extra-ordinary things in newspapers, for example,\"\nsaid the mariner.\n\n\"There are.\"\n\n\"In _this_ newspaper,\" said the mariner.\n\n\"Ah!\" said Mr. Marvel.\n\n\"There's a story,\" said the mariner, fixing Mr. Marvel with an eye\nthat was firm and deliberate; \"there's a story about an Invisible\nMan, for instance.\"\n\nMr. Marvel pulled his mouth askew and scratched his cheek and felt\nhis ears glowing. \"What will they be writing next?\" he asked\nfaintly. \"Ostria, or America?\"\n\n\"Neither,\" said the mariner. \"_Here_.\"\n\n\"Lord!\" said Mr. Marvel, starting.\n\n\"When I say _here_,\" said the mariner, to Mr. Marvel's intense\nrelief, \"I don't of course mean here in this place, I mean\nhereabouts.\"\n\n\"An Invisible Man!\" said Mr. Marvel. \"And what's _he_ been up to?\"\n\n\"Everything,\" said the mariner, controlling Marvel with his eye,\nand then amplifying, \"every--blessed--thing.\"\n\n\"I ain't seen a paper these four days,\" said Marvel.\n\n\"Iping's the place he started at,\" said the mariner.\n\n\"In-_deed_!\" said Mr. Marvel.\n\n\"He started there. And where he came from, nobody don't seem to\nknow. Here it is: 'Pe-culiar Story from Iping.' And it says in this\npaper that the evidence is extra-ordinary strong--extra-ordinary.\"\n\n\"Lord!\" said Mr. Marvel.\n\n\"But then, it's an extra-ordinary story. There is a clergyman and a\nmedical gent witnesses--saw 'im all right and proper--or leastways\ndidn't see 'im. He was staying, it says, at the 'Coach an' Horses,'\nand no one don't seem to have been aware of his misfortune, it says,\naware of his misfortune, until in an Altercation in the inn, it\nsays, his bandages on his head was torn off. It was then ob-served\nthat his head was invisible. Attempts were At Once made to secure\nhim, but casting off his garments, it says, he succeeded in\nescaping, but not until after a desperate struggle, in which he\nhad inflicted serious injuries, it says, on our worthy and able\nconstable, Mr. J. A. Jaffers. Pretty straight story, eh? Names and\neverything.\"\n\n\"Lord!\" said Mr. Marvel, looking nervously about him, trying to\ncount the money in his pockets by his unaided sense of touch, and\nfull of a strange and novel idea. \"It sounds most astonishing.\"\n\n\"Don't it? Extra-ordinary, _I_ call it. Never heard tell of Invisible\nMen before, I haven't, but nowadays one hears such a lot of\nextra-ordinary things--that--\"\n\n\"That all he did?\" asked Marvel, trying to seem at his ease.\n\n\"It's enough, ain't it?\" said the mariner.\n\n\"Didn't go Back by any chance?\" asked Marvel. \"Just escaped and\nthat's all, eh?\"\n\n\"All!\" said the mariner. \"Why!--ain't it enough?\"\n\n\"Quite enough,\" said Marvel.\n\n\"I should think it was enough,\" said the mariner. \"I should think\nit was enough.\"\n\n\"He didn't have any pals--it don't say he had any pals, does it?\"\nasked Mr. Marvel, anxious.\n\n\"Ain't one of a sort enough for you?\" asked the mariner. \"No, thank\nHeaven, as one might say, he didn't.\"\n\nHe nodded his head slowly. \"It makes me regular uncomfortable,\nthe bare thought of that chap running about the country! He is at\npresent At Large, and from certain evidence it is supposed that he\nhas--taken--_took_, I suppose they mean--the road to Port Stowe. You\nsee we're right _in_ it! None of your American wonders, this time.\nAnd just think of the things he might do! Where'd you be, if he took\na drop over and above, and had a fancy to go for you? Suppose he\nwants to rob--who can prevent him? He can trespass, he can burgle,\nhe could walk through a cordon of policemen as easy as me or you\ncould give the slip to a blind man! Easier! For these here blind\nchaps hear uncommon sharp, I'm told. And wherever there was liquor\nhe fancied--\"\n\n\"He's got a tremenjous advantage, certainly,\" said Mr. Marvel.\n\"And--well...\"\n\n\"You're right,\" said the mariner. \"He _has_.\"\n\nAll this time Mr. Marvel had been glancing about him intently,\nlistening for faint footfalls, trying to detect imperceptible\nmovements. He seemed on the point of some great resolution. He\ncoughed behind his hand.\n\nHe looked about him again, listened, bent towards the mariner, and\nlowered his voice: \"The fact of it is--I happen--to know just a\nthing or two about this Invisible Man. From private sources.\"\n\n\"Oh!\" said the mariner, interested. \"_You_?\"\n\n\"Yes,\" said Mr. Marvel. \"Me.\"\n\n\"Indeed!\" said the mariner. \"And may I ask--\"\n\n\"You'll be astonished,\" said Mr. Marvel behind his hand. \"It's\ntremenjous.\"\n\n\"Indeed!\" said the mariner.\n\n\"The fact is,\" began Mr. Marvel eagerly in a confidential undertone.\nSuddenly his expression changed marvellously. \"Ow!\" he said. He rose\nstiffly in his seat. His face was eloquent of physical suffering.\n\"Wow!\" he said.\n\n\"What's up?\" said the mariner, concerned.\n\n\"Toothache,\" said Mr. Marvel, and put his hand to his ear. He caught\nhold of his books. \"I must be getting on, I think,\" he said. He\nedged in a curious way along the seat away from his interlocutor.\n\"But you was just a-going to tell me about this here Invisible Man!\"\nprotested the mariner. Mr. Marvel seemed to consult with himself.\n\"Hoax,\" said a Voice. \"It's a hoax,\" said Mr. Marvel.\n\n\"But it's in the paper,\" said the mariner.\n\n\"Hoax all the same,\" said Marvel. \"I know the chap that started the\nlie. There ain't no Invisible Man whatsoever--Blimey.\"\n\n\"But how 'bout this paper? D'you mean to say--?\"\n\n\"Not a word of it,\" said Marvel, stoutly.\n\nThe mariner stared, paper in hand. Mr. Marvel jerkily faced about.\n\"Wait a bit,\" said the mariner, rising and speaking slowly, \"D'you\nmean to say--?\"\n\n\"I do,\" said Mr. Marvel.\n\n\"Then why did you let me go on and tell you all this blarsted\nstuff, then? What d'yer mean by letting a man make a fool of\nhimself like that for? Eh?\"\n\nMr. Marvel blew out his cheeks. The mariner was suddenly very red\nindeed; he clenched his hands. \"I been talking here this ten\nminutes,\" he said; \"and you, you little pot-bellied, leathery-faced\nson of an old boot, couldn't have the elementary manners--\"\n\n\"Don't you come bandying words with _me_,\" said Mr. Marvel.\n\n\"Bandying words! I'm a jolly good mind--\"\n\n\"Come up,\" said a Voice, and Mr. Marvel was suddenly whirled about\nand started marching off in a curious spasmodic manner. \"You'd\nbetter move on,\" said the mariner. \"Who's moving on?\" said Mr.\nMarvel. He was receding obliquely with a curious hurrying gait, with\noccasional violent jerks forward. Some way along the road he began\na muttered monologue, protests and recriminations.\n\n\"Silly devil!\" said the mariner, legs wide apart, elbows akimbo,\nwatching the receding figure. \"I'll show you, you silly ass--hoaxing\n_me_! It's here--on the paper!\"\n\nMr. Marvel retorted incoherently and, receding, was hidden by a bend\nin the road, but the mariner still stood magnificent in the midst\nof the way, until the approach of a butcher's cart dislodged him.\nThen he turned himself towards Port Stowe. \"Full of extra-ordinary\nasses,\" he said softly to himself. \"Just to take me down a bit--that\nwas his silly game--It's on the paper!\"\n\nAnd there was another extraordinary thing he was presently to hear,\nthat had happened quite close to him. And that was a vision of a\n\"fist full of money\" (no less) travelling without visible agency,\nalong by the wall at the corner of St. Michael's Lane. A brother\nmariner had seen this wonderful sight that very morning. He had\nsnatched at the money forthwith and had been knocked headlong, and\nwhen he had got to his feet the butterfly money had vanished. Our\nmariner was in the mood to believe anything, he declared, but that\nwas a bit _too_ stiff. Afterwards, however, he began to think things\nover.\n\nThe story of the flying money was true. And all about that\nneighbourhood, even from the august London and Country Banking\nCompany, from the tills of shops and inns--doors standing that sunny\nweather entirely open--money had been quietly and dexterously making\noff that day in handfuls and rouleaux, floating quietly along by\nwalls and shady places, dodging quickly from the approaching eyes of\nmen. And it had, though no man had traced it, invariably ended its\nmysterious flight in the pocket of that agitated gentleman in the\nobsolete silk hat, sitting outside the little inn on the outskirts\nof Port Stowe.\n\nIt was ten days after--and indeed only when the Burdock story was\nalready old--that the mariner collated these facts and began to\nunderstand how near he had been to the wonderful Invisible Man.\n\n\n\nCHAPTER XV\n\nTHE MAN WHO WAS RUNNING\n\n\nIn the early evening time Dr. Kemp was sitting in his study in the\nbelvedere on the hill overlooking Burdock. It was a pleasant little\nroom, with three windows--north, west, and south--and bookshelves\ncovered with books and scientific publications, and a broad\nwriting-table, and, under the north window, a microscope, glass\nslips, minute instruments, some cultures, and scattered bottles of\nreagents. Dr. Kemp's solar lamp was lit, albeit the sky was still\nbright with the sunset light, and his blinds were up because there\nwas no offence of peering outsiders to require them pulled down.\nDr. Kemp was a tall and slender young man, with flaxen hair and a\nmoustache almost white, and the work he was upon would earn him, he\nhoped, the fellowship of the Royal Society, so highly did he think\nof it.\n\nAnd his eye, presently wandering from his work, caught the sunset\nblazing at the back of the hill that is over against his own. For a\nminute perhaps he sat, pen in mouth, admiring the rich golden\ncolour above the crest, and then his attention was attracted by the\nlittle figure of a man, inky black, running over the hill-brow\ntowards him. He was a shortish little man, and he wore a high hat,\nand he was running so fast that his legs verily twinkled.\n\n\"Another of those fools,\" said Dr. Kemp. \"Like that ass who ran\ninto me this morning round a corner, with the ''Visible Man\na-coming, sir!' I can't imagine what possesses people. One might\nthink we were in the thirteenth century.\"\n\nHe got up, went to the window, and stared at the dusky hillside, and\nthe dark little figure tearing down it. \"He seems in a confounded\nhurry,\" said Dr. Kemp, \"but he doesn't seem to be getting on. If\nhis pockets were full of lead, he couldn't run heavier.\"\n\n\"Spurted, sir,\" said Dr. Kemp.\n\nIn another moment the higher of the villas that had clambered up the\nhill from Burdock had occulted the running figure. He was visible\nagain for a moment, and again, and then again, three times between\nthe three detached houses that came next, and then the terrace hid\nhim.\n\n\"Asses!\" said Dr. Kemp, swinging round on his heel and walking\nback to his writing-table.\n\nBut those who saw the fugitive nearer, and perceived the abject\nterror on his perspiring face, being themselves in the open roadway,\ndid not share in the doctor's contempt. By the man pounded, and as\nhe ran he chinked like a well-filled purse that is tossed to and\nfro. He looked neither to the right nor the left, but his dilated\neyes stared straight downhill to where the lamps were being lit, and\nthe people were crowded in the street. And his ill-shaped mouth fell\napart, and a glairy foam lay on his lips, and his breath came hoarse\nand noisy. All he passed stopped and began staring up the road and\ndown, and interrogating one another with an inkling of discomfort\nfor the reason of his haste.\n\nAnd then presently, far up the hill, a dog playing in the road\nyelped and ran under a gate, and as they still wondered\nsomething--a wind--a pad, pad, pad,--a sound like a panting breathing,\nrushed by.\n\nPeople screamed. People sprang off the pavement: It passed in\nshouts, it passed by instinct down the hill. They were shouting in\nthe street before Marvel was halfway there. They were bolting into\nhouses and slamming the doors behind them, with the news. He heard\nit and made one last desperate spurt. Fear came striding by, rushed\nahead of him, and in a moment had seized the town.\n\n\"The Invisible Man is coming! The Invisible Man!\"\n\n\n\nCHAPTER XVI\n\nIN THE \"JOLLY CRICKETERS\"\n\n\nThe \"Jolly Cricketers\" is just at the bottom of the hill, where the\ntram-lines begin. The barman leant his fat red arms on the counter\nand talked of horses with an anaemic cabman, while a black-bearded\nman in grey snapped up biscuit and cheese, drank Burton, and\nconversed in American with a policeman off duty.\n\n\"What's the shouting about!\" said the anaemic cabman, going off at a\ntangent, trying to see up the hill over the dirty yellow blind in\nthe low window of the inn. Somebody ran by outside. \"Fire, perhaps,\"\nsaid the barman.\n\nFootsteps approached, running heavily, the door was pushed open\nviolently, and Marvel, weeping and dishevelled, his hat gone, the\nneck of his coat torn open, rushed in, made a convulsive turn, and\nattempted to shut the door. It was held half open by a strap.\n\n\"Coming!\" he bawled, his voice shrieking with terror. \"He's coming.\nThe 'Visible Man! After me! For Gawd's sake! 'Elp! 'Elp! 'Elp!\"\n\n\"Shut the doors,\" said the policeman. \"Who's coming? What's the\nrow?\" He went to the door, released the strap, and it slammed. The\nAmerican closed the other door.\n\n\"Lemme go inside,\" said Marvel, staggering and weeping, but still\nclutching the books. \"Lemme go inside. Lock me in--somewhere. I\ntell you he's after me. I give him the slip. He said he'd kill me\nand he will.\"\n\n\"_You're_ safe,\" said the man with the black beard. \"The door's shut.\nWhat's it all about?\"\n\n\"Lemme go inside,\" said Marvel, and shrieked aloud as a blow\nsuddenly made the fastened door shiver and was followed by a hurried\nrapping and a shouting outside. \"Hullo,\" cried the policeman, \"who's\nthere?\" Mr. Marvel began to make frantic dives at panels that looked\nlike doors. \"He'll kill me--he's got a knife or something. For\nGawd's sake--!\"\n\n\"Here you are,\" said the barman. \"Come in here.\" And he held up the\nflap of the bar.\n\nMr. Marvel rushed behind the bar as the summons outside was\nrepeated. \"Don't open the door,\" he screamed. \"_Please_ don't open\nthe door. _Where_ shall I hide?\"\n\n\"This, this Invisible Man, then?\" asked the man with the black\nbeard, with one hand behind him. \"I guess it's about time we saw\nhim.\"\n\nThe window of the inn was suddenly smashed in, and there was a\nscreaming and running to and fro in the street. The policeman had\nbeen standing on the settee staring out, craning to see who was at\nthe door. He got down with raised eyebrows. \"It's that,\" he said.\nThe barman stood in front of the bar-parlour door which was now\nlocked on Mr. Marvel, stared at the smashed window, and came round\nto the two other men.\n\nEverything was suddenly quiet. \"I wish I had my truncheon,\" said\nthe policeman, going irresolutely to the door. \"Once we open, in he\ncomes. There's no stopping him.\"\n\n\"Don't you be in too much hurry about that door,\" said the anaemic\ncabman, anxiously.\n\n\"Draw the bolts,\" said the man with the black beard, \"and if he\ncomes--\" He showed a revolver in his hand.\n\n\"That won't do,\" said the policeman; \"that's murder.\"\n\n\"I know what country I'm in,\" said the man with the beard. \"I'm\ngoing to let off at his legs. Draw the bolts.\"\n\n\"Not with that blinking thing going off behind me,\" said the\nbarman, craning over the blind.\n\n\"Very well,\" said the man with the black beard, and stooping down,\nrevolver ready, drew them himself. Barman, cabman, and policeman\nfaced about.\n\n\"Come in,\" said the bearded man in an undertone, standing back and\nfacing the unbolted doors with his pistol behind him. No one came\nin, the door remained closed. Five minutes afterwards when a second\ncabman pushed his head in cautiously, they were still waiting, and\nan anxious face peered out of the bar-parlour and supplied\ninformation. \"Are all the doors of the house shut?\" asked Marvel.\n\"He's going round--prowling round. He's as artful as the devil.\"\n\n\"Good Lord!\" said the burly barman. \"There's the back! Just watch\nthem doors! I say--!\" He looked about him helplessly. The\nbar-parlour door slammed and they heard the key turn. \"There's\nthe yard door and the private door. The yard door--\"\n\nHe rushed out of the bar.\n\nIn a minute he reappeared with a carving-knife in his hand. \"The\nyard door was open!\" he said, and his fat underlip dropped. \"He may\nbe in the house now!\" said the first cabman.\n\n\"He's not in the kitchen,\" said the barman. \"There's two women\nthere, and I've stabbed every inch of it with this little beef\nslicer. And they don't think he's come in. They haven't noticed--\"\n\n\"Have you fastened it?\" asked the first cabman.\n\n\"I'm out of frocks,\" said the barman.\n\nThe man with the beard replaced his revolver. And even as he did so\nthe flap of the bar was shut down and the bolt clicked, and then\nwith a tremendous thud the catch of the door snapped and the\nbar-parlour door burst open. They heard Marvel squeal like a caught\nleveret, and forthwith they were clambering over the bar to his\nrescue. The bearded man's revolver cracked and the looking-glass at\nthe back of the parlour starred and came smashing and tinkling down.\n\nAs the barman entered the room he saw Marvel, curiously crumpled up\nand struggling against the door that led to the yard and kitchen.\nThe door flew open while the barman hesitated, and Marvel was\ndragged into the kitchen. There was a scream and a clatter of pans.\nMarvel, head down, and lugging back obstinately, was forced to the\nkitchen door, and the bolts were drawn.\n\nThen the policeman, who had been trying to pass the barman, rushed\nin, followed by one of the cabmen, gripped the wrist of the\ninvisible hand that collared Marvel, was hit in the face and went\nreeling back. The door opened, and Marvel made a frantic effort to\nobtain a lodgment behind it. Then the cabman collared something.\n\"I got him,\" said the cabman. The barman's red hands came clawing\nat the unseen. \"Here he is!\" said the barman.\n\nMr. Marvel, released, suddenly dropped to the ground and made an\nattempt to crawl behind the legs of the fighting men. The struggle\nblundered round the edge of the door. The voice of the Invisible\nMan was heard for the first time, yelling out sharply, as the\npoliceman trod on his foot. Then he cried out passionately and\nhis fists flew round like flails. The cabman suddenly whooped\nand doubled up, kicked under the diaphragm. The door into the\nbar-parlour from the kitchen slammed and covered Mr. Marvel's\nretreat. The men in the kitchen found themselves clutching at and\nstruggling with empty air.\n\n\"Where's he gone?\" cried the man with the beard. \"Out?\"\n\n\"This way,\" said the policeman, stepping into the yard and\nstopping.\n\nA piece of tile whizzed by his head and smashed among the crockery\non the kitchen table.\n\n\"I'll show him,\" shouted the man with the black beard, and suddenly\na steel barrel shone over the policeman's shoulder, and five\nbullets had followed one another into the twilight whence the\nmissile had come. As he fired, the man with the beard moved his\nhand in a horizontal curve, so that his shots radiated out into the\nnarrow yard like spokes from a wheel.\n\nA silence followed. \"Five cartridges,\" said the man with the black\nbeard. \"That's the best of all. Four aces and a joker. Get a\nlantern, someone, and come and feel about for his body.\"\n\n\n\nCHAPTER XVII\n\nDR. KEMP'S VISITOR\n\n\nDr. Kemp had continued writing in his study until the shots\naroused him. Crack, crack, crack, they came one after the other.\n\n\"Hullo!\" said Dr. Kemp, putting his pen into his mouth again and\nlistening. \"Who's letting off revolvers in Burdock? What are the\nasses at now?\"\n\nHe went to the south window, threw it up, and leaning out stared\ndown on the network of windows, beaded gas-lamps and shops, with its\nblack interstices of roof and yard that made up the town at night.\n\"Looks like a crowd down the hill,\" he said, \"by 'The Cricketers,'\"\nand remained watching. Thence his eyes wandered over the town to far\naway where the ships' lights shone, and the pier glowed--a little\nilluminated, facetted pavilion like a gem of yellow light. The moon\nin its first quarter hung over the westward hill, and the stars were\nclear and almost tropically bright.\n\nAfter five minutes, during which his mind had travelled into a\nremote speculation of social conditions of the future, and lost\nitself at last over the time dimension, Dr. Kemp roused himself\nwith a sigh, pulled down the window again, and returned to his\nwriting desk.