At the sight of him Mr. Hoopdriver, according to his previous determination, resolved to dismount. He tightened the brake, and the machine stopped dead. He was trying to think what he did with his right leg whilst getting off. He gripped the handles and released the brake, standing on the left pedal and waving his right foot in the air. Then—these things take so long in the telling—he found the machine was falling over to the right. While he was deciding upon a plan of action, gravitation appears to have been busy. He was still irresolute when he found the machine on the ground, himself kneeling upon it, and a vague feeling in his mind that again Providence had dealt harshly with his shin. This happened when he was just level with the heath-keeper. The man in the approaching cart stood up to see the ruins better. “_That_ ain’t the way to get off,” said the heath-keeper. Mr. Hoopdriver picked up the machine. The handle was twisted askew again. He said something under his breath. He would have to unscrew the beastly thing. “_That_ ain’t the way to get off,” repeated the heath-keeper, after a silence. “_I_ know that,” said Mr. Hoopdriver, testily, determined to overlook the new specimen on his shin at any cost. He unbuckled the wallet behind the saddle, to get out a screw hammer. “If you know it ain’t the way to get off—whaddyer do it for?” said the heath-keeper, in a tone of friendly controversy. Mr. Hoopdriver got out his screw hammer and went to the handle. He was annoyed. “That’s my business, I suppose,” he said, fumbling with the screw. The unusual exertion had made his hands shake frightfully. The heath-keeper became meditative, and twisted his stick in his hands behind his back. “You’ve broken yer ’andle, ain’t yer?” he said presently. Just then the screw hammer slipped off the nut. Mr. Hoopdriver used a nasty, low word. “They’re trying things, them bicycles,” said the heath-keeper, charitably. “Very trying.” Mr. Hoopdriver gave the nut a vicious turn and suddenly stood up—he was holding the front wheel between his knees. “I wish,” said he, with a catch in his voice, “I wish you’d leave off staring at me.” Then with the air of one who has delivered an ultimatum, he began replacing the screw hammer in the wallet. The heath-keeper never moved. Possibly he raised his eyebrows, and certainly he stared harder than he did before. “You’re pretty unsociable,” he said slowly, as Mr. Hoopdriver seized the handles and stood ready to mount as soon as the cart had passed. The indignation gathered slowly but surely. “Why don’t you ride on a private road of your own if no one ain’t to speak to you?” asked the heath-keeper, perceiving more and more clearly the bearing of the matter. “Can’t no one make a passin’ remark to you, Touchy? Ain’t I good enough to speak to you? Been struck wooden all of a sudden?”