September 2, 2025 • 44 mins
CBS Radio Mystery Theater was a noteworthy attempt to revive in American radio dramas like Inner Sanctum (1941-1952) and Suspense (1942-1962). Radio dramas were widely considered "dead" 12 years prior to this series. CBS Radio Mystery Theater, or simply Mystery Theater, was created by Inner Sanctum creator Himan Brown and ran on CBS from 1974-1982. The show, much like older radio dramas, was introduced by a host (E.G. Marshall in this program), who steers us through the creaking door to start the episode. Many voices from the golden age of radio were featured, including Richard Widmark, Bret Morrison, Agnes Moorehead and many more.
Hope you enjoy this episode of Mystery Theater! Find all our OTR radio stations and podcasts at theaterofthemind-otr.com - Audio Credit: The Old Time Radio Researchers Group. - All Podcasts @ Spreaker | Apple | YouTube | Spotify | iHeart | Amazon
Hope you enjoy this episode of Mystery Theater! Find all our OTR radio stations and podcasts at theaterofthemind-otr.com - Audio Credit: The Old Time Radio Researchers Group. - All Podcasts @ Spreaker | Apple | YouTube | Spotify | iHeart | Amazon
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Transcript
Episode Transcript
Available transcripts are automatically generated. Complete accuracy is not guaranteed.
Speaker 1 (00:15):
Come in.
Speaker 2 (00:18):
Welcome.
Speaker 1 (00:20):
I me, G Marshall.
Speaker 3 (00:22):
Do you know that primitive people believed no one died
unless he had been done in by his doctor?
Speaker 1 (00:29):
It's true, of course.
Speaker 3 (00:31):
Today we're very civilized, very sophisticated, very enlightened.
Speaker 1 (00:35):
We smile at the ignorance. The naive k of the
Aborigines pitied them a little.
Speaker 3 (00:40):
But should we search ourselves closely enough? Might we not
find vestiges of the old belief somewhere? The faintly hostile
feeling that the doctor could have saved the patient.
Speaker 1 (00:56):
It must have been a wrong lived right. She'd gone
to bed hours before, but I stayed up reading. I
read till my head ached. I thought of getting something
to quiet the throbbing, but before I could, the book
slipped out of my hand. I was not precisely asleep,
(01:18):
but not really awake either, somewhere in between. So the
knock at the door seemed faint and far away. The
next time it was louder.
Speaker 2 (01:32):
Than very loud, very loud.
Speaker 3 (01:35):
Indeed, our mystery drama Date of Death was written especially
for the Mystery Theater by Elspeth Eric and stars Norman
(01:56):
Rose and Larry Haynes. It is sponsor it in part
by true value hardware stores and do It Mortar division.
I'll be back shortly with Act one. Everyone without exception
(02:23):
dies of heart failure.
Speaker 2 (02:26):
So long as that great.
Speaker 3 (02:27):
Muscle inside the chest a little to the left of
center keeps pumping away, we're alive. Not in very good shape, perhaps,
but undeniably alive. Once it stops doing its work, we're
just as undeniably dead. But long before it quits for good,
(02:49):
it may alter, hesitate, act badly. It has been impeded
in its unceasing work.
Speaker 1 (02:58):
It has been attacked. I'm matt Porter, doctor, Matthew Porter,
Matthew Cranshaw, Porter, m D.
Speaker 2 (03:13):
But this is the story not so much of me, though.
Speaker 1 (03:16):
I do play a part in it, but of one
of my patients. It is his story, as I have
reconstructed it in my own mind. Obviously I could not
be with him at all times, not with him physically,
not with him mentally or emotionally. But he was my patient,
and he was my friend of many years, and I
think I knew him better than anyone, including his wife.
(03:38):
So I have appointed myself to tell his story, the
story of David Jensen. I have to start somewhere, so
it might as well be in his hospital room on
the day I went to tell him that I had
discharged him and he could go home. All set, everybody,
I signed you out, Dave, So anytime, well, I'm to
finish package.
Speaker 4 (03:59):
Get you help missus Jenson, No, thank you. Then I'll
go and order.
Speaker 2 (04:02):
Up the cherry they you glad to be getting?
Speaker 4 (04:05):
Asked, Oh yeah, where's the book?
Speaker 1 (04:06):
Uh? Somewhere around heaven?
Speaker 4 (04:09):
Stay their end of the bed.
Speaker 2 (04:11):
What are all those?
Speaker 4 (04:13):
Just some books you've been reading to pass the time.
Speaker 1 (04:15):
Let me see those, Let me see their mind, Matt,
You and your heart, the healthy heart, how to live
with your heart? Oh?
Speaker 2 (04:25):
Holy have you.
Speaker 1 (04:26):
Been reading these days? But why not? What for?
Speaker 3 (04:28):
Well?
Speaker 1 (04:28):
I had a heart attack, didn't either? Or I know
the better? Anything you need to know, you asked me,
And I'll tell you why. I didn't want to bother it.
Speaker 2 (04:34):
Not to bother?
Speaker 1 (04:35):
How many times do I have to tell you that?
Do you want me to go over the whole thing
again with you? Then if you think I've left out anything,
you can ask me. Okay, Matt, there's no need. You
don't have I want to.
Speaker 2 (04:46):
I want to set your mind at rest.
Speaker 1 (04:48):
My mind.
Speaker 2 (04:48):
You had a simple heart attack, something called a posterior infunction.
Speaker 1 (04:53):
My old cardial inflection. Oh boy, you've really been reading up,
haven't you now. A posterior you infunction is a minor
occlusion of the right coronary artery resulting in the death
of heart muscle tissue. The posterior artery is the one
on the back surface of the art. One on the
front is the anterior artery.
Speaker 2 (05:11):
You really don't need me at all?
Speaker 1 (05:12):
Do you know all about? Well? I know a little.
You know what they say about a little knowledge.
Speaker 5 (05:16):
It's a dangerous thing.
Speaker 2 (05:18):
Tru are words who never spoke or writ or whatever.
Speaker 1 (05:22):
Now, an occlusion like that can be caused by a
thrombus or blood clots.
Speaker 2 (05:27):
You have no frombus.
Speaker 1 (05:28):
It can also be caused by a spasm. That's what
caused your attack.
Speaker 2 (05:32):
A spasm, A mild spasm.
Speaker 1 (05:34):
Mad, I'm only forty two.
Speaker 2 (05:36):
You can live to be ninety two if you take
care of yourself.
Speaker 1 (05:38):
Forty two seems awfully young. Children of six have had
heart attacks. Oh, mad, No, the younger as young as two.
Speaker 5 (05:45):
Unbelievable, terrible.
Speaker 2 (05:47):
Now you are on a mild anticoagulant janet. We'll keep
you on a low salt diet.
Speaker 1 (05:52):
You bet I will. No facts check, no booze and
no cigarettes.
Speaker 4 (05:55):
Check red cas here, doctor Porter.
Speaker 5 (05:58):
Give me the books, Matt.
Speaker 2 (05:59):
Oh no, oh no, no, no books.
Speaker 1 (06:01):
No facts, no cigarettes, no booze, and no books about
heart disease. Read dickens Hemingway read Playboy. I paid a
lot of money for those books, Matt. Now hand them off.
Not not on your life here, nurse, take them out
of the charge desk and throw them in the incenter
in mat.
Speaker 2 (06:15):
Come on, now, you're all packed tennis.
Speaker 4 (06:17):
Well, if you mean it about the book, I mean it,
then you're all dead.
Speaker 2 (06:20):
All right, let's go.
Speaker 6 (06:28):
Then you'll be ready in a minute, day or whatever.
Speaker 1 (06:30):
You say the word.
Speaker 5 (06:31):
What's that you're drinking?
Speaker 1 (06:33):
Oh? Mostly water? Water and what else?
Speaker 2 (06:36):
Shoe drops?
Speaker 1 (06:37):
Whiskey, Dave, you're not supposed to never mind what Matt said.
It's his fault anyway, what's his for? He should have
taken those books away from it.
Speaker 4 (06:46):
But he was absolutely right.
Speaker 5 (06:47):
You're the kind that can work a hangnail up into.
Speaker 2 (06:49):
A blood poisoning.
Speaker 5 (06:50):
You'll always have been.
Speaker 1 (06:51):
I'm going out, but where are you going?
Speaker 6 (06:55):
I'll be back, missus completes mister gents, and I thought
we let you out of here.
Speaker 1 (07:09):
I came back for something. My books? What book? Well,
you know the ones doctor Porter told you to get
rid of you. You didn't, did you.
Speaker 4 (07:17):
I don't know what I did with?
Speaker 1 (07:18):
Well, try and find them, would you.
Speaker 4 (07:20):
Well, I wasn't no where to look. Mister Jenson, if
you don't mind me.
Speaker 1 (07:25):
Putting in my truth sense, you just made.
Speaker 6 (07:28):
A fine recovery from a mild heart attack.
Speaker 4 (07:32):
Now, why don't you just thank God and go about
your business? Mister Dentson, Mister Denton, I didn't mean your fend.
Speaker 1 (07:42):
Oh yes, sir, can I help you? I have a
list of books here. Oh, yes, sir, have you got
any of them?
Speaker 2 (07:53):
Oh? But these are a medical books.
Speaker 1 (07:54):
You don't carry. Medical books are very few. These are
all books on heart disease.
Speaker 2 (07:59):
I'm afraid we don't have any of these in stock,
but I'll be glad to order them for you.
Speaker 1 (08:02):
How long would that take? At least a week?
Speaker 2 (08:04):
Or maybe two? Possibly three?
Speaker 1 (08:05):
Oh that's too long, I can't wait, Thank you very much.
Excuse me? Yes, where would I find these books? With?
Speaker 4 (08:17):
These?
Speaker 1 (08:17):
A medical book? Yes? I know, but you have them
in the library, don't you?
Speaker 5 (08:21):
Medical books doing a special section.
Speaker 4 (08:23):
If you just go out that doing down the hole,
it's the first door on the letters.
Speaker 1 (08:25):
Thank you very much.
Speaker 5 (08:30):
Okay, you're reading these books?
Speaker 1 (08:33):
Now? You reading those books alone, Janet? Their library books,
and you're smoking the law against doing anything the library books?
Speaker 4 (08:39):
Do you insist on doing every single solitary thing that
told you not to? Here?
Speaker 5 (08:44):
I am knocking myself out to keep.
Speaker 1 (08:46):
Your cholesterol down, Ipre, and I really do, Janet? Then
why don't you help me? Stop drinking? I don't drink much?
Speaker 5 (08:54):
Oll wh I drink it? Or why smoke when you're
not supposed to win? That told you're not well.
Speaker 1 (08:58):
I have to do something to quiet my nerves.
Speaker 4 (09:00):
If you stop reading those books, your nerves might quiet down.
Speaker 1 (09:03):
Janet, I've had a heart attack. I have to know
these things. A little knowledge I know. Well, I'm I'm
gonna have a lot of knowledge before I'm through. Don't
you worry about that, Dave.
Speaker 4 (09:13):
I read.
