Long ago, in the days of poverty, there was a poorhouse in every parish, where all the poor of the parish lived: the old who could no longer work, the sick, the spent and destitute, the half-crazed, and homeless children whom no one would take care of - all of them gathered together in that place of sighs which was the poorhouse.
There was one in Scunton parish too, and to it one day came Maria, who was eight years old. Her father and mother had died of consumption and the Scunton farmers were afraid she might be carrying the infection. They would not tkae her for pay in the usual way and that is why she went to the poorhouse.
It was on a Saturday evening in early spring and all the paupers were sitting by the window staring down the road, which was their only entertainment on Saturday evenings. There was not much to see: one belated farmer's cart coming home from the town, a couple of crofter's lads going pike-fishing, and Maria, with her bundle of clothes under her arm. Their eyes widened at the sight of her.
"Poor me, going to the poorhouse," thought Maria as she stood on the steps outside. "Poor me."
She opened the door, to be met by Pompadella, the old women who laid down the law in the poorhouse."Welcome to the house of poverty," said Pompadella. "It's crowded already in here and it's not going to get any better - thought you'll not take up much room, a skinny little thing like you."
Maria stared at the floor.
"We don't want any jumping about in here," said Pompadella, "you'd best know that from the start."
The paupers sat round the walls, gazing sorrowfully at Maria.
"Who would want to jump about in here?" she thought to herself. "Not me, nor anyone else either."
She knew the Scunton paupers already, because they went round the parish every day with their begging bags, begging a crust for the sake of holy charity. Yes, she knew them all. There was Fuggy, the dirtiest man in the parish, whose name was used to frighten the children although he was kind and decent and never harmed a soul; there was Joey Squint, whose brains had been touched by God, and Georgie Porgie who could eat ten blood puddings and still ask for more; there was the Gaffer with his wooden leg and Hen-Helen with her bleary eye, Little Pin and Dearie-Dearie and Spotty Anna, and over them all there was big, powerful Pompadella, appointed by the parish to reign over the poorhouse.
Maria stood at the door, looking round the misery and want of the poorhouse, and thinking that this was where she would have to spend her childhood until she was old enought to go into service. Her heart was heavy, she could not imagine how she could live where there was neither beauty nor fun.
Her own home had been poor, but there had been both beauty and fun in it: the apple tree outside the window, when it flowered in spring, and the clumps of lily-of-the-valley, the cupboard with the painted roses, the big blue candlestick, Mother's brown loaves fresh from the oven, the kitchen floor on Saturdays, newly scoured and covered with chopped juniper twigs - oh, her home had been all beauty and fun before the sickness came.
But here in the poorhouse the dirt was enought to make you weep and outside the window there was nothing but a bleak potato field, no flowering apple trees and no clumps of lily-of-the-valley.
"Poor me," thought Maria, "now I am the littlest pauper in Scunton and all the beauty and fun are over."
That night she slept in a corner on the floor, but first she lay awake a long tim, listening to the paupers, two in a bed, snoring and sniffing. There they slept after the drudging and trudging of the day, Fuggy and the Gaffer, Joey Squint and Georgie Porgie, Hen-Helen, and Dearie-Dearie, Little Pin and Spotty Anna. But Pompadella lived alone in the attic, sharing her bed with nothing but the bugs.
Maria woke up towards morning and in the cold grey light of dawn she saw the hordes of bugs parading up the walls. They were going home to their nooks and crannies now, but the next night they would return and grow fat on the paupers.
"If I were a bug I'd leave this place," thought Maria. "But perhaps bugs don't want any beauty and fun, just so long as there are four beds with eight paupers in them a little pauper on the floor."
From where she lay Maria could also see under the beds, where the paupers hid everything that they could scrimp and scrape from the inhabitants of the parish: a bit of bread here, a few peas and oats there, a scrap of meat, a few coffee beans and a kettle of old coffee dregs.