“Pardon the molesting, but you carry a machine of the photograph, is it not?”
The tripod stretching along the pack-beast from ears to tail, and the square, leather boxes in the chipas were clear enough, and the traveler replied politely:
“As you see, sir.”
“Good! And how much is worth a picture? Come, we will occupy you.”
“Infinite thanks, cavaliers, but I do not sell. And pardon, for I am in haste.”
“How not?” There was an incredulous flash in the ambushed eyes, and the voice had lost the edge of its courtesy. “We have money in hand, and we wish to take out our pictures.”
“I lament it, sirs; but you ask the impossible. The government of Bolivia has entered my materials free of duty, seeing that I come on a scientific mission; and in return, that your native artists shall not have whereof to complain, I am pledged to sell no pictures. It often pains me, knowing how one feels for a picture here where artists are few. But in any event, I make vistas only for the one purpose, and need all the plates we brought.”
The maskers evidently did not credit any such absurd story. The gringo—he was a gringo, of course, in spite of his comfortable Spanish—pues, he knew them for rich and was holding off for a big offer.
“Well, we will give fifty bolivianos.[30] Get in and we will carry you to the chacra. There is your home. You shall stay so much as you will; and there is much hunting and such views of Illimani as you have not seen. Also, there are strange monuments of the ancients. Eh? Then one hundred bolivianos!”
“I give you the most expressive thanks, gentlemen, and would willingly see your chacra. But I am bound for Tiahuanaco. And, in any event, you must know that I talk not lumber, but truth. I cannot make your pictures.”