Chapter Six
Ermyntrude would have been extremely indignant had she known that her dislike of the intimacy prevailing between Wally and Harold White was shared by Janet White. Filial piety forbade Janet to ascribe her father's vagaries to any inherent weakness of character. She said sadly that Mr. Carter had led him into bad ways, a pronouncement that enraged her brother, who did not suffer from filial piety, and who had never shown the slightest hesitation to proclaim his undeviating dislike of his parent. This shocked Janet very much, for she was a girl who believed firmly in doing one's duty, and what more certain duty could there be than that of loving one's father? As it was clearly very difficult to love a father who showed only the most infrequent signs of reciprocating her affection, but more often wondered aloud why he should have been cursed with an unsatisfactory son, and a damned fool of a daughter, Janet was forced to weave round him a veil of her own imagination. She decided that her mother's death had embittered him, conveniently forgetting the quarrels that had raged between the pair during the much-enduring Mrs. White's lifetime. It was more difficult to find excuses to account for Harold White's predilection for low company, and Janet preferred not to think about this. When Alan spoke his mind on the subject of finding the house invaded by bookmakers and touts, she said that poor father had to mix with all sorts and conditions of men in the course of his duties at the colliery, and so had perhaps lost the power of discrimination. Her tea-planter, who privately considered that Harold White was what he called, tersely, "a wrong 'un', was anxious to remove her from the sphere of his influence; but Janet, though generally indeterminate, was firm on one point: until Alan was earning money, and could thus escape from the parental roof, her duty was to remain at home, and to keep the peace between father and son.
She was well aware that White had more than once managed to borrow money from Wally, and that the two men very often entered together into schemes for getting rich-quick which were, she suspected, as dubious as they were unsuccessful. The information, therefore, that Wally Carter and Samuel Jones, of Fritton, were both coming to tea at five o'clock on Sunday, made her feel vaguely disquieted, since it drew from Alan a highly libellous estimate of Mr. Jones's character and reputation.
"A man not fit to be in the same room with my sister!" he said dramatically.
His father was not unnaturally annoyed, and said angrily: "Shut up, you young fool! You don't know what you're talking about, and if you think I'm going to put up with your bloody theatrical ways, you're wrong! What's more, Sam Jones is a Town Councillor, and goes to chapel regularly."
"Yes," sneered Alan. "Votes against Sunday games in the park, too, not to mention Colonel Morrison's scheme for better housing for the poor devils in the Old Town. God, it makes me sick!"
"Perhaps it isn't true," said Janet charitably.
"Perhaps it isn't! And perhaps it isn't true that he gets his own employees into trouble, and doesn't pay a brass cent in maintenance!"
"Oh clear!" said Janet. "Not at the dinner-table, Alan, please!"
"I believe in facing facts unflinchingly," said Alan superbly. "If that greasy swine's coming here, I shall go out, that's all. I suppose, if the truth were told, he's got some shady scheme on foot, and you and Carter think you're going to benefit by it."