Latest / Great Detectives of Old Time Radio Volume 2|Mystery Audio Dramas / Mercury Theatre: The Thirty-Nine Steps (EP1400s)

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Mercury Theatre: The Thirty-Nine Steps (EP1400s) · Great Detectives of Old Time Radio Volume 2|Mystery Audio Dramas

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Welcome to the Great Detectives of Old Time Radio from Boise, Idaho. This
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is your host, Adam Graham. If you have a comment, send it
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to me Box thirteen at Great Detectives dot net, follow us on Twitter at
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Radio Detectives, and become one of our friends on Facebook, Facebook dot com,
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slash Radio Detectives. And I do want to let you know you can
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support the show at support dot Great Detectives dot net. Well, before we
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do get started, I want to say welcome to our one thousand, four
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hundredth episode special, which actually happens to be the fifth anniversary of our very
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first regular podcast of Box thirteen, back on October twenty sixth of two thousand
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and nine. It really has been a pleasure to bring you so many great
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programs, from Box thirteen to Barry Craig and now to The Saint, and
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so many shows in between. Today we're going to bring you a presentation of
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the thirty nine Steps. Now, long time listeners may say, wait a
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second, Adam, I thought, back at our six hundredth episode special,
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you did the thirty nine Steps, and what are you doing doing the same
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story eight hundred episodes later. Well, that's a good question, and it's
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the same title, it's based on the same story, but I think you'll
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find tonight's presentation very different. If for no other reason, then it's the
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Mercury Theater of presentation. So here from August first of nineteen thirty eight is
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the Mercury Theater's presentation of the thirty none Steps. The Columbia Network takes pride
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in presenting Orgon Wells and the Mercury Theater on the air in the fourth broadcast
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of a unique new series dramatizing famous narratives by great authors. This is the
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first time that a complete the ethical producing company has been brought to radio,
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and the Columbia Network again welcomes mister Wells and is a Soviet to its own
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stations and to the stations of the Canadian broadcasting corporations close to coast. Every
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week, Austin Wells and VI star listeners to suggest their favorite titles, and
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Tonight The Mercury Later on the Air presents thirty nine Steps by John Bucken,
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with Auson Wells as Richard Hannay and Marmaduke Joffly. Here is Austin Wells,
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Good Evening Medic and Gentlemen. I cannot resolve the full name of the author
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of the thirty nine steps. Seven university degrees and a title make him a
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gentleman and a starlar, and also practically unpronounceable. So I think you'd like
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to know, if you didn't, that it is the present Governor General of
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the Dominion of Canada and first Baron of Tweedsmuir who perpetrated this all and shamelessly
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exciting spy story about high doings in Scotland, Lord temp who, in private
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life as a publisher, it himself very properly a Scotsman who regards the sensational
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diversity of his responsibilities with the special calm of his nation. I regard my
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business, he says, as my profession, writing as my amusement, and
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politics as my duty. On my will talk fighters not. But it was
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saday eyes that under one left excuse it boiled with one bottle too many with
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one bottle? What's your name? Let's self its what's your name? All
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right? All right? Can there's the streets around times I never sawry before
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in my life. They yellow there hawks of one my wisal cool, all
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right? I think a night over us. Hey, you want to follows.
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The mother had tonight, HM got this shining head and the spin this
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hut Henny in emed Henny oo Sea. This is Hanny too Sea with his
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parent Broo seed see two seed bo with the tenner Hanny, Henny. Wake
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up, wake up this marm and you po mama, mama, you play
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early one. Wake up. Stop the lovely shooting, the little shooting,
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starry fishing, little fishing. I cannaly start, I get canny me,
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Hey, Hanny, are your phone ringing? Wake up? Nons it?
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Hannay, Yeah, that's the drugs, dirty very yellow oft my romolady hat,
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you're still were you close the street? Yere strange that I don't know
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you and I don't know what you're doing here in the middle of the street.
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And I ought to tell you this, you know when I thought then
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flat to see a woman is standing in a bowler hat. And then you
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don't build collector, No, don't stutters, speak up, I don't.
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I'll tell you what I saw. I saw an old old lady. Let's
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put it, just getting all right to the keyho I'm under saying. I
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looked through the keyl and that was the old old ladies in a chair,
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and Richard had an apartment. You know what. Her weight was fucking less.
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He and the phone kept ringing and she didn't answer this. It just
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there. I just sat there with her eyes open. M h Chris,
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I Charlie putting up. You won't make it s dig it, dig it.
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They's not all change a lot. Maybe God greatly get away. You
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are good, but the good change it now be? Yeah, what's end
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of the tapes? And like a dog, he's said, a dog you
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got there? He said, all dogs are missing animals seven pass your comminations.
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They don't wear away do their cameras Elis canby by change you tell me?
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Look, did you play this for mom? Charlie? After the lease?
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Now hear you after's Christy? But I'm an charly seven boy, Charlie.
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You know he don't running off? Did he? Thank you? They
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do? Shout up them Mandy lollipop me out didn't I'm sorry, havn't that
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one? Ye? What is this? I didn't have time as well as
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Lincoln? Where too? Where to Newton Stewart anyway eighty botany ten? Don't
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think, but thank you for bolling from I charge it? Yeah, say
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girl doom I can't see why pleasant you have to put up with that sort
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of thing. And the leasha mind already goes did well, Dame Charlie.
