The Last Night

by Robert Louis Stevenson

　　Poole felt in his pocket and handed out a crumpled note, whichthe lawyer, bending nearer to the candle, carefully examined. Its contents ran thus: "Dr.Jekyll presents his compliments to Messrs. Maw. He assures themthat their last sample is impure and quite useless for hispresent purpose. In the year 18 -- , Dr. J. purchased a somewhatlarge quantity from Messrs. M. He now begs them to search withthe most sedulous care, and should any of the same quality beleft, to forward it to him at once. Expense is no consideration.The importance of this to Dr. J. can hardly be exaggerated." Sofar the letter had run composedly enough, but here with a suddensplutter of the pen, the writer's emotion had broken loose. "ForGod's sake," he had added, "find me some of the old.""This is a strange note," said Mr. Utterson; and then sharply,"How do you come to have it open?""The man at Maw's was main angry, sir, and he threw it back to melike so much dirt," returned Poole."This is unquestionably the doctor's hand, do you know?" resumedthe lawyer."I thought it looked like it," said the servant rather sulkily;and then, with another voice, "But what matters hand-of-write? "he said. "I've seen him!""Seen him?" repeated Mr. Utterson. "Well?""That's it!" said Poole. "It was this way. I came suddenly intothe theatre from the garden. It seems he had slipped out to look for this drug orwhatever it is; for the cabinet door was open, and there he wasat the far end of the room digging among the crates. He looked upwhen I came in, gave a kind of cry, and whipped up-stairs intothe cabinet. It was but for one minute that I saw him, but thehair stood upon my head like quills. Sir, if that was my master,why had he a mask upon his face? If it was my master, why did hecry out like a rat, and run from me? I have served him longenough. And then..." The man paused and passed his hand over hisface."These are all very strange circumstances," said Mr. Utterson,"but I think I begin to see daylight. Your master, Poole, isplainly seised with one of those maladies that both torture anddeform the sufferer; hence, for aught I know, the alteration ofhis voice; hence the mask and the avoidance of his friends; hencehis eagerness to find this drug, by means of which the poor soulretains some hope of ultimate recovery -- God grant that he benot deceived! There is my explanation; it is sad enough, Poole,ay, and appalling to consider; but it is plain and natural, hangswell together, and delivers us from all exorbitant alarms.""Sir," said the butler, turning to a sort of mottled pallor,"that thing was not my master, and there's the truth. My master"here he looked round him and began to whisper -- "is a tall,fine build of a man, and this was more of a dwarf."Utterson attempted to protest. "O, sir," cried Poole, "do youthink I do not know my master after twenty years? Do you think Ido not know where his head comes to in the cabinet door, where Isaw him every morning of my life? No, Sir, that thing in the maskwas never Dr. Jekyll -- God knows what it was, but it was neverDr. Jekyll; and it is the belief of my heart that there wasmurder done.""Poole," replied the lawyer, "if you say that, it will become myduty to make certain. Much as I desire to spare your master'sfeelings, much as I am puzzled by this note which seems to provehim to be still alive, I shall consider it my duty to break inthat door."Ah Mr. Utterson, that's talking!" cried the butler."And now comes the second question," resumed Utterson: "Who Isgoing to do it?""Why, you and me," was the undaunted reply."That's very well said," returned the lawyer; "and whatever comesof it, I shall make it my business to see you are no loser.""There is an axe in the theatre, continued Poole; "and you mighttake the kitchen poker for yourself."The lawyer took that rude but weighty instrument into his hand,and balanced it. "Do you know, Poole," he said, looking up, "thatyou and I are about to place ourselves in a position of someperil?""You may say so, sir, indeed," returned the butler."It is well, then, that we should be frank," said the other. "Weboth think more than we have said; let us make a clean breast.This masked figure that you saw, did you recognise it?""Well, sir, it went so quick, and the creature was so doubled up,that I could hardly swear to that," was the answer. "But if youmean, was it Mr. Hyde? -- why, yes, I think it was! You see, itwas much of the same bigness; and it had the same quick, lightway with it; and then who else could have got in by thelaboratory door? You have not forgot, sir that at the time of