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Suspense - "Three Skeleton Key" (Old Time Radio, 1956) · Suspense | Old Time Radio

0:00
Speaker 1: On November 1st, 1956, Suspense presented Three Skeleton Key, Episode 1.
0:07
Speaker 1: James Poe's radio adaptation of Georges Gustave Toudouze's short story
0:12
Speaker 1: takes us to a small lighthouse key off the coast
0:15
Speaker 1: of French Guiana. There, three isolated keepers, Jean, Auguste, and Louis,
0:22
Speaker 1: see a cruelest, derelict ship driven onto the reef beside
0:25
Speaker 1: their bare, rocky outposts. What comes ashore turns the lighthouse
0:30
Speaker 1: into a siege. Vincent Price is heard as John, with
0:34
Speaker 1: John Daner as August, Ben Wright as Louis, and George
0:38
Speaker 1: Walsh as narrator.
0:39
Speaker 2: William N.
0:40
Speaker 1: Robson directed and produced the CBS broadcast. And now, from suspense,
0:46
Speaker 1: Three Skeleton Key. We now take you back to the
0:49
Speaker 1: original broadcast.
0:57
Speaker 3: Suspense.
0:59
Speaker 4: And the producer of radio's outstanding theater of thrills, the
1:05
Speaker 4: master of mystery and adventure, William N.
1:08
Speaker 2: Robeson.
1:10
Speaker 5: You're about to experience one of the most terrifying half-hours
1:13
Speaker 5: in your entire life. Three Skeleton Key, starring Vincent Price.
1:20
Speaker 5: Oh yes, I realize superlatives tend to lose their significance
1:23
Speaker 5: by overuse. How many times have you even promised that
1:26
Speaker 5: a story would be the funniest or the most dramatic
1:29
Speaker 5: or the most exciting, only to find that it failed
1:32
Speaker 5: to live up to its advertising? The story you are
1:34
Speaker 5: about to hear is an exception. It is unconditionally guaranteed
1:38
Speaker 5: to chill your blood unless you happen to love rats.
1:44
Speaker 5: We begin now with Mr. Vincent Price in Three Skeleton Key,
1:49
Speaker 5: a play well calculated to keep you in suspense.
1:54
Speaker 6: Suspense.
2:13
Speaker 3: Picture this place.
2:15
Speaker 7: A gray tapering cylinder welded by iron rods and concrete.
2:20
Speaker 3: To the key itself.
2:22
Speaker 7: A bare black rock, 150 feet long, maybe 40 wide.
2:27
Speaker 3: That's at low tide.
2:29
Speaker 7: At high tide, just the light, rising 110 feet.
2:33
Speaker 3: Straight up out of the ocean.
2:36
Speaker 7: And all about it, the churning water, gray-green, scum-dappled, warm
2:42
Speaker 7: as soup. and swarming with gigantic bat-like devil fish, great
2:47
Speaker 7: violet schools of Portuguese man-of-war, and, yes, sharks, the big ones,
2:55
Speaker 7: the 15-footers. And as if this wasn't enough, there was
2:59
Speaker 7: a hot, dank, rotten-smelling wind that came at us day
3:02
Speaker 7: and night off the jungle swamps of the mainland.
3:05
Speaker 3: A wind that smelled like death.
3:10
Speaker 7: Set in the base of the light was a watertight
3:12
Speaker 7: bronze door. And in you went and up, yes, up
3:18
Speaker 7: and up and round and round, past the tanks of
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Speaker 7: oil and the coils of rope, cases of wicks, racks
3:25
Speaker 7: of lanterns, sacks of spuds and cottons and cans, and
3:29
Speaker 7: up and up and up, round and round. Over the
3:34
Speaker 7: light storeroom was the food storeroom. And over the food
3:37
Speaker 7: storeroom was the bunk room where the three of us slept.
3:41
Speaker 7: And over the bunk room was the living and cooking room.
3:45
Speaker 7: And over the living and cooking room was the light.
