The plan was set. He would marry Sarah the following week and work as a newsie until his eighteenth birthday next month. When he was eighteen he could get a job in one of the factories. It wasn’t going to be easy. Jack knew what the factories were like. Long, hot days of repetitive, often dangerous work. Being a newsie seemed pretty good in comparison. The great outdoors, fresh air, being your own boss, making your own rules, setting your own hours. He always thought he’d be leaving for Santa Fe when he was eighteen. He had almost enough money saved up. But now . . . .

“Hey Jack!” someone called out to him. Jack looked around at the people passing him by on the busy street corner. “Jack!” the voice called again. He turned to see his old pal Denton approaching.

“Denton! How’s it goin’?” The older man extended his hand and Jack shook it.

“I’ve been hearing things. People have been talking about you, Jack. They say you’re getting married.”

“Yeah, dey’s right. Ain’t ya gonna congratulate me?” Denton looked around.

“Yeah, yeah. Come with me for a minute, I wanna talk to you.” Jack eyed him suspiciously. It was a slow day, no was interested in the papes.

“Okay,” he decided and followed Denton down the street. A few minutes later they stopped in front of a large apartment building. He followed Denton inside and up to apartment 2B. “Is dis yer place?” Jack asked Denton.

“Home sweet home,” he replied, unlocking the door and walking in. Jack looked around, astounded. He whistled.

“Holy shit, Denton, dis is a palace.” In actuality, the three bedroom apartment was no more luxurious than any upper-middle class one in New York. Denton was glad he’d impressed his young friend.

“It’s too big for me,” he confessed. He offered Jack a seat at the table. He sat.

“If I had a swanky join like dis, I’d neva leave home,” Jack joked as Denton brought him a cup of coffee. “Tanks. Why did you’s wanna see me, anyhow?” Denton sat down next to him with a serious expression.

“I was just thinking about you and Sarah. How are you gonna support her, Jack?” Jack looked into his coffee cup.

“I’ll be eighteen soon. I’m gonna get me a regular job.” He looked up at Denton. “At de factory,” he added.

“Jack, the factory doesn’t pay much more than selling newspapers,” he explained.

“Yeah, well at least it’s regular pay. I’ll be bringing home de same money, wedder dere’s a good headline or not.”

“You’re going to give up all you freedom and work in a factory all day? Wouldn’t you rather things stayed as they are?”

“Of course. But I gots ta do what I gots ta do.” He forced a smile. “I gots ta grow up sometime, right?” Denton sighed. He walked around Jack as he spoke.

“So that’s what’s going to become of the famous Jack Kelly, huh? A simple little factory worker making barely enough to feed his wife and baby.” Jack spun around in his chair to face him, shocked. “Did you think I didn’t know? Come on, Jack. A young boy like you getting married without a cent to his name. What other explanation is there?” Jack shrunk down in his chair as Denton sat next to him again. “You don’t really want to get married, do you?” He answered indignantly:

“What difference does it make wedder I wanna? I gotta.”

“Do you, Jack?” Jack tried to read the older man’s eyes.

“What do ya mean?”

“I’m just saying, maybe Sarah deserves better than that, that’s all. What’s her future gonna be like with you? Half-starving on a factory worker’s salary? Or will she be working twelve hour shifts, too?” Jack looked at his shoes. “Your children growing up to work in mills all day, just so you can keep a leaky roof over your heads? That ain’t much of a life, Jack.” Jack buried his head in his hands. He knew everything the man had said was right but there was nothing he could do to change it. Denton leaned in closer. He dropped his voice to a whisper. “Why not let me have her, Jack? She can live here, in luxury. I’ll take care of her and the baby. I’ll take care of her family. I can give her everything you can’t.” Jack slowly looked up at him. He didn’t know what to say.

“I don’t know wedder to tank ya, or punch ya in da nose,” he finally said.

“Thank me,” replied Denton, “I’m taking her off your hands. As soon as she’s mine, you’re free to do as you please. I can have you on the first train to anywhere you’d like to go. Isn’t there somewhere you’d like to go, Jack? Somewhere you’ve never been?” Jack nodded.

