Latest / If You Please, Himan Brown’s Radio Mystery Theater / S2E4: Time and Again

Transcript

S2E4: Time and Again · If You Please, Himan Brown’s Radio Mystery Theater

0:00
>> Welcome to the second season of "If You Please,
0:03
Himan Brown's Radio Mystery Theater."
0:05
On this series, we are offering rebroadcasts of a select group
0:08
of programs created by this legendary producer for CBS
0:12
between 1974 and 1982.
0:15
Brown reimagined radio drama for contemporary times.
0:19
Our new series offers some of these exciting works again.
0:22
In season 1, we delivered riveting tales of foul play,
0:26
betrayal, greed, and misguided love.
0:28
We foiled a murder, considered reincarnation,
0:31
pondered the nature of guilt, and traveled through time.
0:34
We heard Himan Brown's troupe of seasoned audio actors
0:37
embody a wide range of characters
0:40
and deliver thrills time and again.
0:42
And for season 2, they are all set to keep our headsets on
0:46
and our fingers tapping "play." Before each program,
0:49
commentator John Slavney shares details about the cast,
0:53
the writer, and the plot.
0:54
Your job? Listen.
0:56
"If You Please" is produced in loving memory
0:58
of Robert Isaacson.
1:00
♪♪
1:07
>> Hello, listeners, I'm John Slavney, and I'm here
1:09
to bring you a decidedly weird,
1:11
eldritch and Gothic horror story from the fertile
1:14
and delightfully twisted mind of the writer and actor Ian Martin.
1:18
The setting of our play is never quite specified,
1:21
despite a few concessions to modern conveniences.
1:23
For instance, there's a telephone.
1:25
Our story seems to take place in a vague sort of Gothic untime.
1:29
We're in America, to be sure. Boston, perhaps,
1:31
or somewhere further up the New England coast.
1:34
Or maybe we're in Edgar Allan Poe's Baltimore.
1:36
Our protagonist and narrator is Ethan Vigil.
1:39
"Ethan" means "steadfast"
1:40
and Vigil is certainly a curious name,
1:42
one that chimes with clocks and time and keeping watch.
1:45
As our story begins,
1:47
Ethan buys a strange antique timepiece
1:49
from a desperate sailor.
1:50
The clock doesn't just keep time.
1:52
It alters it with hair-raising results.
1:55
Without giving too much away,
1:57
I will say that the story bears a decided resemblance
1:59
to Roger Corman's bizarre
2:00
and irresistible 1960 cult classic
2:03
"The Little Shop of Horrors,"
2:05
in which a florist's assistant becomes a slave
2:07
to his bloodthirsty houseplant.
2:09
The marvelous John Beal is our clockmaker.
2:12
Born in Joplin, Missouri,
2:14
Beal was a veteran of stage and screen
2:15
whose career began on Broadway at the start of the '30s.
2:18
He moved to Hollywood soon after.
2:20
He had come to this recording
2:22
almost directly from the Broadway production
2:23
of David Storey's "The Changing Room,"
2:25
where he served in standby capacity
2:27
for five separate roles,
2:30
including the role played by Ian Martin in that production.
2:32
Ethan's wife, Henrietta,
2:34
is played by the Toronto-born Grace Matthews,
2:36
a member of Golden Age radio royalty.
2:38
Matthews was one of several actors
2:40
to voice Margo Lane on "The Shadow,"
2:42
a role she had from 1946 to 1949.
2:46
Incidentally, our series host Margot Avery
2:48
is the daughter of the actress Margot Stevenson,
2:51
for whom the character Margo Lane was named.
2:53
Grace Matthews had been working in American radio and television
2:56
since the mid '40s,
2:58
and she brought all of her experience
2:59
to Himan Brown's new venture.
3:01
Utility player Bryna Raeburn plays Harriet,
3:03
Henrietta's sister,
3:05
and is thoroughly unpleasant in all the right ways.
3:07
Ian Martin himself doubles as Dr. Royce,
3:10
Ethan's friend and chess partner,
3:12
and as a sailor whose visit sets a catastrophe in motion.
3:15
Martin was born in Glasgow and had a reputation for dialects,
3:18
which makes it all the more endearing
3:20
that his Cockney accent here is a trifle shaky.
3:23
This episode is one of the three "Radio Mystery Theater" tales
3:26
adapted as short stories and collected in the paperback
3:30
"Strange Tales from the CBS Radio Mystery Theater,"
3:33
published by Popular Library in 1976.
3:36
But enough from me.
3:37
The seconds are ticking away
3:39
and we really should get on with our story.
3:41
"Time and Again" was recorded at CBS Radio Studios
3:44
on Christmas Eve, 1973,
3:47
and first aired a little more than a month later
3:49
on January 27, 1974.
3:52
I hope your time listening is time well spent.
3:56
♪♪
4:02
>> The CBS Radio Mystery Theater presents...
4:05
[ Door opens, creaks ]
4:09
[ Ominous music plays ]
4:13
♪♪
4:22
>> Come in.
4:25
Welcome. I'm E.G. Marshall.
4:29
Welcome to the fear you can hear.
4:32
Welcome to the sounds of suspense.
4:36
It was the ill-fated Prince of Denmark, Hamlet,
4:38
who lamented that time is out of joint.
4:42
O cursed spite, that ever I was born to set it right.
4:48
Many people before
4:50
and since have echoed the same cry of despair,
4:53
but none with more compelling justice and reason
4:56
than Ethan Vigil, clockmaker and destroyer, Ethan Vigil,
5:03
for whom a special clock struck a magic and an evil hour.
5:10
>> Got you boxed in. Your move, Jake.
5:13
>> Don't rush me. I'm thinking, I'm thinking.
5:16
[ Cuckoo clock cuckooing, clocks chiming ]
5:19
God in heaven!
5:21
Ethan, how can you stand that infernal racket?
5:24
>> What racket? Oh, you mean the clocks striking?
5:27
I don't even notice them anymore.
5:29
Well, go ahead. What do you want to give up?
5:31
>> No, no, no.
