19 Nocturne Boulevard (Julie Hoverson)

A question of reality.

Read by Julie Hoverson

Music by Sulatus

A full story in one - what happens when aliens come in peace, but land in the wrong place?

Loosely inspired by a story from O. Henry

A "classic sci fi" style retelling of a heartwarming story.

Cover art by Charles Austen Miller

Music from Enox

The demon Beelzebud returns to pester sisters Rena and Matilda...

[sequel to Force Majeure]

Music by Kevin MacLeod (incompetech.com)

Cover art by Julie Hoverson

Cameo from Super Haunted Stories

An actor teaches an alien to play the role of his life - himself.

The oddity of Lovecraft's work - this is a silly melodrama, rather than a horror story, but still has an odd charm all its own....

Where you find war, you find the dead.

And then you need a morgue.

As i threatened, adding another past show to my lineup.

Afterlives is a tale of what happens after death, or maybe afterlife....  and it isn't at all what you would expect.

posted with permission.

Guest starring Tiffany Romaine...

Ring Once for Death by Robert Arthur

From Amazing Stories March 1954

Music from The Brotherhood.

Collecting another telepath, the queen wishes to make a progress...

A hipster geek before there were hipster geeks, Tommy Reames drives fast cars plays tennis with the right set, and still finds time to write speculative papers on tesseracts and non-euclidian geometry.

so what if someone extrapolates from his work and gets into trouble?

Music from Moondark Project

Survival Tactics by Al Sevcik

from Amazing Science Fiction Stories October 1958

Music from Footage Firm and Incompetech.com

In show business, they say never work with kids or animals - but what about monsters?

Happy Happy VHS.

Episode 11 - Captivate

Everyone just gets carried away.....

In this sequel to Cry Wolf, Paul and Donna of B&B Investigations return with another case - this time hired on by the assistant to the head of Emperor Studios!

Cover Art by Brett Coulstock

A side trip to check for telepaths at a DC institution....  with the obvious outcome.

When everything is replaceable, what makes a man?

Men may be from Mars, but the women went there to get away....

A story of brain-melding.  I think I was a bit sleepy....

THE GATE TO XORAN

By Hal K. Wells

from Astounding Stories January 1931.

An interesting exercise regime.

No jibjab this week.

Life is a dream.

Or is a dream life?

Life is just a dream, duh-dee, dah-duh-dah, spend my whole life loving you, bah-dee-bah-dah-dah, promise to be true - LIFE would be a dream, sweetheart - hello, hello again, sh-boom it's a wonderful day again....

Music by Josh Woodward & Kevin MacLeod

Cover by Brett Coulstock

Scream Queen

Tiffany Romaine, an aging star of direct to video horror, finds things to not be what they seem at the horror convention "Schlock-O-Con"!

Music from the Footage Firm, and Audio Zombie

Cover art by Dennis Hager

Story by H.P. Lovecraft, read by Julie Hoverson
Cover art by Brett Coulstock
Music by Kevin MacLeod

A man lost at sea in a small dinghy wakes to find that something awful has risen....

(Keep in mind, these stories were recorded when Julie was still learning how to mix and work with audio - so the sound quality may be a little ... patchy.)

More fun Lovecraft stuff!

Art:  http://antemortemarts.com/tag/lovecraft/

Great discussion:  H.P. Lovecraft Literary Podcast

Story by H.P. Lovecraft, read by Julie Hoverson
Cover art by Brett Coulstock
Music by Kevin MacLeod

In a rainstorm, in the middle of the night, any shelter is better than nothing...  isn't it?

(this version is just Julie reading - we also have the fully dramatized version of this story in our collection)

(Keep in mind, these stories were recorded when Julie was still learning how to mix and work with audio - so the sound quality may be a little ... patchy.)

An interesting tone poem about the end of things.

Finding an advanced alien machine could change the course of history, right?

Stopping for strangers after dark on lonely country roads might be dangerous.

A couple who run a little store get made an offer that might save their business...

....or not.

Cover by Julie Hoverson

Photo by Kimberly Poole

Music from Leslie Hunt (album "Your hair is on Fire", on Jamendo)

Adapted by Julie Hoverson from several stories by Saki (H.H. Munro).

Four girls waiting for punishment tell tales of pranks they've pulled.

Cast List

• Vera - Beverly Poole
• Matilda - Lyndsey Thomas
• Helen - Julie Hoverson
• Nora - Chandra Wade
• Alice - Xandria Nirvana Barber

    Shock Tactics

• Heasant - Megan Lane
• Bertie - Jasper Loovis

The Boar-Pig 

• Stossen - Jody Montague
• Miss Stossen - Hillary Dixon

The Storyteller

• Bachelor - Cole Hornaday

The Open Window

• Nuttel - Kim Turner
• Aunt - Robyn Keyes
• Uncle - Rick Lewis

Alice's stunt doubles

• Caira Greenfield and Draven Schoberg

Music:  Kevin MacLeod (Incompetech.com)

Editing and Sound:   Julie Hoverson

Cover Photo:  Daniel O'Connell (courtesy of Stock Xchange.com)

"What kind of a place is it? Why it's an Edwardian girls' school, can't you tell? 

This way to the Headmistress' office..."

http://www.eastoftheweb.com/short-stories/UBooks/OpeWin.shtml

*************************************************************

[transcript follows]

The Saki Quartette

Adapted by Julie Hoverson from several stories.

I am a huge fan of H.H. Munro, who wrote under the pen name Saki in the early years of the 20th century.  His career ended prematurely when he was killed in The Great War at the age of 46.

Saki is mainly remembered today for the amazing story "The Open Window," which I encourage everyone to read before listening to this episode, so I don't spoil it for you.  It's available on Project Gutenberg, you can get a reading on librivox, it's around.  It is considered to be one of the best short stories ever written in English, right up there with The Lottery by Shirley Jackson.

While Saki wrote a number of supernatural, suspense, or speculative stories, his forte was relatively cruel humor - but always inflicted on those pompous enough that you didn’t feel too badly for them.  And since nobody really got hurt - unless you take it from a modern "mental damage" perspective, you can laugh.  Clovis Sangrail was an ever-recurrent character who sailed through many stories leaving havoc in his wake, but Vera from The Open Window reappeared from time to time as well (later described as a "flapper") - the two of them intersecting in The Almanac.

This episode is an homage to Saki, and incorporates elements from four of his short stories - Shock Tactics, The Boar-Pig, The Storyteller, and of course The Open Window - with a bit of wrap story that is entirely my own.

Three of the four principal girls were from my old high school's drama department, the fourth was me.  Several of the other voices were drawn from ART (American Radio Theater).  It's not a perfect recording - we can't seem to keep the pronunciation of "aunt" straight between us (including me) - and I hadn’t yet learned how to clean tracks perfectly yet, but overall it's fun and quite funny.

Episodes like this were one reason I determined form the start that I wasn't going to nail myself into a "horror story" format.  The name "19 Nocturne Boulevard" is suggestive of the dark side, but open-ended enough to go anywhere I wanted to go.

And as an aside, it has nothing to do with nocturne alley, is it, from Harry Potter?  Several people have commented on that, but when I created 19 Nocturne Boulevard, it was sometime around 2006, and I hadn’t - I may have heard of Harry Potter, but I never actually read the books.  This was entirely on my own.  It’s not a pun like Nocturne alley - nocturnally - was.

I remember the summer of sitting there and thinking I want a number, and an address that sounds cool - what's a cool street? While sitting around at meetings of American Radio Theater.

********************************************************

SAKI QUARTETTE

Cast:

• Olivia, host
• Vera [open window] [15], sly
• Matilda [boar-pig] [14], mischievous
• Helen [shock tactics] [10], eager
• Nora [storyteller] [11], shy, rules-bound
• Alice [15], older girl, screams a lot

[Shock Tactics]

• Bertie, Helen's older brother
• Heasant, their mother

[Boar-Pig]

• Stossen
• Miss Stossen

[Storyteller]

• Bachelor

[open window]

• Nuttel
• Vera's Aunt
• Vera's Uncle

OLIVIA    Did you have any trouble finding it?  What do you mean, what kind of a place is it?  Why, it's an Edwardian girls' school, can't you tell?  This way to the headmistress's office.

MUSIC   CHEEKY MUSIC FADES INTO

SOUND   CHEERFUL RUNNING CHILDREN, THEN FADES

SOUND   CLOCK TICKS LOUDLY, then under

[three girls sit on a bench outside the headmistress' office, waiting to be punished]

SOUND   COUGHS, FIDGETS.  SMALL FOOT KICKING CHAIR.

HELEN   Why send us here if we're only to wait?

NORA   [startled]  Huh?  What?

HELEN   Oh, Nora.  I wish I could sleep with my eyes open.  I said, 'Why--'

ALICE   [superior]  To put us into the proper frame of mind.  To contemplate our misdeeds. 

HELEN    That's silly - I've been thinking about anything and everything BUT my misdeeds.

ALICE   That's adults for you.

SOUND   FOOTSTEPS APPROACH.  MATILDA SITS.

MATILDA   Well, well.  Fresh blood?

ALICE   They don't look very promising.

HELEN    [huff] I'll have you know I've been called on the carpet plenty of times--

MATILDA   [sweetly, cutting her off] --don't care.  Besides, I wasn't referring to that.  [aside, to Alice]  You're right, they're not much good.  I think one of 'em is a waxwork.

ALICE   Oh, well--

SOUND   DOOR OPENS.  SLOW FOOTSTEPS.

VERA   [heaves a deep sigh]  Your turn, Miss Tramplethorpe.

ALICE   Once more into the breach.

SOUND   BENCH SQUEAKS AS SHE STANDS.  SLOW FOOTSTEPS.  DOOR SHUTS.

VERA   If you don't mind, I'll join you for a bit.

NORA   But you should be getting back--

SOUND    FOOTSTEPS, BENCH

MATILDA   Not a mannequin, then.  No one will notice, at least for a bit.  Was it truly awful, Vera?

VERA   Rather. 

SOUND   MUFFLED BY DOOR, SOUND OF SIX SMACKS [RULER ACROSS HAND] UNDERLIE THE TALKING.

NORA   What did you do?  What did ...she do?

VERA   I?  I did nothing.  I will swear it to my grave.

MATILDA   It's vulgar to ask for details.

HELEN   I talked back to a teacher.  I've been told.  She didn't make any mention of it at the time, but I got a note sending me here.

NORA   It's all quiet now, is it ...over?

MATILDA   Of course not.  There's always castigation. 

HELEN   Isn't that immodest?

MATILDA   [sighs impatiently]

VERA   It means Miss Twicket will be talking at her for some time.  Then there may be more strokes, depending on whether she is contrite.

NORA   Are you contrite?

HELEN   [superior] It's vulgar to ask.

VERA   [chuckles] But I'm not.  It was entirely worth it.  [to Matilda, over the smaller girls]  I'll have to get back soon, Matilda, should we have a quick go-round?

