Even now, despite the tanned look of health he had acquired, it could still be seen that he was by no means the strong, virile young man that Bud had become. His face was rather delicate than rugged in outline; his brown hair was inclined to curl, and his blue eyes were large and beautiful.
The sensitive mouth was still wilful, though character was beginning to show there. He was, in fact, a grand mistake in upbringing. With all the instincts of a lover of beauty he had been raised by a couple of dull parents to a rule-of-thumb existence that started in a business office late one morning and ended in a café early the next.
It was the kind of life to which the poor laborer looks up with consuming envy, and which makes him what he thinks is a socialist. Given a couple of sharp pencils and some blocks of paper, along with sympathy and encouragement, Lester Larkin might have become a writer or an artist of no mean ability.
But the elder Larkin, believing that what had made one generation would make another, had started young Lester on a high stool in his office with a larger percentage of dire results than he had ever imagined could accrue to the employment 250 of one individual. With the high stool went a low wage and a lot of wholesome admonitions—and this, after a boyhood and early youth spent in the very lap of luxury.
Thus, when the father died, the boy, at nineteen, knew more ways to spend a dollar than his father had at thirty-nine, and less ways to earn it than his father at nine. So much for Lester.
“Well, if I can help you in any way, Bud, let me know,” he said when his brother had finished his story of the range war that was now reaching its climax. “I rather imagine I would like a jolly good fight for a change.”
“I don’t want you to get hurt, kid,” replied Bud, smiling at the other’s enthusiasm, “but I have an idea that I can use you somehow. Just stick around for a day or two and I’ll show you how to ’walk’ sheep so your eyes’ll pop out.”
“It’s purely a matter of business with me,” rejoined Lester. “Pictures of seventy men at five dollars apiece, selling only one to each, will be three hundred and fifty dollars. I think I’ll stick.”
“Suppose I get ’em all in one group so you can’t take individuals, then what will you do?”
“I’ll make more money still,” retorted the other promptly. “I’ll sell seventy copies of the same 251 picture at five apiece and only have to do one developing. What are you tryin’ to do, kid me?”