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“Why!” said Huxter, suddenly, “that’s not a man at all. It’s just empty clothes. Look! You can see down his collar. I could put my arm-”
He extended his hand, and he drew it back with a sharp exclamation.
“I wish you’d keep your fingers out of my eye,” said the aerial voice. “The fact is, I’m all here-head, hands, legs, and all the rest of it, but I’m invisible.”
The suit of clothes, now all unbuttoned and hanging loosely upon its unseen supports, stood up.
Several men had entered the room, so that it was crowded.
“Invisible, eh?” said Huxter. “Who ever heard of that?”
“It’s strange, perhaps, but it’s not a crime. Why is the policeman here?”
“Ah! that’s a different matter,” said Jaffers. “I got an order and it’s all correct. Invisibility is not a crime, but the burglary is. A house was broken into and money was taken.”
“Well?”
“And circumstances certainly point-”
“Nonsense!” said the Invisible Man.
“I hope so, sir; but I’ve got my instructions.”
“Well,” said the stranger, “I’ll come. I’ll come. But no handcuffs.”
“It’s the regular thing,” said Jaffers.
“No handcuffs,” stipulated the stranger.
“Pardon me,” said Jaffers.
Abruptly the figure sat down, and before any one could realise what was happening, the slippers, socks, and trousers had been kicked off under the table. Then he sprang up again and flung off his coat.
“Stop that!” said Jaffers, suddenly realising what was happening. He gripped at the waistcoat; it struggled, and the shirt slipped out of it.
“Hold him!” said Jaffers, loudly. “Once he gets the things off-”
“Hold him!” cried everyone. A white shirt was now all that was visible of the stranger.
The shirt-sleeve sent Hall backward, and in another moment the garment was lifted up and the shirt hit the man’s head.
“Hold him!” said everybody. “Shut the door! Don’t let him get out! I got something! Here he is!”
Sandy Wadgers got a frightful blow in the nose. He opened the door. The hitting continued. Jaffers was struck under the jaw, and, turning, caught at something that intervened between him and Huxter.
“I got him!” shouted Jaffers, wrestling with purple face and swelling veins against his unseen enemy.
Then Jaffers cried in a strangled voice, and his fingers relaxed.
There were excited cries of “Hold him!” “Invisible!” and so forth, and a young fellow caught something and fell over the constable’s prostrate body. Across the road a woman screamed as something pushed her; a dog, kicked apparently, yelped and ran howling. The Invisible Man ran away. People stood amazed and gesticulating, and then came panic. But Jaffers lay quite still, face upward and knees bent.
Chapter VIII
In Transit
The eighth chapter is exceedingly brief, and relates that Gibbons, the amateur naturalist of the district, while lying on the hill without a soul within a couple of miles of him, as he thought, and almost dozing, heard close to him the sound as of a man coughing, sneezing, and then swearing savagely to himself. Gibbons looked out but saw nothing. Yet the voice was indisputable. It was the swearing of an educated man. It grew, diminished again, and died away in the distance. It lifted to a sneeze and ended. Gibbons had heard nothing of the morning’s events, but the phenomenon was so striking and disturbing that his philosophical tranquillity vanished; he got up hastily, and hurried down the hill towards the village, as fast as he could go.
Chapter IX
Mr. Thomas Marvel
Mr. Thomas Marvel was a person of copious, flexible visage, with a cylindrical nose, a liquorish, ample, fluctuating mouth, and an eccentric beard. He wore a furry silk hat, and the frequent substitution of shoe-laces for buttons, marked a bachelor.
Mr. Thomas Marvel was sitting with his feet in a ditch by the roadside, about a mile and a half out of Iping. His socks were torn out, his big toes were broad like the ears of a watchful dog. In a leisurely manner-he did everything in a leisurely manner-he was going to try on a pair of boots. They were the best boots he had had for a long time, but too large for him. Mr. Thomas Marvel hated roomy shoes, but he hated damp as well. But he could not understand which he hated most, and it was a pleasant day, and there was nothing better to do. So he put the four shoes in a group on the turf and looked at them. And seeing them there among the grass, it suddenly occurred to him that both pairs were ugly to see. He was not at all startled by a voice behind him.
“They’re boots, anyhow,” said the Voice.
“They are-charity boots,” said Mr. Thomas Marvel; “and I can’t decide which is the ugliest pair here.”
“Hm,” said the Voice.
“I’ve worn worse boots. But not so ugly. My old boots-I am sick of them. They’re good enough, of course. And if you’ll believe me, I’ve got nothing in the whole country, but these boots. Look at them! Ugly, right? What a country! What people!”
“It’s a terrible country,” said the Voice. “And people are like pigs.”
“That’s it!” said Mr. Thomas Marvel. “Lord! And their boots!”
He turned his head to the right, to look at the boots of his interlocutor, and lo! Where the boots of his interlocutor should have been were neither legs nor boots. He was in a great amazement.
“Where are you?” said Mr. Thomas Marvel over his shoulder. “Am I drunk? Have I had visions? Was I talking to myself? What the-”
“Don’t be alarmed,” said a Voice.
