Suspense Radio Shows - The Hitchiker

0:00President Barack Obama. Virginia, we are counting on you. Republicans want to steal enough seats in Congress to raid the next election and wield unchecked power for two more years. But you can stop them by voting yes by April 21st. Help put our elections back on a level playing field and let voters decide not politicians. Vote yes by April 21st. Paid for by Virginians for fair elections. Most people would rather assemble a 300-piece cabinet than search for insurance. That's why the zebra searches for you comparing over 100 insurance companies to find savings no one else can compare today at the zebra.com Liberty Mutual customizes your car and home insurance but now we're customizing this ad for your morning commute to wake you up which could help your driving. Science says that stimulating the brain increases alertness so here's a pop quiz. How many months have 28 days? What gets wetter as it dries? What is keys but can't open locks?

1:03If you don't want to hear the answers, turn off this Liberty Mutual ad now. 12 months, a towel, piano. Enjoy being fully alert. The Columbia Network takes pleasure in bringing you to your home. Suspense. Suspense. Columbia's parade of outstanding thrillers produced and directed by William Steer and scored by Bernard Herman. The notable melodramas from stage and screen, fiction and radio presented each week to bring you to the edge of your chair to keep you in. Suspense.

2:10Good evening. This is Orson Wells. I'm very happy I am to be back in the United States and back on the Columbia Network, even for so short a visit as this one. Back with old friends like Johnny Deets who's tonight's director and Bernard Herman. The Mercury Theater presented tonight's radio play for the first time last year. They came right out then and hailed it as a classic of the medium. Nobody argued the point. A lot of people asked us to do it again so it's gratifying here for a chance now and to find a favorite of ours in this distinguished anthology of spook shows. Personally I've never met anybody who didn't like a good ghost story. But I know a lot of people who think there are a lot of people who don't like a good ghost story. For the benefit of these at least I go on record at the outset of his evenings and attainment with a sober assurance that although blood may be curdled on this program none will be stoked. There's no shooting, nighting, throttling, axing or poisoning here, no clanking chains, no cobwebs,

3:12no boney and or hairy hands appearing from secret panels or better yet bedroom curtains. If it's any part of that dear old phosphorescent foolishness that people who don't like ghost stories don't like then again I promise you we haven't got it. Not tonight but we do have as a thriller. Sam is good as we think it is you can call it a shocker. It's already been called a real orson well story. Now frankly I don't know what this means. I've been on the air directing and acting in my own shows for quite a while now and I don't suppose I've done more than half a dozen thrillers and all that time. Honestly I don't think even that many but it seems I do have a reputation for the uncanny quite possibly a little escapative mine involving a couple of planets which shall be nameless is responsible. Doesn't really matter. Don't think I disapprove of thrillers I don't. A story doesn't have to appeal to the heart it can also appeal to the spine. Sometimes you want your heart to be warmed. Sometimes you want your spine to single.

4:15The tingling it's to be hoped will be quite audible as you listen to night to the hitchhiker. That's the name of our story the hitchhiker. I'm in an auto camp on fruit 66 just west of California, Mexico. If I tell it perhaps it'll help me keep it from going going crazy. I got to tell this quickly I'm not crazy now I feel perfectly well except that I'm running a slight temperature. My name is Ronald Adams. I'm 36 years of age. I'm married tall dark with a black mustache. I drive a 1940 Buick license number six Y-175189. I was born in Brooklyn all this I know. I know that I'm at this moment perfectly sane but it's not me who has gone mad.

5:20Something else something not only beyond my control. I don't just speak quickly any minute to link me break. This may be the last thing I ever tell on earth. The last night I ever see the stars. Six days ago I left Brooklyn to drive to California. Good bye son. Good luck to you my boy. Good bye mother. Here give me a kiss and I'll go. I'll come out with you at the car. Oh no it's raining stay out the door. Dear I thought you'd promise for you wouldn't try. I know dear I can't sorry but I I do hate to see. I'll be back. It will be the on the car three months. It isn't that is it's just a trip. Ronald I wish you weren't driving. Oh mother there you go again people do it every day. I know but you'll be careful won't you promise me you'll be extra careful. Don't fall asleep

