In most homes in New York City, most people were still asleep at six in the morning. That number included the twins. Rebecca and Elizabeth were fast asleep, curled up in their comfy beds with beautiful dreams dancing in their heads.

However, Mr. and Mrs. Hearst were awake. They were sitting down in the drawing room, quietly talking over their morning coffee. The two of them didn’t want to be disturbed, and they knew that this early in the morning, their conversation would not be overheard, especially by their sleeping daughters.

They didn’t take into account, though, that their son was awake during that time. Bill was getting ready to go to work that morning. He didn’t know why, but he hadn’t been able to sleep that night, so he thought it made sense for him to get ready to go earlier rather than later. Maybe he could stop and pick up some things on the way to the paper.

As he passed by the closed door to the drawing room, he heard his mother’s voice through the cracks. “I wrote to the Academy last week, and I received a response,” she whispered.

Academy? What academy? Bill hadn’t heard anything about an academy. He pressed his ear up against the wood and listened further.

There was a rustling of paper, then silence for a few seconds. “So, they’ll take them?” His father sounded hopeful, almost relieved with the news.

“The girls can start there this coming fall,” she replied, seemingly proud of this fact. “Isn’t that wonderful?”

“Yes, it certainly is.” There was a shuffling of papers and the sound of footsteps, and Bill immediately knew they were getting ready to leave the room. He quickly stepped back from the door and hurried into the powder room across the hall. As soon as he closed the door as quietly as he could, he heard the door to the drawing room open and his parents step out. Their current conversation was indistinct, but it didn’t matter. He listened as the voices got louder, then faded away as they left the hall.

When the coast was clear, Bill snuck out of the powder room and into the drawing room, silently searching for what could be the letter his mother had received. There was an envelope lying on the table, so he went over and examined it. It was addressed to his mother from Lailana Academy in Boston, a place he had never heard of.

He pulled the letter out of the envelope and began to read.

Dearest Mildred,

My deepest condolences for you and your issues with your unruly daughters. Through our enduring friendship over the course of our lives and my knowledge of your husband and his impeccable character, I am certain that it could not have been either of your faults that these girls have turned into such miscreants. I certainly have my suspicions on what is the cause of these responses.

I have looked into your request, and I am pleased to say that we do have space at our academy for the upcoming year. I would like to personally invite you to enroll your daughters for this term. We will hold their spaces until we hear otherwise, as these two seem to be urgent cases. I can assure you that your daughters will have the finest education here at Lailana Academy, and they will learn to be proper ladies. I personally guarantee that this behavior of theirs will be behind them by Christmas. Also, Elizabeth will have the most advanced medical care for the injuries described in your previous letter. My best wishes for a quick recovery.

Please write to me and let me know your decision as soon as possible. If you choose not to enroll, my advice would be to keep them away from those newsies at all costs. From what you described, their strike brought this rebellion into full bloom, and it also caused the injuries inflicted on one of them. I’d even be wary of Mr. Pulitzer’s daughter, Katherine. She seems to be helping to foster these developments. If you would be so kind as to offer me Mr. Pulitzer’s address when you reply, perhaps I could offer Miss Pulitzer a place at the school as well. It would allow your daughters to have a friend at the school during this important era of their lives. Do let me hear from you soon.

Yours,

Cora Samuels

Bill read the letter once, twice, then three times. He couldn’t believe what he was reading. How long had his parents been planning this, and how didn’t he see this before? The young man knew his sisters needed to see this, so he ran up the stairs and down the hall as quickly and quietly as he could. As soon as he stood in front of the door, he started knocking rapidly.

A drowsy Elizabeth woke up to the sound of the incessant rapping, and she stumbled to the door. When she opened it, she didn’t even have a chance to speak. As soon as she saw her brother’s face, he shoved the letter into her hands and declared, “You and Rebecca need to read this.”

*****

At lunchtime that day, Katherine had been called to a meeting with her father down at The World. She didn’t know what he wanted and why, but she knew better than to ignore his requests, especially after she went against him and supported the strike. It was simply safer this way.

When Katherine arrived outside of her father’s office, she found Hannah standing in front of the door. As soon as the redhead noticed her arrival, she gestured behind her and stated, “He’s just inside, waiting for you.”

“Do you know what this is about?” Katherine asked as she smoothed out her skirt. “He wouldn’t say over the phone.”

Hannah shook her head. “Sorry, I don’t. He just said that you were coming and to make sure you came in right on time, which would be now.” With that, she opened the door and poked her head in. “Mr. Pulitzer? Your daughter is here.”

From inside the room, the two of them could hear the older man respond, “Good. Send her in.”

Before his daughter could enter, though, Hannah stopped her and whispered, “Whatever this is about, good luck.”

There was something wrong, Katherine could tell. As soon as she stepped into the room, there was something in the air that tipped her off. Her father wasn’t at his desk, like he usually was for these little meetings of theirs. Instead, he was standing by the window, looking out at the streets of New York.

She didn’t say anything in greeting, but he spoke up anyway without looking at her. “I think it’s time we reevaluated some things, Katherine.”

“Reevaluate? What do you mean?” she replied, crossing her arms over her chest.

Pulitzer turned his head to look at his youngest daughter. “You can sit down, you know,” he started, seemingly stalling the conversation. When Katherine refused, he sighed and turned back to the window. As his eyes scanned the streets and the people walking down them, he continued, “I think that this had better come to an end. This living on your own while unmarried, and this unladylike behavior of yours, it ends now.”

Her face expressed confusion and suspicion. Where did this even come from? “What are you talking about? You were fine with me living alone before, and you were fine with me as I am,” Katherine pointed out.

