Mary Reilly (12 page)

I thanked him, thinking he would go on, but he bid me come and talk to him on the subject of our plants. I left my cloth in the basket and crossed over to stand beside him. “I don’t know the names of all these flowers,” he said, “though I know that is digitalis, for its use as a medicine.” He pointed to the foxglove, which is the tallest of our plants.

“I only know the common names, sir,” I said. “That’s foxglove to me. And lavender next it. In that circle is lovage, and those tall pink ones is angelica.”

“You have laid it all out so pleasantly,” he said.

“That was Cook’s doing, sir,” I said. “I only followed her instructions. She planned it after a garden she saw in H____________”

“Ah, she could plan it, Mary,” Master said. “But she could not have
planted
it without you. The energy is yours and we all profit by it.”

I could think of no response as Master’s compliments do always make me come over so shy, and also it is not my place ever to contradict him in this or any matter, so I stood silent looking at the garden and I felt a swelling of pride, for it is truly a pleasure to the eyes and nose of anyone as passes. But when I looked up at Master, I saw his thoughts was already somewhere else, for he was gazing at the door of his laboratory with a look almost of worry, so I thought he has some problem not yet solved and has only stopped at the garden for a distraction. And indeed one hand had already strayed to his pocket for the key, which he drew out and looked upon as if it was a surprise to him to find it there. So I looked on it too and without thinking I made a sound of impatience, just a rush of air through my nose, but in the quiet it seemed very loud, as if I had spoken’ my feelings about where that key must take him.

“No, Mary,” Master said. “My work doesn’t have such pleasing results as yours. It may finally be of benefit to no one. It may only make the world more strange than it is already, and more frightening to those who haven’t the courage to know the worst.”

Still I did not speak, for I could hardly understand what Master might mean, so, as is my habit, I was trying to memorize it to put down later and I think I have got
it as he said it. Then he said, “Yet I must do it,” closed his fingers over the key, crossed the yard to the theatre and in a moment he had disappeared inside.

M
r. Poole has seen him.

I went to K____________ to get a fish for Cook this afternoon and while I was out he came to the front door. He addressed Mr. Poole very bold and when he was told that Master was not to home, he said he knew it because Master had sent him to the house on purpose to take a book from the library.

Now this made no sense to Mr. Poole, nor does it to me, for Master was at work in his laboratory and if he wanted a book, why wouldn’t he have sent his assistant across the yard to the kitchen door? But Mr. Poole said later he thought it was the proper course to send him round the corner, as we might be taken aback to see a stranger come in at the kitchen, and Mr. Poole says he does not doubt that in the future he mayn’t come and go in that way. I thought, but he comes and goes that way already, only in the dead of night.

So Mr. Poole thought there was nothing for it but to let him in and he went ahead opening the library door. Mr. Poole told Mr. Bradshaw he thought the errand would only take a moment and so he stood at the door to wait. Mr. Hyde went in and Mr. Poole said he
had an air of being too pleased to be in the room and too comfortable, for he looked all about, rubbing his hands together with a kind of glee, then running his fingers over the big medical dictionary that sits out on the stand. He turned to Mr. Poole and said there was no need to attend him, he’d find his own way out. But Mr. Poole didn’t like that idea at all, so he stood there as if he hadn’t understood. Mr. Hyde looked him up and down until, he told Mr. Bradshaw, he felt his skin begin to crawl, but he stood his ground, even when the man came towards him and, without another word, closed the door in his face.

When Cook told me this I confess it struck me so I laughed and Annie, who was next to me, hung her head forward and said, “Noooo,” for we could all of us imagine the look on Mr. Poole’s face as he stood there.

Then Mr. Hyde stayed in the room for a quarter of an hour while Mr. Poole paced about in the front hall, being sure Mr. Hyde would not go out without being seen again. At last he appeared, clutching a book to his coat and seeming annoyed to find Mr. Poole waiting on him. He asked if Master had not spoken to the staff about him and Mr. Poole said, yes he had; we all understood that Mr. Hyde was to have perfect liberty in the house. At this Mr. Poole said the little man (for he is very small) laughed and looked about the hall as if looking for something to smash, to show Mr. Poole what liberty meant to him. Mr. Poole told Mr. Bradshaw he has a wolfish way about him and seems to hang his
head as if he expects to have blows hail down upon him. “You needn’t look after me, then, Poole,” he said. “I’m not likely to take anything that isn’t mine.”

