THE VOICE THAT STUTTERED
The following Saturday evening the radio boys were once more assembled
at Bob's house. They were in high spirits, having prepared all their
lessons for the following Monday, and were out for an evening's fun
with their radio outfit. It was too early for the regular concert to
start, but they were experimenting with the set, shifting the sliders
around on the tuning coil in an effort to catch some of the messages
sent out by near-by amateurs. It was sometimes great fun to listen in
on these conversations, and often they wished that they had a sending
set so that they could answer some of the remarks passed out by the
ambitious senders.
For some time they had picked up nothing of interest, and were wishing
for the time to come when the concert was to start, when suddenly a
voice they had never heard before came out of the air. The boys gazed
at each other in astonishment for a few moments, and then broke into
irrepressible laughter. For the voice belonged to a man who stuttered
terribly, and the effect was ludicrous indeed. The strange voice
rasped and stuttered its difficult way along, until some one who
possessed a sending as well as a receiving set, interrupted.
"Hey there!" it said. "You're engine's missing, old timer. Let it
cool off a bit and then try again."
This was evidently heard by the stutterer, for he became excited,
and that did not help him much.
"S-s-shut up, y-y-you big b-b-boob," he finally managed to get out,
in an infuriated tone.
"I may be a boob, but I can talk straight, anyway," replied the
amateur.
This so infuriated the stuttering man that he was absolutely unable
to say anything for a few moments, while the boys, with much
merriment, waited expectantly for the forthcoming answer.
"S-s-s-shut up, w-w-will you?" exploded the unfortunate stutterer
at last. "J-j-just you w-w-w-w--" but he was unable to finish the
sentence until he stopped and gave vent to a long whistle, after
which he was able to proceed.
At the sound of the whistle Bob suddenly stopped laughing and sat up
straight in his chair.
"Say, fellows!" he exclaimed, "do you remember what Herb told us
about the man named Dan Cassey?"
"Jerusalem!" exclaimed Joe, "I remember Herb said he stuttered and
had to whistle to go on, and if that doesn't describe this bird I'll
eat my hat!"
Jimmy and Herb himself caught the idea, at the same time, and they
gazed speculatively at each other. There was more recrimination
between the stutterer and his tormentor, and the boys listened
attentively, hoping to get some clue to the whereabouts of the
afflicted one's station. But they could get no hint of this, and
finally the voice ceased, leaving them full of hope but with little
that was definite to found their suspicions on.
"Of course, it may not mean anything at all," said Bob. "This Dan
Cassey isn't the only man in the world who stutters."
"No, but there can't be many who are as bad as he is," said Joe,
grinning at the recollection, even though his mind was occupied with
more serious thoughts. "But it will certainly be worth our while to
try to locate this person and find out what name he answers to."
The others were of the same opinion, and they listened for some
repetition of the voice in the hope that its possessor might drop
some clue to his identity, but although they missed most of the
concert by trying to catch the talk of the object of their interest,
they heard no further word of him that evening nor for many more
to come.
The next morning but one when Bob joined his companions it was plain
to see that he was bursting with news.
"Say, fellows," was his salutation, "did any of you read in the
morning papers of the big Radio Show that is opening up in New York
City?"
They had to confess that they were innocent of any such knowledge.
"It opens to-morrow," went on Bob. "They say it's going to be one
of the biggest things that ever happened. A regular rip-roaring,
honest-to-goodness show. They'll have all the latest improvements
in radio sets and all kinds of inventions and lectures by men who
know all about it, and automobiles that run by wireless without any
drivers--"
"For the love of Pete," interrupted Joe, "go a little easy and let us
take it in a little at a time. Any one would think you were the barker
at a sideshow. Where is this wonderful thing to be?"
"On the roof of one of the big New York hotels," answered Bob. "I
forget the name just now, but it's one of the biggest in the city.
What do you say, fellows, to taking it in? We ought to get all sorts
of ideas that will help us in making our sets."
"Count me in," replied Joe promptly. "That is, if my folks will let
me go, and I think they will."
"Don't leave out little Jimmy," remarked that individual.
"Me too," added Herb. "That is, if dad will see it the same way
I do."
"I guess our folks won't kick," Bob conjectured confidently. "I notice
that they're getting almost as much interested in the game as we are.
Besides we won't have to stay in the city over night. The show's in
the afternoon as well as the evening and we can be home before ten
o'clock."
"We'll put it up to them anyway," replied Joe. They did "put it up"
to their parents with such effect that their consent was readily
obtained, though strict promises were exacted that they would spend
only the afternoon in the city and take the early evening train for
home.
It was a hilarious group that made their way to the city the next day,
full of eager expectations of the wonders to be seen, expectations
that were realized to the full.
From the moment the boys crowded into the jammed elevators and were
shot to the enclosed roof in which the exhibition was held they
enjoyed one continuous round of pleasure and excitement. The place was
thronged, and, as a matter of fact, many late comers were turned away
for lack of room. But the boys wound in and out like eels, and there
were very few things worth seeing that eluded their eager eyes.
Impressions crowded in upon them so thick and fast that it was not
until later that they were fully able to appreciate the wonders that
were being displayed for their benefit.
They listened to talks from men skilled in radio work, they wandered
about to the many booths where information was given about everything
connected with wireless, they studied various types of coils,
transformers, vacuum tubes, switches, aerials, terminals, everything
in fact that ambitious young amateurs could wish to know.
There was the identical apparatus with its marvelously sensitive
receiver, which, while installed in Scotland, had correctly registered
signals from an amateur radio station in America.
A little later they stood entranced in the Convention Hall before a
new, beautifully modeled radio amplifier, so massive that the volume
of music it poured forth actually seemed to cause vibration in the
walls of the great room in which they stood.
One of the most interesting features was the radio-controlled
automobile. The crowd before this almost incredible invention was
so dense that the operator was handicapped in his demonstration.
The car was about seven feet in length, with a cylindrical mass of
wire rising about six feet above its body. It was upon this that the
swiftly moving car caught signals from antennae stretched across the
hall. The boys watched, fascinated, as the inventor, opening and
closing the switches in its mechanism by use of a radio wave of one
hundred and thirty-five metres in length, caused the small car to
back out of its garage and run about the hall without a driver,
delivering papers and messages, afterward returning to the garage.
Then they saw the transmitters that could shoot radio messages into
space, and hung entranced over the moving pictures of what happens
in a vacuum tube. Nothing escaped them, and they "did" the show
thoroughly, so thoroughly in fact that at the end they were, as Joe
expressed it, "all in."
"Gee, I knew that show was going to be great," remarked Bob happily,
as they were returning home on the train. "But I didn't have any
idea that it was going to be such a whale."
"It was a pippin," agreed Joe, as he snuggled back still further
in his seat.
Jimmy sighed gustily.
"What's the matter, Doughnuts?" asked Bob.
"I was just pitying," replied Jimmy, "the poor boobs who didn't
see it."
"And that's no joke!" said Joe. "Seeing all those things is going
to be a big help toward winning those prizes."
"Who said I was joking?" retorted Jimmy. "I wasn't. That show was
the dandiest thing I ever saw."