The Invisible Man: A Grotesque Romance
“Ah! Now—” The Invisible Man stood up, and sticking his arms akimbo
began to pace the study.
“I made a mistake, Kemp, a huge mistake, in carrying this thing through
alone. I have wasted strength, time, opportunities. Alone—it is
wonderful how little a man can do alone! To rob a little, to hurt a
little, and there is the end.
“What I want, Kemp, is a goal-keeper, a helper, and a hiding-place, an
arrangement whereby I can sleep and eat and rest in peace, and
unsuspected. I must have a confederate. With a confederate, with food
and rest—a thousand things are possible.
“Hitherto I have gone on vague lines. We have to consider all that
invisibility means, all that it does not mean. It means little
advantage for eavesdropping and so forth—one makes sounds. It’s of
little help—a little help perhaps—in housebreaking and so forth. Once
you’ve caught me you could easily imprison me. But on the other hand I
am hard to catch. This invisibility, in fact, is only good in two
cases: It’s useful in getting away, it’s useful in approaching. It’s
particularly useful, therefore, in killing. I can walk round a man,
whatever weapon he has, choose my point, strike as I like. Dodge as I
like. Escape as I like.”
Kemp’s hand went to his moustache. Was that a movement downstairs?
“And it is killing we must do, Kemp.”
“It is killing we must do,” repeated Kemp. “I’m listening to your plan,
Griffin, but I’m not agreeing, mind. _Why_ killing?”
“Not wanton killing, but a judicious slaying. The point is, they know
there is an Invisible Man—as well as we know there is an Invisible Man.
And that Invisible Man, Kemp, must now establish a Reign of Terror.
Yes; no doubt it’s startling. But I mean it. A Reign of Terror. He must
take some town like your Burdock and terrify and dominate it. He must
issue his orders. He can do that in a thousand ways—scraps of paper
thrust under doors would suffice. And all who disobey his orders he
must kill, and kill all who would defend them.”
“Humph!” said Kemp, no longer listening to Griffin but to the sound of
his front door opening and closing.
“It seems to me, Griffin,” he said, to cover his wandering attention,
“that your confederate would be in a difficult position.”
“No one would know he was a confederate,” said the Invisible Man,
eagerly. And then suddenly, “Hush! What’s that downstairs?”
“Nothing,” said Kemp, and suddenly began to speak loud and fast. “I
don’t agree to this, Griffin,” he said. “Understand me, I don’t agree
to this. Why dream of playing a game against the race? How can you hope
to gain happiness? Don’t be a lone wolf. Publish your results; take the
world—take the nation at least—into your confidence. Think what you
might do with a million helpers—”
The Invisible Man interrupted—arm extended. “There are footsteps coming
upstairs,” he said in a low voice.
“Nonsense,” said Kemp.
“Let me see,” said the Invisible Man, and advanced, arm extended, to
the door.
And then things happened very swiftly. Kemp hesitated for a second and
then moved to intercept him. The Invisible Man started and stood still.
“Traitor!” cried the Voice, and suddenly the dressing-gown opened, and
sitting down the Unseen began to disrobe. Kemp made three swift steps
to the door, and forthwith the Invisible Man—his legs had
vanished—sprang to his feet with a shout. Kemp flung the door open.
As it opened, there came a sound of hurrying feet downstairs and
voices.
With a quick movement Kemp thrust the Invisible Man back, sprang aside,
and slammed the door. The key was outside and ready. In another moment
Griffin would have been alone in the belvedere study, a prisoner. Save
for one little thing. The key had been slipped in hastily that morning.
As Kemp slammed the door it fell noisily upon the carpet.
Kemp’s face became white. He tried to grip the door handle with both
hands. For a moment he stood lugging. Then the door gave six inches.
But he got it closed again. The second time it was jerked a foot wide,
and the dressing-gown came wedging itself into the opening. His throat
was gripped by invisible fingers, and he left his hold on the handle to
defend himself. He was forced back, tripped and pitched heavily into
the corner of the landing. The empty dressing-gown was flung on the top
of him.
Halfway up the staircase was Colonel Adye, the recipient of Kemp’s
letter, the chief of the Burdock police. He was staring aghast at the
sudden appearance of Kemp, followed by the extraordinary sight of
clothing tossing empty in the air. He saw Kemp felled, and struggling
to his feet. He saw him rush forward, and go down again, felled like an
ox.
Then suddenly he was struck violently. By nothing! A vast weight, it
seemed, leapt upon him, and he was hurled headlong down the staircase,
with a grip on his throat and a knee in his groin. An invisible foot
trod on his back, a ghostly patter passed downstairs, he heard the two
police officers in the hall shout and run, and the front door of the
house slammed violently.
He rolled over and sat up staring. He saw, staggering down the
staircase, Kemp, dusty and disheveled, one side of his face white from
a blow, his lip bleeding, and a pink dressing-gown and some
underclothing held in his arms.
“My God!” cried Kemp, “the game’s up! He’s gone!”
CHAPTER XXV.
THE HUNTING OF THE INVISIBLE MAN
For a space Kemp was too inarticulate to make Adye understand the swift
things that had just happened. They stood on the landing, Kemp speaking
swiftly, the grotesque swathings of Griffin still on his arm. But
presently Adye began to grasp something of the situation.
