So absorbed had I become in these intensely interesting details supplied by Almos’ knowledge, that time had passed without my realizing it, and, reproaching myself for having wasted the valuable moments I might have spent with Zarlah, I now moved the lever at my side and glided gently forward.

The moon, however, as it rapidly journeyed across the heavens, seemed to hold a strange fascination for me, and my gaze constantly reverted to it.  Had I realized that this fascination was caused by the approach of a terrible danger, I might have paid heed to the warning, but desirous now to get to my journey’s end, which, according to Earth’s proverb, should end in a lover’s meeting, I thought only of the time I had lost, and impatiently put the subject from my mind.

Moreover, as my meeting with Zarlah drew near, thoughts that were relevant and of a more serious character filled my mind.  My present visit to her now began to appear most unjustifiable.  If I had found excuse for my action of the previous evening, in the enthusiasm of so suddenly beholding the object of my adoration, unaccustomed as I was to my strange position, I had no such excuse now.  To appear before her again as Almos, after having seen my folly and realized the deceit of my position toward her, would be an act of shameful duplicity.  I had not realized this before, for I had thought only of my great love for her and the joy of again being with her, but now the crushing force with which the truth presented itself, caused me to hesitate before taking another step that I now felt would be impossible to justify before Almos.  In this great uncertainty of mind I glided slowly along.

The wonderful stillness of the night was broken only by the faint hum of voices and merry laughter that reached me from below.  Glancing down, I observed numerous open aerenoids floating some two hundred feet beneath me, while now and then those of the high-speed class appeared, 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.