0674 - Dead Men Do Tell Tales (6/30/1977)

0:00The CBS Radio Mystery Theater presents... Come in. Welcome. I'm E.G. Marshall. If the crime is homicide, three factors are involved in its solution. The corpse or the victim, the perpetrator or the murderer, and the investigation or the detectives involved in it. In this case, there are Captain, Ben Trot and Detective Henry Coalvira. The victim, in a sense, we know his body is there, but his identity is a question mark. The murderer, of course, we do not know until we have traced a strange hearing aid back through time to a dreadful secret hidden in the past.

1:06I was just thinking, here we go. Want, Captain? I got a hunch finding out who isn't going to be the answer in this case. It's going to be... why? So, if my guy would be expensive taste as the culprit, he's a boy with clout and connections. We're going to need a strong case to pin anything on him. Just keep your fingers crossed, we can dig up anything that could. Our mystery drama, Dead Men Do Tell Tales, was written especially for the mystery theater by Ian Martin. And stars, Mason Adams. I'll be back shortly with that one. This is a story told by a man who is already dead.

2:06You have to accept that fact since none of us can really change it. He is a haunted man, haunted by some fact that he is restless and will not stay decently quiet in a grave. Possibly it has something to do with the manner of his going. Possibly we'll find out the whole story if we just listen to him as we're about to do now. The winds who've roared a rattle of teeth had met. And in my friend Amira, I could see him dancing in the breeze as if he had no care in the world. They ordered me to pull the truck away and I obeyed, but shame saw a hot, burned-mo body. Jim Young's head was cocked to one side as if to say, why me? And how could you do it? And I wanted to scream out the answer. It was none of my doing. It wasn't me.

3:08But no matter how much I protest, that night rubbed off on me, I'd stay and I could wash away. Maybe I couldn't have changed anything then. But now, near 20 years later, I have exacted retribution from all but one. And like everything else, it seems as always, he's ended up the winner. Hey, old Sam, what are you doing here? He gave me a gun. He wanted me to use it on yourself. I've changed our minds. It's simple to use it on you. The tight-heared squad Sergeant Overa speaking. Oh, yeah, Pete. Yeah. Okay, on my way.

4:08Where'd you go, Rico? Almost I kept it. No identification. Vagrant? How many vagants you know were a money belt with 8,925 bucks, huh? I think I'll check this one out myself. What did Doc say? Two shots, Captain. One shot at the... What, what, you're calling the front here? Press-Bull? Now, the doc call is something else. Sternum? That, I'd say it, yeah, yeah. So I go to the head of the class. Advantages of a college education. That the one that killed him? Yeah. Doc says he must have driven all the pieces of bone like box shot into the heart. Well, what about the other bullet? Well, it went through him just above the left hip, no damage. Ballistics found the bullet in a chest of drawers, 38, probably short barrel. Well, at least we know something about the killer. Oh, what? He was no professional. Two shots point blank, but far apart. Point blank? How the burns on his shirt? Of course, yeah.

5:10Also, he was no stranger. Have you figured? He opened the door, didn't he? Step back to let the guy in. How can you tell that? The angle. The way he fell, the bullet that went through him ended up in the front of the bottom drawer that just in the drawers. Now, you go to the head of the class. Smart boy, here we go. Learned it all from you. The master detective, Captain Ben Troc. Got the crime solved in a flash. Now, what we got to do is pick who did it and who it was done too. Let's start with the victim. Who is he? Like I said, no identification. Either he had an any or someone didn't want him to be identified. Okay, Rico Amigo. Let's start digging. We could begin with the landlady. And you didn't hear any shots, Mrs. Claren? Shot? Why would I hear shots from 8 to 330 with a volume turned down so I don't have to answer the phone? How was that, again, Captain?

6:10Her hearing aid. The heart had snake stored during the building so she could live in peace and quiet. During that working hour, she turns off her hearing aid. So she didn't hear any shots? And no shots. Did you see anyone coming to the building this afternoon? Certainly I saw people. Him, Mr. Small, the man who got himself murdered. My fourth floor back with a two-thake and Mrs. Bob Lin's sketch had a walker dog. Mrs. Pai Krushy was a toilet fixed and then there was a... I meant like strangers. Oh, found man from Mr. Hicksby. Third row front. He's a new man. Check that, Rico. I got him. And that's all I've seen. From Troc von I got myselfs. What? She follows the daytime television series. I want to know my favorite. I'd rather you didn't tell me. I wouldn't want it to spoil the others for me. So his name is Mr. Small. Any first name? He didn't tell me. You never got around to a first name basis. What? Consider I didn't say it. So you don't know his first name. I didn't say that.

