Please note: This is a companion version & not the original book. Book Preview: #1 The first sound in the morning was the clumping of the mill-girls' clogs down the cobbled street. There were generally four of us in the bedroom, and a beastly place it was. The room had been turned into a bedroom by thrusting four squalid beds among this other wreckage. #2 I lived in a house with a large open range that burned night and day. The kitchen was always full of smoke, and the floor was covered in Worcester Sauce and other food scraps. I never discovered how many bedrooms the house had, but I did see a bathroom that dated from before the Brookers' time. #3 The Brookers were a family who ran a shop as a side business. They had been doing so for many years, and had never been able to make money. They were very dirty, and their hands were always black. #4 The only permanent lodgers were the Scotch miner, Mr. Reilly, two old-age pensioners, and an unemployed man named Joe. The Scotch miner was a bore when you got to know him. The old-age pensioners had been driven from their homes by the Means Test. They handed their weekly ten shillings over to the Brookers, and in return they got the kind of accommodation you would expect for ten shillings

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