Speaker 1: Now, mister in theater, come in.
Speaker 2: Welcome.
Speaker 3: I'm a G. Marshall. What is a life of adventure?
Speaker 4: Some people seem to be forever caught up in a
mailstream of events, while others go along doing hum drum tasks.
Of course, what one person calls exciting is to another
just an everyday occurrence, And some people seem content with
what Thorough called lives of quiet desperation.
Speaker 2: But there is a difference.
Speaker 4: Certain individuals create.
Speaker 2: Their own excitement.
Speaker 4: Perhaps we never find adventure unless we go looking for it,
but when we do find it, the results may be
quite unexpected.
Speaker 5: Are you sure, miss that you want to get off
at Foothill Junction?
Speaker 6: Of course, are we almost there.
Speaker 2: We'll be in about five minutes.
Speaker 5: But it beats me why anyone should want to get
off at the end of nowhere.
Speaker 6: The train doesn't it doesn't.
Speaker 3: He Well, sometimes when there's a reason.
Speaker 6: You mean, it's not a regular stuff on this line,
that's right.
Speaker 5: It's not a town, you know, just a crossroad, no stories,
no phostos, nothing but the station. Well, I may be
living there for quite a while, but nobody lives in
Foothill Junction.
Speaker 6: My uncle John, your uncle, Yes, uncle, Caleb the station match.
Speaker 4: You you're staying with him, Well.
Speaker 2: That's it's hard to believe.
Speaker 4: Our mystery drama stair Way to Oblivion was written especially
for the Mystery Theater by Elizabeth Pennell and stars Anne Shephard.
It is true that Julia had spent most of her
life in the city, and at age thirty five, she
gave every appearance of being a sophisticated woman, quite.
Speaker 2: Able to take care of herself.
Speaker 4: Yet to an outsider, it might seem odd that she
was stepping off a train at what looked like an
abandoned station, but.
Speaker 2: Julia had her reasons.
Speaker 4: For the past three years, she had cared for her
ailing father. Now he was dead, and before taking up
a new life, she wanted to satisfy a long time
curiosity to visit her one remaining relative and uncle she
has never met, but with whom she has corresponded.
Speaker 6: I always wondered my father was reluctant to talk about
his older brother. He never wanted to listen when I
tried to read him Excerpts from Uncle Caleb's letters. The
past few weeks had been difficult, disposing of family possessions
and selling a big house. I was tired. I needed arrested.
The idea of spending a queer time on a remote
mountain top was very appealing.
Speaker 3: There we're here, Missy.
Speaker 2: I'll help you with your bag.
Speaker 6: Thank you.
Speaker 5: I don't see Caleb must be inside the station house.
Speaker 6: What does his na for? Dated too?
Speaker 5: Yeah, should be corn down. All we need here is
the switchbox. You wait, I'll see if I.
Speaker 3: Can find the old man.
Speaker 5: Tail up, tail up?
Speaker 2: Hey, why's the train stuff in? You're two minutes late, Caleb.
Speaker 5: We have a very special passenger. That's that, a passenger asked.
Brady says, she's your niece, Julia, But not today, it's
next week.
Speaker 2: She's coming next week.
Speaker 5: She's waiting for you right now here on the platform.
Speaker 2: Dear me, Julia, Julia, my.
Speaker 5: Dear forgive me, but I thought it was next week
you were coming.
Speaker 6: Hello, uncle Kenna. When you sit in your.
Speaker 3: Letters, are you sure you'll be all right?
Speaker 5: Now?
Speaker 2: Of course she's all right.
Speaker 5: Give me those bags and get going way. Five minutes late.
Speaker 6: Oh, uncle Kenneth, it's good to me, he would last.
I'm sorry if there's a mistake about the date of
my arrival.
Speaker 2: It's told my fault.
Speaker 5: Months and days have a way of all blending together
up where I live.
Speaker 6: Afraid I've brought quite a bit of luggage. My clothes
and some books for you are in that big one.
Do we have far to go?
Speaker 5: Yeah?
Speaker 2: Straight up those stairs.
Speaker 6: That's stair. It looks as though it goes on forever.
Speaker 2: Just about I told you I'd lived on top of
the world.
Speaker 1: Is now you?
Speaker 2: Yours is mighty heavy?
Speaker 6: Perhaps if we carried it together.
Speaker 5: Well, I'm afraid we can't manage everything at once. I'll
just locked the big bag up in the station house.
Speaker 6: But uncle Kenibot, my clothes are in there.