6:25or drive fast or pick up any strangers in the room. Of course. I think I was still 17 here you know. And right I mean from as you get to Hollywood. Of course I will not you worry. It's nothing going to happen as if they days are perfectly simple driving on smooth, decent, civilized roads hot dog or hamburger stand every day. I was in fine spirits drive ahead of me even alone in a sea like a log. I reckon without fear crossing Brooklyn bridge that morning in the rain. I saw a man leaning against the cables. He seemed to be waiting for a lift there was spots of fresh rain on his shoulders. He was carrying a cheap overnight bag in one hand. He was thin nondescript with a cap fall down over his eyes.

7:29I would have forgotten him completely except for just an hour later while crossing the Pulaski Skyway over the Jersey flats. I saw him again. At least he looked like the same person. He was standing now as one some pointing west. I couldn't figure out how he got there but I thought probably one of those fast trucks had picked him up beat me to the skyway and let him off. I didn't stop for him. And late that night. I saw him again. It's on the new Pennsylvania turn by between Harrisburg and Pittsburgh. It's 265 miles long with a very high speed limit. I was just stalling down for all the tunnels. When I saw him standing under an arch light by the side of the road. I think I distinctly the bag of cams. Even the spots of fresh rain. I think I'm going to get some fresh troubles. Hello. Hello. Hello.

8:30I stepped on the gas like a shot. That's the only country's bail game is I have no intention of stopping. Besides the coincidence, Cesar, however it was in the Willis, it stopped in the next gas station. Yes, sir. I'll fill it up. Certainly, sir. Check your oil, sir. No, thanks. Nice night, isn't it? Yes. Come on. It has been raining here recently, hasn't it? Not a drop of rain all the way. Oh. Oh, I suppose that doesn't go on your business, anyhow. All people drive through here all kinds of weather. Mostly business, you know. Can I make clear your cars out on the turn five this season in the year? I suppose not. What about hitchhikers?

9:32Hitchhikers here? What's the matter? Don't you ever see any? Not much. If we did, it'd be a sight for sorry. Why? Oh, God be a fool who started out to hitchhikers on this road. Look at it. Ben, you've never seen anybody? No, maybe they get the lift before the turnpike starts. I mean, you know, just before the toll house. But then it'd be a mighty long ride. Most cars wouldn't want to pick up a guy with that long a ride. And you know, this is pretty on some country here. Mountains and woods. You ain't seen anybody like that, haven't you? No. Oh, no, not at all. It's just a technical question. Hey, say, well, that'll be just $1.49 with the tax. I'm gradually passed from my mind to sheer coincidence. I had a good night's sleep in Pittsburgh.

10:32I didn't think about the man on next day until the start side of Zanesville, Ohio. I saw him again. So bright sunshiney afternoon, the peaceful Ohio fields, brown with the autumn stubble, a grieving in the golden light I was driving slowly, drinking it in them. The road suddenly ended in a detour in front of the barrier. He was standing. Let me explain about his appearance before I go on. I repeat, there was nothing sinister about him. He was as grab as a mud fence. I was as attitude menacing. He merely stood there waiting, almost drooping a little, a cheap overnight bag in his hand. He looked as though he'd been waiting there for hours. And he looked up. He hailed me. He started to walk forward. Hello. Hello. Hello.

11:33No, not just now, sorry. The only fellow for you. No, not today. The other way, going to New York, sorry. I'll try to get the car back on the road again. I can't afford it. He didn't pick him up with having a sit beside me. He was somehow unbearable. Same time, I told him. More than ever. Unspeakably alone. Hour after hour went by, seals the town was ticked off one by one. The light changed. I knew now that I was going to see him again. And though I dreaded the sight, I caught myself searching the side of the road waiting for him to appear. This is it.

