Nell explained that she had had her breakfast at the station, and spent an hour in the waiting room, so as not to present herself too early. "How thoughtful of you!" said Lady Wolfer. "You don't look--you look so young and--girlish." "I'm not very old," remarked Nell, with a smile. "Perhaps I'm not old enough to fill the position." "Oh, for goodness' sake, don't throw a doubt upon your staying!" said her ladyship quickly. "I'm so tired of old, or what I call old, people, and I am sure you will do beautifully. For, though you are so young, you look as if you could manage; and that is what I can't do--I mean manage a house. I can talk--I can talk the hind leg off a donkey, as Archie says"--she stopped, looking slightly embarrassed for a moment, and Nell supposed that her ladyship alluded to Lord Wolfer--"but when it comes to details, fortunately there is always somebody else." While she had been speaking, Lady Wolfer had taken off her hat and jacket, and flung them onto the book-and-paper-strewn couch. "I'm just come in from a breakfast meeting to attend this one at home," she explained. "And I've got to go out again directly to a committee--the Employment of Women Bureau. Have you ever heard of it?" Nell shook her head. "No? I'm half inclined to envy you. No, I'm not! If it weren't for my work, I should go out of my mind." She put her hand to her head, and for an instant a wearied, melancholy expression flitted across her face, as if some hidden trouble had reared its head and grinned at her. The door opened, and a maid appeared. "Burden, this is Miss Lorton," said Lady Wolfer. "Is her room ready?" Burden looked exceedingly doubtful. "I expected it! Please have it got ready at once; and send some wine and biscuits, please." A footman brought them, and Lady Wolfer poured some wine out for Nell. "Oh, but you must! Heaven knows when we shall have lunch; they'll very likely consider that scramble downstairs as sufficient. But you'll see to all that for the future, won't you?" "You must tell me, Lady Wolfer----" began Nell, but her ladyship, with a grimace, stopped her. "My dear girl, I can't tell you anything, excepting that Lord Wolfer takes his breakfast early--not later than nine--is seldom in to lunch, and still less frequently at home to dinner; but when he does dine here, he dines at eight. The cook, who is, I believe, rather a decent sort of man, knows what Lord Wolfer likes, and you can't go very far wrong, I fancy, if you have a joint of roast beef or a leg of mutton on the menu; the rest doesn't matter." Nell began to feel daunted. There was just a little too much carte blanche about it. "And as to the other servants, why, there's an old person named Hubbard--Old Mother Hubbard, I call her--who is supposed to look after them." Nell could not help smiling. "I don't quite see where I come in," she remarked. Lady Wolfer laughed.