November 30, 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. Find more classic, old-time radio series at Theater of the Mind - OTR | Spreaker | Apple | YouTube
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Enjoy all six of our commercial-free internet radio stations at theaterofthemind-otr.com - Do you want to discover more of these classic, old-time radio series? Search "Theater of the Mind - OTR" on your favorite platform or visit Theater of the Mind - OTR | Apple | Spreaker | YouTube | Spotify | Amazon | iHeart
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Transcript
Episode Transcript
Available transcripts are automatically generated. Complete accuracy is not guaranteed.
Speaker 1 (00:00):
The CBS Radio Mystery Theater Presents.
Speaker 2 (00:21):
Come in, We're welcome.
Speaker 3 (00:25):
I'm E. G. Marshall.
Speaker 2 (00:27):
This is the story of a god.
Speaker 1 (00:29):
There have been many gods since the dawn of civilization,
but no god bore so strange a name as the
one you're going to beat right now. No god before
him looked and talked the way this god did in
the beginning of mankind's twenty first century. Yes, this is
the story of a future god, not a very distant future,
(00:50):
because his official recorded birth is July the nineteenth, nineteen
seventy seven. Like most gods, has obscured the mundane facts
of his beginning, the place of his birth, the names
of his parents, even the full name they gave him.
Only one name survived, the family name Smith.
Speaker 3 (01:17):
What is that thing? Smith? What have you got him?
At Glass Box?
Speaker 2 (01:21):
It's a world, luke A What a world? A world
I made all by myself, Smith's world.
Speaker 3 (01:42):
Our mister.
Speaker 1 (01:42):
Drama A God Named Smith was written especially for the
Mystery Theater by Henry Slesser and stars Norman Rose and
Russell Horton. It is sponsored in part by Greyhound, Package
Express and True Value Hardware Stores. I'll be back shortly
with that one.
Speaker 3 (02:10):
Who is Smith?
Speaker 2 (02:13):
What gave him the power to become a god?
Speaker 1 (02:16):
And what did he do with his power? There's only
one man who can answer these questions, and even he
could never reveal all the mysteries that made Smith the
wonderment of the early twenty first century. But when the
biographers of Smith sought out the strange and wondrous facts
of Smith's life, they came to Luke Wingate first.
Speaker 3 (02:38):
Go on, have somebody it's a revantage nineteen seventy nine.
Speaker 2 (02:43):
I don't think so much, the wing Gate. That's a
long drive back to town.
Speaker 3 (02:47):
You don't mind if I help myself. No, of course not.
Smith himself gave me this one, a whole case of it.
This happens to be the last bottle. That makes it
kind of historic, doesn't kind of Well, I'll go ahead.
You want to know about the time that I first
met Smith.
Speaker 2 (03:04):
I know you've answered it before, mister Wingate, but but.
Speaker 3 (03:07):
You feel obliged to ask it just the same. No,
it's all right, don't mind repeating myself.
Speaker 2 (03:12):
You met Smith in college, didn't you Artmore University?
Speaker 3 (03:16):
That's right, I was a sophomore then back in the
nineteen eighties. We were twenty years old. But I remember
the day all right. It was one of my hangover days.
It was a Sunday, and I was content to sleep
until Monday's classes. But then I heard this voice.
Speaker 2 (03:33):
Pardon me, is this is mister Wingate's room.
Speaker 3 (03:36):
He was something I didn't expect, a long headed kid
about twelve or thirteen, with a sad mouth and hair
the color of dry straw. He was carrying a suitcase
that was putting a strain on his thin arms and shoulders.
Speaker 2 (03:49):
I'm sorry to disturb you, but I was told to
come up here.
Speaker 3 (03:52):
My name is Smith. Then I remembered who he was.
For a month, we've been hearing rumors about a boy
prodigy who has been transferred from Crowley College to Ardbourn. Obviously,
Smith had the misfortune to run into Gil Curtis on
his first day. Curtis was the class clown, a senior
with a heavy handed sense of humor.
Speaker 2 (04:12):
Mister Curtis said something about getting a left handed monkey
wrench from you.
Speaker 3 (04:16):
Of course I told the kid what he was dealing with.
That Curtis was only pulling a stale old joke. He
didn't think it was funny. I told him to forget it,
that it was typical of the stuff Curtis laid on
the freshman.
Speaker 2 (04:28):
Oh, I'm not a freshman, I'm a senior. He was
a senior at thirteen years of age.
Speaker 3 (04:34):
I found out that he was only twelve. I learned
that two weeks later when I was crossing the campus
and saw Gil Curtis himself under set Smith.
Speaker 2 (04:42):
Hey, Junior, whatever happened to that left handed monkey wrench? Oh? Sorry,
it took me so long to find one. You finally did, eh?
Speaker 3 (04:51):
I did?
Speaker 2 (04:52):
Do you want to see y? Hey, Luke, did you
hear what the kid said? He's got a left handed wrench.
He's in my room. I'm staying at the Ivy House.
If you'd like to take a look at it, Oh,
I sure would, Junior.
Speaker 3 (05:05):
You want to come along, Luke? I did go along.
I went to Smith's small, bare room on the third
floor of the Ivy House, a room that looked even
more cramped due to a conglomeration of electrical apparatus that
he had brought with him from Crowley.
Speaker 2 (05:19):
Okay, kid, let's see it.
Speaker 3 (05:22):
Smith redded his way through the confused mass of equipment
and picked up a shiny new wrench from some canvas
covered object in the corner. He handed it to Curtis,
who hefted it in his right hand.
Speaker 2 (05:33):
Left handed monkey wrench. Huh, you're not just a genius kid,
you're a comediant. Right try it, mister Curtis. Here's a
nutt and bolt.
Speaker 3 (05:44):
I watched Curtis grab the nutt and bolt and apply
the wrench. No matter how he twisted the nut, it
wouldn't turn. He examined the screw thread, certain that it
was reversed.
Speaker 2 (05:55):
All I told you, mister Curtis, it's a left handed wrench.
He's your left hand.
Speaker 3 (06:01):
I watched Curtis switch the wrench to his left hand
and apply it to the nut. It turned easily off
the bolt. He stared at the pieces in his hand
and stalked out, it was simple enough.
Speaker 2 (06:12):
I just sent an ordinary wrench through a mobious warp.
It came back in a left handed molecular arrangement. Mister Wingate,
is that when you became friends after the monkey wrench episode?
Speaker 3 (06:24):
It's hard to describe it as friendship, but I did
become the only person Smith was willing to spend his
time with. After classes, Smith even at his tender age,
knew more about physics, mathematics, chemistry, and cosmology than anyone
on the staff, and there was a despairing mood among
the faculty. Before long, I realized that my friendship with
(06:45):
Smith was costing me the friendship of virtually every other student.
That was how I became a room mate of Smith.
Speaker 2 (06:53):
And that was how you discovered the Bible.
Speaker 3 (06:56):
Yes, that Bible. It was a Saturday afternoon and Smith
had taken the train into the city to attend some
scientific symposium. I was drifting about the room with the
vague idea of reading a book. I took one down
from Smith's shelf and was surprised to see that it
was a dog eared edition of the Old Testament. I
(07:17):
flipped the pages and then realized that they were penciled corrections,
beginning with Genesis.
Speaker 2 (07:23):
What did they say? Can you still remember? Ah, yes,
I can remember. It simply said in the beginning Smith
created the heaven and the earth, and the earth was
without form and void, and.
Speaker 3 (07:38):
Darkness was upon the face of the deep, and the
spirit of Smith moved upon the face of the waters.
And Smith said, let there be light. And there was light.
What didn't you think he was just a little bit mad.
I don't know what I thought. I have to admit that,
even though I was a professed atheist, the sight of
(07:58):
that faltered page turned me cold and fearful. Or did
you ask him about it?
Speaker 2 (08:02):
Oh?
Speaker 3 (08:02):
Yes, I made the mistake of asking him. He invited
me to see something. It was the large object in
his room that he always kept covered with canvas. It
was a cabinet about five feet high, the top enclosed
with glass, and the sides studded with dials and buttons
and switches. I told Smith that it resembled a coffin,
(08:25):
and he said, just the opposite, looke.
Speaker 2 (08:27):
Things are born here, not veried. Would you like to
see it work?
Speaker 3 (08:33):
He started to fool the controls. The thing emitted a
low pitched wine.
Speaker 2 (08:38):
The glass encloses a group of non condensable gases like
hydrogen and helium. There are dust particles too, water, iron oxide, ice, crystal,
silicon compounds. You can't see them now, but they're there,
just as they might form within the rotating envelope of
the sun. Now this device is activating those gases and
particles that enormous speed, causing them to collide. They're being
(09:02):
mutually exploded by each other, but they are also becoming
embedded with each other's masks. Within a few minutes, you'll
see them aggregate until the mass is visible to the
naked eye.
Speaker 3 (09:16):
It was five minutes before my naked eye saw anything
at all. Then I thought I could make out a
pinpoint of something in the center of the cabinet. I
blinked at it, and it grew larger. Another blink of
the eye and it became a ball, almost an eighth
of an inch in circumference. And then came a sound
like the crash of a lightning bolt in that thing.
(09:38):
What have you got in that grass box? It's a world?
Speaker 2 (09:42):
A what a world? A world I made all by myself,
Smith's world. I'd say it's a small planet created out
of an artificial cosmos. Right now, it's heat intensity is
almost us great enough to shatter the retaining glass, so
we'll we'll have to start the cooling process.
Speaker 3 (10:06):
He tugged at the switch in the panel, but I
could see at once that something was wrong.
Speaker 2 (10:09):
Huh huh, snop moving there, refrigeration switches jam, something's wrong.
Speaker 3 (10:15):
I think a strange mud brown spear in the cabinet
was still growing in size, and now it began to
glow with its own heat.
Speaker 2 (10:22):
Get out of here, Get everyone out of the building, Luke.
Speaker 3 (10:25):
Suddenly Smith seemed like nothing more than a fighting child.
I told him that we were alone in the building,
and he pleaded with me to leave while he wrestled
with the dials and switches and in an attempt to stop
the terrible process that was taking place. Get out of here, Luke.
