August 20, 2025 • 24 mins
A horror and fantasy anthology series that delves into the eerie and the unknown, offering stories that unsettle and provoke thought. Its minimalist production enhances the chilling narratives.
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Episode Transcript
Available transcripts are automatically generated. Complete accuracy is not guaranteed.
Speaker 1 (00:06):
Quiet Please, Quiet Please. The Mutual Broadcasting System presents Quiet Please,
(00:40):
which is written and directed by Willis Cooper and which
features Ernest Chappell. Quiet Please. Fortnight is called Little Visitor.
All I know is there was a train wreck. I
(01:00):
don't even remember the train wreck, but they told me about.
Speaker 2 (01:02):
That afterwards in the hospital.
Speaker 1 (01:04):
Twenty years ago seems a long time when you just
say it, But after all, it was only nineteen twenty eight,
wasn't it the year after Lindbergh through the athletic Remember,
I don't remember it.
Speaker 2 (01:14):
Of course, I don't remember anything before the train rank amnesia.
Speaker 1 (01:19):
They call me just like they have on the radio
in the soap operas. Only anyone that happens to you.
It's very rough not having any childhood to remember. You
just think about that for the minx. Think how dull
your life would be if you hadn't any school days
to remembers, if you didn't have any memories of your
kids friends. Oh, I've heard you talk about him, comparing
(01:43):
notes with other people, laughing, sometimes being very sad when
you think of.
Speaker 3 (01:46):
Somebody in them in the eighth grade. And maybe he.
Speaker 1 (01:49):
Died and brought a canal or someplace maybe some of
my kid friends did too.
Speaker 2 (01:56):
When you get to talking about your.
Speaker 1 (01:58):
Childhood memories and all I and I remember back to it
was a hospital with my head hurting and a lot
of people asking me questions that you had heard worse.
So I walk away and sometimes I cry of it,
A grown man crying grown man. I don't even know
(02:19):
how old I am. I don't know who I am,
really though I'm I'm not full of self kitty all
the time. I try to take into my stride, but ah,
the thing like this leaves scars worse than the one
in the back of my hand. The name I use
is Smith. The doctors of the hospital gave me that name.
(02:42):
They gave me my first name, too, which I don't
specially like, but the fella who suggested it was friendly
and good to me.
Speaker 2 (02:52):
So I go through life carrying Ulysses for a first name.
Remember the doctor was a sentimental budget or something, and
he was thinking about the old Greek Ulysses who had.
Speaker 1 (03:02):
To wander so far before he finally found his home. Well,
i'd wanted too, He said, maybe you'd be a lucky
name because old Ulysses finally got home. Maybe I'd get
home someday too. So I've ulysses and I haven't found
home yet. I've made a home, of course.
Speaker 2 (03:25):
Marjorie and I were married two years ago, and it's
all right, but I'd like to find my real home sometimes.
Speaker 1 (03:35):
And remember, I'm a locksmith by trade, and they taught
me at the hospital.
Speaker 2 (03:41):
I'm not a very good one, just a journeyman.
Speaker 1 (03:43):
Of course, you don't really have to be such a
high powered expert like Courtney that I the other day
was to get by in this trade. Most of the
work you called on for as simple.
Speaker 2 (03:52):
Making a key, unlocking somebody's luggage, things like that. When
the job's too tough for me, there are a lot
of locksmith's in town, so I get by.
Speaker 1 (04:02):
Then there's a lot of time to think. I'm trying
to remember. I keep thinking about the kids and the
ones almost have played with when I was a kid,
And this time of the year, I get to thinking
about coasting on a hill somewhere, and i'd do my
(04:25):
best to remember a hill and remember who was with me.
But it's always the same. I can't remember. Last Thursday night,
I was working in the shop on a late job.
(04:46):
A fella left uh a little safe with me. He'd
lost the combination. He wasn't terrible was inside it, and
he was going away and wanted to get it open.
So I put in a little overtime. Fella said he
didn't mind paying for it. When I was all alone,
it was close to twelve and I was pretty tired.
Long day. I thought I heard somebody at the door,
and I looked around. There wasn't anybody. I looked at
(05:09):
the clock then and saw the time it was and
the safe and turned stubborn on me. So I decided
to call it a day. I knew Marjorie would be
having this anyway, with me being at the shop so late.
I was just slipping into my coat when the door opened. Yeah,
it sure was locked, but it opened, and there was
(05:30):
a kid standing in the doorway grinning at me.
Speaker 2 (05:35):
Hi, how'd you get that door open?
Speaker 3 (05:37):
Son?
Speaker 4 (05:38):
Just open? Oh?
Speaker 2 (05:40):
I locked it? It opened?
Speaker 4 (05:42):
What you doing?
Speaker 3 (05:43):
Oh?
Speaker 2 (05:44):
What are you doing this time of night?
Speaker 4 (05:46):
Nothing?
Speaker 2 (05:47):
Dad's you better be home? Yeah, your mother will be
looking for you.
Speaker 4 (05:51):
I'm gunny mother, I'm your father. I'm gunny father.
Speaker 2 (05:53):
You Uh, you get along home?
Speaker 4 (05:57):
What you doing?
Speaker 3 (05:58):
Thought?
Speaker 2 (05:58):
I was trying to open the safe? Scrap's just full
of money. I don't know what's in it. Oh, and
beat the sun.
Speaker 1 (06:03):
I'm gonna turn out the lights and close up, all right,
want me to walk down to the corner or some
place with you?
Speaker 4 (06:09):
Which way?
Speaker 2 (06:10):
You going that way?
Speaker 4 (06:12):
Yeah? I don't go that way?
Speaker 2 (06:14):
Well, you get along home, okay?
Speaker 4 (06:17):
So long.
Speaker 1 (06:25):
Well, I was naturally a little concerned about a kid
of that age. You look to be about eight running
around the streets at midnight. So I snaffed the lights
off quickly and stepped.
Speaker 3 (06:33):
Out the doughty can't up with them.
