You wouldn't, if you knew what they say of me
indoors.' He made a motion of his head towards the windows of the old
wing--'"Harmless," they say, "quite harmless. Let him alone, he's
harmless." A tiger with his claws cut and his teeth drawn--an old,
grey-bearded tiger, ghastly and grim, but harmless--a cobra with the
poison-bag plucked out of his jaw! The venom grows again, child--the
snake's venom--but youth never comes back: Old, and helpless, and
harmless!'
Again Mary tried to move away, but those evil eyes held her as if she
were a bird riveted by the gaze of a serpent.
'Why do you shrink away?' asked the old man, frowning at her. 'Sit down
here, and let me talk to you. I am accustomed to be obeyed'
Old and feeble and shrunken as he was, there was a power in his tone of
command which Mary was unable to resist. She felt very sure that he was
imbecile or mad. She knew that madmen are apt to imagine themselves
great personages, and to take upon themselves, with a wonderful power of
impersonation, the dignity and authority of their imaginary rank; and
she supposed that it must be thus with this strange old man.
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