"Well, p'raps these 'ere things are called 'beer' in 'is language."
Alf snorted.
"I ask yer, do they look like it? No, it's just 'is fat-'eaded way."
He rubbed his Button fiercely.
"Take these blinkin' egg-boxes away, Eustace," he said. "An' pull yerself together. I asked yer for beer—stuff what you drinks, savvy?"
He made a gesture of drinking. The djinn, with a sudden light of comprehension in his face, bowed and vanished with the sarcophagi, to reappear a moment later with an enormous tray on his head. From this he proceeded to deal out a great number of covered metal plates, exactly as a conjurer produces strange objects from a top hat. He set them down in the trench, and with a final flourish brought forth an enormous silver flagon and two heavily chased goblets. These he placed with the other things, and disappeared.
"Ah!" said Bill, smacking his lips in anticipation. "This looks more like it. Bit 'olesale in 'is ways, ain't 'e? Seems to take us for the Lord Mayor's Banquet."
He lifted the cover from one of the plates and smelt the contents.
"Fish o' some kind," he said dubiously. "Smells funny. Never could stand them foreign messes."
Alf did likewise to another dish.