Speaker 1 (06:35):
When I got outside, there wasn't a sign of him. Well,
I got to worrying, But what could I do? So
I walked down home, and just like I thought, Marjorie
was sore.
Speaker 4 (06:46):
I don't see why you can't get some kind of
work that doesn't keep you up all night. Here you
come in night after night at all out.
Speaker 2 (06:52):
This is the first night I've worked since the week
after Thanksgiving.
Speaker 3 (06:55):
Uh.
Speaker 4 (06:55):
Oh, I don't see why you after it was nice
at all?
Speaker 2 (06:57):
Well, I don't like it either, dear, But the man's
got to make a living.
Speaker 4 (07:01):
Yeah, and the fine living it is too, isn't this?
Speaker 2 (07:04):
It's the best I can do.
Speaker 4 (07:05):
Dear, next thing, I know you'll be asking me to
go back to work again.
Speaker 2 (07:08):
Oh, Marchie, you know better than that.
Speaker 4 (07:10):
Well, I don't see any other way of getting any
decent clothes. I'm sorry, dear, I'm sorry.
Speaker 2 (07:18):
You're going to bed, Dear, would leave me.
Speaker 4 (07:20):
Anything, deed, I went to the restaurant.
Speaker 2 (07:22):
It's finder. Do you have good supper?
Speaker 4 (07:24):
If you think I'm gonna stand around and cooking slave
for you all day long and then half the night
on top of that, well you've got another thing.
Speaker 1 (07:29):
Oh of course, dear. Uh you know the funniest thing
happened tonight. M Yeah, for instance, Well, I was just
getting ready to come home and a little boy opened
the door.
Speaker 4 (07:40):
She would wasn't a little girl about uh eighteen?
Speaker 2 (07:45):
It was a little boy, yeah, about eight years old.
Oh what he wants nothing? He just stood there a minute.
Speaker 4 (07:53):
Oh, we'd think people could keep their breaths off the streets.
Speaker 1 (07:57):
Yeah, that's what I thought. You know, he was the
strangest kid's march ow. Well, I'm I'm not sure.
Speaker 4 (08:06):
Make up your mind.
Speaker 2 (08:08):
Well he the prosy war. They were you know, kind
old fashion.
Speaker 4 (08:16):
How would you know?
Speaker 1 (08:19):
That's right, Marjorie. I wouldn't know. I don't ever remember
seeing any old fashioned cross, but I've seen pictures of
my I guess uh or something.
Speaker 2 (08:30):
Anyway, he doesn't look like other kids.
Speaker 4 (08:33):
Oh you and you were kids, that's all you.
Speaker 2 (08:35):
Say about I wish we had a kid.
Speaker 4 (08:38):
Well, I'm glad we haven't one big lumbus around here
is plenty is a can of salmon. I'm the covered,
I'm on the bed.
Speaker 1 (08:47):
I don't like salmon very well. But uh, don't get
me wrong. I love Marjorie.
Speaker 2 (08:53):
I know it's tough on her, the inargule guy that.
Speaker 3 (08:56):
Just barely gets by this trade.
Speaker 2 (08:58):
And I make a lot sis.
Speaker 1 (09:00):
Only I I wish you'd be sweet, just once in
a while, like she used to be when we were
first married.
Speaker 2 (09:14):
I couldn't get that kid off my mind.
Speaker 1 (09:17):
I went to sleep and dreamed about him, and I
guess it was the salmon. I dreamed about him getting
run over by a street car, or falling in that ditch,
that being down the powerhouse. Sound like an old woman,
don't I? But well, you see when you got the
thing wrong with that, I have that blackout.
Speaker 3 (09:40):
Yeah, you see.
Speaker 2 (09:44):
Anyway, I remember how the dream ended.
Speaker 1 (09:46):
Well, I saw the kids standing in front of me
in those funny, old fashioned clothes, and he.
Speaker 4 (09:50):
Spoke to me, don't you worry about me unless you
I'll be seeing you.
Speaker 1 (09:55):
And I woke up with a start, and I could
have sworn that boy was standing alongside the bed and
half dark, but when I turned on the light, there.
Speaker 2 (10:03):
Was nobody there.
Speaker 1 (10:04):
Marjorie says, for Pete's sake, if I can't sleep, at
least let her sleep.
Speaker 2 (10:17):
That was on a Thursday.
Speaker 1 (10:19):
I got to thinking the next morning about the boy,
the way he seems so real in my dream.
Speaker 2 (10:25):
But he didn't show up. I guess I wasn't very
surprised at that.
Speaker 1 (10:31):
The safe turned out to be a much tougher job
than I expected, and I couldn't try it open.
Speaker 2 (10:35):
I worked at.
Speaker 1 (10:35):
About ten, and I don't know why I did. I
was expecting the kid to pop in the ideas a
fella gets. I stay away from talking to kids, you see,
because I don't know how to talk to him. I
can't talk to the language.
Speaker 2 (10:50):
I don't know it.
Speaker 3 (10:51):
But this is a little devil.
Speaker 1 (10:54):
There was something about him that made me feel weak,
sort of talk brother talk to each other. Something familiar
about him. If if you see what I mean. I
I kind of felt that I really knew him.
Speaker 2 (11:06):
Well. He didn't show up.
Speaker 1 (11:09):
Saturday. I worked all day, no luck with a safe.
The man was getting pretty impatient because he was leaving
town the following Tuesday.
Speaker 2 (11:14):
Wanted to see what.
Speaker 3 (11:15):
Was in it.
Speaker 2 (11:16):
You know, in this business you run into people like that.
Speaker 1 (11:18):
A closed door or a locked strong box. They got
more curiosity than that cat rare. He said, to keep on,
So I did. When I figured even if Marjorie didn't
like my being in the way up the shop all
the time, she'd feel better when she saw the overtime
money the job was gonna pay. So I worked Sunday.
I don't know how he got in. Maybe I did
(11:42):
leave the door unlocked, but there he was grinning at me.
Speaker 4 (11:48):
Haven't you got it open?
