“I will tell you presently. But just try to recollect something about the nature of the document you signed.”
“I can’t do that,” insisted Barker. “I tell you I didn’t read it. Polly and I, the colonel said, were to be witnesses, whatever that meant.”
“Did you notice whether the colonel had signed it?”
“Oh, yes, sir. He wrote his name right before our eyes.”
“So that you would know that it was his signature?”
“Yes, sir, that was it.”
“Well, Barker,” said Mr. Haywood, after a pause, “would you like to earn a hundred dollars easily?”
“Of course I would, sir.”
“Listen, then. You can do it by solemnly promising, in the eyes of your Maker, that you will never breathe a word to any living soul concerning that document you signed.”
“That won’t be much of a job, sir.”