Disclaimer: This is a non-commercial work of fanfiction. Anything recognizable from Newsies belongs to Disney and not to me.


Chapter 29: Behind Locked Doors

A/N: The first part of this chapter is dedicated to the Guest Reviewer from Chapter 6 who suggested the possibility of Abby being Les' date to the rally (I'm not sure if you're still reading this, but if you are, I hope you enjoy this and would love to hear what you think!)


"Abby...hey, Abby!"

Abigail Becker, engrossed in her book, pointedly ignored the voice that had been calling her name with irritating frequency for the past minute or so and deliberately took a bite of her apple.

"Abby!" came the voice again as she crunched loudly to drown out the sound. "I know you can hear me, Abby."

Crunch, crunch, crunch, crunch -

"Abby!" A hand reached over and rudely pushed the book away from her face.

"What, Les?" Abigail snarled, finally looking up to glare at the interloper. "Can't you see I'm busy?"

"You're always busy," he replied, not affected in the slightest by her irritation. "I never see you without your nose in a book!"

"It keeps me from having to deal with people like you," Abby muttered, resigning herself to the fact that she wouldn't be able to get back to reading until she'd heard Les out. Their lunch recess at school was short enough even without any interruptions, so she might as well get the conversation over with so that she could get back to what she really wanted to be doing.

Giving her classmate a disgruntled look, she said sourly, "What do you want?"

"I've got a favor to ask," Les answered grandly. "Though come to think of it, maybe I'm actually the one doing you a favor - you'll see when I explain."

"Well, get to it," Abby snapped. "I want to read."

"Okay, okay, hold your horses."

Les settled himself into the desk across from Abby, making himself comfortable before continuing. "So, it's like this: You know all the newsboys have been on strike lately?"

"Yes. And?"

"Well, we're going to be holding a rally tomorrow night. Newsies from all over the city are invited, and some of the Manhattan fellas are bringing guests - you know, their girls and such." Les smiled brightly. "So, I was wondering if you'd like to come with me as my date."

Of all the things that Abby might have expected, this proposition certainly hadn't been one of them.

"Why are you asking me?" she asked, her eyes narrowing suspiciously. "I thought Sally was your girl."

"Oh, well…" Les shrugged. "That's old news. She told me this morning that the new boy in class has caught her eye, so she's setting her cap at him now. Seems like all the girls in class are stuck on him." He shrugged nonchalantly, but Abby could tell that he was a bit embarrassed.

Truth be told, she was surprised at this recent development. Nearly half of the girls in their class had been swooning over Les since the commencement of the newsboy strike. His sudden fall from grace - or rather, Sally and the others' falling out of infatuation - had probably been rather bruising to his ego, but then again, Abby reflected, such an abrupt transfer of affections wasn't really out of character, given the changeable temperament of the girl in question.

She almost felt sorry for Les. He couldn't be expected to know that Sally never stayed interested in the same boy for long and that the rest of her posse followed her lead when it came to where they directed their attention. Still, that being said, there was no way she was going along with him to this rally, especially not when he'd clearly only asked her as a last resort.

"I'm sorry to hear that, Les," she said, trying to sound at least a little sympathetic, "but I'm not interested in going. You'll be fine."

"But I told the newsies I'd be bringing my girl along!" Les exclaimed, sounding a bit desperate.

"So, tell them that she couldn't make it," Abby suggested, failing to see why telling the truth was such a difficult concept. "They'll understand." She turned back to her book.

For a moment, it was silent. Then, Les rose from the desk beside her.

"I kind of figured you might need some extra persuasion." He walked over to his desk and pulled something out of it, then returned to where Abby was sitting and dropped the object down on her desk with a thump.

"The Adventures of Huckleberry Finn, limited edition print," Les said smoothly. "You come with me to the rally, it's yours."

Despite her irritation at his attempt to bribe her, Abby found herself eyeing the book. It was beautifully bound and appeared to be slightly worn, but whoever had owned it before had taken good care of it, and she was already imagining it sitting on her bookshelf at home among her modest personal collection.

