Erb

“ Erb followed, and the other men contributed to the irregular circle of names. The elderly carman hesitated, but one of his colleagues remarked that one might as well be hung for a sheep as a lamb, and the elderly carman appeared to derive great encouragement from this, signing his name carefully and legibly, and looking at it when done with something like affection.
“I sha'n't ask you to get away with your loads many more times,” shouted the van foreman from the other end of the arch. “Yes, it's you I'm talkin' to. You're all champion mikers, every one of you. ”

“ Erb pulled a drawer underneath the table and complied.
“The other way about, stupid,” said the short girl wrathfully. “You don’t take your knife in your left hand, do you? ’Pon me word, I often wonder that men was ever invented. ”

“ One or two men standing at the zinc bar called on Erb to have a drink, but Erb replied, “Afterwards!” and went up the wooden staircase to the club-room. There, on the landing, men were consulting in undertones, which they changed for much louder speech on seeing Erb, commencing to talk noisily of contests with superiors whom they had, it appeared, worsted in argument; of fresh young horses that required a somewhat similar treatment ”

“ The boy doctor looked anxiously from the foot of the sofa: Rosalind knelt.
“You're going to have a nice long sleep, sir,” said Erb, bending down. “And you'll wake up a different man, bless you.”
“I shall wake up,” repeated the Professor slowly, “wake up a different man.”
Both eyelids closing now, he turned his white head a little towards the wall. Presently his grip of Erb's hand relaxed, and Erb, disengaging himself, went with the others to the window, where the three spoke in an undertone, Erb holding Rosalind's elbows supportingly. A slight groan from the sofa. ”

“ For a moment it occurred to Erb that this might be a sample of aristocratic chaff; he stopped his retort on seeing that the other was talking with perfect seriousness. “But something else may happen at any moment. We live in strange times.”
“We always do,” said Erb.
“I shall keep you in my mind.”
Lady Frances eluded some dowagers who were bearing down upon her, and came to him; she took an envelope from a pretty hiding place.
“My uncle particularly begged me to give you this. You were so good, Mr. Barnes. (Don’t open it until you get home.) Your speech was just what one wanted. ”

“ A plain man, remarked Lady Frances's uncle of himself (which, in one respect at any rate, was a statement bearing the indelible stamp of truth) , always of opinion that it was well to plunge in medias res. On Erb replying that at present he had no remark to offer, the purple-faced Director seemed taken aback, and diverted the conversation for a time to Trichinopolies and how best to keep them, a subject on which Erb was unable to speak with any pretence of authority.
“Little whiskey?” suggested the Director, with his thumb on the electric bell, “just to keep one alive.” ”

“ Erb's Aunt Emma, giving herself reward for a month's hard work in the hop-garden, came up every year by the September excursion. It happened on this occasion that the day could not have made a more awkward attempt to fit in with Erb's convenience.
“Well,” said Aunt Emma, in the 'bus, desolately, “I'm not surprised! It's what comes of looking forward to anything. ”

“ Professor Danks, asleep on the sofa, had the Era over his face for better detachment from a wakeful world: the paper was slipping gradually, and Erb, watching him over the top of the book, knew that the eclipse would be over and the features fully visible in a few minutes. Meanwhile, he noticed that the Professor was a large, heavy man, with snowy hair at one end, and slippers which had walked along muddy pavements at the other; not a man, apparently, of active habits. ”

“ On Erb producing this coin the Professor found, with many expressions of deep regret, that he had left the smaller pieces in a waistcoat at home.
“But I shan’t forget, my dear chap,” said the Professor, raising his hand for a stage clasp. “I am one of those who never permit a kindness to escape from their memory. But I hate to be badgered. That ungrateful young scamp Railton, for instance.” ”

“ There is much to be done in the way of eradicating errors in your speech.”
The reliable lady pupil due at eight-thirty spoilt her record by arriving half an hour late. Thus, when Erb's lesson was finished and the clock on the mantelpiece gave the hour in a hurried asthmatic way, there was still time for polite conversation on a variety of topics; the house, Erb discovered, was not theirs, they only occupied furnished apartments; they had lived in many parts of London, because, said Rosalind cautiously, the Professor liked a change now and again. ”

“ It gave Erb a sensation of power to find that not one of these uniformed men in their brass-bound caps was strong-minded enough or sufficiently clear of intellect to carry out any big scheme by himself; they could only keep of one mind by shoring each other up, and he felt that he himself was the one steady, upright person who prevented them all from slipping. ”

“ A young horse was brought up from the stables to take the place of the solemn animal, and its eccentric and sportive behaviour served to occupy Erb’s thoughts during the afternoon. He had occasion to deliver a hamper of vegetables at a house in Eaton Square, and to collect a basket of laundry, and as he waited he saw his sister Alice on the steps of her house whistling for a hansom ”

“ Members asked questions of Erb, questions which betrayed the fact that their knowledge of the real feelings of the working men was superficial, and thenceforth Erb felt more at his ease. They gave their names as patrons of the Spanswick benefit, and the member who wore coins offered Erb a cigarette, and, seeing him through the outer lobby, begged him to drop a line should anything important occur ”

“ The particular blend of trouble which Willow Walk was occupied in brewing proved highly attractive to Erb, and one that gave to all the men concerned a taste of the joys that must have come in the French Revolution. A few impetuous young spirits who had been brooding on grievances since the days when they were van boys were responsible. ”

“ Erb took off his hat and jerked a bow, and Louisa noticed that the closed scarlet parasol was being waved invitingly. She unhooked the tarpaulin cover at once, and, despite Erb’s protestation that they had paid fares to the Elephant, hurried him down the steps. To Louisa’s great delight, the tram, with its absorbedly interested passengers, did not move until the two had reached the open landau, and Lady Frances’s neatly-gloved hand had offered itself in the most friendly way. ”

