The Invisible Man (16 page)

"At last I reached the object of my quest, a dirty, fly-blown little
shop in a by-way near Drury Lane, with a window full of tinsel
robes, sham jewels, wigs, slippers, dominoes and theatrical
photographs. The shop was old-fashioned and low and dark, and the
house rose above it for four storeys, dark and dismal. I peered
through the window and, seeing no one within, entered. The opening
of the door set a clanking bell ringing. I left it open, and walked
round a bare costume stand, into a corner behind a cheval glass. For
a minute or so no one came. Then I heard heavy feet striding across
a room, and a man appeared down the shop.

"My plans were now perfectly definite. I proposed to make my way
into the house, secrete myself upstairs, watch my opportunity, and
when everything was quiet, rummage out a wig, mask, spectacles, and
costume, and go into the world, perhaps a grotesque but still a
credible figure. And incidentally of course I could rob the house
of any available money.

"The man who had just entered the shop was a short, slight,
hunched, beetle-browed man, with long arms and very short bandy
legs. Apparently I had interrupted a meal. He stared about the shop
with an expression of expectation. This gave way to surprise, and
then to anger, as he saw the shop empty. 'Damn the boys!' he said.
He went to stare up and down the street. He came in again in a
minute, kicked the door to with his foot spitefully, and went
muttering back to the house door.

"I came forward to follow him, and at the noise of my movement he
stopped dead. I did so too, startled by his quickness of ear. He
slammed the house door in my face.

"I stood hesitating. Suddenly I heard his quick footsteps returning,
and the door reopened. He stood looking about the shop like one who
was still not satisfied. Then, murmuring to himself, he examined the
back of the counter and peered behind some fixtures. Then he stood
doubtful. He had left the house door open and I slipped into the
inner room.

"It was a queer little room, poorly furnished and with a number of
big masks in the corner. On the table was his belated breakfast,
and it was a confoundedly exasperating thing for me, Kemp, to have
to sniff his coffee and stand watching while he came in and resumed
his meal. And his table manners were irritating. Three doors opened
into the little room, one going upstairs and one down, but they
were all shut. I could not get out of the room while he was there;
I could scarcely move because of his alertness, and there was a
draught down my back. Twice I strangled a sneeze just in time.

"The spectacular quality of my sensations was curious and novel, but
for all that I was heartily tired and angry long before he had done
his eating. But at last he made an end and putting his beggarly
crockery on the black tin tray upon which he had had his teapot, and
gathering all the crumbs up on the mustard stained cloth, he took
the whole lot of things after him. His burden prevented his shutting
the door behind him—as he would have done; I never saw such a man
for shutting doors—and I followed him into a very dirty underground
kitchen and scullery. I had the pleasure of seeing him begin to wash
up, and then, finding no good in keeping down there, and the brick
floor being cold on my feet, I returned upstairs and sat in his
chair by the fire. It was burning low, and scarcely thinking, I put
on a little coal. The noise of this brought him up at once, and
he stood aglare. He peered about the room and was within an ace
of touching me. Even after that examination, he scarcely seemed
satisfied. He stopped in the doorway and took a final inspection
before he went down.

"I waited in the little parlour for an age, and at last he came up
and opened the upstairs door. I just managed to get by him.

"On the staircase he stopped suddenly, so that I very nearly
blundered into him. He stood looking back right into my face and
listening. 'I could have sworn,' he said. His long hairy hand
pulled at his lower lip. His eye went up and down the staircase.
Then he grunted and went on up again.

"His hand was on the handle of a door, and then he stopped again
with the same puzzled anger on his face. He was becoming aware of
the faint sounds of my movements about him. The man must have had
diabolically acute hearing. He suddenly flashed into rage. 'If
there's anyone in this house—' he cried with an oath, and left the
threat unfinished. He put his hand in his pocket, failed to find
what he wanted, and rushing past me went blundering noisily and
pugnaciously downstairs. But I did not follow him. I sat on the
head of the staircase until his return.

"Presently he came up again, still muttering. He opened the door of
the room, and before I could enter, slammed it in my face.

