"My dear chap, if you come to that, what man is fit to look his children in the face?" he asked impatiently.
But then it occurred to him that he was idealising--a thing he hated.
"Not that children aren't often wicked little beggars themselves," he added cheerfully. "They steal and lie like anything, and torment one another devilishly. I know I did things as a boy that I'd kick any grown man for doing, and so did my brothers and sisters. I tell you what it is, Tom, the devil's there all the time; he shows himself in different ways--that's all."
Tom could not swallow this gospel; he would give up neither his own iniquity nor the halo of purity to which his mind clung amid the sordid ruin of his life and home.
"If I could pull straight----" he murmured despairingly.
"Why shouldn't you? You're getting on in life, you know, after all."
"They--they guess something about it, I expect, Frank. It's not pleasant for a man to be ashamed before his own children. And Miss Bligh--I thought she looked at me very queerly at the funeral."
"You'll find they'll be as nice as possible to you. The children won't understand anything, and Suzette's sure to be on your side. Women always are, you know. They're not naturally moral--we've imposed it on them, and they always like to get an excuse for approving of the other thing."
"I know what I've done, but anyhow I'm glad I don't think as you do."
"Never mind my thoughts, old chap. You go home to your kids," said Caylesham cheerfully.
He was very good-humoured over the matter; neither all the unnecessary fuss nor Tom's aspersions on his own character and views disturbed him in the least; and he did not leave Tom until he had obtained the assurance that he desired. This given, he went off to his club, thanking heaven that he was quit of a very tiresome business. If he did his bad deeds without misgiving, he did his good without arrogance; perhaps they were not numerous enough to give that feeling a plausible excuse for emergence.
"It's all right," he wrote to Mrs. Bolton in reporting his success. "I made him promise not to be an ass. So you can go off with Pattie with a mind free of care. Good luck to you, and lots of plunder!"
The immoral friendliness of this wish for her success quite touched Mrs. Bolton.