5:34
Who can think of a chess move with all hell breaking loose?
5:38
From now on, start our games after midnight.
5:41
Enough to drive a man stark staring mad.
5:44
I swear to Sam Hill, Ethan, you deli...
5:46
[ Clock chiming loudly ]
5:52
>> The only two living things left in the room
5:55
at that terrifying moment,
5:57
as time stood still for myself and that damnable machine.
6:05
[ Dramatic music plays ]
6:07
♪♪
6:13
>> Our mystery drama "Time and Again"
6:16
was written especially for the Mystery Theater
6:19
by Ian Martin and stars John Beal.
6:23
I'll be back shortly with act 1.
6:25
[ Mid-tempo music plays ]
6:27
♪♪
6:31
[ Dramatic music plays ]
6:33
♪♪
6:43
Few of us can resist the fascination of an auction,
6:47
and I'm no different than most.
6:49
Which is how and why I happen to possess this curious document
6:53
which reveals a bone-chilling account of
6:56
how many lives were lost so uncannily and eerily
6:59
to the inhuman demands of what Ethan Vigil called
7:03
"that damnable machine."
7:05
The tale I'm about to tell -- Hm, no, no, wait.
7:09
If you can manage to decipher his cramped longhand,
7:13
let Ethan Vigil confess for himself.
7:16
♪♪
7:20
>> I, Ethan Vigil, clockmaker by trade,
7:24
am writing this in case when the moment comes,
7:28
I fail to destroy the hourglass clock.
7:32
For if I fail, someone must destroy it, kill it,
7:38
end its ghastly existence before God knows
7:41
how many innocent people will die
7:44
to satisfy its insatiable thirst.
7:48
The clock itself came into my possession more
7:51
or less by accident.
7:53
I was working late at my shop one night about a year ago
7:57
when I heard a tapping on the closed glass door.
8:00
[ Tapping on glass door ]
8:02
Tarnation. Some people can't read signs.
8:04
[ Tapping continues ]
8:05
Darn fool is like to break that glass.
8:08
Stop that! Can't you see I'm closed?
8:11
>> Hey! Open up!
8:12
Please let me in. >> Oh, get on with you.
8:16
>> You won't be sorry. Give me a chance.
8:20
I'll give you the chance of a lifetime.
8:24
Look. [ Dramatic music plays ]
8:27
>> It was raining heavily.
8:29
The water streaming down the glass.
8:31
But the object he had drawn from the cover of his pea jacket
8:34
drew my eyes like a magnet.
8:37
It was a clock, the like of which I'd never seen.
8:41
It was shaped like an hourglass,
8:43
with a strange-appearing pendulum hanging
8:45
in the lower half and the face in the upper half.
8:48
In the place of the figure 12 at the top of the face
8:52
was the numeral 13.
8:55
I had to see that clock more closely.
8:57
[ Lock tumbling, door opens ]
9:00
>> Oh, bless you, guv'nor.
9:02
You're a lifesaver, you are.
9:04
>> What do you want?
9:06
>> Oh, I want you to have a look at this here clock.
9:10
>> The clock is the only reason I let you in.
9:12
I'd like to have a look at it myself.
9:14
Let's take it over to the bench.
9:15
[ Door closes ]
9:17
You want this clock repaired?
9:19
>> I want to sell it to you is what I want.
9:23
>> Oh, I hope I don't regret this, but come on
9:26
to my place in the back.
9:28
There's a fire in there to dry you up a bit.
9:30
[ Door opens ]
9:32
[ Door closes ] Where'd you get this clock?
9:33
>> Why, it came into my possession when its owner died.
9:38
>> Does it run?
9:40
>> Well, now, that there clock, it doesn't run.
9:43
I'd be the first to admit it. >> I'll give you $20.
9:46
>> Oh, now look. >> $20. Take it or leave it.
9:49
>> Now, I don't intend to be taken advantage of by somebody.
9:51
>> There doesn't seem to be any question of
9:54
who's being taken advantage of.
9:56
>> Harriet. >> Ethan, who is this person?
9:59
>> He's a customer, more or less.
10:00
This is my sister-in-law. >> [ Scoffs ]
10:02
It's near on to midnight.
10:04
And my poor sick sister is pining upstairs
10:06
for her husband to bring her a little faith and consolation.
10:09
>> Oh, now, ma'am,
10:11
I certainly am sorry to intrude on family problems.
10:15
>> Then don't. Ethan, get rid of this man.
10:18
>> You better go.
10:20
>> But what about our business and the clock?
10:22
>> $20 is all I have to my name. >> I'll take it.
10:26
>> Don't you do it, Ethan.
10:28
>> Oh, mind your own business for once, Harriet.
10:29
[ Dramatic music plays ]
10:32
I had little doubt my sailor, who called himself Harry Stubbs,
10:36
had dubious title to that strange clock.
10:38
But like all collectors,
10:40
to own something totally and unreservedly unique
10:42
is an overriding obsession.
10:44
[ Door closes, lock turns ]
10:48
>> Is he gone? >> Yes.
10:50
>> [ Huffs ] Oh, just look at this place
10:53
after you had that -- that derelict in here.
10:56
Lights on all over the place,
10:58
eating up money, to say nothing of good,
11:00
hard cash thrown away on that piece of junk on the table.
11:03
>> It was my own money.
11:05
>> What "own money"?
11:07
[ Scoffs ] You and Henrietta
11:09
wouldn't even have a roof over your heads,
11:11
let alone a piece of business, if it weren't for me.
11:14
Oh, no, it's my money that keeps you going.
11:16
And don't you forget it.
11:18
Now you lock the door to the shop.
11:20
>> I still have some repairs left to do.
11:22
>> You'll have to get up early tomorrow and do them.
11:24
>> I just -- I just wanted to have another look at this clock.
11:28
>> You'll waste no more time or light or fuel down here tonight.
11:31
[ Scoffs ] It wasn't for good money paid out,
11:34
I'd take that piece of junk on the table
11:36
and dump it in the rubbish.
11:38
[ Dramatic music plays ]
11:39
>> How I wish she'd done just that.