MATILDA   Without Alice?

SOUND   ALICE WAILS, MUFFLED BY THE DOOR.

VERA   [wincing] She'll likely be a while. 

MATILDA   What about the small fry?

NORA   That's not very nice.

HELEN    I'll have you know--

VERA   Oh, let's.  They'll never split on us - will you?

NORA   But - but - but what is it you--?

HELEN   [eager] I'll never tell.  I'm not a sneak.

NORA   But we don't even know what--

MATILDA   Promise or you'll never know.

HELEN   I promise.  I'll never reveal anything, even under torture with wild horses.

NORA   Well...

HELEN   If you don't promise, you're doing me out, too.

NORA   [reluctant]  I don't know.  Ow!  [she's been pinched] I won't tell!! 

VERA and MATILDA laugh.

VERA   It's not so very awful, ducklings.  We have a bit of a club - we call it the Ducks and Geese.  We each take any chance we get to play little tricks on people, and then share the stories.  We're the ducks...

HELEN   And they are the Geese?  

MATILDA   Yes.  And whomever has the best story, wins. 

NORA   Wins?  What?

MATILDA   Vera here is quite a champion liar.

VERA   [correcting]  I prefer the term "romancer."

MATILDA   We always meet here, so we all have to get ourselves into scrapes from time to time, just so we can link up.

HELEN   [excited, but controlling herself]  How does one join?

MATILDA   You have to have a story.  Something good.  I've got a lovely one from last summer holiday.

VERA   Oh, I expect I can top it.

SOUND   SLAPPING AGAIN, SIX OF THE BEST. 

ALICE    [off] [HOWLS in pain]

HELEN   [chagrined]  Oh.  Goodness.  [beat] well, I haven't really...

NORA   I would never--

MATILDA   [dry]  I'm shocked.  [to Vera]  Oh, well, we'll have to talk later.  Perhaps Alice will be out soon.

HELEN   Since I didn't know to prepare, what if I have a truly lovely story, even though it wasn't me that did the joke?

MATILDA   I don't think so.  Sorry.

VERA   Well...  We might listen.  It will pass some time, and then we can deliberate.

MATILDA   It had better be good.

HELEN   I think so - My older brother has a friend--

VERA   Oh, not a friend of a friend tale - those are old enough to have beards.

HELEN   --this friend is quite the card.

MATILDA   An ace or a joker?

HELEN   His name is Clovis Sangrail.

[SILENCE FOR A MOMENT]

VERA   Oh-ho! 

MATILDA   Truly?  You know Clovis?  Perhaps we should make you a member just on the basis of that. 

NORA   Who is Clovis Singrill?

VERA   [very superior] Sangrail.  He is our own Jove - the very top of the tree when it comes to our sort of japes.

MATILDA   Absolutely the lobster's dress shirt.  Though if I do say so myself, a distant cousin of mine, Reginald, is starting to make a good showing.

VERA   Go on, then.  You must tell us your Clovis story.  We might decide to be kind, even if it would be nepotism of a sort.

MATILDA   Clever by association.  What was your name, again, duckling?

HELEN   Helen.  Well, my oldest brother Bertie was chafing terribly, since being nearly 20, he felt mother should stop reading his private correspondence.

VERA   Oh, I cured mine of that long ago.

HELEN   Yes, but Bertie's simply not assertive - not on his own. 

SOUND   MUSIC FOR FLASHBACK SCENE

HELEN   [fading] So one day, a letter arrives...

MRS. HEASANT   [off, a wail, then coming on]  Ohhh!  Helen!  Oh, heavens, Helen!  Bertie is in the toils of an adventuress!  [ominously]  Her name is Clotilde!

HELEN   Truly, mother?  Where?  In the rose garden?

MRS. HEASANT   No!  In the post!

HELEN   How did they fit in the post?

MRS. HEASANT   Hssh!  Listen to this:  "Bertie, carissimo, I wonder if you will have the nerve to do it.  Don't forget the jewels.  They are a detail, but details interest me.  Yours as ever, Clotilde.  Postscript - Your mother must not know of my existence.  If questioned swear you never heard of me." 

HELEN   Clotilde?  I don't know of any--

MRS. HEASANT   Well, your brother certainly does!

HELEN   Perhaps he only just--

MRS. HEASANT   Oh, no!  "As Ever" she says!  As ever!  They've been carrying on under my very nose for ...who knows how long.

HELEN   [narrating]  When my brother returned home, mother braced him with the incriminating Clotilde, and of course he denied it.

MRS. HEASANT   How well you have learned your lesson!

HELEN   He really didn't make much of it, and when she insisted he would have no dinner unless he confessed, I saw him take rather a quantity of sandwich materials up to his room with him.  Then, with the next post:

NORA   [completely enthralled] Another letter?

HELEN   Oh, yes. 

SOUND   INSISTENT KNOCKING ON DOOR

BERTIE   [muffled, speaking through door]  What is it this time?

MRS. HEASANT   Miserable boy!  What have you done to Dagmar?

BERTIE    [muffled]  It's Dagmar now, is it?  It will be Geraldine next.

MRS. HEASANT   [in absolute hysterics]  That it should come to this, after all my efforts.  It's no use; Clotilde's letter betrays everything.  [reading] "Poor Dagmar.  Now she is done for I almost pity her.  The servants all think it was suicide.  Better not touch the jewels till after the inquest.  Clotilde."  [leaves off with a wail]

SOUND   DOOR OPENS

BERTIE   I don't suppose this letter betrays who this Clotilde is?  Seriously, mother, if you go on like this I shall have to go fetch a doctor; I've often enough been preached at about nothing, but I've never had an imaginary harem dragged into the discussion.

SOUND   DOOR SLAMS

HELEN   Mother could have used a doctor, for she was utterly purple about the face from screaming, and had to go and have a lie down - at least until the next post.

SOUND   KNOCKING ON DOOR, MUCH SUBDUED

MRS. HEASANT   [also much subdued] Bertie?  Bertie, darling?

BERTIE   What is it this time?  Have I stolen the Mona Lisa?

MRS. HEASANT   No.  You... have another letter.  From ... Mr. Sangrail. 

SOUND   DOOR IS FLUNG OPEN

BERTIE   [not giving an inch]  Why not go on and tell me what he has to say? 

MRS. HEASENT   [clears throat, then reads, much abashed]  "Dear Bertie.  I hope I haven't distracted your brain with the spoof letters.  You told me the other day that ...somebody... at your home [ahem] tampered with your letters, so I thought I would give them something exciting to read. [slowing with embarrassment]  The... shock might do them good..."

HELEN   [finishing up]  And then, Bertie threatened to get a nerve specialist in to look at mother, since she was obviously far too highly strung - and she couldn't possibly stand the scandal, she said - and they agreed he wouldn't - but only if she would stop.  Reading his mail, you see.

NORA   [concerned]  But, did she?

HELEN   [ominous] So far.

MATILDA   We'll review your application.  Next?

NORA   I?  Oh, I truly don't have anything...

VERA   [warning] You'd best think of something.  We can't have outsiders hearing all our secrets.

MATILDA   I'll go ahead and tell mine - it's not so exotic as to cause a panic, and it will give this little gosling time to think.

VERA   I suppose so.  What do you think, Helen?

HELEN   [surprised and thrilled] Me?  Oh!  [trying to sound grown up and important]  Oh.  I think we should give her one more chance.  She had no time to prepare, after all.

SOUND   SMACKING AGAIN FROM WITHIN, ALICE WAILS

MATILDA   Speaking of preparing - I'd best be quick, as I believe I'm next for the chop.  Very well, I was staying with my aunt in the country, and it was the day of a very important garden party - some princess was attending and everyone wanted to come.  My aunt gloated over the guest list for days. 

VERA   What is it with aunts?  It's as if we all have at least one who is utterly impossible.

NORA   [something is coming to her] Ah!  Aunts...

MATILDA   Mine told me to be on my best behavior, and to imitate my insipid cousin, Claude, which would have been quite horrible. 

HELEN   [bold, trying to sound knowing] I think everyone must have a cousin Claude or Eggbert, or ... something [falters] as... as well as an aunt...

MATILDA   [sigh, eye roll] So... so, when they got on me for eating too much raspberry trifle at luncheon, they said over and over that Claude would never do a thing like that.  So when Claude went down for his nap - imagine, he's all of 11 and still goes meekly to afternoon naps like an infant.

GIRLS    [SNICKER]

VERA   He's the type who will end up married to someone quite overbearing.

HELEN   Like an aunt?

GIRLS    [SNICKER TERRIBLY]

MATILDA   While he was napping, I took the opportunity to take a huge dish of raspberry trifle and force feed it to him - well, much of it got on his sailor suit and the bed, but enough went down him that they will never again be able to say he's never eaten too much raspberry trifle.

VERA   Oh, that's a good one!

NORA   I do have a story!

MATILDA   I'm not finished - that is merely the prologue to my tale, explaining why I was sitting in the back paddock, rather than prancing about the garden party with Claude and Auntie.

NORA   Oh!  I'm so--

VERA   Shh.  Pray continue, scherezade.

HELEN   I thought her name was Matilda?

VERA   Oh, hush.

MATILDA   [taking a deep breath]  So I was sitting in a medlar tree, being stupefied with boredom, when I saw two ladies, dressed as if for the garden party, sail through the paddock in an attempt at infiltration.

HELEN   Weren't they rather obvious?

MATILDA   There was really no one there to see, excepting myself.  And they never once looked up as they passed by.  Well, with no ulterior motive in mind, I decided to let aunt's prize boar-pig, Tarquin Superbus, into the paddock behind them.  It had absolutely nothing to do with the fact that I knew the gate they were aiming for was locked and they would be forced to come back the same way.

GIRLS    [GIGGLE]

SOUND   MUSIC FOR FLASHBACK

MATILDA   So, when they did...

SOUND   OUTDOORS AMBIANCE.  BIRDS.  SLIGHT PIG SNUFFLING IN THE BACKGROUND

MRS. STOSSEN   [fading in] I stopped Mrs. Cuvering in the road yesterday and talked very pointedly about the Princess.  If she didn't choose to take the hint and send me an invitation it's not my fault, is it?

SOUND   DEEP PIG NOISES

MISS STOSSEN   Oh!

MRS. STOSSEN   Oomph! [pulling up short, irritated] What?  Oh!  What a villainous-looking animal, it wasn't there when we came in.

MISS STOSSEN   It's there now, anyhow.  I mean, what on earth are we to do?
I wish we had never come.

BOTH STOSSENS   Shoo!  Hish!

SOUND   CLOSER, DEEP PIG NOISES

MATILDA   [slightly off] If you think you'll drive him away by reciting lists of the kings of Israel and Judah, you're laying yourselves out for disappointment.

MRS. STOSSEN   Oh!  Little girl! 

