"It's nice to finally meet you." Edward flashed a dark look at her. "Hi, Alice," I murmured shyly. "Are you ready?" she asked him. His voice was aloof. "Nearly. I'll meet you at the car." She left without another word; her walk was so fluid, so sinuous that I felt a sharp pang of jealousy. "Should I say 'have fun,' or is that the wrong sentiment?" I asked, turning back to him. "No, 'have fun' works as well as anything." He grinned. "Have fun, then." I worked to sound wholehearted. Of course I didn't fool him. "I'll try." He still grinned. "And you try to be safe, please." "Safe in Forks -- what a challenge." "For you it is a challenge." His jaw hardened. "Promise." "I promise to try to be safe," I recited. "I'll do the laundry tonight -- that ought to be fraught with peril." "Don't fall in," he mocked. "I'll do my best." He stood then, and I rose, too. "I'll see you tomorrow," I sighed. "It seems like a long time to you, doesn't it?" he mused. I nodded glumly.
The armies shuddered in mortal combat. Still there came no sign that America was going to enter the war. Though it seemed that Germany's announcement of unrestricted torpedoings of American ships had made, as Bernstorff himself had warned in cables read by Room 40, "war unavoidable," the American President seemed unable to do what the British thought that honor, self-respect, and the whole course of recent actions made obligatory. Even Ambassador Page, a long-time friend of the President and a wholehearted sympathizer with the Allied cause, was irked enough to note in his diary, "The danger is that with all the authority he wants (short of a formal declaration of war) the President will again wait, wait, wait—till an American liner be torpedoed! Or till an attack is made on our coast by a German submarine!" Evidently Wilson was waiting for the "overt acts" that he had mentioned in his address to Congress. But perhaps Germany would not actually be so rash as to torpedo American
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