3:51
Speaker 7: She was a beauty, balanced like a ballerina on the
3:54
Speaker 7: glistening steel axle of her rotary mechanism. And at night
4:04
Speaker 7: you'd lie there on the stone deck of the gallery.
4:07
Speaker 3: with.
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Speaker 7: Her revolving smoothly and.
4:10
Speaker 3: Quietly over your head.
4:11
Speaker 7: easing her bright white eye 360 degrees around the horizon.
4:17
Speaker 7: You'd lie there watching to see that the feeders kept working...
4:21
Speaker 7: that everything ran right. And it wouldn't be bad.
4:25
Speaker 3: The other two fellows snoring in their.
4:27
Speaker 7: Sacks two levels down. You'd smoke your pipe to kill
4:31
Speaker 7: the stink of the wind....
4:34
Speaker 3: It wouldn't be bad.
4:42
Speaker 7: About those other two, Louie and Auguste. What a pair. Louie,
4:48
Speaker 7: he was head man, was a big fellow from the
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Speaker 7: bass country, black beard, little hard black eyes, and a
4:54
Speaker 7: pair of arms that I tell you, those arms were
4:58
Speaker 7: as big around as my legs, yeah? Head man he was,
5:02
Speaker 7: and what word he let go was law. A silent fellow,
5:07
Speaker 7: and although I spent my first two weeks trying to
5:09
Speaker 7: strike up a real conversation, the.
5:12
Speaker 3: Most I could ever get.
5:13
Speaker 7: Out of him.
5:15
Speaker 8: I took up this profession because I don't like people.
5:22
Speaker 8: They talk too much. It's quiet work, light tending. Let's
5:29
Speaker 8: keep it that way. Understand?
5:33
Speaker 2: You're getting to be as bad as Auguste. I thought maybe.
5:37
Speaker 3: That was no way.
5:39
Speaker 7: And when he accused me of becoming like Auguste, I
5:42
Speaker 7: quieted down because Auguste was the talkingest man I've ever met.
5:47
Speaker 3: The talkingest and the ugliest.
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Speaker 7: He was hunchbacked, stood four feet high, had red hair
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Speaker 7: and big blue eyes. It seems he'd been an actor
5:57
Speaker 7: in Paris.
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Speaker 9: Played over 200 different productions, dear boy.
6:01
Speaker 2: That's a grand guignol.
6:03
Speaker 3: Oh, but it was monstrous.
6:04
Speaker 7: Horrible.
6:05
Speaker 3: The way we used to scare the audience. I, I
6:09
Speaker 3: was hated.
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Speaker 9: Yes, they used to throw things and hiss and bare
6:15
Speaker 9: their teeth at me. Well, finally it got too bad. I,
6:18
Speaker 9: I couldn't stand.
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Speaker 3: It any longer. So I gave up the theater.
6:22
Speaker 9: My nerves, you understand. Yes, I gave it up completely.
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Speaker 1: I really did.
6:25
Speaker 10: I couldn't.
6:25
Speaker 7: It all started one morning at 2.30. I was on watch,
6:43
Speaker 7: lying on the cool stone deck, pulling on my pipe,
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Speaker 7: staring out at the blackness, the phosphorescent combers and the
6:50
Speaker 7: big yellow stars... When out of the corner of my eye,
6:54
Speaker 7: I noticed something show up for a second. Something the
6:58
Speaker 7: light had touched, far off. I waited for her to
7:03
Speaker 7: come around again, and when she did, there it was.
7:08
Speaker 7: A three-master, a big one, about a half mile off,
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Speaker 7: and coming down out of the nor-nor-west, coming straight for us.
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Speaker 7: You must understand, our light was where it was.
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Speaker 3: For a very good reason.
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Speaker 7: Dangerous submerged reefs surrounded us and ships kept clear, but
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Speaker 7: this one, this sailing vessel, was coming straight on. I
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Speaker 7: went over to the gallery door and yelled, Lurie!
7:35
Speaker 3: Lurie!
7:37
Speaker 11: What?
7:38
Speaker 3: Get headed for the reefs! Coming right up! I had
7:44
Speaker 3: the glasses out now. Couldn't read her.
