Wall of Crystal, Eye of Night

In Short

This story follows Rufus Sollenar, a ruthless media mogul who has conquered the market with "EmpaVid," a technology that manipulates viewer emotions. When his long-time rival, Cortwright Burr, returns from Mars with a mysterious alien device, Sollenar’s grip on his empire and his sanity begins to fracture. As an unfeeling, surgically altered agent of the industry’s regulatory board stalks him, Sollenar is driven to a desperate confrontation on the Martian plains. It is a sharp, atmospheric exploration of professional obsession, isolation, and the terrifying cost of total control.

The Story

Rufus Sollenar stands in his Manhattan office, a man who has successfully engineered a system to manipulate the emotional lives of millions. His triumph, "EmpaVid," allows his network to bypass a viewer’s critical judgment, creating perfect emotional rapport. However, his standing is threatened by Cortwright Burr, a bitter rival who has allegedly acquired advanced technology from a dying race of Martian engineers.

Sollenar’s life is further complicated by Mr. Ermine, a representative of the International Association of Broadcasters’ Special Public Relations Office. Ermine is a man devoid of physical sensation—the result of radical, irreversible nerve surgery required for his profession—who serves as a cold, watchful auditor of Sollenar’s affairs. Ermine warns Sollenar that his corporate survival is tied to the stability of the entire industry; if Sollenar fails, he takes his peers down with him.

Paranoia drives Sollenar to attempt a murder. He tracks Burr and, using his own custom-built glider, infiltrates Burr’s office. He shoots his rival, yet Burr survives, seemingly immortal and driven by a singular, obsessive purpose. The encounter leaves Sollenar shattered. He retreats, trying to maintain a facade of normalcy for his social circle, but the reality he has carefully constructed begins to warp. He sees hallucinations; his world, once a dynamic system under his thumb, becomes a source of mounting terror.

The conflict culminates on Mars. Sollenar flees there to purchase his own version of the alien technology, hoping it will provide him with a weapon or a means of salvation. He finds the Martian engineers to be indifferent, alien beings who care nothing for his money or his power. They sell him a projector, a device that allows the user to tell stories to themselves, effectively rearranging their perception of reality to fit a desired narrative.

Sollenar meets Ermine on the Martian plains for a final showdown. As Ermine prepares to execute him, Sollenar offers him the projector. The device is not a weapon of destruction, but a tool of psychological redirection. By manipulating Ermine’s sensory experience, Sollenar grants the agent back his ability to feel—the wind, the ground, and the pain of a physical wound. Ermine kills Sollenar, but he is transformed, suddenly alive with sensory input and a new, vengeful sense of purpose. Sollenar dies in the dust, his own system finally, and irrevocably, broken.

How It Unfolds

The golden window Sollenar surveys his domain from a Manhattan skyscraper, reveling in his ability to manipulate the city and the emotions of its inhabitants through his EmpaVid system. His reverie is interrupted by the arrival of Mr. Ermine, a chilling auditor who signals that Sollenar’s carefully managed corporate dominance is under scrutiny.

The assassination attempt Driven by reports of Burr’s Martian-derived advantage, Sollenar executes a calculated raid on his rival’s office. He guns down Burr, only to be confronted by a man who refuses to die, turning a business rivalry into a surreal, haunting pursuit.

The flight to Mars Sollenar abandons his crumbling empire, fleeing to the Martian surface to replicate Burr’s success. He is dogged by Ermine, who is officially tasked with witnessing Sollenar’s death to protect the financial interests of the broadcasting association.

The engineer’s workshop In the desolate ruins of the Martian city, Sollenar negotiates with the alien engineers for a projector. He learns that the machines are not miracles of immortality, but devices that allow a user to inhabit a self-created, irrational reality.

The final exchange Facing Ermine on the windswept Martian plain, Sollenar offers his last possession as a gift of sensory restoration. The agent kills Sollenar, but the projector succeeds in its final, ironic purpose: it forces the unfeeling auditor to experience his own humanity as he stands over Sollenar’s corpse.

The People

Rufus Sollenar is a man who sees himself as the architect of other people’s dreams. He is defined by his need to manipulate the world as a "dynamic system." He ends as a desperate, hollowed-out figure who realizes his status as an "unimaginable" force is an illusion that cannot survive the pressure of actual, unpredictable reality.

Mr. Ermine is a terrifying embodiment of corporate detachment. By undergoing nerve surgery to become an unfeeling, incorruptible auditor, he has traded his humanity for a role of pure, efficient function. His arc is the most profound: from a man who tastes and touches nothing to a being who is suddenly, painfully reborn into the full, sharp agony of the physical world.

Cortwright Burr serves as the catalyst for Sollenar’s downfall. A reflection of Sollenar’s own ruthlessness, his "immortality" is less a supernatural feat and more a testament to the power of a mind that has been completely, stubbornly committed to its own narrative.

Bess Allardyce represents the conventional, beautiful life Sollenar tries to maintain as a backdrop to his schemes. She is the fragile, human element that Sollenar cannot truly control or inhabit, ultimately standing by in confusion as his carefully managed reality collapses.

In Its Own Voice

"Yet his doom was this: He could not see what he must learn of his own!"

The narrator introduces the fatal blindness of Sollenar, who controls the world’s dreams but remains ignorant of his own internal decay.

"A falling star--an interplanetary rocket--streaked down toward Long Island Facility like a scratch across the soot on the doors of Hell."

This evocative description captures the atmosphere of a world where technological progress is inextricably linked to a sense of impending doom.

"He could as easily renege on the Ball as a king could on his coronation."

The comparison highlights how Sollenar’s sense of entitlement and station has become a cage from which he cannot escape.

What It's Really About

The book is a dark inquiry into the cost of total control. Sollenar’s empire—built on "EmpaVid"—functions as a critique of mass media’s ability to orchestrate emotion, arguing that once we begin to manufacture reality for others, we become susceptible to the same illusions. The story poses a chilling question: what happens to the self when it is no longer anchored in objective truth? By the end, Sollenar and Ermine are both victims of their own systems; one is lost in a self-made dream of power, the other trapped in a self-denying dream of efficiency. The narrative suggests that reality, even when harsh or painful, is the only thing that can truly define us.

Why Read It Today

Readers who enjoy high-stakes psychological drama will find this story compelling, though its tone is decidedly somber. It is a work of cold, sharp precision, mirroring the detached, surgical nature of its antagonist, Ermine. The prose is elegant and atmospheric, capturing a mid-century vision of a high-tech, corporate-dominated future that feels eerily relevant to the current era of algorithmic influence and digital escapism.

The book’s primary difficulty lies in its tight, sometimes claustrophobic focus. It does not offer a traditional "hero" to root for; rather, it invites the reader to observe the slow-motion collapse of a man who has lost his grip on what is real. There is no joy in these pages, only a stark, intellectual beauty. The "Martian" dialect and the specific sci-fi terminology of 1961 are present, but they do not obscure the universal nature of the struggle. If you are looking for a story that dissects the psychology of a man who tries to own the feelings of the world, only to find himself empty-handed, this is a masterful, haunting choice. It leaves the reader with a lasting, unsettling question: how much of our own reality is something we have built, and how much is something we have merely bought?