Mind Webs - Portable Phongraph

https://www.solgoodmedia.com - Listen to hundreds of audiobooks, thousands of short stories, and ambient sounds all ad free! "Mind Webs Daily" rekindles the charm of old time radio with a daily infusion of psychological and speculative tales. Each day offers a unique journey into the enigmatic and often eerie realms of the human mind, reminiscent of classic radio storytelling but with a contemporary flair. Perfect for daily listeners who appreciate a blend of nostalgia and modern narrative depth.

Episode Transcript

Speaker 1 (00:40):
My Way.

Speaker 2 (00:55):
Welcome to a half hour of mind Waits short stories
from the worlds of Spikulative section.

Speaker 1 (01:04):
All.

Speaker 2 (01:38):
This is Michael Hanson with a mind web story, this
time from the book Timeless Stories for Today and Tomorrow,
edited by Ray Bradbury. This tale is the portable phonograph
by Walter van Tolberg Clark. The red sunset, with narrow
black cloud strips like threats across it, lay on the

(01:59):
curved a rising prairie. The air was still and cold,
and in it settled the mute darkness and greater cold
of night. High in the air there was wind, for
through the veil of the dusk the clouds could be
seen gliding rapidly south and changing shapes. A queer sensation
of torment, of two sided, unpredictable nature arose from the

(02:20):
stillness of the earth air beneath the violence of.

Speaker 3 (02:22):
The upper air.

Speaker 2 (02:24):
Out of the sunsets, through the dead, matted grass and
isolated wheat stalks of the prairie, crept the narrow and
deeply rutted remains of a road. In the road and
places there were crusts of shallow, brittle ice. There were
little islands of an old, oiled pavement in the road too,
but most of it was mud, now frozen richet. The

(02:47):
frozen mud still bore the toothed impress of great tanks,
and the wanderer on the neighboring undulations might have stumbled
in this light into large, partially filled in and weat
grown cavities the exchanneled and beginning to spread into bad lands.
These pits were such as might have been made by
falling meteors, but they were not. They were the scars

(03:10):
of gigantic bombs, their rawness already made a little natural
by rain seed and time. Along the road there were
rakish remnants of fence. There was also just visible one
portion of tangled and multiple barbed wires still erect, behind
which was a shelving ditch with small caves, now very

(03:30):
quiet and empty at intervals in its back wall. Otherwise,
there was no structure or remnant of a structure visible
over the dome of the darkling earth, but only in
sheltered hollows, the darker shadows of young trees trying again
under the wathering arch of the high wind. A v

(03:52):
of wild geese fled south. The rush of their pinions
sounded briefly in the faint plaintive notes of their expeditionary coe.
Then they left a still greater vacancy.

Speaker 3 (04:04):
There was the smell.

Speaker 2 (04:05):
An expectation of snow, as there was likely to be
when the wild geese fly south. From the remote distance
towards the red sky came faintly the protracted howl and
quick yap yap of a prairie wolf. North of the road,
perhaps one hundred yards lay the parallel and deeply entrenched

(04:26):
course of a small creek, lined with leafless.

Speaker 3 (04:29):
Alders and willows.

Speaker 2 (04:31):
The creek was already silent under ice, and the bank
above it was dug a sort of cell with a
single opening, like the mouth of a mine tunnel. Within
the cell there was a little red of fire which
showed dully through the opening, like a reflection or a
deception of the imagination. The light came from the cherry

(04:52):
burning the four blocks of poorly aged peak, which gave
off a petty warmth and much acrid smoke. But the
precious remnants of wood old fence posts and timbers from
the bongazered dugouts had to be saved for the real cold,
for the time when a man's breadth blue white, The
moisture in his nostrils stiffened at once when he stepped out,

(05:14):
and the expansive blizzards sported for days over the vast opens,
whirling and settling and thickening, until the dawn of the
clear day, when the sky was thin blue green, and
the terrible cold, which a man could not live for
three hours unwarmed, lay over the uniformly drifted swell of
the plain. Around the smoldering peat, four men were seated

(05:37):
cross legged. Behind them, traversed by their shadows, was the
earth bench with two old and dirty army blankets, where
the owner of the cell slept in a niche. In
the opposite wall were a few tin utensils, which caught
the glint of the colds. The host was rewrapping in
the piece of dub burlap four fine leather bound books.

(06:00):
He worked slowly and very carefully, and at last tied
the bundles securely with a piece of grass woven cord.
The other three looked intently upon the process, as if
a great significance lay in it. As the host tied
the cord, he spoke. He was an old man, his
long matted beard and hair grayed and nearly white. The

(06:24):
shadows made his brows and cheap bones appear gnarled, his
eyes and cheeks deeply sunken. His big hands, rough with
frost and stolen by rheumatism, were awkward but gentle at
their task.

Speaker 3 (06:38):
He was like a prehistoric priest.