Speaker 2: Don't worry about that. We'll get them tomorrow.
Speaker 4: Take the little bag and start up the sairs very slowly.
Speaker 2: I'll catch up with him and plenty more to go.
Speaker 6: You can't be stairs every day.
Speaker 5: You get used to him.
Speaker 2: Here's the one resting pace.
Speaker 6: Can I see your pass sitting house? There?
Speaker 2: Who's that just off in the woods? Take a look
at the views?
Speaker 6: So maybe it's just the climb that's taking my breath away.
Speaker 2: Yeah, we'll be there in a moment. Now, just keep going.
See that's my house.
Speaker 4: It soda comes at you all of a sudden, A
careful I should have warned you about that stone.
Speaker 6: It looks like a marker.
Speaker 2: Yeah that it is. Read what it says?
Speaker 6: Oh, the air a bleillion.
Speaker 4: Yeah, that's the name of my hataway. Very appropriate, don't
you think.
Speaker 6: Oh, I guess. Oh, it's try to frighten me. Why
uncle cokat.
Speaker 2: Hearted like it.
Speaker 6: It's a book and a laboratory too. What are you
doing with those those bottles and things?
Speaker 2: Oh?
Speaker 5: I like to butter with my pots and potions, bugs
and toads and those jars.
Speaker 4: But dear me, I know you'd like to freshen up.
And I haven't even got the towels ready.
Speaker 6: Don't you worry about anything, uncle Caleb. I'm pretty good
at foraging for myself. Whatever there is to do. Please
let me help you.
Speaker 4: The bedrooms are down that way, and oh, excuse me,
I and I just remembered and a poor Crapeanger shut
up in the basement.
Speaker 6: I knew about Crapeanger. I was eager to see the
rest of the house. A long hallway opened off the
living room, with uneven floorboards and many doors, all of
them closed. I moved cautiously, and then at the very
end of the hall, one door was ajar I went
in expecting the worst, But my sagging spirit's sword. It
was a bright, cheerful room with a window.
Speaker 1: And a view.
Speaker 6: I knew it wasn't Uncle Caleb's bedroom, even though a
pair of well worn jeans hung over the back of
a chair. But my uncle was calling me, and I
hurried to tell him I'd found my room.
Speaker 2: Well, here she is, great hanger, this is Julia.
Speaker 6: What a beautiful, beautiful chat you see.
Speaker 5: She knows you're a member of the family. And now,
my dear, I'm gonna show you.
Speaker 2: To your room.
Speaker 6: Oh I've already found it.
Speaker 2: You found Julia's room, the one at the very end.
Speaker 6: The door was open and o Indians.
Speaker 4: No, my dear, that uh, that room is not for you.
Speaker 6: Oh but it looks so comfortable and it has such
a nice view.
Speaker 4: You haven't seen your aunt Julia's room. That's the only
place for the woman of the house.
Speaker 6: That Julia never lived in this house.
Speaker 4: No, my dear, your aunt Julia has been dead for
twenty years, but she would have liked her room, and
so will you.
Speaker 2: Through this door here, it looks like.
Speaker 6: My grandmother's bedroom when I was a child.
Speaker 4: Some of the same furniture I've been saving it for you.
Speaker 2: You wanted of you. I look out here.
Speaker 6: You never wrote me about your garden, and.
Speaker 4: It's said it's best just before sundown. And now at last,
I bid you truly welcome. As you can see you
have come home.
Speaker 6: I didn't know whether to laugh or cry. The dresser
reminded me of my mother, and feeling like a child,
I stealthily opened the top drawer.
Speaker 2: And Uncle Julie, what's the matter, Julia, what is it?
I opened this drawer.
Speaker 6: There's a whole nest of baby mice.
Speaker 4: Yes, yes, of course, and we mustn't disturb them.
Speaker 6: Disturb them. I don't like mice.
Speaker 5: Now now, Julia, the mice are happy here. It's the
perfect place for a nest. Pray Paya can't.
Speaker 2: Get them, and they'll never bother you.
Speaker 4: It's always a great comfort to have living creatures in
the house.
Speaker 6: Uncle Caleb took me into the rear of the garden.
Dark trees rose in the background, but there was a light,
clear space laid out in plots and pathways, and there
was a marvelous shragrance in the air.
Speaker 4: And I hope you'll spend a great deal of time
out here.
Speaker 6: It's an herb garden. Oh it's sorry. Let's see at times,
and this is see who.