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Speaker 7: Name, but I could see her quite plainly, all sails set,
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Speaker 7: the foam creaming away under her bow, her beautiful lines.
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Speaker 7: A Dutch ship, I guessed her. But why didn't she turn?
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Speaker 7: Every time it passed, our light hit her with the
8:01
Speaker 7: glare of day.
8:02
Speaker 3: Ship?
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Speaker 11: Where?
8:04
Speaker 3: Nor, nor west. The light will touch her in a moment.
8:08
Speaker 10: Can't they see?
8:10
Speaker 7: Look at her.
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Speaker 3: He just keeps coming on.
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Speaker 2: Square heads.
8:13
Speaker 4: What is it?
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Speaker 3: What is it? Watch no nor'west. I know. I know
8:20
Speaker 3: what it is.
8:20
Speaker 7: What?
8:21
Speaker 2: The Dutchman.
8:22
Speaker 3: The flying Dutchman.
8:25
Speaker 2: She's derelict. That's it.
8:27
Speaker 3: Derelict?
8:28
Speaker 2: Abandoned.
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Speaker 11: The crew left her for some reason or other, but
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Speaker 11: instead of sinking, she's gone on, running before every wind.
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Speaker 3: She'll not run long.
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Speaker 9: Not with these reefs to break her up.
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Speaker 2: A beautiful ship.
8:43
Speaker 8: Now, why would men leave a beautiful ship like that?
8:52
Speaker 7: We watched her the rest of those black hours, healing
8:56
Speaker 7: and rocking, pushed and pulled by every stray wind, every
9:00
Speaker 7: freak current.
9:01
Speaker 3: Watched her until the.
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Speaker 7: Dawn came, till the sea turned from black to a
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Speaker 7: pearly gray.
9:06
Speaker 3: And on she came again, heading for us.
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Speaker 7: We all had our glasses trained on her now.
9:14
Speaker 2: Auguste, you can kill the light. Right, chief.
9:18
Speaker 7: She doesn't look so good by daylight. Do you think
9:21
Speaker 7: she'll ground this time? I say, do you think she'll
9:25
Speaker 7: ground this time?
9:26
Speaker 2: This is impossible. Absolutely impossible.
9:30
Speaker 7: Why?
9:31
Speaker 2: Here, take my glasses. They're stronger than yours.
9:35
Speaker 7: All right.
9:36
Speaker 3: What is it?
9:38
Speaker 7: I had to focus and then... My breath froze in
9:43
Speaker 7: my throat. The decks were swarming with a dark brown
9:48
Speaker 7: carpet that.
9:49
Speaker 3: Looked like a gigantic fungus, but undulating.
9:53
Speaker 7: And on the masts and yards, the guys and all
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Speaker 7: were hundreds.
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Speaker 3: No, thousands, no, I don't know. an inestimable number of
10:02
Speaker 3: tremendous rats.
10:16
Speaker 2: See them?
10:16
Speaker 3: Yes, yes, I see them.
10:18
Speaker 2: Now we know why she's a devil.
10:21
Speaker 7: Yes, now we know.
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Speaker 3: What are you two doing here? Give me a look.
10:25
Speaker 2: Yes, yes, give him the glasses. Take a good look, chatterbox.
10:29
Speaker 7: Huh?
10:30
Speaker 2: Give you something to talk about.
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Speaker 3: She's still heading for us.
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Speaker 10: Yeah.
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Speaker 3: Look, if she's going to turn, she better turn soon.
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Speaker 2: Suppose she doesn't.
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Speaker 3: You mean suppose she piles up on the key?
10:43
Speaker 2: It's low tide.
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Speaker 3: Yeah. Yes, sir. Yes, it is.
10:47
Speaker 2: Well, where's all the conversation? Boogies?
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Speaker 7: No!
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Speaker 3: No! She's still coming on.
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Speaker 7: Go away!
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Speaker 2: Turn.
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Speaker 3: Go away!
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Speaker 2: Turn, will you turn?
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Speaker 10: I say, I pray you, turn. Cracked up.
11:10
Speaker 7: Rats.