themurder he had still the key with him? But that's not all. I don'tknow, Mr. Utterson, if ever you met this Mr. Hyde?""Yes," said the lawyer, "I once spoke with him.""Then you must know as well as the rest of us that there wassomething queer about that gentleman -- something that gave a mana turn -- I don't know rightly how to say it, sir, beyond this:that you felt it in your marrow kind of cold and thin.""I own I felt something of what you describe," said Mr. Utterson."Quite so, sir," returned Poole. "Well, when that masked thinglike a monkey jumped from among the chemicalsand whipped into the cabinet, it went down my spine like ice. Oh,I know it's not evidence, Mr. Utterson. I'm book-learned enoughfor that; but a man has his, feelings, and I give you myBible-word it was Mr. Hyde!""Ay, ay," said the lawyer. "My fears incline to the same point.Evil, I fear, founded -- evil was sure to come -- of thatconnection. Ay, truly, I believe you; I believe poor Harry iskilled; and I believe his murderer (for what purpose, God alonecan tell) is still lurking in his victim's room. Well, let ourname be vengeance. Call Bradshaw."The footman came at the summons, very white and nervous. Pull yourself together, Bradshaw," said the lawyer. "Thissuspense, I know, is telling upon all of you; but it is now ourintention to make an end of it. Poole, here, and I are going toforce our way into the cabinet. If all is well, my shoulders arebroad enough to bear the blame. Meanwhile, lest anything shouldreally be amiss, or any malefactor seek to escape by the back,you and the boy must go round the corner with a pair of goodsticks and take your post at the laboratory door. We give you tenminutes to get to your stations."As Bradshaw left, the lawyer looked at his watch. "And now,Poole, let us get to ours," he said; and taking the poker under his arm, led the way into theyard. The scud had banked over the moon, and it was now quitedark. The wind, which only broke in puffs and draughts into thatdeep well of building, tossed the light of the candle to and froabout their steps, until they came into the shelter of thetheatre, where they sat down silently to wait. London hummedsolemnly all around; but nearer at hand, the stillness was onlybroken by the sounds of a footfall moving to and fro along thecabinet floor."So it will walk all day, Sir," whispered Poole; "ay, and thebetter part of the night. Only when a new sample comes from thechemist, there's a bit of a break. Ah, it's an ill consciencethat's such an enemy to rest! Ah, sir, there's blood foully shedin every step of it! But hark again, a little closer -- put yourheart in your ears, Mr. Utterson, and tell me, is that thedoctor's foot?"The steps fell lightly and oddly, with a certain swing, for allthey went so slowly; it was different indeed from the heavycreaking tread of Henry Jekyll. Utterson sighed. "Is there neveranything else?" he asked.Poole nodded. "Once," he said. "Once I heard it weeping!""Weeping? how that?" said the lawyer, conscious of a sudden chillof horror."Weeping like a woman or a lost soul," said the butler. "I cameaway with that upon my heart, that I could have wept too."But now the ten minutes drew to an end. Poole disinterred the axefrom under a stack of packing straw; the candle was set upon thenearest table to light them to the attack; and they drew nearwith bated breath to where that patient foot was still going upand down, up and down, in the quiet of the night."Jekyll," cried Utterson, with a loud voice, "I demand to seeyou." He paused a moment, but there came no reply. "I give youfair warning, our suspicions are aroused, and I must and shallsee you," he resumed; "if not by fair means, then by foul! if notof your consent, then by brute force!""Utterson," said the voice, "for God's sake, have mercy!" Ah, that's not Jekyll's voice -- it's Hyde's!" cried Utterson."Down with the door, Poole!"Poole swung the axe over his shoulder; the blow shook thebuilding, and the red baise door leaped against the lock andhinges. A dismal screech, as of mere animal terror, rang from thecabinet. Up went the axe again, and again the panels crashed andthe frame bounded; four times the blow fell; but the wood wastough and the fittings were of excellent workmanship; and it wasnot until the fifth, that the lock burst in sunder and the wreckof the door fell inwards on the carpet.The besiegers, appalled by their own riot and the stillness thathad succeeded, stood back a little and peered in. There lay thecabinet before their eyes in the quiet lamplight, a good fireglowing and chattering on the hearth, the kettle singing its