11:43
Let the city collect it with the morning trash
11:45
and bury it forever.
11:47
But fate hadn't planned it that way.
11:49
So I went upstairs from Harriet to face another problem
11:53
I didn't know how to solve -- my ailing wife, Henrietta.
11:57
[ Door opens ]
11:58
>> Ethan, is that you?
12:00
>> Yes, Henrietta. >> Where have you been?
12:03
>> Working, dear. Are you hurting?
12:06
>> Oh, when don't I hurt?
12:08
>> I know. How's your back? >> It isn't my back.
12:10
It's my stomach. Ethan. I've been --
12:13
I'm scared. I'm --
12:14
I've been afraid to think of it,
12:16
but I know Harriet's sure.
12:17
I've got -- >> No, no, none of that.
12:21
You just get off to sleep. That's what you need.
12:23
>> You just don't know
12:25
how it is to be suffering every blessed minute of every day.
12:32
>> As I slipped under the covers
12:34
and lay wide awake beside Henrietta, snoring away,
12:38
my mind went back to the strange clock on the table downstairs.
12:43
The intriguing mystery of a mechanism
12:45
I had never even imagined in 40 years of clockmaking
12:50
and the enigma of why
12:51
13 replaced the numeral 12 on the face.
12:55
♪♪
13:03
All the next morning, between my infrequent customers,
13:07
I puzzled and poked
13:10
and pried to reveal the workings of this bizarre clock.
13:15
But by 1:00 in the afternoon,
13:17
when I was completely stymied, my wife surprised me
13:22
by coming out to the bench in her bathrobe.
13:25
Henrietta? What's wrong?
13:28
>> I've been calling for someone.
13:29
Where's Harriet?
13:31
>> Well, she went to market.
13:33
>> Is that the old clock that Harriet told me you threw away
13:35
hard-earned money on?
13:36
>> It's a very valuable antique and original.
13:40
And it was my money. >> Does it run?
13:42
>> No. >> Then what good is it?
13:45
>> It's worth $20 as it is, at least.
13:48
In working condition, it could be priceless.
13:50
>> Well, can you fix it?
13:52
>> Well, I don't know.
13:54
>> Why not? >> Well, look at it, Henrietta.
13:57
Have you ever seen anything like it?
13:59
First of all, the hourglass shape of the case.
14:03
>> What's inside? >> Well, that's the problem.
14:06
Except for the two round glass windows --
14:09
and they're not even glass -- I don't know what they are.
14:11
>> What windows?
14:13
>> Well, the one for the clock face in the upper cup,
14:14
if you want to call it that,
14:16
and the one in the lower inverted cup
14:18
where you can see what looks like a pendulum.
14:21
>> Well, can't you shake it and get that to swing?
14:24
>> Well, that doesn't seem to be the way it's activated.
14:26
It's quite stationary.
14:28
>> Funny lopsided shape. Maybe it melted or something.
14:32
Can't you get into the works?
14:34
>> Only through this lid on the top.
14:36
Oh, look.
14:38
There's all you can see that works.
14:40
Very old wooden gears, wooden pinions, wooden axles.
14:44
No way to lift it out.
14:46
I can't even get my hand in there to try.
14:49
>> Let me. It's so silly. There must be some way.
14:51
Ow! >> What is it?
14:53
>> Look what your silly old clock has done.
14:56
>> What's the matter? >> My finger is bleeding.
14:59
It -- It felt like something bit me.
15:01
>> Oh, come on, let me see. Why, it's just a scratch.
15:04
Scarcely drew blood.
15:06
>> Just the same, I'm not taking any chances
15:07
with that dirty old clock.
15:09
I could end up with blood poisoning.
15:10
I'm going to run this under water.
15:12
Now you get me a bandage and some disinfectant.
15:14
>> I'm right with you.
15:15
[ Heart beating ]
15:19
I was suddenly aware that the clock was running
15:23
and its beat was the sound of the human heart.
15:27
[ Dramatic music plays ]
15:31
>> But Ethan didn't follow his wife right away
15:34
because suddenly he had become conscious
15:36
that the dead clock had come to life,
15:39
that it had started to record time again,
15:42
and that the sound of its beat was very different
15:45
from all other clocks.
15:47
It was a sound akin,
15:49
if not completely similar, to the beat of the human heart.
15:54
I shall return shortly with act two.
15:59
>> Like what you're hearing so far?
16:01
Are you curious about the history behind radio programs
16:04
just like this one,
16:06
and the dramatic genius who created them?
16:08
In the nine-part, award-winning documentary "Audio Maverick,"
16:11
we explore the Golden Age of Radio
16:14
through the life of Himan Brown.
16:16
You'll hear the history of radio come to life as we travel
16:19
from the birth of audio drama to the programs
16:22
that brought millions of families
16:24
into their living rooms every night.
16:26
"Audio Maverick" is available anywhere you get your podcasts.
16:33
[ Dramatic music plays ]
16:35
♪♪
16:43
>> Whatever his wife had accidentally touched,
16:46
the clock had begun to run,
16:49
and remained running steadily without any sign of stopping.
16:53
Ethan checked that Henrietta's wound was little more
16:55
than a surface scratch and returned to observe,
17:00
but let him tell his own story for himself
17:03
as he wrote it in his confession.
17:05
♪♪
17:11
>> My examination of the clock
17:13
as it ran made it even more of an enigma.
17:17
Behind the face, beneath the lid, the gears I saw engage
17:22
second by second operated the hands that told the time.
17:26
What motivated them was obvious.
17:29
The strange mass that I had supposed a pendulum weight,
17:32
but which now quite clearly was a diaphragm
17:36
or pump opening and closing
17:39
to create energy in a motion like a human fist or...
17:45
Yes. Suddenly I knew why the irregular shape was familiar.
17:51
Like the human heart.
17:54
But what in turn motivated that or fueled
17:58
it was the ultimate mystery.
18:01
Everything about this clock was different.
18:04
Exotic, strange. Even its chime for the hours --
18:09
plangent, plaintive, almost the sound of a human voice.
