“Yes, perhaps it was. But you see I didn’t like McArdle’s work, though I studied under him. As I was afraid of getting into the same old rut, I went to Pritchard.”
“What do you think of Barry’s things now?”
“Oh, I like them—though they’re not so severe as I should go in for myself. The modern French is a little too florid, and he goes them one better.”
“Just my feeling. I should like you to see a bit of work I’ve been doing on my own; rather a big order—for me, that is—in which I’ve had to be as American as the deuce, and yet keep to the best lines.”
“Like to,” I managed to whisper back as we heard Christian announce that two new men were now to be admitted to the club.
I was interested in the ceremony, having by this time got on friendly terms with both the piano-mover and the Scotchman, and learned something of their history. With necessary divergences the general trend of these tales was the same. Both were married men, both had children, in both cases “the home was broken up”—the phrase had become classic in the club; though in the one instance the wife had taken the children to her own people, and in the other she was doing her best to support them herself.
Their names being called, there was a scraping of chairs, after which the two men lumbered forward, each accompanied by his next friend. The office of next friend, as I came to learn, was one of such responsibility as to put a strain on anything like next friendship. The Scotchman’s next friend was a barber, who, as part of his return for the club’s benefits to himself, had that afternoon cut the hair of all of us inmates—nineteen in number; while the piano-mover had as his sponsor the famous Beady Lamont. The latter pair moved forward like two elephants, their tread shaking the floor.
I shall not describe this initiation further than to say that everything about it was simple, direct, and impressive. The four men being lined in front of Mr. Christian’s desk, the spokesman for the authorities was old Colonel Straight.
“The difference between this club and every other club,” he said, in substance, “is that men goes to other clubs to amuse theirselves, and here they come to fight. This club is an army. Any one who joins it joins a corps. You two men who wants to come in with us ’ave got to remember that up to now you’ve been on your own and independent; and now you’ll be entering a company. Up to now, if you worked you worked for yourself; if you loafed you loafed for yourself; if you was lounge lizards you was lounge lizards on your own account and no one else’s; and if you got drunk no one but you—leaving out your wife and children; though why I leave them out God alone knows!—but if you got drunk no one but you had to suffer. Now it’s going to be all different. You can’t get drunk without hurting us, and we can’t get drunk without hurting you. T’other way round—every bit of fight we put up helps you, and every bit of fight you put up helps us.