“Yes, I will sell you a bond, as quickly as any one else.”
“Upon the payment of a dollar?” he deliberated, gravely.
“That is right. You pay a dollar down, and I will give you a receipt for it; then I will borrow the rest for you, holding the bond as security until you have paid it out.”
He looked around at his tormentors, as if to say: “You see, this man knows a Spanish gentleman when he meets one.” All his Indian pride, plus all he had garnered from the Dons, was aroused. He came to the desk, while they continued to cry him down.
“Where’s your dollar?” they asked mockingly. “You haven’t any dollar!”
And I was much afraid he had not. A fluke would not do. It would mean losing the lot, and I knew there were many present who could afford to buy on payments and who would make good.
The old man grinned wisely.
“I will sign the paper for a bond,” he said.
The blank was shoved forward to him. He daubed his right thumb on an ink-pad to make his thumb-print, the signature the Government accepts from Indians who cannot write. He pressed it down on the dotted line.
“Now where’s your dollar, old father?” jeered the crowd.