Disclaimer: This is a non-commercial work of fanfiction. Anything recognizable from Newsies belongs to Disney and not to me.
Chapter 90: Dawning Hope
"Miss Plumber, Miss McClain would like to see you in her office if you have a moment."
Katherine looked up from the memo she'd been typing to see Jenny standing in front of her desk.
"I'm sorry, I know it's nearly lunchtime," the secretary apologized. "But she said it's important."
"I'll be right over," Katherine promised. Normally, she would have gotten up right away and headed to Lena's office, but instead she finished typing the last two lines of her memo, removed it from the typewriter, and walked it over to the entertainment editor's desk before heading towards the opposite end of the floor where Lena had her office.
She wasn't looking forward to hearing the unpleasant truth that Clarence Raber had already taken upon himself to apprise her of a week ago when he'd cornered her in the near-deserted headquarters of The Sun. She already knew what Lena was going to say: that, despite her best efforts, the editors had turned down the appeal to write an article bringing the still-operational Refuge to the public's attention.
Katherine had been upset for the entire week, the combined effects of that failure and of her falling-out with Darcy casting her into a despondency that she rarely felt. She hadn't told Jack about the news regarding the article; she figured she'd break it to him once she officially got word from Lena, and she hadn't mentioned Darcy, either, the sting of losing one of her oldest friends still too raw to give voice to. But she would have to tell him eventually, and she supposed it might as well be today after her meeting with Lena, which would effectively confirm the disheartening truth.
She and the copy editor hadn't spoken over the past week either, which was slightly unusual for them, but Lena had been out of the office for a few days doing work in the field, and she'd seemed to have more meetings than usual, so Katherine hadn't been surprised that Lena was only now just getting around to updating her.
Arriving at the copy editor's office, Katherine waited until Jenny was done with her phone call, and then was shown in.
"Kath!" Lena set down the document she'd been perusing and motioned for Katherine to have a seat in the guest chair across from her. "I've got some news for you!"
Katherine forced a smile. Act surprised, she reminded herself. You aren't supposed to know this.
"It's about the article that you wanted to write regarding The Refuge," Lena continued. "I just got out of a meeting with the editors, and they agreed to give the subject a second look. They want to see a draft of your article, as well as any accompanying photos or illustrations, as soon as possible - tomorrow would be best, if you can manage it."
Katherine's mind went blank for a moment.
"Wait, Lena," she faltered, unable to hide her bewilderment, "say that again, what you just told me."
The copy editor looked astonished, but she repeated her disclosure.
"They want to see the article?" Katherine echoed, still trying to wrap her mind around the words.
"Yes," Lena replied succinctly. She peered at Katherine in concern. "Are you feeling all right, Kath? I thought you'd be happy."
"I am happy!" Katherine exclaimed, a smile stretching across her face as the reality of Lena's words finally sunk in. "I am. I just couldn't believe it for a moment!" She bounced up from her seat and hurried around to the other side of the desk to throw her arms around the other woman. "Lena, you're the truest, loveliest friend a girl could ask for!"
The copy editor patted her affectionately on the back. "All I did was convince the editors to give you a shot," she reminded Katherine. "You're still the one who's going to have to persuade them to run the article."
"I'll get on it right away," Katherine promised. She was going to meet Jack for lunch that day and was eager to tell him about this exciting development - he'd been working on some drawings to go with her article, so it was a joint effort, and she knew that he'd be thrilled to hear of this small but significant step forward.
"I'm glad to see that you're pleased," Lena smiled. "I know it took a while to get you an answer; I actually broached the subject with the editors a week ago at our meeting, but they were too preoccupied to give the matter a fair hearing and decided to table it until we reconvened today."
So, Katherine thought, Raber had lied. He'd told her that the editors had shot down the proposition, but clearly that had been to raise the stakes in hopes of getting her to capitulate to his unwanted advances. He'd tried to take advantage of the situation - and of her - and hadn't thought twice about employing outright falsehood to do so, and if she'd thought him a scumbag (and a few even more uncharitable things) before, her disdain for him now was only increased a hundredfold.
Thankfully, Raber hadn't approached her again after that night when he'd cornered her outside of Lena's office. She wasn't sure if Thom had said anything to the assistant editor, or if it had simply been the fact that there had been a witness to the latter's completely unprofessional behavior that had deterred him from soliciting her again, but he'd left her alone...at least for the for the time being.
Katherine hid a scowl, wishing (not for the first time) that she could deck the man. But she couldn't afford to let her temper get the best of her now, not when she'd gotten what she wanted: a chance to, once again, blow an important story wide open.
And unlike her first opportunity, this time she knew that she was ready.
