> game is only beginning. There is nothing for it, but to start the

Terror. This announces the first day of the Terror. Port Burdock

is no longer under the Queen, tell your Colonel of Police, and

the rest of them; it is under me--the Terror! This is day one of

year one of the new epoch--the Epoch of the Invisible Man. I am

Invisible Man the First. To begin with the rule will be easy. The

first day there will be one execution for the sake of example--a

man named Kemp. Death starts for him to-day. He may lock himself

away, hide himself away, get guards about him, put on armour

if he likes--Death, the unseen Death, is coming. Let him take

precautions; it will impress my people. Death starts from the

pillar box by midday. The letter will fall in as the postman comes

along, then off! The game begins. Death starts. Help him not, my

people, lest Death fall upon you also. To-day Kemp is to die."



Kemp read this letter twice, "It's no hoax," he said. "That's

his voice! And he means it."



He turned the folded sheet over and saw on the addressed side of it

the postmark Hintondean, and the prosaic detail "2d. to pay."



He got up slowly, leaving his lunch unfinished--the letter had

come by the one o'clock post--and went into his study. He rang

for his housekeeper, and told her to go round the house at once,

examine all the fastenings of the windows, and close all the

shutters. He closed the shutters of his study himself. From a

locked drawer in his bedroom he took a little revolver, examined it

carefully, and put it into the pocket of his lounge jacket. He

wrote a number of brief notes, one to Colonel Adye, gave them to

his servant to take, with explicit instructions as to her way of

leaving the house. "There is no danger," he said, and added a

mental reservation, "to you." He remained meditative for a space

after doing this, and then returned to his cooling lunch.



He ate with gaps of thought. Finally he struck the table sharply.

"We will have him!" he said; "and I am the bait. He will come too

far."



He went up to the belvedere, carefully shutting every door after

him. "It's a game," he said, "an odd game--but the chances are

all for me, Mr. Griffin, in spite of your invisibility. Griffin

contra mundum ... with a vengeance."



He stood at the window staring at the hot hillside. "He must get

food every day--and I don't envy him. Did he really sleep last

night? Out in the open somewhere--secure from collisions. I wish

we could get some good cold wet weather instead of the heat.



"He may be watching me now."



He went close to the window. Something rapped smartly against the

brickwork over the frame, and made him start violently back.



"I'm getting nervous," said Kemp. But it was five minutes before he

went to the window again. "It must have been a sparrow," he said.



Presently he heard the front-door bell ringing, and hurried

downstairs. He unbolted and unlocked the door, examined the chain,

put it up, and opened cautiously without showing himself. A

familiar voice hailed him. It was Adye.



"Your servant's been assaulted, Kemp," he said round the door.



"What!" exclaimed Kemp.



"Had that note of yours taken away from her. He's close about here.

Let me in."



Kemp released the chain, and Adye entered through as narrow an

opening as possible. He stood in the hall, looking with infinite

relief at Kemp refastening the door. "Note was snatched out of her

hand. Scared her horribly. She's down at the station. Hysterics.

He's close here. What was it about?"



Kemp swore.



"What a fool I was," said Kemp. "I might have known. It's not an

hour's walk from Hintondean. Already?"



"What's up?" said Adye.



"Look here!" said Kemp, and led the way into his study. He handed

Adye the Invisible Man's letter. Adye read it and whistled softly.

"And you--?" said Adye.



"Proposed a trap--like a fool," said Kemp, "and sent my proposal

out by a maid servant. To him."



Adye followed Kemp's profanity.



"He'll clear out," said Adye.



"Not he," said Kemp.



A resounding smash of glass came from upstairs. Adye had a silvery

glimpse of a little revolver half out of Kemp's pocket. "It's a

window, upstairs!" said Kemp, and led the way up. There came a

second smash while they were still on the staircase. When they

reached the study they found two of the three windows smashed,

half the room littered with splintered glass, and one big flint

lying on the writing table. The two men stopped in the doorway,

contemplating the wreckage. Kemp swore again, and as he did so the

third window went with a snap like a pistol, hung starred for a

moment, and collapsed in jagged, shivering triangles into the room.



"What's this for?" said Adye.



"It's a beginning," said Kemp.



"There's no way of climbing up here?"



"Not for a cat," said Kemp.



"No shutters?"



"Not here. All the downstairs rooms--Hullo!"



Smash, and then whack of boards hit hard came from downstairs.

"Confound him!" said Kemp. "That must be--yes--it's one of the

bedrooms. He's going to do all the house. But he's a fool. The

shutters are up, and the glass will fall outside. He'll cut his

feet."



Another window proclaimed its destruction. The two men stood on the

landing perplexed. "I have it!" said Adye. "Let me have a stick or

something, and I'll go down to the station and get the bloodhounds

put on. That ought to settle him! They're hard by--not ten

minutes--"



Another window went the way of its fellows.