Speaker 3 (11:49):
Yeah?
Speaker 2 (11:51):
What are you doing here?
Speaker 4 (11:52):
Can I watch it?
Speaker 2 (11:53):
Well? You sure you ought to be here?
Speaker 4 (11:56):
Sure?
Speaker 2 (11:58):
What's your name?
Speaker 5 (11:59):
Yes, Jeffrey what Jeffrey Briggs? My name is ulysses Am.
I sure it is you made that U? Oh, it's
my name?
Speaker 4 (12:10):
Okay, but I bet it ain't.
Speaker 2 (12:13):
Well it is.
Speaker 4 (12:15):
H Haven't you got that thing open yet?
Speaker 2 (12:19):
That's a harder job than I thought.
Speaker 4 (12:21):
I used to open boxes and things.
Speaker 2 (12:23):
You did you bad?
Speaker 4 (12:25):
I opened one once and had a lot of money in.
Speaker 2 (12:27):
Good two dollars. What'd you do with the two dollars?
Speaker 4 (12:32):
I spend it?
Speaker 2 (12:34):
What kind of box was this, Jeffrey?
Speaker 4 (12:36):
It was green chins him.
Speaker 2 (12:41):
It was my grandfather's and he had you open it farther.
Oh no, he didn't know it. Oh, I see.
Speaker 4 (12:47):
And he didn't know the two dollars was his?
Speaker 2 (12:50):
Well don't you.
Speaker 1 (12:52):
Think it was bad to take your grandfather's money?
Speaker 4 (12:55):
Why he didn't know.
Speaker 2 (12:57):
It was there? Mm hmm. Well do you know how
I opened the box?
Speaker 3 (13:04):
Oh?
Speaker 2 (13:04):
I hit it. Well, you can't open a safe that way, Jeffrey.
Speaker 4 (13:08):
I bet you can't.
Speaker 2 (13:09):
Oh you can't. I bet you. I'll show you.
Speaker 4 (13:14):
You see you see? Oh look what's inside here? It's money,
it's money. It's a million dollars. Say some man know
the money's in there?
Speaker 2 (13:26):
I know something he doesn't.
Speaker 4 (13:28):
Oh, goody good? He Then then you can keep it,
can't you?
Speaker 3 (13:37):
Your boys? Your eyes probably have me moved by a maze.
Speaker 4 (13:39):
Not counting that money.
Speaker 1 (13:41):
There was fifty three thousand dollars. There was an old
notebook and a half a douzen money that was all,
I guess. I sat there quite a whiphold him the
big title bills and thinking. Then Jeffrey's eyes never left
my face. He didn't say a word, but he didn't
need to. I had heard him once.
Speaker 4 (14:04):
You can see him, thank you.
Speaker 1 (14:07):
And then the telephone rang hello, Oh, hello, mister Murphy. Yes, uh,
I just got over. Yes you do, come over and
pick it up whenever you want to.
Speaker 4 (14:24):
What.
Speaker 2 (14:26):
No, no, there there wasn't anything in it except an
old note book and some letters. No, not a thing.
Speaker 1 (14:39):
And then I put down the phone and I turned
back to Jeffrey. Jeffrey wasn't there.
Speaker 2 (14:47):
But from somewhere and not far away, I heard him.
Speaker 1 (14:51):
Laughing, uh uh uh up particularly up u. I was
surprised how easy it was. Mister Murphy never questioned me.
He paid me, and I took my pay home and
gave it to my dream and she bought a new dress.
She she even kissed me with the fifty three thousand
(15:13):
dollars that I put in my bottom bureau drawer under
my shirts. I don't know what I intended to do
with it. Maybe I was going to give it to Murphy,
maybe not.
Speaker 2 (15:25):
I don't know. Really, I don't I know what I did.
Of course you've come to that.
Speaker 1 (15:33):
As a matter of fact. What I thought about most
was Jeffrey, an innocent kid, and he'd led me into this.
Speaker 2 (15:42):
He didn't see anything wrong about it. What kind of
man is he going to grow up to be? Oh? Yes,
I dreamed.
Speaker 1 (15:53):
I dreamed lots of things, but mostly about a small
boy in.
Speaker 2 (15:56):
Old fashioned clothes taught me how to be a thief.
Speaker 1 (16:08):
Jeffrey didn't come to the shop again, and it was
the following Wednesday, last Wednesday, but I discovered the money
was gone. I thought at once of the boy. If
he could get into my shop, why couldn't get into
the house. He'd stolen two dollars. What I'd taken was
just more money to him.
Speaker 2 (16:27):
But I discovered what had become of the money at breakfast.
Speaker 4 (16:31):
I think you ought to have some new uh shirts?
You Less says?
Speaker 1 (16:36):
Then my heart nearly stopped. That was all she said.
That was all, but it was enough. I don't think
my face gave me away, or maybe it did, because
she said one more thing.
Speaker 4 (16:49):
Just as I was leaving, is there a reward for
stolen money?
Speaker 3 (16:54):
You Less?
Speaker 4 (16:54):
See?
Speaker 2 (16:55):
M So it was Marjory of course, and I knew
what would happen.
Speaker 1 (17:03):
Whatever Marjorie's fault, she was honest, straight laced, fiercely honest.
She wouldn't hesitate a moment to turn me in if
she thought I'd stolen.
Speaker 2 (17:12):
Well, I had stolen.
Speaker 1 (17:14):
I'd thought about giving the money back to Murphy, as
I told you, but now it was too late. If
I confessed to Marjorie and asked her for the money
to give her back, well, in Marjorie's mind, the crime
had been committed. She'd see that I was punished for
the Only thing that prevented her now was the fact
that she didn't know where it had come from. If
she found out, when she found out, there was no
(17:36):
way out, and had thinking furiously. I was unaware for
a moment of the eight year old was giving Gaily by.
Speaker 4 (17:48):
My side, Hey, where are you going?
Speaker 2 (17:51):
Why? Hello? Jeffrey? Hi? Where'd you come from?