\n\nIt must have been about an hour after this that the front-door bell\nrang. He had been writing slackly, and with intervals of\nabstraction, since the shots. He sat listening. He heard the servant\nanswer the door, and waited for her feet on the staircase, but she\ndid not come. \"Wonder what that was,\" said Dr. Kemp.\n\nHe tried to resume his work, failed, got up, went downstairs from\nhis study to the landing, rang, and called over the balustrade to\nthe housemaid as she appeared in the hall below. \"Was that a\nletter?\" he asked.\n\n\"Only a runaway ring, sir,\" she answered.\n\n\"I'm restless to-night,\" he said to himself. He went back to his\nstudy, and this time attacked his work resolutely. In a little\nwhile he was hard at work again, and the only sounds in the room\nwere the ticking of the clock and the subdued shrillness of his\nquill, hurrying in the very centre of the circle of light his\nlampshade threw on his table.\n\nIt was two o'clock before Dr. Kemp had finished his work for the\nnight. He rose, yawned, and went downstairs to bed. He had already\nremoved his coat and vest, when he noticed that he was thirsty. He\ntook a candle and went down to the dining-room in search of a\nsyphon and whiskey.\n\nDr. Kemp's scientific pursuits have made him a very observant\nman, and as he recrossed the hall, he noticed a dark spot on the\nlinoleum near the mat at the foot of the stairs. He went on\nupstairs, and then it suddenly occurred to him to ask himself what\nthe spot on the linoleum might be. Apparently some subconscious\nelement was at work. At any rate, he turned with his burden, went\nback to the hall, put down the syphon and whiskey, and bending\ndown, touched the spot. Without any great surprise he found it had\nthe stickiness and colour of drying blood.\n\nHe took up his burden again, and returned upstairs, looking about\nhim and trying to account for the blood-spot. On the landing he saw\nsomething and stopped astonished. The door-handle of his own room\nwas blood-stained.\n\nHe looked at his own hand. It was quite clean, and then he\nremembered that the door of his room had been open when he came down\nfrom his study, and that consequently he had not touched the handle\nat all. He went straight into his room, his face quite calm--perhaps\na trifle more resolute than usual. His glance, wandering\ninquisitively, fell on the bed. On the counterpane was a mess of\nblood, and the sheet had been torn. He had not noticed this before\nbecause he had walked straight to the dressing-table. On the further\nside the bedclothes were depressed as if someone had been recently\nsitting there.\n\nThen he had an odd impression that he had heard a low voice say,\n\"Good Heavens!--Kemp!\" But Dr. Kemp was no believer in voices.\n\nHe stood staring at the tumbled sheets. Was that really a voice? He\nlooked about again, but noticed nothing further than the disordered\nand blood-stained bed. Then he distinctly heard a movement across\nthe room, near the wash-hand stand. All men, however highly\neducated, retain some superstitious inklings. The feeling that is\ncalled \"eerie\" came upon him. He closed the door of the room, came\nforward to the dressing-table, and put down his burdens. Suddenly,\nwith a start, he perceived a coiled and blood-stained bandage of\nlinen rag hanging in mid-air, between him and the wash-hand stand.\n\nHe stared at this in amazement. It was an empty bandage, a bandage\nproperly tied but quite empty. He would have advanced to grasp it,\nbut a touch arrested him, and a voice speaking quite close to him.\n\n\"Kemp!\" said the Voice.\n\n\"Eh?\" said Kemp, with his mouth open.\n\n\"Keep your nerve,\" said the Voice. \"I'm an Invisible Man.\"\n\nKemp made no answer for a space, simply stared at the bandage.\n\"Invisible Man,\" he said.\n\n\"I am an Invisible Man,\" repeated the Voice.\n\nThe story he had been active to ridicule only that morning rushed\nthrough Kemp's brain. He does not appear to have been either very\nmuch frightened or very greatly surprised at the moment.\nRealisation came later.\n\n\"I thought it was all a lie,\" he said. The thought uppermost in his\nmind was the reiterated arguments of the morning. \"Have you a\nbandage on?\" he asked.\n\n\"Yes,\" said the Invisible Man.\n\n\"Oh!\" said Kemp, and then roused himself. \"I say!\" he said. \"But\nthis is nonsense. It's some trick.\" He stepped forward suddenly,\nand his hand, extended towards the bandage, met invisible fingers.\n\nHe recoiled at the touch and his colour changed.\n\n\"Keep steady, Kemp, for God's sake! I want help badly. Stop!\"\n\nThe hand gripped his arm. He struck at it.\n\n\"Kemp!\" cried the Voice. \"Kemp! Keep steady!\" and the grip\ntightened.\n\nA frantic desire to free himself took possession of Kemp. The hand\nof the bandaged arm gripped his shoulder, and he was suddenly\ntripped and flung backwards upon the bed. He opened his mouth to\nshout, and the corner of the sheet was thrust between his teeth.\nThe Invisible Man had him down grimly, but his arms were free and\nhe struck and tried to kick savagely.\n\n\"Listen to reason, will you?\" said the Invisible Man, sticking to\nhim in spite of a pounding in the ribs. \"By Heaven! you'll madden\nme in a minute!\n\n\"Lie still, you fool!\" bawled the Invisible Man in Kemp's ear.\n\nKemp struggled for another moment and then lay still.\n\n\"If you shout, I'll smash your face,\" said the Invisible Man,\nrelieving his mouth.\n\n\"I'm an Invisible Man. It's no foolishness, and no magic. I really\nam an Invisible Man. And I want your help. I don't want to hurt\nyou, but if you behave like a frantic rustic, I must. Don't you\nremember me, Kemp? Griffin, of University College?\"\n\n\"Let me get up,\" said Kemp. \"I'll stop where I am. And let me sit\nquiet for a minute.\"\n\nHe sat up and felt his neck.\n\n\"I am Griffin, of University College, and I have made myself\ninvisible. I am just an ordinary man--a man you have known--made\ninvisible.\"\n\n\"Griffin?\" said Kemp.\n\n\"Griffin,\" answered the Voice. A younger student than you were,\nalmost an albino, six feet high, and broad, with a pink and white\nface and red eyes, who won the medal for chemistry.\"\n\n\"I am confused,\" said Kemp. \"My brain is rioting. What has this to\ndo with Griffin?\"\n\n\"I _am_ Griffin.\"\n\nKemp thought. \"It's horrible,\" he said. \"But what devilry must\nhappen to make a man invisible?\"\n\n\"It's no devilry. It's a process, sane and intelligible enough--\"\n\n\"It's horrible!\" said Kemp. \"How on earth--?\"\n\n\"It's horrible enough. But I'm wounded and in pain, and tired ...\nGreat God! Kemp, you are a man. Take it steady. Give me some food\nand drink, and let me sit down here.\"\n\nKemp stared at the bandage as it moved across the room, then saw a\nbasket chair dragged across the floor and come to rest near the bed.\nIt creaked, and the seat was depressed the quarter of an inch or so.\nHe rubbed his eyes and felt his neck again. \"This beats ghosts,\" he\nsaid, and laughed stupidly.\n\n\"That's better. Thank Heaven, you're getting sensible!\"\n\n\"Or silly,\" said Kemp, and knuckled his eyes.\n\n\"Give me some whiskey. I'm near dead.\"\n\n\"It didn't feel so. Where are you? If I get up shall I run into you?\n_There_! all right. Whiskey? Here. Where shall I give it to you?\"\n\nThe chair creaked and Kemp felt the glass drawn away from him. He\nlet go by an effort; his instinct was all against it. It came to\nrest poised twenty inches above the front edge of the seat of the\nchair. He stared at it in infinite perplexity. \"This is--this\nmust be--hypnotism. You have suggested you are invisible.\"\n\n\"Nonsense,\" said the Voice.\n\n\"It's frantic.\"\n\n\"Listen to me.\"\n\n\"I demonstrated conclusively this morning,\" began Kemp, \"that\ninvisibility--\"\n\n\"Never mind what you've demonstrated!--I'm starving,\" said the\nVoice, \"and the night is chilly to a man without clothes.\"\n\n\"Food?\" said Kemp.\n\nThe tumbler of whiskey tilted itself. \"Yes,\" said the Invisible Man\nrapping it down. \"Have you a dressing-gown?\"\n\nKemp made some exclamation in an undertone. He walked to a wardrobe\nand produced a robe of dingy scarlet. \"This do?\" he asked. It was\ntaken from him. It hung limp for a moment in mid-air, fluttered\nweirdly, stood full and decorous buttoning itself, and sat down in\nhis chair. \"Drawers, socks, slippers would be a comfort,\" said the\nUnseen, curtly. \"And food.\"\n\n\"Anything. But this is the insanest thing I ever was in, in my\nlife!\"\n\nHe turned out his drawers for the articles, and then went downstairs\nto ransack his larder. He came back with some cold cutlets and\nbread, pulled up a light table, and placed them before his guest.\n\"Never mind knives,\" said his visitor, and a cutlet hung in mid-air,\nwith a sound of gnawing.\n\n\"Invisible!\" said Kemp, and sat down on a bedroom chair.\n\n\"I always like to get something about me before I eat,\" said the\nInvisible Man, with a full mouth, eating greedily. \"Queer fancy!\"\n\n\"I suppose that wrist is all right,\" said Kemp.\n\n\"Trust me,\" said the Invisible Man.\n\n\"Of all the strange and wonderful--\"\n\n\"Exactly. But it's odd I should blunder into _your_ house to get my\nbandaging. My first stroke of luck! Anyhow I meant to sleep in this\nhouse to-night. You must stand that! It's a filthy nuisance, my\nblood showing, isn't it? Quite a clot over there. Gets visible as\nit coagulates, I see. It's only the living tissue I've changed, and\nonly for as long as I'm alive.... I've been in the house three hours.\"\n\n\"But how's it done?\" began Kemp, in a tone of exasperation.\n\"Confound it! The whole business--it's unreasonable from\nbeginning to end.\"\n\n\"Quite reasonable,\" said the Invisible Man. \"Perfectly reasonable.\"\n\nHe reached over and secured the whiskey bottle. Kemp stared at the\ndevouring dressing gown. A ray of candle-light penetrating a torn\npatch in the right shoulder, made a triangle of light under the\nleft ribs. \"What were the shots?\" he asked. \"How did the shooting\nbegin?\"\n\n\"There was a real fool of a man--a sort of confederate of\nmine--curse him!--who tried to steal my money. _Has_ done so.\"\n\n\"Is _he_ invisible too?\"\n\n\"No.\"\n\n\"Well?\"\n\n\"Can't I have some more to eat before I tell you all that? I'm\nhungry--in pain. And you want me to tell stories!\"\n\nKemp got up. \"_You_ didn't do any shooting?\" he asked.\n\n\"Not me,\" said his visitor. \"Some fool I'd never seen fired at\nrandom. A lot of them got scared. They all got scared at me. Curse\nthem!--I say--I want more to eat than this, Kemp.\"\n\n\"I'll see what there is to eat downstairs,\" said Kemp. \"Not much,\nI'm afraid.\"\n\nAfter he had done eating, and he made a heavy meal, the Invisible\nMan demanded a cigar. He bit the end savagely before Kemp could\nfind a knife, and cursed when the outer leaf loosened. It was\nstrange to see him smoking; his mouth, and throat, pharynx and\nnares, became visible as a sort of whirling smoke cast.\n\n\"This blessed gift of smoking!\" he said, and puffed vigorously.\n\"I'm lucky to have fallen upon you, Kemp. You must help me. Fancy\ntumbling on you just now! I'm in a devilish scrape--I've been mad,\nI think. The things I have been through! But we will do things yet.\nLet me tell you--\"\n\nHe helped himself to more whiskey and soda. Kemp got up, looked\nabout him, and fetched a glass from his spare room. \"It's wild--but\nI suppose I may drink.\"\n\n\"You haven't changed much, Kemp, these dozen years. You fair men\ndon't. Cool and methodical--after the first collapse. I must tell\nyou. We will work together!\"\n\n\"But how was it all done?\" said Kemp, \"and how did you get like\nthis?\"\n\n\"For God's sake, let me smoke in peace for a little while! And then\nI will begin to tell you.\"\n\nBut the story was not told that night. The Invisible Man's wrist\nwas growing painful; he was feverish, exhausted, and his mind came\nround to brood upon his chase down the hill and the struggle about\nthe inn. He spoke in fragments of Marvel, he smoked faster, his\nvoice grew angry. Kemp tried to gather what he could.\n\n\"He was afraid of me, I could see that he was afraid of me,\" said\nthe Invisible Man many times over. \"He meant to give me the slip--he\nwas always casting about! What a fool I was!\n\n\"The cur!\n\n\"I should have killed him!\"\n\n\"Where did you get the money?\" asked Kemp, abruptly.\n\nThe Invisible Man was silent for a space. \"I can't tell you\nto-night,\" he said.\n\nHe groaned suddenly and leant forward, supporting his invisible\nhead on invisible hands. \"Kemp,\" he said, \"I've had no sleep for\nnear three days, except a couple of dozes of an hour or so. I\nmust sleep soon.\"\n\n\"Well, have my room--have this room.\"\n\n\"But how can I sleep? If I sleep--he will get away. Ugh! What\ndoes it matter?\"\n\n\"What's the shot wound?\" asked Kemp, abruptly.\n\n\"Nothing--scratch and blood. Oh, God! How I want sleep!\"\n\n\"Why not?\"\n\nThe Invisible Man appeared to be regarding Kemp. \"Because I've a\nparticular objection to being caught by my fellow-men,\" he said\nslowly.\n\nKemp started.\n\n\"Fool that I am!\" said the Invisible Man, striking the table\nsmartly. \"I've put the idea into your head.\"\n\n\n\nCHAPTER XVIII\n\nTHE INVISIBLE MAN SLEEPS\n\n\nExhausted and wounded as the Invisible Man was, he refused to accept\nKemp's word that his freedom should be respected. He examined the\ntwo windows of the bedroom, drew up the blinds and opened the\nsashes, to confirm Kemp's statement that a retreat by them would be\npossible. Outside the night was very quiet and still, and the new\nmoon was setting over the down. Then he examined the keys of the\nbedroom and the two dressing-room doors, to satisfy himself that\nthese also could be made an assurance of freedom. Finally he\nexpressed himself satisfied. He stood on the hearth rug and Kemp\nheard the sound of a yawn.\n\n\"I'm sorry,\" said the Invisible Man, \"if I cannot tell you all that\nI have done to-night. But I am worn out. It's grotesque, no doubt.\nIt's horrible! But believe me, Kemp, in spite of your arguments of\nthis morning, it is quite a possible thing. I have made a discovery.\nI meant to keep it to myself. I can't. I must have a partner. And\nyou.... We can do such things ... But to-morrow. Now, Kemp, I feel\nas though I must sleep or perish.\"\n\nKemp stood in the middle of the room staring at the headless garment.\n\"I suppose I must leave you,\" he said. \"It's--incredible. Three\nthings happening like this, overturning all my preconceptions--would\nmake me insane. But it's real! Is there anything more that I can\nget you?\"\n\n\"Only bid me good-night,\" said Griffin.\n\n\"Good-night,\" said Kemp, and shook an invisible hand. He walked\nsideways to the door. Suddenly the dressing-gown walked quickly\ntowards him. \"Understand me!\" said the dressing-gown. \"No attempts\nto hamper me, or capture me! Or--\"\n\nKemp's face changed a little. \"I thought I gave you my word,\" he\nsaid.\n\nKemp closed the door softly behind him, and the key was turned upon\nhim forthwith. Then, as he stood with an expression of passive\namazement on his face, the rapid feet came to the door of the\ndressing-room and that too was locked. Kemp slapped his brow with\nhis hand. \"Am I dreaming? Has the world gone mad--or have I?\"\n\nHe laughed, and put his hand to the locked door. \"Barred out of my\nown bedroom, by a flagrant absurdity!\" he said.\n\nHe walked to the head of the staircase, turned, and stared at the\nlocked doors. \"It's fact,\" he said. He put his fingers to his\nslightly bruised neck. \"Undeniable fact!\n\n\"But--\"\n\nHe shook his head hopelessly, turned, and went downstairs.\n\nHe lit the dining-room lamp, got out a cigar, and began pacing the\nroom, ejaculating. Now and then he would argue with himself.\n\n\"Invisible!\" he said.\n\n\"Is there such a thing as an invisible animal? ... In the sea, yes.\nThousands--millions. All the larvae, all the little nauplii and\ntornarias, all the microscopic things, the jelly-fish. In the sea\nthere are more things invisible than visible! I never thought of\nthat before. And in the ponds too! All those little pond-life\nthings--specks of colourless translucent jelly! But in air? No!\n\n\"It can't be.\n\n\"But after all--why not?\n\n\"If a man was made of glass he would still be visible.\"\n\nHis meditation became profound. The bulk of three cigars had passed\ninto the invisible or diffused as a white ash over the carpet before\nhe spoke again. Then it was merely an exclamation. He turned aside,\nwalked out of the room, and went into his little consulting-room and\nlit the gas there. It was a little room, because Dr. Kemp did not\nlive by practice, and in it were the day's newspapers. The morning's\npaper lay carelessly opened and thrown aside. He caught it up,\nturned it over, and read the account of a \"Strange Story from Iping\"\nthat the mariner at Port Stowe had spelt over so painfully to Mr.\nMarvel. Kemp read it swiftly.\n\n\"Wrapped up!\" said Kemp. \"Disguised! Hiding it! 'No one seems to\nhave been aware of his misfortune.' What the devil _is_ his game?\"\n\nHe dropped the paper, and his eye went seeking. \"Ah!\" he said, and\ncaught up the _St. James' Gazette_, lying folded up as it arrived.\n\"Now we shall get at the truth,\" said Dr. Kemp. He rent the paper\nopen; a couple of columns confronted him. \"An Entire Village in\nSussex goes Mad\" was the heading.\n\n\"Good Heavens!\" said Kemp, reading eagerly an incredulous account\nof the events in Iping, of the previous afternoon, that have\nalready been described. Over the leaf the report in the morning\npaper had been reprinted.\n\nHe re-read it. \"Ran through the streets striking right and left.\nJaffers insensible. Mr. Huxter in great pain--still unable to\ndescribe what he saw. Painful humiliation--vicar. Woman ill with\nterror! Windows smashed. This extraordinary story probably a\nfabrication. Too good not to print--_cum grano_!\"\n\nHe dropped the paper and stared blankly in front of him. \"Probably\na fabrication!\"\n\nHe caught up the paper again, and re-read the whole business. \"But\nwhen does the Tramp come in? Why the deuce was he chasing a tramp?\"\n\nHe sat down abruptly on the surgical bench. \"He's not only\ninvisible,\" he said, \"but he's mad! Homicidal!\"\n\nWhen dawn came to mingle its pallor with the lamp-light and cigar\nsmoke of the dining-room, Kemp was still pacing up and down, trying\nto grasp the incredible.\n\nHe was altogether too excited to sleep. His servants, descending\nsleepily, discovered him, and were inclined to think that\nover-study had worked this ill on him. He gave them extraordinary\nbut quite explicit instructions to lay breakfast for two in the\nbelvedere study--and then to confine themselves to the basement\nand ground-floor. Then he continued to pace the dining-room until\nthe morning's paper came. That had much to say and little to tell,\nbeyond the confirmation of the evening before, and a very badly\nwritten account of another remarkable tale from Port Burdock. This\ngave Kemp the essence of the happenings at the \"Jolly Cricketers,\"\nand the name of Marvel. \"He has made me keep with him twenty-four\nhours,\" Marvel testified. Certain minor facts were added to the\nIping story, notably the cutting of the village telegraph-wire.\nBut there was nothing to throw light on the connexion between\nthe Invisible Man and the Tramp; for Mr. Marvel had supplied no\ninformation about the three books, or the money with which he was\nlined. The incredulous tone had vanished and a shoal of reporters\nand inquirers were already at work elaborating the matter.\n\nKemp read every scrap of the report and sent his housemaid out to\nget every one of the morning papers she could. These also he\ndevoured.\n\n\"He is invisible!\" he said. \"And it reads like rage growing to\nmania! The things he may do! The things he may do! And he's\nupstairs free as the air. What on earth ought I to do?\"\n\n\"For instance, would it be a breach of faith if--? No.\"\n\nHe went to a little untidy desk in the corner, and began a note. He\ntore this up half written, and wrote another. He read it over and\nconsidered it. Then he took an envelope and addressed it to \"Colonel\nAdye, Port Burdock.\"\n\nThe Invisible Man awoke even as Kemp was doing this. He awoke in an\nevil temper, and Kemp, alert for every sound, heard his pattering\nfeet rush suddenly across the bedroom overhead. Then a chair was\nflung over and the wash-hand stand tumbler smashed. Kemp hurried\nupstairs and rapped eagerly.