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Speaker 3: Look. On the water. Like a carpet. Swimming.
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Speaker 11: Sure they're swimming. Those are ship rats. They're swimming for
11:18
Speaker 11: the rocks.
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Speaker 3: Door.
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Speaker 7: Below.
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Speaker 3: It's open. Yes, come on.
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Speaker 2: Town he went.
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Speaker 7: Racing down the stone stairs. Taking them three and four
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Speaker 7: at a time.
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Speaker 1: Scared.
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Speaker 3: You can bet we were scared. August, you get the windows.
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Speaker 11: Maybe they can climb.
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Speaker 2: We don't know. Right, chief.
11:36
Speaker 3: But hurry.
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Speaker 1: Hurry.
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Speaker 6: No.
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Speaker 3: Oh, yes, I do.
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Speaker 7: Yes.
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Speaker 3: Up at the other end of the rock. Look at them. Me.
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Speaker 2: Do they smell us?
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Speaker 3: Here they come. Close the door. I can't. It's stuck.
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Speaker 2: Here, let me.
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Speaker 3: You made it.
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Speaker 7: Holy.
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Speaker 2: That was close.
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Speaker 7: What about him?
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Speaker 3: Look, there. We'll get him. Watch it. He's kicking.
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Speaker 8: What a brute.
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Speaker 3: He was as big as a tomcat. Big.
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Speaker 7: His eyes were wild and red, his teeth long and
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Speaker 7: sharp and yellow.
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Speaker 3: He went for a starving ravenous.
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Speaker 7: And we fought him, fought that one rat all over
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Speaker 7: the room.
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Speaker 3: It was over. Believe me, I do not exaggerate. It
12:29
Speaker 3: was like fighting a panther.
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Speaker 10: Got him.
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Speaker 7: We'd better get aloft. We ran up the winding staircase.
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Speaker 7: We passed the tiny windows of the various levels. Every
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Speaker 7: one was a thick, wriggling, screaming curtain of brown fur.
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Speaker 7: I was ahead of Louie and I dreaded each successive level.
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Speaker 3: Suppose they had found a way in. Look at them.
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Speaker 2: Oh, will you look at them? It's a nightmare. Will
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Speaker 2: you look at them?
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Speaker 7: The air of the gallery was thick and fetid with
13:02
Speaker 7: the stink of them. The light was dim brown, filtered
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Speaker 7: through the crawling mass that swarmed over the glass.
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Speaker 3: All about us. We could not see the sky, nothing,
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Speaker 3: nothing but them.
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Speaker 7: Their red eyes, their claws, their wriggling hairy snouts and
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Speaker 7: their teeth.
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Speaker 3: The rats, they screamed.
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Speaker 7: And howled and threw themselves against the glass.
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Speaker 3: They were starving and we three, we.
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Speaker 7: Stood quietly, very, very quietly in the center of the
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Speaker 7: glass room under our beautiful light.
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Speaker 2: What can we do?
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Speaker 3: What can we do, Chief?
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Speaker 10: Take it easy, Yogi. Take it easy.
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Speaker 3: It won't do any good. It won't do any good
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Speaker 3: to stand here and shake.
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Speaker 2: That's right. Go away.
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Speaker 3: Go away.
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Speaker 10: Do you hear me?
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Speaker 3: Go away this instant.
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Speaker 2: They won't go away. Not until.
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Speaker 8: Finish it, Chief.
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Speaker 3: Not until what?
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Speaker 2: Not until.
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Speaker 2: They've been fed.
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Speaker 3: You can take just so much horror.
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Speaker 6: and.
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Speaker 7: Then you get used to it. And they were interesting
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Speaker 7: to watch, you know. They couldn't understand the glass... They
14:35
Speaker 7: could see us and they could rush at us, but
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Speaker 7: that thin, invisible barrier held them off, stopped them. From
14:42
Speaker 7: time to time, we caught a glimpse of the rocks below.
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Speaker 7: More rats down there, swarming brown velvet in.
14:49
Speaker 3: The bright, tropical sunlight. Then the tide began to rise.