Speaker 1 (09:16):
I'm going to bed, okay, you I'm gonna read it one.
Speaker 5 (09:20):
It's almost twelve o'clock or what.
Speaker 1 (09:21):
I just.
Speaker 5 (09:24):
Try not to wake me up when you come to bed.
Speaker 1 (09:26):
I won't sleep well. Pleasant dreams.
Speaker 5 (09:28):
You don't read too long.
Speaker 4 (09:31):
You need your beauty sleep.
Speaker 1 (09:33):
Oh, shut night, honey. Nice read?
Speaker 3 (09:36):
Huh but.
Speaker 1 (09:48):
Oh who's that? Who's there?
Speaker 2 (09:54):
Days?
Speaker 1 (09:55):
Who is it? It's Matt, Matt, Matt Porter. Let me in?
Speaker 2 (10:00):
Uh now what the t I have to talk to.
Speaker 1 (10:02):
You, Matt. This is a heck of a time to
be making a house call. Uh yeah, I know something wrong.
Uh you've been reading? Uh yeah, yeah, a little books?
Like a lot?
Speaker 2 (10:19):
Oh these books? Well, I I like to know things.
You got them out of the library, did you, Yes.
Speaker 1 (10:24):
That's right when you h took 'em away from me
at the hospital. I went back the next day, but
the nurse wouldn't give them to me. Uh huh, So
I went to a book store. They didn't have 'em
in stock and was gonna take two or three weeks
to order 'em.
Speaker 2 (10:37):
They're uh pretty esoteric book.
Speaker 1 (10:39):
Oh I'm kidding where I can understand 'em?
Speaker 2 (10:42):
Oh you are?
Speaker 1 (10:42):
Yeah? Yeah? Anyway, I uh finally got them from the library.
Speaker 2 (10:47):
I see, But you mind if I sit down?
Speaker 3 (10:51):
Now?
Speaker 2 (10:51):
Quit not? You sit down too?
Speaker 1 (10:53):
Yo? Can I make you drink because you want to? Uh? Man,
I might as well tell you I've uh had a
drink from time to time now and then you'll usual.
Speaker 2 (11:04):
Oh, yeah, I I.
Speaker 1 (11:05):
Make mine pretty week. It's uh only the quiet my nerve.
Uh huh uh. Also I I smoke a cigarette now
and then you do allh Here, here's your drink. Oh,
thank you, I just set it down. Okay, not Uh,
I have to tell you. You surprise me in what willing.
Speaker 2 (11:27):
Do I surprise? Well?
Speaker 1 (11:27):
I I I just thought you'd start yelling at me.
Speaker 2 (11:30):
Oh, I wouldn't yell at today. That's the last thing
that I'd do.
Speaker 1 (11:33):
Well, I just told you all the things I've been doing,
the reading, the drinking, but smoking. I thought, uh, you'd
be disgusted with No.
Speaker 2 (11:41):
No, I'm not disgusted to sit down to day.
Speaker 1 (11:43):
I I have to tell you something you okay, shoot,
you know what the aortic artery is. Oh? Sure, It's
like a bicycle tire.
Speaker 2 (11:55):
It has an inner tew yeah. Yeah, now it's that
inner tube be in.
Speaker 1 (12:00):
A wall of the artery gets injured as the blood
pumped through it.
Speaker 2 (12:04):
Well, some blood seeps through the whole.
Speaker 1 (12:07):
Yeah, the aureole.
Speaker 2 (12:08):
Yes, that's the.
Speaker 1 (12:09):
Technical name for it. Now, as the blood seeps through,
some of it absorbs. But if enough of it doesn't absorb, uh,
the artery. M.
Speaker 2 (12:19):
Well it balloon yeah, I I read about that.
Speaker 1 (12:21):
Mm. Now the aortic artery has a a y shape.
Speaker 2 (12:25):
The ballooning can occur there in the crotch of the wy.
Speaker 1 (12:29):
You follow me, yeah, I follow you. When that happens, Well,
when when that happens, you will have an aneurism.
Speaker 2 (12:36):
Oh you know about that?
Speaker 1 (12:37):
Yes, of course I know about that. Now.
Speaker 2 (12:40):
Sometimes this aneurysm is well, it could.
Speaker 1 (12:42):
Be so big its thills the whole chest cavity. Yeah,
and when at first it's goodbye Charlie, Well I well, yes,
and that's what I've got. Yes, Well, how how long
have you known that? That?
Speaker 2 (12:58):
Ever? Since I looked at the well, why didn't you
tell me?
Speaker 1 (13:01):
Well, it's not the kind of thing you want to
tell anybody, because the anyway is some converse at any time,
anytime at all. Why are you telling me now?
Speaker 2 (13:08):
I don't know. I mean, it didn't seem right to
tell you, but it didn't seem.
Speaker 1 (13:12):
Right not to tell you, Dave, I've been agonizing over
this for a long time. Tonight I couldn't get to sleep,
I couldn't relax, so I decided to come over here
and tell you. I know, it's a terrible thing to face,
but at least it's the truth I know, and Matt,
I appreciate it, I really do. I always want to
know the truth. I always have, Matt. Do you you
(13:33):
know that it isn't the kind of thing you want
to tell a patient value patient, But when the patient
is an old friend like you, then it's a hundred
times as hard. It's damn near impossible.
Speaker 2 (13:43):
But I mean it tells you apart.
Speaker 1 (13:45):
That, Matt, don't upset yourself. Please, don't you see I've
I've known less for quite a while.
Speaker 2 (13:55):
Or you couldn't, but I did believe me. I did.
Speaker 1 (13:58):
I I may die tomorrow. I know that tonight. Maybe
are you just just run along home and get some sleep.
You did the right thing. Tell me about the aneurism.
You just back me up on what I knew already.
Now you just run along home and don't worry about it. Thing.
Speaker 3 (14:28):
We talk a lot about the truth. Heaven knows plenty
of people who have written about it. The search for truth,
our right.
Speaker 1 (14:38):
To know the truth, The truth shall make us free.
Speaker 2 (14:42):
Truth is beauty. Beauty is truth.
Speaker 3 (14:46):
Anyone would conclude that man is engaged in an unrelenting
quest for the realities of his existence. But is he,
or on the contrary, is he struggling constantly and desperately
to evade them, in particular the reality of his own demise,
(15:09):
which will return shortly with Act two. At the end
of our first act, David Jensen, victim of a recent
(15:31):
heart attack, had a visitor, a visitor who told him
that he had been lied to that his heart attack
had not been a mild one due to a mild
arterial spasm, that it had in reality been the result
of a massive aneurysm, a giant swelling at a crucial
(15:51):
spot in the aortic artery. Jensen listened to the holding explanation,
attentive and oddly unperturbed.
Speaker 1 (16:02):
And when the aneurysm bursts, it's goodbye, Charlie. It could
burst any time. They This isn't the kind of thing
you like to tell a patient, and when the patient
is an old friend. I I've known this for quite
a while. I may die tomorrow or tonight. I know
that day are you just run along home and get
some sleep. You did the right thing telling me about
the aneurysm. That you just back me up in what
(16:25):
I knew already, so you run along that. Don't worry
about a thing, Janity. Janet has got to know that's on.
There is to it, Janet, I mean, wake up. I've
(16:47):
I've got something to tell you. M Janity, I mean
I I don't like to wake you up, but this
is important. Janety. Hm. But well, I've I've gotta Tarling,
I've got something to tell you.
Speaker 4 (17:03):
Don't turn over that life.
Speaker 1 (17:04):
Yeah, but what's the trouble? No trouble, no trouble. Everything
was fine? Was then what are you waiting me up for? Uh?
Matt portal was just here?
Speaker 5 (17:18):
I don't yet in the middle of the night.
Speaker 1 (17:20):
Yes, I know. I was surprised myself. But he had
something to tell me.
Speaker 5 (17:24):
What could he thought that he had to tell you.
Speaker 1 (17:26):
I'm gonna tell you, Darling, I'm gonna tell you. You see,
it's been there praying on that's mind for quite a while.
And and he had to tell me the truth? What
truth about my heart?
Speaker 5 (17:41):
But we know about your heart?
Speaker 1 (17:43):
Not told early. We thought we knew. At least you
thought you knew. I I never thought I did, not
the whole truth. What in the world are you talking about?
Chair that I have an anneurism of why an annus
a huge aneurysm in one of my arteries, in a
(18:04):
very crucial spot. It's like a big balloon filled with
blood and any minute that could burst. Well, while I'm
sitting here on the edge of the bed talking to you,
it could burst.
Speaker 3 (18:16):
I don't believe you.
Speaker 5 (18:19):
Not, never told you anything like that.
Speaker 1 (18:20):
No, no, not at the hospital. He didn't wanna tell
me because he didn't wanna frighten me. But then he
decided it would be it would be better. It was
his duty to tell me the truth. Of course I
already knew the truth. Well how could it, because because
I've been reading up on these things, Janet. So when
(18:43):
Matt told me finally, he was telling me something I
already knew. Poor Maddie Wall, he was really upset.
Speaker 5 (18:49):
I w when was he here?
Speaker 1 (18:51):
Was just a little while ago.
Speaker 4 (18:52):
If I didn't hear anyone, Darling, you were asleep, I
would have heard the door bell.
Speaker 5 (18:56):
The door bell always waits away.
Speaker 1 (18:57):
He didn't ring the door bell, he just not very softly.
I hardly heard it myself. But how long was he is? Well,
that long we.
Speaker 6 (19:07):
Had a drink together, Matt Porter, Let you have a
drink and a cigarette.
Speaker 1 (19:12):
I to steady my nerves, Jennet. For Matt, he needed
a drink more than I did to get up his
nerve to tell me.
Speaker 5 (19:19):
Well, I simply don't believe it.
Speaker 1 (19:21):
You don't believe what that. I could die any minute,
die while I'm sitting here talking.
Speaker 5 (19:25):
I don't believe any of it.
Speaker 4 (19:26):
I don't believe you have you have a whatever.
Speaker 1 (19:29):
It is, he said, annis darling or swelling.
Speaker 4 (19:31):
I don't care what it is because I don't believe
he's got it. Well, Matt said, I don't believe he
said it.
Speaker 5 (19:37):
I'm going to call him tomorrow and ask him if
he said it.
Speaker 4 (19:39):
He'll say, no, you'll see what it did say.
Speaker 5 (19:42):
Whatever he said, it wasn't that.
Speaker 1 (19:44):
You just made that up of.
Speaker 4 (19:45):
Whatever he did say. You twisted it and distorted.
Speaker 5 (19:48):
It all out of purport.
Speaker 1 (19:49):
So why would I do this, Gord, No, that I
certainly don't.
Speaker 4 (19:53):
I'll go to bed, get some sleep, and tomorrow I'll
call Matt and make an appointment to see him and
get this all straightened up. Take your clothes off and
and come to bed.
Speaker 1 (20:03):
Oh no, I don't think i'll do that, Janet. I
think I'll go out for a while. Where where are
you going out for a while? Day? Dr de draft?