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Dangers and lollipop is a doggy boom. Things are overcurtas of this without being
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a lot of flly frud. Time must say, excuse me, so well
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open the window. Some people are never set its side. What do you
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mind, Charlie? The dog is meant who is friends? You don't mind
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what anybody may say? All right? Maybe all right? I considered myself
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stick dog, and I always remember, Charlie, that a man who doesn't
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like a dog is no friend of yours. You could be sure that's Richard.
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And it did to keep a dog, not in the murderer, no
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man, as with doing a poor old lady through the art, and it's
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that would keep a dog, No, Charlie, dog curious taste that Portland
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pat murder affair, isn't it? Their? All right? I'm good about
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it, you know, I'm always in a good murder here we are,
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sir. These Guardian chronicles take an addition, I haven't seen this on your
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cough yet, gott in her currents in Portland Square, not one stories and
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he disappears since pankcake. Oh yeah, odd one, look at this.
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Yeah, even the belief that the stricks that day they did north of the
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food truckling yard is stitching all great northern thing, Okay, great northern that
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Oh shut it head trying to do frighten the city, all right, lady,
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sorry it. Maybe he's sitting here the news in it's very compartment,
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a moment in the blood of the slain that dry on his hands. You
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got the will shoot right here. It is light hair, brown eyes,
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bloom and flash. But pety five wearing a great sweet feet and somebody's picking.
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Now it is the place seventeen You right with him talking about the last
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wait for that one charm. That's a ray. Now you're not nolly talk
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to one asas gentleman here, what's all roads wid the ten head on his
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sport and police murder reported in stolen car, large green Danler speeding Souers.
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That's the best thing you can suggest, Sullivan, from whose very escaped his
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life from a motor accident, Brendy and so great is the head he did.
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Sullivant went through it like butter down the bed and little Lucky came out
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of line, Juan, lucky thing too. I came it on, twisted
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out get them to stay the supper Sullivans, and then taken the cag you
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clothes on his oar his bath into pad befo. Not a pleasant thing to
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turn over three times for Dave in the sat Sullivan, he's done with his
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s I lead out to loose thurds Oh, good word, Sullivan. Tell
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cop there'll be two for supper. He has been too informed those twos on
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frist unsolved head, Yes, Sullivan, I the gentleman has just been in
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the cargo. Of course, make it risky, Sullivan. Oh still,
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hello, hello there, I say hello. You look better in the U
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turns than I ever said, do do Sullivan? Yes, you're staying the
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couple man. I hope Sullivan does with peasant man in the part you haven't
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introduced that show. I think you ought to know. You have in your
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house the man who was wanted to the sort and straight murder. What's that?
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My name is Richard Hannay. Your duty is to send for the police
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and give me up. I don't think I'll guess that if there'd be an
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accident and I'll have a knife in my rib scenario. So after sunset and
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the less it's your duty as a law abiding citizen. He murderer to me,
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I'm not the fact he is a Three days ago a man was found
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dead in my flat. To think, says a man, sound murdered the
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head of murdered a man. It's important, Terry was a woman. It
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was a man. Oh no, the old fellows Harry is rich here on
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the Wenesday. The victim was a woman, an old woman, an old
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woman. The body that was found in my flat on Tuesday morning the body
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of a man named Nathan Goder Sullivan. Yes, yes, I think two
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blocks. Well, well here it is. Here's the whole story. My
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name is Richard Hannay. I was a mining engineer al Jezia in for a
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while. I made my pile and came back to England three weeks ago.
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Well, last Monday night, I got back to my flat about ten o'clock.
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I lived in a new block behind Portland Place. There's a port in
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the building. Leaves around nine, I came up the stairs. I had
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my phone ringing hello, Hello, Hello, Hello. That calls for me?
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What heaven meant? Put it off? You love yeah, the sorry
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let liberty. I know pretting in this way, but I need help worse
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than any man ever agree when I come on you ten Indeed I have an
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idea by this time tomorrow and for the dead. But what he told me
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the minute he got in the door, the little man was scared. If
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I could see that he carried a parcel undries, I'm a brown paper parcel.
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And there was a trickle of blood on his left hand, fresh cut
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cross the knuckles. There's going to be a war. Now, wait a
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minute, that's what he told me, a war. And this war is
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going to come as a great surprise to Britain. Somebody is going to be
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murdered. He it's only this Thursday, Remember thirty night in London a fellow
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called Karlidas. WoT nothing on Earth's conclusion. But that's just the beginning.
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According to what this fellow told me, Carolidis isn't important, not in himself.
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It's what comes after. He did. On July fifteenth, the Chief
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of the French General Staff will be in London on that day. The British
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Admiralty is to give a complete statement the disposition of the entire British fleet.
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On mobilization. Least if I gather as something like that, something uncommonly important
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now him on the fifteenth of July. There will be others in London.
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I don't know who. He had a name for them. He called them
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me black Stone. But somehow this informations, those secrets about our feet destined
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for France, will be diverted into their hands on that day, July fifteenth,
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and will be used used remember a week or two later against England by
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our dead before with great guns and swift torpedoes. Suddenly in the darkness of
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a summer night. I know you don't believe this. I didn't when he
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told it. I do know well. I noticed that while this man's koda
19:44
was talking, he kept singering a little black notebook which is full of writing,
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some sort of code. It looked like you may believe me or not,
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just as you pity. This is the seller speaking the cellar with the
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brown paper parcel, and they cut across his knuckles. This is what he
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said, yes for this information. I got the first thing nearly two years
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ago in an inn on the acons in Girole. I collected my other clues
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in a first shop in the Delictim quote. I'm good at test in a
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stranger club in Vienna, in a little bookshop, in the reckon staff in
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life. Here I continued my evidence ten days ago in carriage and until yesterday
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I thought that, and it wasn't observed. Don't answered, don't answered for
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me? Those men calling Steve, I'm here, don after yes, let
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me tell you something. One of the lights here into the window. Look
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and uh well I look the moment I saw nothing but the deserted street below.