MISS STOSSEN   Can you find someone to drive away--

MATILDA   [French] Comment? Comprends-pas. [cohm-oh? cohm-prawn pah - what? I don't understand]

NOTE   MATILDA'S FRENCH IS REASONABLY SMOOTH.  MRS. STOSSEN'S IS VERY BAD.

MRS. STOSSEN   Oh, are you French?  Etes vous Francaise? [et voo fran-sehz? - are you French?]

MATILDA   Pas du tout.  Suis Anglaise.  [pah doo toot.  sweez ahn-glehz - not at all.  I'm English]

MRS. STOSSEN   Then why not talk English?  I want to know if--

MATILDA   Permettez-moi expliquer.  [pair-meh-tay mwa eks-plee-kay - let me explain] [narrating again] And I went into a rather long description of Claude and aunt and the raspberry trifle, ending with -- [slightly off again] ...and as an additional punishment I must speak French all the afternoon.  I've had to tell you all this in English, as there were words like 'forcible feeding' that I didn't know the French for.  Mais maintenant, nous parlons francais.  [may mant-noh, new par-lon frahn-say - and now, we will speak French]

MRS. STOSSEN   Oh, very well, tres bien [tray bee-ehn].  [with much difficulty] La, a l'autre cote de la porte, est...um... [la, a low-truh coat de la port, ehst... - there, on the other side of the door, is...] 
[to Miss S] um, a pig?

MISS STOSSEN   Oh, goodness, un grenouille? [uhn grahn-wee?]

MRS. STOSSEN    No, no.  I'm reasonably certain that's a frog.  Oh, yes - un cochon. [uhn koh-shawn - a pig]

MATILDA   Un cochon? Ah, le petit charmant! [uhn koh-shawn?  Ah, le pet-eet shar-mont! - a pig,oh the little sweet!]

MRS. STOSSEN   Mais non, pas du tout petit, et pas du tout charmant; un bete feroce!  [may noh, pah doo too peh-teet, ay pah doo too shar-mont; un bet feh-rohs! - but no, not at all little, and not at all sweet; a beast ferocious!]

MATILDA   Une bete. [Oon bet]  A pig is masculine as long as you call it a pig, but if you lose your temper with it and call it a ferocious beast it becomes one of us at once.  French is a dreadfully unsexing language.

MRS. STOSSEN   For goodness' sake let us talk English then. 

MISS STOSSEN   Is there any way out of this garden except through the paddock where the pig is?

SOUND   OUTSIDE AMBIENCE ENDS ABRUPTLY

SOUND   FOOTSTEPS IN HALLWAY

GIRLS    [SHUSH THEMSELVES, PRACTICALLY STOPPING BREATHING, AS THE FOOTSTEPS GET CLOSER.]

NORA   [Hiccups.  She tries to smother it, but cannot.]

HELEN   [whispered] Shh.  Hold your breath!

SOUND   THE FOOTSTEPS ARE RIGHT ON THEM, AND STOP.

HELEN   [gasp]

NORA   [Hiccups continue.  She is almost crying with the effort of trying to stop.]

SOUND   FOOTSTEPS GO OFF.  AS SOON AS THEY ARE OUT OF EARSHOT--

VERA   Whew.  She's a tartar.

MATILDA   Not a sympathetic bone in her body.

HELEN   Why didn't she say anything?

VERA   She knows we're already in for it.

NORA   Well, [hiccup] you've already been in for it - was it really that [hiccup] bad?

SOUND   AS IF ON CUE, SMACKING AND ALICE'S WHIMPERS FROM BEHIND THE DOOR.

NORA   [gasps - her hiccups are now gone]

HELEN   So what happened with your boar-pig?  Did he devour the invaders?

MATILDA   Devour them?  Oh no - Tarquin Superbus prefers rotten fruit to interlopers any day.  They bribed me to lead him away.  I don't think they were best pleased about it, once they realized what a sweet disposition he has.

NORA   But of course, they were in the wrong, trying to crash a party like that.  So you were merely punishing them.

VERA   Right and wrong have less than nothing to do with it.  We're not the courts, or even public opinion.  A joke is a joke, even if it's on a perfectly nice person who doesn't deserve it in the least.

MATILDA   Though it is much more fun, and less likely to get one into severe hot water, when the person joked on can't complain without revealing their own shortcomings.

NORA   I --

VERA   Speak up gosling.  A sentence is comprised of at least two words.

NORA   [whispered] I might ... have a story.

MATILDA   Five!  And with a full stop.  Alright, then, pray continue.

NORA   We were on a train.  It was some years back, and my aunt was exceedingly boring.  There was a gentleman in the carriage with us, and when he stooped so low as to criticize my aunt's storytelling abilities, she dared him to tell one.

MUSIC   FOR FLASHBACK

NORA   [sounding very young throughout flashbacks] Yes, please - tell us a story!  [narrating] Anything would have been better than my aunt's stories - you would have thought she was never a child herself.

MATILDA   I say, there's an idea - perhaps aunts arrive like motorcars, fully assembled from the factory?

VERA   Shh.  Give ear to the duckling.

NORA   [pause] Oh, me?  Yes.  Well, the story--

SOUND   MUSIC FOR FLASHBACK.  TRAIN LOOP BEHIND BACHELOR

BACHELOR    Very well.  Once upon a time, there was a little girl called Bertha, who was extraordinarily good.  She did all that she was told, she was always truthful, she kept her clothes clean, learned her lessons perfectly, and was polite in her manners.  She was ...horribly good.

VERA   [slightly off] Can one be horribly good?  Truly?

MATILDA   [slightly off] Claude.  Definitely.

VERA   [agreeing] Mm.

BACHELOR   She was so good, that she won several medals for goodness, which she always wore, pinned on to her dress.  They were large metal medals and they clinked against one another as she walked.  No other child in the town where she lived had as many as three medals, so everybody knew that she must be an extra good child.

NORA   [young, gleeful] Horribly good.

BACHELOR   The Prince got to hear about Bertha, and said that as she was so very good she might walk in his park. 

NORA   [young] Were there any sheep in his park?

BACHELOR   No.  There were no sheep.

NORA   [young] Why weren't there any sheep?

BACHELOR   Because the Prince's mother had once had a dream that her son would either be killed by a sheep or else by a clock falling on him. The Prince never kept a sheep in his park or a clock in his palace.

VERA   Oh, very good. 

MATILDA   Was this fellow passenger by any chance a long, lithe, languid type with a somewhat nasal voice?

NORA   No, why?

VERA   She was wondering whether you've encountered Clovis as well.  Roll along.

NORA   Oh, so, um, he said the park was full of little black, gray, and white pigs, and --

BACHELOR   --Bertha was rather sorry to find that there were no flowers in the park. She had promised her aunts, with tears in her eyes, that she would not pick any of the kind Prince's flowers, and she had meant to keep her promise, so of course it made her feel silly to find that there were no flowers to pick.

NORA    [young] Why weren't there any flowers?

BACHELOR   Because the pigs had eaten them all.

VERA   [to Matilda] You know, I'm becoming quite convinced you're right, though the story hardly sounds vicious enough for Clovis.

NORA   Oh, I just haven't gotten to the-- um...

VERA   To the "um..."?  Very well.

NORA   Bertha was just thinking--

BACHELOR   [falsetto] --'If I were not so extraordinarily good I should not have been allowed to come into this beautiful park,' and her medals clinked against one another to remind her how very good she was.  Just then an enormous wolf came prowling into the park to see if it could catch a fat little pig for its supper.  The first thing that it saw in the park was Bertha; her pinafore was so spotlessly white and clean that it could be seen from a great distance.

MATILDA   I have never heard a better argument against cleanliness.  I shall go out and get myself despicably filthy forthwith.

HELEN   After your visit inside.

MATILDA   [annoyed] THANK you.  I had actually managed to forget that for a bit.

NORA   [quickly jumps in]  Bertha saw the wolf and she began to wish that she had never been allowed to come into the park...

BACHELOR   ...She ran as hard as she could, and the wolf came after her with huge leaps and bounds.  She managed to reach a shrubbery of myrtle bushes and hid herself.  The wolf came sniffing among the branches, its pale grey eyes glaring with rage.  Bertha was terribly frightened, and thought to herself: [falsetto]  'If I had not been so extraordinarily good I should have been safe in the town at this moment.'  However, the scent of the myrtle was so strong that the wolf could not sniff out where Bertha was, so he thought he might as well go off and catch a little pig instead.  

VERA   Definitely not Clovis.

NORA   [cross, almost yelling]  LET ME FINISH!

MATILDA   Hmph!  Well, proceed.

NORA   Bertha trembled and the medal for obedience clinked against the medals for good conduct and punctuality.  

BACHELOR   The wolf heard the sound of the medals clinking and dashed into the bush, dragged Bertha out, and devoured her to the last morsel.  All that was left were her shoes, bits of clothing, and three medals for goodness.

HELEN   Were any of the little pigs killed?

MATILDA and VERA laugh somewhat scornfully

NORA   Funny, that's just what my brother asked.  No.  They all got away.  We all agreed it was the most beautiful story we'd ever heard - well, except for aunt, who seemed to find it highly improper.

MATILDA   We shall have to write to Clovis and find out if he's been engaged in the railway storytelling circuit.

VERA   [chuckles] 

NORA   This was some years ago, when I was quite young.

VERA and MATILDA chuckle again.  HELEN joins in, but a bit too loudly.

VERA   I fear, my darlings, that I shall still take the palm today, for I had occasion recently for the most stupendous jape of all... 

[PAUSE]

HELEN   Well?

VERA   I am composing myself.

NORA   [gasps]

MATILDA   Oh, not again.

NORA   [hastily reassuring] No, no.

VERA   I am ready.  I must be careful and include all the vitally important details, for this was more than a mere trick on an aunt...

SOUND   MUSIC FOR FLASHBACK

VERA   [narrating] There was a tedious little man visiting our neighborhood for some sort of rest cure.  [to Nuttel]  Do you know many of the people round here?

NUTTEL   Hardly a soul.  My sister stayed nearby some four years ago, and she gave me letters of introduction to some of the people here.

VERA   [calculating]  Then you know practically nothing about my aunt?

HELEN   More aunts?

MATILDA   Aunts are universal.  Now Shh.

NUTTEL    Only your aunt and uncle's names and the address.

VERA   Uncle.  Oh I see.  [confidential] Aunt's great tragedy happened just three years ago.  That would be since your sister's time.

NUTTEL   T-Tragedy?

VERA   You may wonder why we keep that French window wide open on an October afternoon.

NUTTEL   It is quite warm for the time of the year, but ... tragedy?

VERA   [ominous] Out through that window, three years ago to a day, Aunt's husband and brothers went off shooting... and never came back.  In crossing the moor, they were engulfed in a treacherous piece of bog.  Their bodies were never recovered. [voice breaks]  That was the dreadful part of it.  Poor aunt thinks that they will come back some day, with uncle's little brown spaniel, and walk in that window just as they used to do.  [almost a whisper]  Do you know, sometimes on still, quiet evenings like this, I almost get a creepy feeling that they will all walk in through that window-- [shudder]

NUTTEL   Uh, yes...

