Speaker 1: Come in Welcome. I'm e. G.
Speaker 2: Marshall, New York is a city of subways, old, new
in construction and projected, and of the masses of people
who ride them daily, commuting to and from work. This
is a story of an old and battlescarred subway user
and a new spur line opened at last, and as usual,
too late to achieve its objective relieve congestion. But it
did bring Alvin Freiberg a strange and wonderful freedom from
the grinding daily tragedy of a life not worth living.
Speaker 1: What's the matter? You got a nitch or something? We're
getting near thirty fifth and really I'm not passing it.
I guess subway doesn't stop. But that's why.
Speaker 3: Now I know it's got to be a reason to
how come a conductor doesn't.
Speaker 1: Know brand new wine? Call the transitor third, I.
Speaker 4: Didn't get a chance. I gotta know the truth about it,
just the same. Here it comes thirty fifth of Billie.
This time, I gotta know, what are you gonna do?
Speaker 1: Stop the train?
Speaker 5: I'm gonna get off, crazy or something, Alvin stay away
in an emergency.
Speaker 2: Our mystery drama The Phantom Stop was written especially for
the Mystery Theater by Ian Martin and stars Norman Rose.
It is sponsored in part by Buick Motor Division. I'll
be back shortly with Act one. Al Freiberg and Marvin
Schreiber shared the same treadmill. They both worked for Goldman Incorporated.
Al is a pattern maker, Marv is a cutter. They
both rode the subway morning and night. They both shared
the same two family house in Flushing, owned by Marvin.
But of the two, Marv was the lucky one. When
he came home, he came back to love and affection.
What Al came home to was, well, that was something else?
Speaker 1: Again?
Speaker 6: Is that you at last?
Speaker 4: Dalvin?
Speaker 1: Yes, Ester, I'm home.
Speaker 6: You're late.
Speaker 1: I'm late.
Speaker 6: That's all you got to say?
Speaker 4: Well else should I say? I was making hanky panky
with one of the models.
Speaker 6: We'll give you even a look. Models. I don't worry about.
Speaker 7: But you and that mob downstairs could have stop, maybe
for a beer, Let me smell your breath.
Speaker 1: I wouldn't advise it. I had a garlic tickle with lunch.
Speaker 6: A comedian I married. So why are late to have
a heart?
Speaker 4: We're behind befall deadline. We've got to get out the garments.
Speaker 7: Now, don't give me a story that think Goldman's you
into overtime. He'd have a heart attack if you had
to pay a dime over take on, pay, give a.
Speaker 1: Little, take a little, A few minutes overtime isn't going
to make me run to the shop, Steward, give a little.
Speaker 6: Sure, that's the story of your life. When did you.
Speaker 1: Take person makes his own choices.
Speaker 4: I want to sit down. I've been on my feet
all day. It was just the subway was late.
Speaker 6: Now the subway don't run on time.
Speaker 1: I mean me and Marv. We missed the regular.
Speaker 7: Trail and he was working overtime too.
Speaker 1: Huh. He stopped to buy a present for his wife.
Speaker 6: It's a pity you couldn't have the same excuse.
Speaker 1: It's her birthday you had yours.
Speaker 7: Don't talk about birthdays, and don't sit down. I want
you to fix Rebecca's hair dryer.
Speaker 1: What's the matter with it?
Speaker 6: Would I ask you?
Speaker 7: If I knew it doesn't work?
Speaker 1: Couldn't she let her hair dry with God's own air?
For once?
Speaker 8: In curlers?
Speaker 1: She don't mind in the morning.
Speaker 4: Every time I eat a shredded wheat, I look up
at her and think What am I doing eating one.
Speaker 1: Of your sister's curlers? Hey? How comes she don't wear
her hair straight all the time?
Speaker 7: Nothing helps to So she's gone to the community center.
Speaker 1: She's wasting her time.
Speaker 4: There isn't a nice boy who wasn't already taken?
Speaker 8: Say is that out of his last Yeah?
Speaker 7: He just walked in.
Speaker 9: Oh, tell him to run down of the drug store.
Speaker 8: Give me some gold proom.
Speaker 4: Couldn't she go down to get it herself?
Speaker 1: All day?
Speaker 4: All she does is sit a lumbago?
Speaker 6: Is bothering on?
Speaker 1: Maybe she's just waking up to what she is a
big pain in this?
Speaker 7: Is he going a run out of her hand? Setting?
Speaker 8: I'm only half curled?
Speaker 1: Yef boiled is more like it?
Speaker 7: Is that any way to talk about your own flesh
and blood?
Speaker 1: Is your sister?
Speaker 7: Are you going down to the drug store on that?
Speaker 9: Yes?
Speaker 1: Yes, glow proom? Right, you might as.
Speaker 7: Well get the giant can then you can fix the
hair dryer.
Speaker 4: Should have been a barber. The things I could do
with a racer.
Speaker 7: Come on, come on, re Beck is waiting when I
get home?
Speaker 1: Can we eat?
