Then her mind began to work actively once more. She was a Western girl, and an insistence on freedom was the first article in her creed. A great rush of anger filled her, that this man should set himself up to dictate to her. "Do you mean that you want me to marry this Prince?" she said. "That's right." "I won't do anything of the sort." "Pshaw! Don't be foolish. You make me tired." Betty's eye shone mutinously. Her cheeks were flushed, and her slim, boyish figure quivered. Her chin, always determined, became a silent Declaration of Independence. "I won't," she said. Aunt Marion, suspending operations on the sock, went on with tact at the point where her brother's interruption had forced her to leave off. "I'm sure he's a very nice young man. I have not seen him, but everybody says so. You like him, Bennie, don't you?" "Sure, I like him. He's a corker. Wait till you see him, Betty. Nobody's asking you to marry him before lunch. You'll have plenty of time to get acquainted. It beats me what you're kicking at. You give me a pain in the neck. Be reasonable." Betty sought for arguments to clinch her refusal. "It's ridiculous," she said. "You talk as if you had just to wave your hand. Why should your prince want to marry a girl he has never seen?" "He will," said Mr. Scobell confidently. "How do you know?" "Because I know he's a sensible young skeesicks. That's how. See here, Betty, you've gotten hold of wrong ideas about this place. You don't understand the position of affairs. Your aunt didn't till I put her wise." "He bit my head off, my dear," murmured Miss Scobell, knitting placidly. "You're thinking that Mervo is an ordinary state, and that the Prince is one of those independent, all-wool, off-with-his-darned-head rulers like you read about in the best sellers. Well, you've got another guess coming. If you want to know who's the big noise here, it's me--me! This Prince guy is my hired man. See? Who sent for him? I did. Who put him on the throne? I did. Who pays him his salary? I do, from the profits of the Casino. Now do you understand? He knows his job. He knows which side his bread's buttered. When I tell him about this marriage, do you know what he'll say? He'll say 'Thank you, sir!' That's how things are in this island." Betty shuddered. Her face was white with humiliation. She half-raised her hands with an impulsive movement to hide it. "I won't. I won't. I won't!" she gasped. Mr. Scobell was pacing the room in an ecstasy of triumphant rhetoric. "There's another thing," he said, swinging round suddenly and causing his sister to drop another stitch. "Maybe you think he's some kind of a Dago, this guy? Maybe that's what's biting you. Let me tell you that he's an American--pretty near as much an American as you are yourself." Betty stared at him. "An American!"