12:42So, San, we just infarpire, don't you? Yeah, we go the daytime. We're closed up now for the night. I know. I was one of you to possibly have a cup of coffee, black coffee, just... No! That's not what I was like, mister. My wife's a cop. She's a man. But don't shut the door. Please, listen just a minute ago. Just a minute ago, There was a man standing here, right beside the stand, a suspicious looking man. I don't mean to disturb it. And you see, I was driving along when I just happened to look and there he was. How did he go? For nothing. You've been taking a niff, that's what you were going to. Now land your way before I go on a caribolt. I got him in the car again and drove on slowly. It's getting to hate the car. I could have found a place to stop. To rest a little. I was in the Ozark Mountains of Missouri now. Few resort places that were closed only in occasional log cabin, seemingly deserted.

13:42That's all it broke and knocked me in the wild, wooded landscape. I had seen him at that roadside stand. I knew I'd seen again. Maybe at the next turn of the world. I knew that when I saw him next, I would run him down. I didn't see him yet. I didn't see him until late next afternoon. I stopped to try to sleep at a little junction just across the border and Oklahoma to let a train pass by. When he appeared across tracks, leaning against a telephone pole. Perfectly airless dry day. The red clay of Oklahoma was baking under the southwestern sun. Yet there was spots of fresh rain on his shoulders.

14:43I couldn't stand there. Without thinking blindly, I started the car across the tracks. When he looked up at me, he was staring at the ground. I stepped on the ground. He was trying to get toward him. I could hear the train in the distance now. I didn't care. I went along the car. The train was coming close like a hill to dull rain. The crowd was kissing. Still he stood there. And now I know that he was threatening me to my desk. Liberty Mutual customizes your car and home insurance. But now we're customizing this ad for your morning commute to wake you up. Which could help your driving? Science says that stimulating the brain increases alertness. So here's a pop quiz. How many months have 28 days? What gets wetter as it dries?

15:44What is keys but can't open locks? If you don't want to hear the answers, turn off this Liberty Mutual ad now. 12 months, a towel, piano. Enjoy being fully alert. Liberty Liberty Liberty Liberty Liberty Tyler Reddick here from 2311 Racing. Victory Lane? Yeah. It's even better with Chumba by my side. Race to ChumbaCostino.com. Let's Chumba. No purchase necessary. BTW Group. Boy, we're prohibited by mom. CT and C's. 21 plus. Sponsored by ChumbaCostino. Liberty Mutual customizes your car and home insurance. And now we're customizing this ad for your morning commute to wake you up. Which could help your driving? Science says that stimulating the brain increases alertness. So here's a pop quiz. How many months have 28 days? What gets wetter as it dries? What is keys but can't open locks? If you don't want to hear the answers, turn off this Liberty Mutual ad now. 12 months, a towel, piano. Enjoy being fully alert. Liberty Liberty Liberty Liberty Liberty Liberty Liberty. Yeah.

16:45I frustrated and left. I started working left. I managed to back up. And the train passed, he was gone. I was all alone in the hot dry afternoon. After that, I knew I had to do something. I didn't know who this man was. But what he wanted of me, I only knew that from now on, I nothing but myself alone on the road for one minute. Uh, hello there. Do you like a ride? Well, what do you think? How far are you going? Uh, where do you want to go? I'm going to drive you there. Gee! Mind if I take off my shoes? I don't think she wants to. Go right ahead. Gee, what a break there. Here, try it much. Sure, honey, it's tough sometimes. It needs a break, but the break is to get the break.

17:45I think it would be, though. I bet you get a good pick up in a fast car. You'd better be careful. I'm going to drive you there. I'm going to drive you there. I'm going to drive you there. A fast car. You did, you could get places faster than say another person and another car, wouldn't you? I don't catch it. Well, take me, for instance. Suppose I'm driving across the countryside a nice steady clip about 45 miles an hour. I couldn't, couldn't a girl like you just standing beside the road waiting for less beat me to town, or any town. Fred, she got picked up every time in a car doing from 65 to 70 miles an hour. I don't know. What different did it make? No, the difference is just a crazy idea. I'm sitting here in the car. Imagine spending your time in a swell car thinking of things like that. What would you do instead? What would I do? If I was a good looking fella like yourself? Why? I just enjoy myself every minute of the time.

