MILLTOWN FIRE SIREN MUST BE HELD RESPONSIBLE FOR THIS
Old Man Weisskraks, who can always be depended upon to supply the latest gossip, supplemented by a few original comments whenever and wherever he can corner someone willing to listen to his prattle, was the victim of circumstances, last night, and will spend considerable time and energy in telling the world about it for the next few days to come.
It seems that the Old Boy Himself met with an accident yesterday that will not happen again, by gosh, if he can help it. No Unfortunately, while trying to extract a “chaw” of cut plug which he had saved for his after-dinner session at slim-Chances cut-rate General Store, the Old Boy Himself dropped and smashed beyond any hope of future usefulness, the gold-rim- spectacles that were, figuratively, the apple of his both eyes. That in itself was a catastrophe. But, according to the old aphorism, (which by the way is a favorite, with the Old Boy) “It never rains but it pours.” the loss of his “specs” while bad enough, was only incidental: merely contributing to the general run of hard luck which followed quickly in It’s wake.
The Old Boy, it seems, is lost without his glasses. Lost, at least so far as reading the news is concerned. And reading the news is the one thing that “he Is fondest of.” Without his glasses, the Old Boy had to forego his daily session with the Daily Home News, and therefore could not really be blamed for what happened. Had he read the news in last night s paper he would have been saved considerable energy— about an hour’s.
Had he read the news he would have known that Milltown had installed a new fire siren, and had decided to give it a trial. Last night was the time set for the trial.
However, the Old Boy was completely unaware of the plans and not being able to read he decided to retire earlier than usual. Thus at 7 p. m. last night he was just about ready for bed, was. in fact, just about to turn out the light and crawl between the sheets, when, suddenly he stopped. Could It be? Had he heard aright? He stood motionless and listened. Yes there it was again. No doubt about it this time. That was the fire siren, all right. The Old Boy had no choice. There was only one thing for him to do. As a Public-Spirited-Citizen, it was his duty to at least, witness the event so that his voice might not be found wanting when the event was discussed, as it surely would be on the following day.
Hastily getting into his clothes he dashed from the house and started in the general direction of Fire Headquarters. No doubt the apparatus was well on it’s way by this time but he could learn the location of the fire and probably reach there before it was all over.
Arriving at the Fire House, breathless, and eager, he was dumb founded see all the department apparatus, still on the floor and a general appearance of ease and contentment everywhere in evidence. Evidently they had not heard the siren, thought the Old Boy, but, by ginger, he’d tell ’em. This he proceeded to do, punctuating his loud exclamations with frantically waving arms! Well. After the general laughter laid subsided and someone had mercifully told him alt about it, he sheepishly, and with a sorry attempt at his usual proud gait, started hack home murmuring sweet nothings, as he thought, of the morrow and the razzing that was in store for him.
