"The one who was talking had two theories about it. You see they had two kinds of folks in that world—one bunch was called 'sinners' and one was called 'righteous.' Plenty of both bunches were killed by the quake. But it seemed that the fellow who was talking, wanted the sinners killed and he was praising my friend for doing it. But his difficulty was in explaining the death of the righteous, whom I gathered were friends of his that had been in the habit of paying him to talk to them. There were a good many empty stalls in the room with black cloths on them, and some of the women in the crowd were weeping.
"Well, after the talker got through explaining that their deity had caused the earthquake for the purpose of killing the sinners, he had to admit that it also got a few of the righteous. He said that this was due to the 'mysterious working of the divine purpose' or some such vagary."
"Well, what of it?" asked Fidu.
"Nothing in particular, only it struck me as funny."
"Is that all?"
"About," said Gud—"but as I left that world, I took hold of its axis and gave it another shake."
"Did you know," said Fidu, "that the Copycat had been visiting?"
"What makes you think so?"
"Because there are five little copy kittens."
After which they journeyed on until they came to a wall. In this wall were two doors. Before the wall stood a great multitude and they stared at the two doors with fixed glassy eyes.