18:48I'd sit back and relax. Have I saw a good looking girl along the side of the road? Hey, who? The man standing beside the barbed wire fence. I didn't see anybody. There was nothing but a bunch of cows and a wire fence. What didn't he do? And ran into the barbed wire fence? I tell you, it's a thin grey man with an overnight bag of his hand. I was trying to run him down. Run him down? Kill him? Say he didn't see him back. Are you sure? I didn't see his soul. As far as I'm watching for him the next time. Keep watching. You guys peel on the roll. You'll turn up again. I didn't know. There, we're dead. How does this door work? I'm getting out of here. No, I didn't see him that time. And personally, Mr. I don't expect never to see him.

19:48All I want to do is go on living. I don't see how I live very long driving with you. I'm sorry, I didn't... I don't know what came over me. Please don't go. So if you'll excuse me. You can't go. Listen. How would you like to go to California? I'll grab you to California. Can you see in pink? Ellison's all the way? No thanks. I'll take just a second. Please, just one minute please. You know what I think you need, big boy? Not a girlfriend. Just a good dose of speed. Please. There. I got it now. Now you can't go. Please. Your hands off me. You hear me, your hands off me. She ran from me. I told you. I were a monster. Two minutes later I saw a passing truck picker up. I knew then that I was... utterly alone. It's in the heart of the Great Texas prairies that was in a car on the road as the truck went by and tried to figure out what to do out of California, I said.

20:50I could find a place to rest, or even if I could sleep right here in the car for a few hours long inside of the road. It's getting my winter overcoat out of the back seat to use as a blanket one. I saw him coming toward me, emerging from the heart of moving steer. Hello! Hello! Maybe I should have spoken to him then. Thought it out then and there. But now he began to be everywhere. Whenever I stopped even for a moment for gas, for oil, for drink and pop and cup of coffee sandwich, he was there. I saw him standing outside the auto camp in Amarillo that night, when I dared to slow down. Sitting near the drinking fountain, a little camping spot, just inside the border of New Mexico. He was waiting for me outside the Navajo Reservation,

21:51where I stopped to check my tires. I saw him in Elba curkey when I bought 20 gallons of gas. I was... I was afraid to stop him. I began to drive faster and faster. In the lunar landscape, a great varied messa country of New Mexico. I drove through it with the indifference of a fly crawling over the face of the moon. Now he didn't even wait for me to stop. Unless I drove at 85 miles an hour over those endless roads, he waited for me at every other mile. I'd see his figure, chadolous, smitten before me, still in the same attitude, over the cold, lifeless cloud, flitting over dried up rivers, over broken stones cast up by old glacial upheavals, spreading in that pure and cloudless air.

22:52I was beside myself and I finally reached Gallup, New Mexico. There's an auto camp here. Cold almost deserted this time of year. I went inside, asked if there was a telephone, and the feeling that if only I could speak to someone familiar, someone I thought I could pull myself together. You're cold, please. Long distance. Long distance, certainly. This is long distance. I'd like to put a dinner call to my home in Brooklyn, New York. I'm Ronald Adams. The number is B-220-0828. Certainly, I'll try to get it for you. Albuquerque, New York for Gallup.

23:56New York. Gallup, New Mexico, calling B-220-0828. I read somewhere that love could vanish demons. It's the middle of the morning. I knew mother'd be home. I pictured her tall and white hair in a crisp powstress going about her tasks. The amount I thought just to hear the evil, calmness, and her voice. Will you please deposit $3.85 for the first three minutes? When you have deposited a dollar and a half, will you wait until I have collected the money? All right, deposit another dollar and a half.

24:57Will you please deposit the remaining $85,000? Ready with Brooklyn, go ahead, please. Hello, hello. Mrs. Adams, resident. Hello, hello, mother. Mrs. Adams, resident. Who is it Jewish to speak to, please? Who is this? Mrs. Mrs. Winnie. Mrs. Winnie, I don't know any Mrs. Winnie. Is this B-220-0828? Yes. Where's my mother? Where's Mrs. Adams? Mrs. Adams is not at home. She's still in the hospital. Yes. Who is this calling, please? Is it a member of the family?