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Then I noticed a man in a bold of hat standing in a doorway
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across the street. When I came home last night, I found a card
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in my little box. Where is the black Stone? What's the black stone?
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That's the name, that's what they call themselves, these people. When
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I got that card, I knew that I had to die. Why don't
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you call a police? These men followed me here I'm bottled in this building
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and showed the people heaving of that. That's why I'm telling you all.
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This couldn't tonight. If I say, oh, well, last, I
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should hate to leave the scene without leaving somebody behind for a fight. Oh.
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I still didn't know what to make of the little chap and it was
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getting late, so I made him a bed in nice smoking room. Good
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Night, good night, I intake. I'm up here in the morning.
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I haven't the privilege of your name, sir, but let me tell you
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you're a white man, oh, I said, before you go to bed,
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I'll thank you to lend me a razor. I locked the door of
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my room. Finally I fell asleep. I woke before dawn. Couldn't go
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to bed again. I had a cigarette, started to read and I know
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it's the light and the smoking room still on. I got up. I
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had a cigarette in my mouth, I remember, and as I pushed open
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the smoking room door, I saw something that made me drop my cigarette.
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Bolt upright. In a chair by the window sat old woman with her eyes
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open. There was a long knife through her heart, which skewered her to
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the back of a chair. I looked quickly about and called for Skoda.
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There was no reply. Then I noticed three things. First, the old
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woman's wig had fallen slightly askew. Second that the brown paper parcel I'd noticed
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under Scoder's arm the night before was now lying open and empty on the table.
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Third that across the knuckles of the old woman's left hand was a fresh,
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unhealed cut. From the limpness of the body, I estimated that Skoder
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had been dead for about two hours. I wondered what had happened to the
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little Black Book. I searched Skoda's bodin for nothing. Then I noticed that
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the whole flat had been ransacked in the night. The inside the books drawers
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covered even the sideboard in the dining room. I shut it and bolted every
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door and window in the flat. Scolder's story was true. The men who
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knew that he knew what he knew had found him and had made certain of
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his silence. You see, his disguise had not saved him. I'd be
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the next to girl. But suppose suppose I went out now and called the
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police. What kind of a story could I tell about Scolder? If I
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told them the truth, they'd simply laugh at me. I'd be charged with
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murder. The best I could hope for was jail, and that was just
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what they wanted for me. An English prison was as good a way of
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getting rid of me till after July fifteenth as a knife in my chest.
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I got out an atlas and looked at the big map of the British isles.
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My notion was to get off to some wild district, some open space
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where my South African experience would be helped to me, some place where I'd
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be safe. Hiding for six days until July fifteenth, I decided scott And
24:51
would be best. There was a train from Saint Sankas at seventeen. I
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went to the window and looked out between the shutters. Just beginning to get
25:00
light, I saw a man standing in the doorway in the bowler hat.
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Then another man who seemed to be drunk, came down in evening, dressed
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down the street. He walked unsteadily. He caught sight of the man in
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the bowler hat and went over and spoke to him. Then he crossed the
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street and came into the house. We mother, you put old mother,
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and you father, you the early boy. Wake up, go stopping shooting,
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old shooting. I thought I was literally fling. N't know it.
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Stay old Hannah. He hey, hannay hunting your phoney, Wake up montt
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Hannah, that's a good drop O stop desjoying her. I waited till heave
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gone. I put a pipe in my pocket and threw my pousional tobacco jo
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on the table by the fireplace, and I poked into the tobacco and I
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think it touched something hard and I drew out good this little black book somehow,
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I think a good omen. I went out of the street, past
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the doorway, past the man in the bowler hat, and at seven ten
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I was at in Pancrat station, just went out. Won't make it,
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Jeffree, stop, We'll take him up, David for a good way,
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crazy to get good away. Ten hours later beteen Dolby and Newton Stewart.
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I pulled the emergency cord and jumped off the train from another of that was
27:45
a good mile from the track. Before I stopped running the moor all roun
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me. You couldn't have found a more peaceful lands get in the world.
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Yet, at that moment, for the first time in my life, I
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felt the terror of the hunted on me. Caughtn't the police. I was
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afraid of it. The others who knew that I knew Skoder's secret and dared
28:08
not let me live. They had killed Skoda in my flat within a few
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yards of me, not with my turn. And I didn't even know what
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these men looked like. Wish I'd listened more careful what Skoda had said about
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them. I I think he said with three of them, and that one
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of them was young and dark, and one was plump, and one was
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old and stammered sometimes when he spoke. Suddenly, in the blue evening sky,
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I saw something low down in the south. A monoplane was climbing into
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the heavens. I was as certain as if I had been told that that
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aeroplane was looking for me. It flew low over the hillhouse and then back
29:23
over the valley. I started to run. I ran through the sweat,
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blinded my eyes. I ran most of the night, keeping all my south
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in the direction of the hills, And as the mists cleared before the sun,
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I found myself in the central blot of a high upland country, with
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glens falling away on every side. Then I saw the monoplane again, coming
29:56
up from the east. It was flying high. It circled about me and
30:06
narrowing circles the way I saw wheels before it pounces. Now it was flying
30:17
quite low. They observed one caught sight of me. I could see him
30:21
looking at bit through the through flat No that was speeding eastward again. It
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became a speck in the blue morning. My dams had located me. The
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next thing would be a cordon around me. There wasn't enough cover on the
30:45
whole moor to hide a rat. I tossed the coin heads right, tails,
30:48
left. There were heads. So I turned north. But while I
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got the mountain country and came to the Brava Ridge, way down a slope
31:00
a couple of miles away, several men were advancing, like a row of
31:03
beaters at a shoot. And may have been my imagination, but I thought
31:10
I saw figures one, two perps more moving in a glen beyond the stream.