SOUND   DOOR, SWIFT FOOTSTEPS

AUNT   I hope Vera has been amusing you?

NUTTEL   [spooked] She has been very... interesting.

AUNT   I hope you don't mind the open window.  My husband and brothers will be home directly, and they always come in this way.

NUTTEL   Um, yes.  [changing the subject]  Um, yes - [awkward pause] the doctors agree in ordering me complete rest and an absence of mental excitement.  On the subject of diet, they are less in agreement.

AUNT   [bored]  Ah? 

NUTTEL   Some opine that toast with marmalade is better for digestion, while other lean more towards toast without.

AUNT   [yawns]

NUTTEL   Still other physicians insist on no toast at all.  On the subject of eggs...

AUNT   [brightening]  Aha! Here they are at last!  Just in time for tea!

VERA   [narrating] I put on my best look of wide-eyed fear and stared - I always think of cats when I do that.

NUTTEL   [confused] What?  [panicked] Ahhh!

SOUND   RUNNING FEET, DOOR OPENS, SLAMS CLOSED.

NOTE   MILK THIS MOMENT FOR SUSPENSE

SOUND   OMINOUSLY SLOW, SQUISHY FOOTSTEPS APPROACH.  DOG YIPS MOURNFULLY, then

UNCLE   Here we are, my dear.  Who was that who bolted out as we came up?

AUNT   A most extraordinary man, a Mr. Nuttel.  Could only talk about his illnesses, and dashed off without a word of good-bye or apology when you arrived.  One would think he had seen a ghost.

VERA   I expect it was the spaniel.  [the awful truth]  He told me he had a horror of dogs.  He was once hunted into a cemetery somewhere on the banks of the Ganges by a pack of pariah dogs, and had to spend the night in a newly dug grave with the creatures snarling and grinning and foaming just above him.  Enough to make anyone lose their nerve.

MATILDA   Oh, bravo - two for the price of one!

NORA   How could he be afraid of a Spaniel?  They're so--

HELEN   Silly!  She was romancing!

NORA   Oh.  [thinks]  Oh! 

MATILDA   And her uncle wasn't dead either.

NORA   Well, I - I think I realized that.

SOUND   ALICE SCREAMING FROM BEHIND THE DOOR - HORRIBLE AGONY

HELEN   What? 

NORA   Eek!

VERA   [slightly shaken] That sounds dreadful!

MATILDA   [very shaken] And I'm next!

SOUND   ALICE SCREAMING TAPERS OFF TO A GURGLE

MATILDA   Poor Alice!

HELEN   Maybe the headmistress will wear herself out before she gets to us --

VERA   [calculating, then dry]  Perhaps, but then, she'll just summon a few prefects to help.

HELEN   Really?  But - but what could she be doing?

VERA   [knowing] Let's see, shall we?

SOUND   SLIGHT CREAKS AS SHE TIPTOES TO DOOR

VERA   Shh.

[pause]

ALICE    [Screams, muffled]

SOUND   DOOR SWINGS OPEN

ALICE   AAH! [notices door] Ahh?

SOUND   SCRAMBLING FEET, THEY ALL COME TO LOOK

NORA   Where's the headmistress?

MATILDA   Oh, jolly good one, Alice.  You gave me such a turn.

SOUND   SLOW SERIES OF HAND CLAPS

ALICE    Yes, yes.  No autographs, please.  Screaming does dry out my throat.

HELEN   It was just you...?

MATILDA   I believe, this time, that Alice takes the laurel. 

VERA   Oh, I don't think so.

MATILDA   Whyever not?

VERA   [grinning like a fiend]  Who do you think sent round the sham detention notices to bring us all here?

SOUND   A MOMENT, THEN GENERAL APPLAUSE

NORA   [confused] Oh? [getting it] Oh!

MUSIC

OLIVIA   Now that you know how to find us, don't be a stranger - we have enough of those already...

The first tale of the infamous Philo Gubb, correspondence school deteckative.

Music from Archive.org

Adapted by Julie Hoverson

A park where paedos drop dead, and an investigator who suspects ghostly interference....

Chapters 3 and 4!

The ship finally gets into orbit, and with difficulty must try and escape law enforcement.

Why is the psychic running?  Why are the "agents" chasing?

The new Body Suit.

A problem with fertility finds a strange rescuer.

JULIE WAKES UP AFTER BEING IN HBERNATION

let's hope she doesn't see her shadow and fall back into a coma.

Excavating ancient societies can be thrilling.... but who's the excavator, and who's the ancient?

What's inside the package that just appeared in the hangar bay?

Another adventure of Team E-O of the world Bugle - seeking news wherever it lies, and lying whenever it doens't!

Music by Josh Woodward

Cover art by Les Clay

Number 12 looks just like you! 

Story by H.P. Lovecraft, read by Julie Hoverson
Cover art by Brett Coulstock
Music by Kevin MacLeod

Far under the ocean, the crew of a U-Boat in WWI encounter something very .... deep.

(Keep in mind, these stories were recorded when Julie was still learning how to mix and work with audio - so the sound quality may be a little ... patchy.)

Olivia, that anonymous voice who opens every show, decides to read a couple of cheerful holiday stories.... which take a bit of a left turn when some of the characters won't behave.

Jane has company, Gerald examines one...

Afterlives is a tale of what happens after death, or maybe afterlife....  and it isn't at all what you would expect.

Story by H.P. Lovecraft, read by Julie Hoverson
Cover art by Brett Coulstock
Music by Kevin MacLeod

A pair of jaded reprobates need bigger and bigger thrills

...like stealing

...from the dead.

(Keep in mind, these stories were recorded when Julie was still learning how to mix and work with audio - so the sound quality may be a little ... patchy.)

A new player enters the game...

Oops - turns out it's four parts long.

:)

Hilarious!

The Fifth Dimension Catapult by Murray Leinster

PART 3

Music by Moondark Project

A new 8 part series!

Chapter 1 - Gavin Murdock gets himself a berth on a venusian slaver ship with a unique spacedrive.  But what is his secret motivation?

Adapted by Julie Hoverson from a story by Tom Curry as publlished in Astounding Stories in 1930.

A new exhibit at the museum lets loose something EVIL!

Cover art by Charles Austin Miller

With voice prep help by Reynaud LeBoeuf

Music by Wynn Erickson

our hero finds a reason to leave, but cannot get anyone else to vacate.

What to do if captured and studied by aliens.

The final chapter of the Golden Amazons of Venus - and not before time.

:)

A suspect - er - witness barges into the P.I.'s office to see what the dick knows, but finds only the secretary...

The Night Sucks more.

This is the final episode we finished.  I ran out of time and energy, and Broken eye Books and Clinton Boomer, while being awesome folks, were as shoestring financially as I am, so no hope of this being a "real job" any time soon.  Someday, when I'm rich and idle, we would LOVE to finish this.

:)

For now, you just have to visit Broken Eye Books and read the hard copy, to find out how this comes out.  Try it! 

https://www.brokeneyebooks.com/store/c8/The_Hole_Behind_Midnight.html#/

[Mature themes and violence]

A modernization of the story "Hop-Frog" by Edgar Allen Poe, turning it into a 1980s frat house horror movie.

A bunch of pranksters find out the joke's on them.

Written and produced by Julie Hoverson

Cast List
Frogger - Brian Lomatewama
Lydia - Megan Lane
Rex - James Turpin
Deanna - Chandra Wade
Uno - Justin Charles
Buzz - Lothar Tuppan
Trey - Danar Hoverson
Lucky - Cary Ayers
June - Kate Waterous
Lisa - Melissa Pang
Bob - James Sedgwick
Fred - Jonathon del Arroz
Dora - Melissa Bartell
Kathy - Suzanne Dunn

Music by Persson (available on Jamendo) 
Editing and Sound:   Julie Hoverson
Thanks to Glen Hallstrom for sound assistance
Cover Design:  Dennis Hager

"What kind of a place is it?
Why it's a college locker room, in the classic era of
frat-house prank films, can't you tell?"

******************************************************************

POE-etic Justice

Loosely adapted from the story "Hop-Frog" by Edgar Allen Poe
by Julie Hoverson (19nocturne@live.com)

Cast:
[Opening credits - Olivia]
Frogger
Lydia Tripp
Deanna
Dora
Bob, Fred, Kathy, June

FRATS:
Rex Mason, fraternity head, etc.
Uno
Buzz
Trey
Lucky

OLIVIA      Did you have any trouble finding it?  What do you mean, what kind of a place is it?  Why, it's a college campus in the nostalgic era of screwball hijinks films, can't you tell? 

MUSIC

LYDIA     (Quotes from the original story) I never knew anyone so keenly alive to a joke as the king was. He seemed to live only for joking. To tell a good story of the joke kind, and to tell it well, was the surest road to his favor. Thus it happened that his seven ministers were all noted for their accomplishments as jokers.

AMB     LOCKER ROOM

UNO     Man!  Did you see the look on his face!

BUZZ     Like he'd never seen it bald before.

FRATS      [Hearty laugh]

TREY     That was you guys?  Oh, man. 

FROGGER     [muttered] It's gonna itch.

UNO     [less chummy] What?

FROGGER     [laughs unconvincingly] When the hair grows back.  It itches like a sonofabitch.

TREY, UNO, BUZZ     [chuckle]

UNO     [pretend serious] And Frogger would know!

TREY, UNO, BUZZ     [laugh hysterically]

REX     Cut him some slack, dudes.  Frogger's our pal.  He's a funny guy.

MUSIC

LYDIA     About the refinements, or, as he called them, the 'ghost' of wit, the king troubled himself very little. He had an especial admiration for breadth in a jest, and would often put up with length, for the sake of it.

MUSIC

REX     Are they gonna get here soon?

BUZZ     If Studs and Lucky got everything right.

REX     Cool, then.  This is gonna be a laugh riot.

BUZZ     When the froshes come walking into the rooms, each thinking they're gonna "get a little", oh yeah.

REX     Got someone with a tapedeck in each bathroom?

BUZZ     Too right!  We had to borrow an extra one from Delta pi, but that's cool.  It was Deanna made the tapes anyway.

REX     Frogger, what'd you get her to say?

FROGGER     [sigh, then, putting on a matching tone]  I gave her this script.  Should be funny as hell.

BUZZ     Here!  "oh, good!  You got my note!  I hope you don't mind that I'm a little... kinky.  [laughing and having a hard time reading]  I want you to undress and [collapses]

REX     What?

BUZZ     Gimme a minute!  [laughing, deep breath] undress and put on my underwear.  It's right there on the bed. 

BUZZ and REX     [hysterical fit]

REX     Not laughing, Frogger?

FROGGER     Just saving it til I see their faces.

REX     [agreeing chuckle]  That'll be boss.  Hey, you're into all that educated stuff.  What's up with this Woody Allen guy? 

BUZZ     That's that little Jewish nerd, right?

