ward, toward a large faded sign that read, “Killibrew's Grocery.” A little later Peter entered a big, rather clean store which smelled of spices, coffee, and a faint dash of decayed potatoes. Mr. Killibrew himself, a big, rotund man, with a round head of prematurely white hair, was visible in a little glass office at the end of his store. Even through the glazed partition Peter could see Mr. Killibrew smiling as he sat comfortably at his desk. Indeed, the grocer's chief assets were a really expansive friendliness and a pleasant, easily provoked laughter.
He was fifty-two years old, and had been in the grocery business since he was fifteen. He had never been to school at all, but had learned bookkeeping, business mathematics, salesmanship, and the wisdom of the market-place from his store, from other merchants, and from the drummers who came every week with their samples and their worldly wisdom. These drummers were, almost to a man, very sincere friends of Mr. Killibrew, and not infrequently they would write the grocer from the city, or send him telegrams, advising him to buy this or to unload that, according to the exigencies of the market. As a result of this was very well off indeed, and all because he was a friendly, agreeable sort of man.
The grocer heard Peter enter and started to come out of his office, when Peter stopped him and asked if he might speak with him alone.
The white-haired man with the pink, good-natured
