CHAPTER XXI
IN OXFORD STREET
"In going downstairs the first time I found an unexpected difficultybecause I could not see my feet; indeed I stumbled twice, and therewas an unaccustomed clumsiness in gripping the bolt. By not lookingdown, however, I managed to walk on the level passably well.
"My mood, I say, was one of exaltation. I felt as a seeing manmight do, with padded feet and noiseless clothes, in a city of theblind. I experienced a wild impulse to jest, to startle people, toclap men on the back, fling people's hats astray, and generallyrevel in my extraordinary advantage.
"But hardly had I emerged upon Great Portland Street, however (mylodging was close to the big draper's shop there), when I heard aclashing concussion and was hit violently behind, and turning sawa man carrying a basket of soda-water syphons, and looking inamazement at his burden. Although the blow had really hurt me, Ifound something so irresistible in his astonishment that I laughedaloud. 'The devil's in the basket,' I said, and suddenly twistedit out of his hand. He let go incontinently, and I swung the wholeweight into the air.
"But a fool of a cabman, standing outside a public house, made asudden rush for this, and his extending fingers took me withexcruciating violence under the ear. I let the whole down with asmash on the cabman, and then, with shouts and the clatter of feetabout me, people coming out of shops, vehicles pulling up, Irealised what I had done for myself, and cursing my folly, backedagainst a shop window and prepared to dodge out of the confusion. Ina moment I should be wedged into a crowd and inevitably discovered.I pushed by a butcher boy, who luckily did not turn to see thenothingness that shoved him aside, and dodged behind the cab-man'sfour-wheeler. I do not know how they settled the business. I hurriedstraight across the road, which was happily clear, and hardlyheeding which way I went, in the fright of detection the incidenthad given me, plunged into the afternoon throng of Oxford Street.
"I tried to get into the stream of people, but they were too thickfor me, and in a moment my heels were being trodden upon. I took tothe gutter, the roughness of which I found painful to my feet, andforthwith the shaft of a crawling hansom dug me forcibly under theshoulder blade, reminding me that I was already bruised severely. Istaggered out of the way of the cab, avoided a perambulator by aconvulsive movement, and found myself behind the hansom. A happythought saved me, and as this drove slowly along I followed in itsimmediate wake, trembling and astonished at the turn of myadventure. And not only trembling, but shivering. It was a brightday in January and I was stark naked and the thin slime of mud thatcovered the road was freezing. Foolish as it seems to me now, I hadnot reckoned that, transparent or not, I was still amenable to theweather and all its consequences.
"Then suddenly a bright idea came into my head. I ran round and gotinto the cab. And so, shivering, scared, and sniffing with the firstintimations of a cold, and with the bruises in the small of my backgrowing upon my attention, I drove slowly along Oxford Street andpast Tottenham Court Road. My mood was as different from that inwhich I had sallied forth ten minutes ago as it is possible toimagine. This invisibility indeed! The one thought that possessedme was--how was I to get out of the scrape I was in.
"We crawled past Mudie's, and there a tall woman with five or sixyellow-labelled books hailed my cab, and I sprang out just in timeto escape her, shaving a railway van narrowly in my flight. I madeoff up the roadway to Bloomsbury Square, intending to strike northpast the Museum and so get into the quiet district. I was nowcruelly chilled, and the strangeness of my situation so unnerved methat I whimpered as I ran. At the northward corner of the Square alittle white dog ran out of the Pharmaceutical Society's offices,and incontinently made for me, nose down.
"I had never realised it before, but the nose is to the mind of adog what the eye is to the mind of a seeing man. Dogs perceive thescent of a man moving as men perceive his vision. This brute beganbarking and leaping, showing, as it seemed to me, only too plainlythat he was aware of me. I crossed Great Russell Street, glancingover my shoulder as I did so, and went some way along MontagueStreet before I realised what I was running towards.
"Then I became aware of a blare of music, and looking along thestreet saw a number of people advancing out of Russell Square, redshirts, and the banner of the Salvation Army to the fore. Such acrowd, chanting in the roadway and scoffing on the pavement, Icould not hope to penetrate, and dreading to go back and fartherfrom home again, and deciding on the spur of the moment, I ran upthe white steps of a house facing the museum railings, and stoodthere until the crowd should have passed. Happily the dog stoppedat the noise of the band too, hesitated, and turned tail, runningback to Bloomsbury Square again.