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Speaker 3: If only it had drowned some of them.
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Speaker 2: Shipwrecks don't drown. You can't drown.
15:00
Speaker 10: One of them.
15:01
Speaker 3: Look, they're all climbing up the tower.
15:03
Speaker 2: This bunch around us is getting thicker.
15:06
Speaker 3: Say, what's the time now? Quarter of six.
15:10
Speaker 2: You've got first watch.
15:12
Speaker 3: That's right.
15:14
Speaker 6: I will.
15:15
Speaker 2: Come along, Auguste.
15:18
Speaker 3: It's getting dark.
15:20
Speaker 7: One side of the room was lit a soft, filtered
15:23
Speaker 7: red sunset through the racks.
15:28
Speaker 10: Very pretty.
15:30
Speaker 3: I set the wicks, checked.
15:32
Speaker 7: My fuel, and then lit the lamp. It caught them.
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Speaker 7: Lit them in their gigantic, wriggling web of pale, hairless bellies,
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Speaker 7: twitching red tails, bright eyes.
15:45
Speaker 3: And then I started the rotary motor. The light, the
15:59
Speaker 3: light drove them mad.
16:01
Speaker 7: As she swung slowly and smoothly about, she blinded them
16:05
Speaker 7: in the fierce stabbing bar of light, moving continually about,
16:09
Speaker 7: ever turning, ever touching, ever moving around and around, and
16:12
Speaker 7: they twitching and shuddering, eyes flaming when they were struck
16:16
Speaker 7: by the light, the bright light moving and behind on
16:19
Speaker 7: the dark side of the room, so close, so close...
16:22
Speaker 7: I dared not turn my back, which cannot help turning
16:24
Speaker 7: your back when you are in a room made of glass.
16:28
Speaker 3: On the dark side of the room, you could.
16:30
Speaker 7: Not see them, but only their eyes, thousands of points
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Speaker 7: of blank red light blinking and twinkling like the stars
16:37
Speaker 7: of hell. Louis relieved me at ten, but as you
16:47
Speaker 7: may imagine, I didn't get much sleep that night. And
16:51
Speaker 7: when I came up into the gallery early the next morning,
16:54
Speaker 7: there stood Auguste. He was bowing to the rats, waving
17:01
Speaker 7: his arms, and so help me, making a speech.
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Speaker 12: My dear audience, I am going to play once again
17:08
Speaker 12: that magnificent role which made me the toast of the
17:12
Speaker 12: Paris Theater. Prelati, the evil genius of the medieval underworld.
17:18
Speaker 12: I am he who did guide the dark soul of
17:21
Speaker 12: the Marachal into the nether paths. Do not be frightened,
17:28
Speaker 12: little children.
17:29
Speaker 2: I will not hurt you much.
17:32
Speaker 3: Yes!
17:34
Speaker 2: He kept turning.
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Speaker 7: I stood staring at him, horror struck, but he didn't
17:40
Speaker 7: notice me. The man had gone mad. He kept turning,
17:45
Speaker 7: telling his stories to all the rats, leaving not one out.
17:49
Speaker 3: August! August! Another one! A latecomer! Take a seat on
17:56
Speaker 3: the aisle, dear. Stop it!
17:58
Speaker 12: Stop it!
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Speaker 3: He didn't stop. He went on bowing and.
18:04
Speaker 7: Scraping to the rats, his big blue eyes rolling and winking,
18:09
Speaker 7: his wild red hair waving about him. I grabbed him
18:13
Speaker 7: by the arm and slapped his face.
18:17
Speaker 3: He looked at me like a child, and then his
18:19
Speaker 3: face screwed up. He looked as though he were about
18:22
Speaker 3: to cry.
18:23
Speaker 7: Go below, August.
18:25
Speaker 3: Go on.
18:26
Speaker 2: Go on.
18:28
Speaker 3: Very well, then. Later, my dear audience. Later.
18:35
Speaker 5: Matinee today.
18:43
Speaker 3: Sure, he was crazy. But I guess we all were.
