One Sunday evening Mr. Utterson, a lawyer, and his friend Mr. Richard Enfield are taking their weekly stroll when they chance to walk down a side street in a busy part of London. On recognizing the neighborhood and seeing a particularly shabby door, with neither a bell nor knocker, Enfield remembers an event that he had witnessed there one early winter morning. He tells Utterson “a very odd story.” He was just passing by when he saw a man run into and knock down a young girl when their paths crossed at the corner. The horrible thing is that the man just kept on walking, right over the screaming girl. Enfield was so upset that he ran after the man, a Mr. Hyde, and brought him back to the spot where the girl was lying on the pavement. Although the girl was not hurt, her family and the people who had gathered took such a dislike to the man’s appearance that they began to threaten him. In order to appease them, Hyde agreed to pay a fine of 100 pounds. He went through this particular door to get some cash and a check, signed by another man, an upstanding citizen. Utterson asks if Enfield has been exactly precise in the details of the story because he has heard of this Mr. Hyde. He knows that this door is connected to the home of his friend and client Dr. Jekyll.