"What fools these mortals be!" said the Pale Peacock, without the least idea that any one else had ever before made that remark. Pale Death with even tread knocks at the threshold of rich and poor. "Pallida mors aequam pulsat," etc. One day the Purple Herring died, and the Pale Peacock suffered as suffer those who love and are bereaved. Little cared she for longer life, and she wanted to pine away. She went to a policeman on the corner, and said: "Tell me how to pine." "What now! What now!" said the policeman and he gave her no assistance. But she must pine. She wanted to pine away. She wandered on and met the Cream-Colored Cat, and to her she told her tale. Now, the Cream-Colored Cat had herself learned to pine, having lost her loving mistress, and, being of an affable and affectionate nature, she at once revealed the secret of pining to the Pale Peacock, and they joined forces and pined together. And they pined, and they pined, and they pined. They pined until they became a Sublimated Substance--(just what a Sublimated Substance is does not matter in this story)--and they pined along until they became something so intangible they were almost like a little fog; that is, they were like a young fog, for as a fog gets older and begins to dissipate, it gets thinner, so that the younger a fog is, the thicker it is. Finally it becomes a vapor. And they became what may be called an Evanescent Vapor, until all was lost in the Empyrean. And the souls of the Pale Peacock and the Purple Herring were at last commingled. Perhaps it was so in the end with the souls of John and Agnes. CHAPTER XXVII THE RELEASE As Stafford concluded his fanciful, dreamy but, seemingly, from his manner, most earnest story, the Far Away Lady gave him a single appealing glance and then arose and departed for her own car. As she passed he saw that there were tears in her eyes. They did not speak nor did they meet again that day, but he was resolved to breakfast with her in the morning. Morning opened brilliantly and as he entered the dining car, at the time he knew she would be there, he saw that the sun which had but just climbed lazily above the mountain tops, was engaged in the task of gilding her hair. He advanced with more courage than he had on the first occasion. "Good morning, the world is in a good humor to-day, is it not," was his comment as he took his seat. "Have you noticed that the sun, whose business it is to indicate the world's moods, has leaped through the window and is playing with your head when he isn't dancing on the table-cloth?" She looked up smilingly, but before she could answer, there came an interruption. The door of the car opened and there stalked up to them the big conductor, owner of the stubby red moustache, with a look in his eyes which indicated that he had swift remarks to make. He broke out promptly: "Mr. Stafford, you are wanted at the wire, and, you bet, there's something doing."