"Where did you get this?" she asked, giving Les a wary look. "You didn't steal it, did you?"

"No-ooo," Les answered, looking completely innocent (which made Abby even more suspicious). "I wouldn't steal something like this."

"Then how did you get it?" Abby pressed.

"We've got all sorts of things lying around at home," Les explained vaguely. "It was just there."

Abby stared at him a moment longer, hesitating a bit before her growing desire to own the book overcame her sneaking suspicions that Les had not come into possession of the volume by any honest means. She'd done her due diligence by asking; if he was going to lie about it, that was none of her business.

"Fine," she said, snapping her own novel shut. "I'll go with you to this rally. But I have to ask my parents first. They might not let me go out so late at night, so if they say no, you're out of luck."

"Tell them we'll be going with David," Les suggested, looking relieved that his well-chosen methods of incentivizing had done their job. "He's the one organizing the whole thing anyway, and he's such a stickler for safety and order. Nothing crazy will ever happen when he's in charge - sad to say."

The thought was slightly reassuring. Abby approved of Les' older brother; he was serious and thoughtful and always took the time to ask her what she was reading whenever he came over for tutoring. If she and Les would be going to the rally under David's supervision, her parents would be much more likely to give their consent.

"Well, I'll see if I can persuade them," she said. "But no promises."

The bell announcing the end of lunch recess rang, and she reluctantly watched as Les tucked The Adventures of Huckleberry Finn under his arm and turned to walk towards his own desk.

"I can't believe I just agreed to go to a newsboy rally with that nuisance of a Jacobs brother," Abigail muttered to herself.

"Woah, Abby," Les protested, turning on his heel. "That's a little unfair to David, don't you think?"

Abigail stared at him, surprised at both his acute sense of hearing and his completely outrageous misunderstanding of her statement. "If it wasn't obvious, I was talking about you," she clarified.

"Really?" Les managed to actually sound surprised. "A nuisance?" He cocked his head as though bewildered. "Most people would say that my brother's the more bothersome of the two of us."

Abby couldn't tell if he was joking or not. "More bothersome how?" she asked.

"David's always pestering," Les answered as though that explained everything. "And he makes mountains out of molehills and never lets anyone have any fun."

"He's probably also the only reason you're still alive," Abby observed tartly. "I bet you'd last all of two minutes on your own before being hauled off to jail or squashed flat by a carriage." She rose and picked up her apple core to throw it away, deliberately breezing past Les as she did so.

He really was a nuisance, and she didn't relish the thought of having to attend the rally with him, much less pretend to be his girl so that he could save face with the other newsboys.

But books were Abigail Becker's first love, and she had already determined (parental permission pending) that she would willingly endure the temporary misery of a date with Les Jacobs if it meant the lasting satisfaction of making that copy of Huckleberry Finn hers.


Jack paced up and down the hallway outside of Joseph Pulitzer's office. The carpeting felt strange beneath his feet, and the dark wood paneling on the walls made the corridor seem narrower than it really was.

He could never work in an office. It was too small of a space, too confining, too far away from freedom and from the feel of the wind on his face…

...too much like a place with barred windows and locked doors where the walls had ears and the air reeked of hopelessness.

Jack shivered involuntarily.

Maybe this wasn't such a good idea, he thought. It had seemed like a stroke of genius at the time - give Pulitzer a chance to state his side of the story while compelling him to be face-to-face with the very children he was exploiting - but now that Jack was actually here outside of the man's office, he was starting to doubt the decision for the very first time.

He probably should have given more heed to Davey's silent apprehension. Jack hadn't been fooled by the other newsie's relatively quick agreement to his idea of inviting Pulitzer to the rally. Davey was as bad at hiding his feelings as he was at doctoring up the headlines, and his hesitation had been immediately apparent despite his verbal affirmation of the plan.

Well, it was too late for second-guessing now.

Jack forced his feet to stop pacing.