Speaker 2: I'm a classicist.
Speaker 5: There's Rosemary and Rule, and this is Comfrey, very good
for healing cuts and bruises.
Speaker 6: What an ray.
Speaker 2: And here's what I call my poison plot.
Speaker 6: But it doesn't look very similar to Lily of the Valley, Larkspur,
Jack and the pulprit iron and buttercups, deadly poisonous everyone, Uncle,
you're joking. I noticed these from the window, but I'm
released to see if they're not graystones, just natural outcroppings
of rock. Forgive me, But from a distance, there's something
about the way your gardens laid out made it look
like a cemetery.
Speaker 2: Ooh, I've planted it that way.
Speaker 6: Oh Uncle Kayley, you're a good.
Speaker 2: I don't laugh.
Speaker 4: This is a proper graveyard, all right. And some days
my Julia and I will be laid to rest here
side by side.
Speaker 6: His words were strange, And after I went to bed,
I tossed and turned for hours, ridden with horrible nightmares.
I woke late, dressed and hit it down the hallway morning,
crepe hanger, Where is my uncle? I went into the
surprisingly modern kitchen effiicient like a hospital, except that the
many shelves were filled with herbs and spices. The makings
for a substantial breakfast were on the table, and there
was a note from Uncle Caleb which said I'll be
back at eleven thirty. You know your way to the garden,
but please do not, in big capital letters, open any
other doors. I'll explain later. Well, he needn't worry. I
was not about to pry, but I didn't want to
get outside, and my clothes seemed all wrong for country.
Where then I remember the jeans in the front room.
If that door was still open, I wouldn't be breaking
any rules. It was just as it had been the
day before, and I snatched up the jeans from the
back of that chair, just my size. If I rolled
up the bottoms, I didn't stop to wonder who they
might belong to, for now they were mine. When Uncle
Caleb came back, I was happily kneeling in the garden
trying to identify the herb Cuiajuia, I'm out in the garden.
Speaker 2: Well I'm d to see curia.
Speaker 6: Yes, Uncle Caleb, where.
Speaker 5: Did you get those those those flaw that disgraceful pair
of pants.
Speaker 6: I saw them yesterday in that back room there.
Speaker 2: I'll take them off at once.
Speaker 6: Well, really, if you've brought my suitcase, I have a
couple of pairs of slash.
Speaker 5: Sorry, my dear, but I could not bring your suitcase.
Freight train left the box of provisions and I had
too much to carry.
Speaker 6: But I have no other clothes to wear.
Speaker 2: We'll take care of that.
Speaker 5: Come with me to your room. Over there in the trunk, Julia.
Speaker 6: Open it, But these are Aunt Julia's clothes. I can't
wear anything like this.
Speaker 2: Look down further. You can find something, Oh.
Speaker 6: What, an elegant Cashma sweater, and these spirits, just the
kind they're wearing today. Yes, there were plenty of things
in that trunk I could wear, even a denim wrap
around for gartening.
Speaker 2: Then at the very.
Speaker 6: Bottom I came upon a long sequin evening gown and
pinned to it with a note which read, this is
the dress I want to be buried in.
Speaker 4: What has our Julia gotten herself into? Even her clothes are.
Speaker 2: No longer her own.
Speaker 4: Around Caleb and his house grows ever more ominous, as
you discover when I returned shortly with Act two. As
the days slipped by oblivion cast a strange spell.
Speaker 2: Of lethargy over Julia.
Speaker 4: For a time, she offered to help her uncle carry
her suitcase up the stairs, and then forgot all about it.
She even lost all curiosity about what was behind those
closed doors.
Speaker 2: Caleb, too, seemed far more relaxed.
Speaker 4: They spent many happy hours together in the garden, and
Julia became engrossed in the study of herbs. She had
grown fond of her uncle Caleb, but this false sense
of peace was abruptly shattered early one afternoon, when Julia
was alone in the garden.
Speaker 2: Lawer there, John. Of course he's not here.
Speaker 6: It's Wednesday.
Speaker 2: Oh that's right.
Speaker 3: Let's go around back and.
Speaker 5: See what the old buzz has been up to in
his garden.
Speaker 6: But you look, somebody's there.
Speaker 3: It's a woman.
Speaker 6: I don't frighten her.
Speaker 3: Excuse me, I'm sorry. We came by to say hello
to Caleb.
Speaker 6: People. We're people, But you're looking at us as though
we were ghost.