18:48
Speaker 7: A few hours later, he came back up and caught
18:51
Speaker 7: Louie and me teasing the rats. Yes.
18:55
Speaker 3: Sounds horrible?
18:57
Speaker 7: It was fun. We would get right up against the
19:01
Speaker 7: glass and make faces at them.
19:03
Speaker 3: It drove them crazy. They would scratch away, trying to
19:06
Speaker 3: get at our eyes. Louie was even cuter about it.
19:10
Speaker 3: He'd pull a piece of bread.
19:11
Speaker 7: Out of his pocket and press it against the glass.
19:14
Speaker 7: The rats would scramble into a solid ball, biting each other,
19:18
Speaker 7: clustering like grapes.
19:20
Speaker 3: From time to.
19:21
Speaker 7: Time, a whole knot of them would slip and fall
19:23
Speaker 7: 110 feet to the surf below.
19:26
Speaker 3: Look, look, look at the sharks. They're eating them.
19:30
Speaker 11: Those sharks are our friends. Here, here, I'll get another
19:36
Speaker 11: bunch together.
19:36
Speaker 7: Here, my dear. That's it. I'll kill each other.
19:39
Speaker 3: There they go. August joined in, too. Oh, very ingenious, August.
19:56
Speaker 7: He learned that if he spread-eagled himself against the.
20:00
Speaker 3: Glass, they'd bunch and bundle against his figure. Then he'd
20:04
Speaker 3: leap back. Look, my portrait in rats. Ah! It went
20:14
Speaker 3: on all day, and then I was lying in bed.
20:19
Speaker 3: It was about midnight.
20:21
Speaker 7: I was very tired, and I was just beginning to
20:24
Speaker 7: fall off to sleep when I became conscious of a
20:28
Speaker 7: new sound. I couldn't figure it at first. I got up,
20:36
Speaker 7: lit the lamp, and went to the window. Even as
20:40
Speaker 7: I looked at it, I saw one of the panes
20:43
Speaker 7: begin to sag in. They had eaten the wood away.
20:47
Speaker 6: Louie!
20:49
Speaker 3: Louie, come quick! What? What is it? They found a
20:52
Speaker 3: way in. I held the glass with my hand.
20:55
Speaker 7: Now they were all going crazy, and assured of the
20:58
Speaker 7: success of this maneuver, they were all nibbling away at
21:00
Speaker 7: the wood. Louie ran below and then returned with a
21:03
Speaker 7: large sheet of tin. He spread it against the window
21:07
Speaker 7: and hammered it into place. Even as we did so,
21:10
Speaker 7: I felt the heavy bodies thudding against the other side
21:14
Speaker 7: as the window gave way.
21:17
Speaker 3: That ought to hold.
21:19
Speaker 2: If it doesn't, we're done for.
21:20
Speaker 3: Rats can't eat tin.
21:22
Speaker 2: No, no, they can't.
21:25
Speaker 6: What?
21:26
Speaker 2: What was that?
21:26
Speaker 10: I don't know.
21:28
Speaker 2: It came from below.
21:29
Speaker 3: The storeroom window.
21:30
Speaker 10: They're in. They're swarming up the stairs.
21:33
Speaker 3: Drop the trap.
21:34
Speaker 7: Like....
21:38
Speaker 3: Two of them got him. Go after them.
21:41
Speaker 7: We didn't have to go after them.
21:44
Speaker 3: They came at us.
21:46
Speaker 7: I leapt to one side and grabbed a marlin spike,
21:48
Speaker 7: swung and smashed one in midair. I whirled to see Louie,
21:52
Speaker 7: but the other, it had ripped his hand open and
21:54
Speaker 7: the blood was pouring all over the place. He held
21:57
Speaker 7: his handle off and kicked at the snarling rat.
22:00
Speaker 3: I stepped and swung and got him.
22:02
Speaker 2: My hand.
22:03
Speaker 3: He's got my hand. That's the both of them, Louie.
22:07
Speaker 3: I'll get you something to tie that up. Blood, look
22:10
Speaker 3: at it.
22:10
Speaker 10: My blood.
22:11
Speaker 2: I'm bleeding.
