Lescott looked at the daub before him. A less-trained eye would have seen only the daub, just as a poor judge of horse-flesh might see only awkward joints and long legs in a weanling colt, though it be bred in the purple.
"Samson," he said, earnestly, "that's all there is to art. It's the power to feel the poetry of color. The rest can be taught. The genius must work, of course—work, work, work, and still work, but the Gift is the power of seeing true—and, by God, boy, you have it."
His words rang exultantly.
"Anybody with eyes kin see," deprecated Samson, wiping his fingers on his jeans trousers.
"You think so? To the seer who reads the passing shapes in a globe of crystal, it's plain enough. To any other eye, there is nothing there but transparency." Lescott halted, conscious that he was falling into metaphor which his companion could not understand, then more quietly he went on: "I don't know how you would progress, Samson, in detail and technique, but I know you've got what many men have struggled a lifetime for, and failed. I'd like to have you study with me. I'd like to be your discoverer. Look here."
The painter sat down, and speedily went to work. He painted out nothing. He simply toned, and, with precisely the right touch here and there, softened the crudeness, laid stress on the contrast, melted the harshness, and, when he rose, he had built, upon the rough cornerstone of Samson's laying, a picture.
"That proves it," he said. "I had only to finish. I didn't have to undo. Boy, you're wasting yourself. Come with me, and let me make you. We all pretend there is no such thing, in these days, as sheer genius; but, deep down, we know that, unless there is, there can be no such thing as true art. There is genius and you have it." Enthusiasm was again sweeping him into an unintended outburst.
The boy stood silent. Across his countenance swept a conflict of emotions. He looked away, as if taking counsel with the hills.
"It's what I'm a-honin' fer," he admitted at last. "Hit's what I'd give half my life fer…. I mout sell my land, an' raise the money…. I reckon hit would take passels of money, wouldn't hit?" He paused, and his eyes fell on the rifle leaning against the tree. His lips tightened in sudden remembrance. He went over and picked up the gun, and, as he did so, he shook his head.
"No," he stolidly declared; "every man to his own tools. This here's mine."