Speaker 5: How well, we're just the sum of folks from down
the hill.
Speaker 6: Uncle Caleb never mentioned he's your uncle. Wait, he never
mentioned you. I'm here on a visit, but I so
this was the only house around for miles from n.
Speaker 3: It is, except for our cabin.
Speaker 6: I haven't seen any cambin halfway down the stairs, Oh yes,
I saw a pound.
Speaker 5: You follow that way into the woods, and there we
are for three months of the year.
Speaker 6: Only this year Caleb's in't for a surprise. We told
him we weren't coming.
Speaker 5: I see Caleb has put you to work in what
Emily and I call his cemetery.
Speaker 6: I thought that at first. I guess it's because of
those two rocks that look so much like tombstones.
Speaker 3: I have an idea they are tombstones.
Speaker 6: Let's go in, said, I show him til uncle Caleb
comes home. I don't think we should be snooping around
this way now. Aren't you afraid to stay in this
spooky house? That that's skeleton be enough to turn me off.
Don't tell me there's a skeleton in one of the closet.
Not in the closet. He rolls it around on a
cook rat kind of thing. It must be one of
the surprises behind this closed door. How do you know
so much about this house?
Speaker 5: When we first came here, Caleb showed us all over
the place.
Speaker 6: I think he was trying to frighten this but we
don't scare very easily. Oh.
Speaker 5: Man never talks about himself, but he's a good.
Speaker 6: Neighbor, except when he has visitors. Then he doesn't want
anyone else around. Why I don't understand, Well.
Speaker 3: Neither do we.
Speaker 5: I've been meaning to ask Caleb if I could paint
that marvelous view from his guest room.
Speaker 3: But because now you're staying there.
Speaker 6: Oh, I'm not in that room. Oh where are you
staying up the hall on the other side, looking into
the garden.
Speaker 5: Oh well, then maybe Caleb will let me paint in
the guest room this year.
Speaker 6: I'm sure he will, But you keep calling it the
guest room. My uncle never wrote about any visitors. Were
they many?
Speaker 3: Since we've been coming up? There were just that older
man and the boy.
Speaker 6: When was this?
Speaker 5: Oh the man was here about four or five years ago,
isn't that.
Speaker 6: Right, Emily m I'd say so, And then he was gone,
and we saw the boy two years ago.
Speaker 3: Nobody here last summer wondered who they were.
Speaker 6: I thought maybe the boy was your brother or nephew.
He called him uncle Caleb too. That's very puzzling.
Speaker 2: Hmm.
Speaker 5: See, I'd like to go down the hall and look
at that view again.
Speaker 2: The lights should be just right.
Speaker 6: Oh, I don't want Uncle Caleb to come back and
think that weird.
Speaker 5: But he won't be back until after three o'clock. And
we can hear the train when it goes by.
Speaker 6: This must be win. So you've forgotten what day is too,
They just all blend together. Your uncle Caleb has a
beauty in time clock, even though he doesn't remember days.
He's down at that station every morning when the freight
train comes through, and then one day a week he
waits for the passenger train.
Speaker 3: Go on, man, let's take a look at that view.
Look at those peaks. I know just the purple I'm
going to use.
Speaker 6: Yeah, i'd forgotten how great it is this room, a
man and a boy. I found a pair of jeans
in here.
Speaker 5: Well, now you may be forbidden to open closed doors,
but I'm the nosy type, can't resist closets.
Speaker 3: Let's see what's in time.
Speaker 6: Look, he's filled with clothes, men's works. It's and this old,
old jacket. But it's not Uncle Caleb's sign. None but
a teenager could wear these.
Speaker 3: I'll be damned.
Speaker 6: He goes the train. Uncle Caleb will be back soon.
Speaker 5: Well, it'll take him a while to climb the stairs.
Speaker 3: How do you feel about opening dresser drawers?
Speaker 6: Oh no, no, I'm afraid to after what I found
in the drawer in my room. Okay, it's my turn.
Speaker 2: Here goes.
Speaker 6: Men's work gloves, stocks, here's a jackknife.
Speaker 5: Wait a minute, here's something interesting. The wallet that's empty
except for this sort of ID card.
Speaker 3: You see, name James J. Flanders.
Speaker 5: Her dress has been crossed out. Date of birth it's
almost illegible. Looks like nineteen hundred.
Speaker 6: Well that has to be old gym. And isn't that
what he said?
Speaker 3: He's saying with mum.
Speaker 2: And if he were alive today his age.
