.
1670 / ROBERT Louis STEVENSON
But it was so turned as to show them nothing but the rosy glow playing on the
roof, the fire sparkling in a hundred repetitions along the glazed front of the
presses, and their 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 the same tones.
'For what did Jekyll'?he caught himself up at the word with a start, and then
conquering the weakness?'what could Jekyll want with it?' he said.
'You may say that!' said Poole.
Next they turned to the business table. On the desk, among the neat array
of papers, a large envelope was uppermost, and bore, in the doctor's hand, the
name of Mr. Utterson. The lawyer unsealed it, and several enclosures fell to
the floor. The first was a will, drawn in the same eccentric terms as the one
which he had returned six months before, to serve as a testament in case of
death and as a deed of gift in case of disappearance; but in place of the name
of Edward Hyde, the lawyer, with indescribable amazement, read the name of
Gabriel John Utterson. He looked at Poole, and then back at the paper, and
last of all at the dead malefactor stretched upon the carpet. 'My head goes round,' he said. 'He has been all these days in possession;
he had no cause to like me; he must have raged to see himself displaced; and
he has not destroyed this document.' He caught up the next paper; it was a brief note in the doctor's hand and
dated at the top. 'O Poole!' the lawyer cried, 'he was alive and here this day.
He cannot have been disposed of in so short a space; he must be still alive,
he must have fled! And then, why fled? and how? and in that case, can we
venture to declare this suicide? O, we must be careful. I foresee that we may
yet involve your master in some dire catastrophe.'
'Why don't you read it, sir?' asked Poole. 'Because I fear,' replied the lawyer solemnly. 'God grant I have no cause
for it!' And with that he brought the paper to his eyes and read as follows:
'MY DEAR
UTTERSON,?When this shall fall into your hands, I shall have disappeared, under what circumstances I have not the penetration to foresee,
but my instinct and all the circumstances of my nameless situation tell me
that the end is sure and must be early. Go then, and first read the narrative
which Lanyon warned me he was to place in your hands; and if you care to
hear more, turn to the confession of 'Your unworthy and unhappy friend,
'HENRY JEKYLL.'
'There was a third enclosure?' asked Utterson.
'Here, sir,' said Poole, and gave into his hands a considerable packet sealed
in several places. The lawyer put it in his pocket. 'I would say nothing of this paper. If your
master has fled or is dead, we may at least save his credit. It is now ten; I must
go home and read these documents in quiet; but I shall be back before mid
night, when we shall send for the police.'
They went out, locking the door of the theatre behind them; and Utterson,
once more leaving the servants gathered about the fire in the hall, trudged
back to his office to read the two narratives in which this mystery was now to
be explained.
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THE STRANGE CASE OF DR. JEKYLL AND MR. HYDE / 1671
Dr. Lanyon's Narrative