\n\n\n\nCHAPTER XIX\n\nCERTAIN FIRST PRINCIPLES\n\n\n\"What's the matter?\" asked Kemp, when the Invisible Man admitted him.\n\n\"Nothing,\" was the answer.\n\n\"But, confound it! The smash?\"\n\n\"Fit of temper,\" said the Invisible Man. \"Forgot this arm; and it's\nsore.\"\n\n\"You're rather liable to that sort of thing.\"\n\n\"I am.\"\n\nKemp walked across the room and picked up the fragments of broken\nglass. \"All the facts are out about you,\" said Kemp, standing up\nwith the glass in his hand; \"all that happened in Iping, and down\nthe hill. The world has become aware of its invisible citizen. But\nno one knows you are here.\"\n\nThe Invisible Man swore.\n\n\"The secret's out. I gather it was a secret. I don't know what your\nplans are, but of course I'm anxious to help you.\"\n\nThe Invisible Man sat down on the bed.\n\n\"There's breakfast upstairs,\" said Kemp, speaking as easily as\npossible, and he was delighted to find his strange guest rose\nwillingly. Kemp led the way up the narrow staircase to the\nbelvedere.\n\n\"Before we can do anything else,\" said Kemp, \"I must understand a\nlittle more about this invisibility of yours.\" He had sat down,\nafter one nervous glance out of the window, with the air of a man\nwho has talking to do. His doubts of the sanity of the entire\nbusiness flashed and vanished again as he looked across to\nwhere Griffin sat at the breakfast-table--a headless, handless\ndressing-gown, wiping unseen lips on a miraculously held serviette.\n\n\"It's simple enough--and credible enough,\" said Griffin, putting\nthe serviette aside and leaning the invisible head on an invisible\nhand.\n\n\"No doubt, to you, but--\" Kemp laughed.\n\n\"Well, yes; to me it seemed wonderful at first, no doubt. But now,\ngreat God! ... But we will do great things yet! I came on the stuff\nfirst at Chesilstowe.\"\n\n\"Chesilstowe?\"\n\n\"I went there after I left London. You know I dropped medicine and\ntook up physics? No; well, I did. _Light_ fascinated me.\"\n\n\"Ah!\"\n\n\"Optical density! The whole subject is a network of riddles--a\nnetwork with solutions glimmering elusively through. And being but\ntwo-and-twenty and full of enthusiasm, I said, 'I will devote my\nlife to this. This is worth while.' You know what fools we are at\ntwo-and-twenty?\"\n\n\"Fools then or fools now,\" said Kemp.\n\n\"As though knowing could be any satisfaction to a man!\n\n\"But I went to work--like a slave. And I had hardly worked and\nthought about the matter six months before light came through one\nof the meshes suddenly--blindingly! I found a general principle\nof pigments and refraction--a formula, a geometrical expression\ninvolving four dimensions. Fools, common men, even common\nmathematicians, do not know anything of what some general expression\nmay mean to the student of molecular physics. In the books--the\nbooks that tramp has hidden--there are marvels, miracles! But this\nwas not a method, it was an idea, that might lead to a method by\nwhich it would be possible, without changing any other property of\nmatter--except, in some instances colours--to lower the refractive\nindex of a substance, solid or liquid, to that of air--so far as all\npractical purposes are concerned.\"\n\n\"Phew!\" said Kemp. \"That's odd! But still I don't see quite ... I\ncan understand that thereby you could spoil a valuable stone, but\npersonal invisibility is a far cry.\"\n\n\"Precisely,\" said Griffin. \"But consider, visibility depends on the\naction of the visible bodies on light. Either a body absorbs light,\nor it reflects or refracts it, or does all these things. If it\nneither reflects nor refracts nor absorbs light, it cannot of\nitself be visible. You see an opaque red box, for instance, because\nthe colour absorbs some of the light and reflects the rest, all the\nred part of the light, to you. If it did not absorb any particular\npart of the light, but reflected it all, then it would be a shining\nwhite box. Silver! A diamond box would neither absorb much of the\nlight nor reflect much from the general surface, but just here\nand there where the surfaces were favourable the light would\nbe reflected and refracted, so that you would get a brilliant\nappearance of flashing reflections and translucencies--a sort of\nskeleton of light. A glass box would not be so brilliant, nor so\nclearly visible, as a diamond box, because there would be less\nrefraction and reflection. See that? From certain points of view\nyou would see quite clearly through it. Some kinds of glass would\nbe more visible than others, a box of flint glass would be brighter\nthan a box of ordinary window glass. A box of very thin common\nglass would be hard to see in a bad light, because it would absorb\nhardly any light and refract and reflect very little. And if you\nput a sheet of common white glass in water, still more if you\nput it in some denser liquid than water, it would vanish almost\naltogether, because light passing from water to glass is only\nslightly refracted or reflected or indeed affected in any way.\nIt is almost as invisible as a jet of coal gas or hydrogen is in\nair. And for precisely the same reason!\"\n\n\"Yes,\" said Kemp, \"that is pretty plain sailing.\"\n\n\"And here is another fact you will know to be true. If a sheet of\nglass is smashed, Kemp, and beaten into a powder, it becomes much\nmore visible while it is in the air; it becomes at last an opaque\nwhite powder. This is because the powdering multiplies the surfaces\nof the glass at which refraction and reflection occur. In the sheet\nof glass there are only two surfaces; in the powder the light is\nreflected or refracted by each grain it passes through, and very\nlittle gets right through the powder. But if the white powdered\nglass is put into water, it forthwith vanishes. The powdered glass\nand water have much the same refractive index; that is, the light\nundergoes very little refraction or reflection in passing from one\nto the other.\n\n\"You make the glass invisible by putting it into a liquid of nearly\nthe same refractive index; a transparent thing becomes invisible if\nit is put in any medium of almost the same refractive index. And if\nyou will consider only a second, you will see also that the powder\nof glass might be made to vanish in air, if its refractive index\ncould be made the same as that of air; for then there would be no\nrefraction or reflection as the light passed from glass to air.\"\n\n\"Yes, yes,\" said Kemp. \"But a man's not powdered glass!\"\n\n\"No,\" said Griffin. \"He's more transparent!\"\n\n\"Nonsense!\"\n\n\"That from a doctor! How one forgets! Have you already forgotten\nyour physics, in ten years? Just think of all the things that are\ntransparent and seem not to be so. Paper, for instance, is made up\nof transparent fibres, and it is white and opaque only for the same\nreason that a powder of glass is white and opaque. Oil white paper,\nfill up the interstices between the particles with oil so that there\nis no longer refraction or reflection except at the surfaces, and\nit becomes as transparent as glass. And not only paper, but cotton\nfibre, linen fibre, wool fibre, woody fibre, and _bone_, Kemp,\n_flesh_, Kemp, _hair_, Kemp, _nails_ and _nerves_, Kemp, in fact\nthe whole fabric of a man except the red of his blood and the black\npigment of hair, are all made up of transparent, colourless tissue.\nSo little suffices to make us visible one to the other. For the\nmost part the fibres of a living creature are no more opaque than\nwater.\"\n\n\"Great Heavens!\" cried Kemp. \"Of course, of course! I was thinking\nonly last night of the sea larvae and all jelly-fish!\"\n\n\"_Now_ you have me! And all that I knew and had in mind a year after\nI left London--six years ago. But I kept it to myself. I had to do\nmy work under frightful disadvantages. Oliver, my professor, was a\nscientific bounder, a journalist by instinct, a thief of ideas--he\nwas always prying! And you know the knavish system of the scientific\nworld. I simply would not publish, and let him share my credit. I\nwent on working; I got nearer and nearer making my formula into an\nexperiment, a reality. I told no living soul, because I meant to\nflash my work upon the world with crushing effect and become famous\nat a blow. I took up the question of pigments to fill up certain\ngaps. And suddenly, not by design but by accident, I made a\ndiscovery in physiology.\"\n\n\"Yes?\"\n\n\"You know the red colouring matter of blood; it can be made\nwhite--colourless--and remain with all the functions it has now!\"\n\nKemp gave a cry of incredulous amazement.\n\nThe Invisible Man rose and began pacing the little study. \"You may\nwell exclaim. I remember that night. It was late at night--in the\ndaytime one was bothered with the gaping, silly students--and I\nworked then sometimes till dawn. It came suddenly, splendid and\ncomplete in my mind. I was alone; the laboratory was still, with the\ntall lights burning brightly and silently. In all my great moments\nI have been alone. 'One could make an animal--a tissue--transparent!\nOne could make it invisible! All except the pigments--I could be\ninvisible!' I said, suddenly realising what it meant to be an albino\nwith such knowledge. It was overwhelming. I left the filtering I was\ndoing, and went and stared out of the great window at the stars.\n'I could be invisible!' I repeated.\n\n\"To do such a thing would be to transcend magic. And I beheld,\nunclouded by doubt, a magnificent vision of all that invisibility\nmight mean to a man--the mystery, the power, the freedom. Drawbacks\nI saw none. You have only to think! And I, a shabby, poverty-struck,\nhemmed-in demonstrator, teaching fools in a provincial college,\nmight suddenly become--this. I ask you, Kemp if _you_ ... Anyone, I\ntell you, would have flung himself upon that research. And I worked\nthree years, and every mountain of difficulty I toiled over showed\nanother from its summit. The infinite details! And the exasperation!\nA professor, a provincial professor, always prying. 'When are you\ngoing to publish this work of yours?' was his everlasting question.\nAnd the students, the cramped means! Three years I had of it--\n\n\"And after three years of secrecy and exasperation, I found that to\ncomplete it was impossible--impossible.\"\n\n\"How?\" asked Kemp.\n\n\"Money,\" said the Invisible Man, and went again to stare out of the\nwindow.\n\nHe turned around abruptly. \"I robbed the old man--robbed my\nfather.\n\n\"The money was not his, and he shot himself.\"\n\n\n\nCHAPTER XX\n\nAT THE HOUSE IN GREAT PORTLAND STREET\n\n\nFor a moment Kemp sat in silence, staring at the back of the\nheadless figure at the window. Then he started, struck by a thought,\nrose, took the Invisible Man's arm, and turned him away from the\noutlook.\n\n\"You are tired,\" he said, \"and while I sit, you walk about. Have\nmy chair.\"\n\nHe placed himself between Griffin and the nearest window.\n\nFor a space Griffin sat silent, and then he resumed abruptly:\n\n\"I had left the Chesilstowe cottage already,\" he said, \"when that\nhappened. It was last December. I had taken a room in London, a\nlarge unfurnished room in a big ill-managed lodging-house in a slum\nnear Great Portland Street. The room was soon full of the appliances\nI had bought with his money; the work was going on steadily,\nsuccessfully, drawing near an end. I was like a man emerging from a\nthicket, and suddenly coming on some unmeaning tragedy. I went to\nbury him. My mind was still on this research, and I did not lift\na finger to save his character. I remember the funeral, the cheap\nhearse, the scant ceremony, the windy frost-bitten hillside, and the\nold college friend of his who read the service over him--a shabby,\nblack, bent old man with a snivelling cold.\n\n\"I remember walking back to the empty house, through the place that\nhad once been a village and was now patched and tinkered by the\njerry builders into the ugly likeness of a town. Every way the\nroads ran out at last into the desecrated fields and ended in\nrubble heaps and rank wet weeds. I remember myself as a gaunt black\nfigure, going along the slippery, shiny pavement, and the strange\nsense of detachment I felt from the squalid respectability, the\nsordid commercialism of the place.\n\n\"I did not feel a bit sorry for my father. He seemed to me to be\nthe victim of his own foolish sentimentality. The current cant\nrequired my attendance at his funeral, but it was really not my\naffair.\n\n\"But going along the High Street, my old life came back to me\nfor a space, for I met the girl I had known ten years since.\nOur eyes met.\n\n\"Something moved me to turn back and talk to her. She was a very\nordinary person.\n\n\"It was all like a dream, that visit to the old places. I did not\nfeel then that I was lonely, that I had come out from the world\ninto a desolate place. I appreciated my loss of sympathy, but I put\nit down to the general inanity of things. Re-entering my room\nseemed like the recovery of reality. There were the things I knew\nand loved. There stood the apparatus, the experiments arranged and\nwaiting. And now there was scarcely a difficulty left, beyond the\nplanning of details.\n\n\"I will tell you, Kemp, sooner or later, all the complicated\nprocesses. We need not go into that now. For the most part, saving\ncertain gaps I chose to remember, they are written in cypher in\nthose books that tramp has hidden. We must hunt him down. We must\nget those books again. But the essential phase was to place the\ntransparent object whose refractive index was to be lowered between\ntwo radiating centres of a sort of ethereal vibration, of which I\nwill tell you more fully later. No, not those Roentgen vibrations--I\ndon't know that these others of mine have been described. Yet\nthey are obvious enough. I needed two little dynamos, and these I\nworked with a cheap gas engine. My first experiment was with a bit\nof white wool fabric. It was the strangest thing in the world to\nsee it in the flicker of the flashes soft and white, and then to\nwatch it fade like a wreath of smoke and vanish.\n\n\"I could scarcely believe I had done it. I put my hand into the\nemptiness, and there was the thing as solid as ever. I felt it\nawkwardly, and threw it on the floor. I had a little trouble\nfinding it again.\n\n\"And then came a curious experience. I heard a miaow behind me, and\nturning, saw a lean white cat, very dirty, on the cistern cover\noutside the window. A thought came into my head. 'Everything ready\nfor you,' I said, and went to the window, opened it, and called\nsoftly. She came in, purring--the poor beast was starving--and\nI gave her some milk. All my food was in a cupboard in the\ncorner of the room. After that she went smelling round the room,\nevidently with the idea of making herself at home. The invisible\nrag upset her a bit; you should have seen her spit at it! But I\nmade her comfortable on the pillow of my truckle-bed. And I gave\nher butter to get her to wash.\"\n\n\"And you processed her?\"\n\n\"I processed her. But giving drugs to a cat is no joke, Kemp! And\nthe process failed.\"\n\n\"Failed!\"\n\n\"In two particulars. These were the claws and the pigment stuff,\nwhat is it?--at the back of the eye in a cat. You know?\"\n\n\"_Tapetum_.\"\n\n\"Yes, the _tapetum_. It didn't go. After I'd given the stuff to\nbleach the blood and done certain other things to her, I gave the\nbeast opium, and put her and the pillow she was sleeping on, on the\napparatus. And after all the rest had faded and vanished, there\nremained two little ghosts of her eyes.\"\n\n\"Odd!\"\n\n\"I can't explain it. She was bandaged and clamped, of course--so\nI had her safe; but she woke while she was still misty, and miaowed\ndismally, and someone came knocking. It was an old woman from\ndownstairs, who suspected me of vivisecting--a drink-sodden old\ncreature, with only a white cat to care for in all the world. I\nwhipped out some chloroform, applied it, and answered the door.\n'Did I hear a cat?' she asked. 'My cat?' 'Not here,' said I, very\npolitely. She was a little doubtful and tried to peer past me into\nthe room; strange enough to her no doubt--bare walls, uncurtained\nwindows, truckle-bed, with the gas engine vibrating, and the\nseethe of the radiant points, and that faint ghastly stinging of\nchloroform in the air. She had to be satisfied at last and went\naway again.\"\n\n\"How long did it take?\" asked Kemp.\n\n\"Three or four hours--the cat. The bones and sinews and the fat\nwere the last to go, and the tips of the coloured hairs. And, as I\nsay, the back part of the eye, tough, iridescent stuff it is,\nwouldn't go at all.\n\n\"It was night outside long before the business was over, and nothing\nwas to be seen but the dim eyes and the claws. I stopped the gas\nengine, felt for and stroked the beast, which was still insensible,\nand then, being tired, left it sleeping on the invisible pillow and\nwent to bed. I found it hard to sleep. I lay awake thinking weak\naimless stuff, going over the experiment over and over again, or\ndreaming feverishly of things growing misty and vanishing about me,\nuntil everything, the ground I stood on, vanished, and so I came to\nthat sickly falling nightmare one gets. About two, the cat began\nmiaowing about the room. I tried to hush it by talking to it, and\nthen I decided to turn it out. I remember the shock I had when\nstriking a light--there were just the round eyes shining green--and\nnothing round them. I would have given it milk, but I hadn't any. It\nwouldn't be quiet, it just sat down and miaowed at the door. I tried\nto catch it, with an idea of putting it out of the window, but it\nwouldn't be caught, it vanished. Then it began miaowing in different\nparts of the room. At last I opened the window and made a bustle. I\nsuppose it went out at last. I never saw any more of it.\n\n\"Then--Heaven knows why--I fell thinking of my father's funeral\nagain, and the dismal windy hillside, until the day had come. I\nfound sleeping was hopeless, and, locking my door after me,\nwandered out into the morning streets.\"\n\n\"You don't mean to say there's an invisible cat at large!\" said\nKemp.\n\n\"If it hasn't been killed,\" said the Invisible Man. \"Why not?\"\n\n\"Why not?\" said Kemp. \"I didn't mean to interrupt.\"\n\n\"It's very probably been killed,\" said the Invisible Man. \"It\nwas alive four days after, I know, and down a grating in Great\nTitchfield Street; because I saw a crowd round the place, trying\nto see whence the miaowing came.\"\n\nHe was silent for the best part of a minute. Then he resumed\nabruptly:\n\n\"I remember that morning before the change very vividly. I must have\ngone up Great Portland Street. I remember the barracks in Albany\nStreet, and the horse soldiers coming out, and at last I found the\nsummit of Primrose Hill. It was a sunny day in January--one of those\nsunny, frosty days that came before the snow this year. My weary\nbrain tried to formulate the position, to plot out a plan of action.\n\n\"I was surprised to find, now that my prize was within my grasp, how\ninconclusive its attainment seemed. As a matter of fact I was worked\nout; the intense stress of nearly four years' continuous work left\nme incapable of any strength of feeling. I was apathetic, and I\ntried in vain to recover the enthusiasm of my first inquiries,\nthe passion of discovery that had enabled me to compass even the\ndownfall of my father's grey hairs. Nothing seemed to matter. I saw\npretty clearly this was a transient mood, due to overwork and want\nof sleep, and that either by drugs or rest it would be possible to\nrecover my energies.\n\n\"All I could think clearly was that the thing had to be carried\nthrough; the fixed idea still ruled me. And soon, for the money I\nhad was almost exhausted. I looked about me at the hillside, with\nchildren playing and girls watching them, and tried to think of all\nthe fantastic advantages an invisible man would have in the world.\nAfter a time I crawled home, took some food and a strong dose of\nstrychnine, and went to sleep in my clothes on my unmade bed.\nStrychnine is a grand tonic, Kemp, to take the flabbiness out of\na man.\"\n\n\"It's the devil,\" said Kemp. \"It's the palaeolithic in a bottle.\"\n\n\"I awoke vastly invigorated and rather irritable. You know?\"\n\n\"I know the stuff.