thinstrain, a drawer or two open, papers neatly set forth on thebusiness-table, and nearer the fire, the things laid out for tea:the quietest room, you would have said, and, but for the glasedpresses full of chemicals, the most commonplace that night inLondon.Right in the midst there lay the body of a man sorely contortedand still twitching. They drew near on tiptoe, turned it on itsback and beheld the face of Edward Hyde. He was dressed inclothes far too large for him, clothes of the doctor's bigness;the cords of his face still moved with a semblance of life, butlife was quite gone; and by the crushed phial in the hand and thestrong smell of kernels that hung upon the air, Utterson knewthat he was looking on the body of a self-destroyer."We have come too late," he said sternly, "whether to save orpunish. Hyde is gone to his account; and it only remains for usto find the body of your master."The far greater proportion of the building was occupied by thetheatre, which filled almost the whole ground story and waslighted from above, and by the cabinet, which formed an upperstory at one end and looked upon the court. A corridor joined the theatre to the door on theby-street; and with this the cabinet communicated separately by asecond flight of stairs. There were besides a few dark closetsand a spacious cellar. All these they now thoroughly examined.Each closet needed but a glance, for all were empty, and all, bythe dust that fell from their doors, had stood long unopened. Thecellar, indeed, was filled with crazy lumber, mostly dating fromthe times of the surgeon who was Jekyll's predecessor; but evenas they opened the door they were advertised of the uselessnessof further search, by the fall of a perfect mat of cobweb whichhad for years sealed up the entrance. Nowhere was there any traceof Henry Jekyll, dead or alive.Poole stamped on the flags of the corridor. " He must be buriedhere," he said, hearkening to the sound."Or he may have fled," said Utterson, and he turned to examinethe door in the by-street. It was locked; and lying near by onthe flags, they found the key, already stained with rust."This does not look like use," observed the lawyer."Use!" echoed Poole. "Do you not see, sir, it is broken? much asif a man had stamped on it.""Ay," continued Utterson," and the fractures, too, are rusty."The two men looked at each other with a scare. "This is beyondme, Poole," said the lawyer. "Let us go back to the cabinet."They mounted the stair in silence, and still with an occasionalawe-struck glance at the dead body, proceeded more thoroughly toexamine the contents of the cabinet. At one table, there weretraces of chemical work, various measured heaps of some whitesalt being laid on glass saucers, as though for an experiment inwhich the unhappy man had been prevented."That is the same drug that I was always bringing him," saidPoole; and even as he spoke, the kettle with a startling noiseboiled over.This brought them to the fireside, where the easy-chair was drawncosily up, and the teathings stood ready to the sitter's elbow,the very sugar in the cup. There were several books on a shelf;one lay beside the tea-things open, and Utterson was amazed tofind it a copy of a pious work, for which Jekyll had severaltimes expressed a great esteem, annotated, in his own hand, withstartling blasphemies.Next, in the course of their review of the chamber, the searcherscame to the cheval glass, into whose depths they looked with aninvoluntary horror. But it was so turned as to show them nothingbut the rosy glow playing on the roof, the fire sparkling in ahundred repetitions along the glazed front of the presses, andtheir own pale and fearful countenances stooping to look in."This glass have seen some strange things, sir," whispered Poole."And surely none stranger than itself," echoed the lawyer in thesame tones. "For what did Jekyll" -- he caught himself up at theword with a start, and then conquering the weakness -- "whatcould Jekyll want with it?" he said."You may say that!" said Poole. Next they turned to thebusiness-table. On the desk among the neat array of papers, alarge envelope was uppermost, and bore, in the doctor's hand, thename of Mr. Utterson. The lawyer unsealed it, and severalenclosures fell to the floor. The first was a will, drawn in thesame eccentric terms as the one which he had returned six monthsbefore, to serve as a testament in case of death and as a deed ofgift in case of disappearance; but, in place of the name ofEdward Hyde, the lawyer, with indescribable amazement, read thename of Gabriel John Utterson. He looked at Poole, and then backat the paper, and