"MY dear Mr. Barnes," wrote Lady Frances' uncle in a genial note, dated
from a Pall Mall club, "I am sorry my niece did not make my intention
more apparent; possibly the mistake was my own. I never dreamt of
offering you, as you assume, anything in the shape of a bribe. What I
thought was that, as one who had the interests both of capital and labour
at heart, I might be allowed to make a small contribution towards any
movement in which you were interested. You mentioned once an idea of
starting a small paper; let my small cheque assist in this excellent
effort.
"I was glad to see your admirable speech so fully reported in the
newspapers. The new movement owes much to your influential voice. I
think we shall want you to run down to Birmingham next week, but the
secretary will write you, and he also will see to the expenses. If you
will not accept payment for your services, at any rate there is no reason
why you should be out of pocket over the business.--Yours with great
regard."
"Reads fair enough," commented Erb. "I may have worded my letter a bit
too harsh."
From Birmingham the party went to Stafford and to Coventry, all somewhat
in the manner of a travelling theatrical company, the party including,
indeed, some eccentrics which emphasised the resemblance. There was an
Irish barrister, who had hitherto pleaded mainly at Cogers' Hall, and had
a change in temperament for every glass of whiskey that he drank, going
up and up the hill of cheerfulness until a certain number was reached,
whereupon each succeeding glass made him descend slowly to the tableland
of contempt for the world; a young Oxford man eager to make some
alteration in the world without delay; and one or two safe men, who could
always be relied upon to say a few appropriate words. Erb sent to
Rosalind from each town press notices, with crosses near to the
references to himself, until it suddenly occurred to him that these signs
might have two meanings; afterwards he drew a rather clumsy hand to draw
attention to the only item in the papers worthy of Rosalind's notice.
Erb was now so much in the movement of life that he experienced a kind of
restless fever unless he had some new project in hand. He felt ashamed
to confess himself hurt on his journey back to town when he found names
of other labour leaders endowed with the importance of print, and a
newspaper which did not contain his name appeared to him to have been
scarce worth the trouble of setting up; this was emphasised by the fact
that the Irish barrister, on seeing him off, had given him a generous
compliment; patting him on the back, he had assured Erb that the name of
Barnes was one that would be engraven in imperishable letters of gold on
the temple of Fame, and that he, for his part, would never, never forget
him. Small wonder, with this feeling of self-importance, that Erb should
give but little attention to the fact that Louisa was at home in Page's
Walk, looking paler than usual. Louisa remarked that she was really only
playing truant, having made up her mind not to work so hard in future.
"They think all the more of you," said Louisa acutely.
A storm seldom occurs without some premonitory signs, and it was on the
tramcar that took him to Camberwell--no reason why he should go to
Camberwell other than his desire to see Rosalind, and this would make him
late for the committee meeting--it was on the tramcar that the first
warnings appeared. Erb was seated at the back reading the manuscript, an
article commencing, "Brother Workers!" when two men in railway uniform
came up the steps, so keenly engaged in conversation that they stopped
half-way to settle some disputed point, barring the descent of passengers
who wished to alight. When, at the strenuously-worded request of the
delayed passengers, and the mild appeal of a tame conductor, they were
induced to move, they scampered up, and taking seats immediately in front
of Erb, recommenced their argument. One was a member of Erb's society;
the other, a man who had obstinately kept outside. Erb would have spoken
to them, but that he was just then in a state of ecstatic admiration over
what seemed to him a well-turned sentence in the article.
"Tell you what it is, old man," said the non-member, slapping his
corduroyed knee emphatically. "You've been makin' a little tin god of
the chap, and, naturally enough, he's taken advantage of it. You pass
him votes of thanks, and what not, and fill him up with soft soap, and
consequence is, he goes swelling about, and--"
"He wasn't far wrong about that South Western business," remarked the
other with meek determination, "and chance it."
"You can't expect a man not to do right sometimes. I ain't arguin', mind
you, that Erb's a fool. Far from it! My view of the matter is, if you
must know--"
"I never ast for your opinion!"
"Never mind whether you ast for it or not. My view of the whole matter
is that he's the only clever man amongst you. He's got you all on a bit
o' string. He goes away, as you mentioned, for a week or ten days
together, and never thinks of communicatin' with you; he gets his name in
the papers; for all you know he may be playin' a double game--"
The conductor came up for fares, and the argumentative man fortified his
position by paying for both.