"You haven't a revolver?" asked Adye.



Kemp's hand went to his pocket. Then he hesitated. "I haven't

one--at least to spare."



"I'll bring it back," said Adye, "you'll be safe here."



Kemp, ashamed of his momentary lapse from truthfulness, handed him

the weapon.



"Now for the door," said Adye.



As they stood hesitating in the hall, they heard one of the

first-floor bedroom windows crack and clash. Kemp went to the door

and began to slip the bolts as silently as possible. His face was a

little paler than usual. "You must step straight out," said Kemp. In

another moment Adye was on the doorstep and the bolts were dropping

back into the staples. He hesitated for a moment, feeling more

comfortable with his back against the door. Then he marched, upright

and square, down the steps. He crossed the lawn and approached the

gate. A little breeze seemed to ripple over the grass. Something

moved near him. "Stop a bit," said a Voice, and Adye stopped dead

and his hand tightened on the revolver.



"Well?" said Adye, white and grim, and every nerve tense.



"Oblige me by going back to the house," said the Voice, as tense

and grim as Adye's.



"Sorry," said Adye a little hoarsely, and moistened his lips with

his tongue. The Voice was on his left front, he thought. Suppose he

were to take his luck with a shot?



"What are you going for?" said the Voice, and there was a quick

movement of the two, and a flash of sunlight from the open lip of

Adye's pocket.



Adye desisted and thought. "Where I go," he said slowly, "is my own

business." The words were still on his lips, when an arm came round

his neck, his back felt a knee, and he was sprawling backward. He

drew clumsily and fired absurdly, and in another moment he was

struck in the mouth and the revolver wrested from his grip. He made

a vain clutch at a slippery limb, tried to struggle up and fell

back. "Damn!" said Adye. The Voice laughed. "I'd kill you now if it

wasn't the waste of a bullet," it said. He saw the revolver in

mid-air, six feet off, covering him.



"Well?" said Adye, sitting up.



"Get up," said the Voice.



Adye stood up.



"Attention," said the Voice, and then fiercely, "Don't try any

games. Remember I can see your face if you can't see mine. You've

got to go back to the house."



"He won't let me in," said Adye.



"That's a pity," said the Invisible Man. "I've got no quarrel with

you."



Adye moistened his lips again. He glanced away from the barrel of

the revolver and saw the sea far off very blue and dark under the

midday sun, the smooth green down, the white cliff of the Head, and

the multitudinous town, and suddenly he knew that life was very

sweet. His eyes came back to this little metal thing hanging

between heaven and earth, six yards away. "What am I to do?" he

said sullenly.



"What am I to do?" asked the Invisible Man. "You will get help. The

only thing is for you to go back."



"I will try. If he lets me in will you promise not to rush the

door?"



"I've got no quarrel with you," said the Voice.



Kemp had hurried upstairs after letting Adye out, and now crouching

among the broken glass and peering cautiously over the edge of the

study window sill, he saw Adye stand parleying with the Unseen.

"Why doesn't he fire?" whispered Kemp to himself. Then the revolver

moved a little and the glint of the sunlight flashed in Kemp's

eyes. He shaded his eyes and tried to see the source of the

blinding beam.



"Surely!" he said, "Adye has given up the revolver."



"Promise not to rush the door," Adye was saying. "Don't push a

winning game too far. Give a man a chance."



"You go back to the house. I tell you flatly I will not promise

anything."



Adye's decision seemed suddenly made. He turned towards the house,

walking slowly with his hands behind him. Kemp watched him--puzzled.

The revolver vanished, flashed again into sight, vanished again,

and became evident on a closer scrutiny as a little dark object

following Adye. Then things happened very quickly. Adye leapt

backwards, swung around, clutched at this little object, missed it,

threw up his hands and fell forward on his face, leaving a little

puff of blue in the air. Kemp did not hear the sound of the shot.

Adye writhed, raised himself on one arm, fell forward, and lay

still.



For a space Kemp remained staring at the quiet carelessness of

Adye's attitude. The afternoon was very hot and still, nothing

seemed stirring in all the world save a couple of yellow butterflies

chasing each other through the shrubbery between the house and the

road gate. Adye lay on the lawn near the gate. The blinds of all

the villas down the hill-road were drawn, but in one little green

summer-house was a white figure, apparently an old man asleep. Kemp

scrutinised the surroundings of the house for a glimpse of the

revolver, but it had vanished. His eyes came back to Adye. The game

was opening well.



