Achmed Abdullah

“ There had even been moments, last year on the Killicott ranch, when her liking had edged close to the danger line of something greater. But she had changed since then. In Berlin a new world, new people, a new view-point, new prejudices, had spread before her; and, honest in so far that she saw things without spectacles, dishonest in so far that these things were only those she wanted to see, she told Tom just what she thought.
"Love to me is a romantic thing, and you—I mean, American men—are so terribly, terribly prosy, so commonplace!" ”

“ Bertha smiled rather languidly.
"I am afraid you would lose your bet, Tom," she replied. "This gown is not from Paris. I bought it in Berlin. Had it made there ..." And, as if returning to a subject that was uppermost in her mind: "You don't have to go to Paris any more for gowns or, oh, 'most anything. You can get everything you want in Berlin. Not only frocks and frills, but beauty, and culture, and big things, worthwhile things! Why, compared to Germany, America is ..."
"Daughter," cut in her mother dryly, "aren't you forgetting that you are an American?" ”

“ Now he was on the road to fortune, and so he spoke straight out, without preamble:
"Bertha, I must tell you something. I ..."
She turned very quickly and cut through his sentence with a gesture of her slim, white fingers.
"Don't, Tom," she said.
"But you don't know what I ..."
"I do. You are going to tell me that you love me, aren't you?" And, when he did not reply, just inclined his head, she went on: "I shall never marry an American!"
"You ... What?" Tom was utterly taken aback.
"I shall never marry an American," she repeated calmly. ”