"A double game. No, no! let me finish! And all the time laughing in his
sleeve at the lot of you. I've known that sort before. I've met 'em.
I've come across 'em. I say no more," he added mysteriously, and sat
back, glaring at the sky.
"Well, but--" The member seemed ill-qualified for debate, and Erb was
greatly tempted to prompt him. "What I mean is-- What I was about to
say was--"
"He's a having you," said the other, smiling thoughtfully at the sky,
"he's a having you on toast!"
"But what's it to do with you?" demanded the other, not finding the
argument for which he had searched.
"Nothing!" retorted the other.
The member, taken aback by this unexpected reply, could not speak for a
few moments. He looked appealingly at the names on the shops by which
they were passing for a suggestion, and appeared to find one in the word
Goodenough.
"After all," he began, "for our purpose--"
"Don't forget this!" interrupted the other. "Don't let _this_ fact slip
out of your memory. It was you began this argument. I never seeked for
it. We was having a glass in the Old Kent Road, and you, or one of the
others, began by saying that Erb was growing a great deal too big for his
boots."
"_I_ never said it," growled the other sulkily.
"Did someone pass a remark to that effect, or did someone not pass a
remark to that effect? Am I speaking the truth, or am I a bloomin'
liar?"
"It's one or the other," said the member cautiously.
"That won't do for me," said the non-member, now in the sheer enjoyment
of cross-examination. "I ast you a straightforward question, and if you
can't give me a straightforward answer, why, I must draw me own
conclusions. That's all." And smiled again mysteriously at the sky.
"Well," replied the other, goaded, "I don't mind going so far as this.
Certain things _have_ been said of late at certain depots that I needn't
name, and it's all going to be brought up at the meeting to-night. Mind
you, it mustn't go any further." The other man gave a nod intended to
signify that he had guessed all this. "And being meself on Erb's side,
and not wanting to be mixed up in anything like a shindy, why, I'm giving
it a miss, and I'm off down to meet the wife's brother at his club in
Peckham and spend a nice, quiet, sociable evening. See?"
"And you," remarked the other thoughtfully, "you call yourself a man?
Well, well, well!" with a sigh, "the longer we live the older we get."
"What are you snacking at me about now?" demanded the member heatedly.
Erb slipped down the steps, disturbed by the news which he had heard, but
with also a feeling of elation at the prospect of a fight. He found the
Professor alone in the house in Southampton Street; Rosalind was out
giving lessons at a school for superior young ladies at Brixton.
Professor full of a kind of stale enthusiasm concerning a new project,
which was to take a theatre or a town hall or a room or something and
give costume recitals, grave and gay, and to keep on at it night after
night until people found themselves forced to come in their thousands;
the Professor seemed to have worked this out as though it were a scheme
for winning gold at Monte Carlo, and he had already decided what he
should do with the enormous profits. Difficulty was to select from the
many suburbs of London one place which should be favoured with the
experiment; another difficulty (but this he seemed to think of less
importance) consisted in the fact that, from inquiries he had caused to
be made, it appeared that those who controlled the letting of public
premises had a distrustful habit of requiring the rent in advance. Erb,
in answer to a question, declared that he had no sort of influence in the
City, a place with which the Professor seemed imperfectly acquainted in
that he regarded it as a storehouse of valuables, the door of which flew
open if you but knew the one, the indispensable word; the Professor
considered the matter for a while with one hand twirling his hair, and
then, illuminated, announced his intention of taking off his coat to the
work. As a first step, he proposed to take a cab to Throgmorton Street,
and have a thoroughly good look round. Erb suggested a 'bus and the
Professor replied that undertakings of this kind had to be carried
through with a certain amount of dash and spirit which could not be done
under one and six, or, at the very least, one and three. For this sum
Erb compounded, and the Professor made a note of the amount on the back
of an envelope that a treacherous memory should not play tricks; the
message for Rosalind he could trust to his mind. He was working like a
bonded slave, he added, on behalf of his little girl: she was fortunate,
indeed, in having a father who could keep accounts. Erb restrained an
obvious repartee, and the old gentleman, in his slippers, walked with him
out to Camberwell Gate, where, in the interests of economy, he proposed
to look in at a bar which had in its window a card bearing the ambiguous
announcement, "The 'Stage' Taken In."
