The correct answer is B: Rich Londoners are quick to bet huge sums of money to settle trivial arguments. This is because they were betting whether or not he would starve in a month. This is of course, not an actual concern and just an exaggeration, since rich people don't starve.
A short story's setting is made of time and place.
Apart from plot (what is going on) and characters (who is doing what they are doing), the setting (where and when is the plot happening) is the most important element of a short story. The interpretation of a short story depends very much on how the author has described the setting. It provides a context for the events.
The correct answer is that it is a simple sentence.
This means that it consists of only one independent clause - meaning there is only one finite verb in the sentence. In this case, the verb is <em>rule.
</em><em />A compound sentence has at least two independent clauses; a compound-complex sentence has at least two independent clauses plus at least one dependent clause; a dependent clause cannot exist on its own because it is just a fragment of a larger sentence, which is obviously not the case here.
