The Fourth Invasion - Henry Joseph

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Episode Transcript

Speaker 1 (00:00):
The fourth invasion by Henry Joseph's doctor. Clayton's face was
impassive as a marble mask when he turned to young
Corelli for a moment. The little group stood there in
embarrassed silence in the class room, shifting uneasily from one
foot to the other, feigning interest in the paper weights

(00:22):
upon Clayton's desk or in the utterly uninspiring scenes on
the sidewalk outside the window. You say, Corelli, that you
saw three er Martian ships. Can you describe them? Corelli
blinked as he felt the weight of his colleague's eyes
boring into him. I didn't say they were Martian, sir,

(00:46):
only that they seemed to be unearthly, and they were
not the conventional saucer shaped things. They acted like saucerers
skimming across the water. That's what made me think they
were genuine. And they didn't seem to be going fast
enough so that I'd expect to hear a roar like
a jet plane. It struck me that this might not

(01:08):
be the way they fly naturally, but the way they
might fly if the pilots were having trouble adjusting the
controls to a heavier atmosphere than they were used to.
Clayton tapped the table top with his fingers. What about you, Marty,
did you see three ships? Big Jean Marty, football star

(01:28):
was least nervous. Can't be sure about ships, dock, he rumbled.
I did see something strange disappearing over the horizon. It
I mean, they may have been what Tony says, but
whatever it was, there were three of them. But I
saw something else because I was looking in another direction.
What I saw first was a couple of funny looking

(01:50):
shapes floating down near the ground. Didn't look like parachutists,
yet they seemed big enough to be men, or at
least small men. Interesting. All right, what about the rest
of you? How many saw the ships? A chorus answered him.
I see, Clayton mused. You all agree on the behavior,

(02:11):
and you all think there were three, not four, not two? Three?
It was agreed. Clayton rustled the pile of newspapers the
reports in here. Very I learned what amazement that you
gentlemen seem to have missed completely The squirts of flame
that issued from the alien ships, flame which is reported

(02:33):
to have set a house on fire, and no one
seems to have noticed that the invaders in descending glided
on huge black wings. Corelli blushed a fiery crimson Doctor Clayton,
he protested, we aren't making these things up for popular consumption.
We're just telling you what we actually saw. That is

(02:54):
what what we saw look like to us. Clayton nodded,
Of course, course, that is all people were doing back
in nineteen thirty eight when the Martians landed in New
Jersey at the time Orson Wells presented a radio version
of H. G. Wells or of the World, or when
the Flying Saucer craze first started, or when Fanta Film

(03:16):
put on their big publicity stunt for the improved three
D movie The Outsiders and people saw aliens over Broadway
and heard them address the populace in weird, booming tones. Gentlemen,
I am not pleased to find students of this university
engaging in such unwonted extracurricular activity as inventing interplanetary scares.

(03:39):
I don't think Washington will be amused either. Corelli cooked
his heels, Sir, he stated, in dignified tones. I resent
these implications. I assume they have been directed at me.
At no time have I talked about this to reporters
or in any way engaged in what you accuse me of.
If you want my resorus ignation from this school, you

(04:01):
may have it. Really, you think that an air of
dignified innocence will undo the damage done. I am well
aware of your experiments with a Y wave, gentlemen, and
it was on the Y wave that the messages came.
You may be interested to know that the number of
lives lost, the property damage, the business losses due to

(04:22):
the panic have not yet been fully determined. But it
makes the hysteria following the phantophilm hoax very small potatoes
by comparison. You may withdraw now, gentlemen. This affair will
be discussed at greater length later, regardless of what the
FBI decides. I had hoped that the main culprit would

(04:43):
try to save unwitting accomplices from a measure of grief.
That is all, the seven students left doctor Clayton's office
in record time. Professor Elton wrapped the table for silence, gentlemen,
he began. Doctor Clayton and I both extend our sincere apologies.

(05:03):
He smiled wanly. Of course, that does not exonerate anyone
from the charge of gullibility. But Harvey Gale's confession has
been fully confirmed by the FBI, and you and this
university have been cleared. The public now knows that your
testimony helped lead to the facts in this case. To me,

(05:24):
the most interesting feature of this business is the fact
that Gail was able to put over this hoax despite
the fact that the public had been taken in three
times before. The Orson Wells Scare Road on a wave
of war hysteria, the flying Saucer craze followed World War
the Phanta film hoax came when the world was still

(05:46):
in dread of sudden bombings. But the Gale hoax, what
can we call it? But what it is loosely known
as the continuing gullibility of human beings. We trust that
this demonstration you have just observed will help you to
remember that while seeing may be believing, it's wise not
to believe until it has been established. Just what you

(06:09):
saw in his private office, doctor Clayton leaned forward over
his desk, or, to be more exact, something that looked
like doctor Clayton leaned over the desk. The face was
impassive as marble, but from out a slit in his chest,
a pair of black antennaie like feelers or vibrating into

(06:30):
a framed picture on the wall from which the pitcher
had been slit aside, landing safely affected. Brief panic when
several terrestrials sighted ships. All clear. Now full report containing
details on latest successful persuasion of Earthlings that martians or

(06:54):
other aliens are imaginary will follow. From the speed beneath
the desk came sounds of gasps, heavy breathing, then shuffling footsteps.
Clayton pushed the pitcher back into place, then took off
the skin painted vest he wore with a flat box
on the inside. He snapped a switch on the side

(07:16):
of his desk. There now they can't hear if any
are still hanging around. Doctor Elton looked at him bewilderedly.
I don't get it, after all the risk we went
to to convince the public that there ain't no ghosts.
As the old saying goes, you arrange to have the
students hear you going into a report to the Home

(07:39):
Planet Act, and you use a code. They all know,
what's the point in undoing it. Clayton nodded it looks
somewhat mad, doesn't it. Well, the psychology team was sure
of the necessity. You see, more and more humans remained unconvinced.
Each time one of these hoaxes are exposed. The unconvinced

(08:02):
are sure that something fiendish is going on beneath the surface,
that the authorities, all kinds, from civil to scientific, are
engaged in a vast cover up. We can't prevent this belief,
we don't know how to keep it from spreading. So
the alternative is to direct it. Elton nodded slowly. I

(08:25):
can see possibilities along that line. But just what direction
is this supposed to kind of bring about? Why? Obviously,
if large scale invasion from Mars is imminent, and this
is the belief we're all catering to, then it follows
that the invasion hasn't already taken place. The two of

(08:47):
us and Harvey Gale will disappear shortly in one way
or another, and gradually public cries for efficient planetary defense
will mount. You know who who will direct the defense?
End of the Fourth Invasion by Henry Josephs