REX     This chick I was with last week says he's all hilarious, but I watched this movie - well, some of it, I was mostly macking on another hottie, and it was all like whining.

FROGGER     You want the brainhead answer or the real life one?

REX     Hit me with the smart one.

FROGGER     Woody Allen specializes in observational humor - looking at the angst and neuroses inherent in modern life and stepping aside and commenting on them. 

BUZZ     [elaborate yawn]

FROGGER     But mostly it is just whining.

REX     [laughs]  I knew it!

SOUND     DISTANT DOOR OPENS

BUZZ     Shh!  Here they come!

MUSIC

LYDIA     I believe the name 'Hop-Frog' was not that given to the dwarf by his sponsors at baptism, but it was conferred upon him, by general consent of the several ministers.

MUSIC

AMB     PARTY

REX     Grab me a brewski Frogger.

FROGGER     No problemo.

DEANNA     Why "Frogger"?  I mean, that's not like his real name, right?

REX     Duh.  You just gotta see him cross a street sometime.  Freaking funny.

DEANNA     Why do keep a little toad like that around?  Did you like lose a bet?

REX     Nah.  Frogger's pretty frosty, for a complete nerd.  He comes up with some truly awesome pranks. 

DEANNA     He would have to.  Just looking at him is like visual herpes.

REX     Nah, the guys like having him around, cuz next to a mini weenie like that, we all look like kielbassas.  Not that I don't look good anyway.

DEANNA     [chuckles seductively] Yeah, takes a whole can of vienna sausage to measure up to one ball park frank.

REX     Plumps when you get it hot, babe.

FROGGER     Your beer.  And a cocktail for you.

DEANNA     [cold] Thanks.

REX     Cool.  Hop along now, dude.  My term paper is due tomorrow.

DEANNA     See, that's where it's so much harder to be a girl than a guy.

REX     Why? 

DEANNA     No matter how smart she was, I couldn't keep a dog like that around.  We'd get a rep.  

MUSIC

LYDIA     I am not able to say, with precision, from what country Hop-Frog originally came. It was from some barbarous region, however, that no person ever heard of - a vast distance from the court of our king. Hop-Frog, and a young girl very little less dwarfish than himself, had been forcibly carried off from their homes.

MUSIC

AMB     OUTSIDE

LYDIA     Hiya, Tim!

FROGGER     [warm] Hey Lydia.

LYDIA     You, um, doing anything tonight?

FROGGER     Me?  No.  Did you need some help with something?

LYDIA     Me?  No.  I was thinking there's a showing of L'annee Derniere a Marienbad in Culver Hall tonight.  And after what you said about the surrealists [falters] I thought maybe--

FROGGER     Like a date?

LYDIA     [backing off]  Maybe.  [covering] Or as friends.  I mean, you don't have to pay or anything.

FROGGER     No, no!  I'd love to.  I'm just surprised you'd still speak to me. 

LYDIA     Because you hang out with the jackasses?  Nah.  I understand.  I wouldn't mind getting on someone's good side. 

FROGGER     [deep] It's not worth it.  Really.

LYDIA     But I'm lucky - I don't do anything that makes me a target.  Back in Fulton County, I hated being invisible.  Here, though?  It's a blessing.

FROGGER     Even in Fulton, I didn't have much of a choice.  Gotta run now.  Rex is planning a big party for the long weekend. 

LYDIA     He needs help?

FROGGER      Mostly he just wants people to give him ideas that he can take credit for later.

MUSIC

LYDIA     The king was sitting at his wine; but the monarch appeared to be in a very ill humor. He knew that Hop-Frog was not fond of wine, for it excited the poor cripple almost to madness; and madness is no comfortable feeling. But the king loved his practical jokes, and took pleasure in forcing Hop-Frog to drink.

MUSIC

ALL FRATS     Chug! Chug! Chug! Chug!

FROGGER     [drinking, gasping]

REX     Awesome.

FROGGER     [coughing]

BUZZ     Weenie.

ALL FRATS     [laugh]

FROGGER     [barely contained anger]  Keep 'em coming.

ALL FRATS     [approval]

REX     Take a breather, dude.  Mellow out first.  Besides, before you kiss the sky, we need your brain.

FROGGER     [breathing deep, trying not to get sick]  What do you expect it to do?

ALL      [laugh]

REX     We heard that Epsilon Omega is having a toga party.

ALL     Toga! Toga! Toga! Toga!

REX     Shh!  We're pissed we didn't think of it first. 

UNO     Very pissed.

REX     Since we don't want to look like copycatting dildoes, we need to come up with a better party. 

TREY     And quick - it has to be Friday.

LUCKY     Their party is Saturday.

BUZZ     And it has to be awesome.

UNO     And chicks have to be nearly naked.

REX     Well?

FROGGER     Hmm.  Garden of Eden.

BUZZ     We don't want any bible crap--

FROGGER     You wanted less clothes than togas.

UNO     That’s the dumbest--

REX     Hold on.  Are we talking fig leaves and stuff?  [considering] Hmm...

UNO     I ain't gluing nothing to MY Johnson.

FROGGER     Paint the bikini?

TREY     What?

FROGGER     Get a bunch of tempera paint, have everyone arrive in bikinis, lay out a bunch of tarps and paint each other. 

REX     You mean paint ON each other, right?

FROGGER     Duh.  I would suggest finger painting.

REX     [considering] Yeah.

FROGGER     And then everyone has to shower off...

REX     [up]  Yeah!  That is so boss!  Half naked chicks, AND you get to put your hands all over them.  Frogger, you are the MAN.

MUSIC

LYDIA     On some grand state occasion-I forgot what-the king determined to have a masquerade.  Hop-Frog, in especial, was so inventive in the way of getting up pageants, suggesting novel characters, and arranging costumes, for masked balls, that nothing could be done, it seems, without his assistance.

MUSIC

AMB     OUTSIDE

LYDIA     Hey Tim!

FROGGER     Lydia!  Hey.

LYDIA     [amused] Is this your idea?

FROGGER      What?

SOUND     PAPER

FROGGER     "you are cordially invited to a bikini painting party--"  Uh, no. 

LYDIA     Hmm.  Well, someone invited me.

FROGGER     [up] No!  I mean, don't come.  Those guys are dicks, and--

LYDIA     I wasn't planning to, unless you were asking.

FROGGER     Good.

LYDIA     I'm not much for drinking - or being around a bunch of drunks.

FROGGER     Good!

LYDIA     I suppose... I suppose you're kind of stuck there?

FROGGER     I have to be there for a while.  Until everyone's drunk enough that I can slip out.

LYDIA     Let's meet up later, then. 

SOUND     SHE WALKS AWAY

LYDIA     [calling back] Maybe I'll even let you paint me.

FROGGER     I-- uh-- okay.

TREY     Dude. 

FROGGER     [gasp of shock]

TREY     Nice little number.  I bet you get her out of the glasses and baggy sweater and she's a total fox.

FROGGER     [desperately lying]  Nah.  She's got no tits at all.  Just tissue.

TREY     Damn.  Chicks are such fakers.

FROGGER     [relieved sigh]

MUSIC

LYDIA     Hereupon the dwarf laughed (the king was too confirmed a joker to object to any one's laughing). Moreover, he avowed his perfect willingness to swallow as much wine as desired. The monarch was pacified.

SOUND     PARTY, LOTS OF LAUGHING, DISCO MUSIC

REX     Ni-i-ice.  Blondes look good in green.

JUNE     [GIGGLES]

REX     But are you a natural blonde?

JUNE     Only my bikini knows.

REX     Maybe it will tell me later...

JUNE     [giggles]

REX     See ya.  Hey Frogger.  I notice your hands are clean.

FROGGER     Just - um- came from the bathroom.

REX     Hmm.  Beauty idea about giving each guy a different color and starting a contest to see what girl can get the most colors.

FROGGER     Deanna's got quite a rainbow going.

REX     Is that a crack?

FROGGER     Huh?  No - just admiration.

REX     Ah, new guests.  Gotta mingle.

LISA     [giggle] Oh, look at you!  Are you someone's little brother?

FROGGER     You ever hear the phrase "Say Hello to my leetle friend"?

LISA      Yeah?

FROGGER     That's me.

LISA     [wide-eyed] You said that?

FROGGER     [sighs] No that's Scarface.  I'm "the leetle friend".

LISA     [giggles]

LYDIA     [off, calling]  Oh, there he is!

FROGGER     Oh shit.  Excuse me.

MUSIC

LYDIA     There was a dead silence for about half a minute, during which the falling of a leaf, or of a feather, might have been heard.

MUSIC

FROGGER     [hurried, whispered] What are you doing here?

LYDIA     Didn't you call?  Dora, at the dorm said--

FROGGER     No, I didn't.  You need to get out of here.

LYDIA     [puzzled, but laughing]  Why?  It looks kind of fun.

FROGGER     [frustrated noise]  No!  They're gonna--

BUZZ     I see someone wearing too much clothes!

LYDIA     Huh?

LUCKY     Did you bring your bathing suit, foxy lady?

FROGGER     She's not here for the party.  It's a mistake.

LYDIA     [annoyed] No it's not. 

TREY     Is this cuz of what you said about her?    

FROGGER     Just drop it.  You gotta go.

LYDIA     [sharp] What did you say?

FROGGER     Nothing.  C'mon, let's bail.

TREY     He said you got no boobs under there.

LYDIA     What?  What is wrong with you?  God, Tim, I thought you were my friend.

FROGGER     Lydia!  Don't!  I can explain--

TREY     Want to prove him wrong?

BUZZ     Of course, if you don't have a suit‑‑

SOUND     RUSTLING

LYDIA     Actually, I only have a one-piece.

FROGGER     Don't!

LYDIA     Chill out.

SOUND     RUSTLING AS SHE TAKES OFF HER TOP

ALL FRATS     [approving noises]

TREY     [walking away] Why don't I start - I am curious.  And I'm yellow.

FROGGER     [weak] No...

REX     C'mon dude.  Bottoms up.

SOUND     RATTLE OF ICE IN GLASS

MUSIC

LYDIA     Poor fellow! his large eyes gleamed, rather than shone; for the effect of wine on his excitable brain was not more powerful than instantaneous. He placed the goblet nervously on the table, and looked round upon the company with a half-insane stare. They all seemed highly amused at the success of the king's 'joke.'

MUSIC

SOUND     PAINT SLOSH

LYDIA     [laughing uncomfortably] That's cold!

TREY     I could warm you up a bit.  Maybe a hot shower.  I'll scrub your back.

LYDIA     [uncomfortable] I didn't say stop.

TREY     I haven't seen you at one of these before.  What are you, a hermit?

LYDIA     Just busy studying.

TREY     [suggestive] Do you study... anatomy?

LYDIA     I'm an english major.

TREY     This--[he's painting on her] is the bicep...

LYDIA     Yeah, I know. 

TREY     And this-- is the [drawn out] pec-to-ral...

