Interest came with the arrangements for Spanswick’s benefit. This necessitated calls at the theatre near the Obelisk in the evenings, and speech with excited men who went about behind the scenes with their hats at the backs of their heads: men who were for ever mislaying letters and documents, and complaining of everybody else’s carelessness, and eventually finding the letters or documents in their own hands; the while on the stage some lady in black, with her face whitened, was bewailing to a keenly interested house the perfidy of man, and assuring the gallery of her determination to track down one particular individual, though he should have made his way to the uttermost ends of the earth. The Spanswick night was to be a ticket benefit (which, being interpreted, meant that only the tickets sold outside the theatre would add to Spanswick’s income and assuage his present distress), and the night selected was a Friday in the week booked by the “Sin’s Reward” Company—Friday, because that was near to the men’s pay day, and would hook them at the fleeting moment when spare cash was on the very point of burning a hole in their pockets. Because Lawrence Railton was of the company, and because Erb was responsible for the success of the evening, Rosalind communicated to the scheme the keen interest that became her so well; her father, with ponderous generosity, had promised to ensure a triumphant evening by giving what he termed the considerable advantage of a somewhat long and not altogether undistinguished experience. Erb was anxious to see Lawrence Railton, desirous of seeing what manner of youth had succeeded where he had desired to do so. Matters being as they were, there was no alternative but to play the friend of the family, to meet Mr. Railton with the outstretched hand of amity, to congratulate him, and to save up presently for a wedding present which should represent nicely a genial interest in the welfare of the young couple. A plated cruet-stand he thought, as at present advised, but there were arguments in favour of an inkstand that looked like a lawn-tennis set—an inkstand had a suggestion of literary tastes that appealed to the prospective editor of “The Carman;” it suggested also a compliment to Rosalind that a cruet-stand with the best intentions could never convey. He did not quite know how he would endure it all. Perhaps it would best be remedied by increased application to the work of the society, and if ever the day should come when he found himself elected to a seat in that House at Westminster (the outside of which he went to see very often, just for self-encouragement), Rosalind would feel that she might have done better than marry Mr. Lawrence Railton. “But I don’t quite see,” admitted Erb, as he wrestled with all this, “I don’t quite see what sort of help I shall get out of that.” CHAPTER VIII