7:11And, excuse me. You do know it? Well, I suppose. Sam! After all, his boss would know who would. You're so right. Isn't she, Rico? Of course, Captain. And while we're on the subject of names, would you know his boss's name? Yes, I'm kind of foreign name like Nettie. Nettie? Or would you have any idea what kind of business or an address? No, I wrote down the phone number. Would you have it? I give it to Mr. Small. I mean, I think it was an extanza exchange. I didn't pay too much in ever mind. Oh, yeah. I remember. He called it was something to do with when he would have some name or other's car to be ready. That's ex-Obrico. You know the Sam Small's hands? Yes, I'm real aware manicure, but you could see he was a man who worked with him. The dark shade under the nails and by the cuticles. I figure maybe a mechanic. You better check out all repair shops that might have an escum of exchange with an arun of franchise by guy named Nettie. Can do. On my way.

8:11I still don't way go. Uh, this is Cline. About the visitors. You're sure you haven't forgotten anyone you didn't know that you might have seen in the building? Oh, anybody I see I don't know get the bombs rush. Careful you think a winner woman's got to be. I'm very careful, Mrs. Cline. Well, that ain't easy. I mean, for all poor Jake tried to do God rest his soul. That wouldn't be anyone better. Such a good man. I don't know where the world is going now. It's just not the same. I know how you feel. What do people always know about where the youth is going? Let me take your handkerchief and help you over so you could watch your face. Right, a real gentleman. I try to help. That's nice. What? This handkerchief I'm smelling. That's your perfume. Oh, I don't know. All right, but somebody dropped it. Some place I picked it up. It's a beautiful handkerchief. I wonder which one of your tenants dropped it? My tenants. A special piece of Cambrick linen like this. It has a monogram.

9:14Each I am. Where's my dear piece of evidence? You don't mind if I take this? Well, of course I might. Well, what am I going to do? Fight City Hall. Hey, Louise, you move. We've got a penny. Yeah, what do you want, Mr.? Your name, Nettie. Well, let's be. So what do you want? Oh, I got enough trouble to ready. I need you. Now what? You got a guy who works for your name, Sam Small. Sure. Best mechanic I ever had. What happened to him? What do you mean by that? Now Mr. Belman, he's waiting for his Mercedes and Sam is not here. That figure. You find a master mechanic out of the blue. There's got to be something wrong. He comes to work, am I you? He's dead, Mr. Nettie. Dead? Two bullets in him. What do you know about it? Me. What do I know about it? You try to run a repair shop?

10:14No. What am I going to do now about Mr. Belman and his Mercedes? That's a question you have to answer. I still want to know about this guy, Small. Where did he come from and how come you hired him? Well, I got a brother and put very taxes. He got a shop like mine. He write me a letter saying his guy is coming here to San Felipe. He said, Gido, you better grab this, Pisani. He's one fine mechanic. You don't find no better. So you'll hire him? Who? When? Two? Maybe three months ago. I'm going to want to know all you know about this guy, Sam Small. Very much. I'll pick anything you got. You want to go have coffee? No, come, Belman. Not so much noise. He... See, he... I'm all alone here pumping gas. I'm feeling a car on the bus goes past. He must have got off, but I don't see him until the car leaves.

11:14And he's standing right there with a couple of bags in his hands. Yes, Mr. Gido. Can I help you? Excuse me, but are you Mr. Gido Bato? Sure, that's me. You have a brother in Port Berra, Texas named Luigi. We should. What's it to you? My name is Sam Swall. Hey, never can't. I swear, good business is for me too. You are just what I need. Hey, you want to start tomorrow? So be just fine. Let's go in office. You'll give me the social security number. Here, I'll take one of your bags. All right, I can, man. No, no, no, no, let me help. Hey, hey, Sam. You got a place to say. Well, now, yet I got plenty room, my place. Third of all, one apartment. Three rooms, two, twenty-five a month. Hey, you, you want to take a look? Uh, record, I'm better fine, long-place. Oh, what's the matter? Too much? I make a 200-evo. I didn't add, Mr. Nettie.