Speaker 7: Oh? Just like a man, the only thing on his
mind is this stomach.
Speaker 1: To tell the truth.
Speaker 4: Limping down the drug store, the only thing on my
mind was my sister in.
Speaker 1: Law, except maybe my wife and a razor.
Speaker 4: The things that go through a man's mind that would
frighten you, but you could settle with one simple stroke.
All day long at the shop, the boss screams at me,
and then at night and weekends, I got my wife
and her sister yelling at me. Ah, it's not like
it used to be in the old days with Sarah,
my first wife.
Speaker 1: With Sarah.
Speaker 4: When I got home, it was all together different. Hello, shot,
see hello, sweet high.
Speaker 8: Come into the living room, Sada.
Speaker 9: I got your slippers in the paper and a nice
glass of tea with a little you know what.
Speaker 1: Go and rest up a little before dinner. You're such
a good wife, Sarah.
Speaker 9: Oh, what's so hard? I got a good man here,
done ship? Oh give me your shoes. Hu's business, eh,
I we'll talk later after we eat.
Speaker 1: What's for dinner?
Speaker 8: A favorite?
Speaker 1: Yess ah? What's the difference? Anything you cook is my favorite.
Speaker 4: I never really realized how much Sarah meant to me
until she died and I married esther. If Sarah had lived,
it would have been but it would have been just
like Marvin and Rachel downstairs, love warm, with kids, a
real family. I made more money, but he was the
one with a life. Oh, Marv was a lucky guy
with his Rachel.
Speaker 7: Say good night to the kids, Marv.
Speaker 4: Yeah, growing like weeds.
Speaker 1: Thank god. They both looked like you.
Speaker 8: Go on. Was sit already and drinking coffee.
Speaker 1: Where's yours?
Speaker 8: Right over here?
Speaker 1: They'll bring it to the sofa and sit with me.
Speaker 8: I gotta do the dishes.
Speaker 1: Come on, the dishes can wait. I'll help later.
Speaker 7: You got anything in mind, Marvin?
Speaker 4: The kids aren't that much as anytime I look at you,
I got something in mind.
Speaker 1: But don't worry. It's not that something else.
Speaker 8: It's the matter.
Speaker 6: But you didn't get later.
Speaker 1: On, Nothing like that, don't you. That's just for love?
Speaker 6: What did I do to deserve that?
Speaker 1: Just for being you? Boy? What a lucky guy?
Speaker 8: I am, all right.
Speaker 6: I wouldn't deny it, but I'll come.
Speaker 8: You know it.
Speaker 4: The way we are and the way Alvin and Sarah
used to be before. Why do some guys get all
the breaks and the rest get a kick in the pants.
Speaker 7: It was a terrible thing that happened to Sarah.
Speaker 4: Bad enough to lose your first child, but a wife
as well. Remember how it used to be with the
four of us when we first moved into this house.
Speaker 7: Sure it was a whole family, two family house, but
one family living.
Speaker 1: In a sea.
Speaker 4: You me, Sarah and Alvin dinner every Sunday, one week,
they turn next one hours.
Speaker 1: Times were good. Remember the picnics that Jones be.
Speaker 7: Oh do I Sarah's potato salad? Nobody could make potato
salad like that?
Speaker 4: Oh boy, and you're pot roast the best. And what
a cut up that I used to be. Could have
been on the stage. What laughs we have.
Speaker 7: Especially that last time I remember with Sarah and me
both out here with our kids, and you wanted to
take a picture. Oh I miss Sarah.
Speaker 8: I try to.
Speaker 7: Get on with us.
Speaker 1: I that loud mouse.
Speaker 4: She'd burn your ear off with nothing good to say
about anybody.
Speaker 1: And the sister's worse.
Speaker 7: She can't help it.
Speaker 6: If she's got a face.
Speaker 8: It could stop a horse.
Speaker 4: To keep a big nose out of everybody's business. What's
the madam, Marvin? There's no heat in the house. You
want us all to get pneumonia?
Speaker 6: And she's always sick with something.
Speaker 1: It wasn't for Al.
Speaker 4: I'd find some way to kick him out and get
new tenants.
Speaker 7: Oh you couldn't do that, Aw no.
Speaker 4: Ah, he's the one or to get rid of them.
Speaker 1: God forgive me for saying it.
Speaker 7: Oh why shouldn't he? I mean they deserve him.
Speaker 4: Not what I was thinking, and what sometimes I think
lately Al could have on his mind. What do you mean,
you know, knocking off either one of those two old
crows or to be justifiable homicide?
Speaker 8: Marvin? What do you say?
Speaker 4: There never was a kinder or more gentle person than
Alvin Frebury. But you put a mouse in a bowl
with a lid on and let him run around trapped.
He ever gets that lid off, out comes a raging tiger.
Speaker 1: I don't know.
Speaker 4: Maybe it's all the violence, but the Al worries me
these days. He daydreams a lot, gets behind on his work.