31:15
I looked down into the valley. There were men below police. They
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looked like not more than a quarter of a mile off, based out on
31:22
the hillside, like a sand beating the heather. Hey hey, hey,
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com Oh yes yes there, mbium, Yeah, you are listening to the
31:45
Columbia Networks presentation of Horse and Wells and the Mercury Theater in John Buckin's Thirty
31:52
nine Steps. We shall resume the story in a moment. This is the
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Columbia Broadcasting System. The Columbia Network is presenting thirty nine Steps by John Buckham,
32:13
and now the Mercury theater resumes the story with orson Wells as Richard Hannay
32:17
and Marmaduke Joply. Here we were playing hare and hounds pleas and I soon
32:35
it began to seem less of a game. The police is evidently called in.
32:37
Local herds of gamekeepers he saw as were hestin and on the native heath
32:43
hauking back. I saw that only three were following me, and the others
32:46
had fetched a circuit to cut me off. I crossed a burn and came
32:50
out on a road which seemed to be kept at some care. A few
32:53
hundred yards to my left, I saw the chimneys of a house smoking.
32:58
There was a verandom from the house, and through the grass, I saw
33:02
the face of an elderly gentleman, meekly watching me even a hurry, my
33:16
friend. His face was rounds and shiny, like mister Pickwick. On the
33:24
top of his head was as bright and bare as a glass bottle. Through
33:30
the window could be seen some figures half a mile off I see usually did
33:37
from justice a well. We go into the night at our leisure. Who
33:44
into my study. You'll see two doors facing you. Take the one to
33:49
the left and close it behind you. Close it tight. I did as
33:55
I was told. I was in a little dark chamber that smelled of chemicals.
34:07
Wasn't in it? Too happy? The thing about the old gentleman I
34:13
was terrifying me. He'd been too easy and ready, almost as if he'd
34:17
been expecting me, and his eyes had been horribly intelligent. All right,
34:27
they come out? Now have they gone? They have gone? I convinced
34:34
them that you had crossed the hill. I did not choose that the police
34:37
should come between me and one whom I'm delighted to honor. He smiled gently
34:44
and nodded to the door behind me. I turned and saw two men servants
34:49
who had been covered with pistols. This is a lucky morning for you,
34:53
mister Richard Hanning. Hey, what's going on? Me? And who are
35:00
you calling? Richard? Anny? My name? Thanksley so, but of
35:07
course you have many names. You won't quarrel about a name, mister Henry.
35:12
And now I suppose you're going to give me up after all. And
35:15
a little dirty trick, i't call it. Go on wish. I've never
35:17
seen at kirkey money, and it isn't a dancer. You are a clever
35:23
act on, mister Henry, but not quite clever enough. Oh no,
35:28
I shall not give you up. My friends and I will have a little
35:31
private settlement with you. Just stop jawing everything that gains me. What's the
35:37
arm and a poor devil with an empty stomach picking up the money finds in
35:40
the lost pocket. That's all I've done is for that. I've been killed
35:44
for two days. But these rotted barbies, over these rotted hills, I
35:49
could see the dawning of a thought in his mind. Ah, I'll tell
35:55
you, I'm first sick of it. You oblige me with a story of
36:00
your recent doings, mister Hannon, the governor. I have not had a
36:05
party, but you. They give me a mouthful of food manually a god,
36:07
A good liar, Hannis. But I do not propose to let you
36:13
go. If you are what you say you are, you will soon have
36:16
a chance of killing yourself. If you're what I think you are, I
36:22
do not think you will see the light much longer during the that's nine,
36:28
yeah, yeah, I want thee dameler. In five minutes, there will
36:34
be three to dinner. Goodbye, mister Hannis. You will meet again to
36:39
tonight. He much out the room with a pistol, and the smaller my
36:43
back. They locked me up again in a small dark chamber that's snout of
36:51
chemicals, that was as black as pitch. Well. I made out of
36:55
the world will line with boxes and barrels and sacks of some heavy stuff.
37:01
The old boy had gone off in the car toffect his friends at the back.
37:04
Soon the plump one and the dark thin one. If I figured out,
37:10
I just about two hours longer to live. And I I got a
37:14
skirt dressed up like an old woman, sitting in a chair by a window
37:21
in my flat with his eyes open. I got up and started moving around
37:24
the room again. I found a handle in the wall the door of a
37:28
cupboard of some sort, and in that cupboard that were bottles in cases of
37:31
queer smelling stuffs, and coils of fine copper wire. It was a box
37:36
of detonators and a lot of cord for fuses. Also half a dozen little
37:40
gray bricks. I took up one and smelled it and put it at my
37:44
tongue. I've been a mining engineer for nothing, I know lent to night
37:49
when I see it. It was a risk, but if I didn't take
37:55
it, I'd probably be occupying a six foot hole in the garden by even
38:00
anyhow so it was a quarter of a lens night brick, and buried it
38:07
near the door. And then I got a detonator and a couple of feet
38:08
of fuse, and then I lit a match. Something had hit my left
38:34
shoulder. There was a poisonous yellow fog all around me. Somewhere behind me,
38:38
I felt pressure. I started to run. I ran much later in
38:46
appearing on a hillside, I saw a small stone building with a tower.
