But the voice did not sound. A moment passed; another and yet another. The silence grew oppressive.
Then suddenly a voice boomed out with startling clearness.
But what was this! This was not the old familiar voice. And what was it saying?
“We are sorry to announce that there will be no Voice to-night. A terrible thing has happened.”
“The Ferret” started from his chair. The Chief and his whispering reporter shrank into the shadows.
“The Voice,” the announcer continued, “has been—”
At that instant there came a strange sputtering.
Something had gone wrong. Was it the distant station or the radio at Johnny’s elbow? He turned the dial and at once there came to the ears of the listeners the faint, mournful, melodious notes of a pipe organ.
Ever endowed with a sense of what is fitting in life, Johnny allowed this second station to continue its sweet, sad dirge.
“It is for the Voice,” he told himself. “He is dead.” At once a feeling of infinite sadness came over him. The Voice was dead. Little enough he knew about this strange person and yet he had come to love him, as had hundreds of thousands of others. “He was young,” he whispered, “and now he is dead. The beautiful world with its sunshine and flowers, its singing birds and laughing children is lost to him forever.”