, slowly
wending their way toward the canals, to fly to different parts of the
globe. But although I was aware that for convenience of landing it was
customary to travel just high enough to escape the buildings, I
continued on at my present elevation, as I felt the need of deep and
earnest thought, which I realized would be impossible amid the gay
throng nearer the surface.

As the highest speed attainable by open aerenoids, which were used
mainly for pleasure, was but eight miles an hour, my journey of five
miles gave me ample time for meditation; and when I at last alighted on
the balcony of a small white marble villa, to which I had instinctively
guided my aerenoid, I had fully determined upon what I felt to be the
only honorable course to pursue. This was to confide all in Zarlah, and,
no matter at what cost, to reveal to her the strange conditions that hid
the identity of a being from another world behind that of her friend
Almos.

Having secured my aerenoid, I stood on the balcony, entranced at the
beauty of the scene before me, which lay bathed in a wonderful
starlight--far more brilliant than the light of the full moon upon
Earth--shed by a myriad of blazing gems in a sky that knew no clouds. A
perfect stillness reigned, save for the rippling laughter of a little
stream, that wended its way through an avenue of trees to a lake of
glistening silver, a short distance beyond.

"What happiness would be mine in such a paradise, with Zarlah for my
own!" I thought, and a great anguish filled my heart, as I realized the
impossibility of it--and now for the first time I also realized the
impossibility of life without Zarlah. A sudden dread of meeting the one
I loved came upon me--a dread of seeing the light of love in her eyes,
even for an instant, knowing that it was not for me. I felt I could not
bear to behold the look of tenderness in her beautiful face change to
one of hatred, upon learning how she had been deceived; and in my agony
of spirit, I cried in a voice of deep emotion:

"Ah, Zarlah! I have won you, yet you are not mine! You have loved me,
yet I am not loved!"

"I am yours, and I love you, Harold," softly protested a voice at my
side.

With a start I turned and beheld Zarlah, and for a moment I stood as if
gazing at an apparition.

Realizing my bewilderment, she laid her hand gently upon my arm, and in
a low voice, full of compassion, said: "It is Harold Lonsdale whom I
love!"

In a delirium of