12:14It's just that I'm pretty much a Malona. And I have things to do to finish up. It's better than I, uh, I stayed away. Keep lots of port. I'm not editing to make the door close. The spring is too strong. I'm sorry, I spaced all your things. I'll give them no more. He moves so quick. Push me out of the way. But not before I see a gun. Right there on the ground. So maybe, Mr. Police, when that means something to you, I never found out why he carried it or anything about it. Except he was one damn fine mechanic. This gun, it was a handgun. See, see, I have a revolver, you call it, huh? Something like this. Yeah, you see, just like that. You know if he ever carried it? Ah, no. No, you don't know, or no, he didn't. He didn't have it. How can you be sure to say that? Because I ask him not to. I don't like guns. And every day I check.

13:14One day, he's supposed to be having gun for. Who should? Such a mean? I wonder why it was when he could have used it maybe to define himself. You know if he kept it at his place? No, and I've been there. You know the address? Ah, some are straight ahead, think. And the phone number, I have that. You've been at the station here all day. I see. How about lunch? Well, I'm out about to one hour. Yeah, when? Usually, time 12 to 1. Eh, maybe I'll be able to kill the mort. I am at the box. You go home? No, I bring a lunch. Then I go sit in the park where there is a sun. I am no, no, no, no, no, no, as you know. Yes, I know. It's like the next best thing to an alley by. And I have a buy. Eh, what you talking about? You think I killed Sam? I don't know. Do you? No.

14:14Why should I? I got no answers. Right now, there ain't anything but questions. A strange and torturous story, as I first suggest to you, twisting through the labyrinths of the human soul, sneaking and sculking from the bright light of anything. Most of all, truth. And adding up at last to a lecture, that our lady with the scales may have to wink at behind the bandage over her eyes. I shall return shortly with act two. Murder has been done, leaving its train, the five W's, who, where, when, what, and why.

15:18Well, so far we know where, and what the weapon was, and some idea of when, somewhere between 12 and 1 p.m., according to the medical examiner. Now, there remains a double question, who, and why? For the moment, our investigators detect disargent alveera and captain trock are concerned with the who. Where are we headed, captain? I don't know about you, Rico. Me, precinct, report, and home dinner. What about the case? What about it? Not much more we can do to the moral. You figured the land lady or the guy who runs the service station? You don't count anybody out. Unlike the lead I got here best. What? The little square of white linen. The handkerchief? That's it. Whoever dropped anything, this fan say he didn't belong in that crummy house except for a special reason. I'm just glad they left their calling card. Are you going to do a sum? For the, um, what you called that thing?

16:19The monogram. We have his initials. These are hand-embroided custom made handkerchiefs. Probably all his habit, I show you. Short, shirt, ties. That means special orders. Shouldn't be too hard to trice. And the clincher could be the perfume or fume. Here. Smell. Hey, hey, hey. I am fancy. That's no toilet water. Straight essence. Like $50 an ounce. I see what you mean. Miss Ombre didn't belong in that punk neighborhood. Expensive taste. What was he doing there? What was a grease monkey who travels light doing with all that dough and a money belt? Blackmail? It's one answer. It's one game where you always take the chance of ending up with your head and a basket. Ah, okay, captain. You check out the perpetrator and outconcentrate on the victim. I got a hunch finding out who is it that will be the answer in this case. It's going to be why.

17:20So? So if my guy would be expensive taste as the culprit, he's a boy with clout and connections. We're going to need a real strong case to pin anything on him. Just keep your fingers crossed that we can do up anything that good. I wanted to call out from the grave and tell them the truth. You know? No, I could you know. Are there any other sub-year who have died before their time? Who hang in this half-world between heaven and hell? Lost among the stars? Waiting for some final act of justice. You left undone? Like me? Sam's more? Or waiting and praying the two hard-working detectives can finish the job you left behind? How could I have failed at the last? He should have been the easiest of all. Remember back to how it all began? I just don't understand you, Sam.

