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 tears were streaming from the sergeant's eyes, for he had sat with considerable force upon one of the coasters. When he had picked himself up and replaced the bicycle the foreman spoke.

"If you've come 'ere to show me that trick, you've bloomin' well wasted yer time. You ain't no Cinquevalli, ole son! If, 'owever, you're a-lookin' for a bald little man with a green apron and a red nose"—the sergeant's eyes brightened beneath the tears—"well, 'e's bin took ill, an' 'is mother's took 'im 'ome.

"Now you'd better go, cockie, 'fore I set the dog on yer. I'm pretty damn well sick of the sight of yer, comin' 'ere with yer bicycle tricks, interruptin' o' the day's work. 'Ere, Bindle—where's Bindle?" he shouted into the house.

But the sergeant did not wait. He mounted his machine and disappeared down the drive. Before Bindle came—and Bindle was uneager to respond—he was a quarter of a mile up the road.

Sergeant Wrannock was stunned at the treatment he had received. From such men he was accustomed to respect, deference, and blind obedience. To be called "cockie" by a workman astonished him. Soon he became annoyed, in time his annoyance crystallised into anger, and eventually, passing through the alembic of professional discretion, it became distilled into a determination to teach this man a lesson.

He had no intention of letting him know that it was a police sergeant whom he had thus rudely