Speaker 6: Would be makes you think he's dead? What?
Speaker 3: Because this is his wallet and then there all his clothes.
Speaker 6: But the boy's clothes are there too, wohy didn't he
take them with him? Look, we have to get out
of here. Your uncle will be coming home, and I'm
sure you'll be angry to find us talking to you.
We were in the living room and they were about
to leave. John had already opened the front door, and
then we.
Speaker 2: Heard Julia Cuia.
Speaker 6: We hurried to the top of the stairs to find
uncle Caleb bubbled over I should face some struggling to breathe.
Speaker 2: It's been a bad day, trouble on the track.
Speaker 5: Say, look, it's John and Emily. What can we do?
Just help me into the house. I'll be all right
in a minute.
Speaker 6: John and I supported my uncle, walking him slowly to
the house. When I suggested going straight to his bedroom,
he protested so vehemently. We eased him into a chair
near the fireplace.
Speaker 5: Well, young fella, what are you doing here? We're back
at the cabin for the summer. Eh, it happened here
trip to Europe.
Speaker 6: I had to give it up.
Speaker 2: But you didn't come in on the three o'clock. No, no,
we got here yesterday, and not on the freight train.
Speaker 1: You didn't.
Speaker 2: Oh, we're back backed from where left the car at Bearsville.
I see.
Speaker 6: Uncle Caleb's head brooped forward and he was seized with
a violent coughing. I'd already loosened his collar, and now
I tried to rub his chest. Uncle Caleb, you must
have some pretty talents.
Speaker 5: Where is it fox club? In that jar on my
big table in the little valley. Put it in some water,
and John and Emily you can help me in my room.
Speaker 6: I must lie down, I put water on the stove
and found the bottle labeled Lily of the Valley root.
With shaking hands, I measured a very small portion into
a cup of hot water and took it down the
hall to my uncle's bedroom.
Speaker 2: Oh it's all right.
Speaker 5: I did a spare you for a little while. But
you'd see it sooner or later.
Speaker 6: I couldn't believe I was seeing it.
Speaker 5: Then.
Speaker 6: The walls and floor were black, and so was the
big bed with a prow like a Viking ship. My
uncle looked like a ghost propped up against those white pillows.
And thank heaven John had warned me because there on
one side of the bed was that coke wrack thing,
from which dangled a full size skeleton.
Speaker 5: Don't be frightened, my dear, you would soon get used
to everything around here.
Speaker 6: Uncle Caleb needs the doctor. How do I get one?
Speaker 3: No way, not up here.
Speaker 6: There's a telephone down at the station, yes, but no
passenger train until next week. You have to tell the
train company that Uncle Caleb won't be able.
Speaker 2: Oh, you'd be surprised.
Speaker 5: He's a sturdy old man and he's had these attacks before.
I'll flag down the freight train tomorrow.
Speaker 6: But Julia shouldn't be left alone with him. I think
we should stay here.
Speaker 3: You're done right, We're going to stay well.
Speaker 6: I'm not helpless, really, I'm not. I've taken care of
my father for the last three years. Frankly, I'm worried, Julia. Now,
what if your uncle is he is only pretending to
be sick. How can you say that? You so for yourself.
I've seen other things too, like what's down in the basement. Look,
you've both said that what is down in the basement?
Speaker 5: There are two carved gravestones.
Speaker 6: That doesn't surprise me.
Speaker 5: But one has the name Caleb, and the other name
is Julia.
Speaker 6: Doesn't that tell you something? Yes, Uncle Caleb told me
that one day he would rest peacefully in the garden
behind this house, next to his junior. But but that's you. Oh, now,
I see what's troubling you. He meet his wife, my
aunt Julia. I'm beginning to think her remains may already
be in the garden.
Speaker 3: I wonder, Julia, where's my Julia?
Speaker 6: I hurried to Uncle Caleb's room, feeling better.
Speaker 4: Yes, yes, my dear, Yes, do you remember that time
when you were feeling so very ill? And I asked
what you'd like for supper.
Speaker 6: Oh, that must have been aunt, Julia.
Speaker 5: Then you looked at me so sweetly. That's the way
you're looking now.
Speaker 4: And I said, I'll do anything in the world for you, Julia,
anything to help you.
Speaker 6: And I'm sure you did.
Speaker 4: Always tried to tried to help people like Jamie and Robin.
Speaker 6: Oh, John, let's go back in the house.
Speaker 2: All right, I'll leave the shovel here.
