The men had sent in their ultimatum to the head office, and had held their last meeting. The Directors had remained adamant on the question of receiving Erb as spokesman, and the men, not having an orator of equal power in their ranks, and fearful of being worsted in a private interview, had insisted either that Erb should accompany the deputation or that there should be no deputation at all, but only a strike on the following Monday morning. (The advanced party protested against the idea of giving this formal notice of an unlikely event but Erb insisted and the moderates supported him. “If we can get what we want,” argued the moderates, “by showing a certain amount of what you may call bluff, by all means let us stop at that.”) 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. He not only kept them together, but he guided them. A suggestion from him on some minor point of detail, and they followed as a ship obeys the helm; if any began a remark with doubting preface of “Ah, but—” the others hushed them down and begged them to have some sense. Erb had made all his plans for the possible stop of work; the other stations and depots were willing to contribute something infinitesimal every week with much the same spirit that they would have paid to see a wrestling match. 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 the 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. The sellers on the kerb appealed to him in vain, a shrill-voiced little girl thrust groundsel in his face, and he took no notice. Gay bunches of flowers were flourished in front of his eyes, and he waved them aside. If the men went weak at the knees at the last moment it would be deplorable, but it would be an incident for which he could not blame himself; if he himself were to make some blunder in the conduct of the negotiations it would be fatal to his career, and all other secretaries of all other organisations would whisper about it complacently. “Anxious times, my girl,” said Erb to Louisa. “Anxious times. We’ll have a tram-ride down to Greenwich and back, and blow dull care away.” “I’ve just finished,” said Louisa in a whisper. “I’ll pop on me hat, Erb, and be with you in ’alf a moment.” “What’s become of your voice?” “Mislaid it somewhere,” said his young sister lightly. “Can’t think for the life of me where I put it last.”