Alack and alas! when it was finished, every scrap of it, scarcely any even of the skin being left, she felt almost more hungry than ever. She stretched out her hand for the bread. Mr. Leeson raised his eyes as she did so and gave her a reproachful glance.
“You will be ill,” he said. “You will suffer from a bilious attack. Take it—take it if you want it; I am the last to interfere with your natural appetite.”
Sylvia ate; she ate although her father’s displeased eyes were fixed on her face. She helped herself twice to the stale and untempting loaf. Delicious it tasted. She could even have demolished every scrap of it and still have felt half-wild with hunger. But she was eating it now to give herself courage, for she had made up her mind—speak she must.
The meal came to an end. Mr. Leeson had finished his potato; Sylvia had very nearly consumed the bread.
“There will be a very small breakfast to-morrow,” he said in a mournful tone; “but you, Sylvia, after your enormous supper, will scarcely require a large one.”
Sylvia made no answer. She took her father’s hand and walked back with him through the passage. The fire was out now in the sitting-room; Sylvia brought her father’s greatcoat.
“Put it on,” she said. “I want to sit close to you, and I want to talk.”
He smiled at her and wrapped himself obediently in his coat. It was lined with fur, a relic of bygone and happier days. Sylvia turned the big fur collar up round his ears; then she drew herself close to him. She seated herself on his lap.
“Put your arm round me; I am cold,” she said.
“Cold, my dear little girl!” he said. “Why, so you are! How very strange! It is doubtless from overeating.”