Speaker 4 (17:54):
I she just walked along you going to your shop?
I guess, so you know where I'm going? Where I'm going? Coasting?
Speaker 2 (18:04):
Jeffrey. Listen, what Jeffrey? You know the money?
Speaker 4 (18:11):
You still got it?
Speaker 3 (18:13):
No?
Speaker 4 (18:14):
Who's got it?
Speaker 2 (18:16):
I think my wife has? Yes? Bad, isn't it? Yes?
Speaker 3 (18:20):
It is.
Speaker 4 (18:21):
I wouldn't let anybody take my money.
Speaker 2 (18:23):
I didn't want her to take this money.
Speaker 4 (18:25):
Well, I'm going coasting, so on.
Speaker 2 (18:27):
I wait a minute, Jeffrey, I can't wait.
Speaker 4 (18:29):
The kids are waiting for me up on normal hill
where a normal hill? Hey, did she really take it?
Speaker 2 (18:36):
I'm afraid she did.
Speaker 4 (18:38):
Well, why don't you stab her? What I staffed an Indian?
Once made him dead?
Speaker 2 (18:43):
An Indian?
Speaker 4 (18:44):
Oh, it was only my sister's dog, but I played
it was an Indian. I staffed it statstad staff Well, song, Jeffrey. Here,
you'll take my pocket knife.
Speaker 3 (18:55):
But what for?
Speaker 4 (18:56):
Cause you want to stab her? They'll make her dead? Goodbye, Jeffrey. Wait,
I'll see up on normal hell.
Speaker 1 (19:02):
Huh. I keep wishing Marjorie hadn't come to the shop
that afternoon. I wish he hadn't seen the safe line
there on the workbench where Murphy had left it, because
it was useless. And I wish he hadn't accused me
point blank of stealing that money, because maybe I wouldn't
(19:28):
have stabbed her and made her dead. But I did,
And I left her there in the lock shop with
Jeffrey's pocket knife alongsider.
Speaker 2 (19:39):
And I went home and I turned the house upside down.
Speaker 3 (19:42):
Looking for the money, but I couldn't find it.
Speaker 2 (19:45):
I didn't have very much of my own, but I
wought a ticket and I got on a train, and
finally I got off. I didn't know what to do.
I had breakfast and I started to walking around the
town of Kalamazoo, Michigan. I don't know.
Speaker 1 (19:57):
I got off the train there, you see, I just
got off. I walked down Portage Street, and that name
seemed so familiar. I saw a man crossing a street,
and I said to myself, that man's name is Harry Oswald.
Speaker 2 (20:10):
How did I know that.
Speaker 1 (20:13):
I walked along a lot of streets, and I was
on a street called Davis Street, and kids were coasting
down a big high hill on the other side of
the street, and I felt funny. All of a sudden,
I called at one of the kids and I said, hey, kid,
what's the name of that hill?
Speaker 2 (20:27):
And the kid came closer, and it was Jeffrey and
he said.
Speaker 4 (20:32):
Hi, mister, he came home. Huh.
Speaker 2 (20:36):
And I said, again, what's the name of that hill?
Speaker 4 (20:39):
Well, that's normal hill, mister, where I said i'd meet you,
don't you remember?
Speaker 1 (20:47):
And I turned away, and suddenly everything was familiar to me,
and I knew where I was. I remembered normally hill
and the West Street Hill where we used to go sometimes,
and riding at Bob's.
Speaker 2 (20:59):
Led hits on to Britt McIlroy's ord reel.
Speaker 1 (21:02):
And I turned and wopped up the steps of a
house there on David Street, and I opened the door
and I said hello, Aunt Nelly, and Aunt Nelly jumped
up and spilled her crocheting on the floor, and she
said just what I knew.
Speaker 2 (21:13):
She was going to.
Speaker 4 (21:14):
Say, why, Jeffrey Bridge, you haven't changed a particle, and.
Speaker 2 (21:20):
Then she fainted.
Speaker 1 (21:23):
Well it took a lot of explanation, how I'd lost
my memory and all that.
Speaker 4 (21:30):
And she told me about tick tang you broke open
your grandfather's strong box, and about the other time when
you stabbed your sister's doll. And came and told her
she made her dead.
Speaker 1 (21:44):
And we had a nice visit together, and then I
came away. Yes, I'm going back and.
Speaker 3 (21:52):
Give myself up.
Speaker 1 (21:54):
What else can I do? Aunt Nelly had never know
that Ulysses Smith was Once I I said, I'd wondered
what kind of a man little Jeffrey would grow up
to be.
Speaker 2 (22:08):
Well, you know now.
Speaker 1 (22:12):
He grew up to be a thief and a murderer.
I guess I am the only man in the world
who was haunted by himself. You have listened to Quietly is,
(22:50):
which is written and directed by Willis Cooper.
Speaker 2 (22:53):
Ulysses. The man who talked to you was Ernest Chappel, and.
Speaker 1 (22:57):
Michael Artist was young Jeffrey Audrey Christie was Marjorie, and
that Nelly was played by charm Yellen. The accompanying music
for client Please is composed and played by Albert Gruman.
Speaker 2 (23:12):
And Opera.
Speaker 1 (23:12):
Worried about next week's client Please, Here is our writing
director Willis Cooper. Next week have a story for you
called the Room where the Ghosts lived. That is his
ghosts do there and we'll find out next week.
Speaker 2 (24:02):
And so until next week at this time, I am.
Speaker 1 (24:06):
Quietly yours, Ernest Chamber. Quiet Please comes to you from
New York. This is the mutual broadcasting system Stay.
Speaker 2 (24:17):
With us for and now with John Gambling, which follows
station identification.
Speaker 1 (24:22):
Leading personality to the Republican Party will hold a national
radio rally.
Speaker 2 (24:26):
Over w R at half past eleven to night.
Speaker 1 (24:30):
Republican plans for nineteen forty eight, will be discussed by
Senator Robert A.
Speaker 2 (24:33):
Path, Speaker of the House, Gilded Martin Junior, and many.
