Novella
"The Hodgson’s Dossier, or Shadows over Adyar"
Part 1.
Chapter 1. "The Chase"
London, October 1884.
The narrow grey street was dimly lit by flickering gas lamps and shrouded in fog and foreign mysteries.
A young man with a tense face and burning eyes, raced along the city's tangled artery, trying to catch someone. Tucking up his coat collar and pulling his hat tighter on his head, he plunged into a narrow East End alley, nearly tripping over crates of rotting vegetable scraps. His breath burst out in white clouds, mingling with either the fog or the now-familiar coal smog.
Somewhere nearby, a door slammed. The air hung heavy with the smell of cheap gin and fried fish. The drunken patrons spilling out of the tavern paid no attention to the runner, preferring not to interfere in other people's affairs. From the other side of the street, a child's cry could be heard, and from a basement room, the shouts of an argument drifted. For a moment, Hodgson was distracted. A figure flashing ahead brought him back to the present. The pursued darted around a corner like a ghost. His shadow, sliding along the wall of an old building, disappeared.
The tall brick houses looming over the alley would soon end. Beyond the corner lay the road to the docks. Stumbling over crates and refuse, Hodgson quickened his pace. The smell of fuel oil and rusty iron was already drifting from the river, overpowering the earlier city scents. Somewhere in the darkness, cart wheels creaked, and a coal cart rolled into the road, blocking the path and nearly knocking the young man off his feet. Pressing himself against the wall, he continued to follow the fleeing figure with his gaze. The pursued, crossing a rickety bridge over a canal, moved further away from the docks. "Just don't let him reach the Underground!" Richard thought, using the pause to catch his breath. When the cart moved on, he resumed the chase with renewed vigor. Each step echoed dully in his ears, and his heart pounded in his chest, not so much from the run as from rage.
The steps of the narrow staircase, eaten away by time and thousands of boots, led down to the Underground tunnel, drawing him into a realm of coal dust and smog. Nearly knocking over an old woman with a basket of flowers emerging from the station, Hodgson burst into the spacious lobby, barely illuminated by gaslights.
"Stop!" he shouted, but his voice was drowned out by the roar of a departing train.
On the platform lay a glove – black, leather, with the initials "HPB" embroidered in silver thread. The young man picked it up, examining it in the dim light. It was an elegant ladies' glove, smelling of jasmine and Indian tobacco.