38:53
The door was open. It was dark and cool inside. Daggered in and
39:00
sat down one of the benches, the pain in my shoulders unbearable. Then
39:04
I heard stiffs coming down the path. I found a small door in one
39:09
corner and narrow stairs running up to the tower. I went up, and
39:17
most of the top of this tower was taken up with bells. There was
39:22
a small ledge outside, just wide enough to lie down on. I heard
39:27
a man downstairs below me in the tower. I lay there with a burning
40:01
hair and the sun glaring in my face right above me. With them out
40:14
of me. They couldn't have missed me lying down on the open ledge.
40:17
They knew where I was. Soon they'd come back to me. Suddenly,
40:27
right under me, still some presently up the hill sides, little dark knots
40:39
of men began to appears. They came slowly, dozens of them, all
40:45
moving towards me, slowly advancing, closing in on me. I was too
40:50
sick to move. I laid I waiting for the come and get me.
40:53
Now they were in the building below me. In a few seconds they'd be
40:55
up the stairs. I waited, and no one came. I laid the
40:59
waiting, and a thought struck me. Skoda had been murdered on Thursday night,
41:07
four days ago, Thursday Friday Saturday, four days Then then, these
41:12
men coming up the hills in little dark knots in black, slowly advancing,
41:17
closing in on me, were not my enemies. They weren't after me.
41:21
They didn't even know I was there. They were peacefully walking to church with
41:23
their families. It was Sunday. Presently, a large green open damer drove
41:37
up. Three men got out, my plump friend, the professor, and
41:43
the dark young man. I could see them looking up at my tower.
41:49
Two of them went into the church, the thin man stayed at the car.
41:53
I waited up there on the ledge, but they didn't come up.
42:02
They left me there. The service had just begun. That gave me about
42:17
an hour. Now. There was an old iron drain pipe running along the
42:22
corner of the tower. It didn't seem particularly solid. Besides, I was
42:29
in full sight of a man in the car. At that moment it started
42:35
to rain. The man in the car looked up at the sky. He
42:38
turned his collar, and then he shrugged his shoulders, got out of the
42:40
car and went to the church. I started down the side of the tower.
42:54
Halfway down, my foot slipped and I sail the ground the staft.
42:57
I got up and went over the car and drove off. I drove that
43:13
day and a rough She was worse the bridge, driving with my right arm
43:17
on an action, but I drove on south downhill into the valley in the
43:22
rope is full of sharp curtas and shiny under my head light, and very
43:24
fliberately got that's right, Sudan, mister Haynes. I may talk like an
43:38
alplus at the time, but I can dive up a Thanks Govan, pull
43:44
it with you two stip one very good time. My name is Kenny y
43:47
Honey. You're no murderer and you're no fool, and I believe you're speaking
43:52
the truth. I'm going to back you up. Now what can I do?
43:55
I have got to get in touch with the government sometime before June fifteenth.
44:00
Of July fifteen, that's the day at you can help me, all
44:04
right, I will. The Permanent Secretary of Foreign Office is my cousin.
44:07
One of the best goings. The challenge is college in the country, health
44:10
issues. If you start early, Tom Sullivan, Yes, the head the
44:15
station wagon here at sixteen of mornings. Yes, a deserve compartment of the
44:17
subject stress. Yes in Sullivan, Yes, he pretendant telegram. It's a
44:22
welter. Yes, it's a man called Henny Kenny and better not use my
44:28
real name. So right you are. If a man called Kenathan, you
44:34
will take of a name from mister Hannah, Yes, sir, assaulted in
44:37
Sir, Yes Sullivan and British of course. Oh yes, you can turn
44:40
on me, sir, her daughter Bullivan, Kenneth Arkins, will Kimbridge child.
44:55
It's a man called Christen, a ters to model who candy. He
45:01
needs to do something which will wake you up. He will pass the word
45:07
blackstone and any lolly loves heady. The stream isn't it? Oh, begard
45:43
kennet without fishing east any river in England. He's that big della there four
45:49
pounds if he's not there yard from the reeds. Just let stick now he's
45:57
a big zilla that swear black Stone. Yes, Brisbane's name, isn't it
46:15
No? I mean to say, yes, Why is considered that knows his
46:21
own name as the water? Now? Then Misstephanie, my cousin promised you'd
46:28
tell me something that would rate me up. I'm ready, Oh, mister
46:32
Henny, before we begin, I think Jedio. I got a letter from
46:37
Skoda this morning. Skoda. Yeah, this has been dead a week.
46:40
He's written on the eighth day before he came to you. His letters usually
46:45
took a week to weekly. He descends on the cover of Spain and then
46:47
ned there week you greenfellows, Koda. He knew more international secrets than any
46:55
secret service name in Europe. A couple about him all he liked to play
47:00
alone dead, never tell us all he knew? Say because it was getting
47:04
reminded. Let a novel to water is Carol lightis in London? You being
47:13
the days? In his letter? Did Goot say anything about fling your Carolinas,
47:17
didn't you Carol Ladies. Scotus said that the fourteenth of July to day
47:22
Carolights would be murdered. Carol Ladies murdered. Nonsense. The new state in
47:29
Europe once came out of the way. Virtue, as Carol Ladies is that
47:32
they did was all it was made. Scoola went off the trail there saw
47:37
yes, he followed that came through from London. Thanks to excuse me in
47:44
the separation. Gee, car right away you call the foreign novice fell on
47:52
the way up. Yes, sir, I apologize to the shield of Scooga.
