The housekeeper inspired Rachel with a kind of horror. She had somehow gleaned the knowledge that this woman, with her crafty smile but undeniable capacity for work, when well launched in middle life, had seized upon the idea of marrying her cousin, a certain Jeremiah Foggs, when the cousin's wife, a forlorn, feckless, half-witted creature, should die. As the wife was little more than a troublesome charge on Jeremiah's hands and he feared leaving her to herself in their village home, he always brought her with him on the occasions of his visits to Theresa. During the premature courting of the hard-grained pair, the poor daft thing sat by the cheek of the chimney with frightened eyes and a shaking chin. Rachel had a theory that with kind treatment, her wits might have returned. But no kindness was ever shown her; on the contrary, Jeremiah and Theresa waited impatiently for the creeping disease to make way with her. Meanwhile Theresa employed the time of waiting to good advantage. Packed away in a chest in her room was a great quantity of hemstitched linen, doilies, spreads, embroidered curtains and what not. Indeed, it was a question whether Theresa's means of attraction did not repose solely in her needle; for these products of her skill, which she displayed on every visit of Jeremiah, certainly had a killing effect upon the fellow, with his bullet head. And Theresa, destitute of every feminine grace, gave herself airs on her handiwork as if it had been beauty of person and feature. They were a right curious pair; each with the same air of eager avidity, as if tormented by a keen desire to gain something, each with the same oily and ingratiating manner. Rachel detested Theresa even more than she had detested Nora Gage, and only consented to retain her because Simon seemed to desire it. In truth, Theresa worked in this house as smoothly and briskly as a shuttle in a well-oiled machine.