Speaker 2 (06:40):
Performing a fateful ceremonial rite. Also his voice had in
it a suitable quality of deep, reverent despair, yet perhaps
at the moment a sharpness of selfish satisfaction. When I
perceived what was happening, he said, I told myself, it

(07:02):
is the end.

Speaker 3 (07:03):
I cannot take much. I will take these.

Speaker 2 (07:07):
Perhaps I was impractical, but for myself I do not regret.

Speaker 3 (07:12):
And what do we know those who will come after us?

Speaker 2 (07:16):
We we are the doddering remnant of a race of
mechanical fools. I have saved what I love. The soul
of what was good in us is here. Perhaps the
new ones will make a strong enough beginning not to
fall behind when they become cleverer. He rose with slow

(07:40):
pain and placed the rapt volumes in the niche with
his utensils. The others watched him with the same ritualistic gaze.
Shakespeare The Bible, Moby dick the divine comedy. Hm, you
might have done worse, much worse.

Speaker 3 (08:05):
You'll have a little soul left until you die. Hm.

Speaker 2 (08:09):
That is more than it's true. Bus my brain becomes
thick like my hands, and he held the big battered
hands with their black nails, and the glow to be seen.

Speaker 3 (08:22):
I want paper to write on, and there is none.

Speaker 2 (08:28):
The fourth man said nothing. He sat in the shadow,
farthest from the fire, and sometimes his body jerked in
its rags from the cold. Although he was still young,
he was sick and coughed often. Writing implied a greater
future than he now felt able to consider. The old

(08:49):
man seated himself laboriously and reached out, groaning at the
movement to put another block of peat on the fire,
with bowed heads and averted eyes, as three guests acknowledged
his magnanimity. I thank you doctor Jenkins for the reading,
said the man who named the books. They seemed then

(09:12):
to be waiting, waiting for something. Doctor Jenkins understood, but
was loath to comply. In an ordinary moment he would
have said nothing. But the words of the Tempests which
he had been reading, and the religious attention of the
three made this an unusual occasion, Eh, you you wished

(09:33):
to hear the phonograph. The two middle aged men stared
into the fire, unable to formulate and expose the enormity
of their desire. The young man, however, said anxiously between
suppressed coughs, oh, oh, yes, yes, please. The old man
rose again in his difficult way, and went to the

(09:54):
back of the cell. He returned and placed tenderly upon
the packed floor, for the firelight might fall upon it,
an old portable phonograph in a black case. He smoothed
the top with his hand and then opened it. The
lovely green felt covered disk became visible. I have been

(10:17):
using thorns as needles, but to night, because we have
a musician among us. He bent his head to the
young man, almost invisible in the shadow. To night, I
will use a steel needle. There are only three left.
The two middle aged men stared at him in speechless adoration.

(10:38):
The one with the big hands, who wanted to write,
moved his lips, but the whisperer was not audible. Then
the young man, as if he were hurt, cried, oh, oh,
don't the thorns will do beautifully. No, No, I have
become accustomed to the thorns. But they are not really
good for you, my friend. For you, we will have

(11:02):
good music tonight, after all, he added generously, in beginning
to wind the phonograph.

Speaker 3 (11:09):
Which creaked.

Speaker 2 (11:10):
After all, they can't last forever. No, no, nor we,
the man who needed to write, said harshly.

Speaker 3 (11:21):
They're the needle by all means.

Speaker 2 (11:24):
Oh oh, thanks, said the young man, thanks, and then
stifled his coughing with above head. Their records, though, said
the old man, when he had finished winding. Their records
are a different matter. Already they are very worn. I

(11:44):
do not play them more than once a week. One
once a week. That is what I allow myself. More
than a week. I cannot stand it.

Speaker 3 (11:54):
Not to hear them. No, no, how how could you?
And with them here like this, a man can stand anything.

Speaker 2 (12:04):
Please the music, only the one in the long run,
we would remember more.

Speaker 3 (12:11):
In that way, he had.

Speaker 2 (12:15):
A dozen records with luxuriant gold and red seals. Even
in that light, the others could see that the grooves
of the records were becoming worn. Slowly, he read out
the titles and the tremendous dead names of the composers
and the artists and the orchestras, The three worked upon
the names in their minds carefully. It was difficult to

(12:37):
select from such a wealth what they would at once
most like to remember. Finally, the man who wanted to
write named Gershwin's New York. Oh No, cried the sick
young man, and then could say nothing more because he
had a cough. The others understood him, and the harsh
man withdrew his selection and waited for the musician to choose.

(13:00):
The musician begged Doctor Jenkins to read the titles again,
very slowly, so that he could remember the sounds.

Speaker 3 (13:07):
While he were red.

Speaker 2 (13:09):
He lay back against the wall, his eyes closed, his
thin morning hand pulling at hishite beard, and he listened
to the voices in the orchestras and the single instruments.