How long would they keep him waiting? he wondered. Pulitzer's secretary - a rather tall lady with a sprightly step and an accent strong enough to curdle coffee - had warned him that her boss was meeting with the mayor and some important visitors and could be occupied indefinitely. Jack had told her that he would wait. Her expression seemed to soften at his determination, and he'd thought a note of sympathy might have been in her voice as she'd risen from her desk, bidding him to follow her upstairs. She'd led him down the hallway and had paused outside of Pulitzer's office, instructing him to wait while she assessed the state of things inside, and promising to do her best to catch her boss' attention.

That had been several minutes ago.

Jack scratched his head, impatient and antsy. Just as he was about to start pacing again, the door opened, and Pulitzer's secretary poked her head out.

"Mr. Pulitzer will see you now," she said, beckoning him into the office. Jack strode through the door, barely registering the sound of it clicking shut behind him.

Joseph Pulitzer was standing in front of his desk, and Jack immediately saw at the periphery of his vision several other men off to the side - one of them looked like the mayor, but the other two he couldn't identify.

It made Jack a little nervous, but he shook it off.

It was showtime.

"Afternoon, gents," he said jauntily, giving everyone assembled a cocky nod. He grinned at Pulitzer. "Nice place ya got here, Mr. Pulitzer," he remarked, looking around as he took in the office. "A little dark an' dreary for my taste, but still - real nice." When the man didn't answer, Jack motioned to the row of high-backed chairs positioned in front of the newspaper owner's desk. "You mind if I sit down?" he asked.

Pulitzer looked irked at the impudence, but he nodded stiffly. "Sit if you'd like, Mr. Kelly," he answered, "but I don't suspect that our conversation will take long."

Jack settled himself into the closest chair, grinning as he realized that it could swivel.

"What exactly did you wish to speak to me about, Mr. Kelly?" Pulitzer asked, folding his arms across his chest as he watched Jack rotate back and forth in the chair with a look of distaste.

"Oh, I just came here with an invitation," Jack answered easily, stopping to look the newspaper owner in the eye. "Ya see, Mr. Pulitzer, several hundred of your employees is gonna be havin' a rally tomorrow to discuss some of our objections to how you've been runnin' things lately around here. I thought maybe you'd want to make an appearance and state your side of the story, maybe meet a few of the fellas yourself." He shrugged agreeably. "We could talk this thing out, ya know? We's reasonable - you seems like you's reasonable - "

"Don't make the mistake of presuming that you know anything about me, boy," Pulitzer cut in coldly. "It reveals your ignorance as well as your naïveté."

"Of course, of course," Jack agreed, not even flinching at the unexpected change of tone. "Duly noted, Joe." He tapped the side of his head with his finger, as if willing himself to remember. "But seein' as you don't want us presumin' anything," he continued, leaning forward in his chair, "you see the smarts of my invitation, right? If you come speak at the rally, we could clear up this little misunderstandin' and figure out some kinda compromise we could both live with." He gave the newspaper owner an agreeable grin. "Whaddaya say, huh?"

"What makes you think that I would bother negotiating with a bunch of grousing children?" Pulitzer asked disdainfully. "Last I checked, you newsboys were less than a dime a dozen. For every one of you who goes on strike, I can find another one willing to sell for the right price. My coffers are deep enough to employ scabs indefinitely...but I'd wager you stubborn fools can't go more than two weeks without working."

"Ah, but see, there's where you's missin' the point," Jack contended, wagging a finger in the newspaper owner's direction. "You may be scrapin' by right now on the back of scabs with only the Manhattan boys on strike, but once we get the rest of the city's newsies on board, you ain't gonna be able to find no one to deliver your papes."

He settled himself back into the chair, confidently resting his arms behind his head. "You see, Joe," he continued, "you may be the owner of The World, but us newsies are the ones who really run the joint, so you's gonna have to start listenin' to us soon. You ain't the only one holdin' the cards here."

Pulitzer chuckled. It was a humorless chuckle, devoid of mirth. "Is that really what you think, Jack?" he said, shaking his head. "You're even more naive than I thought."