He drives Goldman frantic, and every so often I'll see
him pick up my cutting shears and just, you know,
kind of weigh.
Speaker 1: Them in his hand like they were I don't know,
I'd like to fight like a weapon.
Speaker 7: What are you suggesting he's going to turn into a
murderer or something? Alf Ryburg Ah, don't make me laugh, but.
Speaker 4: It wasn't something to laugh at. If only Rachel could
have known. And Marv was right, though I didn't know
he'd said it these last years, like a hamster in
a cage, that was me running around and around, going nowhere.
I wouldn't mind so much, but Esther wouldn't have children,
not even a son to carry my name. There are
times lately, like when Abe Goldman is trying to chisel
on the patterns, when I find myself grabbing up Marv's shears,
and oh, I get such a pain in my chest.
Speaker 1: Everything goes black.
Speaker 4: By the time I see straight again, I'm I'm worried
what I might have done, Or like mornings I shave
with a with a straight razor which was my father's.
And sometimes like the morning after Rebecca needed her head dressing.
Speaker 1: Uh, yeah, you plan to spend all day in there
I'm shaving. How come you're up so early?
Speaker 7: The noise you make getting out of bed? Who could sleep?
Speaker 4: Listen?
Speaker 7: Could you spend a pot of room a moment?
Speaker 1: Can't you wait till I'm finished?
Speaker 7: It isn't me, it's Rebecca.
Speaker 1: What's with Rebecca?
Speaker 4: He sic? Tous step Okay, Okay, I'll shave in the kitchen.
Speaker 6: How come you're up so early?
Speaker 4: Well today today, Marv and I are trying the new
subway which just opens. Just to be on the safe side,
we're leaving early.
Speaker 7: I Betty you come home early one of these evenings.
Speaker 1: Now, what's in it for me? All right?
Speaker 4: All right, Ester, don't get mad? Can't I make a joke? Look,
you want to have a cup of coffee with.
Speaker 1: Me before I leave? What for?
Speaker 6: As soon as I get Rebecca straight?
Speaker 1: Not?
Speaker 6: Ain't even my beauty sleep? Have your coffee at the office.
Speaker 4: You used to make it for me when we were
first married.
Speaker 7: I used to do a lot of things before I
discovered what a nothing I married. Go into the kitchen,
shave well, you and let Rebecca use the lady's room.
Speaker 4: The lady's room. That's what it comes down to. Now
I'm a stranger in my own house. I finished shaving,
nicking myself twice without a mirror. Then I cleaned the razor,
and I thought about it, how quick it would be,
and as long as it was sharp enough, how painless?
Speaker 1: And then with a gasp, I thought of myself.
Speaker 4: For whom what am I thinking?
Speaker 8: Me?
Speaker 4: Them all three of us, and then all of a sudden,
All of a sudden, I had the pain in my chest,
and I wondered indigestion. Guess take a buyers finished shaving
and get to work out in.
Speaker 1: So, how do you like it the subway? Who knows?
You same sardines packed in a new can. Here you
got more room to breathe. It's still the same air.
You want to call it that, you know? I thought
maybe there'd be less people. The guy could have one wish,
I say.
Speaker 4: I said, if a guy could have one wish, it
would be not to travel Queens.
Speaker 1: To New York and back in the rush hour. Eh,
it's not so bad, kind? Everything else in to you? Maybe?
What else have I got to look forward to? Either end?
Now I've been meaning to talk to you. Know I'm
not here.
Speaker 4: You couldn't hear yourself, but everybody else could.
Speaker 1: Hey, what, here's a station we're passing.
Speaker 4: Uh thirty fifth and Neely Avenue.
Speaker 1: Hey, how come the train doesn't stop?
Speaker 3: Express? I guess I didn't see the station.
Speaker 4: Here as the nose on your face, I wasn't looking.
What's the differen What could it matter in your life? Anyways?
Speaker 2: What could it matter in Alvin Freiberg's life, not a thing,
just another subway station passed by an express train that
didn't stop there. Thirty fifths and neely. From the first
moment he read the designation, he knew that sometime he
had to get off the subway there. I'll return with
that two shortly. Then it wasn't a good day in
Alvin Freiberg's life.
Speaker 1: The patterns for.
Speaker 2: The new styles were hired to work out seventy yards
of cloth on a boat. You have to lay out
the patterns so that you waste the least amount of material.
If you're a first rate f you don't cut corners.
But if you're just an ordinary firm and times are hard,
there's a little temptation to short change.
Speaker 1: I can't do it, mister Goldman, are you telling me?
I brought you up in the business. So we'll be a.
Speaker 4: Little tight with the seams. We'll still make up a
little tight. Look here under the arms and on the sides.
A woman buys the wrong size, so she takes a
deep breath and the seams go.
Speaker 1: That's her problem. She should buy the right size.
Speaker 4: To begin with, you know, women, That's what always made
our line they could breathe a little buying undersize? Are
you telling me how to merchandise? Look?
Speaker 1: I make patterns, that's all I know.