"I resolved to explore the house, and spent some time in doing so
as noiselessly as possible. The house was very old and tumble-down,
damp so that the paper in the attics was peeling from the walls, and
rat infested. Some of the door handles were stiff and I was afraid
to turn them. Several rooms I did inspect were unfurnished, and
others were littered with theatrical lumber, bought second-hand, I
judged, from its appearance. In one room next to his I found a lot
of old clothes. I began routing among these, and in my eagerness
forgot again the evident sharpness of his ears. I heard a stealthy
footstep and, looking up just in time, saw him peering in at the
tumbled heap and holding an old-fashioned revolver in his hand.
I stood perfectly still while he stared about open-mouthed and
suspicious. 'It must have been her,' he said slowly. 'Damn her!'

"He shut the door quietly, and immediately I heard the key turn in
the lock. Then his footsteps retreated. I realised abruptly that I
was locked in. For a minute I did not know what to do. I walked
from door to window and back, and stood perplexed. A gust of anger
came upon me. But I decided to inspect the clothes before I did
anything further, and my first attempt brought down a pile from an
upper shelf. This brought him back, more sinister than ever. That
time he actually touched me, jumped back with amazement and stood
astonished in the middle of the room.

"Presently he calmed a little. 'Rats,' he said in an undertone,
fingers on lips. He was evidently a little scared. I edged quietly
out of the room, but a plank creaked. Then the infernal little brute
started going all over the house, revolver in hand and locking door
after door and pocketing the keys. When I realised what he was up to
I had a fit of rage—I could hardly control myself sufficiently to
watch my opportunity. By this time I knew he was alone in the house,
and so I made no more ado, but knocked him on the head."

"Knocked him on the head?" exclaimed Kemp.

"Yes—stunned him—as he was going downstairs. Hit him from
behind with a stool that stood on the landing. He went downstairs
like a bag of old boots."

"But—I say! The common conventions of humanity—"

"Are all very well for common people. But the point was, Kemp, that
I had to get out of that house in a disguise without his seeing me.
I couldn't think of any other way of doing it. And then I gagged
him with a Louis Quatorze vest and tied him up in a sheet."

"Tied him up in a sheet!"

"Made a sort of bag of it. It was rather a good idea to keep the
idiot scared and quiet, and a devilish hard thing to get out
of—head away from the string. My dear Kemp, it's no good your
sitting glaring as though I was a murderer. It had to be done. He
had his revolver. If once he saw me he would be able to describe
me—"

"But still," said Kemp, "in England—to-day. And the man was in
his own house, and you were—well, robbing."

"Robbing! Confound it! You'll call me a thief next! Surely, Kemp,
you're not fool enough to dance on the old strings. Can't you see
my position?"

"And his too," said Kemp.

The Invisible Man stood up sharply. "What do you mean to say?"

Kemp's face grew a trifle hard. He was about to speak and checked
himself. "I suppose, after all," he said with a sudden change of
manner, "the thing had to be done. You were in a fix. But still—"

"Of course I was in a fix—an infernal fix. And he made me wild
too—hunting me about the house, fooling about with his revolver,
locking and unlocking doors. He was simply exasperating. You don't
blame me, do you? You don't blame me?"

"I never blame anyone," said Kemp. "It's quite out of fashion. What
did you do next?"

"I was hungry. Downstairs I found a loaf and some rank cheese—more
than sufficient to satisfy my hunger. I took some brandy and
water, and then went up past my impromptu bag—he was lying quite
still—to the room containing the old clothes. This looked out
upon the street, two lace curtains brown with dirt guarding the
window. I went and peered out through their interstices. Outside
the day was bright—by contrast with the brown shadows of the
dismal house in which I found myself, dazzlingly bright. A brisk
traffic was going by, fruit carts, a hansom, a four-wheeler with a
pile of boxes, a fishmonger's cart. I turned with spots of colour
swimming before my eyes to the shadowy fixtures behind me. My
excitement was giving place to a clear apprehension of my position
again. The room was full of a faint scent of benzoline, used, I
suppose, in cleaning the garments.

