My retort was the cheap expedient of re-echoing, "Who the devil
are you?"

"WELL," he said.

"I'm coming along this path if I like," I said. "See? It's a public
path--just as this used to be public land. You've stolen the land--you
and yours, and now you want to steal the right of way. You'll
ask us to get off the face of the earth next. I sha'n't oblige.
See?"

I was shorter and I suppose a couple of years younger than he, but
I had the improvised club in my pocket gripped ready, and I would
have fought with him very cheerfully. But he fell a step backward
as I came toward him.

"Socialist, I presume?" he said, alert and quiet and with the
faintest note of badinage.

"One of many."

"We're all socialists nowadays," he remarked philosophically, "and
I haven't the faintest intention of disputing your right of way."

"You'd better not," I said.

"No!"

"No."