Speaker 1 (24:37):
Others here The National Republican Radio.
Speaker 2 (24:39):
Rally tonight at half past eleven w o R, New
York
Quiet Please, Quiet Please. The Mutual Broadcasting System presents Quiet Please,
(00:40):
which is written and directed by Willis Cooper and which
features Ernest Chappell. Quiet Please. Fortnight is called Little Visitor.
All I know is there was a train wreck. I
(01:00):
don't even remember the train wreck, but they told me about.
Speaker 2 (01:02):
That afterwards in the hospital.
Speaker 1 (01:04):
Twenty years ago seems a long time when you just
say it, But after all, it was only nineteen twenty eight,
wasn't it the year after Lindbergh through the athletic Remember,
I don't remember it.
Speaker 2 (01:14):
Of course, I don't remember anything before the train rank amnesia.
Speaker 1 (01:19):
They call me just like they have on the radio
in the soap operas. Only anyone that happens to you.
It's very rough not having any childhood to remember. You
just think about that for the minx. Think how dull
your life would be if you hadn't any school days
to remembers, if you didn't have any memories of your
kids friends. Oh, I've heard you talk about him, comparing
(01:43):
notes with other people, laughing, sometimes being very sad when
you think of.
Speaker 3 (01:46):
Somebody in them in the eighth grade. And maybe he.
Speaker 1 (01:49):
Died and brought a canal or someplace maybe some of
my kid friends did too.
Speaker 2 (01:56):
When you get to talking about your.
Speaker 1 (01:58):
Childhood memories and all I and I remember back to it
was a hospital with my head hurting and a lot
of people asking me questions that you had heard worse.
So I walk away and sometimes I cry of it,
A grown man crying grown man. I don't even know
(02:19):
how old I am. I don't know who I am,
really though I'm I'm not full of self kitty all
the time. I try to take into my stride, but ah,
the thing like this leaves scars worse than the one
in the back of my hand. The name I use
is Smith. The doctors of the hospital gave me that name.
(02:42):
They gave me my first name, too, which I don't
specially like, but the fella who suggested it was friendly
and good to me.
Speaker 2 (02:52):
So I go through life carrying Ulysses for a first name.
Remember the doctor was a sentimental budget or something, and
he was thinking about the old Greek Ulysses who had.
Speaker 1 (03:02):
To wander so far before he finally found his home. Well,
i'd wanted too, He said, maybe you'd be a lucky
name because old Ulysses finally got home. Maybe I'd get
home someday too. So I've ulysses and I haven't found
home yet. I've made a home, of course.
Speaker 2 (03:25):
Marjorie and I were married two years ago, and it's
all right, but I'd like to find my real home sometimes.
Speaker 1 (03:35):
And remember, I'm a locksmith by trade, and they taught
me at the hospital.
Speaker 2 (03:41):
I'm not a very good one, just a journeyman.
Speaker 1 (03:43):
Of course, you don't really have to be such a
high powered expert like Courtney that I the other day
was to get by in this trade. Most of the
work you called on for as simple.
Speaker 2 (03:52):
Making a key, unlocking somebody's luggage, things like that. When
the job's too tough for me, there are a lot
of locksmith's in town, so I get by.
Speaker 1 (04:02):
Then there's a lot of time to think. I'm trying
to remember. I keep thinking about the kids and the
ones almost have played with when I was a kid,
And this time of the year, I get to thinking
about coasting on a hill somewhere, and i'd do my
(04:25):
best to remember a hill and remember who was with me.
But it's always the same. I can't remember. Last Thursday night,
I was working in the shop on a late job.
(04:46):
A fella left uh a little safe with me. He'd
lost the combination. He wasn't terrible was inside it, and
he was going away and wanted to get it open.
So I put in a little overtime. Fella said he
didn't mind paying for it. When I was all alone,
it was close to twelve and I was pretty tired.
Long day. I thought I heard somebody at the door,
and I looked around. There wasn't anybody. I looked at
(05:09):
the clock then and saw the time it was and
the safe and turned stubborn on me. So I decided
to call it a day. I knew Marjorie would be
having this anyway, with me being at the shop so late.
I was just slipping into my coat when the door opened. Yeah,
it sure was locked, but it opened, and there was
(05:30):
a kid standing in the doorway grinning at me.
Speaker 2 (05:35):
Hi, how'd you get that door open?
Speaker 3 (05:37):
Son?
Speaker 4 (05:38):
Just open? Oh?
Speaker 2 (05:40):
I locked it? It opened?
Speaker 4 (05:42):
What you doing?
Speaker 3 (05:43):
Oh?
Speaker 2 (05:44):
What are you doing this time of night?
Speaker 4 (05:46):
Nothing?
Speaker 2 (05:47):
Dad's you better be home? Yeah, your mother will be
looking for you.
Speaker 4 (05:51):
I'm gunny mother, I'm your father. I'm gunny father.
Speaker 2 (05:53):
You Uh, you get along home?
Speaker 4 (05:57):
What you doing?
Speaker 3 (05:58):
Thought?
Speaker 2 (05:58):
I was trying to open the safe? Scrap's just full
of money. I don't know what's in it. Oh, and
beat the sun.
Speaker 1 (06:03):
I'm gonna turn out the lights and close up, all right,
want me to walk down to the corner or some
place with you?
Speaker 4 (06:09):
Which way?
Speaker 2 (06:10):
You going that way?
Speaker 4 (06:12):
Yeah? I don't go that way?
Speaker 2 (06:14):
Well, you get along home, okay?
Speaker 4 (06:17):
So long.
Speaker 1 (06:25):
Well, I was naturally a little concerned about a kid
of that age. You look to be about eight running
around the streets at midnight. So I snaffed the lights
off quickly and stepped.
Speaker 3 (06:33):
Out the doughty can't up with them.
Speaker 1 (06:35):
When I got outside, there wasn't a sign of him. Well,
I got to worrying, But what could I do? So
I walked down home, and just like I thought, Marjorie
was sore.
