Four kids—Henry (age 14), Jessie (12), Violet (10), and Benjamin, who’s six, enter a bakery. Jessie requests three loaves of bread, and Henry pulls cash from his pocket. The baker’s wife frowns but accepts their money. They ask if they can stay the night on the shop’s benches. Jessie offers their help with dishwashing in the morning. The baker’s wife accepts.

She asks about their parents. Henry says simply, “They are dead” (29). They have a grandfather, but they fear him: He didn’t like their mother and never visited.

The kids share one of the bread loaves, then lie down on the benches. Violet and Benjamin quickly fall asleep, but Jessie and Henry overhear the baker and his wife discussing the children. The wife wants to take in three of them, but the youngest must go to a children’s home. The couple agrees on the plan.

Jessie and Henry agree that they must leave at once. Jessie wakes Violet, puts the remaining bread loaves in a laundry bag and gives it to her, then has Henry pick up Benny without waking him.