LYDIA     [gasp of shock]  I think I'm - out of my depth.  I should go.

TREY     Nonsense.  There's seven more colors to go.  Everybody wants to get his hands on you.

LYDIA     No. No, look, this was a bad idea.

TREY     This-- is the gluteus maximus.

LYDIA     Stop!

SOUND     SLAPPING NOISE

TREY     Oh come on.  You don't want to leave this masterpiece unfinished, do you?

LYDIA     Let go of me!

REX     [overplayed] OK, what's going on?

TREY     Models.  They're so high strung.

REX     You should have a drink.  Frogger did.

LYDIA     I just want to go.

REX     [raising his voice]  Hear that everyone?  She just wants to go.

ALL     [everyone laughing]

DEANNA     Who does she think she is?

ALL     [more laughing, mostly guys]

SOUND     POUNDING ON A DOOR

FROGGER     [in closet]  Stop!  No!

REX     You know, these picnic bottles were a really good idea.

SOUND     SQUIRTS PAINT

LYDIA     [surprised shriek]

ALL     [laugh]      

LYDIA     [crying] Stop!

REX     Well, being the king, I had her first.  Who's next?

BUZZ     I got red, how bout I KETCHUP!

[squirting]

ALL     [laughing]

FROGGER     [in closet]  Nooooo!

MUSIC

LYDIA     The tyrant seemed quite at a loss what to do or say - how most becomingly to express his indignation. At last, he pushed the girl violently from him, and threw the contents of the brimming goblet in her face.

MUSIC

SOUND     BREATHING IN A CLOSED SPACE.  OCCASIONAL THUMPS AS FROGGER BEATS HIS HEAD AGAINST THE WALL; the party has run down

SOUND     DOOR OPENS

REX     Damn.  Almost forgot about you.  C'mon out.  Everyone's all gone home.

SOUND     FROGGER SCRAMBLES TO HIS FEET, THUMP AS HE SLAMS REX AGAINST THE WALL

REX     Unh!

FROGGER     You bastard!  You sonofabitch!

REX     C'mon dude.  It was just a joke.  No big deal.

SOUND     DRINKS FROM A BOTTLE

REX     Here.  mellow out.

SOUND     OFFERS THE BOTTLE

FROGGER     No big deal?  You- you--!

REX     Have a drink and get frosty, dude.  Or I might forget I have a big paper coming up and that you need fingers if you're gonna write it for me.

SOUND     FROGGER SNATCHES THE BOTTLE, DRINKS DEEP

REX     There you go.  That's a pal.

SOUND     FROGGER THROWS THE BOTTLE ACROSS THE ROOM, BOTTLE SMASHES

REX     [laughs heartily]  Yeah!  You cool?

FROGGER     [grim, teeth gritted] I'm completely frozen.

MUSIC

LYDIA     Hop-Frog endeavored, as usual, to get up a jest in reply to these advances from the king; but the effort was too much.

MUSIC

SOUND     SHOWER RUNNING

SOUND     PHONE RINGS, DISTANT, IS PICKED UP

DORA     Yello?  [up]  Lydia!

LYDIA     [yelling, still upset] I'm in the shower!

SOUND     A MOMENT, THEN POUNDING ON THE DOOR

DORA     It's that guy you like.  He wants to talk.

LYDIA     Tell him to sit on it!

MUSIC

LYDIA     "The beauty of the game," continued Hop-Frog, "lies in the fright it occasions among the women."

MUSIC

TREY     Man, he went total meltdown.

BUZZ     His eyes were all bugging out.

UNO     Gets all squeaky, like a little bitty piggie.

REX     Shh,  Here he comes.  [up]  Frogger, my man.  Have a brewski - we need you at the top of your game tonight.

FROGGER     Whatever.  [drinks]

REX     Jeez, check out Mr. Dickweed.  He needs to mellow out.  Bring on Mr. Cuervo. 

SOUND     LIQUID POUR

FROGGER      Just tell me what you need.

REX     Nuh-uh.  Not until you got a good buzz.  [serious]  Drink.

FROGGER     [sighs]

MUSIC

LYDIA     "What do you mean by that? Ah, I perceive. You are Sulky, and want more wine. Here, drink this!" and the king poured out another goblet full and offered it to the cripple, who merely gazed at it, gasping for breath.

MUSIC

REX     I don't know how we didn’t hear about it sooner, but Epsilon Omega is doing this medival banquet thing - and it's tonight!  It's sposed to be totally off the hook, with jousting and shit.

FROGGER     [muttered] Jousting's on horseback.

UNO     We gotta DO something! 

BUZZ     We gotta get in there and mess with them!

LUCKY     Epsilon Omega are such douches, we gotta show em up!

REX     But see, they won't let anyone in that ain't in a costume.  YOU need to get us in there.

FROGGER     You can't just rent some stuff?

UNO     All the shops are sold out!

TREY     We're like the only ones on the entire campus that didn't get an invite!

LUCKY     The pussies!

REX     And we gotta show them up at their own damn game!  So it's got be really really medival.  Come on!

UNO     And frogger, man, you're the king of this crap - the bikini painting party was completely the bomb!

FROGGER     [grim]  That.  Right.  Pour me another one.

MUSIC

LYDIA     The monarch was pacified; and having drained another bumper with no very perceptible ill effect, Hop-Frog entered at once, and with spirit, into the plans for the masquerade.

MUSIC

FROGGER     There is this thing--

BUZZ     Yeah?

FROGGER     Something really authentic and medival--

LUCKY     Dude!  Just spit it out!

FROGGER     I'm assuming you don't want to be lepers--

TREY     Like the cat?  I'd rather be a tiger.

FROGGER     No!  Leper.  Like all grody zombie-looking people.

REX     We could do that.

FROGGER     But this will be better.

REX     Yeah?

TREY     Dude, zombies are medival?

FROGGER     [sigh]  No.  No zombies.  And it has to be a costume we can put together really fast.

REX     Duh.  Party's tonight.

FROGGER     Back in the olden days, they had all sorts of weird party stuff they did.  And one of them was something called the eight chained orangutangs. 

BUZZ     Orangutangs?  Man they rock!  [makes farting sound]  That's like Clyde in Every which way but loose, eh? 

ALL     [start making monkey noises]

FROGGER     It does take eight guys, though...

REX     No problemo.  There's five of us here, plus Ricky, Finn, and uh - Marco.

FROGGER     [dark] Exactly the ones I'd'a suggested.

MUSIC

LYDIA     "The chains are for the purpose of increasing the confusion by their jangling. You are supposed to have escaped, en masse, from your keepers. Your majesty cannot conceive the effect produced, at a masquerade, by eight chained ourang-outangs!"

MUSIC

ALL     [making monkey noises]

FROGGER     BUT we have to get you dressed up!  Come on!

REX     [commanding] Shut up!  Listen to Frogger.  Save the monkey shit for later.

LUCKY     Yeah, man - monkeys throw their shit.  We should have something to throw!

BUZZ     I'm calling the costume shop.

FROGGER     You can't.

BUZZ     Who says?

FROGGER     You want to be all historical, right?

REX     Duh.

FROGGER     OK, well they didn’t have snazzy costumes way back when.

TREY     What did they do?

FROGGER     Covered themselves in tar, then rolled in flax.

BUZZ     What the hell is flax?

FROGGER     Fibers.  Looks like hair.

LUCKY     Tar is gross.  It never comes off.

FROGGER     You do it OVER clothes.  Like a track suit.

TREY     You expect us to get all tarred up and roll around in hair?  You're a complete--

REX     Genius.  We break into the party like this, and those dicks at Epsilon Omega will never be able to live it down.

MUSIC

LYDIA     The king and his ministers were first encased in tight-fitting stockinet shirts and drawers. They were then saturated with tar. A long chain was now procured. First, it was passed about the waist of the king, and tied, then about another of the party, and also tied; then about all successively, in the same manner, making a circle.

MUSIC

SOUND     CLANKING, SHUFFLING FEET

ALL FRAT     [muffled giggling]

SOUND     PASSING A BOTTLE

REX     Shh.  Watch out for the post, dumbass! 

TREY     There's a buttload of posts in an old warehouse.

UNO     Man, it's kind of cold.

FROGGER     [dark] Don't worry - you'll be warm later.

SOUND     MORE CLANKING

FROGGER     I checked out the layout earlier.  They've got a horseshoe of tables surrounding the middle of the room, with knights and wenches and all seated on the outside.  You should go round the outside of the room first, making trouble-

TREY     Grabbing chicks - "not my fault!  Orangutans like boobies!"

BUZZ     Beep-beep.

FROGGER     [exasperated] Yeah.  [up]  But then get to the center of the room, and I'll come in and get the crowd going.

REX     Dude, you are truly the man.

SOUND     DOOR OPENS, CLANKING STARTS LOUD

ALL FRATS     [monkey noises]

SOUND     [distant screams]

MUSIC

LYDIA     The eight ourang-outangs, taking Hop-Frog's advice, waited patiently until midnight before making their appearance. No sooner had the clock ceased striking, however, than they rushed, or rather rolled in, all together-for the impediments of their chains caused most of the party to fall, and all to stumble as they entered.

MUSIC

SOUND     WALKIE TALKIE NOISE

FROGGER     [hushed] Ok, they're in.  Wait for my signal.

SOUND     CRACKLE OF STATIC

LYDIA     [almost unrecognizable, on air] Gotcha.

FROGGER     We've got about five minutes...

MUSIC

LYDIA     The excitement among the masqueraders was prodigious, and filled the heart of the king with glee. As had been anticipated, there were not a few of the guests who supposed the ferocious-looking creatures to be beasts of some kind in reality, if not precisely ourang-outangs.

MUSIC

SOUND     [screams, laughing, monkey noises - behind doors]

SOUND     DOOR CRASHES OPEN

FROGGER     [squeaky british "jester" voice] Good folk!

SOUND     [some quieting, ape noises still going on]

SOUND     MICROPHONE SQUELCH

FROGGER     Good people!

SOUND     [quiet]

FROGGER     Good people!  I spy beasts in our midst!

FRATS     [ape noises]

CROWD     [ripple of laughter]

FROGGER     they must have escaped from a keeper!

REX     Dude, is that my mister microphone?

FROGGER     [not on mike] Shh. [on mike, playing it big] It speaks!  Perhaps it is merely a man in a fabulous costume?

FRATS     [hooting monkey noises]

SOUND     CROWD APPLAUDS

FROGGER     Leave them to me!  I fancy I know them.  If I can only get a good look, I can soon tell who they are!

SOUND     CHAIN RATTLES

FROGGER     Look at these muscles.  If not a beast, then a beast of a man, don't you think?

FRATS     [very butch monkey noises]

FROGGER     Perhaps there is someone here who can help me identify them.  You, Milady?

NOTE     [frogger is using the mike on the people he's talking with, but the frats are just yelling]

SOUND     SLOW MACHINE NOISE SNEAKS IN THROUGHOUT, A BIT OF CHAINS, TOO

DORA     Me?