Erb found that he had allowed the garrulous old gentleman to detain him
longer than he should have done; when, on reaching the coffee-shop in
Grange Road he ran upstairs to the committee rooms, he could hear voices
raised, and he knew that not only had the meeting already commenced, but
that a contentious subject was being debated. The rapping of Payne's
hammer failed to arrest tumultuous speech, and it was only when Erb
opened the door that the argumentative voices stopped.
"Fact of the matter is," said Payne, in the chair, rather
hurriedly--"good evening, Erb, you're lateish--the fact of the matter is
this is one of them very peculiar subjects where there's something, no
doubt, to be said on both sides. Let's get on to the next business."
Erb went to his chair by the side of Payne and took some papers from his
pocket. He looked up and down the table nodding; his salutation was not
in every case returned, and some of the men glared sternly at the
advertisements; Spanswick waved his hand in the friendliest manner.
"There's the matter," said Payne, "the matter of starting a paper or a
organ or something of a sim'lar nature. I call upon the secretary to
make a statement."
"I object," said a voice.
"That you, Lindsay?"
"Yes, Mr. Chairman," announced a hot-faced youth, rising from his seat,
"it _is_ me."
"Sed down," advised Spanswick audibly at his side. "Don't make a silly
young laughing-stock of yourself."
This was sufficient for the fiery-faced Mr. Lindsay. He was from St.
Pancras, and an engagement with a lady who kept a small laundry at
Child's Hill had recently been annulled at her particular request (a
circumstance he had related in confidence to everybody), the Midland man
having been driving about London for some days boiling up his thoughts,
had decided that the world was managed on some erroneous system; it
behoved him to put it right. Lindsay had come to the meeting with the
vague desire to get satisfaction by opposing something; here in the
discussion concerning Erb appeared a subject which exactly fitted his
requirements.
"I should like to say a few brief words on the matter which we 'ave jest
been discussing."
"Question!" cried Spanswick.
"I'll question you," retorted Lindsay heatedly, "if you can't leave off
interruptin'. I appeal to the Midland men present, and I ask whether
they're going to allow themselves to be sat upon?"
"You'll be jumped on if you don't look out," said Spanswick. The room
began to take sides.
"You do it," shouted the other, goaded. "You do it, that's all! Try it
on! Have a dash at it, my friend, and see what 'appens. You talk a lot,
but I vurry much doubt whether you can do anything else."
Payne in the chair made his hammer heard above the din of contending
voices, and then, standing up, shook the hammer threateningly. If they
did not at once stop their row, said Payne, he, as Chairman, would have
to consider the advisability of jolly well doing something; having given
this vague threat Payne conferred with Erb in a whisper.
"Tell you what occurs to me," said Payne, with a weak pretence of
proclaiming an idea of his own. "Let's hear what friend Lindsay has to
say, and if there's anything in it, why no doubt our friend the secretary
will reply."
"On a point of order--" said Spanswick, rising.
"I should like to point out--" began a Great Western man in the corner.
"Seems to me that the proper course to pursue--" said another.
The Chair hammered away noisily. A half-minute of strenuous tumult, and
the noise subsided. Lindsay, of St. Pancras, rose, buttoning his jacket;
this done he unbuttoned it again, continuing this eccentric action during
the whole of his speech. He had some difficulty in finding words at
first, but irritating comments from Spanswick served to encourage him,
and he succeeded in recapitulating charges which it seemed had been made
by certain members, now coy and reserved, against the secretary during
the previous half-hour; these Lindsay emphasised by a suggestion that
friend Barnes was using the society only for his own personal advancement
(at this there was a shout of protest from most of the members that made
Erb, his gaze fixed on the blank sheet of white foolscap before him,
tingle with satisfaction). When having made his fiercest rush, Lindsay,
of St. Pancras, showed signs of wavering, it was Spanswick who pricked
him again into fury with a banderillo question to another neighbour: "But
what was the real reason why the gel wouldn't have him?" asked Spanswick.