Speaker 3: But that's all the proof I need.
Speaker 6: It's horrible. But what are we going to tell Julia.
Speaker 5: John all that third over here said the sit down, Julia,
there's a there's something we've got to talk about.
Speaker 6: No, don't tell her. John, Annie, you have to get
away from this people placed. Oh stop it, both of you.
My uncle may be eccentric, but he's a kind, gentle
old man.
Speaker 2: I used to believe that, but no more.
Speaker 6: We're atting our imaginations run away with it.
Speaker 2: But Julia, I have the proof.
Speaker 6: Proof Ava.
Speaker 5: I remembered that four years ago there was only one
stone in the backyard. Then last year the smaller one
had been added. So I took a shovel and went out.
Speaker 6: Just now, you have no heart.
Speaker 5: I didn't dig down very far, just far enough to
establish that two wooden.
Speaker 3: Coffins are buried out there.
Speaker 5: One of them is about six feet long, big enough
for a man, and the other a smaller, just about
the right size to hold a boy.
Speaker 4: Now, what do you think of the kindly uncle, Caleb.
It's true that Julia was ready for adventure, but she
has no intention of taking her dead aunt's place. Eccentricity
is one thing, but the way things are shaping up,
Caleb could be a scheming old man, or else something
has snapped in his brain and he has lost all
sense of reality. In either case, Julia appears to be
in a dangerous predicament.
Speaker 2: I'll be back shortly.
Speaker 4: With Act three, Julia has been confronted with some highly
incriminating evidence against her uncle. If there really are two
bodies buried in his garden, shouldn't the police be summoned. John,
who made the discovery, is all for placing a telephone
call at the railroad station to give a report on
what he has found, but Julia is surprised at her
own reaction. She feels protective toward her uncle, and although
one might think she'd be grateful to have friendly neighbors,
she finds herself resenting their interference.
Speaker 6: Don't you see, Julia, it's our duty to turn your
uncle in here. Know what you're talking about. After what
I've uncovered, you have found nothing.
Speaker 3: You call two coffins nothing.
Speaker 6: None of us knows what's in those coffins.
Speaker 3: Well, I can certainly find out in a hurry.
Speaker 6: I forbid you to destroy my uncle Caleb's gardens. Julia,
you're beginning to sound as bad as Oh. I'm sorry.
I realize you've been through a lot and you're not
thinking straight. I know my uncle better than you do.
I'm thinking that the smaller coffin may contain the remains
of my aunt Julia, and the other one, well, it's
just like Uncle Caleb to be saving that one for himself.
Speaker 3: Well, there's another way to find out.
Speaker 6: You're right. Let's just ask Uncle Caleb. But if he's
really sick, I mean, when he gets stronger. In the meantime,
I suggest we have some supper and then you can
go home. There's really no reason for you to spend
the night we're staying.
Speaker 2: John. I want to thank you and Emily for what
you've done to help me.
Speaker 3: And Julia, and now as lucky we were here.
Speaker 5: Very lucky because I have another favorite ask my niece
won't let me out of bed. The eleven o'clock freight
will be going straight through. But if they should slow down,
and I don't want them to think no one's minding
the stower.
Speaker 3: Oh, I plan to be there when the train comes through.
Speaker 2: But they won't be stopping today.
Speaker 5: I'm going to flag them down. You need to do that, Emily.
And I need groceries. I want to place an order.
Speaker 4: Freight company won't like it. Plenty of groceries here. I'll
place a big order later on.
Speaker 3: I'd rather do it myself the way I.
Speaker 2: Used to do.
Speaker 4: Times have changed. But if the train does stop, tell
them i'll be back on the job tomorrow.
Speaker 1: I'll be off.
Speaker 5: Oh.
Speaker 6: I'll go half way down the stairs with you. I
want to check up on the cabin.
Speaker 2: It's good to have you here to look after Riscal.
Speaker 6: I like being called that Uncle Caleb.
Speaker 2: I uh, what did I call you?
Speaker 6: A girl?
Speaker 4: Of course, and that's what you'll always be. It's why
I don't like to burden you with my problems.
Speaker 6: There's anything you want to tell me, Uncle Caleb, you
know I'll always listen.
Speaker 4: It's just that, if anything should happen to me, I
want you to make certain that my Julia and I
lie side by side just as we always.
Speaker 6: Do you mean in the garden.
Speaker 5: Yes, yes, I've left instructions in my will, but I'll
feel so much better know one a member of the
family will take care of things personally.
