Waveney felt very strange and forlorn as she stepped into the hall, with Fuss and Fury barking excitedly round her, and then she saw a little old woman with a very long nose, and hair as white as snow bundling down the wide staircase to meet her; for no other word could describe Nurse Marks's rolling and peculiar gait. "She is the most wonderful little old woman I have ever seen," wrote Waveney, in her first letter home. "If you were to dress her in a red cloak and peaked hat she would make an excellent Mother Hubbard, or the 'old woman who lived in her shoe,' or that ambitious old person who tried to brush the cobwebs from the sky. To see her poking that long nose of hers into corners is quite killing. She has bright eyes like a dormouse, and a cosy voice--do you know what I mean by that?--and she wears the funniest cap, with a black bow at the top. But there! you must see her for yourself." "My ladies are out, dearie," she began at once, rather breathlessly. "Miss Doreen is at the Home, and Mrs. Mainwaring has sent for Miss Althea unexpectedly, to go to some grand At Home; but she will be back to dinner, and she begged that you would excuse her absence, and I am going to take you to my room and give you some tea; for you are tired, dearie, I know;" and then Nurse Marks led the way upstairs, and Waveney followed, feeling as though she were the heroine of a fairy-story and that some benevolent fairy had her in tow. "My ladies always calls this the Cubby-house," observed Nurse Marks, in a proud tone, "and to my thinking it is the nicest room in the house, though it is odd-shaped, as Mitchell says, and a trifle low." It was oddly shaped indeed. One corner had been cut off, and the window, a wide one, had been set in an extraordinary angle, so that part of the room was insufficiently lighted. Here there was a large Japanese screen, which hid the bed and washstand. A round table was in the centre of the room, and an old carved wardrobe and a nursery cupboard occupied the wall space. Some comfortable-looking rocking chairs, and a worn old couch, gave it a cosy aspect; but the chief feature of the room was the number of photographs and water-colour paintings that covered the walls, while framed ones stood by dozens on the mantelpiece and chest-of-drawers. One of them at once attracted Waveney. "Why, that is the corporal," she said, in surprise. "Corporal Marks, I mean;" and she spoke in puzzled tones. "Aye, that's Jonadab," returned Nurse Marks, complacently. "It is a grand picture, and his medals come out finely. Dinah thought a heap of that photo;" and then the bright dormouse eyes looked at Waveney, curiously. "Well, it beats me that you should know brother Jonadab. After all, the world is not so big as we think it."