“Santa Fe,” he said quietly. “I’d like ta go ta Santa Fe.” Denton clapped him on the back.

“That’s the spirit! You’ll be in Santa Fe in no time!” Jack thought for a moment.

“It ain’t gonna be dat easy, ya know. Sarah might not wanna marry ya.”

“Jack! We don’t need to ask Sarah, we just need to ask her father.” It was true. Since Sarah wasn’t eighteen, she still belonged to her father, who could marry her off to anyone he chose. “You go set it up. Tell them I’m coming.”

“I don’t know. What if dey ask me why ya wanna marry her?”

“What difference does that make? They don’t need to know why I want to marry her, just that I want to marry her.” Jack nodded.

“But why . . . why does ya wanna marry her?” Denton sighed.

“Jack, I’m getting old. I just want to have a family. I told you, this place is too big for me. Sarah, she’s beautiful, you know that. She’s perfect. I want to give her a good life. You understand?” He could definitely identify with him.

“Yeah, I guess I understand. Ya just can’t stand to see her wit trash like me, huh?” Denton smiled and put his arm around the boy as he ushered him toward the door. “Wait a minute,” Jack said suddenly. “I can’t do dis. I love her.”

“If you love her you know why you have to give her to me.” Jack left the apartment. Denton shut the door behind him, smiling to himself.

The next day Jack told Denton that he had spoken to Sarah’s parents. “Dey didn’t believe me,” he explained, “dey wants ta meet ya.” They set up a time to meet later that day, after Sarah’s mother got home from work, but before Sarah did. When Denton arrived, the family made a big fuss over him. Jack stood back and watched them bargain at the kitchen table.

“You are aware of her condition, aren’t you?” Sarah’s father asked more than once. Before the afternoon was over, she had been promised to Denton and her father was $500 dollars richer. With a handshake and a smile, her future was sealed. Jack found the whole scene sickening, and had to remind himself it was for her own best interest to keep himself from soaking the whole family. Details of the wedding were being planned out when everyone realized Sarah would be home soon.

“Maybe it would be better if you aren’t here when she gets home,” her father suggested. Jack imagined Sarah’s face when they told her she was going to marry Denton. He didn’t want to see it for real. He didn’t want to have to say goodbye. Denton gave him some money for the train ticket. Jack walked into Sarah’s bedroom to have a last look. He wanted to leave her something. He placed his cowboy hat on her bed.

“Goodbye, Sarah,” he said to the empty room. Suddenly, he heard Sarah’s voice in the kitchen. She was home. Without a second thought, he was out the window and down the fire escape, running as fast as her could. He felt horrible, he needed to get away. There was one last stop he had to make. He arrived at the boarding house breathless and teary eyed. The other newsies were still out selling their papes. Jack scribbled a note as best he could on a scrap of paper. He laid it on his usual bunk. It read simply: “Gone to Santa Fe.”

Sarah couldn’t believe what her parents were telling her. She stared at the middle-aged man’s smiling face as they repeated it again and again. “Denton is going to marry you. Jack is gone.” Suddenly she felt very alone. Denton took her hand and kissed it.

“Don’t touch me,” she thought, “get away from me, leave me alone.” As nice as Denty had appeared during the strike, there was something darker in his eyes now. “W-where is Jack?” she asked again.

“He left for Santa Fe on the train, I saw him off myself,” it was a lie and Denton knew it, but it was worth it to convince the girl. His girl.

“Why didn’t he say goodbye?”

“He thought it would be better this way. He didn’t love you, Sarah. He wanted to leave you and run away. I said I’d take care of you and I will.” Denton laughed inside his mind. “Let her think he didn’t care,” he thought, “all the better for me.” Sarah started to cry. “I’ll give you some time to get used to the idea,” he said. He shook hands with Sarah’s parents and left.

The wedding went ahead, despite Sarah and her brother’s protests. “This is the best we could have hoped for you,” he mother explained. Sarah wore a simple white dress and the whole ceremony took less than half and hour.