“We are on our way to the hotel where Mrs. Laurens is waiting for us,” explained the water-power dictator. “Why not walk along with us while you conclude the interview?”
“I have n’t much more to ask Miss Ames,” said the reporter, complying, “except what started her on her patriotic habit.”
“My father was an army officer,” she explained. “While he was alive we always stood up together. Now I could no more sit through ‘The Star-Spangled Banner’ than you would wear your hat in church. But I really do not see anything to write about in that. There was much, surely, more interesting at the meeting.”
“What, for instance?”
“The whole affair,” she said vaguely. “It seemed to me strange. What are so many German subjects doing over here?”
“Those aren’t German subjects, my dear,” said Mr. Laurens. “They’re American citizens, mostly.”
“Surely not!” exclaimed the girl. “The German flags, and the pictures of the Emperor, and all the talk about the German spirit, and—and ‘Deutschland über alles.’ From Americans?”
“Certainly,” said the reporter. “And good ones.”
“I should think they would better be called good Germans. One cannot imagine that sort of thing occurring in a German city. I mean if the case were reversed, and Americans wanted to hold such a meeting.”
“No? What would happen?”