22:12
Speaker 3: Don't worry about.
22:13
Speaker 7: It, Lloyd.
22:13
Speaker 6: Don't worry.
22:14
Speaker 7: Now, here, look.
22:15
Speaker 3: I'll wind this kerchief around it. It'll be okay.
22:18
Speaker 2: Blood. Blood.
22:21
Speaker 3: It's not bad. Just the flesh.
22:23
Speaker 2: My blood.
22:24
Speaker 3: Then I became conscious of a new sound.
22:31
Speaker 7: They were gnawing their way through the wooden trap door.
22:35
Speaker 7: I watched the plagues fascinate it, and even as I did,
22:38
Speaker 7: it began to give way. A bristling, whiskery snout showed through. Louie!
22:44
Speaker 3: Louie, we've got to go up!
22:47
Speaker 7: The next level was the living quarters and kitchen. I
22:50
Speaker 7: slammed the flap there, too, but it, too, was wood.
22:53
Speaker 6: Oh, my blood.
22:54
Speaker 3: What are we going to do? I don't know. They'll
22:56
Speaker 3: be through this one in a moment.
22:58
Speaker 10: The gallery.
22:59
Speaker 2: The trapdoor in the gallery is metal.
23:01
Speaker 3: Good. Come on.
23:02
Speaker 2: Come on.
23:09
Speaker 3: We made it. We made it.
23:13
Speaker 7: We lay across the trap, exhausted, while below us the rats.
23:16
Speaker 3: Took over the entire tower.
23:18
Speaker 7: I could hear them howling and fighting over our food supply,
23:22
Speaker 7: our water, our leather, and all about us. The others
23:25
Speaker 7: screamed and glared in at us, swayed in a tangled mess,
23:29
Speaker 7: hypnotized by the ever-turning light. By morning, the air in
23:43
Speaker 7: the little room was horrible. To now, we'd been getting
23:47
Speaker 7: air from the tower below. Now that was sealed off.
23:52
Speaker 7: And so was all our food and water. We lay
23:56
Speaker 7: exhausted and panting, waiting, waiting. The hours crawled on. I
24:05
Speaker 7: was almost dozing from fatigue when I saw a sight
24:08
Speaker 7: that brought me too fast.
24:10
Speaker 11: It.
24:12
Speaker 2: Would you like to come in, my beauty?
24:15
Speaker 10: Yes, yes, will you?
24:18
Speaker 12: I hold the powers of life and death, and I
24:22
Speaker 12: can let you in, you know.
24:23
Speaker 7: Auguste was standing by the glass, and in one hand
24:28
Speaker 7: he held a big wrench. He was tapping the glass gently,
24:35
Speaker 7: not quite hard enough to break it.
24:40
Speaker 3: I eased myself to my feet.
24:44
Speaker 7: Very slowly, it tiptoed toward him.
24:50
Speaker 2: All I have to do is.
24:54
Speaker 7: Just a little harder.
25:00
Speaker 7: I found a coil of wire in the tool kit
25:02
Speaker 7: and I trussed him up, fastened him to a stanchion in.
25:05
Speaker 3: The center of the room. Louie was of no help.
25:08
Speaker 7: He lay on his side looking at his bloody hand,
25:10
Speaker 7: weak and sick as a baby.
25:12
Speaker 3: So there I was, a.
25:14
Speaker 7: Lunatic and a coward for company and all about watching
25:18
Speaker 7: our little drama, The Rats. The day dragged by. The
25:31
Speaker 7: supply boat wasn't due for another 12 days. I don't
25:36
Speaker 7: know what they could have done if they had come.
25:39
Speaker 7: And we had only one way of summoning them. That
25:42
Speaker 7: was to shoot off distress rockets, but the rockets were
25:45
Speaker 7: four floors below. And even if they'd been right there
25:49
Speaker 7: in the gallery, I couldn't have opened a window to
25:52
Speaker 7: fire them. That night I tended the light, but its
25:59
Speaker 7: flame was devouring our oxygen. The following day we lay,
26:04
Speaker 7: thirst tormented, starving... Waiting, waiting. The following night, I again
26:13
Speaker 7: tended the light, but the small supply of spare wicking
26:17
Speaker 7: we kept in the gallery had become exhausted, and quite suddenly,
26:22
Speaker 7: at about midnight, the light went out.