Thanking Lena again, Katherine hurried out of the copy editor's office, trying not to squeal to herself in delight as she returned to her desk to get her handbag before making her way towards the stairs. She caught sight of Raber on her way there as he was exiting one of his colleague's offices and had to stop herself from thumbing her nose in his direction (the cocky little son of a gun), but she settled instead for giving him an icy look before sweeping past.
The man could connive and scheme all he wanted to; he'd already lost, and Katherine was determined not to let him spoil her good humor.
Making her way down the stairs and towards the exit, Katherine glanced at the clock that sat in the lobby. Half past noon; right on time. Jack would be meeting her outside of The Sun so that they could walk to lunch together, and even though the newsie leader often ran a few minutes late, Katherine found herself hoping, as she pushed open the lobby doors and made her way out of the building and into the sunshine, that he would be punctual today.
She didn't want to wait a moment longer than she had to to tell him the good news.
Jack hurried across the street, ignoring the curses shouted in his direction as he wove between carriages and trolleys. He was late to meet Katherine at The Sun - over half an hour late - and he knew that she wasn't fond of his occasional (well, more like habitual) tardiness. He had a good enough sense of time, generally speaking - you had to, when you were in charge of a rambunctious group of boys - but five minutes or even a quarter hour was neither here nor there for a newsie. As long as you woke up in time to get to the distribution center and purchase your papes, you were good, and then you sold them until you'd moved them all, regardless of the time. You learned to approximate the hour of the day by the angle of the sun in the sky and the length of the shadows (or the sound of the church bells tolling the time if you were near enough to hear them), but the rhythms of the day were governed by the weather and the headlines more than by the minutes passing by.
Blue-bloods like Katherine, however, who had grown up in homes or worked in offices where clocks were commonplace didn't have such lax approaches when it came to time, and while the ex-reporter herself was charitable enough when it came to Jack showing up for their meetings a few minutes late, over half an hour was unacceptable, and Jack knew it.
Jogging down the street, he caught sight of the New York Sun building some blocks away and he hurried towards it, dodging pedestrians as he did so, his empty newsboy bag flopping at his side. He'd taken twenty extra copies of The World that day since the headline hadn't been bad and he knew he would only be selling in the morning (it was Thursday, which meant that he'd be taking the afternoon off from hawking headlines to work on his cartoons for The World).
He hoped his inspiration would come when he needed it; it had been a stressful week, and he hadn't had much time for sketching or for planning out how he was going to depict the subjects he'd been assigned for that week. Race's unexpected disappearance and the subsequent disturbance it had caused in the lodging house meant that Jack had been more preoccupied than usual, reassuring the younger newsies, trying to impress upon the older ones the importance of watching out for the rest, covering as much ground as he could during the day to see if he could find a trace of the gambler, tossing and turning at night with worry and in anticipation of when he'd have to return to The Refuge to see if Race had been imprisoned there…
Fortunately, the last part hadn't been necessary thanks to Davey's odd sense of intuition. It hadn't led directly to Race, but Davey had found him eventually, and Jack could still feel the lingering effects of the relief that had flooded through him when Davey had shown up at the lodging house the night before looking tired but triumphant, saying that he'd found Race in Brooklyn and that he was in the care of Spot and his crew. Jack's concerns had lifted considerably at that point, even after Davey had disclosed that Race had run into some unpleasant company and was recovering from the soaking he'd received. The gambler had gotten roughed up before, but he'd always recovered quickly, and Jack knew that Spot wasn't the kind to let anything happen to another newsie on his watch, so Race was in good hands (and besides, if Davey, the consummate worrier, had assessed that Race was stable enough to leave behind in Brooklyn, the latter was probably in fairly good shape).
As Jack drew near the entrance to The Sun, he saw that Katherine was waiting outside, scanning the street intently, most likely in an attempt to locate her tardy beau.
Well, he'd deserve whatever scolding she was going to give him; he was unforgivably late. Raising his hand a giving a small wave to catch her attention, Jack gave the ex-reporter an apologetic smile as she hurried over.
"Sorry, Plumber," he said as she drew near. "Didn't mean to get here so late, it just took a little longer than usual to move the papes today."
"Never mind that, Jack," Katherine said impatiently, looping her arm through his. "I've got something to tell you."
"Oh yeah?" Jack scratched his head with his free hand, hardly believing his luck that she seemed to be inclined to let his blunder pass this in favor of disclosing whatever exciting news she had to share.
"I just heard from my contact at The Sun, and she convinced the editors to look over a draft of the article on The Refuge!" Katherine exclaimed. "I've already written the article - it just needs to be typed up - but they want to see your drawings, too, so if you've got at least a sketch or two ready to show them, I'll turn it in tomorrow!"
"Hey, that's great news, Plumber!" Jack smiled. "I knew you'd get the job done. And I got some sketches already set, so if you have time, we can stop by the lodgin' house on our way back from lunch and I'll hand 'em over. If the editors approve, I'll clean 'em up a little and make a final copy for the pritin'."