There isn't much time now. The thing in the cabinet
was glowing with white heat, and I could feel the
blast of it right through the retaining glass. Smith was
(10:45):
still working feverishly at the controls, but I knew that
there wasn't any more that he could do. I yanked
him away from the device. He began to kick and scream.
I was a great deal bigger than he was, but
his strength became maniacal. I remembered something from my swimming class,
my right arm, and let go a short, snappy punch
to the chin of Smith. He saved his life. Didn't
(11:12):
you you know what? Smith said later, of course, that
I was his guardian angel. The day of the explosion,
he called it a miracle. The miracle was that nobody
was killed, the entire building was demolished, the area was
radioactive for a good three months after, and of course
Smith was expelled from Ardmore. In fact, it was on
the day of his departure that he told me the
(11:33):
only facts I'd ever learned about his childhood. His father
had died when he was three. His mother had been
a god fearing woman who was frightened by her son's
precocious abilities and thought that a heavy dose of religion
would balance things out. You know, Smith had learned the
entire Bible, Old Testament and New word for word. But
(11:54):
then his mother had died too, and an uncle named
Howard Cherney had been appointed Smith's guardian.
Speaker 2 (12:00):
He made quite a bit of money out of Smith's genius,
didn't he.
Speaker 3 (12:03):
Oh yes, Journey made a lot of money.
Speaker 2 (12:05):
Can I ask you somethings to Ngate. Did Smith ever
thank you for saving his life?
Speaker 3 (12:10):
Oh? Yes, he did that same day. Thank you for
my life, Luke.
Speaker 2 (12:16):
My life is very important to me, to you too,
for that matter, you'll see.
Speaker 3 (12:24):
Then he climbed aboard the train, and I didn't see
him again for six years, And when I did, he
was well on his way to becoming Smith a God,
the man who created his own world.
Speaker 1 (12:43):
Smith a god, and any mortal ever reach such a position,
even a scientific genius who can build worlds out of dust,
particles and electrical energy. Is that enough to qualify for
the job. We'll find out how and when Smith made
(13:03):
the attempt when we returned with that too. Six years
had passed since the Ivy House at Ardmore University vanished
in a cloud of charged atoms, leaving the ground bristling
(13:26):
with dangerous radiation, leaving the memory of a strange young
man with the ability to both build and destroy.
Speaker 2 (13:35):
Luke Wingate heard nothing from his friend in.
Speaker 3 (13:38):
Those six years, but.
Speaker 1 (13:40):
Luke was busy building something himself, his own career in journalism.
Speaker 2 (13:46):
Of course, I knew you worked for the Herald, mister Windate.
Speaker 3 (13:49):
I was lucky. There were forty guys in my graduating
class trying to get that job. But I had a gimmick.
I used my association with Smith to develop a series
of articles about the dangers of scientific experimentation. For three years,
I became a full fledged reporter, and after the fifth year,
I finally earned a byeline. The first person I told
(14:11):
the news to was named Evelyn.
Speaker 2 (14:14):
Evelyn Wilson of course the actress.
Speaker 3 (14:16):
Yes, young as she was, she was ranked as one
of the top actresses on the stage. She never made
a movie, you know, not that she wasn't asked. As
a matter of fact, it was Howard Cherney who asked her.
That was how Smith came into my life again. When
I saw Evelyn with this older man and asked her
who he was.
Speaker 4 (14:34):
Oh, Howard Jurney, still the rich. He's some kind of
pattened attorney was something like ten or twenty million.
Speaker 3 (14:42):
Oh that's nice for you.
Speaker 4 (14:43):
He wants to produce a movie. Can you imagine starring me?
Speaker 3 (14:48):
Journey?
Speaker 2 (14:48):
She had that name's familiar. Smith had an uncle by
that name.
Speaker 4 (14:53):
Do you mean that creepy college friend of your.
Speaker 3 (14:56):
He became Smith's guardian after Smith's mother died. Maybe the
patents or Smith's Maybe my creepy college friend is a
millionaire too, I'm not.
Speaker 4 (15:06):
You might introduce me.
Speaker 3 (15:10):
Sure enough, Journey turned out to be Smith's guardian, a
man who'd made a fortune on Smith's genius. Journey told
Evelyn that his nephew was living in seclusion in a
suburb in upstate New York. I found out where and
wrote Smith a letter, He replied at once and invited
me to visit. Had he changed much well? He was taller, broader,
(15:31):
but still a youth, not even nineteen years old, but
with eyes as old as Methuselist. I congratulated him on
his success, but he said, yes, I've done very well.
Speaker 2 (15:43):
I'm almost ready for it, now ready for some real developments.
Speaker 3 (15:48):
I meant your inventions. Evelyn, the girl I wrote you about,
she says that your uncle is loaded. I guess that
you must be fairly well off too.
Speaker 2 (15:56):
My invention, my toys, so they were, Luke. The only
reason I bothered with them was to get money for equipment.
At how much does my uncle have? Oh?
Speaker 3 (16:08):
I don't know, ten twenty million, that one says, don't
you know?
Speaker 2 (16:11):
No, I haven't kept track of the finance, as I've
left that to him. I suppose I'll have to start
thinking of money soon. I'll be needing a great deal
very soon.
Speaker 3 (16:22):
What four you ought to know, Luke? You saw the
original model? You don't mean that world building machine? Come
have a look. It was very much like the scale
model Smith had built six years before, But this cabinet
was forty feet across and some eight feet high. The
(16:42):
banks of dials and switches and relays and buttons.
Speaker 2 (16:46):
Were multiplied a hundred times from the original. Basically, it
employs the same principles of the earlier model, but there
are important refinements. I've learned to create worlds with their
own satellites in any orbital relationship I use. But I
have a far more difficult project underway. Now. I suppose
(17:07):
I'm ready to concede failure.
Speaker 3 (17:08):
That doesn't sound like you, Smith. What could make you fail?
Speaker 2 (17:12):
Life? Life?
Speaker 3 (17:14):
Life? You mean you want to create people for these
little worlds of yours. I've given up Luke.
Speaker 2 (17:21):
I'll be satisfied just to create the new world itself.
That's what I'm going to do. Build a world that's right,
a better world of Luke, a world without fault.
Speaker 3 (17:34):
And a world without end, a world.
Speaker 2 (17:37):
Where nature is subservient to man and man subservient to God.
A world where man can live in peace and harmony
and in the comfort of eternal truth.
Speaker 3 (17:50):
How do you like my little speech? Smith? Are you serious?
Deadly serious? Look?
Speaker 2 (17:56):
Within two or three years, I'm going out into space
and add another planet to our solar system. I love
a planet, another Earth.
Speaker 3 (18:05):
I can do it. You know it's all a matter.
Speaker 2 (18:08):
Of time and of money, of course, enormous amounts of money.
Speaker 3 (18:14):
How much did you say?
Speaker 2 (18:15):
My uncle Howard has between ten and twenty million as
that'll do for a start. Do you have any connections
in the stock market? No, doesn't matter. I can learn
what I don't know. Luke, would you like to join
me in this enterprise?
Speaker 3 (18:32):
He to do?
Speaker 2 (18:33):
What?
Speaker 3 (18:34):
To assist me? To be my companion?
Speaker 2 (18:36):
My friend? I know it's a great deal to ask,
but I I'd like you to be on Smith's world, Luke.
When I created people, it bring it to a state
of perfection.
Speaker 3 (18:48):
No, No, Smith, I don't think so.
Speaker 2 (18:50):
You're being foolish, Luke. I'm offering you the opportunity to
be my principal assistant, to be God's right hand Thanks.
Speaker 3 (18:59):
Smith, But no, I like the world I have, and
don't forget I'm an old atheist. Remember, I don't believe
in gods, not even when they're you. It was another
six months before I heard the name of Smith again.
(19:20):
I heard it from low Briggs, the Heralds financial editor.
You know Smith, don't you? Yes? I know him? Why?
And following the Wall Street News not particularly what's happening
your friend Smith.
Speaker 1 (19:31):
Decided to take a flyer at the market.
Speaker 2 (19:34):
The talk on the street is if he keeps it up,
he might make the biggest killing in the history of
the market.
Speaker 3 (19:40):
You look worried about it, Briggs. He continues to be successful.
Here costs a paris. Excuse me, Griggs Wingate? Oh yeah, hi,
how are you terrible?
Speaker 4 (19:52):
Look? An awful thing has happened.
Speaker 2 (19:54):
Can you see me right now?
Speaker 5 (19:56):
Howard he did? He's got himself something.
Speaker 3 (20:01):
To do with the stock market.
Speaker 4 (20:04):
I didn't think people did that kind of thing anymore,
but she did it.
Speaker 3 (20:13):
That was how Smith's uncle died. That was how the
fortunes of thousands of so called market experts were wiped out.
But Smith had his millions, and Smith had his dream,
and shortly after that I had no job.
Speaker 4 (20:27):
I don't understand it, Luke. Why was the paper fire you?
Speaker 2 (20:31):
I'll tell you why.
Speaker 3 (20:32):
It's because Smith told them to. From when I heard
Smith bought a controlling interest in the Herald, one of
his first acts was to get me canned.
Speaker 4 (20:40):
What's so flattering about that?
Speaker 3 (20:42):
I wrote Smith and accused him of getting me bounced,
And this is the telegram he sent me.
Speaker 4 (20:50):
You're correct, however, greater employment opportunity awaits you immediately salary
one hundred thousand dollars a year. Reply at once, it's
interested Smith.
Speaker 3 (21:03):
Noah, you understand he's trying to buy a friend evilin.
Speaker 4 (21:07):
Don't you see you're going to accept.
Speaker 3 (21:10):
Aren't you?
Speaker 2 (21:11):
Luke?
Speaker 3 (21:11):
Uh? A hundred thousands a lot of money. I couldn't
make that in five years on the paper. Ah, with
a salary like that, we could even get married, couldn't we.
Speaker 2 (21:22):
But you didn't marry, did you?
Speaker 3 (21:24):
No? No, he didn't marry at first because I was
too busy, because I was the first employee of Smith
Incorporated to move into the eighty seven story Smith Building
and Flushing Meadows, the first of some eighty thousand employees,
including three thousand engineers and computer programmers six thousand scientists
in every conceivable field. I still have the first announcement
(21:49):
ad prepared by Smith Incorporated. Do you remember this? Mes see?
