A Fall of Glass

The story follows Humphrey Fownes, an absentminded resident of a domed city who becomes victim to an elaborate series of pickpockets while preoccupied with obsessively constant weather readings. Patrolmen watching him compile a dossier and debate his eccentricities as they observe his house exhibit strange behavior: all windows snap shut together and the dwelling trembles as if buffeted by winds, while feather-light glass flakes fall from the dome and maintenance machines roam above. The narrative contrasts bureaucratic surveillance and conformity with individual oddness, unfolding through Fownes's misadventures and the officers' clinical fascination as they seek an explanation.