Speaker 4: I made them before you are out of public school.
I asked you to cut a few corners, and you
have to give me an argument. I want only the
best for us, mister Goldman, the.
Speaker 1: Same for me. But we got to go at the time.
I don't like a cheat. Who's cheat? We cut a
corner here and there?
Speaker 4: What are you a conscience for the world?
Speaker 1: You're better than anyone else? Damn? Maybe he was right?
What was I?
Speaker 4: I sat there piecing the jigsaw patterns on a bolt
of cloth, and I wondered myself. Let some customer lift
her arm and split a seam, or eat too much
and have the zippers split?
Speaker 1: Why should I care? What did I have left? No
pride at home? Why try to have any at work?
Speaker 4: Even Marv couldn't shake me while we waited for the
subway home.
Speaker 1: Why'd you knock alunda Ah? What's the difference? Marv? He
wants to cut short? How can I stop him?
Speaker 4: It never pays off? And what you lay out I
gotta cut you know? I want you to make me mad?
Speaker 1: Stand that. But now what's the fight for? These days?
We're lucky to have a job. That's all the business
means to you, tell you the truth, nothing means much
to me. I'm tired. You well, you got something to
protect it as I see, grab it. Come on, stand
you need it more than me. Now sit down, will you? Okay?
Any I do?
Speaker 4: But I wanted to ask the conductor of one of
the guards about that station.
Speaker 1: What station you know? But when we don't stop at
the thirty fifth early line? Who cares me? Why? I
don't know? Just just something crazy? You wouldn't remember? Why
wouldn't I remember?
Speaker 7: Oh?
Speaker 1: I can tell you? But what do I want to do?
Broadcast a secret at the top of my lungs? Wait
to a home? Okay, okay, it's hard to hear you anyway.
Read your paper.
Speaker 4: I sat a little while with my eyes closed, the
tags in my chest again right through the back. The
record of the subway seemed very far away, and then
I glanced at the paper in my lape, just to
skip over the headlines. General Charles de Gaull takes over
premiership of friends.
Speaker 1: Huh, so let them? Or do I care? What the gall? Oh?
He's dead. He's long dead. I look again at the newspaper,
over the date June first, nineteen fifty eight.
Speaker 4: I started to get Marvel's attention, but just then I
realized that we were slowing down. Ready to stop, I
twisted to look out the window.
Speaker 1: Thirty fifth and nearly I had to push and shot
to get off.
Speaker 4: I was the only one. I went through the gate.
There was a long flight of steps to the street.
But my pain was gone, my legs. I felt twenty
years younger, so did all of me. I could fear
my heart lift reach out, expecting something.
Speaker 1: I was right. I came out of the street, and well,
it was just before sunset.
Speaker 4: Everything was bathed in a rosy glow, a collar you
couldn't forget.
Speaker 1: And waiting for me was Alvin two subways.
Speaker 8: I waited. I thought, maybe I've missed your train.
Speaker 4: You know the rush hours, Sarah, But why should you
wait for me?
Speaker 8: Why does any woman wait for her man? Love?
Speaker 9: Besides, I was shopping near here, at the market, so
why not give you a surprise.
Speaker 1: I'll carry it. Hey, this is this is the old neighborhood.
Speaker 8: Why so surprised?
Speaker 1: Thirty fifth? All right, but nearly, that's not near us.
Speaker 9: Oh wa, it's a new subway, so it's a little
longer walk than the old stuff. What's the difference when
a person is young?
Speaker 1: The way I feel?
Speaker 4: So?
Speaker 9: Why do we have to stand talking so much? Come on,
let's go home.
Speaker 1: Yeah, home, Yeah, give.
Speaker 8: Me your hand. Let's just walk like we used to.
Speaker 4: You know, I don't know what's so good tonight? It
seems so special. It is special.
Speaker 1: What's for dinner?
Speaker 8: I shouldn't tell you. I should just surprise you.
Speaker 1: So surprise me.
Speaker 8: Maybe I won't if you sound so.
Speaker 4: Indifferent, who's indifferent?
Speaker 9: Well you'll find out anyway it Strawberry blinches with sour dream.
Speaker 8: You want to leave me for another woman?
Speaker 4: I want to take you in my arms right here
on thirty third Street and hugg.
Speaker 8: Oh you better not.
Speaker 4: I'll call the cops.
Speaker 9: No, just wait till we get home. You want coffee
or glass of tea?
Speaker 1: I just want you. Come. I sit by me on
the couch.
Speaker 8: I'm not sure I could trust you.
Speaker 4: There's more than one kind of love, Sarah.
Speaker 1: This is just old people quiet, just to touch, to know,
to feel that you're there and I'm next to you.
Speaker 8: Come on, sit, maybe just a little because you have
to go.
Speaker 1: What do you mean how come I have to go?
Speaker 8: Don't ask questions, Alvin. Let's take what we got.
Speaker 1: But this is my home. I'm not leaving.
Speaker 8: You have to leave. Answer me one thing first.
