"Two hundred dollars!" His voice sounded like the squeak in a telephone receiver.
The auctioneer cupped his hand behind his ear and leaned forward:
"What?"
The incredulity in his tone prompted Wallie to raise the bid to two hundred and twenty-five when he repeated it.
The auctioneer struck his forehead with his clenched fist and staggered back dramatically, demanding:
"Am I insulted?"
"That ain't possible," croaked a voice among the spectators.
"Two hundred and fifty!" The bid came from a ministerial-looking person who was known as a kind of veterinary occasionally employed by Canby.
"Three hundred!" Wallie challenged him.
"That's more like it, but still an insult to these noble brutes I'm selling. Who says three and a quarter?"