last of all at the dead malefactor stretchedupon the carpet."My head goes round," he said. "He has been all these days inpossession; he had no cause to like me; he must have raged to seehimself displaced; and he has not destroyed this document."He caught up the next paper; it was a brief note in the doctor'shand and dated at the top."O Poole!" the lawyer cried, "he was alive and here this day. Hecannot have been disposed of in so short a space, he must bestill alive, he must have fled! And then, why fled? and how? andin that case, can we venture to declare this suicide? Oh, we mustbe careful. I foresee that we may yet involve your master in somedire catastrophe.""Why don't you read it, sir?" asked Poole."Because I fear," replied the lawyer solemnly. " God grant I haveno cause for it!" And with that he brought the paper to his eyesand read as follows:"MY DEAR UTTERSON, -- When this shall fall into your hands, Ishall have disappeared, under what circumstances I have not thepenetration to foresee, but my instinct and all the circumstancesof my nameless situation tell me that the end is sure and must beearly. Go then, and first read the narrative which Lanyon warnedme he was to place in your hands; and if you care to hear more,turn to the confession ofYour unworthy and unhappy friend,HENRY JEKYLL.""There was a third enclosure?" asked Utterson."Here, sir," said Poole, and gave into his hands a considerablepacket sealed in several places.The lawyer put it in his pocket. "I would say nothing of thispaper. If your master has fled or is dead, we may at least savehis credit. It is now ten; I must go home and read thesedocuments in quiet; but I shall be back before midnight, when weshall send for the police."They went out, locking the door of the theatre behind them; andUtterson, once more leaving the servants gathered about the firein the hall, trudged back to his office to read the twonarratives in which this mystery was now to be explained.MR. UTTERSON was sitting by his fireside one evening afterdinner, when he was surprised to receive a visit from Poole."Bless me, Poole, what brings you here?" he cried; and thentaking a second look at him, "What ails you?" he added; "is thedoctor ill?""Mr. Utterson," said the man," there is something wrong." Take a seat, and here is a glass of wine for you," said thelawyer. "Now, take your time, and tell me plainly what you want.""You know the doctor's ways, sir," replied Poole, "and how heshuts himself up. Well, he's shut up again in the cabinet; and Idon't like it, sir I wish I may die if I like it. Mr. Utterson,sir, I'm afraid.""Now, my good man," said the lawyer, "be explicit. What are youafraid of?""I've been afraid for about a week," returned Poole, doggedlydisregarding the question, "and I can bear it no more."The man's appearance amply bore out his words; his mannerwas altered for the worse; and except for themoment when he had first announced his terror, he had not oncelooked the lawyer in the face. Even now, he sat with the glass ofwine untasted on his knee, and his eyes directed to a corner ofthe floor. "I can bear it no more," he repeated."Come," said the lawyer, "I see you have some good reason, Poole;I see there is something seriously amiss. Try to tell me what itis.""I think there's been foul play," said Poole, hoarsely. "Foul play!" cried the lawyer, a good deal frightened and ratherinclined to be irritated in consequence. "What foul play? Whatdoes the man mean?""I daren't say, sir" was the answer; "but will you come alongwith me and see for yourself?"Mr. Utterson's only answer was to rise and get his hat andgreat-coat; but he observed with wonder the greatness of therelief that appeared upon the butler's face, and perhaps with noless, that the wine was still untasted when he set it down tofollow.It was a wild, cold, seasonable night of March, with a pale moon,lying on her back as though the wind had tilted her, and a flyingwrack of the most diaphanous and lawny texture. The wind madetalking difficult, and flecked the blood into the face. It seemedto have swept the streets unusually bare of passengers, besides; for Mr. Uttersonthought he had never seen that part of London so deserted. Hecould have wished it otherwise; never in his life had he beenconscious of so sharp a wish to see and touch hisfellow-creatures; for struggle as he might, there was borne inupon his mind a crushing anticipation of calamity. The square,when they got there, was all full of wind and dust, and the thintrees in the garden were lashing themselves along the railing.Poole, who had kept all the way a pace or two ahead, now pulledup