Then came a ringing and knocking at the front door, that grew at

last tumultuous, but pursuant to Kemp's instructions the servants

had locked themselves into their rooms. This was followed by a

silence. Kemp sat listening and then began peering cautiously out

of the three windows, one after another. He went to the staircase

head and stood listening uneasily. He armed himself with his

bedroom poker, and went to examine the interior fastenings of the

ground-floor windows again. Everything was safe and quiet. He

returned to the belvedere. Adye lay motionless over the edge of the

gravel just as he had fallen. Coming along the road by the villas

were the housemaid and two policemen.



Everything was deadly still. The three people seemed very slow in

approaching. He wondered what his antagonist was doing.



He started. There was a smash from below. He hesitated and went

downstairs again. Suddenly the house resounded with heavy blows and

the splintering of wood. He heard a smash and the destructive clang

of the iron fastenings of the shutters. He turned the key and

opened the kitchen door. As he did so, the shutters, split and

splintering, came flying inward. He stood aghast. The window frame,

save for one crossbar, was still intact, but only little teeth of

glass remained in the frame. The shutters had been driven in with

an axe, and now the axe was descending in sweeping blows upon the

window frame and the iron bars defending it. Then suddenly it leapt

aside and vanished. He saw the revolver lying on the path outside,

and then the little weapon sprang into the air. He dodged back. The

revolver cracked just too late, and a splinter from the edge of the

closing door flashed over his head. He slammed and locked the door,

and as he stood outside he heard Griffin shouting and laughing.

Then the blows of the axe with its splitting and smashing

consequences, were resumed.



Kemp stood in the passage trying to think. In a moment the

Invisible Man would be in the kitchen. This door would not keep him

a moment, and then--



A ringing came at the front door again. It would be the policemen.

He ran into the hall, put up the chain, and drew the bolts. He made

the girl speak before he dropped the chain, and the three people

blundered into the house in a heap, and Kemp slammed the door

again.



"The Invisible Man!" said Kemp. "He has a revolver, with two

shots--left. He's killed Adye. Shot him anyhow. Didn't you see him on

the lawn? He's lying there."



"Who?" said one of the policemen.



"Adye," said Kemp.



"We came in the back way," said the girl.



"What's that smashing?" asked one of the policemen.



"He's in the kitchen--or will be. He has found an axe--"



Suddenly the house was full of the Invisible Man's resounding

blows on the kitchen door. The girl stared towards the kitchen,

shuddered, and retreated into the dining-room. Kemp tried to

explain in broken sentences. They heard the kitchen door give.



"This way," said Kemp, starting into activity, and bundled the

policemen into the dining-room doorway.



"Poker," said Kemp, and rushed to the fender. He handed the poker

he had carried to the policeman and the dining-room one to the

other. He suddenly flung himself backward.



"Whup!" said one policeman, ducked, and caught the axe on his poker.

The pistol snapped its penultimate shot and ripped a valuable Sidney

Cooper. The second policeman brought his poker down on the little

weapon, as one might knock down a wasp, and sent it rattling to the

floor.



At the first clash the girl screamed, stood screaming for a moment

by the fireplace, and then ran to open the shutters--possibly

with an idea of escaping by the shattered window.



The axe receded into the passage, and fell to a position about two

feet from the ground. They could hear the Invisible Man breathing.

"Stand away, you two," he said. "I want that man Kemp."



"We want you," said the first policeman, making a quick step

forward and wiping with his poker at the Voice. The Invisible Man

must have started back, and he blundered into the umbrella stand.



Then, as the policeman staggered with the swing of the blow he had

aimed, the Invisible Man countered with the axe, the helmet crumpled

like paper, and the blow sent the man spinning to the floor at the

head of the kitchen stairs. But the second policeman, aiming behind

the axe with his poker, hit something soft that snapped. There was a

sharp exclamation of pain and then the axe fell to the ground. The

policeman wiped again at vacancy and hit nothing; he put his foot on

the axe, and struck again. Then he stood, poker clubbed, listening

intent for the slightest movement.



He heard the dining-room window open, and a quick rush of feet

within. His companion rolled over and sat up, with the blood

running down between his eye and ear. "Where is he?" asked the man

on the floor.



"Don't know. I've hit him. He's standing somewhere in the hall.

Unless he's slipped past you. Doctor Kemp--sir."



Pause.



"Doctor Kemp," cried the policeman again.



The second policeman began struggling to his feet. He stood up.

Suddenly the faint pad of bare feet on the kitchen stairs could be

heard. "Yap!" cried the first policeman, and incontinently flung

his poker. It smashed a little gas bracket.



He made as if he would pursue the Invisible Man downstairs. Then he

thought better of it and stepped into the dining-room.



"Doctor Kemp--" he began, and stopped short.



"Doctor Kemp's a hero," he said, as his companion looked over his

shoulder.



The dining-room window was wide open, and neither housemaid nor

Kemp was to be seen.



The second policeman's opinion of Kemp was terse and vivid.