(20:24):
Are you home?
Speaker 4 (20:34):
Escape chances?
Speaker 1 (20:37):
Terrible time to come calling.
Speaker 4 (20:38):
Oh I'm a night person, you know that.
Speaker 1 (20:40):
Come on here, your thanks? They drift?
Speaker 4 (20:43):
Uh, sit down you you want a drink or anything?
Speaker 1 (20:45):
I just wanna talk to you. Of course, why is
I could put me out of your life?
Speaker 4 (20:51):
It's been so long.
Speaker 1 (20:52):
I uh, I've been in the hospital.
Speaker 4 (20:56):
In the hospital, why didn't you let me know? I'd
have think you were flower Well, I didn't want you
to know. Why not.
Speaker 5 (21:02):
I'd have been discreet about it.
Speaker 4 (21:04):
Your wife wouldn't have suspected.
Speaker 1 (21:05):
Any Yes, I know that degree. You've always been discreet.
I appreciate that. I just didn't want you to know
that I was sick.
Speaker 4 (21:16):
Well, plenty of people did say.
Speaker 1 (21:17):
Well, I didn't want you to think of me is less.
That's been a man.
Speaker 4 (21:23):
Well, now, why should I think that.
Speaker 1 (21:27):
I had a heart attack? Oh, I'm sorry, So.
Speaker 4 (21:30):
You see, Uh, there's little Plenty of people have had
heart attacks. I I couldn't even have a dozen of
my own acquaintances.
Speaker 1 (21:37):
No, this wasn't just a heart attack. People at first
the doctor said it was, but it was just a
mild mild cardialinflaction. Oh, d you you wouldn't know what
that is. But it's not really serious. People can live
forty or fifty years after one of those. But what
I what I had?
Speaker 3 (21:53):
What what I.
Speaker 1 (21:56):
What I have is? Uh, it's something different. I say,
it's uh, very very different. Well what is it? An aneurism?
Oh you know what an aneurism is? No, I can't
say I do, no, cause he don't. Well it it
is very serious. Oh it's it's uh inoperable, and it
(22:19):
means it means you can fall dead any minute. Oh,
how do you know all that? The doctor told me
he couldn't tell me. Well, that was the first in
the hospital, but but he didn't tell me the truth.
We're old friends, you see, and it was hard for him.
But to night he came to see me and uh.
Speaker 4 (22:39):
And he told me, oh, it must have been a
terrible shot.
Speaker 1 (22:42):
No, no, no, it wasn't. I knew all about it
before he told me. You see, I've done a lot
of reading and I.
Speaker 4 (22:48):
I I just knew m day, I'm I'm off your shot.
Speaker 1 (22:52):
That's all right. I just wanted to tell somebody.
Speaker 2 (22:56):
I see.
Speaker 1 (22:57):
After the doctor left, I woke my wife up and
I told her, but that she didn't believe a word
of it. Why not, I cause she just didn't want to. Oh,
it's better to take the chill, y'all. That's what I think, Peter.
I uh, I can't tell you how grateful I am
to it.
Speaker 4 (23:15):
Oh what, I couldn't do anything?
Speaker 1 (23:17):
You believe me? That meant a lot. And now I'm
gonna get gone.
Speaker 4 (23:24):
Just good.
Speaker 1 (23:24):
Well, I've got one more call to make. Well, make
you mine, y'all, I really must.
Speaker 4 (23:29):
Well, don't let it take a long time go by
before you call me up and come over.
Speaker 5 (23:33):
Don't be sich a stranger.
Speaker 1 (23:35):
I'll try to remember that. I see that you do. Yes,
of course I probably won't be around much longer? Can
I be? Dri the man? Have the right there? Oh?
(24:02):
Oh okay, okay to come in? Oh sure, I was
afraid you might go on to bed.
Speaker 2 (24:07):
Well I just got in a minute ago.
Speaker 1 (24:08):
Oh we have you been? Oh around? You know?
Speaker 2 (24:12):
Yeah?
Speaker 1 (24:13):
Well I can't blame you for that. Come again, Well,
you put in a pretty terrible evening.
Speaker 2 (24:18):
What would you know about? What kind of an evening?
I put in?
Speaker 1 (24:21):
Matt? Matt, I uh, I understand I understand what It
couldn't have been easy. On the contrary, it was very easy. Well,
of course I tried to make it easy for you.
But even so, telling an old friend he could go
any minute, I know that wasn't an easy thing to do.
I hope that the fact that I'd known it all
(24:41):
along may be well day. I give you my word, John,
that's gonna call you tomorrow. That's why I had to
see you tonight. You see, she refused to believe any
of it.
Speaker 2 (24:50):
Uh huh, oh, just what is it?
Speaker 1 (24:52):
Janet doesn't believe about the aneurysm uh huh, yeah, the
uh the aneurysm ill. You see, after you left, I
w grew up and told her what you'd said. She
wouldn't believe it. So she's going to call you tomorrow,
and Matt, I want you to tell her the truth.
Tell her exactly what she told me tonight about the
aneurism and what it means that it could burst any minutes.
(25:15):
And I'll be sitting Wait wait a minute, I told you, yes,
at the house. At the house. Man, when did I
tell you an hour ago? Maybe less?
Speaker 2 (25:22):
What's the matter with you? I told you at your
house an hour ago? Maybe less that you have an anneurism.
Speaker 1 (25:27):
Matt, it's all right. I already knew it.
Speaker 2 (25:29):
I told you to say, look to sit down.
Speaker 1 (25:33):
I'm all right, I'm perfectly calm. I never felt calmer
in my life. All the same, I'd rather that you
sit down, okay, if you really want me, I really
want you, Okay, now, Dave, I want you to listen
to me very carefully. You've been under a big stream lately,
and fine, you have got things a little bit mixed up. No,
I haven't. But that's all right, Dave. I was not
(25:54):
at your house tonight, not an hour ago, not at
any time now, Mat, you were. We had to drink together,
and you told me, you listened to me.
Speaker 2 (26:04):
I did not come to your house this evening. I
was nowhere near your house this evening.
Speaker 1 (26:10):
I'm at you're trying to kid l day. I spent
the whole evening with a girl, the whole evening up
to about twenty minutes ago. Oh, I know, I know
what it is. You're sorry you told me about the
anu resum mean, you're trying to take it all back,
pretend it never happened. You're never told me. But you
don't have to do that because I knew it all along.
But what are you doing that?
Speaker 2 (26:32):
I'm calling the girl I spent the evening whereas the
whole evening.
Speaker 1 (26:38):
Hello, Uh, honey, I want her to listen to me. Kiffley, Uh,
don't say anything, just listen.
Speaker 2 (26:44):
I'm in kind of a bind here and I need
your help. I need to prove where I was tonight.
Speaker 1 (26:51):
Now? Did you and I have dinner together tonight and
then go back to your place and stay there the
two of us until I left.
Speaker 2 (26:57):
Less them half an hour ago?
Speaker 1 (26:59):
All I want from you with a yes or a no?
Is that true what I just said about where I
was this evening?
Speaker 3 (27:05):
Yes?
Speaker 2 (27:06):
Okay?
Speaker 1 (27:07):
Now would you mind repeating that word for someone who
is standing right here next to me?
Speaker 2 (27:12):
Go ahead?
Speaker 1 (27:14):
Yes?
Speaker 2 (27:16):
Thanks?
Speaker 1 (27:17):
Baby?
Speaker 2 (27:20):
Well, well day.
Speaker 3 (27:34):
Have you ever met with a flat denial of something
you know to be too Have you ever been told
you did not see what you saw, do what you did,
say what you said, and hear what you heard?
Speaker 1 (27:49):
Has such a thing ever happened to you? If it had,
you know that your.
Speaker 3 (27:54):
Inner response was too deep for anger, too deep for
indignation or anything but the most profound and appalling disillusionment
will return shortly with Act three, David Jensen is in
(28:23):
the home of his friend and doctor Matthew Porter. He
has come there to tell him that his wife, Janet,
did not believe that matt had come to their home
earlier in the evening to tell David that he suffers
from a giant aneurysm in the aortic artery, which might
at any moment burst and cause his death. Doctor Porter
(28:45):
has denied saying any such thing, in fact, denied being
at David's house at any time during the evening.
Speaker 1 (28:56):
What are you doing, man, I am calling the girl I.
Speaker 2 (28:59):
Spent the evening. It's the whole evening. Yay, uh honey, uh,
listen to me. I'm in kind of a bind here.
Speaker 1 (29:09):
I need to prove where I was tonight. Now did
you and I have dinner together tonight and then go
back to your place and stay there till I left
less than half an hour ago?
Speaker 2 (29:19):
Just answer yes or no?
Speaker 3 (29:22):
Yes?
Speaker 1 (29:22):
Okay, Now you mind repeating that word for someone who's
standing right next to me?
Speaker 2 (29:28):
Go ahead, yes, thanks baby?
Speaker 1 (29:35):
Well, well, Dave, how could you do it to me?
Matt do what set that thing up with that girl?
Who is she? Anyway?
Speaker 2 (29:46):
A girl?
Speaker 1 (29:47):
The girl.
Speaker 2 (29:48):
I spent the evening with How in the world could
I set anything up? Why would I?
Speaker 1 (29:52):
I wanted to spare me, And I appreciate that. Matt.
I know you meant to be kind. But you were
right the first time when you told me about the annual,
when you told me I was gonna die. I know
you regretted it afterwards, and you set it up with
this girl to say that you never told me, never
came to the house, and all the rest of it.
Speaker 2 (30:10):
Now you look, Dave, I can see that you really
believe that I came to your house.
Speaker 1 (30:14):
That you did. Oh no, I didn't, but you think
I did. So what we have to do now is
figure out why you're so sure I did.
Speaker 2 (30:22):
Now, Dave, this is what I think.
Speaker 1 (30:26):
The only thing I can think.
Speaker 2 (30:29):
You had a dream. You dreamed the whole thing on.
Speaker 1 (30:33):
Now this was no dream, A nightmare, is what it was.
You see, Well, you had a big shock. Any kind
of a heart attack is a shock, not just a
shock to.
Speaker 2 (30:42):
The heart, but a shock to the whole nervous system.
Speaker 1 (30:46):
All of us. We go along with some sort of
conviction that we'll live forever. I don't know where we
get the idea but we all have it now. A
heart attack is a reminder that we won't and that
is a shock. Beside that initial shock, you wouldn't let
go of thing.
Speaker 2 (31:00):
You went all over getting books.
Speaker 1 (31:03):
About heart disease and reading up on this terrible reminder.
Speaker 2 (31:06):
You know, it wasn't a very bright thing to do,
but you did it. I had to know anything, you
had to know.
Speaker 1 (31:11):
I'd already told you, but you didn't really trust me,
didn't really believe me, in spite of the fact that
we've been friends for twenty years, in spite of the
fact that I'm supposed to be a pretty good doctor.
Oh you are, man.
Speaker 2 (31:23):
I don't think you'd have believed anybody anyway.