Speaker 6: Well, of course, Uncle Caleb, you can count on me.
But you know you hadn't told me that Aunt Julia
is already buried in the garden.
Speaker 5: Oh she isn't, Julia, not by herself. We'll go together,
But where is she? She's there that handsome iron on
my bedside table.
Speaker 6: Mercifully, it was several hours before John and Emily returned.
I'd calmed down and decided it was not your time
to give them this latest bit of information. John would
be all too eager to rip the covers off of coffins,
and there was no need to hurry. The bed could wait. Hi, Julia,
how's your uncle? First and comfortable? Thank you for Where
do you get that cordy thing down at the cabin.
It's an extra calendar. I thought you'd better start keeping
track of the days. I've circled today's date. Well, thanks
very much.
Speaker 3: And here's a bag of oranges. The brakemen threw them.
Speaker 2: Off to me.
Speaker 6: Then you did stop the trees, you.
Speaker 3: Bet I did. Had to talk with the engineer.
Speaker 5: He says, there's no reason to have a station at
Foothill Junction, and before long any switching will be done
by automation.
Speaker 6: That means Uncle Caleb will be out of a job.
Speaker 5: Oh okay, Julia, I didn't make any telephone calls.
Speaker 3: Kept my part of the bargain. What about yours?
Speaker 6: Please give me just a few days more along with
my uncle. I'm sure there's an explanation. I put off
asking Uncle Caleb any questions until one morning I found
him in the guest room admiring for you, he said
in a rocker stroking cliphanger, curled up in his lap,
Uncle Caleb, MM, who were a man named Flanders?
Speaker 2: Flandull? No, I can't say I know anyone by that name.
Speaker 6: Try to remember James J. Flanders.
Speaker 2: Why you don't mean Jamie, do you?
Speaker 6: I don't know who's Jamie?
Speaker 2: Poor Jamie. He's dead and very nice man.
Speaker 6: He stayed in this room, didn't he.
Speaker 2: H Jamie loved this room. But how did you know?
He was here.
Speaker 6: We found a wallet in that dresser with his name
on it.
Speaker 2: We Now, who do you mean by we?
Speaker 6: Well, I should say John found the wallet. But they
knew about mister Flanders.
Speaker 4: I didn't just what did they know about him?
Speaker 6: Only that he was staying with you one summer. How
did you meet him?
Speaker 2: Meet Jamie?
Speaker 4: They rolled him off for freight one winter morning, about.
Speaker 2: Five years ago. Poor derelict man. Then is one of
the rails he was riding and you brought him home.
Speaker 4: Two gentlemen, if there ever was one. But the sickness
had gone too far. Jamie didn't have long to live.
Speaker 6: You took care of him.
Speaker 4: Oh why, I gave him food and clothes.
Speaker 2: His strength came back, and we thought he was going
to be well, but it came too late.
Speaker 4: He loved it him and he wanted to stay.
Speaker 6: I see. So you buried him in the garden.
Speaker 2: Well, it's where he wanted to.
Speaker 6: Be, Uncle Caleb. There are two unmarked gray stones in
your garden.
Speaker 4: Oh so you know about Robin too.
Speaker 6: I know nothing about Robin.
Speaker 2: Robin.
Speaker 5: I found him in the wood, was nearly starved to death,
and it was October.
Speaker 6: A boy way up here. Where did he come from
from Bearsville. No, you don't mean he escaped from that
middle institution.
Speaker 2: That was no place for a bright boy like Robin.
Speaker 6: Oh, Uncle Kalb, you can't just take him. A boy
who was a runaway, and why not?
Speaker 2: He needed a home?
Speaker 6: But didn't they look for you?
Speaker 2: Oh? Worse, but I hit him in the basement.
Speaker 6: I don't know what to say. How long did this
boy live with you?
Speaker 3: Nearly a year?
Speaker 4: I had tried so hard to help him, but it
must have been sickly from the time he was born.
It was too late to save a small soul who
had been abandoned when he was a baby.
Speaker 6: Uncle Caleb, When you say you helped him, do you
mean I mean?
Speaker 2: I gave him love and they only home he never know.
Speaker 4: That's why Robin must never be taken away.
Speaker 6: I realized, if it were not for John and Emily,
I too might think completely under the spell of this
place called oblivion. Reluctantly, I went halfway down the stairs
for the first time since I had climbed to the top,
and followed the pathway to the artist's cabin.
