"But
night will take all the ugliness into its arms and hide it; the
sordidness and griminess will disappear and fairyland will come forth
for a playground. The ugly smoke will turn into a thing of beauty. The
queer point of it all is," he continued, shaking his head sadly,
"fairyland is there all the time and always beautiful, only you can't
see it."

Dicky's eyes opened wide and he gazed out of the window intent on
peering into this mysterious invisible playground.

"Lots of things are like that," agreed Roger. "Don't you remember how
those snowflakes we looked at under the magnifying glass on Ethel Blue's
birthday burst into magnificent crystals? You wouldn't think a handful
of earth--just plain dirt--was pretty, would you? But it is. Look at it
through a microscope and see what happens."

"But, Grandfather, if the beauty is there right now why can't we see
it?" insisted Ethel Brown.

Mr. Emerson stared out of the window for a moment.

"That was a pretty necklace of beads you strung for Ayleesabet."

"We all thought they were beauty beads."

"And that was a lovely string of pearls that Mrs. Schermerhorn wore at
the reception for which you girls decorated her house."

There could be no disagreement from that opinion.

"Since Ayleesabet is provided with such beauties we shan't have to fret
about getting her anything else when she goes to her coming-out party,
shall we?"

"What are you saying, Grandfather!" exclaimed Helen. "Of course
Ayleesabet's little string of beads can't be compared with a pearl
necklace!"

"There you are!" retorted Mr. Emerson; "Helen has explained it. This
fairyland we are going to see can't be compared with the glory of the
sun any more than Ayleesabet's beads can be compared with Mrs.
Schermerhorn's pearls. We don't even see the fairyland when the sun is
shining but when the sun has set the other beauties become clear."

"O-o-o!" shouted Dicky, whose nose had been glued to the window in an
effort to prove his grandfather's statement; "look at that funny
umbrella!"

Everybody jumped to one window or another, and they saw in the gathering
darkness a sudden blast of flame and white hot particles shooting into
the air and spreading out like an umbrella of vast size.

"Look at it!" exclaimed the two Ethels, in a breath; "isn't that
beautiful! What makes it?"

"The grimy steel mills of the daytime make the fairyland of night,"
announced Mr. Emerson.

Across the river they notice