Speaker 1 (31:28):
You filled your head with a lot of stuff you
didn't really understand, and you began to imagine the worst,
and that brought on the nightmare.
Speaker 2 (31:34):
That's all it was. That's all it could have been.
Speaker 1 (31:37):
Please believe me. I gotta be going, Dave. I'm going
to get home.
Speaker 2 (31:42):
At least believe this. You do not have an aneurysm.
Do you want me to show you the X rays?
I can get hold of them tomorrow.
Speaker 1 (31:49):
Good night, man, You've been awfully kind to Dave.
Speaker 2 (31:51):
What can I say?
Speaker 3 (31:52):
What?
Speaker 1 (31:52):
Mark?
Speaker 3 (31:52):
Can I say?
Speaker 1 (31:53):
Nothing? You've said it all and I appreciate it.
Speaker 4 (32:08):
You don't have to workfare quiet.
Speaker 5 (32:10):
I'm not asleep.
Speaker 1 (32:11):
Oh, Darry, I thought you might be here. Where did
you go to see?
Speaker 3 (32:15):
Matter?
Speaker 5 (32:16):
What fall?
Speaker 1 (32:17):
Oh about what happened tonight when he was here? Oh?
You know he denied the whole thing. Can you imagine?
Speaker 5 (32:23):
I knew he didn't say you had an aneurysm. You
you simply misunderstood, Darry.
Speaker 1 (32:28):
He denied he was ever here? He did, Jesse said,
I'm He said, I must have had a nightmare.
Speaker 5 (32:35):
Oh, well, of course that's what happened.
Speaker 4 (32:40):
You fell asleep reading those books and you had a nightmare. Now,
why didn't I think?
Speaker 1 (32:46):
No, No, Janet, I didn't have a nightmare. I was
wide awake reading and there was this knock at the door,
very faint.
Speaker 2 (32:54):
At first.
Speaker 1 (32:54):
He was afraid we might both be asleep, you see,
And then he knocked louder and I went to the door.
The men. I made us each a drink. We sat
down and we talked, and he told me what I
told you. You each had a drink. I made mine
very weak. I remember telling him, Oh here, look look
(33:15):
over here, Janet, here are the glasses. There's Matts, and
here's mine. You see I didn't even finish mine. You
see mineus mostly water.
Speaker 5 (33:22):
Well, Matt didn't even touch him.
Speaker 1 (33:23):
Well, now do you see he was here, darling, that's
the proof. Now, how does he dare stand there and
tell me he was never here? Whom?
Speaker 4 (33:33):
Maybe?
Speaker 1 (33:34):
Maybe what, Janet? Nothing, Maybe Matt's not quite right in
the head. Is that what you were gonna say?
Speaker 5 (33:41):
I was going to say, maybe you ought to see
another doctor.
Speaker 1 (33:44):
No, I don't think I need another doctor. Matt is
a very good doctor. I just think it was very
hard for him to tell me the truth. And I
think he regretted it afterwards and wanted to take it back,
so he pretended it never happened. Good lord Jah that
he's probably convinced himself it never really happened. He probably
thinks he's telling the truth. He firmly believes he was
(34:06):
never here. If he's that, And it's all right, Derry. Really,
it's just that he couldn't bear the idea that I'm
gonna die and he had to be the one to
tell me. But it's all right, really, it is, Janet.
Speaker 4 (34:28):
Comfortable?
Speaker 1 (34:29):
Oh yeah, can I get.
Speaker 2 (34:31):
You anything, but you might try coming over here yourself.
Speaker 1 (34:36):
That might help.
Speaker 4 (34:37):
Yeah, okay, m poor overwork doctor man.
Speaker 1 (34:45):
Well, it's not just the work, it's the patience here.
I am beating my brains out to get them well,
and they're making me sick.
Speaker 2 (34:54):
I swear I'll die if.
Speaker 1 (34:55):
I'm trying to take care of people that don't want
to be taken care of. You know when I phoned
you last night, mm, I was with a patient that
time of nice. Uh, patients don't care about the time. Actually,
this was an old friend of mine, heart case, very
mild attack, no reason he shouldn't make a complete recovery,
(35:17):
lived to be a hundred, but he kept brooding about it,
reading books and all that got himself really worked up.
Speaker 2 (35:24):
Morbid. Uh.
Speaker 1 (35:25):
Last night, Well, he had a dream, a nightmare that
I had come to his house and told him that
he was going to die. Oh no, pussy, I couldn't
shake him.
Speaker 2 (35:36):
And that's when I call you.
Speaker 4 (35:38):
Well, I hope that fixed anything up.
Speaker 2 (35:42):
Oh, as a matter of fact, it didn't.
Speaker 1 (35:45):
Oh why not?
Speaker 2 (35:46):
Because he is obsessed.
Speaker 1 (35:47):
That's why you know. I'm gonna send him to a
psychiatrist if you go, which he probably won't.
Speaker 5 (35:53):
Oh honey, try to forget the whole thing.
Speaker 4 (35:57):
At least when you're here.
Speaker 2 (36:00):
What would I do without you?
Speaker 4 (36:03):
You'd sign somebody else.
Speaker 1 (36:05):
Patience will be the death of me.
Speaker 2 (36:07):
I swear, Oh honey, I'm so think somebody but you
know him not. I'll send him away, whoever it is.
Speaker 1 (36:15):
Don't worry. I got you.
Speaker 4 (36:21):
That wasn't onebody here.
Speaker 1 (36:22):
Now.
Speaker 4 (36:22):
Please look at you, David, Dave, what well.
Speaker 2 (36:29):
What are you doing here? Mad well? Dear, he's a friend,
A friend, yes, a friend.
Speaker 4 (36:36):
You do know each old?
Speaker 2 (36:38):
I didn't.
Speaker 1 (36:38):
I couldn't know.
Speaker 4 (36:40):
Oh call him?
Speaker 3 (36:45):
What do I do?
Speaker 1 (36:46):
An emergency heart unit?
Speaker 2 (36:48):
I begin trying to revive in my show.
Speaker 5 (36:59):
Thanks for spending so it's time with me matter?
Speaker 1 (37:01):
Oh, Janet, was the least I could do, very least.
Do you think you understand now what the X rays show?
There was no aneurysm hm. Date died of a massive
spasm like the first one, only violent. Yeah, that's what
all the other doctors said.
Speaker 2 (37:18):
They were right.
Speaker 5 (37:20):
I n I never even knew he knew that Deirdre, any.
Speaker 1 (37:24):
Girl like that I knew. I I don't think that
he knew her very well to go to her at
a time like that and he was so worried.
Speaker 2 (37:32):
Or didre is just someone to relax with.
Speaker 1 (37:35):
You knew her too, was slightly, yes, but it must.
Speaker 5 (37:39):
Have been more than slightly for him to have a
heart attack when.
Speaker 2 (37:42):
He found you with it, Janet. It's all over, It's
all passed. Let's not.
Speaker 3 (37:46):
I know.
Speaker 1 (37:46):
I know, I'm David was, but he was obsessed, obsessed
with the idea of his own death.
Speaker 5 (37:53):
He wouldn't let go cause I I know you never
came to the house that night.
Speaker 1 (37:57):
Of course I didn't. Still, Janet, you know that I didn't.
Dave had a terrible nightmare because he was obsessed, That's
all it was.
Speaker 5 (38:06):
Still there are the glasses?
Speaker 1 (38:08):
What glasses?
Speaker 5 (38:09):
Dave told me he made two drinks that night, one
for you, one for himself.
Speaker 1 (38:14):
Matt there were two, gossip Janet, listen, have you have
you still got the glasses? I mean, have you washed them?
Speaker 5 (38:22):
I don't know?
Speaker 1 (38:24):
Maybe not. Why if you haven't.
Speaker 2 (38:26):
Washed them, take them?
Speaker 1 (38:28):
Have them gone over for fingerprints. I promise you you
won't find mine.
Speaker 3 (38:40):
Good tired doctor man, Wait, I feel it's beyond tired.
Speaker 4 (38:45):
Who exhausted?
Speaker 2 (38:48):
Beyond that too? Who I just left Dave's wife She
still doesn't quite believe that I was not in their
apartment that night you were with me. They had told
her he and I had a drink together.
Speaker 1 (39:00):
Mmm.
Speaker 2 (39:00):
She said there were two glasses in the living one
his one mind. Supposedly, I told her to have him
gone over for fingerprints. I really hope she doesn't, Matt.
Speaker 4 (39:11):
I wonder does an incubus leave fingerprints?
Speaker 1 (39:17):
Oh?
Speaker 5 (39:17):
What an a? An incubus?
Speaker 4 (39:20):
The evil spirit that comes at night and lies upon
people in the sleep.
Speaker 2 (39:25):
You mean Dave was visited by that incubus?
Speaker 1 (39:30):
Why not? I dear?
Speaker 2 (39:32):
You don't believe in stuff like that.
Speaker 4 (39:34):
Oh, absolutely, you do. Well, you said he had a nightmare.
Speaker 1 (39:39):
That's right.
Speaker 4 (39:41):
Don't you know that One definition of a nightmare is
a fan or incubis?
Speaker 2 (39:47):
No, I didn't know.
Speaker 1 (39:48):
We'll look it up.
Speaker 4 (39:50):
A fiend or incubus that comes at night to sit
upon a person's chest, his chest, Matt.
Speaker 5 (39:59):
That could be a.
Speaker 4 (40:01):
But couldn't it?
Speaker 1 (40:03):
I don't know?
Speaker 2 (40:03):
I said? But but why from where?
Speaker 4 (40:07):
Who knows?
Speaker 3 (40:10):
Huh?
Speaker 1 (40:11):
Unless you said it?
Speaker 2 (40:14):
What sent the inkeepers?
Speaker 1 (40:18):
Why would I do that?
Speaker 4 (40:20):
Who knows?
Speaker 5 (40:20):
Not?
Speaker 1 (40:22):
Who knows?
Speaker 4 (40:25):
Unless you do?
Speaker 1 (40:33):
I I don't see dander anymore. It wasn't relaxing the
way it used to be. But I can't get the
idea of the incubus out of my head, especially the
idea that I might have sent it to poor Dave
in the dead of night. I'll tell you something, not
(40:55):
because you have any right to know, not because I
think you even, No, because I'd like to say it
out out loud, just this once. I never liked Dave,
not really, I never really liked my friend.
Speaker 3 (41:34):
The mystic and madman William Blake believed that a firm
persuasion that a thing is so makes it so.
Speaker 2 (41:45):
That's a bit more.
Speaker 3 (41:46):
Than I can swallow, though I'm sure there's a profound
psychological truth contained in the observation, But I prefer the
thought of August Strenberg that an obsessional conviction about supernatural
powers causes events that confirm the reality.
Speaker 1 (42:07):
Of those powers.
Speaker 2 (42:09):
I'll be back shortly.
Speaker 3 (42:23):
It's human to think about the future because we're all
so frightened, and the one thing about the future that.
Speaker 2 (42:32):
Is certain but we know, is that it contains death.