18:22When you mean pick up stakes and leave, Borden. Just what I said, Beth Ann. Oh, you just begin to do real fine. A Chrissy starting high school? She'll be graduated by 1964 and she'll want to be among her friends. I know. I'm going to ask a lot of my wife and my daughter. But I wouldn't be doing it if it wasn't the same thing. Well, I felt I had to ask. But what's suddenly the matter with Borden? Both Borden brought up right here. We've always loved it. And each other? What has changed everything all of a sudden? Borden has changed. Beth Ann, people changed. Time to move. I did play. I don't know what's gotten into you. Nothing has changed about Borden. A lot of what? What rest here now, Beth Ann? Well, you mean Governor Falvers or that fussing about where the anneagra has a right to a decent education? Sort of. What, Sam? That is nothing to run scared about.

19:22That's been coming for years. What you want to take an example from Henry Martin, some of your friends and neighbors, about how to make peace. Bring harmony. Henry Martin. And my other friend. Well, yes. People like Alan Poorn, Jacob Ved and Fred Lembe, you know. You think these men have any conscience about the black man? Yes, I think in the past months they've seen the light. Seen the light? Well, you don't talk to any of them. At least they're out doing something about things in the world. That's more than I can say about you. Between your work in it, your old gas station, shine up your cars. You don't seem to have time for anything. Including me. And Chrissy. I got a lot of my mind, Beth. Not begging you to listen to me. There won't be offer my mind till I get away from Borden for good. But what makes you think any time you've been in your own home one? I swear Sam, small.

20:23You ain't been the same dancing from out of Magnolia Griffith's marriage. Would you disappear to that night anyways? I can't tell you. Well, you shamed something? It's more than I was. It wouldn't have to do with Carrie Sue Griffiths. Where'd he be? That little tram Magnolia's sister. Oh, I wouldn't put anything past her. You know there are a lot of rumors about that party after the wedding and the Lord knows almost anything could be true. Well, you boys, now they're not otherwise. You should look at her with your eyes. Beth, I was sick. I wasn't even at the wedding. You know I was working late at the station that night. You said you worked. I wouldn't lie to you. All right, then. Tell me the truth about why you want to leave Borden. I can't. That's not good enough. It's going to have to be. Because I'm telling you, Beth, if I'm ever to lift up my head again, we've got to go. All right. Because I'm your wife and I love you.

21:23I'll go with you. But whatever it is, Sam, I'm going to tell you something what my father would have said. You've got to face down things. You've got some riding on your back. Don't do it good to run. It'll just keep traveling long right with you. I should have listened to her. But how could I run in as scared as I would? Somehow after Borden, nothing was the same. And I didn't blame Beth once you finally asked for the divorce. But I tell him I bought the fights to the guns and I was in Shaper-Hile, Texas. And that's where I met up with Jacob Better. And the whole idea came to me how I could cleanse my soul. Jake! Jake Better! Sam, Sam's small. What are you doing here? I live here. Anyways, I work here, you.

22:23I'm all just moving some. I'm not hiding the air you since you pulled up stakes from Borden. I've done a power traveling. I don't really like a lot of the sand. What do you mean? No help for her. Plenty of red lamey on the ginseng. It does look violent. And near all of the soup. You know all of us. Who were there that night? How about Erie? Well, my Henry was still around. I pulled up stakes out of thought you knew that. I caught. Well, after you and Mrs. broke up. She came back on home to Borden and Henry and she were trying to tell me they're married. You didn't know? Tell me for us to send her every... which way I'd turn. Oh, take it so much to heart. You got dealt the roughest hand. I tell you, Sam.

23:24I had it to... What's that you got there? A gun. 30 in short barrel. You want to take a man out? This would be just a hand. It's a little weapon you could have close up. Especially if the man was yourself. But you're good in mind, Sam. All my brains are. That is until you showed up. Sam? You're not going to kill me. You'll serve, Jake. No, sir. I'm not. Till you showed up, it was me I forget to do away with. Whatever's sudden, I got to think. There's a heavy burden there in all our minds. And we ain't ever going to live in peace with it. There's only one way for all of us to sit with. To air that night. To find peace in our souls, or the life hereafter. You brought me a kind of call, Jake. Now I know where the rest of my life is at. Here. What? I don't want no gun.