\"\n\n\"And there was someone rapping at the door. It was my landlord\nwith threats and inquiries, an old Polish Jew in a long grey coat\nand greasy slippers. I had been tormenting a cat in the night, he\nwas sure--the old woman's tongue had been busy. He insisted on\nknowing all about it. The laws in this country against vivisection\nwere very severe--he might be liable. I denied the cat. Then the\nvibration of the little gas engine could be felt all over the\nhouse, he said. That was true, certainly. He edged round me into\nthe room, peering about over his German-silver spectacles, and a\nsudden dread came into my mind that he might carry away something\nof my secret. I tried to keep between him and the concentrating\napparatus I had arranged, and that only made him more curious. What\nwas I doing? Why was I always alone and secretive? Was it legal?\nWas it dangerous? I paid nothing but the usual rent. His had always\nbeen a most respectable house--in a disreputable neighbourhood.\nSuddenly my temper gave way. I told him to get out. He began to\nprotest, to jabber of his right of entry. In a moment I had him by\nthe collar; something ripped, and he went spinning out into his own\npassage. I slammed and locked the door and sat down quivering.\n\n\"He made a fuss outside, which I disregarded, and after a time he\nwent away.\n\n\"But this brought matters to a crisis. I did not know what he\nwould do, nor even what he had the power to do. To move to fresh\napartments would have meant delay; altogether I had barely twenty\npounds left in the world, for the most part in a bank--and I\ncould not afford that. Vanish! It was irresistible. Then there\nwould be an inquiry, the sacking of my room.\n\n\"At the thought of the possibility of my work being exposed or\ninterrupted at its very climax, I became very angry and active. I\nhurried out with my three books of notes, my cheque-book--the tramp\nhas them now--and directed them from the nearest Post Office to a\nhouse of call for letters and parcels in Great Portland Street. I\ntried to go out noiselessly. Coming in, I found my landlord going\nquietly upstairs; he had heard the door close, I suppose. You would\nhave laughed to see him jump aside on the landing as I came tearing\nafter him. He glared at me as I went by him, and I made the house\nquiver with the slamming of my door. I heard him come shuffling up\nto my floor, hesitate, and go down. I set to work upon my\npreparations forthwith.\n\n\"It was all done that evening and night. While I was still sitting\nunder the sickly, drowsy influence of the drugs that decolourise\nblood, there came a repeated knocking at the door. It ceased,\nfootsteps went away and returned, and the knocking was resumed.\nThere was an attempt to push something under the door--a blue\npaper. Then in a fit of irritation I rose and went and flung the\ndoor wide open. 'Now then?' said I.\n\n\"It was my landlord, with a notice of ejectment or something. He\nheld it out to me, saw something odd about my hands, I expect, and\nlifted his eyes to my face.\n\n\"For a moment he gaped. Then he gave a sort of inarticulate cry,\ndropped candle and writ together, and went blundering down the dark\npassage to the stairs. I shut the door, locked it, and went to the\nlooking-glass. Then I understood his terror.... My face was\nwhite--like white stone.\n\n\"But it was all horrible. I had not expected the suffering. A night\nof racking anguish, sickness and fainting. I set my teeth, though my\nskin was presently afire, all my body afire; but I lay there like\ngrim death. I understood now how it was the cat had howled until I\nchloroformed it. Lucky it was I lived alone and untended in my room.\nThere were times when I sobbed and groaned and talked. But I stuck\nto it.... I became insensible and woke languid in the darkness.\n\n\"The pain had passed. I thought I was killing myself and I did not\ncare. I shall never forget that dawn, and the strange horror of\nseeing that my hands had become as clouded glass, and watching them\ngrow clearer and thinner as the day went by, until at last I could\nsee the sickly disorder of my room through them, though I closed my\ntransparent eyelids. My limbs became glassy, the bones and arteries\nfaded, vanished, and the little white nerves went last. I gritted\nmy teeth and stayed there to the end. At last only the dead tips of\nthe fingernails remained, pallid and white, and the brown stain of\nsome acid upon my fingers.\n\n\"I struggled up. At first I was as incapable as a swathed\ninfant--stepping with limbs I could not see. I was weak and very\nhungry. I went and stared at nothing in my shaving-glass, at nothing\nsave where an attenuated pigment still remained behind the retina of\nmy eyes, fainter than mist. I had to hang on to the table and press\nmy forehead against the glass.\n\n\"It was only by a frantic effort of will that I dragged myself back\nto the apparatus and completed the process.\n\n\"I slept during the forenoon, pulling the sheet over my eyes to shut\nout the light, and about midday I was awakened again by a knocking.\nMy strength had returned. I sat up and listened and heard a\nwhispering. I sprang to my feet and as noiselessly as possible began\nto detach the connections of my apparatus, and to distribute it\nabout the room, so as to destroy the suggestions of its arrangement.\nPresently the knocking was renewed and voices called, first my\nlandlord's, and then two others. To gain time I answered them. The\ninvisible rag and pillow came to hand and I opened the window and\npitched them out on to the cistern cover. As the window opened, a\nheavy crash came at the door. Someone had charged it with the idea\nof smashing the lock. But the stout bolts I had screwed up some\ndays before stopped him. That startled me, made me angry. I began\nto tremble and do things hurriedly.\n\n\"I tossed together some loose paper, straw, packing paper and so\nforth, in the middle of the room, and turned on the gas. Heavy\nblows began to rain upon the door. I could not find the matches. I\nbeat my hands on the wall with rage. I turned down the gas again,\nstepped out of the window on the cistern cover, very softly lowered\nthe sash, and sat down, secure and invisible, but quivering with\nanger, to watch events. They split a panel, I saw, and in another\nmoment they had broken away the staples of the bolts and stood in\nthe open doorway. It was the landlord and his two step-sons, sturdy\nyoung men of three or four and twenty. Behind them fluttered the\nold hag of a woman from downstairs.\n\n\"You may imagine their astonishment to find the room empty. One of\nthe younger men rushed to the window at once, flung it up and stared\nout. His staring eyes and thick-lipped bearded face came a foot\nfrom my face. I was half minded to hit his silly countenance, but I\narrested my doubled fist. He stared right through me. So did the\nothers as they joined him. The old man went and peered under the\nbed, and then they all made a rush for the cupboard. They had to\nargue about it at length in Yiddish and Cockney English. They\nconcluded I had not answered them, that their imagination had\ndeceived them. A feeling of extraordinary elation took the place\nof my anger as I sat outside the window and watched these four\npeople--for the old lady came in, glancing suspiciously about her\nlike a cat, trying to understand the riddle of my behaviour.\n\n\"The old man, so far as I could understand his _patois_, agreed with\nthe old lady that I was a vivisectionist. The sons protested in\ngarbled English that I was an electrician, and appealed to the\ndynamos and radiators. They were all nervous about my arrival,\nalthough I found subsequently that they had bolted the front door.\nThe old lady peered into the cupboard and under the bed, and one of\nthe young men pushed up the register and stared up the chimney. One\nof my fellow lodgers, a coster-monger who shared the opposite room\nwith a butcher, appeared on the landing, and he was called in and\ntold incoherent things.\n\n\"It occurred to me that the radiators, if they fell into the hands\nof some acute well-educated person, would give me away too much,\nand watching my opportunity, I came into the room and tilted one of\nthe little dynamos off its fellow on which it was standing, and\nsmashed both apparatus. Then, while they were trying to explain the\nsmash, I dodged out of the room and went softly downstairs.\n\n\"I went into one of the sitting-rooms and waited until they came\ndown, still speculating and argumentative, all a little disappointed\nat finding no 'horrors,' and all a little puzzled how they stood\nlegally towards me. Then I slipped up again with a box of matches,\nfired my heap of paper and rubbish, put the chairs and bedding\nthereby, led the gas to the affair, by means of an india-rubber\ntube, and waving a farewell to the room left it for the last time.\"\n\n\"You fired the house!\" exclaimed Kemp.\n\n\"Fired the house. It was the only way to cover my trail--and no\ndoubt it was insured. I slipped the bolts of the front door quietly\nand went out into the street. I was invisible, and I was only just\nbeginning to realise the extraordinary advantage my invisibility\ngave me. My head was already teeming with plans of all the wild and\nwonderful things I had now impunity to do.\"\n\n\n\nCHAPTER XXI\n\nIN OXFORD STREET\n\n\n\"In going downstairs the first time I found an unexpected difficulty\nbecause I could not see my feet; indeed I stumbled twice, and there\nwas an unaccustomed clumsiness in gripping the bolt. By not looking\ndown, however, I managed to walk on the level passably well.\n\n\"My mood, I say, was one of exaltation. I felt as a seeing man\nmight do, with padded feet and noiseless clothes, in a city of the\nblind. I experienced a wild impulse to jest, to startle people, to\nclap men on the back, fling people's hats astray, and generally\nrevel in my extraordinary advantage.\n\n\"But hardly had I emerged upon Great Portland Street, however (my\nlodging was close to the big draper's shop there), when I heard a\nclashing concussion and was hit violently behind, and turning saw\na man carrying a basket of soda-water syphons, and looking in\namazement at his burden. Although the blow had really hurt me, I\nfound something so irresistible in his astonishment that I laughed\naloud. 'The devil's in the basket,' I said, and suddenly twisted\nit out of his hand. He let go incontinently, and I swung the whole\nweight into the air.\n\n\"But a fool of a cabman, standing outside a public house, made a\nsudden rush for this, and his extending fingers took me with\nexcruciating violence under the ear. I let the whole down with a\nsmash on the cabman, and then, with shouts and the clatter of feet\nabout me, people coming out of shops, vehicles pulling up, I\nrealised what I had done for myself, and cursing my folly, backed\nagainst a shop window and prepared to dodge out of the confusion. In\na moment I should be wedged into a crowd and inevitably discovered.\nI pushed by a butcher boy, who luckily did not turn to see the\nnothingness that shoved him aside, and dodged behind the cab-man's\nfour-wheeler. I do not know how they settled the business. I hurried\nstraight across the road, which was happily clear, and hardly\nheeding which way I went, in the fright of detection the incident\nhad given me, plunged into the afternoon throng of Oxford Street.\n\n\"I tried to get into the stream of people, but they were too thick\nfor me, and in a moment my heels were being trodden upon. I took to\nthe gutter, the roughness of which I found painful to my feet, and\nforthwith the shaft of a crawling hansom dug me forcibly under the\nshoulder blade, reminding me that I was already bruised severely. I\nstaggered out of the way of the cab, avoided a perambulator by a\nconvulsive movement, and found myself behind the hansom. A happy\nthought saved me, and as this drove slowly along I followed in its\nimmediate wake, trembling and astonished at the turn of my\nadventure. And not only trembling, but shivering. It was a bright\nday in January and I was stark naked and the thin slime of mud that\ncovered the road was freezing. Foolish as it seems to me now, I had\nnot reckoned that, transparent or not, I was still amenable to the\nweather and all its consequences.\n\n\"Then suddenly a bright idea came into my head. I ran round and got\ninto the cab. And so, shivering, scared, and sniffing with the first\nintimations of a cold, and with the bruises in the small of my back\ngrowing upon my attention, I drove slowly along Oxford Street and\npast Tottenham Court Road. My mood was as different from that in\nwhich I had sallied forth ten minutes ago as it is possible to\nimagine. This invisibility indeed! The one thought that possessed\nme was--how was I to get out of the scrape I was in.\n\n\"We crawled past Mudie's, and there a tall woman with five or six\nyellow-labelled books hailed my cab, and I sprang out just in time\nto escape her, shaving a railway van narrowly in my flight. I made\noff up the roadway to Bloomsbury Square, intending to strike north\npast the Museum and so get into the quiet district. I was now\ncruelly chilled, and the strangeness of my situation so unnerved me\nthat I whimpered as I ran. At the northward corner of the Square a\nlittle white dog ran out of the Pharmaceutical Society's offices,\nand incontinently made for me, nose down.\n\n\"I had never realised it before, but the nose is to the mind of a\ndog what the eye is to the mind of a seeing man. Dogs perceive the\nscent of a man moving as men perceive his vision. This brute began\nbarking and leaping, showing, as it seemed to me, only too plainly\nthat he was aware of me. I crossed Great Russell Street, glancing\nover my shoulder as I did so, and went some way along Montague\nStreet before I realised what I was running towards.\n\n\"Then I became aware of a blare of music, and looking along the\nstreet saw a number of people advancing out of Russell Square, red\nshirts, and the banner of the Salvation Army to the fore. Such a\ncrowd, chanting in the roadway and scoffing on the pavement, I\ncould not hope to penetrate, and dreading to go back and farther\nfrom home again, and deciding on the spur of the moment, I ran up\nthe white steps of a house facing the museum railings, and stood\nthere until the crowd should have passed. Happily the dog stopped\nat the noise of the band too, hesitated, and turned tail, running\nback to Bloomsbury Square again.\n\n\"On came the band, bawling with unconscious irony some hymn about\n'When shall we see His face?' and it seemed an interminable time\nto me before the tide of the crowd washed along the pavement by me.\nThud, thud, thud, came the drum with a vibrating resonance, and for\nthe moment I did not notice two urchins stopping at the railings by\nme. 'See 'em,' said one. 'See what?' said the other. 'Why--them\nfootmarks--bare. Like what you makes in mud.'\n\n\"I looked down and saw the youngsters had stopped and were gaping\nat the muddy footmarks I had left behind me up the newly whitened\nsteps. The passing people elbowed and jostled them, but their\nconfounded intelligence was arrested. 'Thud, thud, thud, when,\nthud, shall we see, thud, his face, thud, thud.' 'There's a\nbarefoot man gone up them steps, or I don't know nothing,' said\none. 'And he ain't never come down again. And his foot was\na-bleeding.'\n\n\"The thick of the crowd had already passed. 'Looky there, Ted,'\nquoth the younger of the detectives, with the sharpness of surprise\nin his voice, and pointed straight to my feet. I looked down and\nsaw at once the dim suggestion of their outline sketched in\nsplashes of mud. For a moment I was paralysed.\n\n\"'Why, that's rum,' said the elder. 'Dashed rum! It's just like\nthe ghost of a foot, ain't it?' He hesitated and advanced with\noutstretched hand. A man pulled up short to see what he was\ncatching, and then a girl. In another moment he would have touched\nme. Then I saw what to do. I made a step, the boy started back with\nan exclamation, and with a rapid movement I swung myself over into\nthe portico of the next house. But the smaller boy was sharp-eyed\nenough to follow the movement, and before I was well down the\nsteps and upon the pavement, he had recovered from his momentary\nastonishment and was shouting out that the feet had gone over the\nwall.\n\n\"They rushed round and saw my new footmarks flash into being on the\nlower step and upon the pavement. 'What's up?' asked someone.\n'Feet! Look! Feet running!'\n\n\"Everybody in the road, except my three pursuers, was pouring along\nafter the Salvation Army, and this blow not only impeded me but them.\nThere was an eddy of surprise and interrogation. At the cost of\nbowling over one young fellow I got through, and in another moment\nI was rushing headlong round the circuit of Russell Square, with\nsix or seven astonished people following my footmarks. There was\nno time for explanation, or else the whole host would have been\nafter me.\n\n\"Twice I doubled round corners, thrice I crossed the road and came\nback upon my tracks, and then, as my feet grew hot and dry, the\ndamp impressions began to fade. At last I had a breathing space\nand rubbed my feet clean with my hands, and so got away altogether.\nThe last I saw of the chase was a little group of a dozen people\nperhaps, studying with infinite perplexity a slowly drying\nfootprint that had resulted from a puddle in Tavistock Square, a\nfootprint as isolated and incomprehensible to them as Crusoe's\nsolitary discovery.\n\n\"This running warmed me to a certain extent, and I went on with a\nbetter courage through the maze of less frequented roads that runs\nhereabouts. My back had now become very stiff and sore, my tonsils\nwere painful from the cabman's fingers, and the skin of my neck\nhad been scratched by his nails; my feet hurt exceedingly and I\nwas lame from a little cut on one foot. I saw in time a blind\nman approaching me, and fled limping, for I feared his subtle\nintuitions. Once or twice accidental collisions occurred and I left\npeople amazed, with unaccountable curses ringing in their ears.\nThen came something silent and quiet against my face, and across\nthe Square fell a thin veil of slowly falling flakes of snow. I had\ncaught a cold, and do as I would I could not avoid an occasional\nsneeze. And every dog that came in sight, with its pointing nose\nand curious sniffing, was a terror to me.\n\n\"Then came men and boys running, first one and then others, and\nshouting as they ran. It was a fire. They ran in the direction of\nmy lodging, and looking back down a street I saw a mass of black\nsmoke streaming up above the roofs and telephone wires. It was my\nlodging burning; my clothes, my apparatus, all my resources indeed,\nexcept my cheque-book and the three volumes of memoranda that\nawaited me in Great Portland Street, were there. Burning! I had\nburnt my boats--if ever a man did! The place was blazing.\"\n\nThe Invisible Man paused and thought. Kemp glanced nervously out of\nthe window. \"Yes?\" he said. \"Go on.\"\n\n\n\nCHAPTER XXII\n\nIN THE EMPORIUM\n\n\n\"So last January, with the beginning of a snowstorm in the air\nabout me--and if it settled on me it would betray me!--weary,\ncold, painful, inexpressibly wretched, and still but half convinced\nof my invisible quality, I began this new life to which I am\ncommitted. I had no refuge, no appliances, no human being in the\nworld in whom I could confide. To have told my secret would have\ngiven me away--made a mere show and rarity of me. Nevertheless, I\nwas half-minded to accost some passer-by and throw myself upon his\nmercy. But I knew too clearly the terror and brutal cruelty my\nadvances would evoke. I made no plans in the street. My sole object\nwas to get shelter from the snow, to get myself covered and warm;\nthen I might hope to plan. But even to me, an Invisible Man, the\nrows of London houses stood latched, barred, and bolted\nimpregnably.\n\n\"Only one thing could I see clearly before me--the cold exposure\nand misery of the snowstorm and the night.\n\n\"And then I had a brilliant idea. I turned down one of the roads\nleading from Gower Street to Tottenham Court Road, and found myself\noutside Omniums, the big establishment where everything is to be\nbought--you know the place: meat, grocery, linen, furniture,\nclothing, oil paintings even--a huge meandering collection of shops\nrather than a shop. I had thought I should find the doors open, but\nthey were closed, and as I stood in the wide entrance a carriage\nstopped outside, and a man in uniform--you know the kind of\npersonage with 'Omnium' on his cap--flung open the door. I contrived\nto enter, and walking down the shop--it was a department where they\nwere selling ribbons and gloves and stockings and that kind of\nthing--came to a more spacious region devoted to picnic baskets and\nwicker furniture.