"
She was silent.
"You think, then," she asked, "that I put my country before
everything else in the world?"
"I believe," he answered, "that you would. Your country is too
young to be wholly degenerate. It is true that you are a nation
of fused races--a strange medley of people, but still you are a
nation. I believe that in time of stress you would place your
country before everything else."
"And therefore?" she murmured.
"And therefore," he continued with a delightful smile, "I shall
not discuss my hopes or fears with you. Or if we do discuss
them," he went on, "let us weave them into a fairy tale. Let us
say that you are indeed the Daughter of All America and that I am
the Son of All Japan. You know what happens in fairyland when two
great nations rise up to fight?"
"Tell me," she begged.
"Why, the Daughter of All America and the Son of All Japan stand
hand in hand before their people, and as they plight their troth,
all bitter feelings pass away, the shouts of anger cease, and
there is no more talk of war."
She sighed, and leaned a little towards him. Her eyes were soft
and dusky, her red lips a little parted.
"But I," she whispered, "am not the Daughter of All America."
"Nor am I," he answered with a sigh, "the Son of all Japan."
There was a breathless silence. The water splashed into the
basin, the music came throbbing in through the flower-hung
doorways. It seemed to Penelope that she could almost hear her
heart beat.
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