Speaker 1: Anything.
Speaker 8: You won't let whatever happens change you.
Speaker 9: If you'll stay the way you are, Why should I change?
Speaker 8: Supposing I wasn't alive, Oh, Sarah.
Speaker 1: Then I wouldn't be alive either.
Speaker 9: It isn't always that easy to die, Sarah, Sarah.
Speaker 1: What are you talking about?
Speaker 9: Promise me, darling, if anything happens, just keep on being
my same, loving kind gentle.
Speaker 8: Alvin, What crazy talk is this?
Speaker 4: I'm Alvin Freiburg. I'm thirty years old. If I don't
know what I am now, I'm in sad condition.
Speaker 8: I'm only thinking of the future.
Speaker 1: With the future we're living now.
Speaker 8: That's just the trouble, Darling, were not and I beg you.
Speaker 9: Whatever happens, don't let anything change you between now.
Speaker 1: Wake up, Alvin, I'll stop. I gotta get off the subway.
What I already did?
Speaker 4: I mean, I mean when we stopped at thirty fifth.
Come on, Alvin, you've been sound asleep since we left Manhattan.
Let's get it out of a sling and on the way.
What are you talking about? You got off the subway
on the way home.
Speaker 1: I did at thirty fifth and nearly got a hole
in the head.
Speaker 4: You were asleep by fifty seventh Street, Manhattan, and you
never woke up till we hit Flushing.
Speaker 1: I didn't.
Speaker 4: I didn't get off and see Sarah, Sarah, my wife.
Speaker 1: It was a dream. It was a dream. You were tired,
You went to sleep, and you had a dream. Oh,
such a dream of you know, it was real, just
like it used to be. But he listened.
Speaker 4: I didn't get off of that station to train doesn't
stop there, aw, it did in my dream. If it
could only be like that, could I say something to
you which is none of my business?
Speaker 1: Or a friend like you, you could say anything. I'm worried
about you. Yeah, that makes the two of us. I
think you should see a doctor. What could a headshrink?
It tell me that I don't know already. I didn't
mean a psychiatrist. I meant a doctor doctor who means him.
Speaker 4: I'm healthy, but I could be if I had the chance.
I was thinking about you should excuse the expression your
home life.
Speaker 1: Now you should excuse the expression.
Speaker 4: All right, Alvin, you ever hear the French painter called
gogang as?
Speaker 1: Sure? You know what he did?
Speaker 4: He went to Tahiti or somewhere, and he well, he
painted pictures were First off, he was a banker and
he was unhappy, so he separated from his wife and
just took off.
Speaker 1: Are you trying to tell me something? Yeah?
Speaker 4: Who likes Esther? Do you are married to her? You
were married to Sarah.
Speaker 1: I was different.
Speaker 4: Sure it was everybody loved Sarah, but Esther?
Speaker 1: Who likes Esther? You got to say it out loud,
not even me? I wish she was dead. You don't
have to go that far. Why don't you just walk
out on her? What happened to Rebecca? That's your problem.
They're driving you crazy, the two of them. Rachel and me.
Speaker 4: We only live downstairs and they're driving us around the corner.
Why don't we all get up from under?
Speaker 1: You're not going to renew early?
Speaker 4: How ow? I ain't talking as a landlord, but as
a friend. Rachel and me we can make out, but
we want to save you from what.
Speaker 1: But we're almost home now. You take a good look
at yourself, do a little thinking. You got a dingling
hung around your neck. I'm your buddy. What else can
I say? Marv? I don't know what to answer you.
I don't blame you.
Speaker 4: I don't know how I had the guts to say
all I said to you. Yeah, I'll see you seven
point thirty in the morning. We'll walk to the subway.
After Marv went in, I waited a moment in the dark, Sarah,
or was it a dream? I had a crazy notion
that grew more real as the pain in my chest
started up again, that I could go back there. All
I had to do was stop the train and get
off at thirty fifth and nearly except except I had
to fix everything right to leap behind.
Speaker 1: A man can't just.
Speaker 4: Walk out on everything like that. That fella go again, he.
Speaker 1: Was a genius. I'm just a slip.
Speaker 7: Yeah, al then you in there again.
Speaker 8: What are you doing?
Speaker 4: I'm shaving ten o'clock in the night and you're shaving.
Speaker 1: I'm coming it, so come in. The door is open.
Speaker 7: Why are you shaving this time of night?
Speaker 4: Well, the morning traffic gets so heavy. I thought maybe
i'd take a load off of it.
Speaker 7: I don't understand you, Alvin Freiburg, Well say something.
Speaker 1: What am I to say? I don't think he ever did.
Why he asked me to say something? I said it.
Speaker 7: I didn't ask to be insulting insulty.
Speaker 6: You said I.
Speaker 7: Didn't understand you, Well you think you do. I certainly
don't understand a man shaving ten o'clock at night and
tying up the only bathroom in the house.
Speaker 4: I shave in the morning. I'm in the way too.
What should I do? Shave at the garment house?