Speaker 2 (21:54):
It wanted one million superior men and women. Yes, it's
a famous document.
Speaker 3 (22:02):
Who wrote it? Do you know Smith himself? Of course? Listen,
if you believe you have superior and or mental capabilities
and are interested in joining other men and women of
your caliber in the most important enterprises in human history.
You are invited to write for full details concerning the
establishment of a new planetary home for the human race. Well,
(22:25):
you know, the rest the world thought it was a joke,
of course, but there were more than twenty five million applications.
Smith was pleased by the response, but his happiness was
short lived. When the testing procedure began. It became apparent
that the Smith's standards were far too demanding to produce
the one million superior men and women demanded by Smith.
(22:46):
After almost a year of testing, only one hundred and
sixty thousand candidates were mocked acceptable. And what did you do,
mister Wing gave me Well. I was given the title
of assistance to the President. I was paid regularly, stationed
in a six window office the size of a small
railroad terminal, and given nothing to do.
Speaker 4 (23:08):
You were right, Luke, you were absolutely right. Smith wanted
to buy himself a friend.
Speaker 2 (23:14):
Well, Evelyn, there are worse things to be are there?
Speaker 3 (23:18):
Oh?
Speaker 4 (23:19):
I want you to quit Smith. I was wrong to
tell you to take this job.
Speaker 3 (23:24):
If it won't be for long, I swear it. In
another year he'll have that manufactured world ready, and then
it'll be over. We can take our money and run.
Speaker 4 (23:32):
Do you really believe that? What makes you think that
you won't have to go to Smith's world too?
Speaker 6 (23:39):
Oh?
Speaker 4 (23:40):
You want you there, Luke, he needs you.
Speaker 3 (23:42):
Since when does a god need anyone?
Speaker 4 (23:44):
You'll get what he wants, Luke, quit now.
Speaker 3 (23:50):
With room? Oh have you don't mean that?
Speaker 4 (23:52):
I do? Luke, I'd ether lose you now. Then later.
Speaker 3 (24:01):
The next day I sent my letter of resignation to Smith,
and that.
Speaker 2 (24:05):
Night I received a telegram.
Speaker 3 (24:07):
It said, accept your resignation with reluctance. However, implore you
to perform one last important errand please visit doctor Martin
Cochran that Salo Laboratory, San Francisco, to enlist his interest
in our enterprise. So he went to San Francisco. Yes,
I went. There was a long and difficult task convincing
(24:29):
doctor Cochran, and it took me thirty five days to
get his affirmative answer. My first stop when I returned
home was Evelyn's apartment, and there was something strangely different
about her.
Speaker 4 (24:42):
Because there's nothing the matter.
Speaker 5 (24:44):
I feel wonderful, but you look different.
Speaker 3 (24:46):
What have you been doing since I left rehearsing.
Speaker 4 (24:51):
Yes, I've been given a part in a new play.
Speaker 3 (24:53):
Oh is that all it is? Oh?
Speaker 4 (24:55):
It's a wonderful play, Luke, the finest I've ever read,
chance like nothing I've ever had before. That's why I'm
so excited that there's something I have to tell you
about it.
Speaker 3 (25:09):
What.
Speaker 4 (25:10):
Well, it has something to do with Smith.
Speaker 3 (25:13):
Smith.
Speaker 4 (25:14):
He hired Arthur Tumble to write the play. It's about Well,
it's about Smith's world.
Speaker 5 (25:20):
I thought, it's very beautiful.
Speaker 3 (25:22):
Well, okay, if Smith's behind it, the play's bound to
be a smash. Ah.
Speaker 4 (25:28):
I knew you'd understand, Luke.
Speaker 3 (25:30):
What's the part?
Speaker 2 (25:31):
Like I played?
Speaker 3 (25:33):
Even? It was a month before the play opened that
the first Smith space vehicle was launched from Death Valley.
It's time of departure, its cargo, its destination, it's purpose.
We're all kept secret. Two days later another ship was launched,
and days apart, two other ships headed out to join
the other Smith vessels on some mysterious mission in outer space.
Speaker 2 (25:58):
I had no idea how.
Speaker 3 (25:59):
Smith planned to build his world away from the controlled
conditions of the laboratory, but that was his problem. My
problem was Evelyn. Few of us who were there will
ever forget the first performance of Arthur Trumbull's The World.
The excitement crackled like a tangible electrical force in the
huge theater where the play was having its premiere. Quite
(26:21):
a play. Some critics think it's a religious play, but
only those who knew Smith could realize the real significance
of its message, A terrible meaning concealed in all that glib,
poetic dialogue. I knew that Smith had suddenly guided Trumbull's hand.
It ended up as a message of praise.
Speaker 2 (26:39):
Of God, a God named.
Speaker 3 (26:43):
Smith, pardoning mister Ingate.
Speaker 2 (26:45):
But wasn't that also the.
Speaker 3 (26:47):
Night that well you yes, yes, that was the night
I got drunk right after the curtain came down. I
tried to see Evelyn backstage, but I couldn't get to
her through the mud Bob. I went out and spent
the next three hours in a neighborhood bar, getting thoroughly stoned.
Then I went up to her apartment and used the
(27:08):
key I had. Wow, well, well what do you know
you've got companies?
Speaker 2 (27:19):
Hello, Luke Smith, What a surprise. I'm sorry, Luke, I'm
really very sorry.
Speaker 3 (27:27):
It's not your fault, Smith, No, sir, it's not your fault.
It's my fault for just barging in here.
Speaker 5 (27:33):
Try to understand.
Speaker 3 (27:34):
It's okay, I have no kidding. It's my fault. Like
I said, I shouldn't still be using that that key
that you gave me. Huh, Here, Smith, you better take
the key now, along with all the other privileges. Only
only I don't suppose you.
Speaker 2 (27:51):
Really need a key?
Speaker 3 (27:53):
Do you a god? Ought to be able to walk
through walls? I never said I was a god? Loop
are you are? Smith? You're a god and you have
to be worthship? Oh? Please get off your knees. Thank you,
oh Lord, thank you for all our blessings.
Speaker 6 (28:12):
Thank you for my salary, Lord, and then thank you
for my bonus. Lord, stop this Loomith Smith is my shepherd.
I shall not want your trunk.
Speaker 3 (28:24):
Hell to our Lord of the Universe, Lord of all creation,
hel to Smith the God.
Speaker 1 (28:35):
And so Pmith the God has lost his first disciple.
But will that make any difference in his plans for
the future? Will that change his mind about building a
new home for the human race? And what will become
of Smith's world when it enters the orbit of Earth.
Speaker 7 (28:55):
We'll find out shortly in Actree in the year two
thousand and nine, Smith's World a planet the size of Mercury,
(29:16):
three thousand miles in diameter, provided with an atmosphere perhaps
even more favorable for the sustainment.
Speaker 1 (29:22):
Of life than our own, became part of the orbital
pattern of the Solar System, equidistant to.
Speaker 2 (29:30):
Earth and the planet Mars.
Speaker 1 (29:33):
The exodus from Earth to Smith's world coincided with the
most disastrous economic panic in history, precipitating riots in a
dozen countries, causing hardships.
Speaker 2 (29:44):
For millions left behind.
Speaker 3 (29:46):
It was a year of hell.
Speaker 1 (29:48):
For many, but for Luke Wingate, it was a year
of oblivion.
Speaker 3 (29:54):
Yes, it's true I spent that entire year the Boon
Socket Sanitarium, but there was never any question about my sanity.
I was nothing more than a simon, pure alcoholic. After
Evelyn made her decision to join Smith on his world,
I sought solace in the Brown Bottle and drank myself
into the place. When I left, I took a job
(30:17):
with a low circulation picture magazine, trying to forget. But
of course you didn't. No, no, I wasn't allowed to forget,
because one night the ghost came a ghost, a ghost
figure standing at the foot of my bed, shimmering as
it in waves of heat, staring at me with hollow eyes.
Speaker 2 (30:39):
It was Smith. Lou, Who are you? You know me?
Speaker 3 (30:44):
Lou? I am Smith.
Speaker 2 (30:46):
Now, don't be frightened. You are not seeing phantoms. This
is merely an electronic projection of my own image, of
purely mechanical trick.
Speaker 3 (30:55):
But where are you?
Speaker 2 (30:57):
I am on Smith's world, in my own chambers. What
do you want? I want you on Smith's.
Speaker 3 (31:02):
World, Luke, I'm offering you paradise. Will you refuse me?
Speaker 2 (31:08):
For the sake of Evelyn alone? Is that why you
reject me?
Speaker 3 (31:12):
I won't worship you Smith. You're not my God. I'm
very sorry, Luke. If I ever start praying Smith, I'll
mention you in my prayers, I'll ask forgiveness for you forgiveness.
I suppose that was the first contact Smith made with
(31:34):
Earth since his departure, but it wasn't. The last. Five
months after that, the first Smith vessel made a return
trip to Earth, containing a delegation that pointed to establish
relations with the planet of their birth. Trading began, with
Smith's scientists exchanging electronic and mechanical marbles for the products
of Earth, things which seem to be unavailable on Smith's paradise,
(31:58):
simple produce like oranges and lemons, tomatoes and lettuce and
all things made of wood. Smith's world was evidently not
as perfect as he suggested.
Speaker 2 (32:07):
Mister Wingate, can you tell me about the assassination plot?
Speaker 3 (32:12):
Well, the anti Smith league was formed without my knowledge,
but they did enlist your health.
Speaker 2 (32:18):
Yes, and that was how you met Alita Morgan. Yes,
wasn't she angry because her fiance passed the Smith test.
Speaker 3 (32:27):
And she didn't? No, No, you had that wrong. Alita
never took the tests, only her fiance, and he left
without her. But you did.
Speaker 2 (32:34):
Attend a meeting at miss Morgan's home.
Speaker 3 (32:37):
Yes, I attended the meeting. I heard George Burgess speak there.
He was a professor of sociology.
Speaker 8 (32:44):
I believe on history, Ladies and gentlemen, Almost three quarters
of a million people have made the transference from Earth
to Smith's World. It is the caliber of the people
we're losing. Our best scientists, engineers, our artists and writers,
many of our best business executives. We must be realistic.
