Medusa's Coil

The unnamed narrator of the story is driving to Cape Girardeau, Missouri, but gets lost in the unfamiliar countryside. He comes across a rundown plantation house, and finds the only inhabitant is an emaciated old man named Antoine de Russy. The narrator asks if he could spend the night in the house. The old man agrees, and begins to tell him the tale of the place. He explains that he inherited the estate from his grandfather, and married in 1885. He had a son, Denis, who, as a young man, wa...