keg.” Hale had promised to pay an extra premium on such a policy,
and the salesman had responded, “Well, we might write him for
$10,000.”
“No, I want it for $25,000,” Hale said.
The salesman had told Hale that because he wasn’t Roan’s
relative, he could become his beneficiary only if he were his
creditor. Hale had said, “Well, he owes me a lot of money, he owes
me $10,000 or $12,000.”
White found it hard to believe that this debt was real. If Roan
had really owed Hale that amount of money, then all Hale would
have had to do was present proof of the debt to Roan’s wealthy
estate, which would have reimbursed him. Hale had no need to get
an insurance policy on his friend’s life—a policy that wouldn’t
have a significant return unless Roan, who was then in his late
thirties, suddenly died.
The salesman, who was close to Hale, admitted that he had no
proof of the debt and that he had simply desired his commission.
He was yet another person bound up in the “Indian business.”
Roan seemed to have been unaware of these machinations; he
trusted that Hale, his supposedly closest friend, was helping him.
But there remained one impediment to Hale’s scheme. A doctor
had to examine Roan—a heavy drinker who had once wrecked his
car while intoxicated—and deem him a safe risk for the insurance
company. Though one physician said that nobody would approve
that “drunken Indian,” Hale shopped for doctors until he found a
man in Pawhuska willing to recommend Roan; one of the
seemingly ubiquitous Shoun brothers, James, also recommended
Roan.
White discovered that the insurance company had rejected the
first application. A company representative later noted dryly of
Hale’s effort to secure a $25,000 policy, “I don’t think it would