"Born again I was the day I left the squalor I considered home for so long. Not a moment too soon, mind you. Too many things were allowed to happen before I left. The last several years were the most sensitive; a few devastating times stay with me and endure more than the blurry whirl of my childhood. By the time I left home, I felt closer to those I had lost than anyone living.

"When I was around fourteen, my mum went off to work for a dress shop to support the little ones. All of us wanted to give them the education we never had. They did, not that it made things any better at home. Since they did attend a decent school from a tender age, my young half brothers always thought themselves a cut above the rest of us. Henry had it worst; he was nearly grown but these children never let him forget that he would always be a labourer, never rising above that rung in the social ladder. In a way, they were right.

"Dear Henry didn't have the chance; not that any of us did, really. Henry was building a mouse hole in a fine house in town. These days, many well-to-do families choose a cat for a pet. There is no accounting for taste, as Henry met a heartrending end at the claws of a tabby before he could finish construction. While Henry was old enough to be living on his own, he remained living at home to help support the family. Mr. Gloucester seemed to forget that Henry's salary provided a healthy portion of what we lived on when he often remarked, One less bloody mouth to be fed.' Another thing that never occurred to him was that he had taken our family into his care, and thus Henry as his son. He and my half-brothers all stood dry-eyed at the burial.

"Not long after Henry's passing, Sophie left home. Unknown to the rest of us, she had been seeing a handsome young mouse who worked at a textile factory. She had the common sense to know that telling Mr. Gloucester of her intention to marry and start a family with this mouse who could barely support himself would amount to nothing. Sophie, to Mr. Gloucester, was a source of income, and he was not about to let her go. Never mind that that was the only reason. She would send a letter to Mum from time to time. It was all that kept Mum, Samuel and I in good spirits to know that she was well.

"Years later, but far too soon, we were met with still more misfortune. Without Henry's income, the limit of what we could afford shrank by the day. All we could manage was to put the three half-brothers through school and keep food on the table. There was no room for luxury, but I harboured a desire that became increasingly difficult to suppress. I dreamt of brie, a cheese I had only come across once before when Henry had celebrated a promotion not long before he was sent to work on his final project. Looking back on it now, I shame myself for having wanted so badly something that I could have done without. At the time, that thought never came. In that den of chaos, it didn't matter.

"My sixteenth birthday was fast approaching. The morning of my birthday, Samuel told me vibrantly that he knew exactly where he would find my gift, something he knew me to want. He kept it a mystery, and I was terribly excited. He left to find my gift and he never came home. Mum asked me where my brother had gone, but I knew not. I told her he planned to retrieve a gift for me, but that was all. Weeks passed. No explanation and no word came to excuse his disappearance.

"Some time later, my mum put her sewing down and cried into her pin-pricked hands. My three half-brothers had the compassion of a fence-post, which they certainly got from their father. I went to her. Regaining her composure, she haltingly related to me what she had heard in town. That dozens of mice had met with a grim fate in the local cheese shop, snared and strangled in mousetraps. Samuel was among them, his body found cold under the bar of a trap baited with brie. My eyes filled with tears, and Mum held me to her. Through her own tears, she hoped to console me, There there, me li'le child. At least our Samuel will have a decent burial.'

"I bawled. Mum, you don't understand! He only went to find a present for me. For my birthday! It's all my fault that that Samuel's dead!' The emphasis I put on the word dead' caught the attention of the three young ones.

"'Don't say such things, Margaret! We'll all miss our Samuel, but this won't do us a bit o' good.' She lowered her voice and added, With Sophie off and married, you're all I have in the world.'

"I wrapped my arms around her neck, but I couldn't miss the question of my half-brother asked a little to innocently, Mummy, why did Mag want to go and hurt Samuel?'