in the middle of the pavement, and in spite of the bitingweather, took off his hat and mopped his brow with a redpocket-handkerchief. But for all the hurry of his cowing, thesewere not the dews of exertion that he wiped away, but themoisture of some strangling anguish; for his face was white andhis voice, when he spoke, harsh and broken."Well, sir," he said, "here we are, and God grant there benothing wrong.""Amen, Poole," said the lawyer.Thereupon the servant knocked in a very guarded manner; the doorwas opened on the chain; and a voice asked from within, "Is thatyou, Poole?""It's all right," said Poole. "Open the door." The hall, whenthey entered it, was brightly lighted up; the fire was builthigh; and about the hearth the whole of the servants, men andwomen, stood huddled together like a flock of sheep. At the sightof Mr. Utterson, the housemaid broke into hysterical whimpering;and the cook, crying out, "Bless God! it's Mr. Utterson," ranforward as if to take him in her arms."What, what? Are you all here?" said the lawyer peevishly. "Veryirregular, very unseemly; your master would be far from pleased.""They're all afraid," said Poole.Blank silence followed, no one protesting; only the maid liftedup her voice and now wept loudly."Hold your tongue!" Poole said to her, with a ferocity of accentthat testified to his own jangled nerves; and indeed, when thegirl had so suddenly raised the note of her lamentation, they hadall started and turned toward the inner door with faces ofdreadful expectation. "And now," continued the butler, addressingthe knife-boy, "reach me a candle, and we'll get this throughhands at once." And then he begged Mr. Utterson to follow him,and led the way to the back-garden."Now, sir," said he, "you come as gently as you can. I want youto hear, and I don't want you to be heard. And see here, sir, ifby any chance he was to ask you in, don't go."Mr. Utterson's nerves, at this unlooked-for termination, gave ajerk that nearly threw him from his balance; but he re-collectedhis courage and followed the butler into the laboratory building and throughthe surgical theatre, with its lumber of crates and bottles, tothe foot of the stair. Here Poole motioned him to stand on oneside and listen; while he himself, setting down the candle andmaking a great and obvious call on his resolution, mounted thesteps and knocked with a somewhat uncertain hand on the red baizeof the cabinet door."Mr. Utterson, sir, asking to see you, "he called; and even as hedid so, once more violently signed to the lawyer to give ear.A voice answered from within: "Tell him I cannot see any one," itsaid complainingly."Thank you, sir," said Poole, with a note of something liketriumph in his voice; and taking up his candle, he led Mr.Utterson back across the yard and into the great kitchen, wherethe fire was out and the beetles were leaping on the floor."Sir," he said, looking Mr. Utterson in the eyes," was that mymaster's voice?""It seems much changed," replied the lawyer, very pale, butgiving look for look."Changed? Well, yes, I think so," said the butler. "Have I beentwenty years in this man's house, to be deceived about his voice?No, sir; master's made away with; he was made, away with eightdays ago, when we heard him cry out upon the name of God; andwho's in there instead of him, and why it stays there, is a thingthat cries to Heaven, Mr. Utterson!""This is a very strange tale, Poole; this is rather a wild tale,my man," said Mr. Utterson, biting his finger. "Suppose it wereas you suppose, supposing Dr. Jekyll to have been -- well,murdered, what could induce the murderer to stay? That won't holdwater; it doesn't commend itself to reason.""Well, Mr. Utterson, you are a hard man to satisfy, but I'll doit yet," said Poole. "All this last week (you must know) him, orit, or whatever it is that lives in that cabinet, has been cryingnight and day for some sort of medicine and cannot get it to hismind. It was sometimes his way -- the master's, that is -- towrite his orders on a sheet of paper and throw it on the stair.We've had nothing else this week back; nothing but papers, and aclosed door, and the very meals left there to be smuggled in whennobody was looking. Well, sir, every day, ay, and twice andthrice in the same day, there have been orders and complaints,and I have been sent flying to all the wholesale chemists intown. Every time I brought the stuff back, there would be anotherpaper telling me to return it, because it was not pure, andanother order to a different firm. This drug is wanted bitterbad, sir, whatever for.""Have you any of these papers?" asked Mr. Utterson.