\n\n\"I did not feel safe there, however; people were going to and fro,\nand I prowled restlessly about until I came upon a huge section in\nan upper floor containing multitudes of bedsteads, and over these I\nclambered, and found a resting-place at last among a huge pile of\nfolded flock mattresses. The place was already lit up and agreeably\nwarm, and I decided to remain where I was, keeping a cautious\neye on the two or three sets of shopmen and customers who were\nmeandering through the place, until closing time came. Then I\nshould be able, I thought, to rob the place for food and clothing,\nand disguised, prowl through it and examine its resources, perhaps\nsleep on some of the bedding. That seemed an acceptable plan.\nMy idea was to procure clothing to make myself a muffled but\nacceptable figure, to get money, and then to recover my books\nand parcels where they awaited me, take a lodging somewhere and\nelaborate plans for the complete realisation of the advantages my\ninvisibility gave me (as I still imagined) over my fellow-men.\n\n\"Closing time arrived quickly enough. It could not have been more\nthan an hour after I took up my position on the mattresses before I\nnoticed the blinds of the windows being drawn, and customers being\nmarched doorward. And then a number of brisk young men began with\nremarkable alacrity to tidy up the goods that remained disturbed. I\nleft my lair as the crowds diminished, and prowled cautiously out\ninto the less desolate parts of the shop. I was really surprised to\nobserve how rapidly the young men and women whipped away the goods\ndisplayed for sale during the day. All the boxes of goods, the\nhanging fabrics, the festoons of lace, the boxes of sweets in the\ngrocery section, the displays of this and that, were being whipped\ndown, folded up, slapped into tidy receptacles, and everything that\ncould not be taken down and put away had sheets of some coarse\nstuff like sacking flung over them. Finally all the chairs were\nturned up on to the counters, leaving the floor clear. Directly\neach of these young people had done, he or she made promptly for\nthe door with such an expression of animation as I have rarely\nobserved in a shop assistant before. Then came a lot of youngsters\nscattering sawdust and carrying pails and brooms. I had to dodge\nto get out of the way, and as it was, my ankle got stung with the\nsawdust. For some time, wandering through the swathed and darkened\ndepartments, I could hear the brooms at work. And at last a good\nhour or more after the shop had been closed, came a noise of\nlocking doors. Silence came upon the place, and I found myself\nwandering through the vast and intricate shops, galleries, show-rooms\nof the place, alone. It was very still; in one place I remember\npassing near one of the Tottenham Court Road entrances and listening\nto the tapping of boot-heels of the passers-by.\n\n\"My first visit was to the place where I had seen stockings and\ngloves for sale. It was dark, and I had the devil of a hunt after\nmatches, which I found at last in the drawer of the little cash\ndesk. Then I had to get a candle. I had to tear down wrappings and\nransack a number of boxes and drawers, but at last I managed to turn\nout what I sought; the box label called them lambswool pants, and\nlambswool vests. Then socks, a thick comforter, and then I went to\nthe clothing place and got trousers, a lounge jacket, an overcoat\nand a slouch hat--a clerical sort of hat with the brim turned down.\nI began to feel a human being again, and my next thought was food.\n\n\"Upstairs was a refreshment department, and there I got cold meat.\nThere was coffee still in the urn, and I lit the gas and warmed it\nup again, and altogether I did not do badly. Afterwards, prowling\nthrough the place in search of blankets--I had to put up at last\nwith a heap of down quilts--I came upon a grocery section with\na lot of chocolate and candied fruits, more than was good for me\nindeed--and some white burgundy. And near that was a toy department,\nand I had a brilliant idea. I found some artificial noses--dummy\nnoses, you know, and I thought of dark spectacles. But Omniums had\nno optical department. My nose had been a difficulty indeed--I had\nthought of paint. But the discovery set my mind running on wigs and\nmasks and the like. Finally I went to sleep in a heap of down\nquilts, very warm and comfortable.\n\n\"My last thoughts before sleeping were the most agreeable I had had\nsince the change. I was in a state of physical serenity, and that\nwas reflected in my mind. I thought that I should be able to slip\nout unobserved in the morning with my clothes upon me, muffling my\nface with a white wrapper I had taken, purchase, with the money I\nhad taken, spectacles and so forth, and so complete my disguise. I\nlapsed into disorderly dreams of all the fantastic things that had\nhappened during the last few days. I saw the ugly little Jew of a\nlandlord vociferating in his rooms; I saw his two sons marvelling,\nand the wrinkled old woman's gnarled face as she asked for her cat.\nI experienced again the strange sensation of seeing the cloth\ndisappear, and so I came round to the windy hillside and the\nsniffing old clergyman mumbling 'Earth to earth, ashes to ashes,\ndust to dust,' at my father's open grave.\n\n\"'You also,' said a voice, and suddenly I was being forced towards\nthe grave. I struggled, shouted, appealed to the mourners, but they\ncontinued stonily following the service; the old clergyman, too,\nnever faltered droning and sniffing through the ritual. I realised\nI was invisible and inaudible, that overwhelming forces had their\ngrip on me. I struggled in vain, I was forced over the brink, the\ncoffin rang hollow as I fell upon it, and the gravel came flying\nafter me in spadefuls. Nobody heeded me, nobody was aware of me. I\nmade convulsive struggles and awoke.\n\n\"The pale London dawn had come, the place was full of a chilly grey\nlight that filtered round the edges of the window blinds. I sat up,\nand for a time I could not think where this ample apartment, with\nits counters, its piles of rolled stuff, its heap of quilts and\ncushions, its iron pillars, might be. Then, as recollection came\nback to me, I heard voices in conversation.\n\n\"Then far down the place, in the brighter light of some department\nwhich had already raised its blinds, I saw two men approaching. I\nscrambled to my feet, looking about me for some way of escape, and\neven as I did so the sound of my movement made them aware of me. I\nsuppose they saw merely a figure moving quietly and quickly away.\n'Who's that?' cried one, and 'Stop there!' shouted the other. I\ndashed around a corner and came full tilt--a faceless figure,\nmind you!--on a lanky lad of fifteen. He yelled and I bowled him\nover, rushed past him, turned another corner, and by a happy\ninspiration threw myself behind a counter. In another moment feet\nwent running past and I heard voices shouting, 'All hands to the\ndoors!' asking what was 'up,' and giving one another advice how to\ncatch me.\n\n\"Lying on the ground, I felt scared out of my wits. But--odd as\nit may seem--it did not occur to me at the moment to take off my\nclothes as I should have done. I had made up my mind, I suppose, to\nget away in them, and that ruled me. And then down the vista of the\ncounters came a bawling of 'Here he is!'\n\n\"I sprang to my feet, whipped a chair off the counter, and sent it\nwhirling at the fool who had shouted, turned, came into another\nround a corner, sent him spinning, and rushed up the stairs. He\nkept his footing, gave a view hallo, and came up the staircase hot\nafter me. Up the staircase were piled a multitude of those\nbright-coloured pot things--what are they?\"\n\n\"Art pots,\" suggested Kemp.\n\n\"That's it! Art pots. Well, I turned at the top step and swung\nround, plucked one out of a pile and smashed it on his silly head\nas he came at me. The whole pile of pots went headlong, and I heard\nshouting and footsteps running from all parts. I made a mad rush\nfor the refreshment place, and there was a man in white like a man\ncook, who took up the chase. I made one last desperate turn and\nfound myself among lamps and ironmongery. I went behind the counter\nof this, and waited for my cook, and as he bolted in at the head of\nthe chase, I doubled him up with a lamp. Down he went, and I\ncrouched down behind the counter and began whipping off my clothes\nas fast as I could. Coat, jacket, trousers, shoes were all right,\nbut a lambswool vest fits a man like a skin. I heard more men\ncoming, my cook was lying quiet on the other side of the counter,\nstunned or scared speechless, and I had to make another dash for\nit, like a rabbit hunted out of a wood-pile.\n\n\"'This way, policeman!' I heard someone shouting. I found myself in\nmy bedstead storeroom again, and at the end of a wilderness of\nwardrobes. I rushed among them, went flat, got rid of my vest after\ninfinite wriggling, and stood a free man again, panting and scared,\nas the policeman and three of the shopmen came round the corner.\nThey made a rush for the vest and pants, and collared the trousers.\n'He's dropping his plunder,' said one of the young men. 'He _must_\nbe somewhere here.'\n\n\"But they did not find me all the same.\n\n\"I stood watching them hunt for me for a time, and cursing my\nill-luck in losing the clothes. Then I went into the refreshment-room,\ndrank a little milk I found there, and sat down by the fire to\nconsider my position.\n\n\"In a little while two assistants came in and began to talk over\nthe business very excitedly and like the fools they were. I heard a\nmagnified account of my depredations, and other speculations as to\nmy whereabouts. Then I fell to scheming again. The insurmountable\ndifficulty of the place, especially now it was alarmed, was to get\nany plunder out of it. I went down into the warehouse to see if\nthere was any chance of packing and addressing a parcel, but I\ncould not understand the system of checking. About eleven o'clock,\nthe snow having thawed as it fell, and the day being finer and a\nlittle warmer than the previous one, I decided that the Emporium\nwas hopeless, and went out again, exasperated at my want of\nsuccess, with only the vaguest plans of action in my mind.\"\n\n\n\nCHAPTER XXIII\n\nIN DRURY LANE\n\n\n\"But you begin now to realise,\" said the Invisible Man, \"the full\ndisadvantage of my condition. I had no shelter--no covering--to\nget clothing was to forego all my advantage, to make myself a\nstrange and terrible thing. I was fasting; for to eat, to fill\nmyself with unassimilated matter, would be to become grotesquely\nvisible again.\"\n\n\"I never thought of that,\" said Kemp.\n\n\"Nor had I. And the snow had warned me of other dangers. I could not\ngo abroad in snow--it would settle on me and expose me. Rain, too,\nwould make me a watery outline, a glistening surface of a man--a\nbubble. And fog--I should be like a fainter bubble in a fog,\na surface, a greasy glimmer of humanity. Moreover, as I went\nabroad--in the London air--I gathered dirt about my ankles, floating\nsmuts and dust upon my skin. I did not know how long it would be\nbefore I should become visible from that cause also. But I saw\nclearly it could not be for long.\n\n\"Not in London at any rate.\n\n\"I went into the slums towards Great Portland Street, and found\nmyself at the end of the street in which I had lodged. I did not\ngo that way, because of the crowd halfway down it opposite to the\nstill smoking ruins of the house I had fired. My most immediate\nproblem was to get clothing. What to do with my face puzzled me.\nThen I saw in one of those little miscellaneous shops--news,\nsweets, toys, stationery, belated Christmas tomfoolery, and so\nforth--an array of masks and noses. I realised that problem was\nsolved. In a flash I saw my course. I turned about, no longer\naimless, and went--circuitously in order to avoid the busy ways,\ntowards the back streets north of the Strand; for I remembered,\nthough not very distinctly where, that some theatrical costumiers\nhad shops in that district.\n\n\"The day was cold, with a nipping wind down the northward running\nstreets. I walked fast to avoid being overtaken. Every crossing was\na danger, every passenger a thing to watch alertly. One man as I\nwas about to pass him at the top of Bedford Street, turned upon\nme abruptly and came into me, sending me into the road and almost\nunder the wheel of a passing hansom. The verdict of the cab-rank\nwas that he had had some sort of stroke. I was so unnerved by this\nencounter that I went into Covent Garden Market and sat down for\nsome time in a quiet corner by a stall of violets, panting and\ntrembling. I found I had caught a fresh cold, and had to turn out\nafter a time lest my sneezes should attract attention.\n\n\"At last I reached the object of my quest, a dirty, fly-blown little\nshop in a by-way near Drury Lane, with a window full of tinsel\nrobes, sham jewels, wigs, slippers, dominoes and theatrical\nphotographs. The shop was old-fashioned and low and dark, and the\nhouse rose above it for four storeys, dark and dismal. I peered\nthrough the window and, seeing no one within, entered. The opening\nof the door set a clanking bell ringing. I left it open, and walked\nround a bare costume stand, into a corner behind a cheval glass. For\na minute or so no one came. Then I heard heavy feet striding across\na room, and a man appeared down the shop.\n\n\"My plans were now perfectly definite. I proposed to make my way\ninto the house, secrete myself upstairs, watch my opportunity, and\nwhen everything was quiet, rummage out a wig, mask, spectacles, and\ncostume, and go into the world, perhaps a grotesque but still a\ncredible figure. And incidentally of course I could rob the house\nof any available money.\n\n\"The man who had just entered the shop was a short, slight,\nhunched, beetle-browed man, with long arms and very short bandy\nlegs. Apparently I had interrupted a meal. He stared about the shop\nwith an expression of expectation. This gave way to surprise, and\nthen to anger, as he saw the shop empty. 'Damn the boys!' he said.\nHe went to stare up and down the street. He came in again in a\nminute, kicked the door to with his foot spitefully, and went\nmuttering back to the house door.\n\n\"I came forward to follow him, and at the noise of my movement he\nstopped dead. I did so too, startled by his quickness of ear. He\nslammed the house door in my face.\n\n\"I stood hesitating. Suddenly I heard his quick footsteps returning,\nand the door reopened. He stood looking about the shop like one who\nwas still not satisfied. Then, murmuring to himself, he examined the\nback of the counter and peered behind some fixtures. Then he stood\ndoubtful. He had left the house door open and I slipped into the\ninner room.\n\n\"It was a queer little room, poorly furnished and with a number of\nbig masks in the corner. On the table was his belated breakfast,\nand it was a confoundedly exasperating thing for me, Kemp, to have\nto sniff his coffee and stand watching while he came in and resumed\nhis meal. And his table manners were irritating. Three doors opened\ninto the little room, one going upstairs and one down, but they\nwere all shut. I could not get out of the room while he was there;\nI could scarcely move because of his alertness, and there was a\ndraught down my back. Twice I strangled a sneeze just in time.\n\n\"The spectacular quality of my sensations was curious and novel, but\nfor all that I was heartily tired and angry long before he had done\nhis eating. But at last he made an end and putting his beggarly\ncrockery on the black tin tray upon which he had had his teapot, and\ngathering all the crumbs up on the mustard stained cloth, he took\nthe whole lot of things after him. His burden prevented his shutting\nthe door behind him--as he would have done; I never saw such a man\nfor shutting doors--and I followed him into a very dirty underground\nkitchen and scullery. I had the pleasure of seeing him begin to wash\nup, and then, finding no good in keeping down there, and the brick\nfloor being cold on my feet, I returned upstairs and sat in his\nchair by the fire. It was burning low, and scarcely thinking, I put\non a little coal. The noise of this brought him up at once, and\nhe stood aglare. He peered about the room and was within an ace\nof touching me. Even after that examination, he scarcely seemed\nsatisfied. He stopped in the doorway and took a final inspection\nbefore he went down.\n\n\"I waited in the little parlour for an age, and at last he came up\nand opened the upstairs door. I just managed to get by him.\n\n\"On the staircase he stopped suddenly, so that I very nearly\nblundered into him. He stood looking back right into my face and\nlistening. 'I could have sworn,' he said. His long hairy hand\npulled at his lower lip. His eye went up and down the staircase.\nThen he grunted and went on up again.\n\n\"His hand was on the handle of a door, and then he stopped again\nwith the same puzzled anger on his face. He was becoming aware of\nthe faint sounds of my movements about him. The man must have had\ndiabolically acute hearing. He suddenly flashed into rage. 'If\nthere's anyone in this house--' he cried with an oath, and left the\nthreat unfinished. He put his hand in his pocket, failed to find\nwhat he wanted, and rushing past me went blundering noisily and\npugnaciously downstairs. But I did not follow him. I sat on the\nhead of the staircase until his return.\n\n\"Presently he came up again, still muttering. He opened the door of\nthe room, and before I could enter, slammed it in my face.\n\n\"I resolved to explore the house, and spent some time in doing so\nas noiselessly as possible. The house was very old and tumble-down,\ndamp so that the paper in the attics was peeling from the walls, and\nrat infested. Some of the door handles were stiff and I was afraid\nto turn them. Several rooms I did inspect were unfurnished, and\nothers were littered with theatrical lumber, bought second-hand, I\njudged, from its appearance. In one room next to his I found a lot\nof old clothes. I began routing among these, and in my eagerness\nforgot again the evident sharpness of his ears. I heard a stealthy\nfootstep and, looking up just in time, saw him peering in at the\ntumbled heap and holding an old-fashioned revolver in his hand.\nI stood perfectly still while he stared about open-mouthed and\nsuspicious. 'It must have been her,' he said slowly. 'Damn her!'\n\n\"He shut the door quietly, and immediately I heard the key turn in\nthe lock. Then his footsteps retreated. I realised abruptly that I\nwas locked in. For a minute I did not know what to do. I walked\nfrom door to window and back, and stood perplexed. A gust of anger\ncame upon me. But I decided to inspect the clothes before I did\nanything further, and my first attempt brought down a pile from an\nupper shelf. This brought him back, more sinister than ever. That\ntime he actually touched me, jumped back with amazement and stood\nastonished in the middle of the room.\n\n\"Presently he calmed a little. 'Rats,' he said in an undertone,\nfingers on lips. He was evidently a little scared. I edged quietly\nout of the room, but a plank creaked. Then the infernal little brute\nstarted going all over the house, revolver in hand and locking door\nafter door and pocketing the keys. When I realised what he was up to\nI had a fit of rage--I could hardly control myself sufficiently to\nwatch my opportunity. By this time I knew he was alone in the house,\nand so I made no more ado, but knocked him on the head.\"\n\n\"Knocked him on the head?\" exclaimed Kemp.\n\n\"Yes--stunned him--as he was going downstairs. Hit him from\nbehind with a stool that stood on the landing. He went downstairs\nlike a bag of old boots.\"\n\n\"But--I say! The common conventions of humanity--\"\n\n\"Are all very well for common people. But the point was, Kemp, that\nI had to get out of that house in a disguise without his seeing me.\nI couldn't think of any other way of doing it. And then I gagged\nhim with a Louis Quatorze vest and tied him up in a sheet.\"\n\n\"Tied him up in a sheet!\"\n\n\"Made a sort of bag of it. It was rather a good idea to keep the\nidiot scared and quiet, and a devilish hard thing to get out\nof--head away from the string. My dear Kemp, it's no good your\nsitting glaring as though I was a murderer. It had to be done. He\nhad his revolver. If once he saw me he would be able to describe\nme--\"\n\n\"But still,\" said Kemp, \"in England--to-day. And the man was in\nhis own house, and you were--well, robbing.