(33:06):
The attractions of Smith's world are great, but the drain
on this world is cataclysmic. The crisis point looms for
all of us.
Speaker 3 (33:14):
A crisis that will result in chaos.
Speaker 5 (33:18):
But what can we do?
Speaker 3 (33:20):
Profession We must fight with every means in our command,
with legislation, with pressure, with sanctions, or even with fut
Now we'd lose. I know Smith, he would defeat us militarily.
Speaker 5 (33:30):
We have number him by a then.
Speaker 1 (33:32):
His brain power is greater. It won't work, I swear it.
Speaker 4 (33:36):
I know a way which would work.
Speaker 3 (33:37):
And what's that?
Speaker 4 (33:39):
It's only one way to fight Smith.
Speaker 2 (33:41):
We have to kiss him. So that was when you
finally took the Smith tests.
Speaker 3 (33:51):
We took something else first, the marriage vows.
Speaker 2 (33:54):
Why was that? I mean, was it because you were
in love or because you knew that married couples were
more desirable on Smith's world.
Speaker 3 (34:03):
For both reasons?
Speaker 2 (34:04):
And what happened? Or you know what happened? And please
mister Wingate ayes sir.
Speaker 3 (34:09):
We took the tests. I realized that Smith would hear
of our applications. Of course, we left the Smith's world
within the week for only one purpose, yes, to kill
its god. Smith's world was nothing like its legend. It
was a practical plant. Its terrain was almost spartan in
(34:31):
its simplicity. There were only artificial trees. There was mathematical precision.
In the areas marked for farming, for residences, for recreation,
there was no surface traffic at all. The air was
used for all transportation. Uniformed Smith officials were everywhere, gray
suited men with no weapons and polite manners. But there
(34:52):
were so many of them, so many, And when did
you see Smith himself? That first day, we were taken
from the crowd new arrivals and brought to the white
steeple of a building where Smith made its headquarters. We
were scammed for weapons, and my belt buckle set off
a warning buzzer. I removed my belt and we passed inspection.
(35:12):
But if you had no weapon, how well. We had one,
but it wouldn't respond to Smith's warning system. And in
that moment I lost some respect for Smith's godlike powers.
Speaker 2 (35:25):
About this weapon.
Speaker 3 (35:26):
It it was in Alita's hair, her hair. I saw
her hand go to her head as if to pat
a stray lock back in place. She took out the
thin bamboo cylinder. It was an ancient, primitive weapon, maybe
the most fitting kind to end the life of a
super scientist. A bloga. Yes, she put it to her
(35:49):
lips at a puff of her breath, sent the poisoned
wooden splinter right into the.
Speaker 2 (35:55):
Hearts of Smith.
Speaker 3 (35:57):
But the attempt failed. Yes, because the poisoned splinter went
right through the body of Smith, or what we both
had presumed was the body of Smith. He was aware
of what happened, of course, and he looked at me sadly.
Speaker 2 (36:12):
I must congratulate you, Luke, on the simple ingenuity of
your plan. Other assassins have used far more sophisticated techniques
and failed, but you almost succeeded.
Speaker 3 (36:24):
Except for one thing. Smith. You're not here, No, my friend,
I'm not here.
Speaker 2 (36:30):
My projection system works very well on short distances, as
you can see.
Speaker 3 (36:36):
Yes, it's perfect, Smith, like your world. But you didn't
really mean it was perfect.
Speaker 2 (36:42):
Did you.
Speaker 3 (36:43):
No, No, I didn't mean it because on the perfect
world there wouldn't be any need for prisons, and there
was one on Smith's world as a leader, and I
soon learned it was underground, hidden from the sight of
the contented citizens, long stone corridors leading from one dismal
chamber to another. It was more a dungeon than a prison,
(37:04):
a storage place for the human refuse of Smith's perfect world.
The earth looks red tonight.
Speaker 9 (37:10):
Why what did you say. My cell window faces west.
I can see the earth glowing at night. It glows
redder and redder all the time. They say that a
day will come when the earth will bleed and Smith's
world will burn.
Speaker 3 (37:30):
What did his words mean? Well, it was a code,
a rallying cry for the revolution that was brewing against Smith.
I learned that there were three thousand prisoners in those dungeons,
Not thieves and murderers, but rebels. How did you escape from.
Speaker 2 (37:45):
That prison, mister wingate?
Speaker 3 (37:46):
There?
Speaker 2 (37:47):
I've heard so many conflicting stories.
Speaker 3 (37:49):
Most of them are false. I didn't overpower any guards.
I didn't use any clever stratagem. You see, I was
released by a friend. Flu you quit. It's Evelyn war Eh, Evelyn,
what are you doing here?
Speaker 4 (38:07):
I'm not here. I'm at home in the citadel.
Speaker 3 (38:11):
Then you're just a ghost of projections.
Speaker 4 (38:13):
Yes, let Smith doesn't know what I'm doing.
Speaker 2 (38:17):
He's in the farm land.
Speaker 4 (38:18):
There's some kind of trouble there.
Speaker 3 (38:20):
Then you know about his machine.
Speaker 4 (38:22):
Who looks I've been so wrong about him, about you,
about what I wanted?
Speaker 3 (38:29):
Evelyn? Why did you come here?
Speaker 2 (38:31):
Something's happening.
Speaker 4 (38:33):
There's been strikes, riot, outbreak, are here to talk about
something called them bleeding earth. One'm so frightened, Luke, please
help me.
Speaker 3 (38:44):
I'm the one who needs to help Evelyn. I'm the prisoner,
not you.
Speaker 5 (38:48):
No, I'm a prisoner.
Speaker 2 (38:50):
Two. Get me out of here.
Speaker 3 (38:52):
Use your authority as Smith's wife to get me free, now,
right now, before he comes back here. That was how
I made my escape from the Smith prisoner. I was
brought back to Smith's citadel as a guest instead of
a prisoner. I found Evelyn waiting for me in Smith's
chamber that I don't know. It sounded like an explosion
(39:16):
somewhere the sky.
Speaker 2 (39:19):
You're coloradity, I've almost forgotten what the sky looks like. Evelyn,
come to the window.
Speaker 3 (39:28):
There must be flames somewhere, flames in the east, the phelan,
the bedding.
Speaker 4 (39:34):
Of fields, could be few of the witch takes.
Speaker 5 (39:39):
Look, I'm so frightened.
Speaker 3 (39:41):
You said that there was trouble on the farmlands.
Speaker 5 (39:44):
Oh please, I was shaking all over, so wrong, so much,
it was.
Speaker 2 (39:55):
So terribly reported.
Speaker 3 (39:56):
Whoa who, Well, what it's fair is fair, isn't it, Luke?
Speaker 2 (40:02):
Shit, that's what the Bible says. Of course, an eye
for an eye a tooth for a tooth, even a
kiss for a kid.
Speaker 3 (40:09):
The world is burning, Smith, Yes, I know.
Speaker 2 (40:12):
I've just seen the farmers put the torch to it
with their own hands. It started it.
Speaker 5 (40:18):
You hadn't started the bleeding Earth.
Speaker 3 (40:21):
You see the mistake I made, Luke, I should have
developed my own form of life.
Speaker 2 (40:26):
Instead, I depended on the miserable ingrate who made a
mess of the planet Earth.
Speaker 3 (40:29):
Who are making a mess of my world too? Is
it really your world? Smith, created by your marvelous world
building machine?
Speaker 5 (40:36):
Why are we just standing here? You'll burn us.
Speaker 2 (40:39):
Down to What about it?
Speaker 3 (40:40):
Smith? This is God's world, isn't it not yours? Your
mind machine didn't really work at the limits of space.
You didn't create Smith's world. Your ship's captured this rock
from the debris of space. They steered it into the
orbit of the Solar System. You're a great scientist, Smith,
but you're not a lock. Only God can make worlds.
(41:03):
See here, he meat, I intend to this citadel, this building.
Speaker 2 (41:09):
They'll come here finally, they'll storm at crying words of liberty.
Speaker 3 (41:12):
Oh but they'll be terribly surprised.
Speaker 2 (41:15):
You see, this isn't the.
Speaker 3 (41:16):
Building at all.
Speaker 2 (41:18):
The only chambers are Evelyn and myself.
Speaker 3 (41:20):
The rest of the structure is an atomic stockpile. If
the rebels come here, they'll destroy Smith's world and themselves.
Speaker 5 (41:28):
Oh think your hard, Luke.
Speaker 2 (41:30):
We have to get away, they have to under little Smith.
Come with us.
Speaker 3 (41:34):
Look, you don't eat me Smith. There's no reason for
any of Smith's world to be destroyed.
Speaker 10 (41:40):
God, my God, wire yourself for safe with me? Luke,
why have done so far from helping me? And from
the words of my roar? Oh my God, I cry
in the same time. And now here's God.
Speaker 2 (42:09):
How many made it to the spaceboard, mister Wingate before.
Speaker 3 (42:13):
The final atomic reaction? Only twenty thousand, they say. All
those others they died out there. Smith's world became the
tombstone of the Solar System. And of course you found
your wife on one of those spaceships.
Speaker 2 (42:30):
Yes, yes, I found the leader. You must have been
very happy. Yes, I was happy.
Speaker 3 (42:39):
For the first time in my life. I said a prayer.
And so Smith, the God is no more, and Smith's
World is.
Speaker 1 (42:55):
Nothing but a rock orbiting the Solar System.
Speaker 2 (42:59):
I use to this object, maybe not, Maybe it will.
Speaker 1 (43:03):
Always appear in the skies of Earth as a memento
of man's folly of what can happen when men not
merely forget their gods, but try to take their place.
Speaker 2 (43:17):
We'll be back shortly.
Speaker 1 (43:30):
Smith wasn't the only person who ever dreamed of having
a world.
Speaker 2 (43:34):
Of his own.
Speaker 1 (43:35):
We all rule our own kingdoms just by using our imagination.
We hope our story exercised your imagination and that you'll
come back for more miracles and more mystery at our
next meeting. Our cast included Norman Rose, Russell Horton, E. V. Justter,
and Bob Caliban. The entire production was under the direction
(43:58):
of Hymon Brown Radio. Mystery Theater was sponsored in part.
