Bert crumpled up in a sort of fit, as though he'd been smitten with sudden colic. "I never thought of that," laughed the other man.
"Very smart nymes you've gev them fowls," said Sam, whose face was as straight and as hypocritically solemn as an undertaker's at a dead rival's funeral.
"Yes, an' they all answer to 'em, too. You ought to see Amos there, when the wife calls to him an' says, 'Amos, you rascal, when are you going to lay us some eggs?' He just sticks his head on one side an' makes a noise in his throat like as if he was quietly chucklin' to himself. He's a knowing bird, that."
"Jus' like an 'uman bein'—eh?"
"Yes."
Sam was anxious to learn how an obvious town-dweller could be so well up in farmyard lore, so he said: "Where d'yer come from?"
"Manchester—but my wife's from Birmingham."
Sam adopted a slightly supercilious manner not at all uncommon with individuals of his class, who either openly or secretly, or both, despise all provincials.
Bermondsey, from its superior heights of cunningness, looked down scornfully upon poor little simple Manchester. "That there Amos cock'll be layin' eggs fer yore missis when Burning'am's a holiday resource," mocked Sam.
Bert grinned and strolled off to join Esther, who had apparently succeeded in diverting the woman's thoughts from the grief of an unexpected bereavement to more pleasant matters connected with their future life on the prairie, two hundred miles from anywhere.