18:14
I watched it irresistibly all day.
18:17
All during the night
18:19
while I waited for Dr. Jacob Royce to come
18:20
and examine my wife.
18:22
Even while I waited for the result of that examination.
18:25
[ Door opens ]
18:27
>> What the devil are you doing out here, Ethan?
18:29
>> Oh, I'm sorry, Jake. Just observing this clock.
18:33
It's got me mesmerized. How's Henrietta?
18:37
>> Oh, what am I going to tell you, Ethan?
18:41
>> Same thing as usual. >> Yep.
18:43
Not a trace of any physiological problem.
18:45
Never is.
18:47
Oh, there's a name for it, if it's of any help.
18:50
Chronic inadequate.
18:52
Someone who just can't handle the simple process of life
18:55
and has to make excuses for it.
18:56
>> I'd better go up to her. >> Oh, there's no need.
18:58
I gave her a sedative.
19:00
Won't hurt her, but it might do you some good.
19:04
Come on now. Let's play chess.
19:07
>> I set us up out here, alright?
19:09
>> With all those clocks rattling away?
19:11
>> I want to keep my eye on this baby here.
19:13
>> [ Chuckles ]
19:15
If you can't sit up with one sick friend,
19:17
you got to sit up with another.
19:22
>> And for the next 10 or 15 minutes,
19:25
I did forget the clock that was to haunt the rest of my days.
19:30
Inexorably, as we concentrated on the chess board,
19:33
all of the clocks ticked on towards 12:00
19:36
and the moment
19:38
when the explanation of that substitute number 13
19:42
was about to be made by the clock itself.
19:48
Don't think much of your king's pawn variation, Jake.
19:52
Got you boxed in. Your move. >> Don't rush me, don't rush me.
19:56
I'm thinking.
19:58
[ Cuckoo clock cuckooing, clocks chiming ]
20:00
Good Lord, Ethan, how can you stand that infernal racket?
20:04
>> What? What racket?
20:05
Oh, you mean the clocks striking? [ Chuckles ]
20:08
I don't even notice them anymore.
20:11
Well, go ahead. What do you want to give up?
20:13
>> No, no, no, no.
20:15
But who can think of a chess move
20:17
with all hell breaking loose?
20:19
From now on, we start our games after midnight.
20:22
Enough to drive a man stark staring mad.
20:25
I swear to Sam Hill, Ethan, you deli...
20:27
[ Clock chiming loudly ]
20:33
>> After the 12th stroke of the hourglass clock's chime,
20:37
there was no sound but
20:40
the beat of the clock and my own heart.
20:44
Everything else had stopped dead.
20:47
My friend's mouth was frozen in the act of speaking.
20:51
His hand poised over a chessman as though cast in bronze.
20:56
Outside, like the old child's game,
21:00
people had turned to statues.
21:03
A car backing into a parking space was stopped in its tracks.
21:07
The very raindrops hung motionless in the air
21:10
like a spangled curtain.
21:13
For everyone else in the world, save only me
21:19
and that damnable clock, time was standing still.
21:23
♪♪
21:29
The next hour was a strange delirium.
21:34
My brain raced with new ideas for achieving my lifelong dream,
21:39
a perpetual motion timepiece.
21:41
My legs were as supple and tireless as an 18-year-old's
21:46
as I climbed the stairs to look at my wife,
21:48
frozen in the act of turning in her sleep,
21:51
my sister-in-law caught in the middle of a snore.
21:54
Towards the end of the hour, I returned to the shop.
21:59
A quick stab of terror prodding at me.
22:02
Was this to be forever?
22:04
[ Clock beating ]
22:06
Poor Jake.
22:07
Still sat in the middle of the move
22:09
he had started almost an hour ago.
22:12
The hands of all the clocks pointed to exactly 12,
22:17
except the hourglass.
22:20
There, the small hand stood directly at 13,
22:24
while the minute hand swept closer and closer to join it.
22:28
With a sense of mounting excitement,
22:30
I waited for their junction.
22:32
Like the other clocks, my strange new one
22:34
had only struck 12 before.
22:38
now, I felt I knew the reason for 13,
22:42
the extra magic hour of precious time
22:46
that twice a day it offered to its owner.
22:50
With bated breath, I waited for the proof,
22:53
the missing chime,
22:55
and then it came. [ Clock chimes ]
22:58
>> ...berately set us up here tonight to get me off my game.
23:01
[ Chuckles ] Ah, I concede.
23:04
>> Don't you want some more time to think it over?
23:06
>> Oh, it wouldn't matter if you gave me an hour to consider it.
23:10
Tonight I'm too bushed to think.
23:13
Huh? Just one minute after 12:00.
23:15
We've only been at the game 10 minutes or so,
23:17
and I feel as if I've been here for 70.
23:19
>> Is it really only 10 minutes?
23:21
>> [ Chuckling ] Well, you're the clockmaker, Ethan.
23:24
Look all around you at your little markers.
23:27
>> Yes, yes. You're right.
23:30
So it's true.
23:33
>> You feeling alright? >> Never better. Why?
23:37
>> Well, you looked a little strange for a minute.
23:40
Matter of fact, Ethan, I've been meaning to mention it.
23:44
I'd like to have you drop around to the office some day soon.
23:46
>> What for?
23:47
>> Well, you're not as young as you were, you know,
23:50
and you've been pushing yourself pretty hard lately.
23:54
Want to make a date now?
23:55
>> Oh, I'll call you.
23:56
>> Well, don't forget. [ Both grunt ]
24:00
>> Now there's something I wish
24:02
all my patients were as healthy as.
24:04
>> Yeah, 20 years since I started
24:06
that old avocado tree in the window.
24:08
>> And like Topsy, it just growed.
24:10
>> Don't you believe it.
24:12
Oh, that took a lot of tender loving care.
24:16
Watered just right. Pinching it back.
24:19
Bringing it along to grow up right.
24:22
Just like the child.
24:25
I love that old tree.
24:28
>> Well, Ethan, man's got to have something to love.
24:34
>> Yeah, I reckon.
