The Project Gutenberg EBook of Mr. Opp, by Alice Hegan Rice

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Title: Mr. Opp

Author: Alice Hegan Rice

Release Date: April 14, 2008 [EBook #25070]

Language: English

Character set encoding: ASCII

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[Illustration: "He read impressively"]

MR. OPP

BY
ALICE HEGAN RICE

Author of "Mrs. Wiggs of the Cabbage Patch,"
"Lovey Mary," "Sandy," etc.

With Illustrations
by LEON GUIPON

NEW YORK
THE CENTURY CO.
1909

Copyright, 1908, 1909, by
The Century Co.

_Published, April, 1909_

THE DE VINNE PRESS

LIST OF ILLUSTRATIONS

PAGE
"He read impressively" _Frontispiece_

"'Don't leave me'" 45

"'Why, Mr. Opp, I'm not old enough'" 129

"It was Mr. Opp saying his prayers" 197

"'Oh, my God, it has come'" 263

"'Can't nobody beat me making skirts'" 319

MR. OPP

I

"I hope your passenger hasn't missed his train," observed the ferryman
to Mr. Jimmy Fallows, who sat on the river bank with the painter of his
rickety little naphtha launch held loosely in his hand.

"Mr. Opp?" said Jimmy. "I bet he did. If there is one person in the
world that's got a talent for missing things, it's Mr. Opp. I never seen
him that he hadn't just missed gettin' a thousand dollar job, or
inventin' a patent, or bein' hurt when he had took out a accident
policy. If he did ketch a train, like enough it was goin' the wrong
way."

Jimmy had been waiting since nine in the morning, and it was now well
past noon. He was a placid gentleman of curvilinear type, short of limb
and large of girth. His trousers, of that morose hue termed by the
country people "plum," reached to his armpits, and his hat, large and
felt and weather-beaten, was only prevented from eclipsing his head by
the stubborn resistance of two small, knob-like ears.

"Mr. Opp ain't been back to the Cove for a long while, has he?" asked
the ferryman, whose intellec