Speaker 3 (42:38):
So while it's only human to think about the future
and therefore to consider death, it's not wise to think
about it too much because If we do, it may
come sooner than it needs to and cut the future
short to Our cast included Larry Haynes, Norman Rose, Joan Copeland,
(43:04):
and E. V.
Speaker 1 (43:05):
Justter.
Speaker 3 (43:06):
The entire production was under the direction of Hymon Brown Radio.
Mystery Theater were sponsored in part by Buick Motor Division
and True Value Hardware stores.
Speaker 2 (43:17):
Missus E. G.
Speaker 3 (43:18):
Marshall inviting you to return to our Mystery Theater for
another adventure in the macabre. Until next time, pleasant, I
(44:12):
don't rank you since now
Come in.
Speaker 2 (00:18):
Welcome.
Speaker 1 (00:20):
I me, G Marshall.
Speaker 3 (00:22):
Do you know that primitive people believed no one died
unless he had been done in by his doctor?
Speaker 1 (00:29):
It's true, of course.
Speaker 3 (00:31):
Today we're very civilized, very sophisticated, very enlightened.
Speaker 1 (00:35):
We smile at the ignorance. The naive k of the
Aborigines pitied them a little.
Speaker 3 (00:40):
But should we search ourselves closely enough? Might we not
find vestiges of the old belief somewhere? The faintly hostile
feeling that the doctor could have saved the patient.
Speaker 1 (00:56):
It must have been a wrong lived right. She'd gone
to bed hours before, but I stayed up reading. I
read till my head ached. I thought of getting something
to quiet the throbbing, but before I could, the book
slipped out of my hand. I was not precisely asleep,
(01:18):
but not really awake either, somewhere in between. So the
knock at the door seemed faint and far away. The
next time it was louder.
Speaker 2 (01:32):
Than very loud, very loud.
Speaker 3 (01:35):
Indeed, our mystery drama Date of Death was written especially
for the Mystery Theater by Elspeth Eric and stars Norman
(01:56):
Rose and Larry Haynes. It is sponsor it in part
by true value hardware stores and do It Mortar division.
I'll be back shortly with Act one. Everyone without exception
(02:23):
dies of heart failure.
Speaker 2 (02:26):
So long as that great.
Speaker 3 (02:27):
Muscle inside the chest a little to the left of
center keeps pumping away, we're alive. Not in very good shape, perhaps,
but undeniably alive. Once it stops doing its work, we're
just as undeniably dead. But long before it quits for good,
(02:49):
it may alter, hesitate, act badly. It has been impeded
in its unceasing work.
Speaker 1 (02:58):
It has been attacked. I'm matt Porter, doctor, Matthew Porter,
Matthew Cranshaw, Porter, m D.
Speaker 2 (03:13):
But this is the story not so much of me, though.
Speaker 1 (03:16):
I do play a part in it, but of one
of my patients. It is his story, as I have
reconstructed it in my own mind. Obviously I could not
be with him at all times, not with him physically,
not with him mentally or emotionally. But he was my patient,
and he was my friend of many years, and I
think I knew him better than anyone, including his wife.
(03:38):
So I have appointed myself to tell his story, the
story of David Jensen. I have to start somewhere, so
it might as well be in his hospital room on
the day I went to tell him that I had
discharged him and he could go home. All set, everybody,
I signed you out, Dave, So anytime, well, I'm to
finish package.
Speaker 4 (03:59):
Get you help missus Jenson, No, thank you. Then I'll
go and order.
Speaker 2 (04:02):
Up the cherry they you glad to be getting?
Speaker 4 (04:05):
Asked, Oh yeah, where's the book?
Speaker 1 (04:06):
Uh? Somewhere around heaven?
Speaker 4 (04:09):
Stay their end of the bed.
Speaker 2 (04:11):
What are all those?
Speaker 4 (04:13):
Just some books you've been reading to pass the time.
Speaker 1 (04:15):
Let me see those, Let me see their mind, Matt,
You and your heart, the healthy heart, how to live
with your heart? Oh?
Speaker 2 (04:25):
Holy have you.
Speaker 1 (04:26):
Been reading these days? But why not? What for?
Speaker 3 (04:28):
Well?
Speaker 1 (04:28):
I had a heart attack, didn't either? Or I know
the better? Anything you need to know, you asked me,
And I'll tell you why. I didn't want to bother it.
Speaker 2 (04:34):
Not to bother?
Speaker 1 (04:35):
How many times do I have to tell you that?
Do you want me to go over the whole thing
again with you? Then if you think I've left out anything,
you can ask me. Okay, Matt, there's no need. You
don't have I want to.
Speaker 2 (04:46):
I want to set your mind at rest.
Speaker 1 (04:48):
My mind.
Speaker 2 (04:48):
You had a simple heart attack, something called a posterior infunction.
Speaker 1 (04:53):
My old cardial inflection. Oh boy, you've really been reading up,
haven't you now. A posterior you infunction is a minor
occlusion of the right coronary artery resulting in the death
of heart muscle tissue. The posterior artery is the one
on the back surface of the art. One on the
front is the anterior artery.
Speaker 2 (05:11):
You really don't need me at all?
Speaker 1 (05:12):
Do you know all about? Well? I know a little.
You know what they say about a little knowledge.
Speaker 5 (05:16):
It's a dangerous thing.
Speaker 2 (05:18):
Tru are words who never spoke or writ or whatever.
Speaker 1 (05:22):
Now, an occlusion like that can be caused by a
thrombus or blood clots.
Speaker 2 (05:27):
You have no frombus.
Speaker 1 (05:28):
It can also be caused by a spasm. That's what
caused your attack.
Speaker 2 (05:32):
A spasm, A mild spasm.
Speaker 1 (05:34):
Mad, I'm only forty two.
Speaker 2 (05:36):
You can live to be ninety two if you take
care of yourself.
Speaker 1 (05:38):
Forty two seems awfully young. Children of six have had
heart attacks. Oh, mad, No, the younger as young as two.
Speaker 5 (05:45):
Unbelievable, terrible.
Speaker 2 (05:47):
Now you are on a mild anticoagulant janet. We'll keep
you on a low salt diet.
Speaker 1 (05:52):
You bet I will. No facts check, no booze and
no cigarettes.
Speaker 4 (05:55):
Check red cas here, doctor Porter.
Speaker 5 (05:58):
Give me the books, Matt.
Speaker 2 (05:59):
Oh no, oh no, no, no books.
Speaker 1 (06:01):
No facts, no cigarettes, no booze, and no books about
heart disease. Read dickens Hemingway read Playboy. I paid a
lot of money for those books, Matt. Now hand them off.
Not not on your life here, nurse, take them out
of the charge desk and throw them in the incenter
in mat.
Speaker 2 (06:15):
Come on, now, you're all packed tennis.
Speaker 4 (06:17):
Well, if you mean it about the book, I mean it,
then you're all dead.
Speaker 2 (06:20):
All right, let's go.
Speaker 6 (06:28):
Then you'll be ready in a minute, day or whatever.
Speaker 1 (06:30):
You say the word.
Speaker 5 (06:31):
What's that you're drinking?
Speaker 1 (06:33):
Oh? Mostly water? Water and what else?
Speaker 2 (06:36):
Shoe drops?
Speaker 1 (06:37):
Whiskey, Dave, you're not supposed to never mind what Matt said.
It's his fault anyway, what's his for? He should have
taken those books away from it.
Speaker 4 (06:46):
But he was absolutely right.
Speaker 5 (06:47):
You're the kind that can work a hangnail up into.
Speaker 2 (06:49):
A blood poisoning.
Speaker 5 (06:50):
You'll always have been.
Speaker 1 (06:51):
I'm going out, but where are you going?
Speaker 6 (06:55):
I'll be back, missus completes mister gents, and I thought
we let you out of here.
Speaker 1 (07:09):
I came back for something. My books? What book? Well,
you know the ones doctor Porter told you to get
rid of you. You didn't, did you.
Speaker 4 (07:17):
I don't know what I did with?
Speaker 1 (07:18):
Well, try and find them, would you.
Speaker 4 (07:20):
Well, I wasn't no where to look. Mister Jenson, if
you don't mind me.
Speaker 1 (07:25):
Putting in my truth sense, you just made.
Speaker 6 (07:28):
A fine recovery from a mild heart attack.
Speaker 4 (07:32):
Now, why don't you just thank God and go about
your business? Mister Dentson, Mister Denton, I didn't mean your fend.
Speaker 1 (07:42):
Oh yes, sir, can I help you? I have a
list of books here. Oh, yes, sir, have you got
any of them?
Speaker 2 (07:53):
Oh? But these are a medical books.
Speaker 1 (07:54):
You don't carry. Medical books are very few. These are
all books on heart disease.
Speaker 2 (07:59):
I'm afraid we don't have any of these in stock,
but I'll be glad to order them for you.
Speaker 1 (08:02):
How long would that take? At least a week?
Speaker 2 (08:04):
Or maybe two? Possibly three?
Speaker 1 (08:05):
Oh that's too long, I can't wait, Thank you very much.
Excuse me? Yes, where would I find these books? With?
Speaker 4 (08:17):
These?
Speaker 1 (08:17):
A medical book? Yes? I know, but you have them
in the library, don't you?
Speaker 5 (08:21):
Medical books doing a special section.
Speaker 4 (08:23):
If you just go out that doing down the hole,
it's the first door on the letters.
Speaker 1 (08:25):
Thank you very much.
Speaker 5 (08:30):
Okay, you're reading these books?
Speaker 1 (08:33):
Now? You reading those books alone, Janet? Their library books,
and you're smoking the law against doing anything the library books?
Speaker 4 (08:39):
Do you insist on doing every single solitary thing that
told you not to? Here?
Speaker 5 (08:44):
I am knocking myself out to keep.
Speaker 1 (08:46):
Your cholesterol down, Ipre, and I really do, Janet? Then
why don't you help me? Stop drinking? I don't drink much?
Speaker 5 (08:54):
Oll wh I drink it? Or why smoke when you're
not supposed to win? That told you're not well.
Speaker 1 (08:58):
I have to do something to quiet my nerves.
Speaker 4 (09:00):
If you stop reading those books, your nerves might quiet down.
Speaker 1 (09:03):
Janet, I've had a heart attack. I have to know
these things. A little knowledge I know. Well, I'm I'm
gonna have a lot of knowledge before I'm through. Don't
you worry about that, Dave.
Speaker 4 (09:13):
I read.
Speaker 1 (09:16):
I'm going to bed, okay, you I'm gonna read it one.
Speaker 5 (09:20):
It's almost twelve o'clock or what.
Speaker 1 (09:21):
I just.
Speaker 5 (09:24):
Try not to wake me up when you come to bed.
Speaker 1 (09:26):
I won't sleep well. Pleasant dreams.
Speaker 5 (09:28):
You don't read too long.
Speaker 4 (09:31):
You need your beauty sleep.
Speaker 1 (09:33):
Oh, shut night, honey. Nice read?
Speaker 3 (09:36):
Huh but.
Speaker 1 (09:48):
Oh who's that? Who's there?
