Colonel Edward Mandell House, who had never accepted a political office, was more powerful than any man in Washington. He was the confidential adviser of President Woodrow Wilson. “His thoughts and mine are one,” Wilson said of House, whom he regarded as the most unselfish, patriotic man he knew. No one in the country had a greater understanding of European affairs than House. “A super-civilized person,” the French statesman, Clemenceau, said of him, “escaped from the wilds of Texas, who sees everything, who understands everything ... a sifting, pondering mind.” From the day he had left England, Paderewski had known that he could not succeed unless he somehow got to House and convinced him of the justice in Polish claims. But Paderewski was not the only foreigner in the country who wanted something from the Colonel. House was under constant siege by representatives of small countries who were hoping to gain something by the peace settlement. Since America was still neutral, House had to be careful in dealing with these men or even in seeing them. This is why Paderewski proceeded cautiously in his opening moves toward the Colonel. The fact that House’s apartment was a three minute walk from Paderewski’s hotel was an added source of frustration. So short a distance separated him from the man who could do so much for him! Then one day early in 1916, his prayers were suddenly answered. Paderewski’s discreet diplomacy had born fruit in a typical way. A Paderewski friend had wangled a letter of introduction from an Assistant Secretary of Agriculture to Mr. Robert Wooley, director of the U.S. Mint. Mr. Wooley was known to be a close friend of Colonel House. One day he sent word from Washington that he would be in New York in two days and would try to arrange a meeting between Paderewski and the Colonel. Paderewski was learning his new role in a practical way. As many a diplomat had done before and after him, he had gained his objective through a friend of a friend of a friend of the man he wanted to meet. Mr. Wooley had sternly cautioned Paderewski against over-optimism. So his heart sank when he was greeted at the door by a radiant Madame Paderewska. “You are going to save Poland!” she cried, her beautiful eyes filled with tears. “I know it!” And as the two men walked the few blocks to House’s East Fifty-third Street brownstone home, the practical man of business wondered even more at the Polish pianist’s calm and complete faith in the events of the next few minutes. Well, perhaps he was right, but Wooley was inclined to doubt it.