Lindsay from St. Pancras, waving his arms excitedly, cried now in a
scream that they were paying a princely salary to a man who thought he
could twist the society round his little finger; who went about mixing
with the nobs and getting his name into the papers; who lorded it over
everybody, or tried to; who, to put it briefly, and to put it finally,
was trying to push everybody else off the earth. Lindsay begged to move
that the secretary, Herbert Barnes, be requested to hand in his
resignation without delay.
Lindsay, of St. Pancras, sat down, grumbling to himself in an undertone,
his head still shaking with excitement. There was more applause than one
would have expected, applause being a thing that can be created furtively
by the stamping of feet hidden under the table. Erb rose. As he did so,
Spanswick, with his right arm raised, a reminiscence of Board School
manners, rose also, and claimed the attention of Payne in the chair.
"I consider it an insult," said Spanswick loudly, "to allow our friend
the secretary to answer the ridic'lous attack that has been made upon
him. I claim the right to reply on his behalf." Erb sat down. "It's
all very well for men to talk who've never been tempted either by the
attractions of 'igh society, or--what shall I say--the allurements and
what not that titled parties, be they gentlemen or be they ladies, can
offer, but put them in our friend Erb's position, and wouldn't they make
mistakes the same as he has? Course they would! Besides, there's this
to be said--"
Spanswick, going on with elaborate replies to attacks that had never been
made, did not look at Erb, preferring to direct his argument to the
contumacious Lindsay and his friends: the cheers from Erb's supporters
which greeted Spanswick's start diminished in volume as he went on.
"Drop it!" whispered somebody to him. "Drop it, old man, before you
spile it."
When Spanswick came to a finish of his ingenious Mark Antony speech the
room was left with the impression that charges of a very serious nature
had been brought against Erb, and that the principal defence to be urged
was the fact of Erb's youth and inexperience. Erb, recognising the
damage that Spanswick's advocacy had effected, started up to argue the
case from his own point of view, but he was again anticipated by a
supporter, this time by a man on whose loyalty he could depend, although
his stock of discretion had limits.
"I claim the right to say a few words!" shouted the new man. The room
cried, "Erb, Erb, Erb!" being, it seemed, anxious to see if the case
could possibly be readjusted, and wishful, at any rate, to see the effort
made.
"Take five minutes," ordered the Chair.
"I can do it in under that," said the other generously. "If it's a case
of argument by words, I think I'm equal to it: if it's case of argument
by fists, I jolly well know I am. Understand that, my fine friend!" he
added, addressing Lindsay.
Lindsay of St. Pancras, at a loss for a good repartee, suggested rather
wearily that the speaker should go home and fry his face. The room
looked on this as wanting in finish, and to Lindsay's confusion gave it
no applause.
"You come from St. Pancras, I believe? Very well; I'll St. Pancras you
before I've done with you."
"Do it!" cried Lindsay, annoyed by the failure of his retort. "You do
it, that's all!"
Lindsay slipped from his seat, and, evading the efforts made by
neighbours to detain him, went quickly to the side of the speaker. The
Chair half rose, his hammer uplifted. Erb stood up with a pained look.
"Here I am," said Lindsay, offering his scarlet face to Erb's supporter.
"Now show us what you can do."
The invitation was one not to be declined. The loud smack on the scarlet
face made Lindsay stagger; the next moment he had seized a wooden chair,
and the speaker had similarly armed himself. Voices in the room shouted,
Payne hammered on the table before him, everybody, in an excited way,
begged everybody else to keep calm. Erb made his way, thrusting aside
the intervening arm, to the quarter of the room where the two men were
facing each other. Lindsay swung his chair, and the other guarded; the
two chairs broke noisily, and left the two disputants holding a single
wooden leg. Spanswick remarked that Lindsay seemed about as successful
in undertakings of this kind as in his love affairs, and the St. Pancras
youth, goaded by this, brought the leg of the chair viciously down on the
head of his opponent. A red line matted the hair; the room filled with
uproar.
"Stop 'em! Keep 'em apart!"
"Let 'em fight it out! Stand back and let 'em finish it!"
"Leave off shoving me then! I've got as good a right to look on as you
have. For two pins--"
"The other one began it. He asked for it."
"I beg your pardon, he did nothing of the kind whatsoever. Keep your
elbows out of the way, or else I'll serve you like he served him. Yes,
and quick about it, too!"