“ Besides, why don't you give up thinking for a bit? You're always at it. I wonder your brain—or whatever you like to call it—stands the tax you put on it.”
“You'd be a rare old nagger,” said Erb, hooking the tarpaulin covering carefully and affectionately around his sister, “if ever anybody had the misfortune to marry you. It'd be jor, jor, jor, from morning, noon, till night.”
“And if ever you was silly enough to get engaged, Erb—— That's Deptford Station down there,” said Louisa, as the tram stopped for a moment's rest. “I used to know a boy who's ticket collector now. ”

“ Being parlourmaid in Eaton Square, and about five foot ten from top to toe, don’t entitle anybody to come down ’ere to Page’s Walk and act about as though Bricklayers’ Arms Station belonged to them. After all, she’s only a servant, Erb; there’s no getting away from that. She doesn’t get her evenings to herself like I do. ”

“ With cheerful sociability, 'Erb had already seated himself at table, and was beating a loud tattoo with mug and plate as he awaited the administrations of the soup-laden Ganymede.
Suddenly the expansive and genial smile faded on 'Erb's happy face, as he felt himself seized by the scruff of his neck and the seat of his trousers, and raised four feet in the air.... For a second he hovered, descended a foot and was then shot through the air with appalling violence to some distant corner of the earth. Fortunately for 'Erb, that corner contained a bed and he landed fairly on it.... ”

“ William Henry, in Erb's van, made a note. Never have an uncle Richard.
“It must be unanimous,” remarked Erb, speaking in fragments, and endeavouring to entice Payne's mind to imperial subjects as the policeman's hand allowed them to go on, “or else it might as well not be done at all. It's a case of all of us sticking together like glue. ”

“ 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 ”

“ If the journal itself was not below contempt——”
“Look here!” interrupted Erb sharply, “don't you go rubbing it in too thick.”
“Sir William is a man with a large heart,” said the other partner, taking up a more conciliatory tone, “and we shall advise him in the circumstances to do the generous thing. You will print in the next issue of your paper an apology?”
“A most humble apology,” remarked the other partner, “terms of which you will permit us to dictate to you. ”

“ The cook, also stout but short, engaged Erb for the first two dances, assuring him (this proved indeed to be a fact) that she was, in spite of appearances, very light on her toes, and quoting a compliment that had been paid to her by a perfect stranger, and therefore unbiased, at Holborn Town Hall in the early eighties.
“And this, Erb, is Jessie,” said Alice, p. 52introducing a large-eyed young woman in pale green. “Jessie is my very great friend.” She added, “Just at present.”
“I think you speak, Mr. Barnes?” said the large-eyed young woman earnestly. ”

“ CHAPTER XV IF Erb's experience of life had been greater, if his knowledge of the trend of events had been more extensive, he would have been helped by the assurance that in this world, mist and sunshine alternate, and that rarely a fog descends on the life of an energetic man and remains there always. ”

“ You pass him votes of thanks, and what not, and fill him up with soft soap, and consequence is, he goes swelling about like anything.”
“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. ”

“ I’m going to leave you to go on with the business of appointing a secretary. There’s plenty of capable men in the world, and the opportunity always finds them. So I wish you every prosperity, and I wish we may always keep friends, because some day we might find ourselves shoulder to shoulder again. And I wish you—” Erb hesitated for a moment in order to steady his voice, “I wish you good-bye.”
The men crowded towards the doorway as Erb went in that direction. ”

“ All the same, Erb showed more confidence than he felt, and when he left the men, declining their invitation to drink success to the movement (clear to them that Fortune was a goddess only to be appeased and gained over by p. 115the pouring out of libations of mild and bitter) , he took cheerfulness from his face, and walked, his collar up, along Bermondsey New Road to call for his young sister at her workshop. ”

“ Has anybody got ’alf a pipe of ’bacca to spare?”
“What we want,” remarked the North Western man, “is a chap that’ll persuade us to—”
“Yes, but—after you with the metch, old sort—but where is he?”
Erb closed the black shiny bag which his sister Louisa had packed and stood out in the gangway between the pews. He held his peaked cap in his hand, and fingered at the brass buttons of his waistcoat. ”

“ Miss Luker was quite a marvellous young woman, for she could dance and talk calmly at the same time, a trick so impossible to Erb that, when he attempted it, he found he could only stammer acquiescence to some contestable theory advanced by his partner, or ejaculate some words in acceptance of an undeserved compliment. ”

“ When, in these circumstances, he encountered men of the society they were sometimes greatly diverted, and cried, “’Ullo, Erb. Going over a speech, eh, Erb?”
No doubt at this period of Erb’s popularity. His unselfish reticence in the Willow Walk affair, the commonsense he exhibited in one or two minor troubles, the increased polish of the spoken word: all these things increased the men’s respect. Also they knew that he worked for them day and night: he had not developed the swollen head of p. 134importance that in secretaries of other societies was nearly always a prominent feature. ”

“ Lady Frances brought to Erb an invitation that flattered him. Her uncle, of Queen Anne's Mansions, a man in most of the money-making schemes of London, but one never anxious to obtrude his own name or his own personality, felt desirous of starting a movement. This Lady Frances explained to him, with her usual vivacity, the while both kept an eye on some noisy Bermondsey infants, who were playing in the hall of the Board School. ”

“ Erb, now interested in the game, suggested that Lady Frances’s uncle probably had some idea of the feelings entertained by his fellow directors, and the host, giving up all efforts to get help from his silent friend, admitted that there was something in this. Pressed by Erb to speak as man to man, Director gave the limits of concession that had been decided upon—limits which would not, however, come within sight unless the men came alone, and quite alone, to plead their cause. ”