“Cora!” he said, his fingers clutching the pound note, “you mean—now? You really mean now? ”
“I said I’d be nice to you, didn’t I? Well, why should we wait?… Only you’ll have to hurry.”
He went down the street with an unsteady, shambling gait, a feverish, incoherent puppet, without a will, without regard to danger, without a thought for anything except what she was offering him.
He blundered into the shop she had indicated. Saddles, rolls of leather, horse blankets, dog collars, trunks, bags and whips overflowed on the counter, the floor and the shelves behind the counter.
An elderly man with a great hooked nose came out of an office at the back of the shop. He looked curiously at George.
“Good afternoon,” he said. “Is there something I can show you?”
George looked round the shop, his eyes bloodshot and wild. He saw a whip, a riding switch, whalebone bound in red leather, with an ivory handle. He picked it up with a shudder.
“I’ll have it,” he said, thrusting it at the Jew, and threw down the pound note.
The Jew shook his head. “I think it’s a little more than a pound,” he said, picking up the whip with long, caressing fingers. He turned the price ticket and glanced at it. “It’s a fine piece of workmanship.” He smiled. “It’s fifty-five shillings.”
George gulped. “Give me something for a ’pound, something like this, only for a pound.”