She looked up at him as he bent over her chair; both were very serious.
"You and I are the only two people bidding," he said. "There are two copies of the book. Don't bid against me and you can buy in the other one for next to nothing—judging from the course this one is taking."
"Very well," she said quietly.
A moment later the first copy of Valdez was knocked down to James White. An indifferent audience paid little attention to the transaction.[267]
Two minutes later the second copy fell to Miss Jean Sandys for five dollars—there being no other bidder.
White had already left the galleries. Lingering at the entrance he saw Miss Sandys pass him, and he lifted his hat. The slightest inclination of her pretty head acknowledged it. The next moment they were lost to each other's view in the crowded street.
Clutching his battered book to his chest, not even daring to drop it into his overcoat for fear of pickpockets, the young fellow started up Broadway at a swinging pace which presently brought him to the offices of the Florida Spanish Grants Company; and here, at his request, he was ushered into a private room; a map of Seminole County spread on the highly polished table before him, and a suave gentleman placed at his disposal.
"Florida," volunteered the suave gentleman, "is the land of perpetual sunshine—the land of milk and honey, as it were, the land of the orange——"
"One moment, please," said White.
"Sir?"