24:36
Oh, you don't think
24:37
there's anything really wrong with Henny, do you?
24:39
>> No, no, I don't.
24:41
It's just another of her eternal spells.
24:44
Well, night, old friend. >> Yeah.
24:47
Rain stopped. Good night, Jake.
24:49
♪♪
24:59
For a long time after my old friend drove away,
25:03
I stood by the door, gazing into the cool, crisp night.
25:08
I didn't notice the cold.
25:10
I was too full of a kind of welling excitement inside me.
25:15
What a gift that clock had brought me.
25:19
The dreams were building like castles in my head.
25:22
For I was richer and more powerful than a king.
25:26
For now I knew, no matter what,
25:28
that for two blessed hours every day from now on,
25:33
I was a free man,
25:36
and the last thing I heard that night as my head hit the pillow,
25:41
was the triumphant beat of the clock sounding in my inner ear.
25:48
Or was it the sound of my own heart?
25:51
♪♪
25:59
>> How is she, Doctor?
26:01
>> I don't know, Harriet.
26:04
Now, I don't mean to alarm you,
26:07
but, uh, I think we'll put your sister Henrietta
26:09
in the hospital for a few days for observation.
26:11
>> But what's the matter with her?
26:13
>> That's what I want to put her in the hospital for -- find out.
26:16
>> [ Sighs ] What do you suspect it is?
26:18
>> I don't suspect it's anything.
26:21
I just want to reassure myself.
26:23
Now, why don't you go up and keep her company
26:24
while I talk to Ethan?
26:26
>> Oh-ho, you won't have any trouble convincing him.
26:29
I don't see why I can't take care of her.
26:30
>> Well, you can't this time, Harriet.
26:33
If you want to help, go sit with her.
26:37
I'll make the arrangements with Ethan.
26:41
>> How's Henny?
26:43
>> I, uh -- I want to put her in the hospital
26:46
for a few days, Ethan.
26:48
>> Oh, she's that sick? >> I'm not sure.
26:50
Whatever it is, this is not just one of her spells.
26:54
I want her under observation for a while.
26:57
>> Well, whatever you say, Jake.
26:58
>> Yeah. I wish I knew what to say.
27:03
I feel a little guilty.
27:04
Ever since that night, a few weeks ago
27:06
when we were playing chess. >> What do you mean, guilty?
27:08
>> Well, damn it, for 20 years
27:10
I've been medicating her imaginary ills.
27:13
I wonder if maybe I got careless that night.
27:16
Well, there's no doubt that from then on, this --
27:20
this, uh, debility, anemia, whatever it is, started.
27:26
Well, I'll get along and make all the arrangements.
27:29
I'll phone you when to expect the ambulance.
27:31
♪♪
27:37
>> I had my own guilt nagging at me.
27:40
In the month since I'd discovered
27:42
the secret of the clock.
27:44
I'd thought of pretty nearly nothing else.
27:46
I waited, as eager as a child for those two stolen hours
27:51
every day, not only for the relief from Harriet's nagging
27:55
and poor Henrietta's everlasting complaints,
27:58
but for the lift, the joy,
28:00
the -- the youth and vigor that they brought me,
28:04
for I'd gone one better than Ponce de León
28:07
for part of a day, anyway.
28:09
I had found the fountain of youth.
28:16
But a wave of shocks was about to jolt me back to reality.
28:21
The first was Henry's being taken to the hospital.
28:24
The second was the morning the clock stopped.
28:29
[ Clock beats stop ]
28:33
Oh, no. No, no.
28:37
[ Door opens ] >> What is it? Ethan.
28:39
>> No, y-you can't -- you can't stop.
28:40
>> What is it, Ethan? What's wrong?
28:42
>> The clock. It stopped.
28:44
>> [ Scoffs ] Is that all? >> I've got to get it started.
28:46
>> Oh, you shake it like that, it'll end up in pieces.
28:49
[ Scoffs ] Good riddance.
28:50
I told you it was a waste of money.
28:52
>> You get out. Get out of here.
28:53
>> How dare you talk to me like that?
28:54
>> You get out!
28:56
>> [ Exhales sharply ] I certainly will.
28:57
Nobody's going to talk to me like that,
28:59
particularly not you!
29:00
[ Door closes ]
29:02
>> I was frantic.
29:03
My golden hours of solitude gone?
29:07
My extra gift of precious time and the rebirth of youth?
29:11
I couldn't let them go.
29:13
There must be some way to bring them back.
29:15
Start that damned intricate mechanism again.
29:22
Clock was dead,
29:24
its lifeblood somehow drained.
29:28
Blood?
29:30
But that's what started it in the first place.
29:32
[ Telephone rings ] Maybe --
29:34
Oh, damnation.
29:35
Let it ring. I've got -- I've got to find something.
29:39
Oh, alright. [ Ringing stops ]
29:42
Hello? >> Ethan, it's Jake.
29:46
>> Oh, Jake. Look, I don't want to talk now.
29:49
>> Oh, then you've heard.
29:51
>> Heard what?
29:52
>> About Henrietta.
29:54
>> Well, she -- she's not -- she's not --
29:57
>> Aye.
29:58
I just got back to my office
30:00
and got a message from the hospital.
30:02
I'm, uh --
30:03
I'm afraid she's passed away.
30:06
>> Oh. Are you sure?
30:08
>> I'm on my way to the hospital now,
30:10
just on the outside chance.
30:12
Better meet me there.
30:13
>> I'm on my way. [ Receiver clicks ]
30:15
[ Dramatic music plays ]
30:20
We were -- We were too late.
30:23
Henny was gone.
30:25
With no goodbyes.
30:28
I sat by a nurse's desk
30:30
waiting for Jake to complete arrangements and drive me home.
30:34
A young nurse came down the hall with a tray of blood samples,
30:38
putting them on the desk.
30:40
She came towards me.
30:41
>> Mr. Vigil? >> Yes, nurse?
30:43
>> Dr. Royce asked me to tell you
30:45
he'll only be a minute or two.
30:46
>> Oh, thank you nurse.
