"I don't believe you did have anything to eat last night."
Lydia gave a little jump in her chair. She didn't see how Anne dared bait the scowling martyr. He looked at Anne. His scowl continued. They began to see he perhaps couldn't smooth it out. But he smiled a little.
"Because I'm so hungry?" he asked. His voice sounded kind. "Well, I didn't."
Lydia, now conversation had begun, wanted to be in it.
"Why not?" asked she, and Anne gave a little protesting note.
"I don't know," said Jeffrey, considering. "I didn't feel like it."
This he said awkwardly, but they all, with a rush of pity for him, thought they knew what he meant. He had eaten his food within restraining walls, probably in silence, and to take up the kind ceremonial of common life was too much for him. Anne poured him another cup of coffee.
"Seen Jim Reardon?" Jeffrey asked his father.
Anne and Lydia could scarcely forbear another glance at him. Here was Reardon, the evil influence behind him, too soon upon the scene. They would not have had his name mentioned until it should be brought out in Jeffrey's vindication.
"No," said the colonel. "Alston Choate called."