Speaker 3 (44:03):
By Buick Motor Division.
Speaker 2 (44:05):
Missus E. G.
Speaker 1 (44:06):
Marshall inviting you to return to our Mystery Theater for
another adventure in the macabre. Until next time, pleasant dreaming,
The CBS Radio Mystery Theater Presents.
Speaker 2 (00:21):
Come in, We're welcome.
Speaker 3 (00:25):
I'm E. G. Marshall.
Speaker 2 (00:27):
This is the story of a god.
Speaker 1 (00:29):
There have been many gods since the dawn of civilization,
but no god bore so strange a name as the
one you're going to beat right now. No god before
him looked and talked the way this god did in
the beginning of mankind's twenty first century. Yes, this is
the story of a future god, not a very distant future,
(00:50):
because his official recorded birth is July the nineteenth, nineteen
seventy seven. Like most gods, has obscured the mundane facts
of his beginning, the place of his birth, the names
of his parents, even the full name they gave him.
Only one name survived, the family name Smith.
Speaker 3 (01:17):
What is that thing? Smith? What have you got him?
At Glass Box?
Speaker 2 (01:21):
It's a world, luke A What a world? A world
I made all by myself, Smith's world.
Speaker 3 (01:42):
Our mister.
Speaker 1 (01:42):
Drama A God Named Smith was written especially for the
Mystery Theater by Henry Slesser and stars Norman Rose and
Russell Horton. It is sponsored in part by Greyhound, Package
Express and True Value Hardware Stores. I'll be back shortly
with that one.
Speaker 3 (02:10):
Who is Smith?
Speaker 2 (02:13):
What gave him the power to become a god?
Speaker 1 (02:16):
And what did he do with his power? There's only
one man who can answer these questions, and even he
could never reveal all the mysteries that made Smith the
wonderment of the early twenty first century. But when the
biographers of Smith sought out the strange and wondrous facts
of Smith's life, they came to Luke Wingate first.
Speaker 3 (02:38):
Go on, have somebody it's a revantage nineteen seventy nine.
Speaker 2 (02:43):
I don't think so much, the wing Gate. That's a
long drive back to town.
Speaker 3 (02:47):
You don't mind if I help myself. No, of course not.
Smith himself gave me this one, a whole case of it.
This happens to be the last bottle. That makes it
kind of historic, doesn't kind of Well, I'll go ahead.
You want to know about the time that I first
met Smith.
Speaker 2 (03:04):
I know you've answered it before, mister Wingate, but but.
Speaker 3 (03:07):
You feel obliged to ask it just the same. No,
it's all right, don't mind repeating myself.
Speaker 2 (03:12):
You met Smith in college, didn't you Artmore University?
Speaker 3 (03:16):
That's right, I was a sophomore then back in the
nineteen eighties. We were twenty years old. But I remember
the day all right. It was one of my hangover days.
It was a Sunday, and I was content to sleep
until Monday's classes. But then I heard this voice.
Speaker 2 (03:33):
Pardon me, is this is mister Wingate's room.
Speaker 3 (03:36):
He was something I didn't expect, a long headed kid
about twelve or thirteen, with a sad mouth and hair
the color of dry straw. He was carrying a suitcase
that was putting a strain on his thin arms and shoulders.
Speaker 2 (03:49):
I'm sorry to disturb you, but I was told to
come up here.
Speaker 3 (03:52):
My name is Smith. Then I remembered who he was.
For a month, we've been hearing rumors about a boy
prodigy who has been transferred from Crowley College to Ardbourn. Obviously,
Smith had the misfortune to run into Gil Curtis on
his first day. Curtis was the class clown, a senior
with a heavy handed sense of humor.
Speaker 2 (04:12):
Mister Curtis said something about getting a left handed monkey
wrench from you.
Speaker 3 (04:16):
Of course I told the kid what he was dealing with.
That Curtis was only pulling a stale old joke. He
didn't think it was funny. I told him to forget it,
that it was typical of the stuff Curtis laid on
the freshman.
Speaker 2 (04:28):
Oh, I'm not a freshman, I'm a senior. He was
a senior at thirteen years of age.
Speaker 3 (04:34):
I found out that he was only twelve. I learned
that two weeks later when I was crossing the campus
and saw Gil Curtis himself under set Smith.
Speaker 2 (04:42):
Hey, Junior, whatever happened to that left handed monkey wrench? Oh? Sorry,
it took me so long to find one. You finally did, eh?
Speaker 3 (04:51):
I did?
Speaker 2 (04:52):
Do you want to see y? Hey, Luke, did you
hear what the kid said? He's got a left handed wrench.
He's in my room. I'm staying at the Ivy House.
If you'd like to take a look at it, Oh,
I sure would, Junior.
Speaker 3 (05:05):
You want to come along, Luke? I did go along.
I went to Smith's small, bare room on the third
floor of the Ivy House, a room that looked even
more cramped due to a conglomeration of electrical apparatus that
he had brought with him from Crowley.
Speaker 2 (05:19):
Okay, kid, let's see it.
Speaker 3 (05:22):
Smith redded his way through the confused mass of equipment
and picked up a shiny new wrench from some canvas
covered object in the corner. He handed it to Curtis,
who hefted it in his right hand.
Speaker 2 (05:33):
Left handed monkey wrench. Huh, you're not just a genius kid,
you're a comediant. Right try it, mister Curtis. Here's a
nutt and bolt.
Speaker 3 (05:44):
I watched Curtis grab the nutt and bolt and apply
the wrench. No matter how he twisted the nut, it
wouldn't turn. He examined the screw thread, certain that it
was reversed.
Speaker 2 (05:55):
All I told you, mister Curtis, it's a left handed wrench.
He's your left hand.
Speaker 3 (06:01):
I watched Curtis switch the wrench to his left hand
and apply it to the nut. It turned easily off
the bolt. He stared at the pieces in his hand
and stalked out, it was simple enough.
Speaker 2 (06:12):
I just sent an ordinary wrench through a mobious warp.
It came back in a left handed molecular arrangement. Mister Wingate,
is that when you became friends after the monkey wrench episode?
Speaker 3 (06:24):
It's hard to describe it as friendship, but I did
become the only person Smith was willing to spend his
time with. After classes, Smith even at his tender age,
knew more about physics, mathematics, chemistry, and cosmology than anyone
on the staff, and there was a despairing mood among
the faculty. Before long, I realized that my friendship with
(06:45):
Smith was costing me the friendship of virtually every other student.
That was how I became a room mate of Smith.
Speaker 2 (06:53):
And that was how you discovered the Bible.
Speaker 3 (06:56):
Yes, that Bible. It was a Saturday afternoon and Smith
had taken the train into the city to attend some
scientific symposium. I was drifting about the room with the
vague idea of reading a book. I took one down
from Smith's shelf and was surprised to see that it
was a dog eared edition of the Old Testament. I
(07:17):
flipped the pages and then realized that they were penciled corrections,
beginning with Genesis.
Speaker 2 (07:23):
What did they say? Can you still remember? Ah, yes,
I can remember. It simply said in the beginning Smith
created the heaven and the earth, and the earth was
without form and void, and.
Speaker 3 (07:38):
Darkness was upon the face of the deep, and the
spirit of Smith moved upon the face of the waters.
And Smith said, let there be light. And there was light.
What didn't you think he was just a little bit mad.
I don't know what I thought. I have to admit that,
even though I was a professed atheist, the sight of
(07:58):
that faltered page turned me cold and fearful. Or did
you ask him about it?
Speaker 2 (08:02):
Oh?
Speaker 3 (08:02):
Yes, I made the mistake of asking him. He invited
me to see something. It was the large object in
his room that he always kept covered with canvas. It
was a cabinet about five feet high, the top enclosed
with glass, and the sides studded with dials and buttons
and switches. I told Smith that it resembled a coffin,
(08:25):
and he said, just the opposite, looke.
Speaker 2 (08:27):
Things are born here, not veried. Would you like to
see it work?
Speaker 3 (08:33):
He started to fool the controls. The thing emitted a
low pitched wine.
Speaker 2 (08:38):
The glass encloses a group of non condensable gases like
hydrogen and helium. There are dust particles too, water, iron oxide, ice, crystal,
silicon compounds. You can't see them now, but they're there,
just as they might form within the rotating envelope of
the sun. Now this device is activating those gases and
particles that enormous speed, causing them to collide. They're being
(09:02):
mutually exploded by each other, but they are also becoming
embedded with each other's masks. Within a few minutes, you'll
see them aggregate until the mass is visible to the
naked eye.
Speaker 3 (09:16):
It was five minutes before my naked eye saw anything
at all. Then I thought I could make out a
pinpoint of something in the center of the cabinet. I
blinked at it, and it grew larger. Another blink of
the eye and it became a ball, almost an eighth
of an inch in circumference. And then came a sound
like the crash of a lightning bolt in that thing.
(09:38):
What have you got in that grass box? It's a world?
Speaker 2 (09:42):
A what a world? A world I made all by myself,
Smith's world. I'd say it's a small planet created out
of an artificial cosmos. Right now, it's heat intensity is
almost us great enough to shatter the retaining glass, so
we'll we'll have to start the cooling process.
Speaker 3 (10:06):
He tugged at the switch in the panel, but I
could see at once that something was wrong.
Speaker 2 (10:09):
Huh huh, snop moving there, refrigeration switches jam, something's wrong.
Speaker 3 (10:15):
I think a strange mud brown spear in the cabinet
was still growing in size, and now it began to
glow with its own heat.
Speaker 2 (10:22):
Get out of here, Get everyone out of the building, Luke.
Speaker 3 (10:25):
Suddenly Smith seemed like nothing more than a fighting child.
I told him that we were alone in the building,
and he pleaded with me to leave while he wrestled
with the dials and switches and in an attempt to stop
the terrible process that was taking place. Get out of here, Luke.
There isn't much time now. The thing in the cabinet
was glowing with white heat, and I could feel the
blast of it right through the retaining glass. Smith was
(10:45):
still working feverishly at the controls, but I knew that
there wasn't any more that he could do. I yanked
him away from the device. He began to kick and scream.
