A Matter Of Balance is a short story written by W.D. Valgardson. In this short story the protagonist Harold is an interesting character with a stressful and brutal past. His wife was brutally murdered with six of her fingernails broken. He also had children and loved to hike, but he had to be back home by seven since it was the time agreed upon by his children because since their mother had been killed, the children became upset if he was even a few minutes late. Harold was only able to work part time and had carefully arranged his schedule so that his Wednesdays were free that he kept completely to himself. He liked hiking and mostly spends his time hiking. Every Wednesday for the last six months he hiked, but this Wednesday afternoon was different. Harold was sitting on a cedar log, resting absentmindedly. Suddenly he saw them. They were standing on the narrow bridge above the waterfall. Bikers, Harold thought with a mixture of contempt and fear. He considered their presence only a momentary annoyance. One of the bikers, tall blond man turned, leaned against the railing and pointed two fingers like he would a pistol and pretend to shoot. They reminded Harold of the kids from his public school days who used to block the sidewalk, daring anyone to try to get by. He had been in grade two at the time and had not yet learned about fear. He wanted to get to the station wagon that was across the river, however the only way to get across the river was the bridge and Harold had no intentions of trying to force his way past them. When he had tried to ignore them and go around, they shifted with him and started following him. Then harold came up with a plan rather than simply escaping or fleeing. He tempts them to follow him hike down a steep rock face overlooking a cliff, and leaves them there unable to climb. That gave Harold a time to think. When the bikers however got up the track, they started asking each other “where’d he go?" tha