The last chapter! Don't be disappointed. But better short and sweet than long and…well, rambling, pointless, boring.

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Charl

Chapter 4

But I Knew You Before

1 ½ months later

"Darling, do hurry up or we'll be sweeping the scraps from the tables along with the serving boys," Lester Borden muttered. "This is an important party and I don't care how long it takes you to powder your nose; in five minutes I shall be off, and you can take a cab there." He shot a questioning look at his wife's maid, who was waiting outside Lady Borden's bedroom door, as if she was partially responsible for the woman's delay.

Lord Borden was an important man, fully aware of the urgency of the affairs surrounding him. He had a keen interest in politics, determined to get himself to the height of his ambitions by means of ruthlessly polishing his profile in the pages of high society. He had a plump, reasonably pretty wife whom he cared not one whit for as long as she had enough money to get her through next week's shopping. But for all his airs and egocentrism, he was a fair employer, even carelessly generous at times; and the staff had few complains of him, including Katherine Faye, Lady Borden's personal maid. Through observance and an instinct of what was expected of her, she managed to carry herself with a mixture of servitude and dignity, and a hint of modest impatience even when she felt her lady's needs were not being met quickly enough.

Katy would never, in fact, have been an employee here on the good side of London had she not fallen in with Herbert Frasier, Borden's nephew, who had stolen a jaunt into the slums and ended up procuring her services. All would have been well had he not become infatuated with her. In return for her discretion, Herbert's father landed her a position at Borden's manor, and there she had been ever since, while Herbert eventually and dutifully went through the list of proper, established young ladies with whom to settle down.

Now she found herself hurrying out after Lord and Lady Borden, dressed quite finely herself in green taffeta. As they bustled past another carriage some distance away which was just dropping off its passenger, Katy caught a glimpse of the man alighting from the corner of her eye. She halted in her step. Who was he, and why was he so familiar?

He must have spotted her too, and he paused in the midst of tipping the cab driver, turning to cast a passing glance at her. She gasped. Why, it was him!

Yes, it was, she marvelled, only less compactly-built, more upright, slender, with a gentlemanly carriage; and the same face was immaculate, handsome, clean-shaved. Devoid of any cruelty or ill-intent, and harbouring only a mild curiosity that grew stronger… The like a light bulb, recognition bloomed on his face, or at least she thought it did. The moment lasted for all of a second before he turned and retreated into the house.

It was to be two weeks or so before she saw him again. This time he was a guest at a party in celebration of Herbert's twenty-fifth birthday. The Frasier manor was lit up magnificently, and Herbert and his fiancée (they were due to be wed in a month's time) were constantly heaped with congratulations and approving nods from elderly aunts and uncles. Katy was quite unoccupied once Lord and Lady Borden began making their obligatory social rounds; she would not be needed anymore for quite a while. Milling absently around, trying to be as unobtrusive as possible as a proper lady's maid should be, she bumped quite accidentally into Herbert, who turned and was struck with a terrible moment of awkwardness. But not quite as awkward as she felt – for on his side was the man whom she had once known as Edward Hyde.

"Ah. Kat – Katherine." Herbert fumbled with his handkerchief. "Glad to see you're doing well. I – I must be going now." He made to leave, but the other man stopped him.

"Herbert, you have not introduced me to the…to the lady."

"Right. Right. Erm – Katherine, this is – pardon me – this is Dr Jekyll." With this hasty introduction the young man left, sweating rather obviously.

Katy blinked. She could not tear her eyes away from him. "Doctor…?" His dark eyes said that, yes, he knew her; and he even held out a hand. Dizzily she extended hers, and he kissed it.

"No – please, I – I'm not really a lady, I don't – you shouldn't be seen with me." She was red in the face; she could not help it. He was so handsome, and so inaccessible suddenly. Yet seconds later she was waltzing in his arms as if she was an eligible young woman of class instead of a humble servant.

"My dear Katy," he said at last. "Or is it Katherine now?"

Her cheeks burned, "You are almost a stranger," she whispered. "I think I knew you better when I was a whore, and you were Edwar – "

"Sshhh! Do not ever mention that name in the presence of decent society. You know that man as a friend; the rest of London knows him as a murderer."

Her head whirled as they spun around the room. "And all this while the murderer is in their midst."

"I know – do you think I don't know!" A flash of intense hatred for his other life tightened his features, then passed. "But it is something I have vowed to live with – the man you were acquainted with is no more."

"No more? But he lives inside you."

"Yes, Katy, but I have found a way to control that monster. A drug whose formula is known only to me. Sometimes I feel as if I am succeeding, for his dark urging voice grows dimmer, less dormant. Yet – occasionally – I feel him rising, begging to be let out…the product of a monstrous experiment…. "

As she studied his countenance Katy glimpsed the weariness, the desperation beneath the flawlessly composed exterior. She could not help but pity him.

"Jekyll," she said. "What is your first name…good sir?"

A wry grin darted across his lips. He remembered their very first encounter.

"Talk, woman," he said.

"About…what, sir?"

"Anything. I don't care."

"What is your name, good sir?"

"Henry," he replied. The music ended; the room stopped spinning.

She smiled softly. "Thank you for the dance…Dr Henry Jekyll."

He shook his head. "Please. Just Henry."

"Henry." She smiled, and he returned the smile – but it was abruptly torn apart by a convulsive tremor that he barely managed to control.

"Katy," he breathed. "Katy, I must go. I must leave now." And as he said those words another trembling fit overcame him, running through his whole frame – and then he flung himself away from her, running wildly through the hall, pale and frantic and shivering, his composure fallen away like a dead skin.

It was the last she ever saw of Henry Jekyll.

It would be many months later before she saw him in the news, about his ties to the murderous Edward Hyde who was supposedly the doctor's protégé. Astounding for a respectable man of his noble career, they said; absolutely shocking, but they pitied him also. Poor Jekyll, to have made a poor judgment that doomed him finally at the hands of the brutal Hyde.

Katherine saw the picture and felt tears burning her eyes, fingers tracing the familiar contours of the handsome face, her tears wetting the newspaper. "But I knew you," she whispered. "I would have loved both of you…but you hid yourself, from a world that only knows how to judge without knowing. And it killed you in the end. Ah, Henry, Edward Hyde, if only you had not had to hide yourself from me!"

Unimportant footnote (for those who are interested): the characteristics for Hyde and Jekyll were both partially inspired by Hugh Jackman as Wolverine and Leopold (of Kate & Leopold), respectively. At least, I was thinking of him when I wrote the story. Quite by accident, I might add.