Vang gulped down the hot soup with a gurgling noise like a malstrøm. Egholm looked across nervously and enviously, and when Hedvig came round behind his chair, he reached out backwards greedily, but was sadly disappointed. No second helping—only the big geranium that Hedvig had brought in to set in the middle of the table. This was her mother’s last brilliant effort; no one could see now that the plates were not alike. She had even fastened paper round the pot, as if it were a birthday tribute.
They ate in silence, but when the dish was empty, and each was wrenching at his skinny, fleshless wing, Vang let off his long-restrained witticism:
“Egholm, what do you say? Can a chicken swim?”
“Swim? A chicken? Why, I suppose so—no, that is, I don’t think so.”
“Well, shall we try if we can teach it?”
“I—I don’t quite follow.... And, anyhow there’s only the ghost of it left now, ha ha!”
“Well, there’s time yet, for it’s fluttering about just now in this little round pond just here!” Vang rose heavily, as if from repletion, snorting with delight at the success of his little joke, and drew a circle with one finger over the front of his well-expanded waistcoat. “All we want’s a drop of something for it to practise in!”
Hedvig was dispatched to buy akvavit with the few coins Vang found in his pockets; he gave her the most precise instructions as to which particular brand it was to be.
Egholm never drank with his meals as a rule, but that evening he took three glasses of the spirit, though it burned his throat like fire. Vang made no attempt to force him, but simply said “Skaal!” and tossed off his glass.
Egholm, however, had other reasons.