e surface of the lake. The rain fell almost
vertically, as though it were a tremendous curtain of silver strings.
And each of these strings broke apart into great shining pearls as the
eye followed downward the course of the raindrops.

For perhaps ten minutes the silver torrent poured down. Then suddenly it
ceased. The wind had died away; in the air there was the fresh warm
smell of wet and steaming earth. From the lake rolled up a shimmering
translucent cloud of mist, like an enormous silver fire mounting into
the sky. And then, as the gray cloud swept back behind them, beyond the
city, and the stars gleamed overhead, they saw again that great trail of
star-dust which the Chemist first had seen through his microscope,
hanging in an ever broadening arc across the sky, and ending vaguely at
their feet.

CHAPTER XXII

THE TRIAL

In a few moments more the storm had passed completely; only the wet city
streets, the mist over the lake, and the moist warmth of the air
remained. For some time the three visitors to this extraordinary world
stood silent at the latticed windows, awed by what they had seen. The
noise of the panels as the Chemist slid them back brought them to
themselves.

"A curious land, gentlemen," he remarked quietly.

"It's--it's weird," the Very Young Man ejaculated.

The Chemist led them out across the roof to its other side facing the
city. The street upon which the house stood sloped upwards over the hill
behind. It was wet with the rain and gleamed like a sheet of burnished
silver. And down its sides now ran two little streams of liquid silver
fire.

The street, deserted during the storm, was beginning to fill again with
people returning to their tasks. At the intersection with the next road
above, they could see a line of sleighs passing. Beneath them, before
the wall of the garden a little group of men stood talking; on a
roof-top nearby a woman appeared with a tiny naked infant which she sat
down to nurse in a corner of her garden.

"A city at work," said the Chemist with a wave of his hand. "Shall we go
down and see it?"

His three friends assented readily, the Very Young Man suggesting
promptly that they first visit Lylda's father and Aura.

"He is teaching Loto this morning," said the Chemist smiling.

"Why not go to the court?" suggested the Big Business Man.

"Is the public admitted?" asked the Doctor.

"Nothing is secret here," the Chemist answered. "By all means, we wi