e blazing symphonies. I will prove to you that colour is also
music. This sounds as if I were a victim to that lesion of the brain
called 'coloured-audition.' Perhaps! Not Helmholtz or Chevreul can tell
me anything new in the science of optics. I am the possessor of the
rainbow secrets--for somewhere in Iceland, a runic legend runs, there is
a region vast as night, where all the rainbows--worn out or to be
used--drift about in their vapoury limbo. I have the key to this land of
dreams. Over the earth I shall float my rainbows of art like a flock of
angels. With them I propose to dazzle the eyes of mankind, to arouse
sleeping souls. From the chords of the combined arts I shall extort
nobler cadences, nobler rhythms, for men to live by, for men to die
for!"

Shannon was impressed. Through the smoke of his host's discourse he
discovered genuine fire. The philosopher took his hand and led him to
the window.

"Stand there a moment!" he adjured. Mila joined him and after turning
the lamp to a pin-head of light, their shoulders touching--for the
window was narrow--they peered into the night. They were on the side of
the water. Suddenly Gerald exclaimed:--

"What's that light out at sea--far out? It looks like the moon!"

"It is the sun," coolly replied his companion. They saw arise from the
waters a majestic, glowing sphere of light, apparently the size of the
sun. It flooded the country with its glare, and after sailing nearly in
front of the house it shrank into a scarlet cross not larger than a
man's hand. Then in a shower of sparks it ceased, its absence making the
blackness almost corporeal. Instinctively the hands of the two indulged
in a long pressure, and Mila quickly adjusted the lamp. But Gerald still
stood at the window a prey to astonishment, terror, stupefaction.

Karospina entered. His face was slightly flushed and in his eyes there
burned the sombre fire of the fanatic. Triumphantly he regarded his
young friend.

"That was only a little superfluous gas--nothing I cared to show you.
Read the newspapers to-morrow, and you will learn that a big meteor
burst off the north coast the night before, and fell into the sea." Then
he moved closer and whispered:--

"The time is at hand. Within three weeks--not later than the middle of
October--I shall make my first public test. 'Thus saith the Lord God to
the mountains and to the hills, to the rivers and to the valleys:
Behold, I, _even_ I, will bring a sword upon y