"Try Central Park, it's guaranteed," Racetrack sang softly, adjusting his cigar with one hand and waving a paper halfheartedly with the other.

            "Da t'ing is," Blink sighed, "Central Park apparently ain't guaranteed no moah. I'se neveh known da sellin' ta be so lousy heah." He interrupted himself to holler, "Diah threat ta New Yawk, thousands flee da state in panic!"

            "So we's approachin' boid migratin' season again," Race commented. "Hey, it ain't much of a lie. Kitten born wit six eyes!" he yelled as an afterthought, then added, "I'd shoah call wintah a threat. Fer us, at least. What say we go track down da goils again afta one more sale?"

            "Aw, guys, can't we let 'em alone?" pleaded Mush, the quietest and most sensitive of the trio, as a gorgeous teenage girl batted an eyelash at him before buying a pape. It was a sure mark of Mush's distress that he didn't stop to blush and stammer a thanks.

            "C'mon, Mush, it ain't like we's doin' anytin' wrong," Race protested, continuing to walk and wave his papers in vain. "Dey gotta loin ta tolerate our company sometime if deyre gonna be livin' wit us. We ain't hoitin' 'em or teasin' 'em or nuttin', jist hangin' around 'em. T'ink o' us as deyre last hope. Da odda fellas 'ave all given up; if we can't make Flick an' Secret come outta deyre shells, no one can."

            "Secret may be in a shell," Blink muttered, rubbing a graze on his left arm, souvenir of one of the redhead's near misses. "Flick's surrounded by a wall o' fiah."

            At that moment, the three newsies froze. Standing at the edge of the park, with his back to them, was a boy about Race's age, fifteen, two years younger than Mush and Blink. He was tall, broad-shouldered, and dark-haired, and he was shouting something that they couldn't make out at this distance. However, passing pedestrians kept stopping and making some sort of exchange with the boy, handing him something and taking something else in return. It was a rather suspicious scene, and the Three Musketeers hurried over to investigate.

            Sure enough, the boy was holding a stack of newspapers. It was rather thin, as if he had been selling for quite a while and doing rather well. His pockets sagged with the coins he'd been collecting from his customers. He glanced up when the three Manhattan newsies approached him. Race frowned.

            "Hey, kid, when'd ya become a newsie?" he asked. "I don't rememba eveh seein' ya 'round." Most newsies started selling young, at seven or eight, and most of the regulars in any given borough knew each other at least by sight. Race certainly knew this boy didn't live at the lodging house, and he didn't recognize him as one of the many newsies who lived at home either.

            Looking down at Racetrack, the stranger smirked. "I'd look who I was callin' 'kid' if I was you."

            Race rolled his eyes. "I really doubt yer a day older'n me. Anyway, ya din't answa my question. When'd ya start sellin' in Manhattan?"

            "Yeah," Blink added, "I'd like ta know dat too. Ya new 'round heah?"

            The boy gave Blink a long look. Finally, he nodded. "Yeah, I'se new."

            "Wheah ya from?" Mush asked, his tone friendlier than the other two.
                        The strange newsie's smirk widened. "Jist oveh da borda."

                        Race frowned. "Queens?"

                        Crossing his arms, the kid nodded. "Yeah, Queens. Looks like youse hoid o' it. Well, tell me dis. Ya eveh hoid 'bout all da hot sellin' spots in Queens?"

            The trio exchanged confused glances, then stared blankly at the intruder. There were no hot selling spots in Queens. The boy's face was growing steadily nastier.

            "E'zactly. Da sellin' ain't been all dat great oveh dere lately. So some o' us t'ought we'd try our luck at da good spots: Bottle Alley, Central Park, an' such. But we come oveh heah ta Manhattan, an' whadda we find?"

            "Manhattan newsies?" Race suggested. The newsie glared. Race shrugged. "Look, kid, we's real sorry youse Queens fellas ain't havin' da best o' luck, but Central Park happens ta already be claimed by quite a lot o' Manhattan newsies, t'ree o' whom happen ta be sellin' heah right now. An' ya been takin' all our customas, so I'd suggest ya find a new place ta sell." Blink and Mush nodded.

            For a long moment, the Queens newsie stared at them, as if sizing them up. The three Manhattan newsies tensed. But at last the invader seemed to realize how stupid it would be to try to fight, one against three. Shrugging, he turned toward the street.

            "I'se almost outta papes anyway." But when he had left the park and started to cross the street, he glanced over his shoulder, and his nasty smirk had returned. "I don't t'ink youse seen da last o' Queens dough," he called. "I neveh finished tawkin' ta youse. What we found when we came heah dat we din't like was youse Manhattans crowdin' all da best spots. Dat's sometin' I t'ink Crow is gonna wanna 'tawk' 'bout wit youse." And before the three could react, the Queens boy had vanished across the street and into the crowd, snickering.

            Race turned glumly to his two companions. "Got a feelin' Cowboy should know 'bout dis."

                        Mush sighed. "Guess yer right. Poor Jack, dough. Foist two goils showed up las' night, an' one o' dem punched 'im in 'is own lodgin' house in front o' all 'is newsies. Den da goils insisted on stayin' an' sellin' heah...an' now dis."