FROGGER     I think you know that big one in front.  Do you not?

LUCKY     [chuckling] Oh, yeah, she knows me.  If you know what I mean.

DORA     [furious] He got me drunk and took topless pictures of me, that he posted all over the dorm!

LUCKY     What’s a dog like her doing at an Epsilon party?

DORA     You ... you bastard!

FROGGER     That's a big clue, but I still don't quite recognize them.  Maybe you, sir?

BOB     [stuttring]  They - all of them - cornered me in the locker room and pelted me with jockstraps!

BUZZ     Dude, it was a joke!

BOB     Every day?  For a semester!  It wasn't funny!

TREY     It was to us.

FROGGER     And you, fair maiden?

KATHY     [crying]  They tied me up and covered me in dip at one of their parties.

UNO     What's so bad about that?

KATHY     I got a rash!  And a yeast infection!

REX     Okay, we're out of here.  This ain't funny any more.

SOUND     CHAINS RATTLE, A COUPLE OF STEPS

FRATS     [reaction noises - ugh, hey, whoa! - as they trip, get pulled up short]

UNO     What the crap?

REX     The chains're caught on something.  Frogger!  Help us out here.

FROGGER     [annoucning] How blind they are, eh, gentle folks?

SOUND     APPLAUSE

MUSIC

LYDIA     With the rapidity of thought, he had inserted the hook from which the chandelier had been wont to depend; and, in an instant, by some unseen agency, the chandelier-chain was drawn so far upward as to take the hook out of reach, and, as an inevitable consequence, to drag the ourang-outangs together in close connection.

MUSIC

SOUND     MORE CHAINS, STRUGGLES

BUZZ     We're stuck!

REX     The chains got caught on that hook thing!  Can you reach it?

TREY     Give me a boost!

SOUND     MACHINE NOISE, HOOK RAISING

REX     What the crap?

UNO     We're chained at the waist, dumbass, how far you think you're gonna get climbing?

FROGGER     Little do they know that this party was thrown in their [sour] honor.  Is it not ironic that they were so caught up in their own amusement they didn't recognize a single one of the people they've wronged?

REX     You are so dead, you little shitball.  The minute we get out of here, your life will go to hell.

FROGGER     My life has been hell, you evil douchbags!  You think I liked being your little funny guy - your jester?  You think I helped you because I thought it was fun?  Every joke I helped with was like ground glass in my soul, and I still feel like I should be hanging up there with you.  [to crowd]  One more notch, and they'll be on tiptoe.  What do you think?

CROWD     [roars approval]

FROGGER     It's not as funny when you're the butt of the joke, is it?

UNO     Dude, just cut it out.  We've learned our lesson, and shit. man.

FROGGER     Lets see what the crowd thinks! 

CROWD     [booo]

FROGGER     Sorry.  Can’t let it go just yet.  How about you, milord?  What's your beef?

SOUND     HAND OVER THE MIKE NOISE

FRED     [not on mike] They're gonna bury us.

FROGGER     [not on mike] Not a problem.  C'mon.  Think of it as group therapy.

SOUND     MIKE UNCOVERED

FRED     [quick, ashamed] They duct taped my - my butt.

FROGGER     [sincere] I'm very sorry.

SOUND     CROWD SUBDUED APPLAUSE

SOUND     ANOTHER CRANK OF CHAIN

FRATS     [whoa!  They've been pulled off the ground]

MUSIC

LYDIA     The jester suddenly uttered a shrill whistle; and the chain flew violently up - dragging with it the dismayed and struggling ourang-outangs, and leaving them suspended in mid-air.

MUSIC

FROGGER     Ah, ha! I begin to see who these "people" are now!  But it's so dark in here.  Give me a tiki torch, someone.

DORA     Here.

FRED     Watch out - they'll kick you!

FROGGER     They could.  But then they'll start swinging.  It's not fun, hung up by your waist, is it?

UNO     You little shit!

TREY     Your ass is grass, man.

SOUND     STRUGGLING, CHAIN CREAKING, SWINGING

FROGGER     [to the crowd]  How many of us have been hung like this - by you, or those like you?

CROWD     [agrees]

FROGGER     [over elaborate]  Watch out!  Don't swing too close to the fire!

SOUND     FIRE CATCHES WITH A WHOOMPH

FRATS     [screaming]

CROWD     [screams]

FROGGER     Whoops!

MUSIC

LYDIA     "I now see distinctly." he said, "what manner of people these maskers are. They are a great king and his seven privy-councillors, - a king who does not scruple to strike a defenceless girl and his seven councillors who abet him in the outrage. As for myself, I am simply Hop-Frog, the jester-and this is my last jest."

MUSIC

AMB     OUTSIDE, NIGHT

SOUND     DISTANT FIRE TRUCKS

LYDIA     I can't even feel sorry for them.

FROGGER     Nope.

LYDIA     It helps, to know I'm not alone.

FROGGER     You should never feel alone.  I'm here.

LYDIA     I mean, that they hurt lots of people.

FROGGER     [self-loathing] And I helped.  Too many times. 

LYDIA     They would have done it anyway.

FROGGER     I can't forgive myself.

LYDIA     Could I?

FROGGER     Could you what?

LYDIA     Could I forgive you?

FROGGER     [a bit teary] That would be a good start.

MUSIC

LYDIA     It is supposed that Trippetta, stationed on the roof, had been the accomplice of her friend in his fiery revenge, and that, together, they effected their escape.

MUSIC

THE END

...

Cast List

• Herbert - Carl Cubbedge
• Warren - Glen Hallstrom
• Charles - Michael Coleman (Tales of the Extraordinary)
• Richard - Philemon Vanderbeck
• Edward - Mathias Rebne-Morgan
• Randolph - Sebastian Orr
• Elihu, uncle - Charles Austin Miller
• Ann, servant - Julie Hoverson

Music by incompetech.com and a-mclassical.com

Editing and Sound:   Julie Hoverson

Cover Design:  Julie Hoverson / Brett Coulstock

"What kind of a place is it?
Why it's Charles' study again, can't you tell?"

**********************************************************************

THE SHUNNED HOUSE (Lovecraft 5, #6)

Cast:

• Edward, a writer
• Charles, a dilettante
• Herbert, a scientist
• Richard, a painter
• Warren, a professor
• Randolph, cousin
• Elihu, uncle
• Ann, servant

OLIVIA     [opening credits] Did you have any trouble finding it?  What do you mean, what kind of a place is it?  Why, we've returned to Charles' comfortable brownstone, can't you tell? 

Scene 1.   

MUSIC

SOUND     MUSIC PLAYS

CHARLES    I should warn you all from the outset that this is a rather more mundane story than most of those brought to this gathering.

EDWARD    As long as you feed me this well, Charles, I'd listen to a story about a dog.

RICHARD    Oh?  I know this fellow in Andalusia...  A friend of a friend.

CHARLES    [cutting in] My story involves... a vampire.

EDWARD    And you tell us?  Right up front?  That's poor narrative framing.

CHARLES    No, no, there's a perfectly good reason to get it out in the open right away.

HERBERT    Vampires?  Haven't they been adequately explained by contemporary science?

CHARLES    See? 

WARREN    The existence of vampires has been .. debatable... for several centuries.

EDWARD    Ah.

HERBERT    The vampire myth is almost certainly explainable.  Most simply by common or garden anemia--

WARREN    Or any number of similarly communicable diseases, for example, consumption--

HERBERT    Tuberculosis.

WARREN    --which, until very recently, were often attributed to supernatural origin.

HERBERT    But now, with our understanding of germs and the vectors of infection, vampires must be relegated to the vast list of creatures that have been debunked.

CHARLES    [aside] I'll give Warren and Herbert one more minute.

RICHARD    I'm just stunned that they seem to be on the same side.  Science and History are usually at odds.

EDWARD    Fiction can go either way. 

WARREN    It's fascinating to consider the mindset that created a myth such as that of the vampire. 

RICHARD    Created?  You think someone sat down and designed them, like a new model of automobile?

WARREN    Created it to account for otherwise inexplicable events. 

EDWARD    More like a detective, trying to piece together a crime from the clues.

WARREN    Do you know that in historical folklore, vampires were said to always return and prey on members of their own family before passing to others?

HERBERT    Again, a simple disease contagion statistic.  With the substandard hygiene of past eras, it was almost inevitable that those in close proximity to a dying person were the most likely--

CHARLES    Enough! 

[moment of silence]

Scene 2.   

CHARLES    Thank you for the erudite exposition.  I'm quite sure we'll come back to this throughout the lecture.

EDWARD    [laughing] Please raise your hand if you have any questions.

RICHARD    Over here?

CHARLES    [chuckling]  The chair recognizes the commissioner for art.  Richard?

RICHARD    Thank you.  My question - does the name Stoker come into this story anywhere?

CHARLES    No.  Despite the nature of the central creature involved, or supposedly involved, the story has a long and verifiable history, which began well before any of such contemporary novels appeared on bookstands. 

EDWARD    I dunno - there have been similar creatures haunting Gothic novels for nearly two centuries.

WARREN    Aren't they all explained away by the end of the book? 

EDWARD    Only in Radcliffe.

RICHARD    You need a gavel, Charles, so you can call us to order.

Scene 3.   

CHARLES    My story is about a house.

EDWARD    A vampire house? [laughs]

CHARLES    Well....  A cursed house.

WARREN    A curse?  AND a vampire?

EDWARD    Do you mean a house in the sense of a family line or a physical house?

CHARLES    The latter.  This house happens to be in Providence.  And while I could lie and tell you this was another personal experience, in truth, it happened to a cousin of mine.

EDWARD    Your cousin is a vampire house?

HERBERT    You forgot to raise your hand, Edward.

CHARLES    This particular area of Providence was haunted by Poe in his day.  Sometime in the 1840s, he was wont to pass by this very house on visits to the poetess Mrs. Whitman. 

RICHARD    Whitman?  Should we know her?

EDWARD    We certainly know Poe.

CHARLES    She was an ardent spiritist and something of an early suffragette.  I haven't come across any of her writings myself.  Almost as much a draw as the lady, though, St. John's churchyard was also along Poe's route.

EDWARD    Is Poe in this story?

CHARLES    He's merely making an appearance for historical perspective.  Setting the time and place.

WARREN    Understood.

CHARLES    The point - the irony is this - the world's greatest master of the terrible and the bizarre regularly passed a particular house on the eastern side of the street; a dingy, antiquated structure perched on the abruptly rising side hill.  There is no evidence that he even noticed it.  And yet that house, to certain persons, equals or outranks in horror Poe's wildest phantasy.

EDWARD    [avid] Now we get into it!

CHARLES    The house was - and for that matter still is - of a kind to attract the attention of the curious.  It followed the colonial lines of the middle eighteenth century - the prosperous peaked-roof sort of farm house; two stories; dormerless attic; Georgian doorway and interior paneling.

RICHARD    All the best accoutrements of the mid 1700s?

