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Chapter 13 Mr. Marvel discusses his resignation.
When the dust was gathering and Iping was just beginning to peep timorously forth again upon the shattered wreckage of its bank holiday, a short, thick-set man in a shabby silk hat was marching painfully through the twilight behind the beechwoods on the road to Bramblehurst.
He carried three books bound together by some sort of ornamental elastic ligature, and a bundle wrapped in a blue tablecloth. His rubicund face expressed consternation and fatigue.He appeared to be in some sort of spasmodic hurry.
He was accompanied by a voice other than his own, and ever and again he winced under the touch of unseen hands.
"'If you give me the slip again,' said the voice, "'if you attempt to give me the slip again—' "'Lord,' said Mr. Marvel, "'that shoulder's a mass of bruises as it is.' "'On my honour,' said the Voice, "'I will kill you.'"
"'I didn't try to give you the slip,' said Marvel, in a voice that was not far remote from tears."'I swear I didn't.I didn't know the blessed turning, that was all.How the devil was I to know the blessed turning?As it is, I've been knocked about.'
"'You'll get knocked about a great deal more if you don't mind,' said the Voice, and Mr. Marvel abruptly became silent.He blew out his cheeks, and his eyes were eloquent of despair.
It's bad enough to let those floundering yokels explode my little secret without your cutting off with my books.It's lucky for some of them they cut and ran when they did.Here am I. No one knew I was invisible.And now what am I to do?"
What am I to do?"asked Marvel Sotovoci. It's all about.It will be in the papers.Everybody will be looking for me.Everyone on their guard."The voice broke off into vivid curses and ceased.
The despair of Mr Marvel's face deepened and his pace slackened.Go on, said the voice.Mr Marvel's face assumed a greyish tint between the ruddier patches.Don't drop those books, stupid, said the voice sharply, overtaking him.
"'The fact is,' said the Voice, "'I shall have to make use of you.You're a poor tool, but I must.'"'I'm a miserable tool,' said Marvel."'You are,' said the Voice."'I'm the worst possible tool you could have,' said Marvel.
"'I'm not strong,' he said, after a discouraging silence."'I'm not over-strong,' he repeated. and my heart's weak.That little business, I pulled it through, of course, but bless you, I could have dropped.
Well, I haven't the nerve and strength for the sort of thing you want.I'll stimulate you.I wish you wouldn't.I wouldn't like to mess up your plans, you know, but I might, out of sheer funk and misery.
"'You'd better not,' said the voice with quiet emphasis."'I wish I was dead,' said Marvel."'It ain't justice,' he said."'You must admit, it seems to me I've a perfect right—' "'Get on,' said the voice."
Mr Marvel mended his pace, and for a time they went in silence again. It's devilish hard," said Mr Marvel.This was quite ineffectual.He tried another tag.What do I make by it?He began in again, in a tone of unendurable wrong.Oh, shut up!
said the voice, with sudden amazing vigour.I'll see to you all right.You do what you're told.You'll do it all right.You're a fool and all that, but you'll do.I tell you, sir, I'm not the man for it.Respectfully, but it is so.
"'If you don't shut up I shall twist your wrist again,' said the Invisible Man. Presently two oblongs of yellow light appeared through the trees, and the square tower of a church loomed through the gloaming.
"'I shall keep my hand on your shoulder,' said the Voice, "'all through the village.Go straight through, and try no foolery.It'll be the worst for you if you do.'""'I know that,' sighed Mr. Marvel."'I know all that.'"
the unhappy-looking figure in the obsolete silk hat passed up the street of the little village with his burdens, and vanished into the gathering darkness beyond the lights of the windows.CHAPTER XIV AT PORTSTONE
At ten o'clock the next morning found Mr Marvel, unshaven, dirty, and travel-stained, sitting with the books beside him and his hands deep in his pockets, looking very weary, nervous, and uncomfortable, and inflating his cheeks at infrequent intervals, on the bench outside a little inn on the outskirts of Port Stowe.
Beside him were the books, but now they were tied with string. The bundle had been abandoned in the pine-woods beyond Bramblehurst, in accordance with a change of plans in the Invisible Man.
Mr. Marvel sat on the bench, and although no one took the slightest notice of him, his agitation remained at fever-heat.His hands would go ever and again to his various pockets with a curious nervous fumbling.