“None of your jokes,” said Mr. Thomas Marvel, rising sharply to his feet. “Where are you?”
“Don’t be alarmed,” repeated the Voice.
“You’ll be alarmed in a minute, you silly fool,” said Mr. Thomas Marvel. “Where are you? Let me catch you.”
There was no answer. Mr. Thomas Marvel stood bootless and amazed.
“Peewit,” said a peewit, very remote.
“Peewit, indeed!” said Mr. Thomas Marvel. “This is no time for foolery.”
The field was desolate, east and west, north and south; the road ran smooth and empty north and south, and, save for that peewit, the blue sky was empty too.
“I know,” said Mr. Thomas Marvel, shuffling his coat on to his shoulders again. “It’s the alcohol! I might have known.”
“It’s not the alcohol,” said the Voice. “Don’t worry.”
“Oh!” said Mr. Marvel, and his face grew white. “It’s the alcohol!” his lips repeated noiselessly. He remained staring about him, rotating slowly backwards. “I could have sworn I heard a voice,” he whispered.
“Of course you did.”
“It’s there again,” said Mr. Marvel, closing his eyes and clasping his hands with a tragic gesture. He was suddenly taken by the collar and shaken violently, and left more dazed than ever.
“Don’t be a fool,” said the Voice.
“I got crazy,” said Mr. Marvel. “It’s no good. It’s because of those damned boots. Or it’s spirits.”
“Neither one thing nor the other,” said the Voice. “Listen!”
“Crazy,” said Mr. Marvel.
“One minute,” said the Voice.
“Well?” said Mr. Thomas Marvel.
“You think I’m just imagination? Just imagination?”
“What else can you be?” said Mr. Thomas Marvel, rubbing the back of his neck.
“Very well,” said the Voice, in a tone of relief. “Then I’m going to throw little stones at you till you think differently.”
“But where are you?”
The Voice made no answer. Whizz came a little stone, apparently out of the air. Mr. Marvel was too amazed to dodge. Whizz came another little stone, and ricochetted from a bare toe into the ditch. Mr. Thomas Marvel jumped a foot and howled aloud.
“Now,” said the Voice, “am I imagination?”
Mr. Marvel lay quiet.
“If you struggle,” said the Voice, “I shall throw the stone at your head.”
“Oh-oh,” said Mr. Thomas Marvel, taking his wounded toe in hand. “I don’t understand it. Stones are flinging themselves. Stones are talking. I’ll surrender.”
“It’s very simple,” said the Voice. “I’m an invisible man.”
“Tell me something more interesting,” said Mr. Marvel. “Where you’ve hid-how you do it-I don’t know.”
“That’s all,” said the Voice. “I’m invisible. That’s what I want you to understand.”
“Anyone can see that. There is no need for you to be so confounded impatient, mister. But tell me: where do you hid?”
“I’m invisible. That’s the great point. And what I want you to understand is this-”
“But where are you?” interrupted Mr. Marvel.
“Here! Six yards in front of you.”
“Oh, come on! I am not blind. You will tell me now that you are just air. I’m not ignorant.”
“Yes, I am air. You’re looking through me.”
“What! And you have nothing? Only your voice?”
“I am just a human being-solid, needing food and drink, needing covering too-But I’m invisible. Do you see? Invisible. Simple idea. Invisible.”
“What? Are you a real man?”
“Yes, real.”
“Let me touch your hand,” said Marvel, “if you are real. Lord!”
He felt the hand that had closed round his wrist with his disengaged fingers, and his fingers patted a muscular chest, and explored a bearded face. Marvel was very surprised.
“Great!” he said. “It’s even better than cock-fighting! Most remarkable! And there I can see a rabbit clean through you, a mile away! Not a bit of you visible-except-”
He scrutinised the apparently empty space keenly.
“Have you eaten bread and cheese?” he asked, holding the invisible arm.
“You’re quite right, and it’s not quite assimilated.”
“Ah!” said Mr. Marvel. “Sort of ghostly, though.”
“Of course, all this isn’t half so wonderful as you think.”
“It’s quite wonderful enough for my modest mind,” said Mr. Thomas Marvel. “How did you manage it? How the devil is it done?”
“It’s a long story. And besides-”
“I tell you, I can’t believe it,” said Mr. Marvel.
“What I want to say at present is this: I need help. I have come to that. I was wandering, mad with rage, naked, impotent. And I saw you-”
“Lord!” said Mr. Marvel.
“-then stopped. ‘Here,’ I said, ‘is an outcast like myself. This is the man for me.’ So I came to you. And-”
“Lord!” said Mr. Marvel. “But may I ask-How is it? And what help do you need? Invisible!”
“I want you to help me get clothes and shelter and then, with other things. I’ve left them long enough. If you won’t-well! But you will-you must.”
“Look here,” said Mr. Marvel. “I’m too flabbergasted. Don’t touch me any more. And let me go. It’s all so unreasonable. Empty hills, empty sky. Nothing visible for miles except the nature. And then comes a voice. A voice out of heaven! And stones! Lord!”
“So,” said the Voice, “you have to do the job I’ve chosen for you.”
