That meant 407,000 dollars!
Four hundred and seven thousand dollars! A high price to pay for a collection of icebergs, ice-fields, and ice-floes!
And the representative of the North Polar Practical Association did not even raise his eyes from his newspaper. Had he been instructed not to bid? If he had waited for his competitors to bid their highest, surely the moment had come? In fact, their look of dismay when the Major fired his “hundred cents” showed that they had abandoned the battle.
“A hundred cents the square mile!” said the auctioneer. “Any advance? Is that so? Is that so? No advance?”
And he took a firm grasp on his hammer, and looked round him.
“Once!” he continued. “Twice! Any advance?”
“A hundred and twenty cents!” said Forster, quietly, as he turned over a page of his newspaper.
“And forty!” said the Major.
“And sixty!” drawled Forster.
“And eighty!” drawled the Major, quite as placidly.