30:49
As she walked away, my eyes following her blindly,
30:54
then...
30:56
I was looking at that tray of blood samples.
30:59
Blood.
31:01
It was Henny's cutting her finger
31:02
that started the clock.
31:05
Would that be the answer?
31:07
I acted without thinking.
31:09
In a moment, I had slipped one of the tubes into my pocket,
31:12
and I was back in my seat
31:13
before Jake came striding down the hall.
31:15
♪♪
31:20
I was back in the shop at last, alone.
31:23
With shaking fingers, I lifted the lid,
31:26
exposing the brain, or whatever it was, of the clock.
31:29
Uncapping the tube, I poured in the blood.
31:33
I looked at the dial.
31:36
The hands were spinning around to the proper time.
31:39
And then the clock was alive again.
31:43
[ Clock beating ]
31:45
Its heart was beating.
31:47
[ Dramatic music plays ]
31:49
♪♪
31:56
>> It would have been better,
31:58
far better had Ethan left it for dead,
32:01
as we shall see when we return shortly with act three.
32:07
>> Like what you're hearing so far?
32:09
Are you curious about the history behind radio programs
32:12
just like this one
32:14
and the dramatic genius who created them?
32:16
In the nine-part award-winning documentary "Audio Maverick,"
32:19
we explore the golden age of radio
32:22
through the life of Himan Brown.
32:24
You'll hear the history of radio come to life
32:27
as we travel from the birth of audio drama
32:29
to the programs that brought millions of families
32:31
into their living rooms every night,
32:34
"Audio Maverick" is available anywhere you get your podcasts.
32:37
♪♪
32:44
♪♪
32:52
>> Which of us could resist the temptation of perpetual youth?
32:56
Or short of that, any extension of life?
33:00
2 extra hours a day is 730 a year,
33:04
almost exactly an extra month.
33:08
In a lifetime, six whole more years.
33:12
But what Ethan Vigil forgot is that for every action
33:15
there is a reaction,
33:17
for every gift, a recompense.
33:20
♪♪
33:27
>> The saddest part of my confession
33:29
is that, after my wife's death,
33:31
I became completely blind to everything
33:33
but my two periods of escape every day.
33:37
More and more, my sister-in-law, Harriet,
33:39
took over the ordinary part of life,
33:41
transforming my beloved clock shop into a nightmare
33:44
against which I preferred to close my eyes.
33:47
>> Ethan. Ethan. >> What, Harriet?
33:51
>> Would you mind helping me dress this window, please?
33:53
>> Well, what's the matter with it as it is?
33:55
>> If you'd just get away from that bench of yours for a moment
33:57
and come here, perhaps I can show you.
33:59
>> Alright, Harriet.
34:01
>> [ Sighs ] You know how I'm branching out now
34:04
that I'm the active partner in the store.
34:06
>> Aw, Gewgaws and gimcracks.
34:09
>> Well, you might know you'd lag a mile behind the times.
34:12
This is novelty jewelry, and to sell it, we must display it.
34:16
>> Cheap claptrap.
34:17
>> Now, first off, I want you to get this cheap,
34:19
silly rubber plant out of the window.
34:21
>> Rubber plant? That's my avocado tree
34:23
that I grew with my own hand. >> Well, whatever it is,
34:25
it takes up the whole window. I want it out of here.
34:27
>> No, sir. Not my tree. Needs the sunshine it gets.
34:31
>> But what use is it?
34:32
>> Tarnation, woman.
34:34
Does everything have to have a function?
34:36
It's beautiful. It's balm to my soul.
34:39
That's enough reason for its existence.
34:41
Besides, it don't cost nothing, so you leave it alone.
34:44
>> Oh, very well.
34:46
But I must have somewhere to display my costume jewelry.
34:49
Oh, ah, let's move that ugly, old hourglass clock
34:53
somewhere else.
34:54
Why does it have to be right beside your bench
34:56
where every customer comes in?
34:57
>> Harriet, I'm warning you.
34:58
You leave that clock where it is.
35:00
Don't you ever dare lay a hand on it.
35:02
You hear me? >> [ Scoffs ]
35:03
My, aren't we touchy?
35:06
Well, just let me remind you of something, Ethan.
35:09
With Henrietta gone, her share goes to me,
35:12
so I am 2/3 of this store.
35:13
I can have it any way I want to.
35:15
>> Over my dead body.
35:18
You can do what you want with all your cheap tinselly stuff,
35:20
but you keep your hands off that clock.
35:22
>> [ Scoffs ] Heaven's sake. Alright.
35:27
Don't you have an appointment with Dr. Royce?
35:29
>> [ Groans ] I forgot.
35:31
Better get right over to his office.
35:33
♪♪
35:42
>> Okay, Ethan, you can put your shirt back on.
35:45
I'm all finished examining you.
35:46
>> Well, what's the verdict?
35:48
>> [ Chuckles ] I couldn't be more pleased.
35:51
>> Ah, you approve of the shape I'm in, huh?
35:53
>> Well, before Henrietta died,
35:54
I don't mind telling you I was plumb worried about you.
35:58
Your heart was acting up.
35:59
Your -- I didn't like your blood pressure.
36:01
And there was a lump in your belly
36:03
I could palpate big as a grapefruit.
36:05
>> And now?
36:07
>> Now I don't even need the X-rays I took.
36:09
Know it before I see them.
36:12
[ Chuckles ] It's practically noon.
36:14
Now, go on. You don't need a doctor.
36:15
Get out of here.
36:17
Let me get around to the sick people outside who do.
36:19
♪♪
36:25
>> As I went into the outer office,
36:27
I glanced at the electric clock on the wall.
36:30
The hands clocked to noon as I did so,
36:33
and I was looking at a, by now, familiar scene.
36:38
The nurse, who had risen to escort the next patient in,
36:42
was suddenly transfixed,
36:44
halfway up from her chair.
36:47
A child about to scream remained with face contorted,
36:51
the scream not yet uttered.
36:54
A thought crossed my mind.
36:57
It was a month since I had fed the clock
36:59
that first transfusion.
