ully reproachful tone, she said, "And have you no
experiments at the observatory that demand your attention that you can
afford to linger here, Almos?"

How beautiful she looked as she stood before me thus! Surely I could not
hope for a better time than now to tell her all that was in my heart.
There was uncertainty in the future--perhaps I would never again be
given the opportunity to speak that with which my soul burned.

Placing a hand lightly on her shoulder and looking down into her
wonderful eyes, I said tenderly, "The reason I have lingered here,
Zarlah, was to think of you."

A tremor of her slight form was the only response I received for some
seconds that seemed hours to me, then, with her eyes turned away so I
could not read in them my fate, she murmured, "Did you not come to hear
the wonderful instrument by which Sarraccus gives the flowers a voice?"

"I did," I answered passionately, "and its sweet melody whispered only
of you--the radiant rose of the spheres. It told me of the yearning in
my heart--it sang of your great beauty, and of my unspeakable love for
you, and sobbed at the time I have wasted, a fortune of golden moments;
then, as it died away, it led me to you. Is not this melody of flowers
direct from God's own hand, Zarlah? It must then be decreed by Him that
I should love you, for being truth itself, it can appeal only to the
truth that is within the soul."

I drew her unresisting form toward me, and, gently pushing back the
waves of soft brown hair, I tenderly kissed the beautiful face, radiant
with the light of love. A thought of fabled beauties of Earth passed
before me. Could any of them compare with my Martian love? Would not the
face of Helen--that which "launched a thousand ships" at Troy--have
paled into insignificance beside it?

For some moments we remained thus, neither of us caring to break that
sacred silence which to lovers means infinitely more than words. The joy
of feeling that my love was returned, and that she whom I held in my
arms was mine, made me forget all else, until, with a little sob, Zarlah
whispered:

"Dearest, in our great happiness, we must not forget the duties that
have been confided to us. You must return to the observatory at once.
Come, and I will accompany you to where Reon waits."

The truth of Zarlah's words flashed upon me, and with it a full
realization of the terrible mistake I had made. In the eyes of Zarlah I
was a Martian, her life-long frien