"Oh, I'm sure she will not."
"Well, now, I must be off. But before I go I will show you the catalogues of my library; and perhaps I can bring home some books which will bear on these occult subjects. I have given orders that no information as to you shall go off the place; and your mother is safe here. You may read, or hoe in the garden, or ride a horse."
"I wish I might go to the city with you."
"My judgment is against it. Stay here for a few days till we see which way the wind is blowing." And with a cheery wave of his hand he drove away, leaving Victor on the porch with the feeling of being marooned on an island—a peaceful and beautiful island, but an island nevertheless.
XI
LOVE'S TRANSLATION
To tell the truth, Victor dreaded being left alone with his mother in this way. He was fully aware now of the invisible barrier between them. No matter what explanation was finally offered, she could never be the same to him again, for whether it was her subconscious self which had cunningly lured them all to the verge of disaster, or some uncontrollable impulse coming from without, in the light any explanation, she was no longer the sweet, gentle, normal mother he had hitherto thought her to be.
It was not a question of being in possession of strange abilities, it was a question of being obsessed by some diabolical power—of being the prey of malignant demons avid to destroy.
The more deeply he thought upon all that had come to him, the more bewildered he became; and to avoid this tumult, which brought no result, he went out and wandered about the farm. His experience was like visiting a foreign country, for the men were either Swiss or German; and the walls of the farm-yard quite as un-American in their massiveness and their formal arrangement—a vivid contrast to the flimsy structures of the neighboring village. The servants (that is what they were, servants) treated him with the trained deference of those who for generations have touched their caps to the more fortunate beings of the earth, and these signs of subordination were distinctly soothing to the youth's disturbed condition of mind. Instantly, and without effort, he assumed the air of the young aristocrat they thought him.