I was a great deal bigger than he was, but
his strength became maniacal. I remembered something from my swimming class,
my right arm, and let go a short, snappy punch
to the chin of Smith. He saved his life. Didn't
(11:12):
you you know what? Smith said later, of course, that
I was his guardian angel. The day of the explosion,
he called it a miracle. The miracle was that nobody
was killed, the entire building was demolished, the area was
radioactive for a good three months after, and of course
Smith was expelled from Ardmore. In fact, it was on
the day of his departure that he told me the
(11:33):
only facts I'd ever learned about his childhood. His father
had died when he was three. His mother had been
a god fearing woman who was frightened by her son's
precocious abilities and thought that a heavy dose of religion
would balance things out. You know, Smith had learned the
entire Bible, Old Testament and New word for word. But
(11:54):
then his mother had died too, and an uncle named
Howard Cherney had been appointed Smith's guardian.
Speaker 2 (12:00):
He made quite a bit of money out of Smith's genius,
didn't he.
Speaker 3 (12:03):
Oh yes, Journey made a lot of money.
Speaker 2 (12:05):
Can I ask you somethings to Ngate. Did Smith ever
thank you for saving his life?
Speaker 3 (12:10):
Oh? Yes, he did that same day. Thank you for
my life, Luke.
Speaker 2 (12:16):
My life is very important to me, to you too,
for that matter, you'll see.
Speaker 3 (12:24):
Then he climbed aboard the train, and I didn't see
him again for six years, And when I did, he
was well on his way to becoming Smith a God,
the man who created his own world.
Speaker 1 (12:43):
Smith a god, and any mortal ever reach such a position,
even a scientific genius who can build worlds out of dust,
particles and electrical energy. Is that enough to qualify for
the job. We'll find out how and when Smith made
(13:03):
the attempt when we returned with that too. Six years
had passed since the Ivy House at Ardmore University vanished
in a cloud of charged atoms, leaving the ground bristling
(13:26):
with dangerous radiation, leaving the memory of a strange young
man with the ability to both build and destroy.
Speaker 2 (13:35):
Luke Wingate heard nothing from his friend in.
Speaker 3 (13:38):
Those six years, but.
Speaker 1 (13:40):
Luke was busy building something himself, his own career in journalism.
Speaker 2 (13:46):
Of course, I knew you worked for the Herald, mister Windate.
Speaker 3 (13:49):
I was lucky. There were forty guys in my graduating
class trying to get that job. But I had a gimmick.
I used my association with Smith to develop a series
of articles about the dangers of scientific experimentation. For three years,
I became a full fledged reporter, and after the fifth year,
I finally earned a byeline. The first person I told
(14:11):
the news to was named Evelyn.
Speaker 2 (14:14):
Evelyn Wilson of course the actress.
Speaker 3 (14:16):
Yes, young as she was, she was ranked as one
of the top actresses on the stage. She never made
a movie, you know, not that she wasn't asked. As
a matter of fact, it was Howard Cherney who asked her.
That was how Smith came into my life again. When
I saw Evelyn with this older man and asked her
who he was.
Speaker 4 (14:34):
Oh, Howard Jurney, still the rich. He's some kind of
pattened attorney was something like ten or twenty million.
Speaker 3 (14:42):
Oh that's nice for you.
Speaker 4 (14:43):
He wants to produce a movie. Can you imagine starring me?
Speaker 3 (14:48):
Journey?
Speaker 2 (14:48):
She had that name's familiar. Smith had an uncle by
that name.
Speaker 4 (14:53):
Do you mean that creepy college friend of your.
Speaker 3 (14:56):
He became Smith's guardian after Smith's mother died. Maybe the
patents or Smith's Maybe my creepy college friend is a
millionaire too, I'm not.
Speaker 4 (15:06):
You might introduce me.
Speaker 3 (15:10):
Sure enough, Journey turned out to be Smith's guardian, a
man who'd made a fortune on Smith's genius. Journey told
Evelyn that his nephew was living in seclusion in a
suburb in upstate New York. I found out where and
wrote Smith a letter, He replied at once and invited
me to visit. Had he changed much well? He was taller, broader,
(15:31):
but still a youth, not even nineteen years old, but
with eyes as old as Methuselist. I congratulated him on
his success, but he said, yes, I've done very well.
Speaker 2 (15:43):
I'm almost ready for it, now ready for some real developments.
Speaker 3 (15:48):
I meant your inventions. Evelyn, the girl I wrote you about,
she says that your uncle is loaded. I guess that
you must be fairly well off too.
Speaker 2 (15:56):
My invention, my toys, so they were, Luke. The only
reason I bothered with them was to get money for equipment.
At how much does my uncle have? Oh?
Speaker 3 (16:08):
I don't know, ten twenty million, that one says, don't
you know?
Speaker 2 (16:11):
No, I haven't kept track of the finance, as I've
left that to him. I suppose I'll have to start
thinking of money soon. I'll be needing a great deal
very soon.
Speaker 3 (16:22):
What four you ought to know, Luke? You saw the
original model? You don't mean that world building machine? Come
have a look. It was very much like the scale
model Smith had built six years before, But this cabinet
was forty feet across and some eight feet high. The
(16:42):
banks of dials and switches and relays and buttons.
Speaker 2 (16:46):
Were multiplied a hundred times from the original. Basically, it
employs the same principles of the earlier model, but there
are important refinements. I've learned to create worlds with their
own satellites in any orbital relationship I use. But I
have a far more difficult project underway. Now. I suppose
(17:07):
I'm ready to concede failure.
Speaker 3 (17:08):
That doesn't sound like you, Smith. What could make you fail?
Speaker 2 (17:12):
Life? Life?
Speaker 3 (17:14):
Life? You mean you want to create people for these
little worlds of yours. I've given up Luke.
Speaker 2 (17:21):
I'll be satisfied just to create the new world itself.
That's what I'm going to do. Build a world that's right,
a better world of Luke, a world without fault.
Speaker 3 (17:34):
And a world without end, a world.
Speaker 2 (17:37):
Where nature is subservient to man and man subservient to God.
A world where man can live in peace and harmony
and in the comfort of eternal truth.
Speaker 3 (17:50):
How do you like my little speech? Smith? Are you serious?
Deadly serious? Look?
Speaker 2 (17:56):
Within two or three years, I'm going out into space
and add another planet to our solar system. I love
a planet, another Earth.
Speaker 3 (18:05):
I can do it. You know it's all a matter.
Speaker 2 (18:08):
Of time and of money, of course, enormous amounts of money.
Speaker 3 (18:14):
How much did you say?
Speaker 2 (18:15):
My uncle Howard has between ten and twenty million as
that'll do for a start. Do you have any connections
in the stock market? No, doesn't matter. I can learn
what I don't know. Luke, would you like to join
me in this enterprise?
Speaker 3 (18:32):
He to do?
Speaker 2 (18:33):
What?
Speaker 3 (18:34):
To assist me? To be my companion?
Speaker 2 (18:36):
My friend? I know it's a great deal to ask,
but I I'd like you to be on Smith's world, Luke.
When I created people, it bring it to a state
of perfection.
Speaker 3 (18:48):
No, No, Smith, I don't think so.
Speaker 2 (18:50):
You're being foolish, Luke. I'm offering you the opportunity to
be my principal assistant, to be God's right hand Thanks.
Speaker 3 (18:59):
Smith, But no, I like the world I have, and
don't forget I'm an old atheist. Remember, I don't believe
in gods, not even when they're you. It was another
six months before I heard the name of Smith again.
(19:20):
I heard it from low Briggs, the Heralds financial editor.
You know Smith, don't you? Yes? I know him? Why?
And following the Wall Street News not particularly what's happening
your friend Smith.
Speaker 1 (19:31):
Decided to take a flyer at the market.
Speaker 2 (19:34):
The talk on the street is if he keeps it up,
he might make the biggest killing in the history of
the market.
Speaker 3 (19:40):
You look worried about it, Briggs. He continues to be successful.
Here costs a paris. Excuse me, Griggs Wingate? Oh yeah, hi,
how are you terrible?
Speaker 4 (19:52):
Look? An awful thing has happened.
Speaker 2 (19:54):
Can you see me right now?
Speaker 5 (19:56):
Howard he did? He's got himself something.
Speaker 3 (20:01):
To do with the stock market.
Speaker 4 (20:04):
I didn't think people did that kind of thing anymore,
but she did it.
Speaker 3 (20:13):
That was how Smith's uncle died. That was how the
fortunes of thousands of so called market experts were wiped out.
But Smith had his millions, and Smith had his dream,
and shortly after that I had no job.
Speaker 4 (20:27):
I don't understand it, Luke. Why was the paper fire you?
Speaker 2 (20:31):
I'll tell you why.
Speaker 3 (20:32):
It's because Smith told them to. From when I heard
Smith bought a controlling interest in the Herald, one of
his first acts was to get me canned.
Speaker 4 (20:40):
What's so flattering about that?
Speaker 3 (20:42):
I wrote Smith and accused him of getting me bounced,
And this is the telegram he sent me.
Speaker 4 (20:50):
You're correct, however, greater employment opportunity awaits you immediately salary
one hundred thousand dollars a year. Reply at once, it's
interested Smith.
Speaker 3 (21:03):
Noah, you understand he's trying to buy a friend evilin.
Speaker 4 (21:07):
Don't you see you're going to accept.
Speaker 3 (21:10):
Aren't you?
Speaker 2 (21:11):
Luke?
Speaker 3 (21:11):
Uh? A hundred thousands a lot of money. I couldn't
make that in five years on the paper. Ah, with
a salary like that, we could even get married, couldn't we.
Speaker 2 (21:22):
But you didn't marry, did you?
Speaker 3 (21:24):
No? No, he didn't marry at first because I was
too busy, because I was the first employee of Smith
Incorporated to move into the eighty seven story Smith Building
and Flushing Meadows, the first of some eighty thousand employees,
including three thousand engineers and computer programmers six thousand scientists
in every conceivable field. I still have the first announcement
(21:49):
ad prepared by Smith Incorporated. Do you remember this? Mes see?
Speaker 2 (21:54):
It wanted one million superior men and women. Yes, it's
a famous document.
Speaker 3 (22:02):
Who wrote it? Do you know Smith himself? Of course? Listen,
if you believe you have superior and or mental capabilities
and are interested in joining other men and women of
your caliber in the most important enterprises in human history.
