CHAPTER XVIII
KEEPING STORE

IT was a queer little store. There was a window on each side of the front door, a window which peeped out onto the tiny side yard and the brick walk, and the sweet-williams, and a window directly opposite which, had the shutters been open, would have given a view of the houses across the road and the river beyond. At the back of the store was a door which led into a good-sized yard extending along the backs of the store and the living house. There were a few bedraggled shrubs here and a row of hollyhocks nodded along a stretch of the high board fence which inclosed the space. A door in the fence, securely padlocked, led onto the road. For the most part the back yard was given over to barrels and packing cases, but in one corner a tiny shed housed two green tanks labeled respectively “Gasolene” and “Kerosine.”