"I began a systematic search of the place. I should judge the
hunchback had been alone in the house for some time. He was a
curious person. Everything that could possibly be of service to me
I collected in the clothes storeroom, and then I made a deliberate
selection. I found a handbag I thought a suitable possession, and
some powder, rouge, and sticking-plaster.

"I had thought of painting and powdering my face and all that
there was to show of me, in order to render myself visible, but
the disadvantage of this lay in the fact that I should require
turpentine and other appliances and a considerable amount of time
before I could vanish again. Finally I chose a mask of the better
type, slightly grotesque but not more so than many human beings,
dark glasses, greyish whiskers, and a wig. I could find no
underclothing, but that I could buy subsequently, and for the time I
swathed myself in calico dominoes and some white cashmere scarfs. I
could find no socks, but the hunchback's boots were rather a loose
fit and sufficed. In a desk in the shop were three sovereigns and
about thirty shillings' worth of silver, and in a locked cupboard I
burst in the inner room were eight pounds in gold. I could go forth
into the world again, equipped.

"Then came a curious hesitation. Was my appearance really
credible? I tried myself with a little bedroom looking-glass,
inspecting myself from every point of view to discover any
forgotten chink, but it all seemed sound. I was grotesque to the
theatrical pitch, a stage miser, but I was certainly not a physical
impossibility. Gathering confidence, I took my looking-glass down
into the shop, pulled down the shop blinds, and surveyed myself
from every point of view with the help of the cheval glass in the
corner.

"I spent some minutes screwing up my courage and then unlocked the
shop door and marched out into the street, leaving the little man
to get out of his sheet again when he liked. In five minutes a
dozen turnings intervened between me and the costumier's shop. No
one appeared to notice me very pointedly. My last difficulty seemed
overcome."

He stopped again.

"And you troubled no more about the hunchback?" said Kemp.

"No," said the Invisible Man. "Nor have I heard what became of him.
I suppose he untied himself or kicked himself out. The knots were
pretty tight."

He became silent and went to the window and stared out.

"What happened when you went out into the Strand?"

"Oh!—disillusionment again. I thought my troubles were over.
Practically I thought I had impunity to do whatever I chose,
everything—save to give away my secret. So I thought. Whatever I
did, whatever the consequences might be, was nothing to me. I had
merely to fling aside my garments and vanish. No person could hold
me. I could take my money where I found it. I decided to treat
myself to a sumptuous feast, and then put up at a good hotel, and
accumulate a new outfit of property. I felt amazingly confident;
it's not particularly pleasant recalling that I was an ass. I went
into a place and was already ordering lunch, when it occurred to me
that I could not eat unless I exposed my invisible face. I finished
ordering the lunch, told the man I should be back in ten minutes,
and went out exasperated. I don't know if you have ever been
disappointed in your appetite."

"Not quite so badly," said Kemp, "but I can imagine it."

"I could have smashed the silly devils. At last, faint with the
desire for tasteful food, I went into another place and demanded a
private room. 'I am disfigured,' I said. 'Badly.' They looked at
me curiously, but of course it was not their affair—and so at
last I got my lunch. It was not particularly well served, but it
sufficed; and when I had had it, I sat over a cigar, trying to plan
my line of action. And outside a snowstorm was beginning.

"The more I thought it over, Kemp, the more I realised what a
helpless absurdity an Invisible Man was—in a cold and dirty
climate and a crowded civilised city. Before I made this mad
experiment I had dreamt of a thousand advantages. That afternoon
it seemed all disappointment. I went over the heads of the things
a man reckons desirable. No doubt invisibility made it possible
to get them, but it made it impossible to enjoy them when they
are got. Ambition—what is the good of pride of place when you
cannot appear there? What is the good of the love of woman when
her name must needs be Delilah? I have no taste for politics, for
the blackguardisms of fame, for philanthropy, for sport. What was
I to do? And for this I had become a wrapped-up mystery, a swathed
and bandaged caricature of a man!"