Read "The Seed of Empire" by Fred M. White online for free on Textopian. Full text with search, annotations, highlights, and AI-powered reading aids.
Harold turned a surprised glance on the speaker. He saw a little man, short and squarely built; a man with fiery red hair, and whose impudent face was deeply marked with orange freckles. His clothes were dingy and dilapidated, his toes were working through his broken boots, and to all appearance fortune had not smiled his way of late. But the impudent blue of his eyes and the audacious swaggering smile on his lips seemed to have been born there and ready to defy every misfortune that came his way. He might have been any age between 19 and 25, but in the case of the typical pariah of the London streets it is always difficult to tell. This was not the question that Harold was asking himself--he was wondering how this ragged and tough specimen of humanity knew him so well by name.
"I think I can manage all right, thank you," he said coldly.