The sight of blood excited all to the point of ill-temper. Two, with the
best intentions, held Erb firmly, screaming to him urgent recommendations
to keep cool, and as Erb was the only man in the room capable of
exercising any control over the members, there seemed no reason why the
disturbance should not go on for all time; the arrival of the landlord
with a threat of police caused the two men to loosen their hold of Erb,
and he, with a fierce remark condemning the stupidity of all, freed
himself, and took charge of the proceedings. Ordered Payne to turn the
landlord out and lock the door. Directed his supporters to resume their
seats. Found the decanter, the contents of which had been only partly
upset, and, pouring water into the palm of his hand, bathed the damaged
man's head. Commanded Lindsay to stand away at the end of the room by
himself, which that young man did, to his own astonishment, in the manner
of a penitent schoolboy. Gave orders to members of one or two disputant
groups, causing them to separate and occupy themselves with other duties.
Whispered to Payne. Payne went back to his chair and his hammer.
"Friends," cried Payne, mopping his forehead, "this meeting's going to be
adjourned for 'alf a hower so as to get cool."
Most of the men went downstairs, and in the bar discussed the tumultuous
event with hushed voices, that outsiders might not share the knowledge;
they were not quite certain whether to be proud of the incident or
ashamed. Erb told off two men to take his damaged advocate to a
chemist's, and, giving no answer to inquiries concerning his intentions,
went out, and walked up and down Grange Road alone. He saw the whole
case clearly; admitted that his popularity had received a shock;
recognised the true inwardness of Spanswick's intervention, and foresaw
the difficulties that would obstruct his path if he should lose his
position. Not seeing Rosalind this evening was, he now felt, an augury
of bad luck; he would be glad when the night was over and done with.
"This ain't my birthday," said Erb grimly.
All the same, something had to be done. Individual men one could deal
with, but with men in a lump you could only safely count on their
unreliability. Erb stopped at a furniture shop and tried to guess the
identity of a young man with hat tipped back and forehead creased with
thought; the face looked familiar, and it was only on approaching that he
discovered it was his own reflection in a long mirror marked in chalk, "A
Rare Bargain. Late the Property of a Club." He laughed and went back.
"I don't want to make a speech," he said quietly. The room had refilled,
members conducting themselves with a studied decorum almost painful to
behold; the smoke had escaped by the open windows, and it was possible to
see everything clearly. "It appears that there's some dissatisfaction."
"No, no!" said voices.
"There's some dissatisfaction," repeated Erb determinedly, "and it
doesn't really matter much whether it's grounded or not. No society can
go on like this with success under these circumstances. I started this
society--"
"Earear!"
"And I tell you candidly, I feel much more interested in the prosperity
of this society than I do in the prosperity of myself. I'm a single man,
I regret to-- I mean to say I'm a single man, and as a single man, I can
find something else to do."
Members looked at each other with concern.
"That is why, Mr. Chairman, I address myself to you, because you're an
old friend and a--and a good sort." Payne blinked at the compliment.
"And I hand to you, old chum, this letter that I've just written out,
which contains--"
The room leaned forward to listen.
"Contains my resignation." Erb sat down.
A murmur started slowly near the Chairman and went down the table,
increased its pace and its volume, and came back to Erb in the condition
of an angry remonstrance. Half a dozen men rose.
"I give notice," said Spanswick, "that at the next meeting I shall move
the appointment of a new secretary."
"At the next meeting," said a Cannon Street man, who had never heard his
own voice raised in public speech before, and seemed himself astonished
by the novelty, "at the next meeting you'll damn well do nothing of the
kind." The room roared its approval. "We don't want a new secretary,
because we ain't a going to get rid of the old one. The position isn't
vacant. I move, Mr. Chairman, or second, or whatever you call it, that
that letter what you've got in your hand be given back to our friend Erb,
and that he be asked or invited or requested--I don't know how you put
these things--to tear it up and forget all about it; I will now conclude
my few remarks by asking you to join me in a well-known song."
"F--or _he's_ a jolly good faillow,
For he's--"
The room sang the refrain with enthusiasm; the man with the broken head
came, bandaged, and joined in. Spanswick, recognising that the game for
the present was over, beat time.
"That's all right, then," said Payne, when the hurrahing stopped. "Now,
let's get on to the next business. 'Proposed starting of a new paper to
be called "The Carman."'"