24:25A that lived by the sword shall die by it. The only way you'll ever put your conscience to rest. It took Jake pretty near three weeks to make up his mind. All for me to make it up for him. But I raised the sight of Jim Young so clear in his mind. It haunted him night and day till the only way to get peace was... He used the gun I gave him. And that's what moved me on to the next step. I counted up how many were there that night. And how many I could figure out was still left. I figured that till all of them were gone, the ghost would never be laid to rest. I bought me five short barrels at eight. And I started out on a journey to pass them out to be used. A journey that took me twelve years right up to the day before yesterday. And my death.

25:30Morning, Captain. Morning, Rico. Sorry, I'm late. Did you know on the Sam Small homicide? Mm, couple of things. Did you get him make up who owned the Henkelchiff yet? I found out the manufacturer. They keep a list of their monogram customers. And waiting to get a rundown on who HRM is. And how many of them there are. And what have you got? A bunch of stuff. I just don't know what it adds up to. Here's the fire. Let's look it into my office and get away from this racket. Like I thought you had the hunch the guy might have had military service. Through his finger, brain side dug up his record. No doubt he is Sam Small. We knew that would be thirty-six hours after we found him. I dug a couple of other things out of the record too. He was married and divorced and one kid. What happened to his wife? I'm still digging on that. I'm waiting for the tellyx from Borden. Where? Borden, Mississippi. Where Sam Small comes from. Borden there. He's got a far peace instead.

26:30And you should know how far. Up till now I traced him to four other towns besides this. Not to mention his service in Korea. This man has done some traveling. Any notion why he cleared out of these other birds? Ken Sabi. Except that my hunch is it has to do with these. What are they? Newspaper clippings. Found them in an envelope inside the dresser. When the kid are ransacked, they must have caught in the back of the drawer and fallen behind. Son-to-peer record, June 14, 1968. New Mexico mourns. Judge Douglas McParlan commits suicide. Muscat pan, graphic 8 February 1970. Business executive as suicide. Fred La Maye, president of Oklahoma Security and Homeowners. Die this morning from a gunshot wound. Okay. Other towns, other dates, other men. Suicides apparently. So what? You notice the weapon used in each case?

27:32Yeah. A short barrel of 38. What does that prove? Why would he save these clippings? Here. One is even a bum. This Jake veteran in Chopper, Texas. Where would he get a gun? You figure small would have any other connection with them besides saving the clippings? I don't know. I'm working on that. Oh, yeah. Oh, sure. Put them on. It's my guy calling from County Honors about the hangkerchief. Yes, hello. Right this is Captain Trot speaking. You did. That's fine. That many? Oh, from all over the country. And I see. But any from right here? There is one. Good. Bad is name in address please. Henry Roberts... Martin. No, that's all right. I don't need the address. I know it. Yes. Yes, thanks.

28:33I will arrange for someone to pick up the list and have it tell extant of me. But thank you. Ah. Looks like maybe you've caught yourself a murderer? It looks like I caught myself a bull by the tail. You know who Henry Roberts Martin is. Hey, you don't mean the police commissioner himself? And the candidate for the next governor of this state? Oh, man. You don't have that thorough by the tail. He's just about ready to run up your nose. The immortal Mr. Sullivan of Gilbert and Sullivan fame. At a point in the Maccato, when the plot is incredibly complicated, as his principal singer trio, in which each lament's in turn, here's a how do you do? Here's a pretty mess, and here's a state of things. I suppose our American equivalent at this given moment in our story would be where do we go from here?

29:35I shall return shortly with Act Three. Captain Ben Tronk is holding a very hot potato, and he knows it. The homicide of an obscure citizen with no apparent surviving family has slowly evolved into a nightmare. If the who, in our famous five of W's, is really the police commissioner and a candidate for governor of the state, what on earth is the why? What link very deep in the past could tie the victim to this prominent man, respected man? Well, the easiest way to find out is to continue our strange and twisted story. What am I going to do now? Got to be a mistake somewhere. Maybe someone else dropped it. Well, who would have the commissioner's hankerchief?

