CHAPTER SIX
Remarkable Incident of Dr. Lanyon
TIME ran on; thousands of pounds were offered in reward, for the death of
Sir Danvers was resented as a public injury; but Mr. Hyde had disappeared
out of the ken of the police as though he had never existed. Much of his
past was unearthed, indeed, and all disreputable: tales came out of the man's
cruelty, at once so callous and violent; of his vile life, of his strange
associates, of the hatred that seemed to have surrounded his career; but
of his present whereabouts, not a whisper. From the time he had left the
house in Soho on the morning of the murder, he was simply blotted out; and
gradually, as time drew on, Mr. Utterson began to recover from the hotness
of his alarm, and to grow more at quiet with himself. The death of Sir Danvers
was, to his way of thinking, more than paid for by the disappearance of Mr.
Hyde. Now that that evil influence had been withdrawn, a new life began for
Dr. Jekyll. He came out of his seclusion, renewed relations with his friends,
became once more their familiar guest and entertainer; and whilst he had
always been, known for charities, he was now no less distinguished for religion.
He was busy, he was much in the open air, he did good; his face seemed to
open and brighten, as if with an inward consciousness of service; and for
more than two months, the doctor was at peace.
On the 8th of January Utterson had dined at the doctor's with a small party;
Lanyon had been there; and the face of the host had looked from one to the
other as in the old days when the trio were inseparable friends. On the 12th,
and again on the 14th, the door was shut against the lawyer. "The doctor
was confined to the house," Poole said, "and saw no one." On the 15th, he
tried again, and was again refused; and having now been used for the last
two months to see his friend almost daily, he found this return of solitude
to weigh upon his spirits. The fifth night he had in Guest to dine with him;
and the sixth he betook himself to Dr. Lanyon's.
There at least he was not denied admittance; but when he came in, he was
shocked at the change which had taken place in the doctor's appearance. He
had his death-warrant written legibly upon his face. The rosy man had grown
pale; his flesh had fallen away; he was visibly balder and older; and yet
it was not so much, these tokens of a swift physical decay that arrested
the lawyer's notice, as a look in the eye and quality of manner that seemed
to testify to some deep-seated terror of the mind. It was unlikely that the
doctor should fear death; and yet that was what Utterson was tempted to suspect.
"Yes," he thought; "he is a doctor, he must know his own state and that his
days are counted; and the knowledge is more than he can bear." And yet when
Utterson remarked on his ill-looks, it was with an air of greatness that
Lanyon declared himself a doomed man.
"I have had a shock," he said, "and I shall never recover. It is a question
of weeks. Well, life has been pleasant; I liked it; yes, sir, I used to like
it. I sometimes think if we knew all, we should be more glad to get away."
"Jekyll is ill, too," observed Utterson. "Have you seen him?"
But Lanyon's face changed, and he held up a trembling hand. "I wish to see
or hear no more of Dr. Jekyll," he said in a loud, unsteady voice. "I am
quite done with that person; and I beg that you will spare me any allusion
to one whom I regard as dead."
"Tut-tut," said Mr. Utterson; and then after a considerable pause," Can't
I do anything?" he inquired. "We are three very old friends, Lanyon; we shall
not live to make others."
"Nothing can be done," returned Lanyon; "ask himself."
"He will not see me," said the lawyer.
"I am not surprised at that," was the reply. "Some day, Utterson, after I
am dead, you may perhaps come to learn the right and wrong of this. I cannot
tell you. And in the meantime, if you can sit and talk with me of other things,
for God's sake, stay and do so; but if you cannot keep clear of this accursed
topic, then, in God's name, go, for I cannot bear it."
As soon as he got home, Utterson sat down and wrote to Jekyll, complaining
of his exclusion from the house, and asking the cause of this unhappy break
with Lanyon; and the next day brought him a long answer, often very pathetically
worded, and sometimes darkly mysterious in drift. The quarrel with Lanyon
was incurable. "I do not blame our old friend," Jekyll wrote, "but I share
his view that we must never meet. I mean from henceforth to lead a life of
extreme seclusion; you must not be surprised, nor must you doubt my friendship,
if my door is often shut even to you. You must suffer me to go my own dark
way. I have brought on myself a punishment and a danger that I cannot name.
If I am the chief of sinners, I am the chief of sufferers also. I could not
think that this earth contained a place for sufferings and terrors so unmanning;
and you can do but one thing, Utterson, to lighten this destiny, and that
is to respect my silence." Utterson was amazed; the dark influence of Hyde
had been withdrawn, the doctor had returned to his old tasks and amities;
a week ago, the prospect had smiled with every promise of a cheerful and
an honoured age; and now in a moment, friendship, and peace of mind, and
the whole tenor of his life were wrecked. So great and unprepared a change
pointed to madness; but in view of Lanyon's manner and words, there must
lie for it some deeper ground.
A week afterwards Dr. Lanyon took to his bed, and in something less than
a fortnight he was dead. The night after the funeral, at which he had been
sadly affected, Utterson locked the door of his business room, and sitting
there by the light of a melancholy candle, drew out and set before him an
envelope addressed by the hand and sealed with the seal of his dead friend.
"PRIVATE: for the hands of G. J. Utterson ALONE and in case of his predecease
to be destroyed unread," so it was emphatically superscribed; and the lawyer
dreaded to behold the contents. "I have buried one friend to-day," he thought:
"what if this should cost me another?" And then he condemned the fear as
a disloyalty, and broke the seal. Within there was another enclosure, likewise
sealed, and marked upon the cover as "not to be opened till the death or
disappearance of Dr. Henry Jekyll." Utterson could not trust his eyes. Yes,
it was disappearance; here again, as in the mad will which he had long ago
restored to its author, here again were the idea of a disappearance and the
name of Henry Jekyll bracketed. But in the will, that idea had sprung from
the sinister suggestion of the man Hyde; it was set there with a purpose
all too plain and horrible. Written by the hand of Lanyon, what should it
mean? A great curiosity came on the trustee, to disregard the prohibition
and dive at once to the bottom of these mysteries; but professional honour
and faith to his dead friend were stringent obligations; and the packet slept
in the inmost corner of his private safe.
It is one thing to mortify curiosity, another to conquer it; and it may be
doubted if, from that day forth, Utterson desired the society of his surviving
friend with the same eagerness. He thought of him kindly; but his thoughts
were disquieted and fearful. He went to call indeed; but he was perhaps relieved
to be denied admittance; perhaps, in his heart, he preferred to speak with
Poole upon the doorstep and surrounded by the air and sounds of the open
city, rather than to be admitted into that house of voluntary bondage, and
to sit and speak with its inscrutable recluse. Poole had, indeed, no very
pleasant news to communicate. The doctor, it appeared, now more than ever
confined himself to the cabinet over the laboratory, where he would sometimes
even sleep; he was out of spirits, he had grown very silent, he did not read;
it seemed as if he had something on his mind. Utterson became so used to
the unvarying character of these reports, that he fell off little by little
in the frequency of his visits.
Chapter Seven |
