Millie was 7 years old when she was abandoned by her mother in an all too obvious flight from the law Aggie first encountered her whilst on her way home and realising the dangers awaiting such a strikingly pretty girl alone in the rough, vice-ridden quarter, she took her home, at least for the time being Millie's advance through the coming years to the threshold of womanhood is the core of this historical novel which displays the good and evil of the Victorian era