You are invited to write for full details concerning the
establishment of a new planetary home for the human race. Well,
(22:25):
you know, the rest the world thought it was a joke,
of course, but there were more than twenty five million applications.
Smith was pleased by the response, but his happiness was
short lived. When the testing procedure began. It became apparent
that the Smith's standards were far too demanding to produce
the one million superior men and women demanded by Smith.
(22:46):
After almost a year of testing, only one hundred and
sixty thousand candidates were mocked acceptable. And what did you do,
mister Wing gave me Well. I was given the title
of assistance to the President. I was paid regularly, stationed
in a six window office the size of a small
railroad terminal, and given nothing to do.
Speaker 4 (23:08):
You were right, Luke, you were absolutely right. Smith wanted
to buy himself a friend.
Speaker 2 (23:14):
Well, Evelyn, there are worse things to be are there?
Speaker 3 (23:18):
Oh?
Speaker 4 (23:19):
I want you to quit Smith. I was wrong to
tell you to take this job.
Speaker 3 (23:24):
If it won't be for long, I swear it. In
another year he'll have that manufactured world ready, and then
it'll be over. We can take our money and run.
Speaker 4 (23:32):
Do you really believe that? What makes you think that
you won't have to go to Smith's world too?
Speaker 6 (23:39):
Oh?
Speaker 4 (23:40):
You want you there, Luke, he needs you.
Speaker 3 (23:42):
Since when does a god need anyone?
Speaker 4 (23:44):
You'll get what he wants, Luke, quit now.
Speaker 3 (23:50):
With room? Oh have you don't mean that?
Speaker 4 (23:52):
I do? Luke, I'd ether lose you now. Then later.
Speaker 3 (24:01):
The next day I sent my letter of resignation to Smith,
and that.
Speaker 2 (24:05):
Night I received a telegram.
Speaker 3 (24:07):
It said, accept your resignation with reluctance. However, implore you
to perform one last important errand please visit doctor Martin
Cochran that Salo Laboratory, San Francisco, to enlist his interest
in our enterprise. So he went to San Francisco. Yes,
I went. There was a long and difficult task convincing
(24:29):
doctor Cochran, and it took me thirty five days to
get his affirmative answer. My first stop when I returned
home was Evelyn's apartment, and there was something strangely different
about her.
Speaker 4 (24:42):
Because there's nothing the matter.
Speaker 5 (24:44):
I feel wonderful, but you look different.
Speaker 3 (24:46):
What have you been doing since I left rehearsing.
Speaker 4 (24:51):
Yes, I've been given a part in a new play.
Speaker 3 (24:53):
Oh is that all it is? Oh?
Speaker 4 (24:55):
It's a wonderful play, Luke, the finest I've ever read,
chance like nothing I've ever had before. That's why I'm
so excited that there's something I have to tell you
about it.
Speaker 3 (25:09):
What.
Speaker 4 (25:10):
Well, it has something to do with Smith.
Speaker 3 (25:13):
Smith.
Speaker 4 (25:14):
He hired Arthur Tumble to write the play. It's about Well,
it's about Smith's world.
Speaker 5 (25:20):
I thought, it's very beautiful.
Speaker 3 (25:22):
Well, okay, if Smith's behind it, the play's bound to
be a smash. Ah.
Speaker 4 (25:28):
I knew you'd understand, Luke.
Speaker 3 (25:30):
What's the part?
Speaker 2 (25:31):
Like I played?
Speaker 3 (25:33):
Even? It was a month before the play opened that
the first Smith space vehicle was launched from Death Valley.
It's time of departure, its cargo, its destination, it's purpose.
We're all kept secret. Two days later another ship was launched,
and days apart, two other ships headed out to join
the other Smith vessels on some mysterious mission in outer space.
Speaker 2 (25:58):
I had no idea how.
Speaker 3 (25:59):
Smith planned to build his world away from the controlled
conditions of the laboratory, but that was his problem. My
problem was Evelyn. Few of us who were there will
ever forget the first performance of Arthur Trumbull's The World.
The excitement crackled like a tangible electrical force in the
huge theater where the play was having its premiere. Quite
(26:21):
a play. Some critics think it's a religious play, but
only those who knew Smith could realize the real significance
of its message, A terrible meaning concealed in all that glib,
poetic dialogue. I knew that Smith had suddenly guided Trumbull's hand.
It ended up as a message of praise.
Speaker 2 (26:39):
Of God, a God named.
Speaker 3 (26:43):
Smith, pardoning mister Ingate.
Speaker 2 (26:45):
But wasn't that also the.
Speaker 3 (26:47):
Night that well you yes, yes, that was the night
I got drunk right after the curtain came down. I
tried to see Evelyn backstage, but I couldn't get to
her through the mud Bob. I went out and spent
the next three hours in a neighborhood bar, getting thoroughly stoned.
Then I went up to her apartment and used the
(27:08):
key I had. Wow, well, well what do you know
you've got companies?
Speaker 2 (27:19):
Hello, Luke Smith, What a surprise. I'm sorry, Luke, I'm
really very sorry.
Speaker 3 (27:27):
It's not your fault, Smith, No, sir, it's not your fault.
It's my fault for just barging in here.
Speaker 5 (27:33):
Try to understand.
Speaker 3 (27:34):
It's okay, I have no kidding. It's my fault. Like
I said, I shouldn't still be using that that key
that you gave me. Huh, Here, Smith, you better take
the key now, along with all the other privileges. Only
only I don't suppose you.
Speaker 2 (27:51):
Really need a key?
Speaker 3 (27:53):
Do you a god? Ought to be able to walk
through walls? I never said I was a god? Loop
are you are? Smith? You're a god and you have
to be worthship? Oh? Please get off your knees. Thank you,
oh Lord, thank you for all our blessings.
Speaker 6 (28:12):
Thank you for my salary, Lord, and then thank you
for my bonus. Lord, stop this Loomith Smith is my shepherd.
I shall not want your trunk.
Speaker 3 (28:24):
Hell to our Lord of the Universe, Lord of all creation,
hel to Smith the God.
Speaker 1 (28:35):
And so Pmith the God has lost his first disciple.
But will that make any difference in his plans for
the future? Will that change his mind about building a
new home for the human race? And what will become
of Smith's world when it enters the orbit of Earth.
Speaker 7 (28:55):
We'll find out shortly in Actree in the year two
thousand and nine, Smith's World a planet the size of Mercury,
(29:16):
three thousand miles in diameter, provided with an atmosphere perhaps
even more favorable for the sustainment.
Speaker 1 (29:22):
Of life than our own, became part of the orbital
pattern of the Solar System, equidistant to.
Speaker 2 (29:30):
Earth and the planet Mars.
Speaker 1 (29:33):
The exodus from Earth to Smith's world coincided with the
most disastrous economic panic in history, precipitating riots in a
dozen countries, causing hardships.
Speaker 2 (29:44):
For millions left behind.
Speaker 3 (29:46):
It was a year of hell.
Speaker 1 (29:48):
For many, but for Luke Wingate, it was a year
of oblivion.
Speaker 3 (29:54):
Yes, it's true I spent that entire year the Boon
Socket Sanitarium, but there was never any question about my sanity.
I was nothing more than a simon, pure alcoholic. After
Evelyn made her decision to join Smith on his world,
I sought solace in the Brown Bottle and drank myself
into the place. When I left, I took a job
(30:17):
with a low circulation picture magazine, trying to forget. But
of course you didn't. No, no, I wasn't allowed to forget,
because one night the ghost came a ghost, a ghost
figure standing at the foot of my bed, shimmering as
it in waves of heat, staring at me with hollow eyes.
Speaker 2 (30:39):
It was Smith. Lou, Who are you? You know me?
Speaker 3 (30:44):
Lou? I am Smith.
Speaker 2 (30:46):
Now, don't be frightened. You are not seeing phantoms. This
is merely an electronic projection of my own image, of
purely mechanical trick.
Speaker 3 (30:55):
But where are you?
Speaker 2 (30:57):
I am on Smith's world, in my own chambers. What
do you want? I want you on Smith's.
Speaker 3 (31:02):
World, Luke, I'm offering you paradise. Will you refuse me?
Speaker 2 (31:08):
For the sake of Evelyn alone? Is that why you
reject me?
Speaker 3 (31:12):
I won't worship you Smith. You're not my God. I'm
very sorry, Luke. If I ever start praying Smith, I'll
mention you in my prayers, I'll ask forgiveness for you forgiveness.
I suppose that was the first contact Smith made with
(31:34):
Earth since his departure, but it wasn't. The last. Five
months after that, the first Smith vessel made a return
trip to Earth, containing a delegation that pointed to establish
relations with the planet of their birth. Trading began, with
Smith's scientists exchanging electronic and mechanical marbles for the products
of Earth, things which seem to be unavailable on Smith's paradise,
(31:58):
simple produce like oranges and lemons, tomatoes and lettuce and
all things made of wood. Smith's world was evidently not
as perfect as he suggested.
Speaker 2 (32:07):
Mister Wingate, can you tell me about the assassination plot?
Speaker 3 (32:12):
Well, the anti Smith league was formed without my knowledge,
but they did enlist your health.
Speaker 2 (32:18):
Yes, and that was how you met Alita Morgan. Yes,
wasn't she angry because her fiance passed the Smith test.
Speaker 3 (32:27):
And she didn't? No, No, you had that wrong. Alita
never took the tests, only her fiance, and he left
without her. But you did.
Speaker 2 (32:34):
Attend a meeting at miss Morgan's home.
Speaker 3 (32:37):
Yes, I attended the meeting. I heard George Burgess speak there.
He was a professor of sociology.
Speaker 8 (32:44):
I believe on history, Ladies and gentlemen, Almost three quarters
of a million people have made the transference from Earth
to Smith's World. It is the caliber of the people
we're losing. Our best scientists, engineers, our artists and writers,
many of our best business executives. We must be realistic.
(33:06):
The attractions of Smith's world are great, but the drain
on this world is cataclysmic. The crisis point looms for
all of us.
Speaker 3 (33:14):
A crisis that will result in chaos.
Speaker 5 (33:18):
But what can we do?