When he had been sitting for the best part of an hour, however, an elderly mariner, carrying a newspaper, came out of the inn and sat down beside him."'Pleasant day,' said the mariner.Mr. Marvel glanced about him, with something very like terror.
"'Very,' he said. "'Just seasonable weather for the time of year,' said the Mariner, taking no denial."'Quite,' said Mr.Marvel."The Mariner produced a toothpick, and, saving his regard, was engrossed thereby for some minutes.
His eyes, meanwhile, were at liberty to examine Mr. Marvel's dusty figure and the books beside him. As he had approached Mr. Marvel, he had heard a sound like the dropping of coins into a pocket.
He was struck by the contrast of Mr. Marvel's appearance with this sudden suggestion of opulence.Thence his mind wandered back again to a topic that had taken a curiously firm hold of his imagination. books?"
he said suddenly, noisily finishing with a toothpick.Mr Marvell started and looked at them."'Oh, yes,' he said, "'yes, they're books.'"'There's some extraordinary things in books,' said the Mariner."'I believe you,' said Mr Marvell.
"'And some extraordinary things out of them,' said the Mariner."'True, likewise,' said Mr Marvell.He eyed his interlocutor and then glanced about him. There's some extraordinary things in newspapers, for example," said the mariner.There are.
In this newspaper," said the mariner.Ah, said Mr Marvell.There's a story," said the mariner, fixing Mr Marvell with an eye that was firm and deliberate.There's a story about an invisible man, for instance.
Mr Marvel pulled his mouth askew and scratched his cheek and felt his ears glowing.What will they be writing next?he asked faintly.Austria or America?Neither, said the Mariner.Here.Lord, said Mr Marvel, starting.
When I say here, said the Mariner, to Mr Marvel's intense relief, I don't of course mean here in this place.I mean hereabouts. an invisible man," said Mr Marvel.And what's he been up to?
Everything, said the Mariner, controlling Marvel with his eye and then amplifying every blessed thing.I ain't seen a paper these four days, said Marvel.Ipings the place he started at, said the Mariner.Indeed, said Mr Marvel.
He started there, and where he came from nobody don't seem to know. Here it is, peculiar story from Iping, and it says in this paper that the evidence is extraordinary strong, extraordinary.Lord, said Mr Marvel, but then it's an extraordinary story.
there's a clergyman and a medical gent witnesses saw him all right and proper at least ways didn't see him he was staying as at the coach and horses and don't no one seemed to be aware of his misfortune aware of his misfortune it says until in an altercation at the inn it says his bandages on his head was torn off it was then observed that his head was invisible attempts were at once made to secure him but casting off his garments it says
he succeeded in escaping, but not until after a desperate struggle, in which he had inflicted serious injuries, it says, on our worthy and able constable, Mr. J. A. Jaffers.Pretty straight story, eh?Names and everything."
"'Lord,' said Mr. Marvel, looking nervously about him, trying to count the money in his pockets by his unaided sense of touch, and full of a strange and novel idea."'It sounds most astonishing don't it?Extra-ordinary, I call it.
Never heard tell of invisible men before, I haven't, but nowadays one hears such a lot of extra-ordinary things that—' "'That all he did?'asked Marvel, trying to seem at his ease."'It's enough, ain't it?'said the Mariner.
Didn't go back by any chance?"asked Marvel.Just escaped and that's all, eh?All?"said the Mariner.Why, ain't it enough?Quite enough," said Marvel.I should think it was enough," said the Mariner.I should think it was enough. He didn't have any pals.
It don't say he had any pals, does it?"asked Mr. Marvel, anxious."'Ain't one of a sort enough for you?'asked the Mariner."'No, thank heaven,' as one say, he didn't.'He nodded his head slowly.
"'It makes me regular uncomfortable, the bare thought of that chap running about the country.He is at present at large, and from certain evidence it is supposed that he has taken—took, I suppose they the road to Port Stowe.You see, we're right in it.
None of your American Wanderers this time, and just think of the things he might do.Where'd you be if he took a drop over and above and had a fancy to go for you?Supposing he wants to rob, who can prevent him?
He can trespass, he can burgle, he could walk through the cordon of a policeman as easy as me, or you could give the slip to a blind man.Easier. for these here are blind chaps, here uncommon sharp, I'm told, and wherever there was liquor he fancied."