47:57
Carrol Ladies was shot dead this evening, a few minutes after seven.
48:07
He begets, look like warster Hanna, and what about our naval plans to
48:14
want you know what Scota sineba and said, tomorrow your life at kim We
48:20
are taking no chances, mister Hannay. General dufour chiefs of the French General
48:24
staff arrived in London five day. He dines with the Prime Minister and then
48:29
he goes to the foreign vist. The poor people will see him, will
48:32
have go from the admiral dead as Ol go up at groom. General Winstanley,
48:37
Lord Sterling maybe it out. You never know about him. He gets
48:40
more erected every day the Foreign Office, General dufour, we will get a
48:45
certain document from Phitttergo. After that you will be motor to Portsmouth. Better
48:51
destroyer will take him to ub You won't be left unattended for a moment and
48:54
gonna be safe in terrace. The same with whittter Go till the people's out
48:59
with his head and they do kains ofmitting. I'm horribly nervous. So what
49:05
if that transquires children? Could the disposition to changed? We can't meet any
49:09
serious change in those dispositions, mister Hennay, unless we all the the geography
49:15
of Engram Ooh. And now, gentlemen, that our meeting is over,
49:35
I must ask you to give me a few minutes longer of your game.
49:37
Gentlemen, I ask you to meet mister Henny. How do you do mister
49:42
Henny, General the four to meet you, Arthur Drew, how do you
49:45
do so? Don't win that? How do you do so? General Winstanley?
49:50
Gentlemen, I take a heavy unusual step of asking mister Hannay to attend
49:54
our Meeting's nate because mister Hennay is in possession of a certain fatal informations which
50:00
everyone of those. Yes, Sarry Walter, I am a sick man and
50:05
going back to my bed where I belong. Good night, gentlemen, good
50:10
night, mister Hannay. Sorry I can't stay to hear what you've got to
50:15
say. Oh and whatever comes up, you take care of it. Don't
50:22
call me again tonight. Stop that man. I tell you, stop that
50:29
man. Stop him. I beg of you to stop him. If you
50:32
won't, I will too. Late. Gentlemen, who do you think went
50:42
through that door a minute ago? God sternly did not with his living image,
50:45
but it was not Lord Sterling. Gentlemen, have you ever known Lord
50:47
Sterling? Good stammer Kenny, if you don't have your head, I tell
50:52
you, gentlemen, that man who went up with not Lord Sterling, with
50:54
someone who recognized me, someone I've seen in the last three days. Ansome
51:00
surly, mister Henry, I think you have gone out of here. Amain
51:01
to the seen. So waltermy I call Lord Sterning touse, I'll do it.
51:06
Hello say a house hi please? Hello? Yes, Hello, this
51:13
is wrf at Bullaman. Will you ask Lord Sterling to call me the manye?
51:16
He gets home. What what's that? Are you sure? Hey?
51:22
Thanks? Lord Sterling hasn't been out of his bed all day. He went
51:29
to sleep at six and wrote up a few minutes ago. Well then,
51:31
who was it? The Blackstone? But it's madness. You need to tell
51:37
me that that man came here and tactic tide me for the death part of
51:39
an hour, and I didn't detect the impostor my own chief. You were
51:44
too interested in other things to have the use of your eyes. You took
51:46
Lord Sterning for granted, did its been anybody else? You might have looked
51:51
more closely? Thing that puzzles me is? Or what good would his nature?
51:54
Here? Do? That pillow here depends I here on this table.
52:00
He couldn't carry away several pages of figures and langed names in his head.
52:04
Yes he could. The train sky has a photographic memory. You noticed he
52:08
said nothing which went through those papers again in the game. Those plans were
52:13
as lost to us as if he had them in his pocket. Give me
52:16
the home office, port divisions, had every report watched, every outgoing steamer
52:22
checked. As we have not a lag of a crew. I wonder his
52:30
scoder's little black book it encode except for one seventh scroll of the last page.
52:35
Scoder knew where those fellows would hide. He knew when they were going
52:38
to leave the country. I wonder if in that second what is it?
52:44
Let's car it thirty nine steps? I counted them high tide ten seventeen PM
52:52
thirty nine. That is a clue, don't you see? And it was
52:55
someplace where high tide was a ten seventeen So at least one hundred places in
53:00
England where they died high at ten seventeen tomorrow we've gone from. They have
53:07
their own secret friends and they won't be married firty nine. What does he
53:10
mean by his step? Doc steps? And he wouldn't have mentioned their numbers.
53:15
It must be a place where there's more than one set of spills,
53:20
Oh, Rob, Department of ten plases. Hello, Bullowan speaking, They
53:25
say, is there any regular steamer leading for the continent ten seventeen gm?
53:30
We have what you sure? Thanks, there's no regular steamer sailing for the
53:38
continent at ten seventeen gm from anywhere. It must be a private, broken
53:43
little port that explains how the ti it's important. Hello, give me the
53:46
Admiral Dape. Hello all the Bullowan speaking O Jencans. What places you know
53:54
along the east coast, whether at cliff there are several sets of steps run
53:59
down of the leak, I mean steps, regular staircases. What's that?
54:04
Based in Norfolk, Brettleton, Golf Coast. No, that's not it.
54:09
No, No, marine DearS don't do either. Has to be more retired
54:15
than that. What we else, dank man think it's important? What's that?
