The gold-buying clerk at the Kangaroo Bank was an immaculately dressed young man with a taste for jewelry. In his tie he wore a pearl, in a gold setting shaped like a diminutive human hand; his watch-chain was of gold, wrought in a wonderful and extravagant design. As he stepped through the swinging, glazed doors of the Bank, and stood on the broad step without, at the witching hour of twelve, he twirled his small black moustache so as to display to advantage the sparkling diamond ring which encircled the little finger of his left hand. His Semitic features wore an expression of great self-satisfaction, and his knowing air betokened intimate knowledge of the world and all that therein is. He nodded familiarly to a couple of young men who passed by, and glanced with the appreciative eye of a connoisseur at the shop-girls who were walking briskly to their dinners.
Loitering across the pavement he stood upon the curbing, and looked wistfully up and down the street. Presently there hove in sight a figure that riveted his attention: it was Rachel Varnhagen, with muslins blowing in the breeze and ribbons which streamed behind, approaching like a ship in full sail.
The gold-clerk crossed over the street to meet her, and raised his hat.
“You’re in an awful hurry. Where bound, Rachel?”
“If your old Dad told you to go and buy a gold watch and chain, you’d be in a hurry, lest he might change his mind.”
“My soul hankers after something dearer than watches and chains. If your Dad would give me leave, I’d annex his most precious jewel before he could say, ‘Knife!’ He’d never get a chance to change his mind. But he always says, ‘My boy, you wait till you’re a manager, and can give me a big overdraft.’ At that rate we shall have to wait till Doomsday.”
“The watch is at Tresco’s. Come along: help me turn the shop upside down to find the dandiest.”
“How d’you manage to get round the Governor, Rachel? I’d like to know the dodge.”
“He wouldn’t mind if you fell off a stack of bales and broke your neck. He’d say, ‘Thank God! that solves that liddle difficulty.’”
“Wool bales? Has wool gone up? I don’t understand.”