He's got a tremendous advantage, certainly," said Mr. Marvel.And, well, you're right," said the Mariner.He has. All of this time Mr Marvel had been glancing about him intently, listening for faint footfalls, trying to detect imperceptible movements.
He seemed on the point of some great resolution.He coughed behind his hand. He looked about him again, listened, bent towards the Mariner, and lowered his voice.
The fact of it is, I happen to know just a thing or two about this invisible man from private sources."Oh," said the Mariner, interested."'You?'"'Yes,' said Mr. Marvel. "'Indeed,' said the Mariner.
"'And may I ask—' "'You will be astonished,' said Mr Marvel, behind his hand."'It's tremendous.'"'Indeed,' said the Mariner."'The fact is,' began Mr Marvel, eagerly, in a confidential undertone.Suddenly his expression changed marvellously."'Ow!'
he said.He rose stiffly in his seat.His face was eloquent of physical softening."'Wow!'he said. "'What's up?'said the Mariner, concerned."'Toothache,' said Mr Marvel, and put his hand to his ear.He caught hold of his books.
"'We must be getting on, I think.'He edged in a curious way along the seat away from his interlocutor."'But you was just a-gonna tell me about this here invisible man,' protested the Mariner.Mr Marvel seemed to consult with himself.
"'Hoax,' said a voice."'It's a hoax,' said Mr Marvel. But it's in the paper!"said the Mariner.Hoax all the same, said Marvel.I know the chap that started the lie.There ain't no invisible man whatsoever.Blimey!But how about this paper?
Do you mean to say... Not a word of it, said Marvel, stoutly.The Mariner stared, paper in hand.Mr Marvel jerkily faced about. Wait a bit," said the mariner, rising and speaking slowly."'D'you mean to say—' I do," said Mr Marvel.
"'Then why d'you let me go on and tell you all this blasted stuff, then?What d'you mean by letting a man make a fool of himself like that for, eh?' Mr Marvel blew out his cheeks.The Mariner was suddenly very red indeed.He clenched his hands.
I've been talking here this ten minutes, he said, and you, you little pot-bellied, leathery-faced son of an old boot, couldn't have the elementary manners.Don't you come bandying words with me, said Mr Marvel. bandying words over jolly good mind."
"'Come up,' said a voice, and Mr. Marvel was suddenly whirled about and started marching off in a curious spasmodic manner."'You'd better move on,' said the Mariner."'Who's moving on?'said Mr. Marvel.
He was receding obliquely with a curious hurrying gait, with occasional violent jerks forward.Somewhere along the road he began a muttered monologue, protests and recriminations.
Silly devil," said the mariner, legs wide apart, elbows akimbo, watching the receding figure.I'll show you, you silly ass, hoaxing me.It's here on the paper.
Mr Marvel retorted incoherently, and, receding, was hidden by a bend in the road, but the mariner still stood magnificent in the midst of the way until the approach of a butcher's cart dislodged him.Then he turned himself towards Portstow.
Full of extraordinary asses, he said softly to himself, just take me down a bit.It was his silly game.It's on the paper.
And there was another extraordinary thing he was presently to hear that had happened quite close to him, and that was a vision of a fistful of money, no less, travelling without visible agency along by the wall at the corner of St.Michael's Lane.
A brother mariner had seen this wonderful sight that very morning.He had snatched at the money forthwith and had been knocked headlong, and when he got to his feet the butterfly money had vanished.
Our mariner was in the mood to believe anything, he declared, but that was a bit too stiff.Afterwards, however, he began to think things over. The story of the flying money was true.
And all about that neighbourhood, even from the august London and Country Banking Company, from the tills of shops and inns, doors standing that sunny weather entirely open, money had been quietly and dexterously making off that day in handfuls and rouleaux, floating quietly along by walls and shady places, dodging quickly from the approaching eyes of men.
And it had, though no man had traced it, invariably ended its mysterious flight in the pocket of that agitated gentleman in the obsolete silk hat, sitting outside the Little Inn, on the outskirts of Port Stowe.
It was ten days after, and indeed only when the burdock story was already old, that the Mariner collated these facts, and began to understand how near he had been to the wonderful, invisible man.
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