"Mum could see that the question came not for Samuel's sake, but out of resentment that I was still there. Mr. Gloucester had always seen my whole siblings and myself as extra mouths that did nothing but eat up the money he brought home, as far as he was concerned. His three children were extensions of himself, so of course he loved them. I alone remained the intruder. Mum couldn't answer them; it would do no good. If we offended Mr. Gloucester's darlings so to set them into a tantrum, Mum and I were the ones who would bear the brunt of Mr. Gloucester's fury for it. So I went on being Maudlin Mag to them, not that it mattered. All the while Mum and I held each other and wept. Equally difficult to accept was our inability to give him the finest coffin. We did what we could, then gave him our love.

"There is nothing I have told you thus far that you haven't heard thousands of times before, but that makes it no less harsh of a memory. Maybe I am Maudlin Mag after all," I pause, thinking of my own children. As I try to find the place where my life went amiss, setting things wrong for them, I find myself pitying me more than fearing for them.

"No," Basil says gently, raising his hand from the armchair. "You" he glances resentfully at the painting of Ratigan and holds his tongue. "Go on."

I do. "Then perhaps you can make some sense of what came next. By the time nearly eighteen years in that nest of hell had come and gone, it was my turn to have to make my voice heard against Mr. Gloucester. He fancied that I go to work as Henry and Samuel had done before me, but remain in the nest as they had. I had had only a few years of education to speak of, not nearly enough to be selected for a satisfying means of work. One evening, when all of us were clustered together before the fire, Mr. Gloucester brought the matter up again. And I, firmly this time, pushed it down.

"'No!' I shouted defiantly. I won't go. First Henry, then Samuel, and now me as well?'

"'Mum slapped a paw across her mouth, shocked that I would say such a thing. I had never let out a squeak in my own defense before. Margaret, please!' She pleaded with me, trying to sit me down next to her again. I wouldn't let her.

"Mr. Gloucester was enraged by the loss of his authority. To his stepdaughter, no less! You are eighteen, but you still act like a child! It's well time you began earning your keep.'

"'How can I when I can barely read the newspaper? There is nowhere for me to go! What do you want, for me to work my arse off in some miserable sweatshop?' By the time Mr. Gloucester and I were close enough to each other to feel breath fuming from each other's words, my half brothers tried to restrain me, pull me away from him. Let go of me!' I screamed, struggling. I stamped on a tail and one of them howled. Mum shuddered to watch, and I hated to see her hurt that way. The nest she had created out of love with my father had gone all to staves. Now there was only poverty, dissention, and liquor. Lots of liquor.

"'How dare you, wretch!' Mr. Gloucester headed for me with a raised fist, but would not lower it, as his precious sons were in the way. At least in a sweatshop you would have some scrap of honour to your name! No mouse would want to support a homely thing like you in marriage. Instead you sit at home with your foolish mother and appreciate nothing I do. I'm the one who has kept this family together, you ungrateful sewer rat!' He spat the words out at me. To any mouse, there was no more degrading an insult that could be hissed in anger. Hearing them made me want to fulfill his words and revert back to natural instincts, unlike the way Mum had tried to bring me up properly. I wanted to bear down and tear at him, scratch his eyes out, make him feel as lowly as Mum, Sophie and my brothers had. And how I felt.

"I flailed my arms in his direction, but Mr. Gloucester cleanly dodged the blows. Most fun for him was watching me struggle all in vain. When my strength wore out, I went limp in my half brothers' arms, and they coldly let me drop to the floor. I'll never be your servant,' I snarl through clenched teeth. This mouse was the one who broke our family nest. I resolved to never let him control me. I would leave the only place I knew to escape that. That was when I knew I had to leave. I glared up at him viscously.

"'You'll thank me one day when you're going nowhere,' he said, and disappeared. The half brothers pounded me with a couple hard fists until I shoved them off and returned to my mum's side.

"She was still trembling, but sat bent over with her face buried in one hand. I put my arms around her and whispered gently, I love you, Mum. But I can't stay here, not like this. I have to get out right away.'

