Spitball Army

From The 42nd Parallel (1930):

Mac got to like the life of a storekeeper.  He got up when he wanted to and walked up the sunny streets past the cathedral and the façade of the national palace and up Independencia where the sidewalks had been freshly sprinkled with water and a morning wind was blowing through, sweet with the smell of flowers and roasting coffee.  Concha’s little brother Antonio would have the shutters down and be sweeping out the store by the time he got there.  Mac would sit in the back reading or would roam about the store chatting with people in English and Spanish.  He didn’t sell many books, but he kept all the American and European papers and magazines and they sold well, especially The Police Gazette and La Vie Parisienne.  He started a bank account and was planning to take on some typewriter agencies.  Salvador kept telling him he’d get him a contract to supply stationery to some government department and make him a rich man.