25:57Well, what's she in the hospital for? She's been prostrated for five days. Nervous breakdown. But who is called? Nervous breakdown. Well, my big mother never was nervous. It's all taken place since the death of her oldest son, Ronald. That's a for... That's a for oldest son, Ronald. Hey, what's this? What number is this? This is B-220-0828. It's all been very sudden. It was killed just six days ago. In the note of obel accident on the Brooklyn Bridge. Your three minutes are up, sir. Your three minutes are up, sir. Your three minutes are up, sir. And so... So I'm sitting here on this deserted auto camp in... Yellow, New Mexico.

26:59I'm trying to think... Trying to get hold of myself. Otherwise, I... I'm going to go crazy. Outside its night... The vast, soulless night of New Mexico. A million stars are in the sky. I head of me, stretch a thousand miles to empty, mister. Mountains, prairies... Desert. Somewhere among them... He's waiting for me. Somewhere, I shall know... Who he is... And who I am.

28:05So ends the hitchhiker. And to Austin Wells are considerable thanks for his playing of the title role. Mr. Wells... Help wanted. Men, women, and children. Nature of work, hard, monotonous, back-breaking labor. Our 75-a-week minimum. Hey, few cents an hour. Added inducements. Two meals a day, including several ounces of bad bread. And a cup of thin soup. Don't delay a plied once. How'd you respond to a wand ad like that, mister? And this is American working man and woman? You'd laugh, wouldn't you? Throw the paper in the trash basket. To smist the whole advertisement to some kind of a joke. But believe me, it's no joke. It's a simple statement of the working conditions that exist today in Nazi Germany. And the conquered countries under Nazi rule. It's also an exact statement of the working conditions that will be imposed on you. And every member of your family, if the Nazis win this war, you yourself personally can stop them from winning, as you know.

29:08You don't have to give up your well-paid job to do it. You needn't have to be a soldier or a sailor or an airman or a nurse or a war worker to ensure American victory. Uncle Sam doesn't ask plain ordinary hard-working citizens like you to give him anything. All he asks, all he does asks very seriously and very urgently, is that you loan him ten cents out of every dollar you make. That's all there is to it. Lend Uncle Sam a dime to win this war. And he'll pay you back with interest when he's won it. The easiest, most convenient way to lend him these dimes is to enroll in the payroll savings plan. Just tell your boss to deduct ten cents from every dollar he pays you and lend it, Uncle Sam, in your name. Sign up for this simple savings plan today and one victory comes. You'll have war bonds in your pockets instead of access bonds on your wrists. Suspense will be heard again two weeks from tonight. Next Wednesday night September 9th,

30:08the Columbia Broadcasting System will present over many of these stations at 9.30 p.m. Eastern wartime, an address by W.Averall Haramon, the United States Landleast Administrator in London. Mr. Haramon has the personal representative of the President of the United States, attended the Moscow conferences between Winston Churchill and Joseph Stalin. Next Wednesday's broadcast will be Mr. Haramon's first public address since his return to this country. Suspense is produced and directed by William Spear. John Deetz was our guest director this evening. Tonight's radio drama was written by Lucille Fletcher. The original score was by Bernard Hermann. Tyler Reddick here from 2311 Racing, another checkered flag for the books. Time to celebrate with Chamba. Jump in at chambacacino.com. Let's chamba. No purchase necessary. VTW Group.

31:08Void work prohibited by law. CTNC. 21 plus. Sponsored by Chambacacino. There's nothing like my American Express Apply on the card. I love that I can earn hotel credits when I travel. I can also earn wealthy credits. So you know I'm hitting the restaurants everyone's talking about. Plus, with the digital entertainment credit, I'm even more excited to catch my favorite shows. All in all, I can access over $3,500 and annual value with benefits and eligible purchases across travel, entertainment, and more. Learn more at americanexpress.com slash explore.com Enrollment requirements, monthly and other limits in terms of apply. Every day the world gets a little weirder, and a lot more awesome. Cool stuff daily takes a look at everything from mining and space to the latest in the fight against cancer to how AI is basically changing everything. It's all the cool stuff you didn't know you needed to know. Join us for cool stuff daily as we take a quick look at science, tech, and the wait what stories that make you sound way smarter at dinner.

32:10Subscribe to cool stuff daily now because the future is happening fast and it's way too fun to miss.