\"\n\n\"Robbing! Confound it! You'll call me a thief next! Surely, Kemp,\nyou're not fool enough to dance on the old strings. Can't you see\nmy position?\"\n\n\"And his too,\" said Kemp.\n\nThe Invisible Man stood up sharply. \"What do you mean to say?\"\n\nKemp's face grew a trifle hard. He was about to speak and checked\nhimself. \"I suppose, after all,\" he said with a sudden change of\nmanner, \"the thing had to be done. You were in a fix. But still--\"\n\n\"Of course I was in a fix--an infernal fix. And he made me wild\ntoo--hunting me about the house, fooling about with his revolver,\nlocking and unlocking doors. He was simply exasperating. You don't\nblame me, do you? You don't blame me?\"\n\n\"I never blame anyone,\" said Kemp. \"It's quite out of fashion. What\ndid you do next?\"\n\n\"I was hungry. Downstairs I found a loaf and some rank cheese--more\nthan sufficient to satisfy my hunger. I took some brandy and\nwater, and then went up past my impromptu bag--he was lying quite\nstill--to the room containing the old clothes. This looked out\nupon the street, two lace curtains brown with dirt guarding the\nwindow. I went and peered out through their interstices. Outside\nthe day was bright--by contrast with the brown shadows of the\ndismal house in which I found myself, dazzlingly bright. A brisk\ntraffic was going by, fruit carts, a hansom, a four-wheeler with a\npile of boxes, a fishmonger's cart. I turned with spots of colour\nswimming before my eyes to the shadowy fixtures behind me. My\nexcitement was giving place to a clear apprehension of my position\nagain. The room was full of a faint scent of benzoline, used, I\nsuppose, in cleaning the garments.\n\n\"I began a systematic search of the place. I should judge the\nhunchback had been alone in the house for some time. He was a\ncurious person. Everything that could possibly be of service to me\nI collected in the clothes storeroom, and then I made a deliberate\nselection. I found a handbag I thought a suitable possession, and\nsome powder, rouge, and sticking-plaster.\n\n\"I had thought of painting and powdering my face and all that\nthere was to show of me, in order to render myself visible, but\nthe disadvantage of this lay in the fact that I should require\nturpentine and other appliances and a considerable amount of time\nbefore I could vanish again. Finally I chose a mask of the better\ntype, slightly grotesque but not more so than many human beings,\ndark glasses, greyish whiskers, and a wig. I could find no\nunderclothing, but that I could buy subsequently, and for the time I\nswathed myself in calico dominoes and some white cashmere scarfs. I\ncould find no socks, but the hunchback's boots were rather a loose\nfit and sufficed. In a desk in the shop were three sovereigns and\nabout thirty shillings' worth of silver, and in a locked cupboard I\nburst in the inner room were eight pounds in gold. I could go forth\ninto the world again, equipped.\n\n\"Then came a curious hesitation. Was my appearance really\ncredible? I tried myself with a little bedroom looking-glass,\ninspecting myself from every point of view to discover any\nforgotten chink, but it all seemed sound. I was grotesque to the\ntheatrical pitch, a stage miser, but I was certainly not a physical\nimpossibility. Gathering confidence, I took my looking-glass down\ninto the shop, pulled down the shop blinds, and surveyed myself\nfrom every point of view with the help of the cheval glass in the\ncorner.\n\n\"I spent some minutes screwing up my courage and then unlocked the\nshop door and marched out into the street, leaving the little man\nto get out of his sheet again when he liked. In five minutes a\ndozen turnings intervened between me and the costumier's shop. No\none appeared to notice me very pointedly. My last difficulty seemed\novercome.\"\n\nHe stopped again.\n\n\"And you troubled no more about the hunchback?\" said Kemp.\n\n\"No,\" said the Invisible Man. \"Nor have I heard what became of him.\nI suppose he untied himself or kicked himself out. The knots were\npretty tight.\"\n\nHe became silent and went to the window and stared out.\n\n\"What happened when you went out into the Strand?\"\n\n\"Oh!--disillusionment again. I thought my troubles were over.\nPractically I thought I had impunity to do whatever I chose,\neverything--save to give away my secret. So I thought. Whatever I\ndid, whatever the consequences might be, was nothing to me. I had\nmerely to fling aside my garments and vanish. No person could hold\nme. I could take my money where I found it. I decided to treat\nmyself to a sumptuous feast, and then put up at a good hotel, and\naccumulate a new outfit of property. I felt amazingly confident;\nit's not particularly pleasant recalling that I was an ass. I went\ninto a place and was already ordering lunch, when it occurred to me\nthat I could not eat unless I exposed my invisible face. I finished\nordering the lunch, told the man I should be back in ten minutes,\nand went out exasperated. I don't know if you have ever been\ndisappointed in your appetite.\"\n\n\"Not quite so badly,\" said Kemp, \"but I can imagine it.\"\n\n\"I could have smashed the silly devils. At last, faint with the\ndesire for tasteful food, I went into another place and demanded a\nprivate room. 'I am disfigured,' I said. 'Badly.' They looked at\nme curiously, but of course it was not their affair--and so at\nlast I got my lunch. It was not particularly well served, but it\nsufficed; and when I had had it, I sat over a cigar, trying to plan\nmy line of action. And outside a snowstorm was beginning.\n\n\"The more I thought it over, Kemp, the more I realised what a\nhelpless absurdity an Invisible Man was--in a cold and dirty\nclimate and a crowded civilised city. Before I made this mad\nexperiment I had dreamt of a thousand advantages. That afternoon\nit seemed all disappointment. I went over the heads of the things\na man reckons desirable. No doubt invisibility made it possible\nto get them, but it made it impossible to enjoy them when they\nare got. Ambition--what is the good of pride of place when you\ncannot appear there? What is the good of the love of woman when\nher name must needs be Delilah? I have no taste for politics, for\nthe blackguardisms of fame, for philanthropy, for sport. What was\nI to do? And for this I had become a wrapped-up mystery, a swathed\nand bandaged caricature of a man!\"\n\nHe paused, and his attitude suggested a roving glance at the\nwindow.\n\n\"But how did you get to Iping?\" said Kemp, anxious to keep his\nguest busy talking.\n\n\"I went there to work. I had one hope. It was a half idea! I have\nit still. It is a full blown idea now. A way of getting back! Of\nrestoring what I have done. When I choose. When I have done all I\nmean to do invisibly. And that is what I chiefly want to talk to\nyou about now.\"\n\n\"You went straight to Iping?\"\n\n\"Yes. I had simply to get my three volumes of memoranda and my\ncheque-book, my luggage and underclothing, order a quantity of\nchemicals to work out this idea of mine--I will show you the\ncalculations as soon as I get my books--and then I started. Jove!\nI remember the snowstorm now, and the accursed bother it was to\nkeep the snow from damping my pasteboard nose.\"\n\n\"At the end,\" said Kemp, \"the day before yesterday, when they found\nyou out, you rather--to judge by the papers--\"\n\n\"I did. Rather. Did I kill that fool of a constable?\"\n\n\"No,\" said Kemp. \"He's expected to recover.\"\n\n\"That's his luck, then. I clean lost my temper, the fools! Why\ncouldn't they leave me alone? And that grocer lout?\"\n\n\"There are no deaths expected,\" said Kemp.\n\n\"I don't know about that tramp of mine,\" said the Invisible Man,\nwith an unpleasant laugh.\n\n\"By Heaven, Kemp, you don't know what rage _is_! ... To have worked\nfor years, to have planned and plotted, and then to get some\nfumbling purblind idiot messing across your course! ... Every\nconceivable sort of silly creature that has ever been created has\nbeen sent to cross me.\n\n\"If I have much more of it, I shall go wild--I shall start\nmowing 'em.\n\n\"As it is, they've made things a thousand times more difficult.\"\n\n\"No doubt it's exasperating,\" said Kemp, drily.\n\n\n\nCHAPTER XXIV\n\nTHE PLAN THAT FAILED\n\n\n\"But now,\" said Kemp, with a side glance out of the window, \"what\nare we to do?\"\n\nHe moved nearer his guest as he spoke in such a manner as to\nprevent the possibility of a sudden glimpse of the three men who\nwere advancing up the hill road--with an intolerable slowness, as\nit seemed to Kemp.\n\n\"What were you planning to do when you were heading for Port\nBurdock? _Had_ you any plan?\"\n\n\"I was going to clear out of the country. But I have altered that\nplan rather since seeing you. I thought it would be wise, now the\nweather is hot and invisibility possible, to make for the South.\nEspecially as my secret was known, and everyone would be on the\nlookout for a masked and muffled man. You have a line of steamers\nfrom here to France. My idea was to get aboard one and run the\nrisks of the passage. Thence I could go by train into Spain, or else\nget to Algiers. It would not be difficult. There a man might always\nbe invisible--and yet live. And do things. I was using that tramp\nas a money box and luggage carrier, until I decided how to get my\nbooks and things sent over to meet me.\"\n\n\"That's clear.\"\n\n\"And then the filthy brute must needs try and rob me! He _has_ hidden\nmy books, Kemp. Hidden my books! If I can lay my hands on him!\"\n\n\"Best plan to get the books out of him first.\"\n\n\"But where is he? Do you know?\"\n\n\"He's in the town police station, locked up, by his own request, in\nthe strongest cell in the place.\"\n\n\"Cur!\" said the Invisible Man.\n\n\"But that hangs up your plans a little.\"\n\n\"We must get those books; those books are vital.\"\n\n\"Certainly,\" said Kemp, a little nervously, wondering if he heard\nfootsteps outside. \"Certainly we must get those books. But that\nwon't be difficult, if he doesn't know they're for you.\"\n\n\"No,\" said the Invisible Man, and thought.\n\nKemp tried to think of something to keep the talk going, but the\nInvisible Man resumed of his own accord.\n\n\"Blundering into your house, Kemp,\" he said, \"changes all my plans.\nFor you are a man that can understand. In spite of all that has\nhappened, in spite of this publicity, of the loss of my books, of\nwhat I have suffered, there still remain great possibilities, huge\npossibilities--\"\n\n\"You have told no one I am here?\" he asked abruptly.\n\nKemp hesitated. \"That was implied,\" he said.\n\n\"No one?\" insisted Griffin.\n\n\"Not a soul.\"\n\n\"Ah! Now--\" The Invisible Man stood up, and sticking his arms akimbo\nbegan to pace the study.\n\n\"I made a mistake, Kemp, a huge mistake, in carrying this thing\nthrough alone. I have wasted strength, time, opportunities. Alone--it\nis wonderful how little a man can do alone! To rob a little,\nto hurt a little, and there is the end.\n\n\"What I want, Kemp, is a goal-keeper, a helper, and a hiding-place,\nan arrangement whereby I can sleep and eat and rest in peace, and\nunsuspected. I must have a confederate. With a confederate, with\nfood and rest--a thousand things are possible.\n\n\"Hitherto I have gone on vague lines. We have to consider all that\ninvisibility means, all that it does not mean. It means little\nadvantage for eavesdropping and so forth--one makes sounds. It's\nof little help--a little help perhaps--in housebreaking and so\nforth. Once you've caught me you could easily imprison me. But on\nthe other hand I am hard to catch. This invisibility, in fact, is\nonly good in two cases: It's useful in getting away, it's useful in\napproaching. It's particularly useful, therefore, in killing. I can\nwalk round a man, whatever weapon he has, choose my point, strike\nas I like. Dodge as I like. Escape as I like.\"\n\nKemp's hand went to his moustache. Was that a movement\ndownstairs?\n\n\"And it is killing we must do, Kemp.\"\n\n\"It is killing we must do,\" repeated Kemp. \"I'm listening to your\nplan, Griffin, but I'm not agreeing, mind. _Why_ killing?\"\n\n\"Not wanton killing, but a judicious slaying. The point is, they\nknow there is an Invisible Man--as well as we know there is an\nInvisible Man. And that Invisible Man, Kemp, must now establish a\nReign of Terror. Yes; no doubt it's startling. But I mean it. A\nReign of Terror. He must take some town like your Burdock and\nterrify and dominate it. He must issue his orders. He can do that\nin a thousand ways--scraps of paper thrust under doors would\nsuffice. And all who disobey his orders he must kill, and kill\nall who would defend them.\"\n\n\"Humph!\" said Kemp, no longer listening to Griffin but to the sound\nof his front door opening and closing.\n\n\"It seems to me, Griffin,\" he said, to cover his wandering\nattention, \"that your confederate would be in a difficult\nposition.\"\n\n\"No one would know he was a confederate,\" said the Invisible Man,\neagerly. And then suddenly, \"Hush! What's that downstairs?\"\n\n\"Nothing,\" said Kemp, and suddenly began to speak loud and fast.\n\"I don't agree to this, Griffin,\" he said. \"Understand me, I don't\nagree to this. Why dream of playing a game against the race? How\ncan you hope to gain happiness? Don't be a lone wolf. Publish\nyour results; take the world--take the nation at least--into your\nconfidence. Think what you might do with a million helpers--\"\n\nThe Invisible Man interrupted--arm extended. \"There are\nfootsteps coming upstairs,\" he said in a low voice.\n\n\"Nonsense,\" said Kemp.\n\n\"Let me see,\" said the Invisible Man, and advanced, arm extended,\nto the door.\n\nAnd then things happened very swiftly. Kemp hesitated for a second\nand then moved to intercept him. The Invisible Man started and stood\nstill. \"Traitor!\" cried the Voice, and suddenly the dressing-gown\nopened, and sitting down the Unseen began to disrobe. Kemp made\nthree swift steps to the door, and forthwith the Invisible Man--his\nlegs had vanished--sprang to his feet with a shout. Kemp flung the\ndoor open.\n\nAs it opened, there came a sound of hurrying feet downstairs and\nvoices.\n\nWith a quick movement Kemp thrust the Invisible Man back, sprang\naside, and slammed the door. The key was outside and ready. In\nanother moment Griffin would have been alone in the belvedere\nstudy, a prisoner. Save for one little thing. The key had been\nslipped in hastily that morning. As Kemp slammed the door it fell\nnoisily upon the carpet.\n\nKemp's face became white. He tried to grip the door handle with\nboth hands. For a moment he stood lugging. Then the door gave six\ninches. But he got it closed again. The second time it was jerked a\nfoot wide, and the dressing-gown came wedging itself into the\nopening. His throat was gripped by invisible fingers, and he left\nhis hold on the handle to defend himself. He was forced back,\ntripped and pitched heavily into the corner of the landing. The\nempty dressing-gown was flung on the top of him.\n\nHalfway up the staircase was Colonel Adye, the recipient of Kemp's\nletter, the chief of the Burdock police. He was staring aghast at\nthe sudden appearance of Kemp, followed by the extraordinary sight\nof clothing tossing empty in the air. He saw Kemp felled, and\nstruggling to his feet. He saw him rush forward, and go down again,\nfelled like an ox.\n\nThen suddenly he was struck violently. By nothing! A vast weight,\nit seemed, leapt upon him, and he was hurled headlong down the\nstaircase, with a grip on his throat and a knee in his groin. An\ninvisible foot trod on his back, a ghostly patter passed downstairs,\nhe heard the two police officers in the hall shout and run, and the\nfront door of the house slammed violently.\n\nHe rolled over and sat up staring. He saw, staggering down the\nstaircase, Kemp, dusty and disheveled, one side of his face white\nfrom a blow, his lip bleeding, and a pink dressing-gown and some\nunderclothing held in his arms.\n\n\"My God!\" cried Kemp, \"the game's up! He's gone!\"\n\n\n\nCHAPTER XXV\n\nTHE HUNTING OF THE INVISIBLE MAN\n\n\nFor a space Kemp was too inarticulate to make Adye understand the\nswift things that had just happened. They stood on the landing,\nKemp speaking swiftly, the grotesque swathings of Griffin still on\nhis arm. But presently Adye began to grasp something of the\nsituation.\n\n\"He is mad,\" said Kemp; \"inhuman. He is pure selfishness. He thinks\nof nothing but his own advantage, his own safety. I have listened\nto such a story this morning of brutal self-seeking.... He has wounded\nmen. He will kill them unless we can prevent him. He will create a\npanic. Nothing can stop him. He is going out now--furious!\"\n\n\"He must be caught,\" said Adye. \"That is certain.\"\n\n\"But how?\" cried Kemp, and suddenly became full of ideas. \"You must\nbegin at once. You must set every available man to work; you must\nprevent his leaving this district. Once he gets away, he may go\nthrough the countryside as he wills, killing and maiming. He dreams\nof a reign of terror! A reign of terror, I tell you. You must set a\nwatch on trains and roads and shipping. The garrison must help. You\nmust wire for help. The only thing that may keep him here is the\nthought of recovering some books of notes he counts of value. I will\ntell you of that! There is a man in your police station--Marvel.\"\n\n\"I know,\" said Adye, \"I know. Those books--yes. But the tramp....\"\n\n\"Says he hasn't them. But he thinks the tramp has. And you must\nprevent him from eating or sleeping; day and night the country must\nbe astir for him. Food must be locked up and secured, all food, so\nthat he will have to break his way to it. The houses everywhere must\nbe barred against him. Heaven send us cold nights and rain! The\nwhole country-side must begin hunting and keep hunting. I tell you,\nAdye, he is a danger, a disaster; unless he is pinned and secured,\nit is frightful to think of the things that may happen.\"\n\n\"What else can we do?\" said Adye. \"I must go down at once and begin\norganising. But why not come? Yes--you come too! Come, and we\nmust hold a sort of council of war--get Hopps to help--and the\nrailway managers. By Jove! it's urgent. Come along--tell me as we\ngo. What else is there we can do? Put that stuff down.\"\n\nIn another moment Adye was leading the way downstairs. They found\nthe front door open and the policemen standing outside staring at\nempty air. \"He's got away, sir,\" said one.\n\n\"We must go to the central station at once,\" said Adye. \"One of you\ngo on down and get a cab to come up and meet us--quickly. And\nnow, Kemp, what else?\"\n\n\"Dogs,\" said Kemp. \"Get dogs. They don't see him, but they wind\nhim. Get dogs.\"\n\n\"Good,\" said Adye. \"It's not generally known, but the prison\nofficials over at Halstead know a man with bloodhounds. Dogs. What\nelse?\"\n\n\"Bear in mind,\" said Kemp, \"his food shows. After eating, his food\nshows until it is assimilated. So that he has to hide after eating.\nYou must keep on beating. Every thicket, every quiet corner. And\nput all weapons--all implements that might be weapons, away. He\ncan't carry such things for long. And what he can snatch up and\nstrike men with must be hidden away.\"\n\n\"Good again,\" said Adye. \"We shall have him yet!\"\n\n\"And on the roads,\" said Kemp, and hesitated.\n\n\"Yes?\" said Adye.\n\n\"Powdered glass,\" said Kemp. \"It's cruel, I know. But think of what\nhe may do!\"\n\nAdye drew the air in sharply between his teeth. \"It's\nunsportsmanlike. I don't know. But I'll have powdered glass got\nready. If he goes too far....\"\n\n\"The man's become inhuman, I tell you,\" said Kemp. \"I am as sure he\nwill establish a reign of terror--so soon as he has got over the\nemotions of this escape--as I am sure I am talking to you. Our\nonly chance is to be ahead. He has cut himself off from his kind.\nHis blood be upon his own head.\"\n\n\n\nCHAPTER XXVI\n\nTHE WICKSTEED MURDER\n\n\nThe Invisible Man seems to have rushed out of Kemp's house in a\nstate of blind fury. A little child playing near Kemp's gateway was\nviolently caught up and thrown aside, so that its ankle was broken,\nand thereafter for some hours the Invisible Man passed out of human\nperceptions. No one knows where he went nor what he did. But one\ncan imagine him hurrying through the hot June forenoon, up the\nhill and on to the open downland behind Port Burdock, raging and\ndespairing at his intolerable fate, and sheltering at last, heated\nand weary, amid the thickets of Hintondean, to piece together again\nhis shattered schemes against his species. That seems the most\nprobable refuge for him, for there it was he re-asserted himself in\na grimly tragical manner about two in the afternoon.