"That's wonderful, Jack! And I know that the editors will approve - my words with your drawings are an unbeatable combination." She jostled him playfully in the arm. "And since you were so good about having those illustrations ready for me at the drop of a hat, I'm not even going to scold you for being over half an hour late to lunch."
Jack chuckled. He could tell that she wasn't angry. "I'm tryin', Plumber," he wheedled, half-serious and half-teasing. "I just ain't used to bein' so scheduled, you know? It's already bad enough havin' to keep a weekly deadline in my head to make sure I get my drawin's in on time to The World."
"Well, from everything I've seen, you've really taken to the job," Katherine said encouragingly. "I'm proud of you for sticking with it."
Jack shrugged, but inwardly he was pleased.
"So, that must be a weight off your shoulders, huh?" he remarked as they turned the corner and headed in the direction of their favorite deli. "Seems like I haven't seen you smile all last week, but you's practically beamin' now."
"It's a relief for sure," Katherine agreed. She paused for just a moment, and then added, "I actually had a difficult time last week for more reasons than one."
"What happened?" Jack asked, feeling his protective instincts rise.
"I had a run-in with one of the assistant editors at The Sun," Katherine divulged. "He's been harassing me to go out with him ever since I started working there, and last week he tried to leverage his position to get me to agree to a date in return for pushing our article through."
Jack's hands clenched into fists. "You want me to head over there right now and soak him?" he growled.
Katherine gave him a wry but slight-fond look. "Believe me, Jack, if I thought that decking the man would solve the problem, I would have done it myself. But unfortunately, he's got some clout with my superiors, and I can't afford to lose their goodwill. He's already upset at me enough as it is for brushing him off so persistently."
"Seems kinda wrong that you'd have to put up with that," Jack muttered, only slightly mollified.
"It comes with the territory," Katherine answered simply. "I don't like it any more than you do, but if I lash back, I'll be thrown out of the game completely. That's not something I'm willing to undergo. I've worked too hard to get to where I am, and I'm not going to let some smarmy assistant editor cut my career short." There was a steely determination in her voice as she added, "One day I hope that women will be given the same respect in the workplace that men seem to be accorded on principle, but until that day, I'll work with what's in front of me."
"Well...let me know if you change your mind about the soakin'," Jack conceded, admiring her fortitude but still a little irked by the situation. "I's ready to throw fists any time, you just say the word."
"I'll keep that in mind."
They walked in silence for a moment before Jack added, "You said there was more than one reason last week weren't so good. What else happened?"
Katherine sighed. "I had a falling out with Darcy."
"Oh...you did?" Jack tried not to sound too delighted, but he was sure he was doing a poor job of it.
"I went to him to see if he'd be willing to run our article in The Tribune if The Sun turned it down," Katherine admitted, "but I guess he'd been feeling taken advantage of for a while, and my request was the last straw."
Jack could tell that there was more to the story, but she didn't elaborate.
"Anyway, we exchanged some terse words before parting ways," Katherine concluded. "It wasn't a happy goodbye, and I doubt we'll speak much to each other in the future."
The regret was clear in her voice, and Jack, despite his elation and relief that Darcy was now ostensibly out of the picture for good, found himself feeling sorry for Katherine. Darcy was one of her oldest friends; their history went back for years, and for it to end so abruptly must have felt like a huge loss.
"That's real tough, Ace," he said sincerely. "I wish you woulda told me."
"Why, so you could have soaked him, too?" she asked, the attempted joke falling flat.
"Nah. So you wouldn't have had to keep all that to yourself all week," Jack clarified.
"I wasn't exactly in the right frame of mind to share it at the time," Katherine admitted. "And I know you had other things weighing on you. I didn't want to add another."
"Well, you's one plucky gal, that's for sure," Jack gave her a fond smile. "One of the things I like most about'cha - you ain't the kind to buckle under pressure, even when the the goin's rough and the odds is against you."
"Well, nothing happens if you just give in," Katherine grinned as they arrived at the door of the deli where they would be dining for lunch. "And I'm not going to let what happened last week stop me. We're going to get this article published, and then we're going to make sure that The Refuge gets shut down once and for all. Snyder and the rest of his goons won't know what hit them."
"You said it, Plumber," Jack declared, following her inside.
He couldn't have agreed with her more.
A/N: Finally a bit of good news for our star reporter as she continues her quest to shut down The Refuge for good. :) Davey and Sadie are up next, and then after that we'll be returning to Race and the problem of the missing money as we get significantly closer to finding out the culprit's identity. Until then, I'd be ever so grateful to hear what you thought of this latest installment! Thank you so much for reading! :)