Karlsson on the Roof
”
Then, quick as lightning, both the wallet and the watch reappeared under the table because Cosh dared not keep the watch, and Ruffy dared not keep the wallet on him in case Oscar began to make a disturbance. And sure enough Oscar did begin to make quite a considerable amount of disturbance, shouting that he wanted his watch and his wallet. Cosh said, “How are we to know what you’ve done with your old wallet?”
And Ruffy said, “We haven’t seen your old watch; you should be more careful with your things!”
Karlsson picked up the wallet and the watch and handed them up to Oscar. Oscar put them away in his pockets and said, “Thank you, Cosh; thank you, Ruffy. You mustn’t play tricks like that again.”
Karlsson gave Cosh’s leg a hard kick, and Cosh shouted, “You’ll pay for this, Ruffy!”
Then Karlsson gave Ruffy’s leg a hard kick, and Ruffy shouted, “You’re off your head, Cosh; what’re you kicking me for?”
Ruffy and Cosh leaped up and began to fight, so that all the plates crashed to the floor and broke, and Oscar was so frightened that he hurried off with his wallet and watch and was never seen again.
Eric was frightened too, but he could not run away; he had to sit quietly under the table.
Cosh was stronger than Ruffy, and he chased Ruffy out onto the landing where he continued the beating. Karlsson and Eric came out from under the table and looked at all the plates lying in pieces on the floor. Karlsson said, “Why should the soup tureen be left when all the plates are broken? It’ll be lonely by itself, the poor soup tureen!”
He smashed the tureen, and he and Eric rushed to the window and climbed out as fast as they could. They had just done so when Eric heard Cosh and Ruffy come back into the room, and Cosh was saying, “Why, for Pete’s sake, did you give him back the watch and the wallet, you stupid idiot?”
“You must be crazy,” said Ruffy. “It was you that did it.”
This made Karlsson shake with laughter, and he said, “We’ve played enough tricks for one day.”
Eric too felt that he had had enough of tricks.
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In a village there lived two men who had the self-same name. Both were named Claus. But one of them owned four horses, and the other owned only one horse; so to distinguish between them people called the man who had four horses Big Claus, and the man who had only one horse Little Claus. Now I'll tell you what happened to these two, for this is a true story.
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