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