"On came the band, bawling with unconscious irony some hymn about'When shall we see His face?' and it seemed an interminable timeto me before the tide of the crowd washed along the pavement by me.Thud, thud, thud, came the drum with a vibrating resonance, and forthe moment I did not notice two urchins stopping at the railings byme. 'See 'em,' said one. 'See what?' said the other. 'Why--themfootmarks--bare. Like what you makes in mud.'
"I looked down and saw the youngsters had stopped and were gapingat the muddy footmarks I had left behind me up the newly whitenedsteps. The passing people elbowed and jostled them, but theirconfounded intelligence was arrested. 'Thud, thud, thud, when,thud, shall we see, thud, his face, thud, thud.' 'There's abarefoot man gone up them steps, or I don't know nothing,' saidone. 'And he ain't never come down again. And his foot wasa-bleeding.'
"The thick of the crowd had already passed. 'Looky there, Ted,'quoth the younger of the detectives, with the sharpness of surprisein his voice, and pointed straight to my feet. I looked down andsaw at once the dim suggestion of their outline sketched insplashes of mud. For a moment I was paralysed.
"'Why, that's rum,' said the elder. 'Dashed rum! It's just likethe ghost of a foot, ain't it?' He hesitated and advanced withoutstretched hand. A man pulled up short to see what he wascatching, and then a girl. In another moment he would have touchedme. Then I saw what to do. I made a step, the boy started back withan exclamation, and with a rapid movement I swung myself over intothe portico of the next house. But the smaller boy was sharp-eyedenough to follow the movement, and before I was well down thesteps and upon the pavement, he had recovered from his momentaryastonishment and was shouting out that the feet had gone over thewall.
"They rushed round and saw my new footmarks flash into being on thelower step and upon the pavement. 'What's up?' asked someone.'Feet! Look! Feet running!'
"Everybody in the road, except my three pursuers, was pouring alongafter the Salvation Army, and this blow not only impeded me but them.There was an eddy of surprise and interrogation. At the cost ofbowling over one young fellow I got through, and in another momentI was rushing headlong round the circuit of Russell Square, withsix or seven astonished people following my footmarks. There wasno time for explanation, or else the whole host would have beenafter me.
"Twice I doubled round corners, thrice I crossed the road and cameback upon my tracks, and then, as my feet grew hot and dry, thedamp impressions began to fade. At last I had a breathing spaceand rubbed my feet clean with my hands, and so got away altogether.The last I saw of the chase was a little group of a dozen peopleperhaps, studying with infinite perplexity a slowly dryingfootprint that had resulted from a puddle in Tavistock Square, afootprint as isolated and incomprehensible to them as Crusoe'ssolitary discovery.
"This running warmed me to a certain extent, and I went on with abetter courage through the maze of less frequented roads that runshereabouts. My back had now become very stiff and sore, my tonsilswere painful from the cabman's fingers, and the skin of my neckhad been scratched by his nails; my feet hurt exceedingly and Iwas lame from a little cut on one foot. I saw in time a blindman approaching me, and fled limping, for I feared his subtleintuitions. Once or twice accidental collisions occurred and I leftpeople amazed, with unaccountable curses ringing in their ears.Then came something silent and quiet against my
face, and acrossthe Square fell a thin veil of slowly falling flakes of snow. I hadcaught a cold, and do as I would I could not avoid an occasionalsneeze. And every dog that came in sight, with its pointing noseand curious sniffing, was a terror to me.
"Then came men and boys running, first one and then others, andshouting as they ran. It was a fire. They ran in the direction ofmy lodging, and looking back down a street I saw a mass of blacksmoke streaming up above the roofs and telephone wires. It was mylodging burning; my clothes, my apparatus, all my resources indeed,except my cheque-book and the three volumes of memoranda thatawaited me in Great Portland Street, were there. Burning! I hadburnt my boats--if ever a man did! The place was blazing."
The Invisible Man paused and thought. Kemp glanced nervously out ofthe window. "Yes?" he said. "Go on."