N ell lived in the Millhouse for several days. They gave her a little bed 
under the eaves on the top floor, in a cozy place only she was tiny enough to 
reach. She had her meals with Rita or Brad or one of the other nice people she 
knew there. During the days she would wander in the meadow or dangle her feet 
in the river or explore the woods, sometimes going as far as the dog pod grid. 
She always took the Primer with her. Lately, it had been filled with the doings 
of Princess Nell and her friends in the city of King Magpie. It kept getting 
more like a ractive and less like a story, and by the end of each chapter she 
was exhausted from all the cleverness she had expended just to get herself and 
her friends through another day without falling into the clutches of pirates or 
of King Magpie himself.