The year is eighteen-ten, five years after the sea battle of Trafalgar. Sam and April are brother and sister. Sam being the oldest, it is his job to care for his sister: living in a workhouse in the year eighteen-ten that is not a pleasant place to live. At the beginning of this story the workhouse is burned down. The workhouse being destroyed, brother and sister are cast out into the streets, and must beg to survive. They meet a boy who becomes their friend. He is streetwise. He teaches Sam and April how to stay alive as beggars on the streets of York.

They trust him. Although the last person they trusted, a man called Twister, told them lies, and Sam and April got into trouble with the law. Later, the three of them left York, and settled in Liverpool, and later again set sail for the new colony, New South Wales, which is now part of Australia.