I did not see fit to make answer to this.
"If your master, as you call him, takes the portfolio with Tyler, it is to annex Texas," she repeated sharply. "Is not that true?"
Still I would not answer. "Come!" I said.
"And he asks me to come to him so that he may decide—"
This awoke me. "No man decides for John Calhoun, Madam," I said. "You may advance facts, but he will decide." Still she went on.
"And Texas not annexed is a menace. Without her, you heathen people would not present a solid front, would you?"
"Madam has had much to do with affairs of state," I said.
She went on as though I had not spoken:
"And if you were divided in your southern section, England would have all the greater chance. England, you know, says she wishes slavery abolished. She says that—"
"England says many things!" I ventured.