Some minor simplifications in code and tests.

Background:
This is actually a resubmit of an earlier cl that was
reverted because was test was less robust against
inlining changes (it assumed a virtual call would
never be inlined).

original cl: If8ada79dfd70bea991c11d2b18661b951b6c4cd4
revert cl:   I739aaaccd0509d02a62ef01e797a6d45bfe941df

Change-Id: I952680d60ff488874907f066bfdf156a45b409ba