merryeccentricities

That's better! If he can make Joly laugh, things can't be too bad. (But then, Joly, dear fellow, would manage to laugh at--oh, a barricade, say.) He pats Joly's shoulder. "Anyway, we weren't so very direly not ourselves! Minor points like being a robot, or having out souls manifest externally as small birds, what's that in the grand scheme of things? --All right, perhaps I'm being a bit nonsensical."

He pulls away a little, to study Joly's face. "I'm myself at the moment, I'm sure," he says more seriously.