54:22
What you call it? The rap? Listen to this? A big
54:28
chalk headlanding, Kent. Plose to brad Sata b at the abital to tie
54:31
table, Bradgate, Kent. Yes, yes, a lot of villas on
54:36
top of the cliff and some of the houses have staircases down to a private
54:39
shih Serrata. Yeah. Listen to this Bradgate high Tide, July the fifteen,
54:45
ten seventeen PM. Bradgate, July fifteenth, considential report, Richard Hannes,
55:17
Special Agent, Sir Walter Bullivant, Permanent Secretary and Foreign Office. There
55:23
is a villa with thirty nine steps leading down to the sea Strafargo Lodge.
55:29
It's called a dropped an old gentleman called Appleton, a retired stockbroker. Well,
55:37
here's what happened At about six that evening I saw the yacht. The
55:40
foreign steam yacht came up from the south and dropped anchor pretty well up at
55:45
the rough. Then later our British destroyer came in. At half past nine,
55:53
I strolled towards Strafargo Lodge, the Scotland yard. Men would be hosted
56:00
around the house by now, but there was no sign of a soul.
56:07
The house stood as open and public as a charity bazaar. Yes, sir,
56:15
does mister Appleton live here? Yes, sir, I'd like to see
56:17
him, please, I please, he's in. Will you wait here any
56:22
old please, sir? I found myself in a neat hall. There were
56:27
the golf clubs and tennis rackets which you'll find in ten thousand British homes.
56:31
There was you know, grandfather clock taking a barometer and a print of children
56:37
winning a grand nash War Nigel last day, sir, hannay, will you
56:42
came this wife, Lisa? Mister Nay. The old man rose to meet
56:46
me. He was an evening dress, so was the plump one. The
56:52
third, the dark one wore a blue searge suit the colors of some club
57:00
or school. Hannay, you see me one moment you fellows, I'll go
57:07
on. You bet you go to the smoking room, mister Hanny, we'll
57:10
stay here. I think we've met before. I guess you know my business.
57:16
Maybe, sir, maybe I haven't said it was memory. I'm afraid
57:21
you must tell me your Evan, for I really don't know it. Well,
57:24
then, I've come to tell you that the game's up. I have
57:30
a warrant here for the rest of you three really best, good God?
57:35
What for the murder of Nathan Scoder in London on the eighth day of this
57:38
month? By I've never heard the name before, Good Heaven. You must
57:43
be mad, though? Where did it come from? Don't get faster?
57:46
Then it's a ridiculous mistake. Well, these things happen sometimes. Well,
57:51
we can easily sat it right. I can show that I was out of
57:53
the country on the eighth and Bob was down here. You were in London.
57:58
But of course you can explain you were doing right Thursday four, that's
58:01
easy enough. Eight last Thursday, Why that was the day after Agatha's wedding.
58:07
Let me see what was I doing. I came up in the morning
58:09
from walking and lunched the club with Charlie Simonds. Oh yes, Then I
58:15
dined at the City Hall, I remember, with the punch. Didn't degree
58:17
with me. I was seen you next morning. Hang it all those the
58:22
cigar box I got back from the dinner. I think what a Ellio says.
58:25
She always said you'd die on bottom because nothing ever happened to you,
58:29
And now you've got intig and strong. Well that's wonderful guy job. Yes,
58:32
just think of it. What a story to tell at the club,
58:37
lady, mister Hanney. I suppose I should be angry to show my innoces,
58:39
but it's too funny. I almost forgive you the fright you gave me.
58:45
You looked so glum. I thought I might have been walking in my
58:47
sleep and killing people. I jacked the ripper. It couldn't be acting.
58:52
It was too confounded, genuine. Well, my heart went into my boots.
58:58
My first impulse was to apologize and clear out. And yet there were
59:04
three of them, and one was old and one was plump, and one
59:12
was lean and dark, and their house fitted in with Scudder's notes, and
59:15
half a mile off shore was lying a foreign yacht. There's any one thing
59:20
to do, go for as rand or dogs. I was going to make
59:22
a fool myself him as well, do it handsomely. Then I remembered what
59:25
old Peter Peniels told me in rudesia Vescar Avenue. He told me once talking
59:30
about disguises, the buying certainties like finger prints near physical traits are of very
59:37
little importance. If a man really knows his business, well, he laughed,
59:43
to think like dyed here and false beards and such childish follies. If
59:47
a man really knew his business, If you're playing a part, you'll never
59:53
keep it up unless you convince yourself that you really are the man you're pretending
59:58
to be. So I walked to the door and switched on the electric light,
1:00:05
and the sudden gray I made them blink, and I stood scanning the
1:00:07
three faces while I made nothing of it. One was old and bald,
1:00:10
one was stark, one was dark and thin. That's all I could tell.
1:00:14
Perhaps they were the three men who had hunted me in Scoff, and
1:00:15
perhaps they weren't. There was a silver cigarette box from the table beside me,
1:00:20
and I saw that it had been won by Percy Appleton, a squire
1:00:23
the Saint Bede's Club, in a golf tournament. Are you reassured by your
1:00:27
scoudin name. I make no complaint, but you see how annoying it must
1:00:30
be, respectable people. Are you going to drop it? No? O,
1:00:36
lord, this is a bit too thick. Do you suppose the march
1:00:37
of office a police station? And I have the right less to see your
1:00:40
warrant? You know what? I don't wish to catch any aversions of one.
1:00:43
You say you're only doing a goody with you will admit it hollibly awkward.
