



Produced by Barbara Tozier, Bill Tozier, Karina Aleksandrova
and the Online Distributed Proofreading Team at
http://www.pgdp.net









[Illustration: MRS. TREE.]




MRS. TREE

By
Laura E. Richards

_Author of_
"Captain January," "Melody," "Marie," etc.

Boston
Dana Estes & Company
Publishers



_Copyright, 1902_
BY DANA ESTES & COMPANY

_All rights reserved_


MRS. TREE
Published June, 1902


Colonial Press
Electrotyped and Printed by C. H. Simonds & Co.
Boston, Mass., U. S. A.



To
My Daughter Rosalind




CONTENTS


CHAPTER                                                    PAGE

I. Wedding Bells                                           11

II. Phoebe's Opinions                                      25

III. Introducing Tommy Candy and Solomon, his Grandfather  41

IV. Old Friends                                            55

V. "But When He Was Yet a Great Way off"                   75

VI. The New Postmaster                                     92

VII. In Miss Penny's Shop                                  107

VIII. A Tea-party                                          124

IX. A Garden-party                                         142

X. Mr. Butters Discourses                                  161

XI. Miss Phoebe Passes on                                  175

XII. The Peak in Darien                                    189

XIII. Life in Death                                        201

XIV. Tommy Candy, and the Letter He Brought                217

XV. Maria                                                  233

XVI. Doctor Stedman's Patient                              249

XVII. Not Yet!                                             267




LIST OF ILLUSTRATIONS



                                                               PAGE

Mrs. Tree                                                      Frontispiece

"She put out a finger, and Jocko clawed it without ceremony"  