Proof of my terrible cowardice. I've lived alone so many years, throwing images on the walls with my imagination. Fiddling with electronics, radio transmission, has been my hobby. My cowardice is of such a passion, complementing the revolutionary spirit that lives in it's shadow, I was forced to design this.
It looks like a seashell radio
I paid for all this-how? Playing the stock market, of course, the last refuge in the world for the dangerous intellectual out of a job. Well, I played the market and built all this and I've waited. I've waited, trembling, half a lifetime for someone to speak to me. I dared speak to no one. That day in the park when we sat together, I knew that some day you might drop by, with fire or friendship, it was hard to guess. I've had this little item ready for months. But I almost let you go, I'm that afraid!
(in earbud) Montag!
And something more! It listens! if you put it in your ear, Montag, I can sit comfortably home, warming my frightened bones, and hear and analyze the firemen's world, find it's weaknesses, without danger. I'm the Queen Bee, safe in the hive. You will be the drone, the traveling ear. Eventually, I could put out ears into all parts of the city, with various men, listening and evaluating. If the drones die, I'm still safe at home, tending my fright with a maximum of comfort and a minimum of chance. See how safe I play it, how contemptible I am?