Mr. Poole recovered to his own satisfaction by saying, “I only want to be of what service I can, sir, should you require any assistance,” but Mr. Hyde replied, “For the moment the only assistance I require is that you open the door and stand aside, rather than standing between it and my speedy departure,” or some such rude remark that shocked Mr. Poole into doing just as he was told, and in a moment Mr. Hyde was out of the house.

I got this all from Cook, who had it from Mr. Bradshaw, who came upon Mr. Poole immediately after Mr. Hyde’s departure, when he was in such a state that he dropped his usual caution and poured out the whole story. I asked Cook what else Mr. Poole had said about Master’s assistant. She puzzled a minute and put down her spoon, as if she could not stir and recall at once.

“Well,” she said, “he says he is very young, that his voice is coarse though he speaks well enough and must have got some education somewhere, and that his clothes is well made, of good quality, even to his boots, which was made by Master’s own bootmaker. He is small, and, as I said, has a deal of dark hair, dark eyes, and is clean-shaven.” Cook paused and then added, as if to put the finishing touch on her picture of Mr. Edward Hyde, “Mr. Poole said that he may dress and speak as well as he likes, and give orders in this house until his breath runs out, but his beginnings is stamped
on his features and no one will ever mistake him for a gentleman.”

Then we spoke no more on the subject and Mr. Poole was silent on the matter at tea, nor did any of us have the nerve to question him upon it, though I could feel the name of Mr. Edward Hyde hanging over the table like a cloud. In the evening Master came in at a decent hour and had his dinner in the dining room, joined by his solicitor Mr. Utterson. They sat over their port so late that Mr. Poole come in and bid me go stir up the fire as it had burned very low, and after that he said Annie and I could be off to bed. So I went upstairs. Along the hall I could hear their voices and it seemed to me they was not in agreement. I tapped at the door and Master called out for me to come in. As I did I heard him say, “I’ll say no more about it, Gabriel. You must trust me in this matter,” and I saw Mr. Utterson shake his head, his lips pressed tight together, as if to shake off what Master had said to him.

“I’ve come to do the fire, sir,” I said. Master gave me a long look that seemed to fasten me in my place and then he said, “That won’t be necessary, Mary. Mr. Utterson is just leaving.”

Mr. Utterson seemed startled, but only for a moment. Then he was gathering himself up saying, “It’s true. It is very late and I must be in Chancery Lane early tomorrow.”

So I went out. As I walked along the hall I thought, they was arguing about this Mr. Hyde and Mr. Utterson likes it no more than do we, so perhaps he has met the
young man or knows about his situation and is worried for Master’s welfare. How I knew this, I can’t say, but I think I was right. Then I thought of what Mr. Poole told Mr. Bradshaw, that Master’s assistant had his beginnings stamped on his face, and that he is no gentleman.

What is he, then? A young man from Master’s school? Has Master taken him on as a sort of experiment, or just out of curiosity? Is he looking into
his
life with the same sympathy and interest he has shown in looking into my own?

The answer to this question come to me quick and it was this: with more interest than that, for he has set Mr. Hyde no limits and taken him as his companion in those long hours when he works in his laboratory towards some frightening end he has told me himself takes all his courage to pursue.

T
his morning was cold and damp, and the air so full of dust we could hardly breathe. My hands was both of them numb when I woke so I could not move my fingers and the scars in my neck was throbbing so I thought they must be standing out, but when I looked in the hall mirror I saw I look as always. In the kitchen I filled a bowl with hot water and thrust my poor hands in to get some feeling. Cook was muttering over her pots, seeming in an ill humour, but when she
saw me soaking my hands she said, “It’s in your hands as you feel it Mary, but with me it is my sore old knees,” and I said, “I suppose we are in for some bad weather, by the look of us.” She said, “You may say so.” Then I thought, Cook knows of the trouble with my hands and has surely seen enough of them to notice the scars, but she has never asked how they come to be so. But servants’ ways is not to speak on such things, out of courtesy, for no one could imagine that there was anything but bad recollections attached to such hands as these, so why speak of past sadness.

After breakfast I had a deal of coal to get in, for the coalmonger had come, and soon I was as black as the air around me, but feeling good and warm in spite of it, for the shovelling is work such as cannot be done without drawing up some heat. I laid the grates downstairs, then filled a scuttle to carry up to Master’s room. Mr. Poole come in to say Master was up and in his library, where he would have his breakfast, so I thought, good, I can go up as I am without him seeing me, which I did. Then I was down, and seeing as Cook was done in the kitchen and off to the market and I was already black from my work, I thought to scrub out the kitchen floor, as the oven was up and it might dry out before she returned. I got my buckets and brushes, tied up my skirts and was hard at it when Mr. Poole come in, looking as vexed as if all his plans had been crossed, and told me Master wanted to speak to me in the drawing room at once. I looked up at him, for I was on my knees and said, “But I can’t go in to him like this. I’m black
as a nigger and wet to the knees,” but Mr. Poole did not care for my difficulty and, saying, “Master won’t be kept waiting,” turned and walked away.

