Why a duck, in "ducked out"?
Solution 1:
Green’s Dictionary of Slang suggests that the usage of duck in duck out meaning:
- to make off, to leave, to abscond.
- 1898 [US] F. Norris Moran of the Lady Letty 15: I’ve got to duck my nut or I’ll have the patrol boat after me.
derives from the old sense of duck meaning “to escape, to run off” as in:
do a/the duck (v.) (also do a duckaway)
- 1896 [US] F. Hutcheson Barkeep Stories 173: ‘Dey ’re sore ’cause I do me duckaway an’ dey t’ink dey ’ll just take a shot at me anyhow’.