            "Yeah," Blink put in mournfully, "I doubt he's gonna take da news o' dis latest trouble too well. Pity Queens."

            Race shook his head. "We's da bringas o' bad news. Pity us."

Jack was in a good mood when he arrived back at the lodging house. He, David, and Les had gotten all their papers sold. And, more to the point, after walking Dave and Les home to their apartment on Broome Street, he had stopped for what was originally meant to be a brief visit with their older sister Sarah. The visit had stretched into a rather long one, and Jack entered the Duane Street lodging house flushed and whistling to himself. After signing in, with a cheerful greeting to Kloppman, he headed into the bunkroom. There were his newsies, spread all over the room and engaged in their usual activities: chatting, gossiping, playfully fighting, stealing and hiding each other's hats and glasses, counting their day's earnings, reading leftover newspapers, smoking, pitching pennies, and playing poker, blackjack, craps, and other card and dice games. The only differences were that they were all fully dressed, and nearly all of them were sporting various injuries. Jack had heard all about these at Tibby's; they were the reason the newsies had voted not to sell the evening edition of the World today. Both differences in the lodging house, he noted, were directly caused by the arrival of those two girls. Where were they, anyway? Probably in their bunk behind the sheet, talking or playing cards or counting their money. But after Sarah had clucked over the shiner on his cheek, insisting on wiping it with a soft, damp cloth and putting ice on it, and obviously believing that "the other boy" looked much worse, Jack was feeling a lot more forgiving toward Flick. She alone couldn't ruin his good mood. It took the Three Musketeers' news to do that.

            "He said what?!?"

                        Mush cringed and stepped back, Blink and Race not far behind. All the other newsies stopped what they were doing and looked up apprehensively. Jack was livid. He simply couldn't take this. At the shock of learning about possible trouble from the newsies of another borough, and a rather tough borough at that, even the memories of Sarah's kisses dissolved, leaving only the current negative aspects of his life: Queens and Flick.

            Queens an' Flick.

                        In a moment, the two lines of thought connected like wires or magnets of opposite forces. There was almost an audible click.

            "Wheah're da goils?" Jack demanded.

                        Confusion etched on his face, Bumlets dropped the stick with which he'd been fencing with Swifty and pointed mutely at the hidden bunk. A moment later, Flick and Secret emerged from the other side of the sheet. Both faces wore the expressions becoming familiar to all the boys; Secret's calm and unreadable, Flick's fiery.

            "Youse two!" Jack pointed accusingly at them. "Yer from Queens, ain't youse? Dose newsies sent youse ta spy on us an' cleah da way fer 'em ta steal our sellin' spots. I bet ya ain't even newsies," he rushed on, his anger building with every word. "I'll bet yer jist da goils of a couple Queens newsies an' ya agreed ta do yer boys dis liddle favah."

            At that, Flick started toward Jack with pure murder in her eyes, but Secret was ready this time, and quickly grabbed the back of Flick's vest and restrained her.

            "We ain't from Queens," Secret informed Jack, in a voice that was the opposite of Flick's when she was angry; rather than lava, it was the temperature of ice. It was clear that she wouldn't be able to hold the struggling Flick back for long, and just might not even be trying especially hard.

            "Really? Dat so?" Jack demanded, unwisely ignoring the outraged redhead, having forgotten, in his own anger, about the little episode the previous night. "So it's jist an amazin' coincidence dat youse toined up da night befoah a Queens newsie barged in on one o' our sellin' spots an' threatened us, an' youse had no good explanation fer bein' heah, not ta mention da fact dat youse refused ta tell us wheah yer from!"

            Flick finally managed to jerk free, but Secret swiftly stepped between her and Jack and turned to her friend. "Flick...ya t'ink ya should tell 'em? It don't matta...really. I mean..."

            Race, standing nearby with Blink and Mush, realized that the situation was almost identical to last night's: Jack, Flick, and Secret in the spotlight, with all the other newsies watching the drama unfold. But now, Secret was between Jack and Flick. Would Flick go so far as to hurt her best friend to get at Cowboy?

            Apparently not. Though her cheeks were glowing like rubies and her now cobalt-blue eyes were practically spitting flame, Flick hesitated, then bit her lip and gave a curt nod. She turned to Jack.

            "We ain't from Queens. We's from Harlem."

            Jack regarded the two girls for a moment, a bit of his anger ebbing away at this small admission, but still retaining enough to be suspicious.

            "Yeah? Can anyone confoim dat?"

            To all the boys' amazement, it was Secret who answered, in the same voice of deadly frost. "Ya can ask any o' da Harlem newsies," she told Jack levelly, her eyes sparkling with anger, or was it...? Nah, Race shook his head, couldn't be teahs. "But," Secret continued, "jist ta warn ya, I really don't t'ink dey'll wanna be bodda'd jist now."

            Jack snorted. "Right. Dat's pretty convenient, ain't it? Leaves us no one but da two o' youse who can testify dat yer really from Harlem."

            "I can."

                        The two words came out of the blue, spoken by someone who had until now been standing outside the spotlight, observing from a safe distance just like all the other Manhattan newsies. He had voluntarily chosen to drop his safe wall of invisibility and toss out two syllables into the middle of the battle. Twenty-nine newsboys and two newsgirls turned to stare in shock at Racetrack Higgins.