She set about removing her traveling clothes as if she never had been waited upon in her life. It was only when she failed to discover how she was put together that Georgiana had to come to the rescue.
"It's dreadfully stupid of me," protested Jeannette, her delicate cheeks flushing, "but I simply can't find that absurd hook."
It was then that Georgiana frankly took the situation by its horns and did away with all embarrassment.
"You must let me help you, Jean," she said, finishing the unhooking with ease, "whenever you need it. I shall love to do it, for you might have rather a bad time trying to do everything for yourself. There you are--and please call me when you are ready to be fastened into your other frock. I'm just around the corner, and there's nobody else at home now."
Before supper was served, Georgiana prepared her cousin to meet "the boarder." Not on any account would she have let his presence be accounted for on the score of his being a guest in the house; not even would she call him a "paying guest."
"Mr. Jefferson came to us through a letter from a friend. He said he wanted a quiet place to work in, away from all interruptions by friends or claims of any sort. He is writing a book, and we see as little of him as if he were not in the house--except at the table. I think you will like him. It's so long since we have had a man in the house we're not yet used to it, but on the whole it's rather comforting."
"How interesting--to have a book being written in the house! Is it fact or fiction, do you know?"
"I don't imagine it's fiction. He has piles of reference books, and a great deal of mail, and--somehow--he doesn't look as if he wrote fiction."
Yet, as Mr. Jefferson came into the dining-room that night, Georgiana found herself wondering why she should think he did not look as if he would write fiction--not foolish fiction, certainly, but sensible fiction, made possible by keen observation and set off by a capacity for quiet--possibly even biting--humour. He looked at least as if he might write essays, thoughtful, clever essays, full of searching analyses of his fellow human creatures, of their oddities, their hopes, their aspirations, their sins, and their virtues. Or--was he, after all, writing on scientific matters--facts, pure and simple; inferences, deductions, conclusions from facts? She wondered, more than she had yet done, as to the nature of his work.