Presently her eye wandered to the other, and she
was surprised to recognise in him a certain Mr. Hyde, who had once
visited her master and for whom she had conceived a dislike. He
had in his hand a heavy cane, with which he was trifling; but he
answered never a word, and seemed to listen with an ill-contained
impatience. And then all of a sudden he broke out in a great
flame of anger, stamping with his foot, brandishing the cane, and
carrying on (as the maid described it) like a madman. The old
gentleman took a step back, with the air of one very much
surprised and a trifle hurt; and at that Mr. Hyde broke out of all
bounds and clubbed him to the earth. And next moment, with
ape-like fury, he was trampling his victim under foot and hailing
down a storm of blows, under which the bones were audibly
shattered and the body jumped upon the roadway. At the horror of
these sights and sounds, the maid fainted.
It was two o'clock when she came to herself and called for the
police. The murderer was gone long ago; but there lay his victim
in the middle of the lane, incredibly mangled. The stick with
which the deed had been done, although it was of some rare and
very tough and heavy wood, had broken in the middle under the
stress of this insensate cruelty; and one splintered half had
rolled in the neighbouring gutter--the other, without doubt, had
been carried away by the murderer.
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