Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde: Chapter 2 Summary & Analysis

Mr. Utterson returns to his house, in a somber mood. It is his usual routine on a Sunday to read until late but tonight he goes to his private safe and finds the will that has been entrusted to him by a Dr. Jekyll. The will bequeaths Dr. Jekyll’s estate to Edward Hyde and also notes that should Dr. Jekyll disappear for any reason for longer than three months, Mr. Hyde should also take over his fortune.

This document has always angered Mr. Utterson. At first it was because he didn’t know Mr. Hyde, and didn’t know why this man should be placed so high above Dr. Jekyll’s own family, but now, his anger comes from his knowledge of the “detestable” man. He had thought this bequest showed madness on Dr. Jekyll’s part but now he thinks it shows disgrace.

Mr. Utterson goes to visit his friend Dr. Lanyon, whose house is always crowded with eager patients. The butler brings Mr. Utterson straight to the doctor, who is sitting, ruddy and energetic, in his dining room. He is an old school friend of Mr. Utterson’s and greets him warmly. Mr. Utterson gets to the point of Dr. Jekyll and asks if he and Jekyll not Dr. Lanyon’s two oldest friends. Dr. Lanyon agrees that they are but says that his own friendship with Dr. Jekyll has soured. According to him, Dr. Jekyll has become devilish and unscientific.

Mr. Utterson is glad of this explanation from Dr. Lanyon because he thinks that his dispute with Dr. Jekyll is based on a difference of medical opinion, but when Utterson hears that Dr. Lanyon has never heard of Edward Hyde, his restlessness returns. That night he can’t sleep. The nearby clock strikes six and he finds himself replaying Mr. Enfield’s story in vivid pictures in his mind. Then he imagines Dr. Jekyll in bed in his rich house and the figure of Mr. Hyde approaching and blackmailing him in the night.

As Utterson sleeps, the images become more repetitive and nightmarish but he can never make out Mr. Hyde’s face. He becomes obsessed with knowing what Mr. Hyde looks like. He thinks it might explain how Dr. Jekyll has been so influenced by the man. The next day, Utterson starts to hang about the stoop of the bleak-looking house in the hope of spying the mysterious figure. At last, on a frosty night, when the street is silent and sounds are sharply magnified, Utterson hears someone approaching.

The steps draw nearer until Mr. Utterson sees the plain figure of the man in question and quickly surprises him at the door, addressing him. Mr. Hyde is afraid for a moment but answers to the name. Mr. Utterson introduces himself as a friend of Dr. Jekyll’s but Mr. Hyde tells him that Dr. Jekyll is not inside. Utterson asks to see Mr. Hyde’s face and Mr. Hyde obliges, after a brief hesitation, and agrees that it is good that they have made each other’s acquaintance, as if Hyde has also been thinking about Jekyll’s affairs. He gives Utterson his address in the neighborhood of Soho.

Mr. Utterson explains to Mr. Hyde that they have mutual friends, naming Dr. Jekyll as one of them. Mr. Hyde becomes suddenly defensive and tries to cover up the snarl that forms on his face. He rushes inside and Mr. Utterson is left to make his way through the dark street and ponder the inexplicable grotesqueness of the man. There is something deformed, even monstrous, about Hyde, but Utterson cannot place what detail gives him that impression.

Mr. Utterson walks to a house around the corner, in a square of elegant but old properties, and asks its servant if Dr. Jekyll is at home. He recalls that this hallway in Jekyll's house was once his favorite room in the city, but that now with its flickering light and strange shadows, it seems fearful, and he is glad when the servant returns to say that Dr. Jekyll has gone out.

Mr. Utterson asks the servant if it is all right that he has seen Mr. Hyde going into the “old dissecting room” and the servant replies that Mr. Hyde has a key and that the servants have been instructed to always obey him. Mr. Utterson goes home, having come to the conclusion that Dr. Jekyll has been condemned by some past fault and is now bound to obey Hyde by some debt.

This makes Utterson think of his own past. He, of all people, has little cause to worry about sinfulness, but now he thinks of every moral wrong he has ever done or avoided. He is sure that Mr. Hyde has heinous deeds in his past, and Utterson resolves to protect Dr. Jekyll. He knows he must act quickly, because if Mr. Hyde has found out about the will, he is sure to aim to inherit the estate soon.