1:00:46
What are you proposed to do? Well? I vote we have a
1:00:49
game of far They will give us a hannay time to think things over and
1:00:52
so and there's no ill feeling. You played there? Yes, play vidiot,
1:00:57
room is downstairs, mister Hannay. Why don't you two stark with litty
1:01:00
shot? The guard doesn't come down later h went to the big drove.
1:01:10
Chuse your cue, sir, Thanks, play, I'll stop stop shop.
1:01:22
Thanks? How about if you practice shot? Yeah? You works, Hannay.
1:01:30
I'm fraid you're in for a looking bob. Should we stop? We'll
1:01:31
begin? Where? Should we talk? What are you playing for? Chilling
1:01:35
a game? All right? Head the tails heads as it is you begin?
1:01:44
Will you mark for a Purphy. I know Steven that presently have one
1:01:49
rough lot five eight. That's all all right, mister Hannay, Why that's
1:02:02
thirteen seventeen? Good, that was seventeen, Percy. Look at the time.
1:02:15
You'd better think about catching your train. Yes, certain got to town
1:02:17
tonight. I'm afraid you must put off your journey. Oh dash it all,
1:02:22
Hannah. I thought you'd drop that, but I simply got to go.
1:02:24
You can have my address and you can have any security right, No,
1:02:27
you must stay. It was five minutes after ten and twelve minutes it
1:02:30
would be high tide. Through the window I could see the lights of the
1:02:32
foreign you the aut off shore bail for my nephew. That ought to content
1:02:37
you, mister Hannah. Was it my sense? Here? Did I detect
1:02:38
some halt in the smoothness of that voice? And then then I I thought
1:02:45
of something, mister Ampleton. When did your nephew have to be in London?
1:02:50
And you say you would go bail for miss Sampleton? Yes, yes,
1:02:53
I told you. I will. Well, then preps, if I
1:02:55
could arrange the course Scotland Yards early in the morning, had it simply has
1:03:01
to be tonight, then I knew who he was come off, Come off.
1:03:10
The young dot man leads in the window. He's threw it over the
1:03:13
low fence and down the steps before a hand could reach him. Someone switched
1:03:15
on the light. The plump one was lying crumpled in the heat. They'd
1:03:17
got handcuffs on the old man. Call him time, call the up,
1:03:24
Yes, tim like storm. I hope he'll bear his triumph will mister Appleton.
1:03:32
I ought to tell you that you're yacht for the last two hours has
1:03:36
been in our hands. Well, the water, that's about all those to
1:03:45
it. That's the stories you're asking to set it down. You know the
1:03:49
rest of the present I do. Skoda was right about the war, right,
1:03:52
wasn't there in about a week? I expected right in the middle of
1:03:53
it myself because of my Matabady experience. I've got a captain's commission straight off.
1:03:57
I joined my division on Thursday. All the short I understand we're doing
1:04:00
straight up the front. Still, I'm afraid I had most of my excitement
1:04:03
before I put on Cocky heyway, good Brian, thanks for everything, great
1:04:09
sport while it lasted, Yours, Urson Stilley Richard Hannay August eighth, nineteen
1:04:15
fourteen, Night The Columbia Network has brought you Orson Wells and the Mercury Theater
1:04:26
on the air and thirty nine Steps by John Bucken. We now present the
1:04:30
star and director release broadcast, Who's the Knight played Richard Hannay Auston Wells.
1:04:34
Ladies and gentlemen, if you missed Madeline Carrol in our sag version of thirty
1:04:39
nine Steps, the young lady in the movie in common was almost everything else
1:04:42
in that movie was the child of its director's own unparalleled and unpredictable fancy.
1:04:46
If you missed anything, you must blame mister Alfred Hitchcock. If you were
1:04:49
surprised by anything, he must blame us. Well. Next week the Mercury
1:04:54
Theater, by way of an experiment, attempts the radio anthology of short stories.
1:04:58
Until then, good night everybody. They could say, let's see you
1:05:01
that week, welcome back. I have to admit the very first time I
1:05:14
heard this play a few years back, I was very shocked because the only
1:05:18
version of the Thirty nine Steps I was used to was the one with Alfred
1:05:24
Hitchcock and the mind reading act and all the trappings of that, which is
1:05:31
what we got when we played the Studio one adaptation of The Thirty nine Steps
1:05:39
starring Glenn Ford back in the six hundredth episode special, and it does say
1:05:44
something about the power of film that even a decade after The Thirty nine Steps
1:05:51
came out on film, Hitchcock's work had become the definitive version to most people.
1:06:00
And so that's what was adapted rather than the book. And it's helpful
1:06:03
to get the book adaptation, which is certainly very different, but also has
1:06:09
a very strong and engaging mystery plot as well as a good performance from Wells.
1:06:15
I wish the audio were in better shape, and there is a rehearsal
1:06:18
copy that's in better shape, but it also has it doesn't quite have the
1:06:23
same class as a full broadcast version. So I hope you enjoyed this version
1:06:28
visit to the Mercury Theater, and thank you so much to all my listeners
1:06:32
who've listened throughout these fourteen hundred episodes. And we'll be back on Monday tomorrow
1:06:40
with The Saint and then be sure and listen in again with us Tuesday for
1:06:45
Easy Money and coming next Tuesday, Crime and Peter Chambers in the meantimes,
1:06:51
and your comments to Box thirteen at Great Detectives dot net, follow us on
1:06:56
Twitter at Radio Detectives, and become one of our friends on Facebook, Facebook
1:07:00
dot com. Slash Radio Detectives from Woiseidaho. This is your host, Adam
1:07:06
Grahamson and Off