Speaker 3 (33:20):
Profession We must fight with every means in our command,
with legislation, with pressure, with sanctions, or even with fut
Now we'd lose. I know Smith, he would defeat us militarily.
Speaker 5 (33:30):
We have number him by a then.
Speaker 1 (33:32):
His brain power is greater. It won't work, I swear it.
Speaker 4 (33:36):
I know a way which would work.
Speaker 3 (33:37):
And what's that?
Speaker 4 (33:39):
It's only one way to fight Smith.
Speaker 2 (33:41):
We have to kiss him. So that was when you
finally took the Smith tests.
Speaker 3 (33:51):
We took something else first, the marriage vows.
Speaker 2 (33:54):
Why was that? I mean, was it because you were
in love or because you knew that married couples were
more desirable on Smith's world.
Speaker 3 (34:03):
For both reasons?
Speaker 2 (34:04):
And what happened? Or you know what happened? And please
mister Wingate ayes sir.
Speaker 3 (34:09):
We took the tests. I realized that Smith would hear
of our applications. Of course, we left the Smith's world
within the week for only one purpose, yes, to kill
its god. Smith's world was nothing like its legend. It
was a practical plant. Its terrain was almost spartan in
(34:31):
its simplicity. There were only artificial trees. There was mathematical precision.
In the areas marked for farming, for residences, for recreation,
there was no surface traffic at all. The air was
used for all transportation. Uniformed Smith officials were everywhere, gray
suited men with no weapons and polite manners. But there
(34:52):
were so many of them, so many, And when did
you see Smith himself? That first day, we were taken
from the crowd new arrivals and brought to the white
steeple of a building where Smith made its headquarters. We
were scammed for weapons, and my belt buckle set off
a warning buzzer. I removed my belt and we passed inspection.
(35:12):
But if you had no weapon, how well. We had one,
but it wouldn't respond to Smith's warning system. And in
that moment I lost some respect for Smith's godlike powers.
Speaker 2 (35:25):
About this weapon.
Speaker 3 (35:26):
It it was in Alita's hair, her hair. I saw
her hand go to her head as if to pat
a stray lock back in place. She took out the
thin bamboo cylinder. It was an ancient, primitive weapon, maybe
the most fitting kind to end the life of a
super scientist. A bloga. Yes, she put it to her
(35:49):
lips at a puff of her breath, sent the poisoned
wooden splinter right into the.
Speaker 2 (35:55):
Hearts of Smith.
Speaker 3 (35:57):
But the attempt failed. Yes, because the poisoned splinter went
right through the body of Smith, or what we both
had presumed was the body of Smith. He was aware
of what happened, of course, and he looked at me sadly.
Speaker 2 (36:12):
I must congratulate you, Luke, on the simple ingenuity of
your plan. Other assassins have used far more sophisticated techniques
and failed, but you almost succeeded.
Speaker 3 (36:24):
Except for one thing. Smith. You're not here, No, my friend,
I'm not here.
Speaker 2 (36:30):
My projection system works very well on short distances, as
you can see.
Speaker 3 (36:36):
Yes, it's perfect, Smith, like your world. But you didn't
really mean it was perfect.
Speaker 2 (36:42):
Did you.
Speaker 3 (36:43):
No, No, I didn't mean it because on the perfect
world there wouldn't be any need for prisons, and there
was one on Smith's world as a leader, and I
soon learned it was underground, hidden from the sight of
the contented citizens, long stone corridors leading from one dismal
chamber to another. It was more a dungeon than a prison,
(37:04):
a storage place for the human refuse of Smith's perfect world.
The earth looks red tonight.
Speaker 9 (37:10):
Why what did you say. My cell window faces west.
I can see the earth glowing at night. It glows
redder and redder all the time. They say that a
day will come when the earth will bleed and Smith's
world will burn.
Speaker 3 (37:30):
What did his words mean? Well, it was a code,
a rallying cry for the revolution that was brewing against Smith.
I learned that there were three thousand prisoners in those dungeons,
Not thieves and murderers, but rebels. How did you escape from.
Speaker 2 (37:45):
That prison, mister wingate?
Speaker 3 (37:46):
There?
Speaker 2 (37:47):
I've heard so many conflicting stories.
Speaker 3 (37:49):
Most of them are false. I didn't overpower any guards.
I didn't use any clever stratagem. You see, I was
released by a friend. Flu you quit. It's Evelyn war Eh, Evelyn,
what are you doing here?
Speaker 4 (38:07):
I'm not here. I'm at home in the citadel.
Speaker 3 (38:11):
Then you're just a ghost of projections.
Speaker 4 (38:13):
Yes, let Smith doesn't know what I'm doing.
Speaker 2 (38:17):
He's in the farm land.
Speaker 4 (38:18):
There's some kind of trouble there.
Speaker 3 (38:20):
Then you know about his machine.
Speaker 4 (38:22):
Who looks I've been so wrong about him, about you,
about what I wanted?
Speaker 3 (38:29):
Evelyn? Why did you come here?
Speaker 2 (38:31):
Something's happening.
Speaker 4 (38:33):
There's been strikes, riot, outbreak, are here to talk about
something called them bleeding earth. One'm so frightened, Luke, please
help me.
Speaker 3 (38:44):
I'm the one who needs to help Evelyn. I'm the prisoner,
not you.
Speaker 5 (38:48):
No, I'm a prisoner.
Speaker 2 (38:50):
Two. Get me out of here.
Speaker 3 (38:52):
Use your authority as Smith's wife to get me free, now,
right now, before he comes back here. That was how
I made my escape from the Smith prisoner. I was
brought back to Smith's citadel as a guest instead of
a prisoner. I found Evelyn waiting for me in Smith's
chamber that I don't know. It sounded like an explosion
(39:16):
somewhere the sky.
Speaker 2 (39:19):
You're coloradity, I've almost forgotten what the sky looks like. Evelyn,
come to the window.
Speaker 3 (39:28):
There must be flames somewhere, flames in the east, the phelan,
the bedding.
Speaker 4 (39:34):
Of fields, could be few of the witch takes.
Speaker 5 (39:39):
Look, I'm so frightened.
Speaker 3 (39:41):
You said that there was trouble on the farmlands.
Speaker 5 (39:44):
Oh please, I was shaking all over, so wrong, so much,
it was.
Speaker 2 (39:55):
So terribly reported.
Speaker 3 (39:56):
Whoa who, Well, what it's fair is fair, isn't it, Luke?
Speaker 2 (40:02):
Shit, that's what the Bible says. Of course, an eye
for an eye a tooth for a tooth, even a
kiss for a kid.
Speaker 3 (40:09):
The world is burning, Smith, Yes, I know.
Speaker 2 (40:12):
I've just seen the farmers put the torch to it
with their own hands. It started it.
Speaker 5 (40:18):
You hadn't started the bleeding Earth.
Speaker 3 (40:21):
You see the mistake I made, Luke, I should have
developed my own form of life.
Speaker 2 (40:26):
Instead, I depended on the miserable ingrate who made a
mess of the planet Earth.
Speaker 3 (40:29):
Who are making a mess of my world too? Is
it really your world? Smith, created by your marvelous world
building machine?
Speaker 5 (40:36):
Why are we just standing here? You'll burn us.
Speaker 2 (40:39):
Down to What about it?
Speaker 3 (40:40):
Smith? This is God's world, isn't it not yours? Your
mind machine didn't really work at the limits of space.
You didn't create Smith's world. Your ship's captured this rock
from the debris of space. They steered it into the
orbit of the Solar System. You're a great scientist, Smith,
but you're not a lock. Only God can make worlds.
(41:03):
See here, he meat, I intend to this citadel, this building.
Speaker 2 (41:09):
They'll come here finally, they'll storm at crying words of liberty.
Speaker 3 (41:12):
Oh but they'll be terribly surprised.
Speaker 2 (41:15):
You see, this isn't the.
Speaker 3 (41:16):
Building at all.
Speaker 2 (41:18):
The only chambers are Evelyn and myself.
Speaker 3 (41:20):
The rest of the structure is an atomic stockpile. If
the rebels come here, they'll destroy Smith's world and themselves.
Speaker 5 (41:28):
Oh think your hard, Luke.
Speaker 2 (41:30):
We have to get away, they have to under little Smith.
Come with us.
Speaker 3 (41:34):
Look, you don't eat me Smith. There's no reason for
any of Smith's world to be destroyed.
Speaker 10 (41:40):
God, my God, wire yourself for safe with me? Luke,
why have done so far from helping me? And from
the words of my roar? Oh my God, I cry
in the same time. And now here's God.
Speaker 2 (42:09):
How many made it to the spaceboard, mister Wingate before.
Speaker 3 (42:13):
The final atomic reaction? Only twenty thousand, they say. All
those others they died out there. Smith's world became the
tombstone of the Solar System. And of course you found
your wife on one of those spaceships.
Speaker 2 (42:30):
Yes, yes, I found the leader. You must have been
very happy. Yes, I was happy.
Speaker 3 (42:39):
For the first time in my life. I said a prayer.
And so Smith, the God is no more, and Smith's
World is.
Speaker 1 (42:55):
Nothing but a rock orbiting the Solar System.
Speaker 2 (42:59):
I use to this object, maybe not, Maybe it will.
Speaker 1 (43:03):
Always appear in the skies of Earth as a memento
of man's folly of what can happen when men not
merely forget their gods, but try to take their place.
Speaker 2 (43:17):
We'll be back shortly.
Speaker 1 (43:30):
Smith wasn't the only person who ever dreamed of having
a world.
Speaker 2 (43:34):
Of his own.
Speaker 1 (43:35):
We all rule our own kingdoms just by using our imagination.
We hope our story exercised your imagination and that you'll
come back for more miracles and more mystery at our
next meeting. Our cast included Norman Rose, Russell Horton, E. V. Justter,
and Bob Caliban. The entire production was under the direction
(43:58):
of Hymon Brown Radio. Mystery Theater was sponsored in part.
Speaker 3 (44:03):
By Buick Motor Division.
Speaker 2 (44:05):
Missus E. G.
Speaker 1 (44:06):
Marshall inviting you to return to our Mystery Theater for
another adventure in the macabre. Until next time, pleasant dreaming,
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