That devil, too, that he saw standing close by and whispering to them--his form was dim and fading; he was not sure whether he was a reality or a thought, but--if he had life, was it his own?
Somewhere, he could not remember where or when, he had heard the voice of truth saying, "Thou couldst have no power against me except it were given thee from above." The strange complexity of dreams, which seems so foolish, brings them nearer to reality than we suppose, for there is nothing real which has not manifold meanings.

Before this vision of his townspeople faded, Bart saw Ann slowly walk over from the group in which she had risen to be a queen, to that group whose members were worn with disappointment and age; as she went he saw her perfectly as he had never seen her before, the hard shallow thoughts that were woven in with her unremitting effort to do always the thing that she had set herself to do; and he saw, too, a nature that was beneath this outer range of activity, a small trembling fountain of feeling suppressed and shut from the light.

In some strange way as she stood, having grown older by transition from one group to the other, he saw that this inner fountain of strength was increasing and overflowing all that other part which had before made up almost the entire personality of the woman.

This change did not take place visibly in the other people among whom she stood.

It was in Ann he saw the change.