that behind you?" Tarrano's voice simulated sudden alarm; he
scuffled his feet on the floor. The men jumped with fright; nerves
unstrung, they cowered.

"What manner of men!" Tarrano's laugh was contemptuous. "Oh, Lady Elza,
let this be a lesson to all of us! To cure disease is well. To prevent
it--that too is good. But immortality--Dr. Brende never intended it,
_you_ know he did not, Lady Elza--the belief that we have everlasting
life here on this plane--the Creator never intended that. With all
danger of death gone--save violence--these immortals here fear violence
so greatly that they are men no longer!

"Immortal terror! God forbid _I_ should ever feel it! Or you, Lady Elza.
A lesson for us all, who would be so un-Godly as to seek and think we
have found what only the Creator Himself can bestow!"

CHAPTER XXVI

_Black Cloud of Death_

I must revert now to that time in the gardens of Maida's palace at the
Great City when we stood upon its roof-top, threatened below by that mob
of _slaans_. Georg stood with the cylinder in his hand, waving it. The
palm foliage was freezing. Down through the swirling snow fell the
frozen bodies of the _slaans_ who had climbed into the gigantic palm
fronds. The thuds as the bodies struck the ground sounded horribly plain
in the stillness. Georg was still waving his cylinder. Snow and ice were
gathering everywhere. Incautiously he lowered the weapon; a brief,
momentary chill--the congealing breath of the Arctic in this warm
palm-laden garden--swept the horror-stricken crowd.

"Georg, have mercy!"

Maida's frightened, pleading words brought Georg to his senses. He
snapped off the cylinder and dropped it behind him to the palace
roof-top. He was trembling and white as he stood with his arm around
Maida. Weapons so drastic as this one were seldom used. Indeed, it was
law throughout both Venus and the Earth that no civilian should possess
them. The power for wholesale death in his hand, and which without
wholly meaning to, he had so nearly used to its full effect, had
unnerved him.

Without the ray, the wind soon died. The warmer air mounting, melted the
ice; the snow ceased falling. But the swath of shriveled foliage
remained--a hideous scar cut into the luxuriant tropical growth.

The mob had forgotten its threats, its evil intent. Silent for a moment,
it now burst into outcries. Motionless: then milling about, struggling
aimlessly with itself--struggling to retreat. A p