Speaker 2 (09:54):
Days?
Speaker 1 (09:55):
Who is it? It's Matt, Matt, Matt Porter. Let me in?
Speaker 2 (10:00):
Uh now what the t I have to talk to.
Speaker 1 (10:02):
You, Matt. This is a heck of a time to
be making a house call. Uh yeah, I know something wrong.
Uh you've been reading? Uh yeah, yeah, a little books?
Like a lot?
Speaker 2 (10:19):
Oh these books? Well, I I like to know things.
You got them out of the library, did you, Yes.
Speaker 1 (10:24):
That's right when you h took 'em away from me
at the hospital. I went back the next day, but
the nurse wouldn't give them to me. Uh huh, So
I went to a book store. They didn't have 'em
in stock and was gonna take two or three weeks
to order 'em.
Speaker 2 (10:37):
They're uh pretty esoteric book.
Speaker 1 (10:39):
Oh I'm kidding where I can understand 'em?
Speaker 2 (10:42):
Oh you are?
Speaker 1 (10:42):
Yeah? Yeah? Anyway, I uh finally got them from the library.
Speaker 2 (10:47):
I see, But you mind if I sit down?
Speaker 3 (10:51):
Now?
Speaker 2 (10:51):
Quit not? You sit down too?
Speaker 1 (10:53):
Yo? Can I make you drink because you want to? Uh? Man,
I might as well tell you I've uh had a
drink from time to time now and then you'll usual.
Speaker 2 (11:04):
Oh, yeah, I I.
Speaker 1 (11:05):
Make mine pretty week. It's uh only the quiet my nerve.
Uh huh uh. Also I I smoke a cigarette now
and then you do allh Here, here's your drink. Oh,
thank you, I just set it down. Okay, not Uh,
I have to tell you. You surprise me in what willing.
Speaker 2 (11:27):
Do I surprise? Well?
Speaker 1 (11:27):
I I I just thought you'd start yelling at me.
Speaker 2 (11:30):
Oh, I wouldn't yell at today. That's the last thing
that I'd do.
Speaker 1 (11:33):
Well, I just told you all the things I've been doing,
the reading, the drinking, but smoking. I thought, uh, you'd
be disgusted with No.
Speaker 2 (11:41):
No, I'm not disgusted to sit down to day.
Speaker 1 (11:43):
I I have to tell you something you okay, shoot,
you know what the aortic artery is. Oh? Sure, It's
like a bicycle tire.
Speaker 2 (11:55):
It has an inner tew yeah. Yeah, now it's that
inner tube be in.
Speaker 1 (12:00):
A wall of the artery gets injured as the blood
pumped through it.
Speaker 2 (12:04):
Well, some blood seeps through the whole.
Speaker 1 (12:07):
Yeah, the aureole.
Speaker 2 (12:08):
Yes, that's the.
Speaker 1 (12:09):
Technical name for it. Now, as the blood seeps through,
some of it absorbs. But if enough of it doesn't absorb, uh,
the artery. M.
Speaker 2 (12:19):
Well it balloon yeah, I I read about that.
Speaker 1 (12:21):
Mm. Now the aortic artery has a a y shape.
Speaker 2 (12:25):
The ballooning can occur there in the crotch of the wy.
Speaker 1 (12:29):
You follow me, yeah, I follow you. When that happens, Well,
when when that happens, you will have an aneurism.
Speaker 2 (12:36):
Oh you know about that?
Speaker 1 (12:37):
Yes, of course I know about that. Now.
Speaker 2 (12:40):
Sometimes this aneurysm is well, it could.
Speaker 1 (12:42):
Be so big its thills the whole chest cavity. Yeah,
and when at first it's goodbye Charlie, Well I well, yes,
and that's what I've got. Yes, Well, how how long
have you known that? That?
Speaker 2 (12:58):
Ever? Since I looked at the well, why didn't you
tell me?
Speaker 1 (13:01):
Well, it's not the kind of thing you want to
tell anybody, because the anyway is some converse at any time,
anytime at all. Why are you telling me now?
Speaker 2 (13:08):
I don't know. I mean, it didn't seem right to
tell you, but it didn't seem.
Speaker 1 (13:12):
Right not to tell you, Dave, I've been agonizing over
this for a long time. Tonight I couldn't get to sleep,
I couldn't relax, so I decided to come over here
and tell you. I know, it's a terrible thing to face,
but at least it's the truth I know, and Matt,
I appreciate it, I really do. I always want to
know the truth. I always have, Matt. Do you you
(13:33):
know that it isn't the kind of thing you want
to tell a patient value patient, But when the patient
is an old friend like you, then it's a hundred
times as hard. It's damn near impossible.
Speaker 2 (13:43):
But I mean it tells you apart.
Speaker 1 (13:45):
That, Matt, don't upset yourself. Please, don't you see I've
I've known less for quite a while.
Speaker 2 (13:55):
Or you couldn't, but I did believe me. I did.
Speaker 1 (13:58):
I I may die tomorrow. I know that tonight. Maybe
are you just just run along home and get some sleep.
You did the right thing. Tell me about the aneurism.
You just back me up on what I knew already.
Now you just run along home and don't worry about it. Thing.
Speaker 3 (14:28):
We talk a lot about the truth. Heaven knows plenty
of people who have written about it. The search for truth,
our right.
Speaker 1 (14:38):
To know the truth, The truth shall make us free.
Speaker 2 (14:42):
Truth is beauty. Beauty is truth.
Speaker 3 (14:46):
Anyone would conclude that man is engaged in an unrelenting
quest for the realities of his existence. But is he,
or on the contrary, is he struggling constantly and desperately
to evade them, in particular the reality of his own demise,
(15:09):
which will return shortly with Act two. At the end
of our first act, David Jensen, victim of a recent
(15:31):
heart attack, had a visitor, a visitor who told him
that he had been lied to that his heart attack
had not been a mild one due to a mild
arterial spasm, that it had in reality been the result
of a massive aneurysm, a giant swelling at a crucial
(15:51):
spot in the aortic artery. Jensen listened to the holding explanation,
attentive and oddly unperturbed.
Speaker 1 (16:02):
And when the aneurysm bursts, it's goodbye, Charlie. It could
burst any time. They This isn't the kind of thing
you like to tell a patient, and when the patient
is an old friend. I I've known this for quite
a while. I may die tomorrow or tonight. I know
that day are you just run along home and get
some sleep. You did the right thing telling me about
the aneurysm. That you just back me up in what
(16:25):
I knew already, so you run along that. Don't worry
about a thing, Janity. Janet has got to know that's on.
There is to it, Janet, I mean, wake up. I've
(16:47):
I've got something to tell you. M Janity, I mean
I I don't like to wake you up, but this
is important. Janety. Hm. But well, I've I've gotta Tarling,
I've got something to tell you.
Speaker 4 (17:03):
Don't turn over that life.
Speaker 1 (17:04):
Yeah, but what's the trouble? No trouble, no trouble. Everything
was fine? Was then what are you waiting me up for? Uh?
Matt portal was just here?
Speaker 5 (17:18):
I don't yet in the middle of the night.
Speaker 1 (17:20):
Yes, I know. I was surprised myself. But he had
something to tell me.
Speaker 5 (17:24):
What could he thought that he had to tell you.
Speaker 1 (17:26):
I'm gonna tell you, Darling, I'm gonna tell you. You see,
it's been there praying on that's mind for quite a while.
And and he had to tell me the truth? What
truth about my heart?
Speaker 5 (17:41):
But we know about your heart?
Speaker 1 (17:43):
Not told early. We thought we knew. At least you
thought you knew. I I never thought I did, not
the whole truth. What in the world are you talking about?
Chair that I have an anneurism of why an annus
a huge aneurysm in one of my arteries, in a
(18:04):
very crucial spot. It's like a big balloon filled with
blood and any minute that could burst. Well, while I'm
sitting here on the edge of the bed talking to you,
it could burst.
Speaker 3 (18:16):
I don't believe you.
Speaker 5 (18:19):
Not, never told you anything like that.
Speaker 1 (18:20):
No, no, not at the hospital. He didn't wanna tell
me because he didn't wanna frighten me. But then he
decided it would be it would be better. It was
his duty to tell me the truth. Of course I
already knew the truth. Well how could it, because because
I've been reading up on these things, Janet. So when
(18:43):
Matt told me finally, he was telling me something I
already knew. Poor Maddie Wall, he was really upset.
Speaker 5 (18:49):
I w when was he here?
Speaker 1 (18:51):
Was just a little while ago.
Speaker 4 (18:52):
If I didn't hear anyone, Darling, you were asleep, I
would have heard the door bell.
Speaker 5 (18:56):
The door bell always waits away.
Speaker 1 (18:57):
He didn't ring the door bell, he just not very softly.
I hardly heard it myself. But how long was he is? Well,
that long we.
Speaker 6 (19:07):
Had a drink together, Matt Porter, Let you have a
drink and a cigarette.
Speaker 1 (19:12):
I to steady my nerves, Jennet. For Matt, he needed
a drink more than I did to get up his
nerve to tell me.
Speaker 5 (19:19):
Well, I simply don't believe it.
Speaker 1 (19:21):
You don't believe what that. I could die any minute,
die while I'm sitting here talking.
Speaker 5 (19:25):
I don't believe any of it.
Speaker 4 (19:26):
I don't believe you have you have a whatever.
Speaker 1 (19:29):
It is, he said, annis darling or swelling.
Speaker 4 (19:31):
I don't care what it is because I don't believe
he's got it. Well, Matt said, I don't believe he
said it.
Speaker 5 (19:37):
I'm going to call him tomorrow and ask him if
he said it.
Speaker 4 (19:39):
He'll say, no, you'll see what it did say.
Speaker 5 (19:42):
Whatever he said, it wasn't that.
Speaker 1 (19:44):
You just made that up of.
Speaker 4 (19:45):
Whatever he did say. You twisted it and distorted.
Speaker 5 (19:48):
It all out of purport.
Speaker 1 (19:49):
So why would I do this, Gord, No, that I
certainly don't.
Speaker 4 (19:53):
I'll go to bed, get some sleep, and tomorrow I'll
call Matt and make an appointment to see him and
get this all straightened up. Take your clothes off and
and come to bed.
Speaker 1 (20:03):
Oh no, I don't think i'll do that, Janet. I
think I'll go out for a while. Where where are
you going out for a while? Day? Dr de draft?
(20:24):
Are you home?
Speaker 4 (20:34):
Escape chances?
Speaker 1 (20:37):
Terrible time to come calling.
Speaker 4 (20:38):
Oh I'm a night person, you know that.
Speaker 1 (20:40):
Come on here, your thanks? They drift?
Speaker 4 (20:43):
Uh, sit down you you want a drink or anything?
Speaker 1 (20:45):
I just wanna talk to you. Of course, why is
I could put me out of your life?
Speaker 4 (20:51):
It's been so long.
Speaker 1 (20:52):
I uh, I've been in the hospital.
Speaker 4 (20:56):
In the hospital, why didn't you let me know? I'd
have think you were flower Well, I didn't want you
to know. Why not.