Speaker 4 (06:46):
I don't see why you can't get some kind of
work that doesn't keep you up all night. Here you
come in night after night at all out.
Speaker 2 (06:52):
This is the first night I've worked since the week
after Thanksgiving.
Speaker 3 (06:55):
Uh.
Speaker 4 (06:55):
Oh, I don't see why you after it was nice
at all?
Speaker 2 (06:57):
Well, I don't like it either, dear, But the man's
got to make a living.
Speaker 4 (07:01):
Yeah, and the fine living it is too, isn't this?
Speaker 2 (07:04):
It's the best I can do.
Speaker 4 (07:05):
Dear, next thing, I know you'll be asking me to
go back to work again.
Speaker 2 (07:08):
Oh, Marchie, you know better than that.
Speaker 4 (07:10):
Well, I don't see any other way of getting any
decent clothes. I'm sorry, dear, I'm sorry.
Speaker 2 (07:18):
You're going to bed, Dear, would leave me.
Speaker 4 (07:20):
Anything, deed, I went to the restaurant.
Speaker 2 (07:22):
It's finder. Do you have good supper?
Speaker 4 (07:24):
If you think I'm gonna stand around and cooking slave
for you all day long and then half the night
on top of that, well you've got another thing.
Speaker 1 (07:29):
Oh of course, dear. Uh you know the funniest thing
happened tonight. M Yeah, for instance, Well, I was just
getting ready to come home and a little boy opened
the door.
Speaker 4 (07:40):
She would wasn't a little girl about uh eighteen?
Speaker 2 (07:45):
It was a little boy, yeah, about eight years old.
Oh what he wants nothing? He just stood there a minute.
Speaker 4 (07:53):
Oh, we'd think people could keep their breaths off the streets.
Speaker 1 (07:57):
Yeah, that's what I thought. You know, he was the
strangest kid's march ow. Well, I'm I'm not sure.
Speaker 4 (08:06):
Make up your mind.
Speaker 2 (08:08):
Well he the prosy war. They were you know, kind
old fashion.
Speaker 4 (08:16):
How would you know?
Speaker 1 (08:19):
That's right, Marjorie. I wouldn't know. I don't ever remember
seeing any old fashioned cross, but I've seen pictures of
my I guess uh or something.
Speaker 2 (08:30):
Anyway, he doesn't look like other kids.
Speaker 4 (08:33):
Oh you and you were kids, that's all you.
Speaker 2 (08:35):
Say about I wish we had a kid.
Speaker 4 (08:38):
Well, I'm glad we haven't one big lumbus around here
is plenty is a can of salmon. I'm the covered,
I'm on the bed.
Speaker 1 (08:47):
I don't like salmon very well. But uh, don't get
me wrong. I love Marjorie.
Speaker 2 (08:53):
I know it's tough on her, the inargule guy that.
Speaker 3 (08:56):
Just barely gets by this trade.
Speaker 2 (08:58):
And I make a lot sis.
Speaker 1 (09:00):
Only I I wish you'd be sweet, just once in
a while, like she used to be when we were
first married.
Speaker 2 (09:14):
I couldn't get that kid off my mind.
Speaker 1 (09:17):
I went to sleep and dreamed about him, and I
guess it was the salmon. I dreamed about him getting
run over by a street car, or falling in that ditch,
that being down the powerhouse. Sound like an old woman,
don't I? But well, you see when you got the
thing wrong with that, I have that blackout.
Speaker 3 (09:40):
Yeah, you see.
Speaker 2 (09:44):
Anyway, I remember how the dream ended.
Speaker 1 (09:46):
Well, I saw the kids standing in front of me
in those funny, old fashioned clothes, and he.
Speaker 4 (09:50):
Spoke to me, don't you worry about me unless you
I'll be seeing you.
Speaker 1 (09:55):
And I woke up with a start, and I could
have sworn that boy was standing alongside the bed and
half dark, but when I turned on the light, there.
Speaker 2 (10:03):
Was nobody there.
Speaker 1 (10:04):
Marjorie says, for Pete's sake, if I can't sleep, at
least let her sleep.
Speaker 2 (10:17):
That was on a Thursday.
Speaker 1 (10:19):
I got to thinking the next morning about the boy,
the way he seems so real in my dream.
Speaker 2 (10:25):
But he didn't show up. I guess I wasn't very
surprised at that.
Speaker 1 (10:31):
The safe turned out to be a much tougher job
than I expected, and I couldn't try it open.
Speaker 2 (10:35):
I worked at.
Speaker 1 (10:35):
About ten, and I don't know why I did. I
was expecting the kid to pop in the ideas a
fella gets. I stay away from talking to kids, you see,
because I don't know how to talk to him. I
can't talk to the language.
Speaker 2 (10:50):
I don't know it.
Speaker 3 (10:51):
But this is a little devil.
Speaker 1 (10:54):
There was something about him that made me feel weak,
sort of talk brother talk to each other. Something familiar
about him. If if you see what I mean. I
I kind of felt that I really knew him.
Speaker 2 (11:06):
Well. He didn't show up.
Speaker 1 (11:09):
Saturday. I worked all day, no luck with a safe.
The man was getting pretty impatient because he was leaving
town the following Tuesday.
Speaker 2 (11:14):
Wanted to see what.
Speaker 3 (11:15):
Was in it.
Speaker 2 (11:16):
You know, in this business you run into people like that.
Speaker 1 (11:18):
A closed door or a locked strong box. They got
more curiosity than that cat rare. He said, to keep on,
So I did. When I figured even if Marjorie didn't
like my being in the way up the shop all
the time, she'd feel better when she saw the overtime
money the job was gonna pay. So I worked Sunday.
I don't know how he got in. Maybe I did
(11:42):
leave the door unlocked, but there he was grinning at me.
Speaker 4 (11:48):
Haven't you got it open?
Speaker 3 (11:49):
Yeah?
Speaker 2 (11:51):
What are you doing here?
Speaker 4 (11:52):
Can I watch it?
