"Of course," I answered. I was sick and tired and I did not want to be bothered.
He persisted. "Tûan, how much?"
"All of them or just one?"
"That one," he answered, pointing to the elephant I was leading.
I thought he was asking just out of curiosity, and so I set a price that I thought would silence him—$3,000 Mexican.
"Tûan, truly will you sell it for that?"
"Yes."
He followed me to the animal house, and I wondered what he had on his mind. As a matter of fact, I would have sold the elephant for $450, because it was young and small. At the animal house, he again asked me if I would sell for $3,000; then he undid several of the shirts he was wearing and pulled forth an old wallet. He gave me $500 to bind the bargain and called a friend of his to act as witness. When he left to get the rest of the money, I went to the stall where I had placed the animal and examined it.
It didn't take me long to discover why the Arati was willing to pay $3,000. The little elephant had twenty toes instead of the usual eighteen. Twenty-toed elephants are held in veneration throughout India, and are keenly sought by all the rajas and maharajas for the prosperity they are supposed to bring. They are guarded more carefully and quartered even more sumptuously than the white elephants of Siam, and the price they will bring is determined almost entirely by the amount the rajas can gather together. My little twenty-toed elephant was a faultless specimen. He was about five years old and stood four and a half feet high. His head was perfectly shaped; his back was straight and absolutely even with the top of his head.
I was naturally disgusted to think that I had let such a bargain slip out of my hands, and, when the Arab returned, I blamed him for cheating me when I was sick with the fever. I abused him and his ancestors and gave a great show of indignation. He begged me to take the money and give him the elephant; I refused the money and told him to take the elephant out of my sight.