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.

CHAPTER XXVIII

THE HUNTER HUNTED

Mr. Heelas, Mr. Kemp's nearest neighbour among the villa holders,
was asleep in his summer house when the siege of Kemp's house
began. Mr. Heelas was one of the sturdy minority who refused to
believe "in all this nonsense" about an Invisible Man. His wife,
however, as he was subsequently to be reminded, did. He insisted
upon walking about his garden just as if nothing was the matter,
and he went to sleep in the afternoon in accordance with the custom
of years. He slept through the smashing of the windows, and then
woke up suddenly with a curious persuasion of something wrong. He
looked across at Kemp's house, rubbed his eyes and looked again.
Then he put his feet to the ground, and sat listening. He said he
was damned, but still the strange thing was visible. The house
looked as though it had been deserted for weeks--after a violent
riot. Every window was broken, and every window, save those of the
belvedere study, was blinded by the internal shutters.

"I could have sworn it was all right"--he looked at his watch--"twenty
minutes ago."

He became aware of a measured concussion and the clash of glass,
far away in the distance. And then, as he sat open-mo