\n\nOne wonders what his state of mind may have been during that time,\nand what plans he devised. No doubt he was almost ecstatically\nexasperated by Kemp's treachery, and though we may be able to\nunderstand the motives that led to that deceit, we may still\nimagine and even sympathise a little with the fury the attempted\nsurprise must have occasioned. Perhaps something of the stunned\nastonishment of his Oxford Street experiences may have returned to\nhim, for he had evidently counted on Kemp's co-operation in his\nbrutal dream of a terrorised world. At any rate he vanished from\nhuman ken about midday, and no living witness can tell what he did\nuntil about half-past two. It was a fortunate thing, perhaps, for\nhumanity, but for him it was a fatal inaction.\n\nDuring that time a growing multitude of men scattered over the\ncountryside were busy. In the morning he had still been simply a\nlegend, a terror; in the afternoon, by virtue chiefly of Kemp's\ndrily worded proclamation, he was presented as a tangible\nantagonist, to be wounded, captured, or overcome, and the\ncountryside began organising itself with inconceivable rapidity.\nBy two o'clock even he might still have removed himself out of\nthe district by getting aboard a train, but after two that became\nimpossible. Every passenger train along the lines on a great\nparallelogram between Southampton, Manchester, Brighton and Horsham,\ntravelled with locked doors, and the goods traffic was almost\nentirely suspended. And in a great circle of twenty miles round Port\nBurdock, men armed with guns and bludgeons were presently setting\nout in groups of three and four, with dogs, to beat the roads and\nfields.\n\nMounted policemen rode along the country lanes, stopping at every\ncottage and warning the people to lock up their houses, and keep\nindoors unless they were armed, and all the elementary schools had\nbroken up by three o'clock, and the children, scared and keeping\ntogether in groups, were hurrying home. Kemp's proclamation--signed\nindeed by Adye--was posted over almost the whole district by four or\nfive o'clock in the afternoon. It gave briefly but clearly all the\nconditions of the struggle, the necessity of keeping the Invisible\nMan from food and sleep, the necessity for incessant watchfulness\nand for a prompt attention to any evidence of his movements. And\nso swift and decided was the action of the authorities, so prompt\nand universal was the belief in this strange being, that before\nnightfall an area of several hundred square miles was in a stringent\nstate of siege. And before nightfall, too, a thrill of horror\nwent through the whole watching nervous countryside. Going from\nwhispering mouth to mouth, swift and certain over the length and\nbreadth of the country, passed the story of the murder of Mr.\nWicksteed.\n\nIf our supposition that the Invisible Man's refuge was the\nHintondean thickets, then we must suppose that in the early\nafternoon he sallied out again bent upon some project that involved\nthe use of a weapon. We cannot know what the project was, but the\nevidence that he had the iron rod in hand before he met Wicksteed\nis to me at least overwhelming.\n\nOf course we can know nothing of the details of that encounter.\nIt occurred on the edge of a gravel pit, not two hundred yards\nfrom Lord Burdock's lodge gate. Everything points to a desperate\nstruggle--the trampled ground, the numerous wounds Mr. Wicksteed\nreceived, his splintered walking-stick; but why the attack was made,\nsave in a murderous frenzy, it is impossible to imagine. Indeed the\ntheory of madness is almost unavoidable. Mr. Wicksteed was a man of\nforty-five or forty-six, steward to Lord Burdock, of inoffensive\nhabits and appearance, the very last person in the world to provoke\nsuch a terrible antagonist. Against him it would seem the Invisible\nMan used an iron rod dragged from a broken piece of fence. He\nstopped this quiet man, going quietly home to his midday meal,\nattacked him, beat down his feeble defences, broke his arm, felled\nhim, and smashed his head to a jelly.\n\nOf course, he must have dragged this rod out of the fencing before\nhe met his victim--he must have been carrying it ready in his hand.\nOnly two details beyond what has already been stated seem to bear\non the matter. One is the circumstance that the gravel pit was not\nin Mr. Wicksteed's direct path home, but nearly a couple of hundred\nyards out of his way. The other is the assertion of a little girl\nto the effect that, going to her afternoon school, she saw the\nmurdered man \"trotting\" in a peculiar manner across a field towards\nthe gravel pit. Her pantomime of his action suggests a man pursuing\nsomething on the ground before him and striking at it ever and\nagain with his walking-stick. She was the last person to see him\nalive. He passed out of her sight to his death, the struggle being\nhidden from her only by a clump of beech trees and a slight\ndepression in the ground.\n\nNow this, to the present writer's mind at least, lifts the murder\nout of the realm of the absolutely wanton. We may imagine that\nGriffin had taken the rod as a weapon indeed, but without any\ndeliberate intention of using it in murder. Wicksteed may then have\ncome by and noticed this rod inexplicably moving through the air.\nWithout any thought of the Invisible Man--for Port Burdock is ten\nmiles away--he may have pursued it. It is quite conceivable that\nhe may not even have heard of the Invisible Man. One can then\nimagine the Invisible Man making off--quietly in order to avoid\ndiscovering his presence in the neighbourhood, and Wicksteed,\nexcited and curious, pursuing this unaccountably locomotive\nobject--finally striking at it.\n\nNo doubt the Invisible Man could easily have distanced his\nmiddle-aged pursuer under ordinary circumstances, but the position\nin which Wicksteed's body was found suggests that he had the\nill luck to drive his quarry into a corner between a drift of\nstinging nettles and the gravel pit. To those who appreciate the\nextraordinary irascibility of the Invisible Man, the rest of the\nencounter will be easy to imagine.\n\nBut this is pure hypothesis. The only undeniable facts--for stories\nof children are often unreliable--are the discovery of Wicksteed's\nbody, done to death, and of the blood-stained iron rod flung among\nthe nettles. The abandonment of the rod by Griffin, suggests that\nin the emotional excitement of the affair, the purpose for which\nhe took it--if he had a purpose--was abandoned. He was certainly\nan intensely egotistical and unfeeling man, but the sight of his\nvictim, his first victim, bloody and pitiful at his feet, may have\nreleased some long pent fountain of remorse which for a time may\nhave flooded whatever scheme of action he had contrived.\n\nAfter the murder of Mr. Wicksteed, he would seem to have struck\nacross the country towards the downland. There is a story of a\nvoice heard about sunset by a couple of men in a field near Fern\nBottom. It was wailing and laughing, sobbing and groaning, and ever\nand again it shouted. It must have been queer hearing. It drove up\nacross the middle of a clover field and died away towards the\nhills.\n\nThat afternoon the Invisible Man must have learnt something of\nthe rapid use Kemp had made of his confidences. He must have\nfound houses locked and secured; he may have loitered about\nrailway stations and prowled about inns, and no doubt he read the\nproclamations and realised something of the nature of the campaign\nagainst him. And as the evening advanced, the fields became dotted\nhere and there with groups of three or four men, and noisy with the\nyelping of dogs. These men-hunters had particular instructions in\nthe case of an encounter as to the way they should support one\nanother. But he avoided them all. We may understand something of\nhis exasperation, and it could have been none the less because\nhe himself had supplied the information that was being used so\nremorselessly against him. For that day at least he lost heart; for\nnearly twenty-four hours, save when he turned on Wicksteed, he was\na hunted man. In the night, he must have eaten and slept; for in\nthe morning he was himself again, active, powerful, angry, and\nmalignant, prepared for his last great struggle against the world.\n\n\n\nCHAPTER XXVII\n\nTHE SIEGE OF KEMP'S HOUSE\n\n\nKemp read a strange missive, written in pencil on a greasy sheet of\npaper.\n\n\"You have been amazingly energetic and clever,\" this letter ran,\n\"though what you stand to gain by it I cannot imagine. You are\nagainst me. For a whole day you have chased me; you have tried to\nrob me of a night's rest. But I have had food in spite of you, I\nhave slept in spite of you, and the game is only beginning. The\ngame is only beginning. There is nothing for it, but to start the\nTerror. This announces the first day of the Terror. Port Burdock\nis no longer under the Queen, tell your Colonel of Police, and\nthe rest of them; it is under me--the Terror! This is day one of\nyear one of the new epoch--the Epoch of the Invisible Man. I am\nInvisible Man the First. To begin with the rule will be easy. The\nfirst day there will be one execution for the sake of example--a\nman named Kemp. Death starts for him to-day. He may lock himself\naway, hide himself away, get guards about him, put on armour\nif he likes--Death, the unseen Death, is coming. Let him take\nprecautions; it will impress my people. Death starts from the\npillar box by midday. The letter will fall in as the postman comes\nalong, then off! The game begins. Death starts. Help him not, my\npeople, lest Death fall upon you also. To-day Kemp is to die.\"\n\nKemp read this letter twice, \"It's no hoax,\" he said. \"That's\nhis voice! And he means it.\"\n\nHe turned the folded sheet over and saw on the addressed side of it\nthe postmark Hintondean, and the prosaic detail \"2d. to pay.\"\n\nHe got up slowly, leaving his lunch unfinished--the letter had\ncome by the one o'clock post--and went into his study. He rang\nfor his housekeeper, and told her to go round the house at once,\nexamine all the fastenings of the windows, and close all the\nshutters. He closed the shutters of his study himself. From a\nlocked drawer in his bedroom he took a little revolver, examined it\ncarefully, and put it into the pocket of his lounge jacket. He\nwrote a number of brief notes, one to Colonel Adye, gave them to\nhis servant to take, with explicit instructions as to her way of\nleaving the house. \"There is no danger,\" he said, and added a\nmental reservation, \"to you.\" He remained meditative for a space\nafter doing this, and then returned to his cooling lunch.\n\nHe ate with gaps of thought. Finally he struck the table sharply.\n\"We will have him!\" he said; \"and I am the bait. He will come too\nfar.\"\n\nHe went up to the belvedere, carefully shutting every door after\nhim. \"It's a game,\" he said, \"an odd game--but the chances are\nall for me, Mr. Griffin, in spite of your invisibility. Griffin\n_contra mundum_ ... with a vengeance.\"\n\nHe stood at the window staring at the hot hillside. \"He must get\nfood every day--and I don't envy him. Did he really sleep last\nnight? Out in the open somewhere--secure from collisions. I wish\nwe could get some good cold wet weather instead of the heat.\n\n\"He may be watching me now.\"\n\nHe went close to the window. Something rapped smartly against the\nbrickwork over the frame, and made him start violently back.\n\n\"I'm getting nervous,\" said Kemp. But it was five minutes before he\nwent to the window again. \"It must have been a sparrow,\" he said.\n\nPresently he heard the front-door bell ringing, and hurried\ndownstairs. He unbolted and unlocked the door, examined the chain,\nput it up, and opened cautiously without showing himself. A\nfamiliar voice hailed him. It was Adye.\n\n\"Your servant's been assaulted, Kemp,\" he said round the door.\n\n\"What!\" exclaimed Kemp.\n\n\"Had that note of yours taken away from her. He's close about here.\nLet me in.\"\n\nKemp released the chain, and Adye entered through as narrow an\nopening as possible. He stood in the hall, looking with infinite\nrelief at Kemp refastening the door. \"Note was snatched out of her\nhand. Scared her horribly. She's down at the station. Hysterics.\nHe's close here. What was it about?\"\n\nKemp swore.\n\n\"What a fool I was,\" said Kemp. \"I might have known. It's not an\nhour's walk from Hintondean. Already?\"\n\n\"What's up?\" said Adye.\n\n\"Look here!\" said Kemp, and led the way into his study. He handed\nAdye the Invisible Man's letter. Adye read it and whistled softly.\n\"And you--?\" said Adye.\n\n\"Proposed a trap--like a fool,\" said Kemp, \"and sent my proposal\nout by a maid servant. To him.\"\n\nAdye followed Kemp's profanity.\n\n\"He'll clear out,\" said Adye.\n\n\"Not he,\" said Kemp.\n\nA resounding smash of glass came from upstairs. Adye had a silvery\nglimpse of a little revolver half out of Kemp's pocket. \"It's a\nwindow, upstairs!\" said Kemp, and led the way up. There came a\nsecond smash while they were still on the staircase. When they\nreached the study they found two of the three windows smashed,\nhalf the room littered with splintered glass, and one big flint\nlying on the writing table. The two men stopped in the doorway,\ncontemplating the wreckage. Kemp swore again, and as he did so the\nthird window went with a snap like a pistol, hung starred for a\nmoment, and collapsed in jagged, shivering triangles into the room.\n\n\"What's this for?\" said Adye.\n\n\"It's a beginning,\" said Kemp.\n\n\"There's no way of climbing up here?\"\n\n\"Not for a cat,\" said Kemp.\n\n\"No shutters?\"\n\n\"Not here. All the downstairs rooms--Hullo!\"\n\nSmash, and then whack of boards hit hard came from downstairs.\n\"Confound him!\" said Kemp. \"That must be--yes--it's one of the\nbedrooms. He's going to do all the house. But he's a fool. The\nshutters are up, and the glass will fall outside. He'll cut his\nfeet.\"\n\nAnother window proclaimed its destruction. The two men stood on the\nlanding perplexed. \"I have it!\" said Adye. \"Let me have a stick or\nsomething, and I'll go down to the station and get the bloodhounds\nput on. That ought to settle him! They're hard by--not ten\nminutes--\"\n\nAnother window went the way of its fellows.\n\n\"You haven't a revolver?\" asked Adye.\n\nKemp's hand went to his pocket. Then he hesitated. \"I haven't\none--at least to spare.\"\n\n\"I'll bring it back,\" said Adye, \"you'll be safe here.\"\n\nKemp, ashamed of his momentary lapse from truthfulness, handed him\nthe weapon.\n\n\"Now for the door,\" said Adye.\n\nAs they stood hesitating in the hall, they heard one of the\nfirst-floor bedroom windows crack and clash. Kemp went to the door\nand began to slip the bolts as silently as possible. His face was a\nlittle paler than usual. \"You must step straight out,\" said Kemp. In\nanother moment Adye was on the doorstep and the bolts were dropping\nback into the staples. He hesitated for a moment, feeling more\ncomfortable with his back against the door. Then he marched, upright\nand square, down the steps. He crossed the lawn and approached the\ngate. A little breeze seemed to ripple over the grass. Something\nmoved near him. \"Stop a bit,\" said a Voice, and Adye stopped dead\nand his hand tightened on the revolver.\n\n\"Well?\" said Adye, white and grim, and every nerve tense.\n\n\"Oblige me by going back to the house,\" said the Voice, as tense\nand grim as Adye's.\n\n\"Sorry,\" said Adye a little hoarsely, and moistened his lips with\nhis tongue. The Voice was on his left front, he thought. Suppose he\nwere to take his luck with a shot?\n\n\"What are you going for?\" said the Voice, and there was a quick\nmovement of the two, and a flash of sunlight from the open lip of\nAdye's pocket.\n\nAdye desisted and thought. \"Where I go,\" he said slowly, \"is my own\nbusiness.\" The words were still on his lips, when an arm came round\nhis neck, his back felt a knee, and he was sprawling backward. He\ndrew clumsily and fired absurdly, and in another moment he was\nstruck in the mouth and the revolver wrested from his grip. He made\na vain clutch at a slippery limb, tried to struggle up and fell\nback. \"Damn!\" said Adye. The Voice laughed. \"I'd kill you now if it\nwasn't the waste of a bullet,\" it said. He saw the revolver in\nmid-air, six feet off, covering him.\n\n\"Well?\" said Adye, sitting up.\n\n\"Get up,\" said the Voice.\n\nAdye stood up.\n\n\"Attention,\" said the Voice, and then fiercely, \"Don't try any\ngames. Remember I can see your face if you can't see mine. You've\ngot to go back to the house.\"\n\n\"He won't let me in,\" said Adye.\n\n\"That's a pity,\" said the Invisible Man. \"I've got no quarrel with\nyou.\"\n\nAdye moistened his lips again. He glanced away from the barrel of\nthe revolver and saw the sea far off very blue and dark under the\nmidday sun, the smooth green down, the white cliff of the Head, and\nthe multitudinous town, and suddenly he knew that life was very\nsweet. His eyes came back to this little metal thing hanging\nbetween heaven and earth, six yards away. \"What am I to do?\" he\nsaid sullenly.\n\n\"What am _I_ to do?\" asked the Invisible Man. \"You will get help. The\nonly thing is for you to go back.\"\n\n\"I will try. If he lets me in will you promise not to rush the\ndoor?\"\n\n\"I've got no quarrel with you,\" said the Voice.\n\nKemp had hurried upstairs after letting Adye out, and now crouching\namong the broken glass and peering cautiously over the edge of the\nstudy window sill, he saw Adye stand parleying with the Unseen.\n\"Why doesn't he fire?\" whispered Kemp to himself. Then the revolver\nmoved a little and the glint of the sunlight flashed in Kemp's\neyes. He shaded his eyes and tried to see the source of the\nblinding beam.\n\n\"Surely!\" he said, \"Adye has given up the revolver.\"\n\n\"Promise not to rush the door,\" Adye was saying. \"Don't push a\nwinning game too far. Give a man a chance.\"\n\n\"You go back to the house. I tell you flatly I will not promise\nanything.\"\n\nAdye's decision seemed suddenly made. He turned towards the house,\nwalking slowly with his hands behind him. Kemp watched him--puzzled.\nThe revolver vanished, flashed again into sight, vanished again,\nand became evident on a closer scrutiny as a little dark object\nfollowing Adye. Then things happened very quickly. Adye leapt\nbackwards, swung around, clutched at this little object, missed it,\nthrew up his hands and fell forward on his face, leaving a little\npuff of blue in the air. Kemp did not hear the sound of the shot.\nAdye writhed, raised himself on one arm, fell forward, and lay\nstill.\n\nFor a space Kemp remained staring at the quiet carelessness of\nAdye's attitude. The afternoon was very hot and still, nothing\nseemed stirring in all the world save a couple of yellow butterflies\nchasing each other through the shrubbery between the house and the\nroad gate. Adye lay on the lawn near the gate. The blinds of all\nthe villas down the hill-road were drawn, but in one little green\nsummer-house was a white figure, apparently an old man asleep. Kemp\nscrutinised the surroundings of the house for a glimpse of the\nrevolver, but it had vanished. His eyes came back to Adye. The game\nwas opening well.\n\nThen came a ringing and knocking at the front door, that grew at\nlast tumultuous, but pursuant to Kemp's instructions the servants\nhad locked themselves into their rooms. This was followed by a\nsilence. Kemp sat listening and then began peering cautiously out\nof the three windows, one after another. He went to the staircase\nhead and stood listening uneasily. He armed himself with his\nbedroom poker, and went to examine the interior fastenings of the\nground-floor windows again. Everything was safe and quiet. He\nreturned to the belvedere. Adye lay motionless over the edge of the\ngravel just as he had fallen. Coming along the road by the villas\nwere the housemaid and two policemen.\n\nEverything was deadly still. The three people seemed very slow in\napproaching. He wondered what his antagonist was doing.