30:37He's wife? Why would she have looked? You'd know better than me, Ben. You've been around him and his family, but that perfume. Well, what about it? Well, it's not very much, oh, when you think of it, more like a woman's. Maybe. You know what kind of perfume is his Martin Wers? Well, of hell, I don't. But maybe I can find out. No way out of it. I have to ask the commissioner a couple of questions. From the solid wars of my grave, I want to cry on despair. I wanted only to bring justice to the guilty. I for I, too, for tooth. How could I know it might reach out to the innocent? Of all people who was more innocent than Beth Ann, who once had been my wife and all my living days was my love. She had been destroyed enough by the guilt of the past.

31:37How could I have brought the present down in ruins about her head as well? I remember how secure I thought I was in that planned meeting in the park. Oh, Lord, so hard to think it was less than a month ago. Sam. You here? Are you alone? Can't you see? I don't trust you. No more than I do you. We got a little choice, I wish. You? Less than I. Come here. Out of the light into the bushes. I can't be sure it's not a trap. Come on home with me where we can talk and try, but Sam, if it is you, and if I did, could I be sure that wasn't a trap? What do you have to fear for me? Only your fear of me? Because I cannot mask you for what you're saying. Sam, in the name of heaven, it's 10 gone, 20 years or so ago. Can we let it rest? Oh, let's go back and discuss it.

32:38It's too open here. All right, Henry. But just remember, I am armed. One false move, and you could be dead. I'll take my chances as I have come into this meeting. If you wanted to kill me, you could easily have done so by now. I don't want to kill you, Henry. I want you to kill yourself, like all the others. I am not here to exact vengeance, only to accomplish retribution. You really expect me to believe the incredible story you told me while we were driving home? I'm quite sure you believe me. You are serious. Try to convince me that everyone who was there that night is dead. Except you and me. What I knew about red folders with a cancer and buts is still in Korean skinny Ellis with a two-bar canoes. I reckon you could say they died. Natural deaths. What else would you say?

33:38I'd say God took them in His own time. The others I took for Him. Now I read the copies of the newspaper, clippings you sent me. I thought they took them alive. Mostly they did, except on a jensen. He never got to pull the trigger, so I helped him step off his terrace, 14 floors up. Hell, you're dead. Just who are you, Sam's Molder? Set yourself up as Judge and Executioner. Where I see it, Henry, I'm neither. I'm only your conscious. And what right have you to be there? You all made me what I am. I didn't ask to be part of what you did. I beg you not to do it. But you made me part of your sin and tired me with the same guilty secret all of you had to bear. It broke me, the innocent, one first, and ended my marriage in my home. And in the end I came to see the only reason I had left to keep on living. Was to make all of you pay the same price you made for Jim Young pay. You had to give your own life.

34:38You must be mad, Jim Young is dead and buried and forgotten. The only God what was coming to you had no pride. He didn't need one, the evidence was in. And automatically he was guilty. When you doubt Kerry's who, Griffith's word? When she cried rape against my friend Jim Young, yes. Will you forget it the past is dead? Oh no, are they, Henry? I've been spending the last years making time wind up and all the hens come home to roost. So I'm bringing you a present like I brought all the rest. I'm giving you this gun. Why, thank you Sam. Now the tables are turned. I could shoot you down like the dog you are. You want to stay in your soul twice. I don't think you're there. But you can go ahead if you want. I'm only living on borrowed time. I've been dead ever since the night you and your kind forced me to be part of the crime you committed. I'm offering you your own reservation.

35:38The way out everyone else took it. If you don't want it, it's your own damnation. You can roast in hell for the rest of all eternity. If you pull that trigger and send me to join Jim Young. Damn it, he was a black man. And I'll wait. You think there's any difference in what color you kill? You're guilty just the same before the Lord. Turned and walked out of the room, leaving him with the drink in his hand, looking down at the gun. His half blind and at last it was all over. And I could go seek my own peace. I nearly stumbled over Bethan when she stopped me just before the outside door. Bethan? Bethan? I heard. I'm sorry, you did. I'm ashamed for the both of us. I should have known all those years ago. Maybe I should have told you. I didn't know how. Oh, how could I ever have married him after you? If it helps any, I've hated him for years.