Speaker 2 (11:53):
Well? You sure you ought to be here?
Speaker 4 (11:56):
Sure?
Speaker 2 (11:58):
What's your name?
Speaker 5 (11:59):
Yes, Jeffrey what Jeffrey Briggs? My name is ulysses Am.
I sure it is you made that U? Oh, it's
my name?
Speaker 4 (12:10):
Okay, but I bet it ain't.
Speaker 2 (12:13):
Well it is.
Speaker 4 (12:15):
H Haven't you got that thing open yet?
Speaker 2 (12:19):
That's a harder job than I thought.
Speaker 4 (12:21):
I used to open boxes and things.
Speaker 2 (12:23):
You did you bad?
Speaker 4 (12:25):
I opened one once and had a lot of money in.
Speaker 2 (12:27):
Good two dollars. What'd you do with the two dollars?
Speaker 4 (12:32):
I spend it?
Speaker 2 (12:34):
What kind of box was this, Jeffrey?
Speaker 4 (12:36):
It was green chins him.
Speaker 2 (12:41):
It was my grandfather's and he had you open it farther.
Oh no, he didn't know it. Oh, I see.
Speaker 4 (12:47):
And he didn't know the two dollars was his?
Speaker 2 (12:50):
Well don't you.
Speaker 1 (12:52):
Think it was bad to take your grandfather's money?
Speaker 4 (12:55):
Why he didn't know.
Speaker 2 (12:57):
It was there? Mm hmm. Well do you know how
I opened the box?
Speaker 3 (13:04):
Oh?
Speaker 2 (13:04):
I hit it. Well, you can't open a safe that way, Jeffrey.
Speaker 4 (13:08):
I bet you can't.
Speaker 2 (13:09):
Oh you can't. I bet you. I'll show you.
Speaker 4 (13:14):
You see you see? Oh look what's inside here? It's money,
it's money. It's a million dollars. Say some man know
the money's in there?
Speaker 2 (13:26):
I know something he doesn't.
Speaker 4 (13:28):
Oh, goody good? He Then then you can keep it,
can't you?
Speaker 3 (13:37):
Your boys? Your eyes probably have me moved by a maze.
Speaker 4 (13:39):
Not counting that money.
Speaker 1 (13:41):
There was fifty three thousand dollars. There was an old
notebook and a half a douzen money that was all,
I guess. I sat there quite a whiphold him the
big title bills and thinking. Then Jeffrey's eyes never left
my face. He didn't say a word, but he didn't
need to. I had heard him once.
Speaker 4 (14:04):
You can see him, thank you.
Speaker 1 (14:07):
And then the telephone rang hello, Oh, hello, mister Murphy. Yes, uh,
I just got over. Yes you do, come over and
pick it up whenever you want to.
Speaker 4 (14:24):
What.
Speaker 2 (14:26):
No, no, there there wasn't anything in it except an
old note book and some letters. No, not a thing.
Speaker 1 (14:39):
And then I put down the phone and I turned
back to Jeffrey. Jeffrey wasn't there.
Speaker 2 (14:47):
But from somewhere and not far away, I heard him.
Speaker 1 (14:51):
Laughing, uh uh uh up particularly up u. I was
surprised how easy it was. Mister Murphy never questioned me.
He paid me, and I took my pay home and
gave it to my dream and she bought a new dress.
She she even kissed me with the fifty three thousand
(15:13):
dollars that I put in my bottom bureau drawer under
my shirts. I don't know what I intended to do
with it. Maybe I was going to give it to Murphy,
maybe not.
Speaker 2 (15:25):
I don't know. Really, I don't I know what I did.
Of course you've come to that.
Speaker 1 (15:33):
As a matter of fact. What I thought about most
was Jeffrey, an innocent kid, and he'd led me into this.
Speaker 2 (15:42):
He didn't see anything wrong about it. What kind of
man is he going to grow up to be? Oh? Yes,
I dreamed.
Speaker 1 (15:53):
I dreamed lots of things, but mostly about a small
boy in.
Speaker 2 (15:56):
Old fashioned clothes taught me how to be a thief.
Speaker 1 (16:08):
Jeffrey didn't come to the shop again, and it was
the following Wednesday, last Wednesday, but I discovered the money
was gone. I thought at once of the boy. If
he could get into my shop, why couldn't get into
the house. He'd stolen two dollars. What I'd taken was
just more money to him.
Speaker 2 (16:27):
But I discovered what had become of the money at breakfast.
Speaker 4 (16:31):
I think you ought to have some new uh shirts?
You Less says?
Speaker 1 (16:36):
Then my heart nearly stopped. That was all she said.
That was all, but it was enough. I don't think
my face gave me away, or maybe it did, because
she said one more thing.
Speaker 4 (16:49):
Just as I was leaving, is there a reward for
stolen money?
Speaker 3 (16:54):
You Less?
Speaker 4 (16:54):
See?
Speaker 2 (16:55):
M So it was Marjory of course, and I knew
what would happen.
Speaker 1 (17:03):
Whatever Marjorie's fault, she was honest, straight laced, fiercely honest.
She wouldn't hesitate a moment to turn me in if
she thought I'd stolen.
Speaker 2 (17:12):
Well, I had stolen.
Speaker 1 (17:14):
I'd thought about giving the money back to Murphy, as
I told you, but now it was too late. If
I confessed to Marjorie and asked her for the money
to give her back, well, in Marjorie's mind, the crime
had been committed. She'd see that I was punished for
the Only thing that prevented her now was the fact
that she didn't know where it had come from. If
she found out, when she found out, there was no
(17:36):
way out, and had thinking furiously. I was unaware for
a moment of the eight year old was giving Gaily by.
Speaker 4 (17:48):
My side, Hey, where are you going?
Speaker 2 (17:51):
Why? Hello? Jeffrey? Hi? Where'd you come from?
Speaker 4 (17:54):
I she just walked along you going to your shop?
I guess, so you know where I'm going? Where I'm going? Coasting?