Speaker 3: You believe everything he told you, don't you?
Speaker 6: Julia had no reason to doubt anything, he said.
Speaker 3: I think it's the perversion of a demented mind.
Speaker 6: John, don't say that. There's no harm in trying to
help people. My uncle did nothing wrong.
Speaker 5: Nothing wrong. He may have murdered two people, possibly more.
Speaker 6: My uncle could never commit a crime.
Speaker 5: It's a criminal offense to harbor fugitives, and no same
person buries bodies in the back.
Speaker 2: Y'all.
Speaker 6: Now, what are we going to do. You're not going
to do anything. I'm taking a trip to Bearsville. You
mean you're.
Speaker 3: Turning your uncle e.
Speaker 6: No, I'm going to tell them about that poor boy,
and if you had no family, I'm.
Speaker 5: Sure they were about the man named Flanders.
Speaker 6: Well, I'll get legal advice. Take it easy, John, This
is Julia's problem, all.
Speaker 5: Right, all right, But if she doesn't come back with
some straight answers, I'm going to the authorities and tell
them exactly what I think.
Speaker 6: It was a week to the day since Uncle Caleb's
heart attack. He had been doing a little work in
the garden and showing signs of restlessness. Emily had come over,
I suspect just to check up on us. It was
nearly eleven o'clock in the morning.
Speaker 2: Julia, what day is today.
Speaker 6: Well, let's see, where's the calendar I've brought you, Harry.
Speaker 2: I have to know the.
Speaker 6: Day you circled Emily with Saturday. So it's Monday, Tuesday.
Today is Wednesday.
Speaker 2: I should have known.
Speaker 6: I have to get down to the Don't worry, Caleb,
John's there.
Speaker 2: You don't understand.
Speaker 5: I have to go.
Speaker 2: I have to do it.
Speaker 5: Do what the switch, have to throw the switch before
the train passes the station.
Speaker 2: My jacket? Where's my jacket?
Speaker 6: After a minute, Uncle Caleb, you're not going anywhere.
Speaker 5: It should have been fixed long ago. I told them
the last time.
Speaker 6: I'll go down the stairs with a message.
Speaker 2: No one else knows what's wrong. I'm the only one.
Speaker 6: You're not will enough, not down that long flight upstairs.
Speaker 2: Last week, trouble with the switch.
Speaker 5: It cammed and I threw the emergency for the passenger track.
Speaker 6: The passenger train doesn't get here till three. That should
be plenty here too.
Speaker 5: No, the way it's said now that the freight will
go through on the passenger tracks, and then about twenty
miles from here there'll be a hit on collision.
Speaker 6: There must be some way that you can fight.
Speaker 5: Doesn't throw down on Wednesdays, and the only one knows
about that switch.
Speaker 2: I must hurry.
Speaker 6: We'll write with you, call me.
Speaker 2: I can't be late. Broken switch, my hand I missed
the last time. No one must be hurt. When I
see what I have to do.
Speaker 6: He mean, calm stop the train. I know he said
he had to do it. John, John, Everything's all right now,
isn't it?
Speaker 3: Going back up the hill, both of you. There's nothing
you can do.
Speaker 6: So then we don't need to give you the message.
What message about the switch? The broken switch?
Speaker 2: Switch? So that's why he did it.
Speaker 6: That's exactly why.
Speaker 2: He should have told me last week.
Speaker 6: Where is Caleb?
Speaker 5: I suppose there was no other way, no other way
to stop that freight train. Caleb threw himself across the track.
Speaker 4: Uncle Caleb's death, like his wife's, was dedicated.
Speaker 2: To helping people.
Speaker 4: Perhaps on the evidence you believe that, or if you
have a different kind of imagination, you may believe there
was a darker side to his nature. That's up to you.
As for Julia, I'll tell you about her. In just
a moment, Caleb left everything he possessed to Julia, and
she too, had fallen in love with that mountain top
oh was.
Speaker 3: She reported the deaths of Jamie and Robin, but.
Speaker 4: Since no one claimed them, they rested in peace beside
Caleb and Aunt.
Speaker 3: Julia in the garden where they all.
Speaker 4: Wanted to be in oblivion. Our cast included Anne Shepherd,
Guy Sorell, Mary Jane Higbee and Nat Poland. The entire
production was under the direction of Hymon Brown.
Speaker 3: This is E. G.
Speaker 4: Marshall inviting you to return to our Mystery Theater for
another adventure in the macabre. Until next time, pleasant dreams.