Speaker 8: Shon't have to make a think?
Speaker 1: Who is making a think?
Speaker 9: You?
Speaker 1: I was just trying to make things easy.
Speaker 6: Don't give me that, Alvin.
Speaker 7: You just try to make things a problem because me
and Rebecca haven't ever been good.
Speaker 6: Enough for you.
Speaker 1: Did I ever say that?
Speaker 6: That's what you think?
Speaker 9: Sarah?
Speaker 7: She was so great your first wife, nobody could live
up to it.
Speaker 1: You leave Sarah out. I brought her in.
Speaker 6: I just don't try to fool me.
Speaker 7: Ever since we were married, you compared the two of us.
Speaker 1: That is not true.
Speaker 7: Don't try to pull the wool over my eyes. I
know what I know, and let me tell you something,
Alvin Freiberg, your first wife was a nothing. If you
had stayed with her, you'd still be a gofer for
mister Goldman, running errands, getting coffee, pushing breast racks, a
forty year old office boy without my connections and my family.
Speaker 9: So don't you ever forget it?
Speaker 1: That is true. I was a cutter before.
Speaker 8: You don't made.
Speaker 7: Me laugh with that Sarah soft in the head about
how great you'd be. She couldn't see a future in
any dress.
Speaker 6: Cut Alvin, Alvin, don't hold that razor like that?
Speaker 7: Alvin?
Speaker 6: What are you thinking about?
Speaker 1: You ever? Mention Sarah's name to me again? Don't chew ever?
Speaker 7: Godsn are you crazy or something? I was just trying
to bring you the senses now, don't take a sense
about Sarah's there has been dead for sixteen years.
Speaker 4: How can you leave me alone?
Speaker 1: You and Rebecca? You leave me alone? Or I don't
know what I'm gonna do?
Speaker 7: What are you and a crazy man?
Speaker 1: As friend of the moment? I'm yes, yes, I love me.
Speaker 4: You, you, you and your Niking sister.
Speaker 8: You get out.
Speaker 4: For the first time in her life, esther knuckle under
to me. She fled from a bathroom in terror, and
as she slammed the door shut behind her, I I
I stopped in terror myself because I realized that I
had advanced on her. With the razor in my hand,
held like a weapon. I couldn't kid myself that I
didn't want to use it against her and her sister.
And suddenly, all alone, I started to shake from head
to foot.
Speaker 1: What had I become?
Speaker 4: Because I knew that I knew that I was near
the end of control, and if something didn't happen, I
would move.
Speaker 1: My mind, my mind.
Speaker 4: And destroy both of these women as surely as they
had been destroying.
Speaker 1: Me day by day.
Speaker 4: For the last fifteen years.
Speaker 2: The wrong marriage, two selfish women driving against a quiet
and simple man.
Speaker 1: The day by day.
Speaker 2: Deterioration of what had once been a human relationship is
as devastating as the Chinese water torture, and as inescapable
without violent reaction or some miracle to end it, which
is the deciding factor? Back with that solution shortly when
I return with Act three. The Dictionary definition of tragedy
is the downfall or destruction of some great or noble
figure because of some flaw or fatal weakness. But surely
the fate of a simple man living a life of
quiet and utter despair misunderstood unappreciated and starved for a
kind of love he had once known is just as tragic.
Speaker 4: And when he finds himself with his back to the.
Speaker 1: Wall, how desperate might he become.
Speaker 2: Let's watch Alvin Freiberg, who might be you or I
or any of us who sees no hope of escape.
Let's watch him face his problem and find its solution.
The next day, I woke up early, even earlier than usual,
with a gut feeling that I'd reached the end of
my rope, just.
Speaker 1: Like any other morning.
Speaker 4: That's just snoring like a walritz beside me, same heavy
feeling in my chest. Why should it surprise me? My
heart was dead already fifteen years. I turned off the
alarm clock, checked the time automatically, and went into the
bathroom half an hour early.
Speaker 1: I reached for my razor. All of a sudden, I'm thinking, what.
Speaker 4: Kind of a fool are you?
Speaker 1: You're shaved already last night.
Speaker 4: Then I said to myself, al then you know that,
So what are you doing with a razor in your hand?
Speaker 1: I knew I didn't have to ask that quest. I
was desperate. Who was I kidding?
Speaker 4: I couldn't face another day the way I lived even
without hearing the mester's snores were sounding in my ears.
Speaker 1: I could hear her back as whine what would she
have today?
Speaker 4: And also a thrit's indigestion, a something which wouldn't have
a name anything.
Speaker 1: The driver to a doctor so he could reassure her
or try to the razor. The razor would end all this.
Speaker 4: I was like a like a man walking in his
sleep with the razor in my hand.
Speaker 1: I walked into the bedroom.
Speaker 7: Well, then at six o'clock, what are you doing now?
Speaker 1: I hear? I couldn't I couldn't sleep.
Speaker 6: What's the razor for?
Speaker 7: You got five o'clock shadow in the morning?