“He is mad,” said Kemp; “inhuman. He is pure selfishness. He thinks of
nothing but his own advantage, his own safety. I have listened to such
a story this morning of brutal self-seeking.... He has wounded men. He
will kill them unless we can prevent him. He will create a panic.
Nothing can stop him. He is going out now—furious!”
“He must be caught,” said Adye. “That is certain.”
“But how?” cried Kemp, and suddenly became full of ideas. “You must
begin at once. You must set every available man to work; you must
prevent his leaving this district. Once he gets away, he may go through
the countryside as he wills, killing and maiming. He dreams of a reign
of terror! A reign of terror, I tell you. You must set a watch on
trains and roads and shipping. The garrison must help. You must wire
for help. The only thing that may keep him here is the thought of
recovering some books of notes he counts of value. I will tell you of
that! There is a man in your police station—Marvel.”
“I know,” said Adye, “I know. Those books—yes. But the tramp....”
“Says he hasn’t them. But he thinks the tramp has. And you must prevent
him from eating or sleeping; day and night the country must be astir
for him. Food must be locked up and secured, all food, so that he will
have to break his way to it. The houses everywhere must be barred
against him. Heaven send us cold nights and rain! The whole
country-side must begin hunting and keep hunting. I tell you, Adye, he
is a danger, a disaster; unless he is pinned and secured, it is
frightful to think of the things that may happen.”
“What else can we do?” said Adye. “I must go down at once and begin
organising. But why not come? Yes—you come too! Come, and we must hold
a sort of council of war—get Hopps to help—and the railway managers. By
Jove! it’s urgent. Come along—tell me as we go. What else is there we
can do? Put that stuff down.”
In another moment Adye was leading the way downstairs. They found the
front door open and the policemen standing outside staring at empty
air. “He’s got away, sir,” said one.
“We must go to the central station at once,” said Adye. “One of you go
on down and get a cab to come up and meet us—quickly. And now, Kemp,
what else?”
“Dogs,” said Kemp. “Get dogs. They don’t see him, but they wind him.
Get dogs.”
“Good,” said Adye. “It’s not generally known, but the prison officials
over at Halstead know a man with bloodhounds. Dogs. What else?”
“Bear in mind,” said Kemp, “his food shows. After eating, his food
shows until it is assimilated. So that he has to hide after eating. You
must keep on beating. Every thicket, every quiet corner. And put all
weapons—all implements that might be weapons, away. He can’t carry such
things for long. And what he can snatch up and strike men with must be
hidden away.”
“Good again,” said Adye. “We shall have him yet!”
“And on the roads,” said Kemp, and hesitated.
“Yes?” said Adye.
“Powdered glass,” said Kemp. “It’s cruel, I know. But think of what he
may do!”
Adye drew the air in sharply between his teeth. “It’s unsportsmanlike.
I don’t know. But I’ll have powdered glass got ready. If he goes too
far....”
“The man’s become inhuman, I tell you,” said Kemp. “I am as sure he
will establish a reign of terror—so soon as he has got over the
emotions of this escape—as I am sure I am talking to you. Our only
chance is to be ahead. He has cut himself off from his kind. His blood
be upon his own head.”
CHAPTER XXVI.
THE WICKSTEED MURDER
The Invisible Man seems to have rushed out of Kemp’s house in a state
of blind fury. A little child playing near Kemp’s gateway was violently
caught up and thrown aside, so that its ankle was broken, and
thereafter for some hours the Invisible Man passed out of human
perceptions. No one knows where he went nor what he did. But one can
imagine him hurrying through the hot June forenoon, up the hill and on
to the open downland behind Port Burdock, raging and despairing at his
intolerable fate, and sheltering at last, heated and weary, amid the
thickets of Hintondean, to piece together again his shattered schemes
against his species. That seems the most probable refuge for him, for
there it was he re-asserted himself in a grimly tragical manner about
two in the afternoon.
One wonders what his state of mind may have been during that time, and
what plans he devised. No doubt he was almost ecstatically exasperated
by Kemp’s treachery, and though we may be able to understand the
motives that led to that deceit, we may still imagine and even
sympathise a little with the fury the attempted surprise must have
occasioned. Perhaps something of the stunned astonishment of his Oxford
Street experiences may have returned to him, for he had evidently
counted on Kemp’s co-operation in his brutal dream of a terrorised
world. At any rate he vanished from human ken about midday, and no
living witness can tell what he did until about half-past two. It was a
fortunate thing, perhaps, for humanity, but for him it was a fatal
inaction.
During that time a growing multitude of men scattered over the
countryside were busy. In the morning he had still been simply a
legend, a terror; in the afternoon, by virtue chiefly of Kemp’s drily
worded proclamation, he was presented as a tangible antagonist, to be
wounded, captured, or overcome, and the countryside began organising
itself with inconceivable rapidity. By two o’clock even he might still
have removed himself out of the district by getting aboard a train, but
after two that became impossible. Every passenger train along the lines
on a great parallelogram between Southampton, Manchester, Brighton and
Horsham, travelled with locked doors, and the goods traffic was almost
entirely suspended. And in a great circle of twenty miles round Port
Burdock, men armed with guns and bludgeons were presently setting out
in groups of three and four, with dogs, to beat the roads and fields.
Mounted policemen rode along the country lanes, stopping at every
cottage and warning the people to lock up their houses, and keep
indoors unless they were armed, and all the elementary schools had