“Yes, well, that was until I got a few phone calls over the past week.” Now it was Pulitzer’s turn to cross his arms as he looked at his daughter. “Let’s start with the phone call I got from one of your neighbors. She spotted Mr. Kelly walking with you out of the building, but she didn’t see him go up the stairs.”

“Let me guess, it was Mrs. Gould, wasn’t it?” Katherine mumbled. She was certain that was the judgemental neighbor that had put Jack off when he came to visit her on Sunday, and she was the kind of person who would call up her father for “inappropriate” behavior.

Her father ignored the question. “So, my question is how long, and how, did your ‘suitor’ stay in your apartment?” He said that word with such disgust. Pulitzer clearly wasn’t used to the idea of his youngest daughter dating a newsie, even one that he had given a job a little higher up.

“Well if you must know,” Katherine started, “he came up the fire escape because he felt uncomfortable in the lobby. He wanted to invite me to go for a walk and then to see a show. We stayed in my apartment for fifteen minutes at the most, and that was only because I needed to finish my article. That’s all that happened.”

Pulitzer looked at her, as if trying to figure out whether or not to believe her. After what felt like eons of silence, which was probably more like thirty seconds, he spoke. “Even so, that’s not how someone should go about courting someone. So, I have two options for you.” He walked away from the window, finally, and took his place behind his desk. “Option one: you move back into our home.”

Katherine almost laughed at this. “Move back in? I moved out to have some independence. Moving back in would just defeat the purpose. Sorry, but no thank you.”

“You didn’t let me finish.” Pulitzer leaned back in his seat with a smug little smile on his face. “You move back into our home, or you can choose option two. There’s a finishing school in Boston called Lailana Academy that’s come highly recommended to me by Mrs. Hearst. She called me this morning to tell me about it. She is considering sending her daughters there, and I think it would be a good idea to send you there too.”

Initially, she didn’t say anything. What was there to say? She certainly hadn’t seen this coming. She had never even heard of Lailana Academy before today. Besides, she was working now. She couldn’t just put her career on hold to go to a finishing school. Finishing schools were for girls who weren’t going to work, and were going to stay home and knit and be a housewife. That wasn’t Katherine. Would she even be able to get her job back if she were to leave The Sun? “You’re not giving me much of a choice, are you?” she commented.

“Oh, you have a choice,” Pulitzer stated while he leaned back in his chair, “but I think you know what the right choice would be. So, what are you going to do, Katherine?”

Katherine exhaled and averted her gaze to anywhere but her father. “I...I guess I’ll pack my things and move back in as soon as possible.” With that, she turned and walked towards the door.

As she grabbed the handle of the door, she heard her father clear his throat. “I’m glad you were able to see reason, Katherine,” Pulitzer commented as he picked up his glasses from the desk.

Her fingers curled around the door handle as she thought through her words. “No, you’re just glad that I’m not putting up a fight today.” With that, she slipped out the door, leaving a victorious Pulitzer in her stead.

*****

After dinnertime, the newsies were all sitting around and chatting in the lodging house, relaxing after a long day’s work. The building was full of laughter and fun, and people could hardly hear anything that wasn’t happening right near them. One group of the boys was sitting on a few bunks in the corner, gambling for cigars with an old deck of cards they had found on the street one day. It was missing a few cards, an ace here, a king there, but they made do.

Sniper, though, wasn’t really doing much. While everyone else was having fun doing whatever they felt like doing, he was lying on his bunk and tossing a ball up towards the ceiling. He threw it and caught it over and over, deep in thought.

Another group of boys were playing a game by the stairs, since they didn’t feel like doing anything for cigars that night. “Sniper! Come over here and play a round, why don’t ya?” one of the boys, Ike, called over to the young boy.

“If ya win, we’ll buy you a candy from the drugstore with our profit tomorrow,” his twin, Mike, added at the same volume.

Sniper just shook his head and tossed the ball again. It bounced off the bottom of the bunk above him, and so did the next few tosses he made. “Not in the mood,” he admitted to his friends.

Tommy Boy grumbled, “Well you’re no fun,” and the group of boys went back to playing their games together.

He continued to toss the ball upwards until a young redhead poked his head out from the top bunk and glared at Sniper. “D’ya mind?” Albert urged. “I’m tryin’ ta have a nice dream up here and that ain’t helpin’.”

“Sorry.” Sniper tucked the ball under his pillow and sighed, unsure of what else to do with his time. The games his friends were playing weren’t the most entertaining to him, but there wasn’t much else to do. He didn’t know how to draw very well, otherwise he would go and ask to borrow some paper and a pencil from Jack. Then again, even if he did, he knew better than to disturb Jack while he was focusing on a drawing. The only person in the lodging house who could do that without risking anything was Crutchie, and that was because nobody could be mad at Crutchie. It was pretty much impossible.

The knock on the door, though, made sure he didn’t have to worry about that much longer. The noise died down briefly as the newsies evaluated what they heard. Nobody came to visit here this late, but if they did, they knew better than to knock. Normally, they would just walk inside. “I got it,” Sniper yelled and got up off his bunk. His comment was understood and quickly forgotten as noise engulfed the rest of the room all over again, accompanied by complaints from a drowsy Albert, who just wanted the yelling to end.

When he threw the door open, he found three figures standing there on the step, two girls and a guy. The shadow was covering their faces, but he knew who they were immediately. It was the Hearst siblings. “Beck? Lizzie? Bill? What’s goin’ on?”

Before any of the three could respond, Jack came down the stairs with his hands covered in charcoal dust. “What’s goin’ on down here? I can hear all youse from the roof.” As he walked over to the open door, he spotted the newcomers and tilted his head in confusion. “What are youse doin’ here?”

That was when the two girls stepped forward, which allowed everyone to see the bags that they were carrying. Rebecca, as she tucked a strand of dark hair behind her ear, spoke for the group. “Do you happen to have two available beds?”