sister were kind girls, and their mother was like them. But their father was a terrible man. He was a thief and a beggar. Tom had to go begging every day, and when he came home with nothing, his father always hit him. But little Tom was not unhappy. His life was not unusual: all the fathers in Offal Court were bad to their children and hit them. At night, Tom's kind mother often brought him a piece of bread.