\n\nHe started. There was a smash from below. He hesitated and went\ndownstairs again. Suddenly the house resounded with heavy blows and\nthe splintering of wood. He heard a smash and the destructive clang\nof the iron fastenings of the shutters. He turned the key and\nopened the kitchen door. As he did so, the shutters, split and\nsplintering, came flying inward. He stood aghast. The window frame,\nsave for one crossbar, was still intact, but only little teeth of\nglass remained in the frame. The shutters had been driven in with\nan axe, and now the axe was descending in sweeping blows upon the\nwindow frame and the iron bars defending it. Then suddenly it leapt\naside and vanished. He saw the revolver lying on the path outside,\nand then the little weapon sprang into the air. He dodged back. The\nrevolver cracked just too late, and a splinter from the edge of the\nclosing door flashed over his head. He slammed and locked the door,\nand as he stood outside he heard Griffin shouting and laughing.\nThen the blows of the axe with its splitting and smashing\nconsequences, were resumed.\n\nKemp stood in the passage trying to think. In a moment the\nInvisible Man would be in the kitchen. This door would not keep him\na moment, and then--\n\nA ringing came at the front door again. It would be the policemen.\nHe ran into the hall, put up the chain, and drew the bolts. He made\nthe girl speak before he dropped the chain, and the three people\nblundered into the house in a heap, and Kemp slammed the door\nagain.\n\n\"The Invisible Man!\" said Kemp. \"He has a revolver, with two\nshots--left. He's killed Adye. Shot him anyhow. Didn't you see him on\nthe lawn? He's lying there.\"\n\n\"Who?\" said one of the policemen.\n\n\"Adye,\" said Kemp.\n\n\"We came in the back way,\" said the girl.\n\n\"What's that smashing?\" asked one of the policemen.\n\n\"He's in the kitchen--or will be. He has found an axe--\"\n\nSuddenly the house was full of the Invisible Man's resounding\nblows on the kitchen door. The girl stared towards the kitchen,\nshuddered, and retreated into the dining-room. Kemp tried to\nexplain in broken sentences. They heard the kitchen door give.\n\n\"This way,\" said Kemp, starting into activity, and bundled the\npolicemen into the dining-room doorway.\n\n\"Poker,\" said Kemp, and rushed to the fender. He handed the poker\nhe had carried to the policeman and the dining-room one to the\nother. He suddenly flung himself backward.\n\n\"Whup!\" said one policeman, ducked, and caught the axe on his poker.\nThe pistol snapped its penultimate shot and ripped a valuable Sidney\nCooper. The second policeman brought his poker down on the little\nweapon, as one might knock down a wasp, and sent it rattling to the\nfloor.\n\nAt the first clash the girl screamed, stood screaming for a moment\nby the fireplace, and then ran to open the shutters--possibly\nwith an idea of escaping by the shattered window.\n\nThe axe receded into the passage, and fell to a position about two\nfeet from the ground. They could hear the Invisible Man breathing.\n\"Stand away, you two,\" he said. \"I want that man Kemp.\"\n\n\"We want you,\" said the first policeman, making a quick step\nforward and wiping with his poker at the Voice. The Invisible Man\nmust have started back, and he blundered into the umbrella stand.\n\nThen, as the policeman staggered with the swing of the blow he had\naimed, the Invisible Man countered with the axe, the helmet crumpled\nlike paper, and the blow sent the man spinning to the floor at the\nhead of the kitchen stairs. But the second policeman, aiming behind\nthe axe with his poker, hit something soft that snapped. There was a\nsharp exclamation of pain and then the axe fell to the ground. The\npoliceman wiped again at vacancy and hit nothing; he put his foot on\nthe axe, and struck again. Then he stood, poker clubbed, listening\nintent for the slightest movement.\n\nHe heard the dining-room window open, and a quick rush of feet\nwithin. His companion rolled over and sat up, with the blood\nrunning down between his eye and ear. \"Where is he?\" asked the man\non the floor.\n\n\"Don't know. I've hit him. He's standing somewhere in the hall.\nUnless he's slipped past you. Doctor Kemp--sir.\"\n\nPause.\n\n\"Doctor Kemp,\" cried the policeman again.\n\nThe second policeman began struggling to his feet. He stood up.\nSuddenly the faint pad of bare feet on the kitchen stairs could be\nheard. \"Yap!\" cried the first policeman, and incontinently flung\nhis poker. It smashed a little gas bracket.\n\nHe made as if he would pursue the Invisible Man downstairs. Then he\nthought better of it and stepped into the dining-room.\n\n\"Doctor Kemp--\" he began, and stopped short.\n\n\"Doctor Kemp's a hero,\" he said, as his companion looked over his\nshoulder.\n\nThe dining-room window was wide open, and neither housemaid nor\nKemp was to be seen.\n\nThe second policeman's opinion of Kemp was terse and vivid.\n\n\n\nCHAPTER XXVIII\n\nTHE HUNTER HUNTED\n\n\nMr. Heelas, Mr. Kemp's nearest neighbour among the villa holders,\nwas asleep in his summer house when the siege of Kemp's house\nbegan. Mr. Heelas was one of the sturdy minority who refused to\nbelieve \"in all this nonsense\" about an Invisible Man. His wife,\nhowever, as he was subsequently to be reminded, did. He insisted\nupon walking about his garden just as if nothing was the matter,\nand he went to sleep in the afternoon in accordance with the custom\nof years. He slept through the smashing of the windows, and then\nwoke up suddenly with a curious persuasion of something wrong. He\nlooked across at Kemp's house, rubbed his eyes and looked again.\nThen he put his feet to the ground, and sat listening. He said he\nwas damned, but still the strange thing was visible. The house\nlooked as though it had been deserted for weeks--after a violent\nriot. Every window was broken, and every window, save those of the\nbelvedere study, was blinded by the internal shutters.\n\n\"I could have sworn it was all right\"--he looked at his watch--\"twenty\nminutes ago.\"\n\nHe became aware of a measured concussion and the clash of glass,\nfar away in the distance. And then, as he sat open-mouthed, came a\nstill more wonderful thing. The shutters of the drawing-room window\nwere flung open violently, and the housemaid in her outdoor hat and\ngarments, appeared struggling in a frantic manner to throw up the\nsash. Suddenly a man appeared beside her, helping her--Dr. Kemp!\nIn another moment the window was open, and the housemaid was\nstruggling out; she pitched forward and vanished among the shrubs.\nMr. Heelas stood up, exclaiming vaguely and vehemently at all these\nwonderful things. He saw Kemp stand on the sill, spring from the\nwindow, and reappear almost instantaneously running along a path in\nthe shrubbery and stooping as he ran, like a man who evades\nobservation. He vanished behind a laburnum, and appeared again\nclambering over a fence that abutted on the open down. In a second\nhe had tumbled over and was running at a tremendous pace down the\nslope towards Mr. Heelas.\n\n\"Lord!\" cried Mr. Heelas, struck with an idea; \"it's that Invisible\nMan brute! It's right, after all!\"\n\nWith Mr. Heelas to think things like that was to act, and his cook\nwatching him from the top window was amazed to see him come pelting\ntowards the house at a good nine miles an hour. There was a\nslamming of doors, a ringing of bells, and the voice of Mr. Heelas\nbellowing like a bull. \"Shut the doors, shut the windows, shut\neverything!--the Invisible Man is coming!\" Instantly the house was\nfull of screams and directions, and scurrying feet. He ran himself\nto shut the French windows that opened on the veranda; as he did so\nKemp's head and shoulders and knee appeared over the edge of the\ngarden fence. In another moment Kemp had ploughed through the\nasparagus, and was running across the tennis lawn to the house.\n\n\"You can't come in,\" said Mr. Heelas, shutting the bolts. \"I'm very\nsorry if he's after you, but you can't come in!\"\n\nKemp appeared with a face of terror close to the glass, rapping and\nthen shaking frantically at the French window. Then, seeing his\nefforts were useless, he ran along the veranda, vaulted the end,\nand went to hammer at the side door. Then he ran round by the side\ngate to the front of the house, and so into the hill-road. And Mr.\nHeelas staring from his window--a face of horror--had scarcely\nwitnessed Kemp vanish, ere the asparagus was being trampled this\nway and that by feet unseen. At that Mr. Heelas fled precipitately\nupstairs, and the rest of the chase is beyond his purview. But as\nhe passed the staircase window, he heard the side gate slam.\n\nEmerging into the hill-road, Kemp naturally took the downward\ndirection, and so it was he came to run in his own person the very\nrace he had watched with such a critical eye from the belvedere\nstudy only four days ago. He ran it well, for a man out of\ntraining, and though his face was white and wet, his wits were cool\nto the last. He ran with wide strides, and wherever a patch of\nrough ground intervened, wherever there came a patch of raw flints,\nor a bit of broken glass shone dazzling, he crossed it and left the\nbare invisible feet that followed to take what line they would.\n\nFor the first time in his life Kemp discovered that the hill-road\nwas indescribably vast and desolate, and that the beginnings of the\ntown far below at the hill foot were strangely remote. Never had\nthere been a slower or more painful method of progression than\nrunning. All the gaunt villas, sleeping in the afternoon sun,\nlooked locked and barred; no doubt they were locked and barred--by\nhis own orders. But at any rate they might have kept a lookout\nfor an eventuality like this! The town was rising up now, the sea\nhad dropped out of sight behind it, and people down below were\nstirring. A tram was just arriving at the hill foot. Beyond that\nwas the police station. Was that footsteps he heard behind him?\nSpurt.\n\nThe people below were staring at him, one or two were running, and\nhis breath was beginning to saw in his throat. The tram was quite\nnear now, and the \"Jolly Cricketers\" was noisily barring its doors.\nBeyond the tram were posts and heaps of gravel--the drainage\nworks. He had a transitory idea of jumping into the tram and\nslamming the doors, and then he resolved to go for the police\nstation. In another moment he had passed the door of the \"Jolly\nCricketers,\" and was in the blistering fag end of the street, with\nhuman beings about him. The tram driver and his helper--arrested\nby the sight of his furious haste--stood staring with the tram\nhorses unhitched. Further on the astonished features of navvies\nappeared above the mounds of gravel.\n\nHis pace broke a little, and then he heard the swift pad of his\npursuer, and leapt forward again. \"The Invisible Man!\" he cried to\nthe navvies, with a vague indicative gesture, and by an inspiration\nleapt the excavation and placed a burly group between him and the\nchase. Then abandoning the idea of the police station he turned\ninto a little side street, rushed by a greengrocer's cart,\nhesitated for the tenth of a second at the door of a sweetstuff\nshop, and then made for the mouth of an alley that ran back into\nthe main Hill Street again. Two or three little children were\nplaying here, and shrieked and scattered at his apparition, and\nforthwith doors and windows opened and excited mothers revealed\ntheir hearts. Out he shot into Hill Street again, three hundred\nyards from the tram-line end, and immediately he became aware of a\ntumultuous vociferation and running people.\n\nHe glanced up the street towards the hill. Hardly a dozen yards off\nran a huge navvy, cursing in fragments and slashing viciously with\na spade, and hard behind him came the tram conductor with his fists\nclenched. Up the street others followed these two, striking and\nshouting. Down towards the town, men and women were running, and he\nnoticed clearly one man coming out of a shop-door with a stick in\nhis hand. \"Spread out! Spread out!\" cried some one. Kemp suddenly\ngrasped the altered condition of the chase. He stopped, and looked\nround, panting. \"He's close here!\" he cried. \"Form a line across--\"\n\nHe was hit hard under the ear, and went reeling, trying to face\nround towards his unseen antagonist. He just managed to keep his\nfeet, and he struck a vain counter in the air. Then he was hit\nagain under the jaw, and sprawled headlong on the ground. In\nanother moment a knee compressed his diaphragm, and a couple of\neager hands gripped his throat, but the grip of one was weaker than\nthe other; he grasped the wrists, heard a cry of pain from his\nassailant, and then the spade of the navvy came whirling through\nthe air above him, and struck something with a dull thud. He felt\na drop of moisture on his face. The grip at his throat suddenly\nrelaxed, and with a convulsive effort, Kemp loosed himself, grasped\na limp shoulder, and rolled uppermost. He gripped the unseen elbows\nnear the ground. \"I've got him!\" screamed Kemp. \"Help! Help--hold!\nHe's down! Hold his feet!\"\n\nIn another second there was a simultaneous rush upon the struggle,\nand a stranger coming into the road suddenly might have thought an\nexceptionally savage game of Rugby football was in progress. And\nthere was no shouting after Kemp's cry--only a sound of blows\nand feet and heavy breathing.\n\nThen came a mighty effort, and the Invisible Man threw off a couple\nof his antagonists and rose to his knees. Kemp clung to him in\nfront like a hound to a stag, and a dozen hands gripped, clutched,\nand tore at the Unseen. The tram conductor suddenly got the neck\nand shoulders and lugged him back.\n\nDown went the heap of struggling men again and rolled over. There\nwas, I am afraid, some savage kicking. Then suddenly a wild scream\nof \"Mercy! Mercy!\" that died down swiftly to a sound like choking.\n\n\"Get back, you fools!\" cried the muffled voice of Kemp, and there\nwas a vigorous shoving back of stalwart forms. \"He's hurt, I tell\nyou. Stand back!\"\n\nThere was a brief struggle to clear a space, and then the circle of\neager faces saw the doctor kneeling, as it seemed, fifteen inches\nin the air, and holding invisible arms to the ground. Behind him a\nconstable gripped invisible ankles.\n\n\"Don't you leave go of en,\" cried the big navvy, holding a\nblood-stained spade; \"he's shamming.\"\n\n\"He's not shamming,\" said the doctor, cautiously raising his knee;\n\"and I'll hold him.\" His face was bruised and already going red; he\nspoke thickly because of a bleeding lip. He released one hand and\nseemed to be feeling at the face. \"The mouth's all wet,\" he said.\nAnd then, \"Good God!\"\n\nHe stood up abruptly and then knelt down on the ground by the side\nof the thing unseen. There was a pushing and shuffling, a sound of\nheavy feet as fresh people turned up to increase the pressure of\nthe crowd. People now were coming out of the houses. The doors of\nthe \"Jolly Cricketers\" stood suddenly wide open. Very little was said.\n\nKemp felt about, his hand seeming to pass through empty air. \"He's\nnot breathing,\" he said, and then, \"I can't feel his heart. His\nside--ugh!\"\n\nSuddenly an old woman, peering under the arm of the big navvy,\nscreamed sharply. \"Looky there!\" she said, and thrust out a\nwrinkled finger.\n\nAnd looking where she pointed, everyone saw, faint and transparent\nas though it was made of glass, so that veins and arteries and\nbones and nerves could be distinguished, the outline of a hand, a\nhand limp and prone. It grew clouded and opaque even as they stared.\n\n\"Hullo!\" cried the constable. \"Here's his feet a-showing!\"\n\nAnd so, slowly, beginning at his hands and feet and creeping along\nhis limbs to the vital centres of his body, that strange change\ncontinued. It was like the slow spreading of a poison. First came\nthe little white nerves, a hazy grey sketch of a limb, then the\nglassy bones and intricate arteries, then the flesh and skin, first\na faint fogginess, and then growing rapidly dense and opaque.\nPresently they could see his crushed chest and his shoulders, and\nthe dim outline of his drawn and battered features.\n\nWhen at last the crowd made way for Kemp to stand erect, there lay,\nnaked and pitiful on the ground, the bruised and broken body of a\nyoung man about thirty. His hair and brow were white--not grey\nwith age, but white with the whiteness of albinism--and his eyes\nwere like garnets. His hands were clenched, his eyes wide open, and\nhis expression was one of anger and dismay.\n\n\"Cover his face!\" said a man. \"For Gawd's sake, cover that face!\"\nand three little children, pushing forward through the crowd, were\nsuddenly twisted round and sent packing off again.\n\nSomeone brought a sheet from the \"Jolly Cricketers,\" and having\ncovered him, they carried him into that house. And there it was, on\na shabby bed in a tawdry, ill-lighted bedroom, surrounded by a crowd\nof ignorant and excited people, broken and wounded, betrayed and\nunpitied, that Griffin, the first of all men to make himself\ninvisible, Griffin, the most gifted physicist the world has ever\nseen, ended in infinite disaster his strange and terrible career.\n\n\n\nTHE EPILOGUE\n\n\nSo ends the story of the strange and evil experiments of the\nInvisible Man. And if you would learn more of him you must go to a\nlittle inn near Port Stowe and talk to the landlord. The sign of\nthe inn is an empty board save for a hat and boots, and the name is\nthe title of this story. The landlord is a short and corpulent\nlittle man with a nose of cylindrical proportions, wiry hair, and a\nsporadic rosiness of visage. Drink generously, and he will tell you\ngenerously of all the things that happened to him after that time,\nand of how the lawyers tried to do him out of the treasure found\nupon him.\n\n\"When they found they couldn't prove whose money was which, I'm\nblessed,\" he says, \"if they didn't try to make me out a blooming\ntreasure trove! Do I _look_ like a Treasure Trove? And then a\ngentleman gave me a guinea a night to tell the story at the Empire\nMusic 'All--just to tell 'em in my own words--barring one.\"\n\nAnd if you want to cut off the flow of his reminiscences abruptly,\nyou can always do so by asking if there weren't three manuscript\nbooks in the story. He admits there were and proceeds to explain,\nwith asseverations that everybody thinks _he_ has 'em! But bless you!\nhe hasn't. \"The Invisible Man it was took 'em off to hide 'em when\nI cut and ran for Port Stowe. It's that Mr. Kemp put people on with\nthe idea of _my_ having 'em.\"\n\nAnd then he subsides into a pensive state, watches you furtively,\nbustles nervously with glasses, and presently leaves the bar.\n\nHe is a bachelor man--his tastes were ever bachelor, and there\nare no women folk in the house. Outwardly he buttons--it is\nexpected of him--but in his more vital privacies, in the matter\nof braces for example, he still turns to string. He conducts his\nhouse without enterprise, but with eminent decorum. His movements\nare slow, and he is a great thinker. But he has a reputation for\nwisdom and for a respectable parsimony in the village, and his\nknowledge of the roads of the South of England would beat Cobbett.\n\nAnd on Sunday mornings, every Sunday morning, all the year round,\nwhile he is closed to the outer world, and every night after ten,\nhe goes into his bar parlour, bearing a glass of gin faintly tinged\nwith water, and having placed this down, he locks the door and\nexamines the blinds, and even looks under the table. And then,\nbeing satisfied of his solitude, he unlocks the cupboard and a box\nin the cupboard and a drawer in that box, and produces three\nvolumes bound in brown leather, and places them solemnly in the\nmiddle of the table. The covers are weather-worn and tinged with an\nalgal green--for once they sojourned in a ditch and some of the\npages have been washed blank by dirty water. The landlord sits down\nin an armchair, fills a long clay pipe slowly--gloating over the\nbooks the while. Then he pulls one towards him and opens it, and\nbegins to study it--turning over the leaves backwards and forwards.\n\nHis brows are knit and his lips move painfully. \"Hex, little two up\nin the air, cross and a fiddle-de-dee. Lord! what a one he was for\nintellect!\"\n\nPresently he relaxes and leans back, and blinks through his smoke\nacross the room at things invisible to other eyes. \"Full of\nsecrets,\" he says. \"Wonderful secrets!\"\n\n\"Once I get the haul of them--_Lord_!\"\n\n\"I wouldn't do what _he_ did; I'd just--well!\" He pulls at his\npipe.\n\nSo he lapses into a dream, the undying wonderful dream of his life.\nAnd though Kemp has fished unceasingly, no human being save the\nlandlord knows those books are there, with the subtle secret of\ninvisibility and a dozen other strange secrets written therein.\nAnd none other will know of them until he dies."