Walking over behind his desk, he held up a copy of The New York Sun. "You and the newsboys may have gotten lucky with this article, but rest assured, you won't find a reporter in town willing to cover the rally. And if it's not in the paper…" he tossed the copy onto his desk, " - it never happened."

Jack scoffed. "You sure you ain't the naive one of the two of us?" he asked. "You may think you got this whole town under your thumb, but there are some of us here who still have a backbone and ain't gonna answer to you."

"Ah…" Pulitzer said, looking pleased. "Now that is an interesting theory. Perhaps you speak of that feisty reporter who wrote your first article, a Miss Katherine...Plumber?"

"Yeah, she's one of 'em," Jack nodded shortly. "She ain't your lackey, just like the rest of us ain't."

"She most certainly is not my lackey," Pulitzer agreed, walking over from behind his desk to the nearest high-backed chair. "But what you may have failed to realize is that she is, in fact, my daughter." He swiveled the chair around, revealing an ashamed-looking Katherine, who had been sitting concealed in the turned-away chair the entire time.

Jack's heart dropped.

"Surprised?" Pulitzer smirked, raising an eyebrow. He clucked his tongue, shaking his head condescendingly. "And who's the naive one now?"

Katherine took a step forward. "Jack - " she pleaded.

He held up his hand to stop her, his emotions roiling and his mind quickly retreating into a defensive posture.

How could she? How could she?

"And since we're on the subject of surprises," Pulitzer continued pleasantly, with the air of a puppeteer pulling strings, "perhaps now would be the perfect time to introduce our second surprise guest." He called over his shoulder, "Mr. Snyder, if you please."

Jack felt terror surge through him as The Spider loomed out of the shadows where he had been hiding.

"Hello, Jack," he sneered.

Jack turned to run, but suddenly the Delanceys were there, restraining him and pushing him back towards Pulitzer who smiled approvingly, and towards the menacing hulk of Snyder whose eyes glittered with a malice that Jack remembered only too well.

"As you can see," Pulitzer said smugly, "I actually do hold all the cards here. A snap of my fingers...and off to The Refuge you go! I'm sure you've missed it, and Mr. Snyder is eager to have you back." He paused to let that sink in, and Jack felt his heart pounding as his eyes darted between the newspaper owner and the warden.

"However," Pulitzer continued, his words calm and calculating, "since you were so kind as to offer me an invitation to your rally, let me in turn offer an alternate scenario to you." He looked Jack in the eye. "If you go to the rally, address the newsboys, and denounce the strike, I'll ensure the eradication of your criminal record. You'll be free to go where you please - and in fact, I'll even pay for a train ticket for you to get as far away from here as you care to go." He gave Jack a condescending smile. "It's quite a benevolent offer, and you'd be wise to take it."

Jack hesitated. What the man was proposing was betrayal, complete and utter betrayal of the newsies and the cause. The Refuge loomed large...but the devastating thought of what he'd have to do to stay out of it was almost more frightening than the threat of the juvenile jail itself.

"I see you're unconvinced," Pulitzer noted, clearly beginning to tire of this game of cat-and-mouse. "If my offer doesn't seem agreeable to you, Mr. Kelly, it's straight to The Refuge for you. You can be reunited with your disabled friend…and I'll make sure that the rest of the strike's organizers will join you there soon. You may think you've played your cards right, but I already know where the rally's being held, and I've got the names of your two remaining men-in-charge. I'll have police waiting to arrest them as soon as the rally's over."

Jack's mind was frantic. How had the man gotten word of the rally's location? And even stranger, how did he know Davey and Race's names and their roles in the strike?

Katherine, he thought furiously. It had to be the ex-reporter who had tipped Pulitzer off. She was the only one who interfaced with both the newsies and the newspaper owner, so she must have been the one to spill the information.

"Perhaps you need a little more time to think this decision over," Pulitzer said, breaking into Jack's growing anger. "The cellar will be the perfect place for you to reflect." He rested his hands on his hips, again smiling his humorless smile. "I'll look forward to chatting with you again, Jack, when you've had time to come to your senses."

