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 frequent 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 pinewoods beyond Bramblehurst, in accordance with a change in the plans of 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.
"Seasonable weather for the time of year," said the mariner, taking no denial.
"Quite," said Mr. Marvel.
The mariner produced a toothpick, and was occupied by this 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 suggestion of opulence. So 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 the toothpick.
Mr. Marvel jumped and looked at them. "Oh, yes," he said. "Yes, they're books."
"There's some extra-ordinary things in books," said the mariner.
"I believe you," said Mr. Marvel.
"And some extra-ordinary things out of them," said the mariner.
"Also true," said Mr. Marvel. He looked at his interlocutor, and then glanced about him.
"There's some extra-ordinary things in newspapers, for example," said the mariner.
"There are."
"In this newspaper," said the mariner.
"Ah!" said Mr. Marvel.
"There's a story," said the mariner, fixing Mr. Marvel with an eye that was firm and deliberate; "there's a story about an Invisible Man, for instance."
Mr. Marvel pulled his mouth to one side 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 haven't seen a paper for four days," said Marvel.
"Iping's the place he started at," said the mariner.
"In-deed!" said Mr. Marvel.
"He started there. And where he came from, nobody seems to know. Here it is: Pe Culiar Story from Iping. And it says in this paper that the evidence is extra-ordinary strong - extra-ordinary."
"Lord!" said Mr. Marvel.
"But then, it's a extra-ordinary story. A clergyman and a doctor were witnesses, - saw him all right - or at least, didn't see him. He was staying, it says, at the Coach and Horses, and no one seems to have been aware of his misfortune, it says, aware of his misfortune, until in an Alteration in the inn, it says, his bandages on his head were torn off. It was then observed that his head was invisible. Attempts were At Once made to secure him, but casting off his clothes, 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."
"Doesn't it? Extra-ordinary, I call it. Never heard 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, isn'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! - isn'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 friends - it doesn't say he had any friends, does it?" asked Mr. Marvel, anxious.
"Isn't one of a sort enough for you?" asked the mariner. "No, thank Heaven, as one might say, he didn't."
He nodded his head slowly. "It makes me quite uncomfortable, the 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 mean - the road to Port Stowe. You see we're right in it! None of your American wonders, this time. And just think of the things he might do! Where'd you be, if he drank too much, and went for you? Suppose he wants to rob - who can stop him? He can trespass, he can burgle, he could walk through a cordon of policemen as easy as me or you could give the slip to a blind man! Easier! For these here blind chaps hear very well, I'm told. And wherever there was liquor he fancied - "
"He's got a tremenjous advantage, certainly," said Marvel. "And - well."
"You're right," said the mariner. "He has."
All this time Mr. Marvel had been glancing about him intently, listening for faint footsteps, 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 to 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. "Me."
"Indeed!" said the mariner. "And may I ask - "
"You'll 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 rigidly in his seat. His face was eloquent of physical suffering. "Wow!" he said.
"What's up?" said the mariner, concerned.
"Toothache," said Mr. Marvel, and put his hand to his ear. He picked up his books. "I must be getting on, I think," he said. He moved in a strange way along the seat away from his interlocutor. "But you were just going to tell me about this 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's no Invisible Man whatsoever - Blimey."
"But how about this paper? Doyou mean to say - ?"
"Not a word of it," said Marvel, firmly.
The mariner stared, paper in hand. Mr. Marvel jerkily turned round. "Wait a bit," said the mariner, rising and speaking slowly. "Do you mean to say - ?"
"I do," said Mr. Marvel.
"Then why did you let me go on and tell you all this blasted stuff, then? What do 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 been talking here for 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 insult me," said Mr. Marvel.
"Insult! I'm a jolly good mind - "
"Come on," said a voice, and Mr. Marvel was suddenly turned 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. Some way along the road he began a muttered monologue, protests and recriminations.
"Silly devil!" said the mariner, legs wide apart, hands on his hips, watching the receding figure. "I'll show you, you silly ass, - hoaxing me! It's here - in the paper!"
Mr. Marvel replied incoherently and, receding, was hidden by a bend in the road, but the mariner still stood magnificent in the middle of the road, until the approach of a butcher's cart made him move. Then he turned himself towards Port Stowe. "Full of extra- ordinary asses," he said softly to himself. "Just to take me down a bit - that was his silly game - It's in the paper!"
And there was another extraordinary thing he was soon to hear, that had happened quite close to him. And that was a vision of a "fist full of money" (no less) travelling without visible help, 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 and had been knocked headlong, and when he had 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 far. Afterwards, however, he began to think things over.
The story of the flying money was true. And all about that neighbourhood, even from the serious 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 packets, 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.