Mrs. Tree

Transcriber's Note: Punctuation errors have been corrected, but suspected misprints retained as possible dialect.
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
Well, they're gone! said Direxia Hawkes.
H'm! said Mrs. Tree.
Direxia had been to market, and, it was to be supposed, had brought home, beside the chops and the soup-piece, all the information the village afforded. She had now, after putting away her austere little bonnet and cape, brought a china basin, and a mystic assortment of white cloths, and was polishing the window-panes, which did not need polishing. From time to time she glanced at her mistress, who sat bolt upright in her chair, engaged on a severe-looking piece of knitting. Mrs. Tree detested knitting, and it was always a bad sign when she put away her book and took up the needles.