That put him out on first. I enjoyed his silence for a while, then I said: "Come on, old top, sing us some more Norse sagas about 'My girl's a corker.'"
"Can it!" retorted that typical product of Christiania.
So with quip and retort and persiflage veiled and more or less merry, we strolled about in the beautiful early summer weather.
"Why the devil don't you find Thusis and take another lesson in angling?" he suggested.
"Because, dear friend, Thusis hitched up our horse and went to Zurich this morning."
"What? When?"
"Ere the earliest dicky-bird had caroled—ere Aurora had wiped night's messy cobwebs from the skies with rosy fingers."
"What did she go for?—that is, what did she say she was going for?"
"To purchase various household necessaries. Why?"
"She's a funny girl," he remarked evasively.