Carroll flushed with pleasure at his warm praise. “I guess it’s because I feel so strongly on the subject,” he said simply. “A fellow can write so much better, you know, if he really feels what he writes.”
“People who buy the Bulletin to-morrow morning are certainly going to get their money’s worth,” Hawley chuckled. “That editorial alone will be well worth the price of the paper. Your readers ought to paste it in their scrapbooks as a model of satire.”
“Cut out the joshing, old man,” protested Carroll. “If the readers of the Bulletin paste anything in their scrapbooks, it will be those wonderful snapshots of yours. They’re going to create a big sensation, Frank.”
The Camera Chap grinned. “Yes, the snapshots and your editorial combined certainly ought to stir things up. Don’t forget that I’ve bet you a new hat that your circulation figures will be more than doubled to-morrow, Fred.[Pg 52]”
“I’ll be quite satisfied to lose the hat,” Carroll chuckled. “And just to show you that I don’t expect to win the bet, let me tell you that I’ve already given orders to my pressroom to print twice the usual number of papers to-morrow.”
“I guess you’re quite safe in doing so,” said the Camera Chap earnestly. “I don’t think you’ll have many copies left on your hands. But how are the pictures getting along, Fred? Have they been made into cuts yet?”
“Neilson is working on them now,” Carroll answered. “Come on up, and we’ll see how he’s progressing.”
Neilson was working on an outside job—a half-tone cut for the letterhead of a local tailor—when they entered his laboratory. Observing this, Carroll was somewhat annoyed. He had asked Neilson to rush the cuts through, and, while he realized that it was the outside work which paid the expenses of the plant, he felt aggrieved that the tailor’s half tone should be given first attention.
“How about that work I gave you?” he inquired sharply. “Started on it yet, Ole?”
The engraver looked at him in astonishment. “How can I start on it until you give me back them negatives?” he exclaimed. “I ban yoost coming down to ask you for them.”