"Is that Jack laughing?" asked David incredulously, poking his head around the intervening boys to see for himself.
"Yes, it is," said Joel, bobbing his head decidedly.
"Oh, well, then, it's all right," said David happily. So he ran off to fill his plate and go over in the corner to eat its contents with a group of boys of whom he was especially fond.
Joel, left alone, was feeling very dismal, when suddenly he looked over, and caught Jack's eye. Curtis Park was saying something very jolly—Joel knew it was, for he caught scraps of it, and so did some of the other boys who pushed up to hear the rest. But Jack Parish evidently didn't listen, for his eye had been anxiously roving around the room, and just at that moment, they rested on Joel, and they lighted up so unmistakably that Joel sprang forward, a light in his own.
"Did you want me, Jack?"
"Yes," said Jack, "I did." The words were not much, but they seemed to satisfy Joel.
XXVI
MR. HAMILTON DYCE A TRUE FRIEND
And after every boy protested that he couldn't eat another bit, the butler and the two maids packed up the trays and carried them down again.
"Now, Comfort committee," said Mrs. Sterling, "all draw up here."