37:02
I went into Jake's small lab, opened the refrigerator,
37:06
I helped myself to a blood sample, and left.
37:09
♪♪
37:13
[ Clock beating ]
37:16
Back at the store, the only sound was the beat of my clock.
37:21
It seemed a little labored to me,
37:23
but, for the moment, I was too furious
37:25
to see what Harriet had been at since I left.
37:27
Draped all over my avocado tree,
37:30
were festoons of cheap tin and glass jewelry,
37:33
and Harriet, a superior smirk on her face
37:37
was caught immobile in the act of adding more.
37:41
I choked back my anger because, suddenly,
37:44
before I could move, the clock beat died.
37:49
>> Why, Ethan? How'd you get back so soon?
37:51
>> Well, uh, I...
37:53
What are you doing to the avocado?
37:55
>> Well, I-I -- Since I can't take it out of the window,
37:58
I thought I'd just use it as a display tree.
38:01
>> You leave that alone. As long as it's there,
38:04
no one moves that or touches it except me.
38:06
You understand that? >> Well, you certainly don't
38:08
have to be so abusive -- >> Get away.
38:10
Get out of here. Leave me alone.
38:11
>> Oh, when you're in a mood like this, I'm glad to.
38:15
I'm sorry to tell you that your precious clock
38:17
seems to be out of order again.
38:18
I hope this time it's broken for good.
38:21
[ Door closes ]
38:22
>> Good riddance.
38:24
Poor old tree.
38:27
But first, some special oil for the magic lamp.
38:31
Please, God, you'll still run again.
38:34
[ Clock winding ]
38:38
[ Clock beating ]
38:41
And time stood still again.
38:49
The pattern for the next months of my life was set.
38:53
The part of it in my waking moments.
38:54
Was only a necessary bridge between the long hours
38:58
of infinite relief and accomplishment
39:01
my clock brought me each noon and midnight.
39:05
My designs for my perpetual motion mechanism were completed.
39:09
I had already started to build it.
39:12
That was my real life.
39:15
Although I found to my dismay
39:17
that the clock seemed to demand more and more
39:20
frequent transfusions to stay running,
39:23
but these were easy to steal from Jake's office
39:26
in the hours when time stood still.
39:31
Then, once again, events caught up with me.
39:34
[ Knock on door ]
39:35
Oh, Jake, just a moment.
39:37
[ Door unlocks, opens ]
39:39
What are you doing here this time of night?
39:42
>> Well, the evening's young.
39:43
I thought a chess game might get some things off my mind.
39:47
What were you frowning at in the window when I passed?
39:50
>> My plant there. >> The avocado?
39:53
Oh, yeah. [ Chuckles ]
39:55
Looks a might peaked. >> I can't understand it.
39:58
It's been wilting and drooping day by day.
40:01
No reason.
40:02
Are you any good at diagnosing vegetable life, Jake?
40:05
>> Nope.
40:07
And I am beginning to think I'm not much better with humans.
40:11
I wish I knew the secret of your spot of youth.
40:13
I think I'm getting old.
40:16
>> You're not yourself, Jake.
40:18
What's wrong?
40:20
>> I don't know.
40:22
In a way, it goes back to -- to Henrietta's death.
40:25
Or seems to. >> What does?
40:29
>> Well, I never said too much about the way she died
40:31
at the time, Ethan.
40:32
>> Congestive heart failure, you say?
40:34
>> Oh, that's true enough.
40:36
That's a condition that produces an end to living.
40:39
But what caused it?
40:41
>> Are you asking me?
40:43
>> No, I'm asking myself,
40:45
and I have no answer.
40:47
Oh, tests were run,
40:48
and the pathological evidence was clear enough.
40:51
But in spite of massive transfusions,
40:54
we couldn't stop Henrietta's blood from --
40:57
from simply disintegrating,
41:01
quite literally turn into water.
41:03
>> And that's unusual? >> Abnormal.
41:06
Never seen a case like it before.
41:08
In the last three months,
41:10
I've lost three of my patients to the same sort of...
41:13
oh, what shall I say? Same sort of malady.
41:16
I might have seen it developing, except for a strange thing.
41:20
>> What?
41:22
>> Well, all of them had been to my office
41:24
and had had routine blood samples drawn
41:26
for physical checkups.
41:29
>> And, uh, the samples didn't warn you?
41:32
>> There weren't any samples to examine.
41:34
Unaccountably, they disappeared from my office.
41:38
And one other strange coincidence.
41:41
The night your wife died,
41:43
a blood sample for a patient in the hospital disappeared.
41:47
>> And that patient died later?
41:49
>> Yep. About four weeks later.
41:53
But I don't know why I'm worrying you with all this.
41:56
It's none of your business. >> Well, it is.
41:57
>> Huh?
41:59
Oh, you mean as far as Henrietta is concerned?
42:01
>> No, no, I-I mean -- I mean much more than that.
42:05
>> Ethan, what is it?
42:07
I -- I didn't mean to upset you like this.
42:09
>> I'm not upset. I mean, uh, I just want you to understand.
42:14
>> Understand what?
42:16
>> That...
42:18
That I'm sorry.
42:20
Oh, I'm so sorry.
42:23
>> Well, you're a good friend, Ethan.
42:27
And I guess I don't feel like any chess tonight now.
42:32
I'll run along.
42:33
>> Jake.
42:34
>> Yeah?
42:36
>> I --
42:37
I never asked before,
42:39
but do you remember exactly what time Henny died?
42:44
>> Ooh, about 25 to 12:00, I think.
42:49
[ Dramatic music plays ]
42:53
>> I didn't have to think.
42:56
I knew it all now.
42:58
That was the precise moment that that evil clock first stopped.
43:04
So it was a monster, insatiable,
43:08
that once, having tasted blood,
43:10
continued to suck on its victim
43:12
till it had drained all life away,
43:15
and I was no better, no less evil.
43:20
I had been feeding this mechanical vampire
43:24
at the cost of other human lives.
