"
I felt mollified; he was the only other man on the platform, and I
had a quarter of an hour to wait. "No, it certainly wasn't me," I
returned genially, but ungrammatically. "Why, did you want him?"
"Yes, I did," he answered. "I put a penny in the slot here," he
continued, feeling apparently the need of unburdening himself:
"wanted a box of matches. I couldn't get anything put, and I was
shaking the machine, and swearing at it, as one does, when there
came along a man, about your size, and--you're SURE it wasn't you?"
"Positive," I again ungrammatically replied; "I would tell you if it
had been. What did he do?"
"Well, he saw what had happened, or guessed it. He said, 'They are
troublesome things, those machines; they want understanding.' I
said, 'They want taking up and flinging into the sea, that's what
they want!' I was feeling mad because I hadn't a match about me,
and I use a lot. He said, 'They stick sometimes; the thing to do is
to put another penny in; the weight of the first penny is not always
sufficient. The second penny loosens the drawer and tumbles out
itself; so that you get your purchase together with your first penny
back again. I have often succeeded that way.
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