"
"There is an axe in the theatre," continued Poole; "and you
might take the kitchen poker for yourself."
The lawyer took that rude but weighty instrument into his
hand, and balanced it. "Do you know, Poole," he said, looking up,
"that you and I are about to place ourselves in a position of
some peril?"
"You may say so, sir, indeed," returned the butler.
"It is well, then that we should be frank," said the other.
"We both think more than we have said; let us make a clean breast.
This masked figure that you saw, did you recognise it?"
"Well, sir, it went so quick, and the creature was so doubled
up, that I could hardly swear to that," was the answer. "But if
you mean, was it Mr. Hyde?--why, yes, I think it was! You see,
it was much of the same bigness; and it had the same quick, light
way with it; and then who else could have got in by the laboratory
door? You have not forgot, sir, that at the time of the murder he
had still the key with him? But that's not all. I don't know,
Mr. Utterson, if you ever met this Mr. Hyde?"
"Yes," said the lawyer, "I once spoke with him."
"Then you must know as well as the rest of us that there was
something queer about that gentleman--something that gave a man
a turn--I don't know rightly how to say it, sir, beyond this:
that you felt in your marrow kind of cold and thin.
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