“When I begin a row, I stay with it,” said Mr. Brewster grimly. “Quitters and I don’t pull well together.”
“Then I’m to tell him ‘No’?”
“Positively.”
“Not so positively at all. I shall say, ‘No, thank you,’ in my very nicest way, and say that you’re very grateful and appreciative and not at all the growly old bear of a dad that you pretend to be when one doesn’t know and love you. And perhaps I’ll invite him to dine here and go away on the yacht with us—”
“And graciously accept a couple of hundred thousand dollars bonus, and come into the company as first vice-president,” chuckled her father. “And then he’ll wake up and find he’s been sitting on a cactus. See here,” he added, with a sharpening of tone, “do you suppose he could get a cablegram for transmission to Washington over to the mainland for us by this mysterious route of his?”
“Very likely.”
“You’re really sure you want to go, Pollipet? This is your cruise, you know.”
“Yes, I do.”
Hitherto Miss Polly had been declaring to all and sundry, including the beetle man himself, that it was her firm intent and pleasure to stay on the island and observe the presumptively interesting events that promised. That she had reversed this decision, on the unsolicited counsel of an extremely queer stranger, was a phenomenon the peculiarity of which did not strike her at the time. All that she felt was a settled confidence in the beetle man’s sound reason for his advice.
“Very good,” said Mr. Brewster. “If I can get through a message to the State Department, they’ll bring pressure to bear on the Dutch, and we can take the yacht through the blockade. It’s only a question of finding a way to lay the matter before the Dutch authorities, anyway. I’ve been making inquiries here, and I find there’s no intention of bottling up neutral pleasure craft. I dare say we could get out now. Only it’s possible that the Hollanders might shoot first and ask questions afterward.”