Speaker 5 (21:02):
I'd have been discreet about it.
Speaker 4 (21:04):
Your wife wouldn't have suspected.
Speaker 1 (21:05):
Any Yes, I know that degree. You've always been discreet.
I appreciate that. I just didn't want you to know
that I was sick.
Speaker 4 (21:16):
Well, plenty of people did say.
Speaker 1 (21:17):
Well, I didn't want you to think of me is less.
That's been a man.
Speaker 4 (21:23):
Well, now, why should I think that.
Speaker 1 (21:27):
I had a heart attack? Oh, I'm sorry, So.
Speaker 4 (21:30):
You see, Uh, there's little Plenty of people have had
heart attacks. I I couldn't even have a dozen of
my own acquaintances.
Speaker 1 (21:37):
No, this wasn't just a heart attack. People at first
the doctor said it was, but it was just a
mild mild cardialinflaction. Oh, d you you wouldn't know what
that is. But it's not really serious. People can live
forty or fifty years after one of those. But what
I what I had?
Speaker 3 (21:53):
What what I.
Speaker 1 (21:56):
What I have is? Uh, it's something different. I say,
it's uh, very very different. Well what is it? An aneurism?
Oh you know what an aneurism is? No, I can't
say I do, no, cause he don't. Well it it
is very serious. Oh it's it's uh inoperable, and it
(22:19):
means it means you can fall dead any minute. Oh,
how do you know all that? The doctor told me
he couldn't tell me. Well, that was the first in
the hospital, but but he didn't tell me the truth.
We're old friends, you see, and it was hard for him.
But to night he came to see me and uh.
Speaker 4 (22:39):
And he told me, oh, it must have been a
terrible shot.
Speaker 1 (22:42):
No, no, no, it wasn't. I knew all about it
before he told me. You see, I've done a lot
of reading and I.
Speaker 4 (22:48):
I I just knew m day, I'm I'm off your shot.
Speaker 1 (22:52):
That's all right. I just wanted to tell somebody.
Speaker 2 (22:56):
I see.
Speaker 1 (22:57):
After the doctor left, I woke my wife up and
I told her, but that she didn't believe a word
of it. Why not, I cause she just didn't want to. Oh,
it's better to take the chill, y'all. That's what I think, Peter.
I uh, I can't tell you how grateful I am
to it.
Speaker 4 (23:15):
Oh what, I couldn't do anything?
Speaker 1 (23:17):
You believe me? That meant a lot. And now I'm
gonna get gone.
Speaker 4 (23:24):
Just good.
Speaker 1 (23:24):
Well, I've got one more call to make. Well, make
you mine, y'all, I really must.
Speaker 4 (23:29):
Well, don't let it take a long time go by
before you call me up and come over.
Speaker 5 (23:33):
Don't be sich a stranger.
Speaker 1 (23:35):
I'll try to remember that. I see that you do. Yes,
of course I probably won't be around much longer? Can
I be? Dri the man? Have the right there? Oh?
(24:02):
Oh okay, okay to come in? Oh sure, I was
afraid you might go on to bed.
Speaker 2 (24:07):
Well I just got in a minute ago.
Speaker 1 (24:08):
Oh we have you been? Oh around? You know?
Speaker 2 (24:12):
Yeah?
Speaker 1 (24:13):
Well I can't blame you for that. Come again, Well,
you put in a pretty terrible evening.
Speaker 2 (24:18):
What would you know about? What kind of an evening?
I put in?
Speaker 1 (24:21):
Matt? Matt, I uh, I understand I understand what It
couldn't have been easy. On the contrary, it was very easy. Well,
of course I tried to make it easy for you.
But even so, telling an old friend he could go
any minute, I know that wasn't an easy thing to do.
I hope that the fact that I'd known it all
(24:41):
along may be well day. I give you my word, John,
that's gonna call you tomorrow. That's why I had to
see you tonight. You see, she refused to believe any
of it.
Speaker 2 (24:50):
Uh huh, oh, just what is it?
Speaker 1 (24:52):
Janet doesn't believe about the aneurysm uh huh, yeah, the
uh the aneurysm ill. You see, after you left, I
w grew up and told her what you'd said. She
wouldn't believe it. So she's going to call you tomorrow,
and Matt, I want you to tell her the truth.
Tell her exactly what she told me tonight about the
aneurism and what it means that it could burst any minutes.
(25:15):
And I'll be sitting Wait wait a minute, I told you, yes,
at the house. At the house. Man, when did I
tell you an hour ago? Maybe less?
Speaker 2 (25:22):
What's the matter with you? I told you at your
house an hour ago? Maybe less that you have an anneurism.
Speaker 1 (25:27):
Matt, it's all right. I already knew it.
Speaker 2 (25:29):
I told you to say, look to sit down.
Speaker 1 (25:33):
I'm all right, I'm perfectly calm. I never felt calmer
in my life. All the same, I'd rather that you
sit down, okay, if you really want me, I really
want you, Okay, now, Dave, I want you to listen
to me very carefully. You've been under a big stream lately,
and fine, you have got things a little bit mixed up. No,
I haven't. But that's all right, Dave. I was not
(25:54):
at your house tonight, not an hour ago, not at
any time now, Mat, you were. We had to drink together,
and you told me, you listened to me.
Speaker 2 (26:04):
I did not come to your house this evening. I
was nowhere near your house this evening.
Speaker 1 (26:10):
I'm at you're trying to kid l day. I spent
the whole evening with a girl, the whole evening up
to about twenty minutes ago. Oh, I know, I know
what it is. You're sorry you told me about the
anu resum mean, you're trying to take it all back,
pretend it never happened. You're never told me. But you
don't have to do that because I knew it all along.
But what are you doing that?
Speaker 2 (26:32):
I'm calling the girl I spent the evening whereas the
whole evening.
Speaker 1 (26:38):
Hello, Uh, honey, I want her to listen to me. Kiffley, Uh,
don't say anything, just listen.
Speaker 2 (26:44):
I'm in kind of a bind here and I need
your help. I need to prove where I was tonight.
Speaker 1 (26:51):
Now? Did you and I have dinner together tonight and
then go back to your place and stay there the
two of us until I left.
Speaker 2 (26:57):
Less them half an hour ago?
Speaker 1 (26:59):
All I want from you with a yes or a no?
Is that true what I just said about where I
was this evening?
Speaker 3 (27:05):
Yes?
Speaker 2 (27:06):
Okay?
Speaker 1 (27:07):
Now would you mind repeating that word for someone who
is standing right here next to me?
Speaker 2 (27:12):
Go ahead?
Speaker 1 (27:14):
Yes?
Speaker 2 (27:16):
Thanks?
Speaker 1 (27:17):
Baby?
Speaker 2 (27:20):
Well, well day.
Speaker 3 (27:34):
Have you ever met with a flat denial of something
you know to be too Have you ever been told
you did not see what you saw, do what you did,
say what you said, and hear what you heard?
Speaker 1 (27:49):
Has such a thing ever happened to you? If it had,
you know that your.
Speaker 3 (27:54):
Inner response was too deep for anger, too deep for
indignation or anything but the most profound and appalling disillusionment
will return shortly with Act three, David Jensen is in
(28:23):
the home of his friend and doctor Matthew Porter. He
has come there to tell him that his wife, Janet,
did not believe that matt had come to their home
earlier in the evening to tell David that he suffers
from a giant aneurysm in the aortic artery, which might
at any moment burst and cause his death. Doctor Porter
(28:45):
has denied saying any such thing, in fact, denied being
at David's house at any time during the evening.
Speaker 1 (28:56):
What are you doing, man, I am calling the girl I.
Speaker 2 (28:59):
Spent the evening. It's the whole evening. Yay, uh honey, uh,
listen to me. I'm in kind of a bind here.
Speaker 1 (29:09):
I need to prove where I was tonight. Now did
you and I have dinner together tonight and then go
back to your place and stay there till I left
less than half an hour ago?
Speaker 2 (29:19):
Just answer yes or no?
Speaker 3 (29:22):
Yes?
Speaker 1 (29:22):
Okay, Now you mind repeating that word for someone who's
standing right next to me?
Speaker 2 (29:28):
Go ahead, yes, thanks baby?
Speaker 1 (29:35):
Well, well, Dave, how could you do it to me?
Matt do what set that thing up with that girl?
Who is she? Anyway?
Speaker 2 (29:46):
A girl?
Speaker 1 (29:47):
The girl.
Speaker 2 (29:48):
I spent the evening with How in the world could
I set anything up? Why would I?
Speaker 1 (29:52):
I wanted to spare me, And I appreciate that. Matt.
I know you meant to be kind. But you were
right the first time when you told me about the annual,
when you told me I was gonna die. I know
you regretted it afterwards, and you set it up with
this girl to say that you never told me, never
came to the house, and all the rest of it.
Speaker 2 (30:10):
Now you look, Dave, I can see that you really
believe that I came to your house.
Speaker 1 (30:14):
That you did. Oh no, I didn't, but you think
I did. So what we have to do now is
figure out why you're so sure I did.
Speaker 2 (30:22):
Now, Dave, this is what I think.
Speaker 1 (30:26):
The only thing I can think.
Speaker 2 (30:29):
You had a dream. You dreamed the whole thing on.
Speaker 1 (30:33):
Now this was no dream, A nightmare, is what it was.
You see, Well, you had a big shock. Any kind
of a heart attack is a shock, not just a
shock to.
Speaker 2 (30:42):
The heart, but a shock to the whole nervous system.
Speaker 1 (30:46):
All of us. We go along with some sort of
conviction that we'll live forever. I don't know where we
get the idea but we all have it now. A
heart attack is a reminder that we won't and that
is a shock. Beside that initial shock, you wouldn't let
go of thing.
Speaker 2 (31:00):
You went all over getting books.
Speaker 1 (31:03):
About heart disease and reading up on this terrible reminder.
Speaker 2 (31:06):
You know, it wasn't a very bright thing to do,
but you did it. I had to know anything, you
had to know.
Speaker 1 (31:11):
I'd already told you, but you didn't really trust me,
didn't really believe me, in spite of the fact that
we've been friends for twenty years, in spite of the
fact that I'm supposed to be a pretty good doctor.
Oh you are, man.
Speaker 2 (31:23):
I don't think you'd have believed anybody anyway.
Speaker 1 (31:28):
You filled your head with a lot of stuff you
didn't really understand, and you began to imagine the worst,
and that brought on the nightmare.
Speaker 2 (31:34):
That's all it was. That's all it could have been.
Speaker 1 (31:37):
Please believe me. I gotta be going, Dave. I'm going
to get home.
Speaker 2 (31:42):
At least believe this. You do not have an aneurysm.
Do you want me to show you the X rays?
I can get hold of them tomorrow.
Speaker 1 (31:49):
Good night, man, You've been awfully kind to Dave.
Speaker 2 (31:51):
What can I say?
Speaker 3 (31:52):
What?
Speaker 1 (31:52):
Mark?
Speaker 3 (31:52):
Can I say?