36:39I just didn't know how to bust loose. And how about Chrissy? Oh, no worry about her. She's safe married with a fine boy, and she's got your grandchildren. Sure would have liked to see them. Why can't you? No way. I gave them up with everything else that night. Sam? What? Don't trust Henry. He doesn't have any conscience. I'm his conscience, Bethan. He knows now he ain't got anything else as long as I'm alive. Because I can open up to truth, and it will pull him down. But he could kill you. If he does, he kills his only hope for salvation. You're sure you want to make this statement, Mrs. Martin? I'm quite sure, Captain. You followed your husband to this address without his knowledge. You were on the floor below when the deceased Sam Small opened his door. You heard the conversation you have reported to me.

37:39I did, Captain Trump. You had climbed as far as the floor below the top floor when you heard. Who is it? Telegram for Mrs. Sam Small. You didn't have to pry any tricks, Henry. You want to come in? No. I want to get out, and this is the way. Then what happened, Mrs. Martin? I...couched on the land and below, not knowing what to do. No one else in the building was stirring. And then I climbed the stairs slowly to Sam's floor, and I listened at the door. There were sounds of things being overturned, banging, straightened, I don't know what. And then suddenly, the door to the apartment was flowing open with me hidden behind it, and my husband. And when he walked in, ran out and down the stairs as if all hell were out to him. Did you go into the apartment?

38:39No, I couldn't. Let's see if the door to the apartment had locked. I could smell that a gun had been fired. I couldn't force my way in. So you ran? Yes. Dropping one of your husband's handkerchiefs that you had borrowed as you did. Well, I suppose so, I must have. Will you arrest him now? From whatever that's. It's highly circumstantial, Mrs. Martin. And on top of that, a white cannot testify against her husband. You don't believe me? Of course I do. But you can't think I'm guilty. Captain, to understand you would have to have lived in bored and all those years ago. Everyone on edge uptight, fired by fear of a race riot, that beginning of the 60s, any torch could light an explosion. Borden was a small town, and the Griffiths Redden was a mighty special event. So when Carrey Sue cried, rape, who do you think was going to be blamed? Nobody any color this side, a light tan.

39:42Everybody was roaring drunk, and poor black Jim Young was the one they chose to crucify. And Henry was the leading nor an order man. He rounded up the lynch mob. They wanted a real neat hanging. So when they stopped for gas at Sam's mall's place, they roped him into it. So he bring his open truck. You see, that's a mighty good place for someone with a noose around his neck to stand, before they drive it off and leave you swaying in the breeze. It was certain poor Sam wanted no part of, but they forced him into it. They threatened him to be a man. They threatened, they killed me and Chrissy too, if anyone else talked. You knew about this man? Oh, well of course not, not then. It was a secret buried as deep as Jim Young's body, but I know it now. Like I said, ma'am, a wife cannot testify against her husband. Then let us go home and see if he won't testify against himself.

40:45Henry, it's me, Beth. Yes, I've been expecting you. Are the police with you? Yes. That's too bad. The man had had a ball. He did it. Oh well. Check him, Rico. Are you all right, Mrs. Martin? I'm bad at it. Don't let her come in, Captain. In the tampon. He's gone. I'm sorry. No, I'm not. It's perhaps the one decent thing he's ever done. The life is a vital force which can create and which can destroy.

41:45Too often it is occupied with tragedy. Our story swept away in the ordinary business of living and lifted the curtain on some people whose lives were scarred and doomed. In a way I hope none of you may have had to face. I'll be back shortly. Time after time you come to my sanctum, seeking stories, living vicariously the life of other people, or simply settling back and enjoying your good yarn. You may be abused, thrilled, scared, appalled, each by turn. I cannot promise you what to tell will come your way when you knock in my door. You take your own chances every time the door creaks open. Like Pandora's Box, you'd ever know what will fly out.

42:51Our cast included Mason Adams, Howard Ross, Bob Caliban, and Marion Zeldies. The entire production was under the direction of Iman Brown. And now a preview of our next tale. That's paid for what I did. Believe me, I paid. You haven't paid enough. Well, what do you want? What do you want from me? Money? That's not what you stole from me. What's in? Tell me. I don't know. I'm just here to collect Jade. How you want to pay me is up to you. This is my gift. This is my house. You follow me in and I will have you arrested. But trust pass. I won't follow you in Jade, but I'll be waiting. And whenever you leave your house, I'll be waiting to follow you wherever you go.

43:53Huh? How long until you pay? Mrs. E. G. Marshall inviting you to return to our mystery theater for another adventure in the macabre. Until next time, pleasant dream.