Speaker 1: Oh that's the you know, that's the first joke you
ever made.
Speaker 8: Who cares about jokes this hour? What's the razor for?
Speaker 1: I don't know, I don't know. I don't know. I
forgot I shaved last night. I guess I.
Speaker 7: Put it away and come back to bed.
Speaker 1: Yes, yes, yes, yes, yes, Esther, I don't know. I
don't know what came over me all of a sudden.
Speaker 7: I'll just come back to bed and don't wake up
the whole high.
Speaker 1: I don't feel sleepy.
Speaker 4: Maybe I'll make a cup of coffee.
Speaker 7: I don't understand you, but do what you want as
long as you don't wake up Rebecca and me. I
couldn't care less.
Speaker 4: I couldn't care less. I don't understand you. It was
all there in those two sentences. And the coffee was bitter,
no matter how much sugar I dumped in, And so
was my life. It's the way a good half of
the world, maybe more live. An hour and a half later,
walking to the subway, how different could I feel, except
that Marv was a friend, and with him I could
talk a little? Hey, nice risk morning. Eh, that's a
good word. You should know me by now. I wonder
you even bothered or walk to the subway with me?
What are you giving me? Al Fribury twenty five years.
Speaker 1: We're friends. Why would I walk out on h I
ain't the same man I once was.
Speaker 4: Look when was the last time you saw a doctor?
I don't know, three maybe four years? You ought to
have a check up, but four Who cares?
Speaker 1: Anyway? My regular doctor died a couple of years ago.
Speaker 4: A person in our age should have a check up
once a year, stay alive.
Speaker 1: What else? Supposing you get to the point where you
don't care. Huh, oh, that pends it. I'm going to
make an appointment with my doctor to see you. Don't
waste the time. I'm ready to waste more than that.
You'll see him.
Speaker 4: If I have to drag you there, we'll go at lunchtime. Oh,
give me the arguments. I'll pay, just my own piece
of mind, marv Ma. You're a good friend. Okay, okay,
I'll see your doctor. But you know he can't help me.
And we got one thing straight.
Speaker 1: I pay, I pay. Come on tomorrow to some way.
Speaker 4: Would you get the ants out of your pants out?
So we changed it Ronaldy Plaza to a local. What
are you gonna do when you get the thirty fifth
and nearly got to get off? Go upstairs and.
Speaker 1: We get off. We could be late for work. You
don't have to come.
Speaker 3: Listen the way you're acting as a friend.
Speaker 1: I wouldn't leave you for a minute. I ain't got
enough mucksy to argue. Anyway. Here it comes.
Speaker 4: How do you know I can't see I know pair
they see coming into the city.
Speaker 1: Yeah, okay, but we're not slowing down. Well, we've got
to slow down there. This is a local. Some train
has got to stop.
Speaker 4: Maybe there's some other local, but this one isn't gonna stop,
or there is a station there isn't there russo it says,
it says thirty fifth and nearly don't. Yeah, that's what
it says, or said, We're already passed it. For some reason,
trains just don't stop there. But I told you last
night I was a dream out.
Speaker 3: I was standing right over you, and we passed right
through as usual.
Speaker 1: You didn't go off, nobody got off.
Speaker 3: Whatever this station is, that just isn't a train that
stops here.
Speaker 1: I didn't feel well that morning.
Speaker 4: My mind wasn't working properly, or I might have thought
of calling the transit authority. But everything I did was automatic.
I laid out my patterns, and then at lunch I
went to the doctor with Marvin leading me by the
hand like I was a baby. It was nearly quitting
time before I got back from the doctor, and Goldman
was fit to be tied. So why are you gonna
claim now, Alvin seniority. You take almost the whole afternoon
off without a whirl. I was to the doctor.
Speaker 1: Fact you couldn't see him on your own time. Maybe
it was your head that needed examining.
Speaker 4: Look what you did here, and your friend mav already
cut saw.
Speaker 1: What can we do? I'm in the factor's hands already.
But what is it?
Speaker 4: Miss mister Goldman expected three more address?
Speaker 1: This is out of these bolts of cloth?
Speaker 4: Didn't I tell you to skimp on the pattern? I forgot?
How could you forget with that?
Speaker 1: Look? I'm sorry. I went to the doctor. I only
the doctor. You'll give me heart failure.
Speaker 4: The whole line is a disaster before we even got
one dress. I might as well end up in bankruptcy
by your fire.
Speaker 1: I don't want to see you again. You're lucky.
Speaker 4: I don't fire your friend, mister, don't give me any occupants.
Speaker 1: Horror. It s quitting time. I'm in enough trouble with
the union to begin with.
Speaker 4: So let's close up. Maybe tomorrow, maybe next week. We
won't open again. That's the way things die. Mar Mom,
I'm sorry, forget it, forget it. Let's have a fling.
Even knows we need a lyft. Come on, I'll buy
you a drink at Leven's before we take the subway home.