26:28
Speaker 3: There was nothing I could do. Wicks were stored three
26:32
Speaker 3: levels below. Nothing I could do, nothing.
26:36
Speaker 7: From time to time, I'd strike a match to see
26:39
Speaker 7: the clock.
26:40
Speaker 3: And when I did, it lit up the million.
26:42
Speaker 7: Red eyes about us, all about us, watching, waiting.
26:48
Speaker 3: Below it had grown quiet. They'd cleaned us out, and.
26:52
Speaker 7: Now they, too, were waiting, all waiting.
27:00
Speaker 3: And then the rats, quite suddenly, were silent Then I
27:09
Speaker 3: heard it.
27:17
Speaker 7: Then I saw the sky and the stars.
27:22
Speaker 3: The rats were gone. I went to the glass.
27:26
Speaker 7: Out there on the water, a small freighter, a banana boat,
27:30
Speaker 7: showing a few lights, came.
27:32
Speaker 3: Softly and innocently out. The light was out. They didn't know.
27:39
Speaker 7: I wanted to open the windows, to call out to them,
27:43
Speaker 7: to warn them somehow, but I was afraid.
27:46
Speaker 3: What if the rats were hiding from me, tricking me?
27:50
Speaker 3: So I waited.
27:54
Speaker 7: She grounded very softly on a reef not 200 yards
27:59
Speaker 7: from the quay. Grounded so gently that the man playing
28:03
Speaker 7: the cornet, was he a passenger.
28:05
Speaker 3: A crewman off watch, didn't even stop playing. They tried
28:11
Speaker 3: washing her back off.
28:13
Speaker 7: I could have told them to save their fuel. The
28:15
Speaker 7: tide was rising. Would have floated her free.
28:22
Speaker 3: And I waited.
28:31
Speaker 7: Well, that's all. That's the story. The sun came up
28:36
Speaker 7: and there wasn't a rat on the whole quay. Every
28:40
Speaker 7: last one of that terrible army had deserted us. Gone
28:44
Speaker 7: back to sea on their new ship.
28:48
Speaker 10: August?
28:49
Speaker 7: Insane asylum he never recovered. Louis, they took him into
28:54
Speaker 7: Cayenne where he died of blood poisoning from his bike.
28:59
Speaker 7: Life on three skeleton key isn't bad these days. But sometimes,
29:05
Speaker 7: when I see a strange vessel approaching, I get a
29:09
Speaker 7: little nervous.
29:10
Speaker 10: Sure.
29:12
Speaker 3: Somewhere on the seas, there's.
29:14
Speaker 7: A little banana boat without a crew.
29:17
Speaker 3: That is, without a human crew.
29:21
Speaker 7: The End.
29:37
Speaker 4: Suspense In which Vincent Price starred in Three Skeleton Key
29:45
Speaker 4: with John Daner and Ben Wright.
29:49
Speaker 6: Suspense.
29:54
Speaker 4: Suspense was directed in Hollywood by William N.
29:56
Speaker 10: Robeson.
29:57
Speaker 4: Three Skeleton Key was adapted by James Poe from the
30:00
Speaker 4: story by George G.
30:01
Speaker 3: Tudus.
30:02
Speaker 4: Leith Stevens composed and conducted the original score. Sound pattern
30:06
Speaker 4: by Cliff Thorsness, Gus Bays, and Ray Kemper. George Walsh speaking.
30:11
Speaker 4: Suspense is presented by the United States Armed Forces Radio
30:14
Speaker 4: and Television Service.
30:14
Speaker 3: Suspense is presented by.
30:16
Speaker 1: The United States Armed Forces Radio and Television Service. Suspense
30:40
Speaker 1: has concluded with Three Skeleton Key. Good night, and thank
30:43
Speaker 1: you for sharing this broadcast with us.