"This was not the news she wanted. Heavens, you can't! You ave nowhere to go, no work, no money. You'll be quite alone in the world.'

"'I won't. As long as I'm alive, I'm still your daughter," I told her, pulling her closer. And you'll always be me mum.'

"Her smile shone through her tears. It was the same smile I have seen on her face often in the years since Mr. Gloucester became part of our family, or what of it remained, the very same. Whenever Gloucester, in a drunken stupor, lashed out at her with words, fists, or lust, that was the smile she would wear before us children. That was how much she loved us; we could take away any sorrow that she experienced. Well, Margaret. If you must go, then you must take this.' From her neck, she removed this silver locket that I now wear, engraved with a delicate pattern of flowers and grasses. Opening it, she revealed to me dark photographs of her and father, he on the left, she on the right. Never fo'get where you're from. Someday, when ye need it most, we'll be there.'

"We embraced. I'll leave in the morning,' I said finally, making up my mind. I knew it had to be done, but my conviction to follow through was not as strong as I would have hoped. Thank you for everything, Mum.' That night, I packed everything of mine into a tattered valise. I got barely a moment of sleep that night.

"That morning was a blur of emotions. Rather than risk being convinced to stay by Mum's affection, I disappeared into the streets of London before anyone was awake. For what felt like hours, I wandered the streets, carrying this awkward case of clothes. Looking for what, I knew not. As I reflect on it now, I can't imagine what was going through my head as I tried to make a life out of nothing when I was not very much more than a child.

"My attention was not focused on anything in particular, on the relief of escape, mainly. I certainly was giving precious little attention to where I was going, and I soon found myself by the waterfront. Fog swirled above my head like I had never seen before, even in my neighbourhood. Visible only were the silhouettes of rough cut mice, who blustered past and went slinking off into the fog as mysteriously as they had come. I quickened my pace, becoming suddenly fearful. My suspicious shuffle transformed into a near sprint, as much as I could still carrying my belongings. I kept up this gait until I bumped into someone and fell backwards, lightheaded.

"'Watch where you're going' My eyes widen at the sound of the commanding female voice, which followed the accusation with a string of obscenities. She appeared through a swirl of mist as a large, full-figured mousemaid, likely ten years older than I. She tried too hard to look my age as she made up her face and squeezed her heavy body into a revealing dress. Noticing me as I tried to scurry away, she grasped me by the wrist and pulled me forcefully to my feet. Well, well! Wot's this then?' She asked to no one in particular, eyeing me from head to toe.

"'I didn't mean to,' I stuttered. ' She wasn't listening. She was looking at me.

"'You look a bit down on your luck, darling. It's a sad sight to see when a lovely lady such as yourself must wander about the streets like no one at all!' With dramatic movements, she dusts me off. Now, ow would you like to come with me, and get off your feet?' I was in no position to refuse, and I was convinced that nowhere she could take me could be worse than where I had come from. Eagerly, I nodded, beginning to grin. That's right. We'll make you most comfortable. Ey, Jack, bring the lady's things. She needs to get off er feet for awhile.' A disreputable looking mouse with several notches in his ears scooped up my case and dragged it along with him as he followed us a few doors down.

"'As I said, Miss'

"'Margaret,'

"Miss Margaret, you can have a sit down. If it pleases you, we may have a job for you as well.'

"My eyes brightened. A job being handed to me! I was so relieved by the idea, it made no difference what this job was as long as it wasn't in a sweatshop. I don't know how to thank you,' I said, grinning innocently.

"The grin she returned to me was not so innocent. Don't bother with that aroun' ere. Just call me Miss Pearl. Ere we are! Margaret, welcome to the Rat Trap!' Simple as that, I began the rest of my life. From there, everything fell into place almost on its own. Even when I had the power of choice, I wasn't aware of it. They somehow seemed to be made for me."

Sighing, I past look past Basil and Dawson and up at the painting. It is cold and unsentimental.