Brooklyn's Girl (A Spot Conlon love story)

Chapter 3 - Strike

The next morning as I walked up to the gates with Jack, I heard yelling coming from the others. 

"Hey what's going on?" Jack asked Race. " They jacked up the prices! you hear that Jack? 10 more cents a 100! You know it's bad enough that we got to eat what we don't sell, now they jack up the price! can you believe that?" 

" This will bust me, I'm barely making a living right now," Skittery complained.

" I'll be back to sleeping on the streets," Boots said miserably.

"It don't make no sense," Mush said to Jack, " I mean, all the money pulled there's making, why would he gouge us?" 

"Because he's a tight wad, thats why!" Racetrack yelled. 

Pipe down, it's just a gag. So, why the jack up Weasel?

Weasel gave him a slimey grin. "Why not? It's a nice day. Why don'tcha ask Mr. Pulitzer?"

"They can't to this to me Jack." Blink said. Race glared at Weasel. "They can do whatever they want. It's their stinkin' paper. " He said. Boots looked at the ground sadly. "It ain't fair. We got no rights at all." " Come on, it's a rigged deck. They got all the marbles." Race said.

Mush sighed and walked over to us. "Jack, Jace, we got no choice, so why don't we

get our lousy papes while they still got some, huh?"

"No!" Jack yelled. " Nobody's going anywhere. They can't get away with this!" He sat down on the curb with mr. "Give em some room, give em some room. Let them think." Les said. If I wasn't so annoyed, I would've laughed. After a few minutes Race said; "You two done thinkin' yet?"

"Hey! Hey! Hey! World employees only on this side of the gate!" Weasel yelled at us, causing most of us to yell back.

"Well, listen. One thing for sure, if we don't sell papes, then nobody sells papes. Nobody comes through those gates until they put the price back to where it was." Jack said, standing up. "You mean like a strike?" David asked. "Yeah, like a strike!" I said, also standing up.

"Are you out of your mind?" Race asked us. "It's a good idea!" Jack replied. " Jack, I was only joking. We can't go on strike, we don't have a union." David told him. "But, if we go on strike, then we are a union, right?" I asked.

"No, we're just a bunch of angry kids with no money. Maybe if we got every newsie in New York, but..." David trailed off, knowing where this was gonna go.

"Yeah, well we organize. Crutchy, you take up for collection. We get all the newsies of New York together." Jack said. "Jack, this isn't a joke. You saw what happened to those trolley workers." David told him. "Yeah, well that's another good idea. Any newsie don't join with us, then we bust their heads like the trolley workers." Jack said. I smirked at the idea.

"Stop and think about this Jack. You can't just rush everybody into this." Dave told him.

"Alright. Let me think about it. Listen. Dave's right. Pulitzer and Hearst and all them other rich fellas, I mean, they own this city, so do they really think a bunch of street kids like us can make any difference?" Jack said. "The choice has got to be yours. Are we just gonna take what they give us, or are we gonna strike?" I chimed in after. 

"Strike!" Les yelled, causing me to laugh and David to cover his mouth. "Keep talking Jack, tell us what to do!" Boots called out. "Well, you tell us what to do Davey." I said, putting an arm on his shoulder. David looked at Jack and said; "Pulitzer and Hearst have to respect our rights."

Jack grinned and called out, "Hey listen! Pulitzer and Hearst have to respect the rights of the working boys of New York!" He leaned over to me and Davey. "Well, that worked pretty good, so what else?" I smirked. "Tell them that they can't treat us like we don't exist." I told Jack. He grinned at me, and jumped up onto the statue.