His daughter heard these words with a sinking heart. She had a most
unhappy picture of herself boarding a ship and sailing out of Liverpool
or Southampton, leaving the mystery that so engrossed her thoughts
forever unsolved. Wisely she diverted her father's thoughts toward
the question of food. She had heard, she said, that Simpson's, in the
Strand, was an excellent place to dine. They would go there, and walk.
She suggested a short detour that would carry them through Adelphi
Terrace. It seemed she had always wanted to see Adelphi Terrace.

As they passed through that silent Street she sought to guess, from an
inspection of the grim forbidding house fronts, back of which lay the
lovely garden, the romantic mystery. But the houses were so very much
like one another. Before one of them, she noted, a taxi waited.

After dinner her father pleaded for a music-hall as against what he
called "some highfaluting, teacup English play." He won. Late that
night, as they rode back to the Carlton, special editions were being
proclaimed in the streets. Germany was mobilizing!

The girl from Texas retired, wondering what epistolary surprise the
morning would bring forth. It brought forth this: DEAR DAUGHTER OF THE SENATE: Or is it Congress? I could not quite
decide. But surely in one or the other of those August bodies your
father sits when he is not at home in Texas or viewing Europe through
his daughter's eyes. One look at him and I had gathered that.