So I got up, washed my face and hands at the clean bucket, untied my skirts and wrung the water from them, wiped and dried my boots, put on a cap and a clean apron, which only looked foolish, I thought, as my skirt was black underneath, but it was the best I could do, so I went up to the drawing room door and tapped lightly, wishing I could make myself smaller somehow so that Master might not notice me at all.

Master called out, “Come in,” sounding impatient, so I opened the door and stepped inside, closing it behind me. He was at his desk, writing away hurriedly, and I saw a cheque lying out beside the sheet of paper on which he was writing. He glanced up only to see it was me and said, “Come in, Mary,” very sharp, then turned back to his writing. I felt timid as I knew I had never seen Master in such a state, nor has he ever spoken to me sharply. It seemed the whole room was full of agitation and Master at the centre of it, filling a sheet of paper with angry words, and I knew at once why he had sent for me. It was to carry his anger out of the house.

Still he kept writing, so I made up my mind to be still and wait upon him. He reached out for an envelope, looking up at me again, but only for a moment, as if to make sure of me. His mouth was set and he looked at me so cold, I felt he hardly saw me, that I was some object to him, useful like his pen or his cheque, such as
only exist to serve his will. A rush of anger came upon me, but I fought it down, remembering my place and my duty. Why, I thought, should he think of his own hands when he needs them? No more should he think of me.

Master signed the page, folded the cheque inside it and put them both in the envelope. I did not need to look at the name he wrote on the front, for I felt I knew it. Then he turned to me and said, “I must send you on an unpleasant errand this morning, Mary.”

“To Mrs. Farraday,” I said.

This startled Master. He sat forward a little and seemed to focus his eyes closely upon me, the way birds do when they see something to pluck in the grass. “How do you know?” he asked.

“I don’t, sir,” I said. “Only I can think of no other errand you might send me upon that might not best be carried out by Mr. Poole.”

Master looked as if he might answer, but his eyes fell on the letter in his hands and the sight of it seemed to distress him so that he forgot all other cares but that which it contained. He held it out to me, speaking as he did, “I rely on you entirely in this matter, Mary. Though I cannot tell you the nature of it, I can tell you that it is of such importance to me, of such importance …” Here Master fell silent and once again we was both of us looking on a letter I did not want to take. But I put my hand out, as if Master’s will was the same as my own and said only, as I tucked the envelope in my sleeve, “What am I to tell Mr. Poole?”

Master looked annoyed. “Why should you have to tell him anything?” he said.

“If I go out now,” I replied, “leaving my work undone.”

“I’ll take care of Poole,” Master said. “Set your mind at rest upon that.”

“I will, sir,” I said, though my mind was not at rest, nor would it be, I knew, for some time to come. “Will there be a reply?”

“Yes,” he said. “I don’t doubt that there will be.”

“Shall I go at once, then, sir?” I said.

Master nodded, his mouth set in such a grim line I felt too timid to speak. I wanted to ask if I might take the time to change my clothes, for I could feel the wet cloth soaking through my stockings, but it seemed a frivolous worry next to whatever had provoked Master to call on me so anxious. I made up my mind to change only my skirt and shoes, which I could do quickly in the kitchen, for I had a muslin skirt, too light for the weather but dry nonetheless, in the pantry, as well as my walking shoes. I gave Master a curtsy, which he barely took in, he was so distracted, and went out across the hall, hoping I should have the good luck not to encounter Mr. Poole, for I had no idea what I would say to him. Nor did I see him. Cook was still out, so I had the kitchen to myself. I changed quickly, put on my bonnet and cloak and went through the area to the front of the house. It was brown with fog out so I could barely make out the square, and that cold I hunched my shoulders up as if I could protect my chest by folding
myself around it. I hurried along the side street, past the door that, unbeknownst to passersby, leads to Master’s laboratory. The fog was hanging just at my eye level, but it was patchy and through a broken bit of it a beam of sunlight shined on the door, showing it up dingy and unkempt, so dreary it seemed to soak up the light and turn it dull. I could not pause to look at it, though I half expected it to fly open and Mr. Edward Hyde to burst out, a thought which was like a little shove at me so that I hurried along, pulling in my skirts behind me.