Goin' to see her off?
Come along." Jacob Welse pulled on his bearskin coat and mittens, and they passed through the outer offices into the main store.

So large was it, that the tenscore purchasers before the counters made no apparent crowd.
Many were serious-faced, and more than one looked darkly at the head of the company as he passed.

The clerks were selling everything except grub, and it was grub that was in demand.

"Holding it for a rise.
Famine prices," a red-whiskered miner sneered.

Jacob Welse heard it, but took no notice.