Speaker 2 (18:04):
Jeffrey. Listen, what Jeffrey? You know the money?
Speaker 4 (18:11):
You still got it?
Speaker 3 (18:13):
No?
Speaker 4 (18:14):
Who's got it?
Speaker 2 (18:16):
I think my wife has? Yes? Bad, isn't it? Yes?
Speaker 3 (18:20):
It is.
Speaker 4 (18:21):
I wouldn't let anybody take my money.
Speaker 2 (18:23):
I didn't want her to take this money.
Speaker 4 (18:25):
Well, I'm going coasting, so on.
Speaker 2 (18:27):
I wait a minute, Jeffrey, I can't wait.
Speaker 4 (18:29):
The kids are waiting for me up on normal hill
where a normal hill? Hey, did she really take it?
Speaker 2 (18:36):
I'm afraid she did.
Speaker 4 (18:38):
Well, why don't you stab her? What I staffed an Indian?
Once made him dead?
Speaker 2 (18:43):
An Indian?
Speaker 4 (18:44):
Oh, it was only my sister's dog, but I played
it was an Indian. I staffed it statstad staff Well, song, Jeffrey. Here,
you'll take my pocket knife.
Speaker 3 (18:55):
But what for?
Speaker 4 (18:56):
Cause you want to stab her? They'll make her dead? Goodbye, Jeffrey. Wait,
I'll see up on normal hell.
Speaker 1 (19:02):
Huh. I keep wishing Marjorie hadn't come to the shop
that afternoon. I wish he hadn't seen the safe line
there on the workbench where Murphy had left it, because
it was useless. And I wish he hadn't accused me
point blank of stealing that money, because maybe I wouldn't
(19:28):
have stabbed her and made her dead. But I did,
And I left her there in the lock shop with
Jeffrey's pocket knife alongsider.
Speaker 2 (19:39):
And I went home and I turned the house upside down.
Speaker 3 (19:42):
Looking for the money, but I couldn't find it.
Speaker 2 (19:45):
I didn't have very much of my own, but I
wought a ticket and I got on a train, and
finally I got off. I didn't know what to do.
I had breakfast and I started to walking around the
town of Kalamazoo, Michigan. I don't know.
Speaker 1 (19:57):
I got off the train there, you see, I just
got off. I walked down Portage Street, and that name
seemed so familiar. I saw a man crossing a street,
and I said to myself, that man's name is Harry Oswald.
Speaker 2 (20:10):
How did I know that.
Speaker 1 (20:13):
I walked along a lot of streets, and I was
on a street called Davis Street, and kids were coasting
down a big high hill on the other side of
the street, and I felt funny. All of a sudden,
I called at one of the kids and I said, hey, kid,
what's the name of that hill?
Speaker 2 (20:27):
And the kid came closer, and it was Jeffrey and
he said.
Speaker 4 (20:32):
Hi, mister, he came home. Huh.
Speaker 2 (20:36):
And I said, again, what's the name of that hill?
Speaker 4 (20:39):
Well, that's normal hill, mister, where I said i'd meet you,
don't you remember?
Speaker 1 (20:47):
And I turned away, and suddenly everything was familiar to me,
and I knew where I was. I remembered normally hill
and the West Street Hill where we used to go sometimes,
and riding at Bob's.
Speaker 2 (20:59):
Led hits on to Britt McIlroy's ord reel.
Speaker 1 (21:02):
And I turned and wopped up the steps of a
house there on David Street, and I opened the door
and I said hello, Aunt Nelly, and Aunt Nelly jumped
up and spilled her crocheting on the floor, and she
said just what I knew.
Speaker 2 (21:13):
She was going to.
Speaker 4 (21:14):
Say, why, Jeffrey Bridge, you haven't changed a particle, and.
Speaker 2 (21:20):
Then she fainted.
Speaker 1 (21:23):
Well it took a lot of explanation, how I'd lost
my memory and all that.
Speaker 4 (21:30):
And she told me about tick tang you broke open
your grandfather's strong box, and about the other time when
you stabbed your sister's doll. And came and told her
she made her dead.
Speaker 1 (21:44):
And we had a nice visit together, and then I
came away. Yes, I'm going back and.
Speaker 3 (21:52):
Give myself up.
Speaker 1 (21:54):
What else can I do? Aunt Nelly had never know
that Ulysses Smith was Once I I said, I'd wondered
what kind of a man little Jeffrey would grow up
to be.
Speaker 2 (22:08):
Well, you know now.
Speaker 1 (22:12):
He grew up to be a thief and a murderer.
I guess I am the only man in the world
who was haunted by himself. You have listened to Quietly is,
(22:50):
which is written and directed by Willis Cooper.
Speaker 2 (22:53):
Ulysses. The man who talked to you was Ernest Chappel, and.
Speaker 1 (22:57):
Michael Artist was young Jeffrey Audrey Christie was Marjorie, and
that Nelly was played by charm Yellen. The accompanying music
for client Please is composed and played by Albert Gruman.
Speaker 2 (23:12):
And Opera.
Speaker 1 (23:12):
Worried about next week's client Please, Here is our writing
director Willis Cooper. Next week have a story for you
called the Room where the Ghosts lived. That is his
ghosts do there and we'll find out next week.
Speaker 2 (24:02):
And so until next week at this time, I am.
Speaker 1 (24:06):
Quietly yours, Ernest Chamber. Quiet Please comes to you from
New York. This is the mutual broadcasting system Stay.
Speaker 2 (24:17):
With us for and now with John Gambling, which follows
station identification.
Speaker 1 (24:22):
Leading personality to the Republican Party will hold a national
radio rally.
Speaker 2 (24:26):
Over w R at half past eleven to night.
Speaker 1 (24:30):
Republican plans for nineteen forty eight, will be discussed by
Senator Robert A.
Speaker 2 (24:33):
Path, Speaker of the House, Gilded Martin Junior, and many.
Speaker 1 (24:37):
Others here The National Republican Radio.
Speaker 2 (24:39):
Rally tonight at half past eleven w o R, New
York
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