Speaker 1: Uh look, I am, look, I am, I don't know
what I missed you. Good luck for the way it goes,
it don't matter.
Speaker 4: I'll get the severance, pay some pension and the beauty part.
Speaker 1: The insurance. But insurance, the life insurance got you to take
care of Esther and Rebecca. What are you talking about?
Life insurance? You made me see the doctor. Huh So
what did he say?
Speaker 4: Yeah, I got a that's something I ain't sure I
know how to tell you that ventricular filibration. The doctor wondered,
I should go in the hospital right away. So why
didn't you WI eat up all the money in hospital.
I'll go home or rest. I haven't got a job anymore.
Speaker 1: Rest with Esther and Rebecca. I'll give it a try.
Thanks for the drink.
Speaker 4: You wouldn't believe, Marvin, a glass of whiskey could make
me feel so good. Come on, let's go home. Ob
Mov's protests, we got into the subway. I did feel good,
like I was young again, like I didn't care, and
I had this crazy idea I was gonna try because
the possibility to find out would never come around again.
I'm not gonna pass it ever again.
Speaker 1: A subway don't stop at this station? Why not? What
do I know?
Speaker 8: Why not?
Speaker 1: There's gonna be a reason. So how come the conductor
doesn't It's.
Speaker 3: A brand new subway out call the transiss.
Speaker 1: I never had the chance.
Speaker 4: Just the same here it comes thirty fifth and nearly
this time.
Speaker 10: I gotta know, Alvin, wait, I gotta know. I gotta
find out out.
Speaker 4: The doors open.
Speaker 1: You can't open these. I'll get out between the far Wait.
Speaker 5: Wait, wait, Alven, Wait hold the helven, hold it.
Speaker 1: Just a minute, mister, what's going on here? You poorly
emergency brain? Oh no, it was my friend. She wanted
to get off here.
Speaker 4: Why I don't exactly know.
Speaker 3: Why doesn't the train stop anyway?
Speaker 4: But there's nothing up there but mud flats in an
old city dump. Then what's the point of the station.
The city is fitting in the dump. There's a big
housing project going to go up there. I'll be finished
for a couple of years, but they'll need to stop.
Speaker 1: Then.
Speaker 4: Come on, we got to pick up your cookie friend.
He can't get out of here, it's all blocked up.
Speaker 1: You're going to arrest him. Sure, he could have caused
a panic. I've got a lot of people hurt, that's
the matter with him. Anyway.
Speaker 4: I don't think I could explain to your officer except
it's his heart. Hello, Wilen, Sarah, you're waiting again.
Speaker 9: This time I knew what's subway he behind? Come my darling,
Let's go home.
Speaker 1: That's all I want.
Speaker 8: That's what you got this time for good.
Speaker 4: See I told her there was no way out. Or
what's he what's he lying there for? He gets fits
or something?
Speaker 1: No? No, he Uh just hasn't done well lately. You
ain't just whishling Dixie. Yeah, I'm sorry to tell you, mister,
but your friend is dead. Heart attacker, Yeah, something like that.
I wonder what do you mean?
Speaker 9: Uh?
Speaker 4: Just I hope he found what he wanted. And Uh,
for the record, Guard, there's no doubt it was his heart.
Speaker 2: Mm tragedy or something nearer to all of our lives
escape death, of course, is always tragic, But if you
have belief in something beyond. Alvin Freiberg slippers on his feet,
Sarah by his side, and something too delectable to name
cooking in the kitchen for dinner, is a happier man
dead than alive.
Speaker 1: I'll be back shortly.
Speaker 2: It was Elizabeth Barrett Browning who wrote I love you
with the breath, smiles tears of all my life. Alvin
Freiberg could never have expressed himself so well, but beyond question,
he felt as deeply for his Sarah as Elizabeth Barrett
fell for Robert Browning. The quiet unnoticed ones love as
deeply and perhaps more securely than the great or famous.
Speaker 1: Let this be Alvin's epitheph and the end of his story.
Speaker 2: Our cast included Norman Rose nat poland Carol Titel and
Briana Raeburn. The entire production was under the direction of
Hyman Brown and now a preview of our next tale.
Speaker 1: But John, this is the only time we can call.
Speaker 2: When Dan Dingo at midnight, it's the only time he's
able to hear the voice of mortal man and.
Speaker 4: The clock just struck. Listen, he he's here, that's his voice. Shape,
that's just an ego way or listen, will you go back?
Speaker 1: Leslie? Who's sounds like Enop Frasier. He's come to to
en must be a nightmare. Enough does drink an awful lot.
Speaker 2: It's when Dan Dingo all right and justice is being done.
Speaker 1: I don't think Enoch's crimes were that's the reason. Well,
he's quiet now he's dead.
Speaker 2: Radio Mystery Theater was sponsored in part by anheuser Busch Incorporated,
brewers of Budweiser.
Speaker 1: This is E. G.
Speaker 2: Marshall inviting you to return to our mystery theater for
another adventure in the macabre. Until next time, pleasant dreams.