The Invisible Man

“You don’t say so,”[6] said Hall, who was a man of sluggish apprehension.

“Yes,” said Teddy. “By the week.[7] Whatever he is, you can’t get rid of him under the week.[7] And he’s got a lot of luggage coming to–morrow, so he says. Let’s hope it won’t be stones in boxes, Hall.”

He told Hall how his aunt at Hastings had been swindled by a stranger with empty portmanteaux. Altogether he left Hall vaguely suspicious. “Get up, old girl,”[8] said Hall. “I s’pose I must see ’bout this.”

Teddy trudged on his way with his mind considerably relieved.

Instead of “seeing ’bout it,” however, Hall on his return, was severely rated by his wife on the length of time he had spent in Sidderbridge, and his mild inquiries were answered snappishly and in a ma

“You mind your own business, Hall,” said Mrs. Hall, “and I’ll mind mine.”

She was all the more inclined to snap at Hall because the stranger was undoubtedly an unusually strange sort of stranger, and she was by no means assured about him in her own mind. In the middle of the night she woke up dreaming of huge, white heads like turnips, that came trailing after her, at the end of interminable necks, and with vast black eyes. But being a sensible woman, she subdued her terrors, and turned over and went to sleep again.

CHAPTER III

THE THOUSAND AND ONE BOTTLES

So it was that on the 9th day of February, at the begi

There were a couple of trunks, indeed, such as a rational man might have, but in addition there were a box of books—big, fat books, of which some were just in an incomprehensible handwriting—and a dozen or more crates, boxes, and cases, containing objects packed in straw—glass bottles, as it seemed to Hall, tugging with a casual curiosity at the straw. The stranger, muffled in hat, coat, gloves, and wrapper,[1] out impatiently to meet Fearenside’s cart, while Hall was having a word or so of gossip preparatory to helping bring them in. Out he came, not noticing Fearenside’s dog, who was sniffing in a dilettante[2] spirit at Hall’s legs.

“Come along with those boxes,” he said. “I’ve been waiting long enough.”

And he came down the steps towards the tail of the wagon, as if to lay hands on the smaller crate.

No sooner had Fearenside’s dog caught sight of him, however, than it began to bristle and growl savagely, and when he rushed down the steps it gave an undecided hop, and then sprang straight at his hand. “Whup!” cried Hall, jumping back, for he was no hero with dogs, and Fearenside howled, “Lie down!” and snatched his whip.

They saw the dog’s teeth had slipped the hand, heard a kick, saw the dog execute a flanking jump and get home on the stranger’s leg,[3] and heard the rip of his trousering. Then the finer end of Fearenside’s whip reached his property, and the dog, yelping with dismay, retreated under the wheels of the wagon. It was all the business of a swift half minute. No one spoke, every one shouted. The stranger glanced swiftly at his torn glove and at his leg, made as if he would stoop[4] to the latter, then turned and rushed up the steps into the i

“You brute, you!” said Fearenside, climbing off the wagon with his whip in his hand, while the dog watched him through the wheel.

“Come here!” said Fearenside… “You’d better.”

Hall had stood gaping. “He wuz bit,” said Hall. “I’d better go an’ see to en.” And he trotted after the stranger. He met Mrs. Hall in the passage. “Carrier’s darg,” he said, “bit en.”

He went straight upstairs, and the stranger’s door being ajar, he pushed it open, and was entering without any ceremony, being of a naturally sympathetic turn of mind.

The blind was down and the room dim. He caught a glimpse of a most singular thing, what seemed a handless arm waving towards him, and a face of three huge, indeterminate spots on white, very like the face of a pale pansy. Then he was struck violently in the chest, hurled back, and the door slammed in his face, and locked. It was so rapid that it gave him no time to observe. A waving of indecipherable shapes, a blow and a concussion. There he stood on the dark little landing, wondering what it might be that he had seen.

After a couple of minutes he rejoined the little group that had formed outside the “Coach and Horses.” There was Fearenside telling about it all over again for the second time; there was Mrs. Hall saying his dog didn’t have no business to bite her guests;[5] there was Huxter, the general dealer[6] from over the road, interrogative; and Sandy Wadgers from the forge, judicial;[7] besides women and children, all of them saying fatuities: “Wouldn’t let en bite me, I knows”; “ ’Tasn’t right have such dargs”; “Whad ’e bite ’n for, then?” and so forth.

Mr. Hall, staring at them from the steps and listening, found it incredible that he had seen anything so very remarkable happen upstairs. Besides, his vocabulary was altogether too limited for his impressions.

“He don’t want no help, he says,” he said in answer to his wife’s inquiry. “We’d better be a–takin’ of his luggage in.”

“He ought to have it cauterised at once,” said Mr. Huxter, “especially if it’s at all[8] inflamed.”

“I’d shoot en, that’s what I’d do,” said a lady in the group.

Suddenly the dog began growling again.

“Gome along,” cried an angry voice in the doorway, and there stood the muffled stranger, with his collar turned up and his hat brim bent down. “The sooner you get those things in the better I’ll be pleased.” It is stated by an anonymous bystander that his trousers and gloves had been changed.

“Was you hurt, sir?” said Fearenside. “I’m rare[9] sorry the darg—”

“Not a bit,” said the stranger. “Never broke the skin. Hurry up with those things.”

He then swore to himself, so Mr. Hall asserts.

Directly the first crate was, in accordance with his directions, carried into the parlour, the stranger flung himself upon it with extraordinary eagerness and began to unpack it, scattering the straw with an utter disregard of Mrs. Hall’s carpet, and from it he began to produce bottles—little fat bottles containing powders, small and slender bottles containing coloured and white fluids, fluted blue bottles labelled poison, bottles with round bodies and slender necks, large green glass bottles, large white glass bottles, bottles with glass stoppers and frosted labels, bottles with fine corks, bottles with bungs, bottles with wooden caps, wine bottles, salad–oil bottles—putting them in rows on the chiffonier, on the mantle, on the table under the window, round the floor, on the bookshelf—everywhere. The chemist’s shop in Bramblehurst could not boast half so many. Quite a sight it was. Crate after crate yielded bottles,[10] until all six were empty and the table high with straw;[11] the only things that came out of these crates besides the bottles were a number of test tubes and a carefully packed balance.

2.6

You don’t say so (разг.) — Не может быть!

2.7

By the week. — Понедельник; under the week — раньше чем через неделю

2.7

By the week. — Понедельник; under the week — раньше чем через неделю

2.8

Get up, old girl! — зд. Ну, трогай, старуха! (обращаясь к лошади)

2.9

wim’простореч. — women

3.1

in hat, gloves and wrapper — отсутствие артикля при перечислении придаёт перечислению эмфатичность, подчёркивает множественность (… и в шляпе, и в пальто, и в перчатках)

3.2

dilettante [,dιlι´tæntι] итал. — зд. лениво

3.3

to get home on the stranger’s leg — вцепиться в ногу незнакомцу. Компонент home в подобных сочетаниях значит «прямо в цель», «в самую точку».

3.4

made as if he would stoop — сделал движение, словно желая наклониться

3.5

his dog didn’t have no (правильно: had no) business to bite her guests — его собака не имела никакого права кусать её постояльцев

3.6

general dealer — лавочник

3.7

judicial — зд. делающий глубокомысленные замечания

3.8

at all — в утвердительных конструкциях значит «хоть немного», в отрицательных — имеет значение «совсем», «ничуть»

3.9

rareдиал. = extremely

3.10

crate after crate yielded bottles — из одного ящика за другим вынимали бутылки

3.11

the table high with straw — на столе была гора соломы