Speaker 3 (13:17):
In his mind. When the reading was done, he spoke despairingly.

Speaker 2 (13:24):
I I I have forgotten I I cannot hear them clearly.

Speaker 3 (13:29):
There are there are things missing.

Speaker 2 (13:33):
I know. I thought that I knew all of Shelley
by heart. I should have brought Shelley us more soul,
and we can use mop Moby Dick is better. By God,
we can understand that.

Speaker 3 (13:51):
The doctor nodded. Then the man who had admired.

Speaker 2 (13:54):
The book said, still, we we need the absolute if
we are to keep a grasp on anything, anything but
these sticks and peat clods and rabbit snares. Shelley desired
an ultimate absolute. It's too much, it's no good, no

(14:15):
earthly good. The musicians selected a WC. Nocturne. The others
considered and approved. They rose to their knees to watch
the doctor prepare for the plane, so that they appeared
to be actually in an attitude of worship. The beat
glow showed the thinness of their bearded faces and the

(14:36):
deep lines and them, and revealed the condition of their garments.
The other two continued to kneel as the old man
carefully lowered the needle onto the spinning disk. But the
musician suddenly drew back against the wall again with his
knees up, and buried his face in his hands. At
the first notes of the piano, the listeners were startled.

(15:00):
They stared at each other. Even the musician lifted his
head in amazement, but then quickly bowed it again, strainingly,
as if he were suffering from a pain he might
not be able to endure. They were all listening deeply
without movement. The wet blue green notes tinkled forth from
the old machine and were individual delectable presences in the cell.

(15:23):
The individual delectable presences swept into a sudden tide of
unbearably beautiful dissonance, and then continued fully. The swelling and
ebbing of that tide, The dissonant in ports, and the resolutions,
and the diminishings, and the little quiet wavelets of interlode
lapping between every sound was piercing and singularly sweet. In

(15:47):
all the men except a musician, there occurred rapid sequences
of tragically heightened recollection. He heard nothing but what was there?

Speaker 4 (16:41):
M something but no thing, something disa.

Speaker 2 (20:16):
At the final whispering disappearance, but moving quietly so that
the others were not hearing the ogaining. He let his
head fall back in agony, as if it were drawn
there by the hair, and clenched the fingers of one
hand over his teeth. He sat that way, and while
the others were silent, and until they began to breathe
again normally. His drawn up legs were trembling violently. Quickly,

(20:41):
Doctor Jenkins lifted the needle off to save it and
not to spoil the recollection with scraping. When he had
stopped the whirling of the sacred disc, he courteously left
the phonograph open and by the fire in sight. The others, however,
understood The musician rose last, but then abruptly and went

(21:01):
quickly out the door, without staying anything. The others stopped
at the door and gave their thanks in low voices.
The doctor nodded magnificently.

Speaker 3 (21:13):
Come again, come again, in their week, we will have
the New York.

Speaker 2 (21:21):
When the two had gone together out towards the rhymed road,
he stood in the entrance, peering and listening. At first
there was only the resonant boom of the wind overhead,
and then, far over the dome of the dead dark plane,
the wolf cry lamenting. In the rifts of clouds, the

(21:43):
doctor saw four stars flying. It impressed the doctor that
one of them had just been obscured by the beginning
of a flying cloud. At the very moment he heard
what he had been listening for, a sound of suppressed coughing.
It was not nearby, why, however, he believed that down
against the pale alders he could see the moving shadow.

(22:09):
With nervous hands, he lowered the piece of canvas which
served as a door, and pegged it at the bottom. Then,
quickly and silently, looking at the piece of canvas frequently,
he slipped the records into the case, snapped the lid shut,
and carried the phonograph to his couch. There, pausing off
on the stair at the canvas and listened, he dug

(22:31):
earth from the wall and disclosed a piece of board.
Behind this, there was a deep hole in the wall
into which he put the phonograph. After a moment's consideration,
he went over and reached down his bundle of books
and inserted it also. Then, guardedly, he once more sealed
up the hole with a board in the earth. He

(22:54):
also changed his blankets in the grass stuffed sack, which
served as a pillow, so that he could lie by
facing the entrance. After carefully placing two more blocks of
heat upon the fire, he stood for a long time
watching the stretched canvas, but it seemed to blow naturally
with the first gusts of a lowering wind. At last,

(23:17):
he prayed and got in under his blankets and closed
his smoke's martin eyes. On the inside of the bed
next to the wall. He could feel with his hands,
the comfortable piece of lead pipe that was the portable pornograph.

(23:43):
Written by Walter van Tolberg Clark. It appears in Ray
Bradbury's book Timeless Stories for Today and Tomorrow. This is
Michael Hansen speaking technical production for mindwebs by Leslie Hilsenov
and Webs comes to you from w h A Radio
in Madison, the service of the University of Wisconsin Extension.

Speaker 1 (25:27):
Call the Moca MOA. The MI