born in Berlin. But I am an American—every inch of me—all the time!"
"Uncle Heinrich told me in Berlin that. . ."
"Leave your Uncle Heinrich out of the question. He and I have gone different ways. I tell you that 1 am an American, while he is a Prussian officer. And—" turning to Tom and smiling bitterly, as if remembering something that had happened very long ago and that he had never been able to eradicate completely from his mind, "you know what Prussian officers are, don't you?"
Tom shook his head. His range of actual experience was limited by Spokane to the west, by Butte to the east, and the British Columbia border to the north. Of course he had known foreigners, but they were mostly Britons, Canadians, and Scandinavians, men very much like himself, men blending easily into the great, rolling West.
"I'll tell you what they are," continued Wedekind heatedly, "for I know them. They are brass-buttoned, brass-gallooned, brass-helmeted, brass-souled, saber-rattling vulgarians. They are. . ."
"Father! Please!" came Bertha's hurt, indignant cry, and at the same time, simultaneous with the Chinese servant's felt-slippered appearance, Mrs, Wedekind interrupted with a conciliatory:
"The soup's on the table!"
Martin Wedekind laughed.
"Never mind, little fellow," he said to his daughter, calling her by his favorite nickname, "you and I aren't going to quarrel over. . ."
"Over anything or anybody, Dad dear." Bertha finished the sentence for him, and gave his arm an affectionate little squeeze.
But even so there was a sort of embarrassed hush
