Mr. Utterson was a lawyer in London. He was a serious, quiet man who rarely smiled, but he was loyal to his friends and always ready to help them. Every Sunday he went for a long walk with his cousin, Mr. Richard Enfield.

One Sunday they walked down a busy little street. Between the bright shops there was an old, dirty building with no windows, only a door. Mr. Enfield pointed at it with his walking stick.

“Have you ever noticed that door?” he asked. “It reminds me of a very strange story.”

One night, at about three in the morning, Mr. Enfield was walking home. He saw a small man walking quickly down the street, and a little girl of eight or ten running from the other direction. At the corner they ran into each other. The man did not stop. He walked over the child's body and left her screaming on the ground.

“It was horrible,” said Mr. Enfield. “It was like watching an evil machine, not a man.” He ran after the man and brought him back. Soon a crowd was around them. The girl's family was there, and a doctor. Everybody hated the man at once. Mr. Enfield felt it too. There was something about him that made you want to kill him.

They made the man pay one hundred pounds to the child's family. He went to that door, opened it with a key, and came back with ten pounds in gold and a cheque for the rest. The cheque was signed with the name of a very famous and respected gentleman. In the morning they went to the bank, sure that the cheque was false. But it was real.

“What was the man's name?” asked Utterson.

“Hyde,” said Enfield. “Mr. Hyde. He is hard to describe. There is something wrong with his appearance, something ugly, but I cannot say what.”

Utterson went home very worried. In his safe he had the will of his old friend, Dr. Henry Jekyll, a rich, kind and respected doctor. The will said that if Dr. Jekyll died or disappeared for more than three months, all his money and property must go to his “friend and benefactor, Edward Hyde.” Utterson had always disliked this will. Now he was afraid. Who was this Mr. Hyde? Did he have some power over Jekyll?