Speaker 1 (31:53):
Nothing? You've said it all and I appreciate it.
Speaker 4 (32:08):
You don't have to workfare quiet.
Speaker 5 (32:10):
I'm not asleep.
Speaker 1 (32:11):
Oh, Darry, I thought you might be here. Where did
you go to see?
Speaker 3 (32:15):
Matter?
Speaker 5 (32:16):
What fall?
Speaker 1 (32:17):
Oh about what happened tonight when he was here? Oh?
You know he denied the whole thing. Can you imagine?
Speaker 5 (32:23):
I knew he didn't say you had an aneurysm. You
you simply misunderstood, Darry.
Speaker 1 (32:28):
He denied he was ever here? He did, Jesse said,
I'm He said, I must have had a nightmare.
Speaker 5 (32:35):
Oh, well, of course that's what happened.
Speaker 4 (32:40):
You fell asleep reading those books and you had a nightmare. Now,
why didn't I think?
Speaker 1 (32:46):
No, No, Janet, I didn't have a nightmare. I was
wide awake reading and there was this knock at the door,
very faint.
Speaker 2 (32:54):
At first.
Speaker 1 (32:54):
He was afraid we might both be asleep, you see,
And then he knocked louder and I went to the door.
The men. I made us each a drink. We sat
down and we talked, and he told me what I
told you. You each had a drink. I made mine
very weak. I remember telling him, Oh here, look look
(33:15):
over here, Janet, here are the glasses. There's Matts, and
here's mine. You see I didn't even finish mine. You
see mineus mostly water.
Speaker 5 (33:22):
Well, Matt didn't even touch him.
Speaker 1 (33:23):
Well, now do you see he was here, darling, that's
the proof. Now, how does he dare stand there and
tell me he was never here? Whom?
Speaker 4 (33:33):
Maybe?
Speaker 1 (33:34):
Maybe what, Janet? Nothing, Maybe Matt's not quite right in
the head. Is that what you were gonna say?
Speaker 5 (33:41):
I was going to say, maybe you ought to see
another doctor.
Speaker 1 (33:44):
No, I don't think I need another doctor. Matt is
a very good doctor. I just think it was very
hard for him to tell me the truth. And I
think he regretted it afterwards and wanted to take it back,
so he pretended it never happened. Good lord Jah that
he's probably convinced himself it never really happened. He probably
thinks he's telling the truth. He firmly believes he was
(34:06):
never here. If he's that, And it's all right, Derry. Really,
it's just that he couldn't bear the idea that I'm
gonna die and he had to be the one to
tell me. But it's all right, really, it is, Janet.
Speaker 4 (34:28):
Comfortable?
Speaker 1 (34:29):
Oh yeah, can I get.
Speaker 2 (34:31):
You anything, but you might try coming over here yourself.
Speaker 1 (34:36):
That might help.
Speaker 4 (34:37):
Yeah, okay, m poor overwork doctor man.
Speaker 1 (34:45):
Well, it's not just the work, it's the patience here.
I am beating my brains out to get them well,
and they're making me sick.
Speaker 2 (34:54):
I swear I'll die if.
Speaker 1 (34:55):
I'm trying to take care of people that don't want
to be taken care of. You know when I phoned
you last night, mm, I was with a patient that
time of nice. Uh, patients don't care about the time. Actually,
this was an old friend of mine, heart case, very
mild attack, no reason he shouldn't make a complete recovery,
(35:17):
lived to be a hundred, but he kept brooding about it,
reading books and all that got himself really worked up.
Speaker 2 (35:24):
Morbid. Uh.
Speaker 1 (35:25):
Last night, Well, he had a dream, a nightmare that
I had come to his house and told him that
he was going to die. Oh no, pussy, I couldn't
shake him.
Speaker 2 (35:36):
And that's when I call you.
Speaker 4 (35:38):
Well, I hope that fixed anything up.
Speaker 2 (35:42):
Oh, as a matter of fact, it didn't.
Speaker 1 (35:45):
Oh why not?
Speaker 2 (35:46):
Because he is obsessed.
Speaker 1 (35:47):
That's why you know. I'm gonna send him to a
psychiatrist if you go, which he probably won't.
Speaker 5 (35:53):
Oh honey, try to forget the whole thing.
Speaker 4 (35:57):
At least when you're here.
Speaker 2 (36:00):
What would I do without you?
Speaker 4 (36:03):
You'd sign somebody else.
Speaker 1 (36:05):
Patience will be the death of me.
Speaker 2 (36:07):
I swear, Oh honey, I'm so think somebody but you
know him not. I'll send him away, whoever it is.
Speaker 1 (36:15):
Don't worry. I got you.
Speaker 4 (36:21):
That wasn't onebody here.
Speaker 1 (36:22):
Now.
Speaker 4 (36:22):
Please look at you, David, Dave, what well.
Speaker 2 (36:29):
What are you doing here? Mad well? Dear, he's a friend,
A friend, yes, a friend.
Speaker 4 (36:36):
You do know each old?
Speaker 2 (36:38):
I didn't.
Speaker 1 (36:38):
I couldn't know.
Speaker 4 (36:40):
Oh call him?
Speaker 3 (36:45):
What do I do?
Speaker 1 (36:46):
An emergency heart unit?
Speaker 2 (36:48):
I begin trying to revive in my show.
Speaker 5 (36:59):
Thanks for spending so it's time with me matter?
Speaker 1 (37:01):
Oh, Janet, was the least I could do, very least.
Do you think you understand now what the X rays show?
There was no aneurysm hm. Date died of a massive
spasm like the first one, only violent. Yeah, that's what
all the other doctors said.
Speaker 2 (37:18):
They were right.
Speaker 5 (37:20):
I n I never even knew he knew that Deirdre, any.
Speaker 1 (37:24):
Girl like that I knew. I I don't think that
he knew her very well to go to her at
a time like that and he was so worried.
Speaker 2 (37:32):
Or didre is just someone to relax with.
Speaker 1 (37:35):
You knew her too, was slightly, yes, but it must.
Speaker 5 (37:39):
Have been more than slightly for him to have a
heart attack when.
Speaker 2 (37:42):
He found you with it, Janet. It's all over, It's
all passed. Let's not.
Speaker 3 (37:46):
I know.
Speaker 1 (37:46):
I know, I'm David was, but he was obsessed, obsessed
with the idea of his own death.
Speaker 5 (37:53):
He wouldn't let go cause I I know you never
came to the house that night.
Speaker 1 (37:57):
Of course I didn't. Still, Janet, you know that I didn't.
Dave had a terrible nightmare because he was obsessed, That's
all it was.
Speaker 5 (38:06):
Still there are the glasses?
Speaker 1 (38:08):
What glasses?
Speaker 5 (38:09):
Dave told me he made two drinks that night, one
for you, one for himself.
Speaker 1 (38:14):
Matt there were two, gossip Janet, listen, have you have
you still got the glasses? I mean, have you washed them?
Speaker 5 (38:22):
I don't know?
Speaker 1 (38:24):
Maybe not. Why if you haven't.
Speaker 2 (38:26):
Washed them, take them?
Speaker 1 (38:28):
Have them gone over for fingerprints. I promise you you
won't find mine.
Speaker 3 (38:40):
Good tired doctor man, Wait, I feel it's beyond tired.
Speaker 4 (38:45):
Who exhausted?
Speaker 2 (38:48):
Beyond that too? Who I just left Dave's wife She
still doesn't quite believe that I was not in their
apartment that night you were with me. They had told
her he and I had a drink together.
Speaker 1 (39:00):
Mmm.
Speaker 2 (39:00):
She said there were two glasses in the living one
his one mind. Supposedly, I told her to have him
gone over for fingerprints. I really hope she doesn't, Matt.
Speaker 4 (39:11):
I wonder does an incubus leave fingerprints?
Speaker 1 (39:17):
Oh?
Speaker 5 (39:17):
What an a? An incubus?
Speaker 4 (39:20):
The evil spirit that comes at night and lies upon
people in the sleep.
Speaker 2 (39:25):
You mean Dave was visited by that incubus?
Speaker 1 (39:30):
Why not? I dear?
Speaker 2 (39:32):
You don't believe in stuff like that.
Speaker 4 (39:34):
Oh, absolutely, you do. Well, you said he had a nightmare.
Speaker 1 (39:39):
That's right.
Speaker 4 (39:41):
Don't you know that One definition of a nightmare is
a fan or incubis?
Speaker 2 (39:47):
No, I didn't know.
Speaker 1 (39:48):
We'll look it up.
Speaker 4 (39:50):
A fiend or incubus that comes at night to sit
upon a person's chest, his chest, Matt.
Speaker 5 (39:59):
That could be a.
Speaker 4 (40:01):
But couldn't it?
Speaker 1 (40:03):
I don't know?
Speaker 2 (40:03):
I said? But but why from where?
Speaker 4 (40:07):
Who knows?
Speaker 3 (40:10):
Huh?
Speaker 1 (40:11):
Unless you said it?
Speaker 2 (40:14):
What sent the inkeepers?
Speaker 1 (40:18):
Why would I do that?
Speaker 4 (40:20):
Who knows?
Speaker 5 (40:20):
Not?
Speaker 1 (40:22):
Who knows?
Speaker 4 (40:25):
Unless you do?
Speaker 1 (40:33):
I I don't see dander anymore. It wasn't relaxing the
way it used to be. But I can't get the
idea of the incubus out of my head, especially the
idea that I might have sent it to poor Dave
in the dead of night. I'll tell you something, not
(40:55):
because you have any right to know, not because I
think you even, No, because I'd like to say it
out out loud, just this once. I never liked Dave,
not really, I never really liked my friend.
Speaker 3 (41:34):
The mystic and madman William Blake believed that a firm
persuasion that a thing is so makes it so.
Speaker 2 (41:45):
That's a bit more.
Speaker 3 (41:46):
Than I can swallow, though I'm sure there's a profound
psychological truth contained in the observation, But I prefer the
thought of August Strenberg that an obsessional conviction about supernatural
powers causes events that confirm the reality.
Speaker 1 (42:07):
Of those powers.
Speaker 2 (42:09):
I'll be back shortly.
Speaker 3 (42:23):
It's human to think about the future because we're all
so frightened, and the one thing about the future that.
Speaker 2 (42:32):
Is certain but we know, is that it contains death.
Speaker 3 (42:38):
So while it's only human to think about the future
and therefore to consider death, it's not wise to think
about it too much because If we do, it may
come sooner than it needs to and cut the future
short to Our cast included Larry Haynes, Norman Rose, Joan Copeland,
(43:04):
and E. V.
Speaker 1 (43:05):
Justter.
Speaker 3 (43:06):
The entire production was under the direction of Hymon Brown Radio.
Mystery Theater were sponsored in part by Buick Motor Division
and True Value Hardware stores.
Speaker 2 (43:17):
Missus E. G.
Speaker 3 (43:18):
Marshall inviting you to return to our Mystery Theater for
another adventure in the macabre. Until next time, pleasant, I
(44:12):
don't rank you since now
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