Then he snapped his fingers. "Gentlemen," he barked, "take him away."

Jack felt himself being pushed in the direction of the door, a different door than the one he'd entered through. He leveled a glare in Pulitzer's direction, but the newspaper owner had already turned away and was sitting down at his desk, lifting his spectacles to his eyes as he reached for a stack of papers.

As Jack passed by Katherine, he caught sight of her anguished expression and saw that her eyes were teary and red. But he hardened his heart. She had betrayed him. The damage was already done.

"Jack!" the woman cried out, her composure breaking as she rushed towards him. "Jack!" Her hand caught his shirtsleeve, but Jack shook her off, not even glancing in her direction as he was shoved roughly down the stairs.

The cellar was dark and cold, and as Jack stumbled down the last few steps, he could feel the dampness seeping into him as his feet touched the floor.

Morris and Oscar shoved him over to a canvas-covered object, which turned out to be an old printing press, but - to Jack's surprise - they didn't do much more than pound aggressively on the machine and threaten him. Pulitzer had probably instructed them to intimidate Jack but not hurt him, because any visible sign of injury would certainly raise suspicions at the rally. It was a small favor, though Jack's anger and despair at being cornered and trapped were growing and he almost would have welcomed a fight, even if he would have been clearly outnumbered.

Eventually, the Delanceys left, flinging a few more taunts over their shoulders and sneering in Jack's direction before climbing back up the stairs and shutting the door loudly behind them. Jack let out a frustrated snarl, pulling his newsboy cap from his head and smacking the printing press as hard as he could with it. He was about to draw back and kick the machine when he thought the better of it and took in a shuddering breath instead, pulling his cap back on top of his head.

Time seemed to stand still.

Jack paced the cellar, his anger too hot and his thoughts too frantic to settle.

Eventually, though, he had to slow down. He wasn't sure how long he'd been locked away or how long Pulitzer intended to keep him there, but the man would be demanding an answer sometime soon, and Jack knew that he needed to be ready.

He slowed his restless pacing, coming to stand in front of the printing press and then hoisting himself up to sit on its flat, table-like surface.

What choice did he really have?

If he refused to speak at the rally and denounce the strike, he'd be sent to The Refuge immediately, and Pulitzer and his goons could still show up at the rally to arrest Davey and Race and the others (there was nothing to stop them from doing that, really). They'd all be trapped there, and the strike would die anyway with no one to lead it. Some of the older boys might be able to get through the ordeal all right - they'd been in The Refuge before and knew how to keep their heads down. But the younger ones were a different story, and Race...well, Jack wasn't sure if Race could handle another visit to The Refuge. Talkative, cheeky Les would get eaten alive; Davey, with his cautious defensiveness, would hold up better, but the experience would likely scar both of them. And their parents would be distraught.

Jack shuddered, hunching over to rest his arms on his knees. It was hopeless. Either Pulitzer and his goons would show up at the theater to arrest whatever newsies they could get their hands on...or Jack himself would speak against the strike, keeping his boys out of The Refuge but ensuring his own permanent banishment in the process. He might as well take a train to Santa Fe, or to wherever he could find that was furthest away from New York, because he knew that he wouldn't be welcomed at the lodging house after betraying the newsies again.

Everything was falling apart, and no matter what he decided to do now, the rally - and the strike - were doomed to failure. So he had to cut his losses. He had to be the one to take the fall so that the rest of them could be safe.

He would take the offer and denounce the cause. He would ruin the carefully made plans for the rally. He would stop the strike in its tracks.

His boys would be confused and upset.

Spot would be furious.

Davey would never trust him again.

...and Race? Race was definitely going to kill him.


A/N: Not much to say this time except "thank you!" for continuing to follow along with this, and for encouraging me to keep up with it. I'm convinced that I have the best readers a fanfiction-writing fansie could ask for, and I'm very thankful for you! :)