43:28
In a daze, unable to explain to him,
43:31
I saw my old friend Jake out
43:33
and turned to face what I had to face.
43:36
[ Door closes ]
43:37
[ Footsteps ]
43:41
The shop was dark as I walked to the clock.
43:45
My ears were so attuned to it by now
43:47
that I'd been aware that it had started to labor
43:50
and needed a fresh transfusion.
43:52
I was more than a little mad by now, as, in the dark,
43:55
I said to it...
43:56
Die.
43:58
Damn you, you devil.
44:00
Die.
44:01
♪♪
44:05
My moment of triumph was brief.
44:08
I still had my own expiation to make, not only for my wife,
44:14
but for all those others.
44:16
and there was a personal sadness as my hands in the darkness
44:20
traced the form of my perpetual motion machine,
44:24
which would never be completed now.
44:27
a man without love, wife, or children
44:32
would like to leave a small footprint on the sands,
44:36
his gage to immortality.
44:39
All I would leave now was a sick avocado tree
44:43
I had nourished for 20 years for nothing.
44:47
And then suddenly I heard stealthy footsteps
44:52
and pulled back into the shadows.
44:54
[ Door opens ]
44:56
[ Footsteps approaching ]
44:59
[ Can uncaps ]
45:00
[ Aerosol spraying ]
45:03
>> Harriet. >> Oh, uh,
45:04
I thought you'd gone to bed.
45:06
>> What are you doing to the plant?
45:08
>> Oh, why, see, it's just some food to make --
45:10
>> Let me see. [ Sighs ] It's a weed killer.
45:13
You've been poisoning my tree.
45:16
Why you -- >> Don't you touch me.
45:18
>> Get away from it.
45:19
[ Harriet grunting ] Get away.
45:20
[ Both grunting ]
45:22
>> [ Breathing heavily ]
45:23
Look what you've done. I've cut my hand.
45:26
It's your fault.
45:28
But, finally, you've smashed up this ugly, old clock for good.
45:31
It's dead, just as dead
45:33
as your precious avocado tree is going to be.
45:36
[ Exhales sharply ] And don't think you can save it.
45:40
I knew you'd never agree to take it out of the window,
45:42
so I've been poisoning it for weeks.
45:46
It's as good as dead right now.
45:48
[ Dramatic music plays ]
45:53
>> And so were you, Harriet.
45:56
So were you.
45:58
[ Clock beating ]
45:59
Her blood had started the damn thing again.
46:03
But this was to be the last time.
46:07
What is there left to say?
46:09
I have to watch another human being die,
46:13
slowly, inexorably, unable to arrest the inevitable.
46:18
And even though it is someone I despise,
46:21
my guilt is in no way lessened.
46:24
The only pleasure I can take is that, as Harriet sinks,
46:29
so does that remorseless, evil, damnable machine.
46:35
And once its heart is stilled, I shall destroy it forever.
46:41
The one element I have not tried against it
46:46
is the enemy of the devil.
46:49
I shall take it, chained to my body,
46:54
when we go to our grave in the river to share it for eternity.
47:00
[ Beating continues ]
47:03
As I finish this confession to mail to my good friend,
47:07
Dr. Jacob Royce,
47:10
I can hear the evil thing labor, about to die.
47:18
It's time for me to write "the end."
47:25
[ Dramatic music plays ]
47:27
♪♪
47:33
>> So be warned. If you should, by any chance,
47:36
come across a clock in a curio shop shaped like an hourglass
47:41
with a dial that bears the number 13 instead of 12
47:45
shun it like the plague.
47:48
I'll be back shortly.
47:50
♪♪
47:58
♪♪
48:07
Oh, the fascination of time
48:10
and man's never-ending quest to hoard it.
48:13
I, too, have that irrational impulse
48:15
all of us have felt sometime
48:18
to hold back the hands and bring time itself to stop.
48:23
And then I remember Ethan Vigil,
48:26
and I decide that once around is enough for all of us.
48:30
our cast included John Beal, Grace Matthews,
48:33
Bryna Raeburn and Ian Martin.
48:36
The entire production was under the direction of Himan Brown.
48:41
This is E.G. Marshall inviting you
48:43
to return to our "Mystery Theater"
48:45
for another adventure in the macabre.
48:48
Until next time, pleasant dreams.
48:53
[ Door creaking ]
48:57
[ Door closes ]
48:59
♪♪
49:08
♪♪
49:17
♪♪
49:25
♪♪
49:34
>> "If You Please, Himan Brown's Radio Mystery Theater"
49:36
is produced and directed by Sarah Montague.
49:40
Our executive producers are Malina Brown and Sarah Montague.
49:44
CUNY TV's executive director is Chiqui Cartagena.
49:48
The director of production is Susan Iger.
49:50
The associate producer is Corinne Wallace,
49:53
and our audio production intern is Sofia Cedeno.
49:56
Margot Avery is the voice of the series introduction and credits.
50:01
The program commentaries are by John Slavney.
50:04
Our technical team at CUNY TV
50:07
includes senior audio engineer Richard Kim
50:10
and broadcast audio engineers Jackie Mitchell and Kevin Wolfe.
50:14
Our staff photographer is Laura Fuchs.
50:17
Our archivists are David Rice and Catriona Schlosser.
50:21
Our closed caption coordinator is Amy Monte,
50:24
the "If You Please" program mix engineer
50:26
is Lisa Gosselin-Vincent.
50:28
Tink Media handles our publicity and marketing.
50:32
Our director of social media is Karen A. Brown
50:35
in collaboration with StardustBlue PR,
50:38
"If You Please, Himan Brown's Radio Mystery Theater"
50:41
is a production of CUNY TV and Radio Drama Network.
50:47
If you enjoyed the show and are curious
50:48
about the history of these radio programs,
50:51
listen to "Audio Maverick."
50:53
In this award-winning nine-part documentary,
50:56
we explore the golden age of radio
50:58
through the life of dramatic genius Himan Brown,
51:01
and then explore the work of contemporary audio dramatists
51:04
who are part of his legacy.
51:06
"Audio Maverick" is available anywhere you get your podcasts.