CHARLES    Ayup.  Facing south, it's buried to the lower windows in the hillside, and exposed to the foundations on the street.

RICHARD    [knowing] I've seen a few of those.

CHARLES    Its construction, over a century and a half ago, followed hard upon the rerouting of the nearby road.  Benefit Street - at the time called Back Street - wound through the graveyards of the first settlers.  It was straightened only when the removal of the bodies to the North Burial Ground made it decently possible to cut across the old family plots.

EDWARD    Aha!

HERBERT    A house built over the miasmatic remains of a graveyard?  Simply begging for some festering disease to seep in through the foundation.

Scene 4.   

WARREN    Uh... May I?

CHARLES    Recognized.

WARREN    When you speak of this being a "vampire", do you specifically speak of a walking corpse that drinks blood, or the more classic creature of folklore which is something like a stealer of soul or essence?

HERBERT    Warren!  You sounded almost impartial before, and now this?

WARREN    Whether or not I believe in such a creature, it's important to uncover what the people involved believe, regardless of the underlying source.

HERBERT    Hmph.

CHARLES    I may have to leave the ultimate decision up to you as to what particular phylum this entity falls into.

HERBERT    Don't try to make taxonomical jokes.  It doesn't suit you.

CHARLES    Moving on.  I should point out that while I was not a witness to all the events of my story, I have been to - and in fact, been in - the house in question.

EDWARD    Do tell?

CHARLES    Boys will be boys, and visits in my youth to my cousin--

EDWARD    The one who witnessed these events?

CHARLES    Ayup.  Visits with his family every summer.  And many boyish dares ended with someone venturing into the empty, foreboding edifice.

WARREN    Empty?  Providence isn't a place where houses generally stand empty for long.

CHARLES    Precisely.  And this one should have been occupied, except for--

EDWARD    The vampire?  Or the Curse?  The Curse of the Vampire?

CHARLES    Not precisely.  You see the house wasn't associated with anything like that at the time, it was simply thought... unlucky.

HERBERT    [very snide] Oh, yes.  That's much more classifiable.

CHARLES    People just kept dying in the house.  Individually, they were generally attributed to something more along the lines you've suggested, Herbert - bad air, foul fungus in the basement, something material and accountable, and yet...

EDWARD    Yet?

Scene 5.   

CHARLES    That's for later.  There's quite a tragic history to the house, which I will touch upon, but let me finish with my own impressions first - the facts, anyway. 

HERBERT    Well, I can agree with that.

CHARLES    It was the dank, humid cellar which exerted the strongest repulsion on us - even though it was wholly aboveground on the street side, with only a thin door and window-pierced brick wall to separate it from the busy sidewalk.  We scarcely knew whether to haunt it in spectral fascination, or to shun it for the sake of our souls and our sanity.

HERBERT    Facts, he says.  Hmph.

CHARLES    For one thing, the bad odour of the house was strongest there; and there were white fungous growths which occasionally sprang up in rainy summer weather from the hard earthen floor.

HERBERT    What kind of fungi?

CHARLES    I'm no expert.  Something between toadstools and Indian pipes?  They rotted and became slightly phosphorescent; so that nocturnal passers-by sometimes spoke of witch-fires glowing behind the broken panes of the foetor-spreading windows.

RICHARD    [shudder]  Interesting.  [musing] True phosphorescence is a colour that's so hard to capture... 

CHARLES    We never - even in our wildest Hallowe'en moods - visited this cellar by night, but in some of our daytime visits could detect the glowing of the fungi, especially when the day was dark and wet.  And something else... [trails off]

WARREN    [sincere] It really bothered you, didn’t it?

CHARLES    Distressing events have so much more influence when one is impressionable ...and young.  [shaking it off]  Lets have a bit more of vampires while I regain my composure - meaning while I fetch myself something to drink.  Warren, if you would? 

Scene 6.   

WARREN    Oh, well...  Some basic facts, then.  Vampires were originally believed to be a form of revenant - the returning spirit of a recently deceased person, not a physical manifestation at all. 

EDWARD    Really?  Not bloated corpses returning to gorge on the gore of gorgeous...um, gamines?

RICHARD    [laughs]  Gratuitous.  I believe it was Stoker who started a lot of what most people think of as "vampire traditions?"

WARREN    I confess I am not particularly conversant with the novel.  I'm not much for such sensational fiction.

EDWARD    I am.

RICHARD    I am.

HERBERT    Don't look at me.

EDWARD    Go on.

RICHARD    [prompting] They drink blood?

WARREN    Probably attributable to either anemia, as Herbert suggested, or to any number of wasting diseases that plagued people. 

EDWARD    But what about the bite marks?

HERBERT    Disease sores.  Or the predation of rats.  Which, in turn, spread disease. 

WARREN    Very likely.  Rats have lived cheek and jowl with humans since the dawn of civilization.

RICHARD    Stoker did make the connection between his vampire and rats - he was supposed to be able to summon and control them.

HERBERT    If you consider the "vampire" as symbolic of disease, then its presumed connection to rats is fairly logical.

RICHARD    But Dracula also couldn't enter a home without being invited?

CHARLES    [drink - ahh] On the other hand, we boys could, and did.  Why don't I take my narrative back up?

Scene 7.   

WARREN    Go ahead. 

CHARLES    I won't be able to adequately describe the place to convey the depth of the horror we felt in its presence. 

EDWARD    We promise to laugh quietly.

CHARLES    No need.  [deep breath, bracing himself]  There was this sort of cloudy whitish pattern on the dirt floor - a vague, shifting deposit of mould or nitre which we usually seemed to be able to trace out amidst the sparse fungous growths near the huge fireplace of the basement kitchen.

EDWARD    Something carved into the floor?

CHARLES    Floor was dirt.  No.  This patch... it bore an uncanny resemblance to a doubled-up human figure. 

RICHARD    Like some sort of primitive grave-marking?

CHARLES    [growing haunted] On one certain rainy afternoon I fancied I glimpsed a thin, yellowish, shimmering exhalation rising from the nitrous pattern toward the yawning fireplace.  [brisk]  Shortly after, my cousin and I broached this to our uncle.

WARREN    Perhaps you could put names to these people? 

CHARLES    Of course.  My cousin - well, I'll just call him Randolph, and our uncle's name is Elihu Whipple.  Doctor Elihu Whipple.

WARREN    Whipple?  I know him - or have met him, but didn't he recently--?

CHARLES    [cutting him off]  Yes, yes.  I'll get there.

EDWARD    Ooh!  A mystery.

CHARLES    Uncle Elihu never pooh-poohed our concerns about the house.  As it turned out he'd done a good deal of research on it, himself.

RICHARD    The house is still standing, is it?  Might be worth making a day trip to Providence - or rather a night trip.

CHARLES    Probably futile - the house has been cleaned and is once more gainfully employed.

EDWARD    A happy ending?  To a vampire story?  Say it isn’t so!

WARREN    [grim] Not as happy as all that, I warrant.

EDWARD    Not fair!  You know something!

RICHARD    How do you mean the house has been cleaned?

CHARLES    Everything natural around the house used to be ... wrong.  From the aforementioned fungus to the tree roots that grew into the cellar, and the weeds that flourished in the back yard - everything was twisted and flabby and somehow unnatural.  And now--

EDWARD    All better?

CHARLES    Yes.  But at a cost.

WARREN    [serious] Yes.

CHARLES    The history of the house is long-winded, statistical, and drearily genealogical, but there runs through it a continuous thread of brooding, tenacious horror and preternatural malevolence.  My cousin and uncle apparently became obsessed with charting every death possibly attributable to the house.

WARREN    [carefully choosing his words to not give anything away] I never fancied Whipple as an historian?

CHARLES    A physician and amateur antiquarian.  And yet, he approached the problem much as Herbert might - as a technical one.  Hygiene and germs.

HERBERT    Oh.  A realist.  In your family? 

CHARLES    Yes.  Well, every herd has its black sheep.  Now, the origin of the house, amidst a maze of dates, revealed no trace of the sinister.  It was built by a merchant, William Harris.

Scene 8.   

EDWARD    Built on a recently moved graveyard?

CHARLES    A recently-straightened part of the street, anyway. 

EDWARD    But there must be something?

CHARLES    Actually, from what I understand, the land the house stands upon was never marked for graves. 

EDWARD    Why bring up the graves, then, if they're not relevant?

RICHARD    Setting tone.  

WARREN    Of course, vampires were supposed to be buried in unhallowed ground, like suicides, so the LACK of a consecrated churchyard is possibly just as significant.

CHARLES    The following spring, sickness occurred among the Harris children, and two of the four died within a month.  

HERBERT    Children are particularly susceptible to many kinds of disease.

CHARLES    And one of the two servants died of it in the following June.  The remaining servant, Eli, constantly complained of weakness. 

WARREN    Servants have traditionally been drawn from the lower classes, who in turn tend to be more superstitious, and therefore more inclined to give credence to, and in turn be affected by, such things.

CHARLES    Eli died the next year, as did the master of the house and a third of the four children. 

WARREN    Goodness!

CHARLES    The widow fell victim to insanity, after such a series of tragedies, and was thereafter confined to the upper part of the house.  This was in 1768.

EDWARD    This story is starting to sound oddly familiar.  Was there a meteorite involved?

HERBERT    [scoffing] In Providence?

CHARLES    The widow's sister, Mercy Dexter, moved in to take charge of the family. Mercy was a plain, raw-boned woman of great strength, but her health visibly declined from the time of her arrival.

EDWARD    Now it sounds like Luella Miller.

HERBERT    You would think that by this time they would have the sense to move out. 

EDWARD    Or get in an exorcist.

HERBERT    Nonsense.  It's more likely something toxic in the groundwater - arsenic, perhaps.  Slight traces can cause anemia and wasting as it builds up in the body's vital organs.

CHARLES    So many deaths and a case of madness, all within five years, started strange rumours.

RICHARD    Rumors?  Nonsense.  This is a definite pattern.  Herbert?  You agree?

HERBERT    [definite] Arsenic.  Or one of the other heavy metals.  Perhaps Thallium?  Did anyone suffer from hair loss?

CHARLES    There were other symptoms.  The poor widow, in her madness, gave voice to dreams and imaginings of the most hideous sort.

HERBERT    Fever rantings.

CHARLES    Her terrors periodically necessitated her remaining son's residence with a cousin.  He improved during these visits, and, had Mercy been as wise as she was well-meaning, she would have let him live away permanently.

WARREN    What sort of direction did this madness take?  Paranoia?

Scene 9.   

CHARLES    Now, William, the one remaining child of this unfortunate house, broke away from the place in his teens by enlisting - what with the [ahem] trouble with Great Britain.

EDWARD    What trouble?

WARREN    [hinting]  Consider the year?

EDWARD    I don't know what year we're at.  I haven’t been taking notes. 

CHARLES    1775.

EDWARD    Oh, of course.

CHARLES    William was away for the duration, married, and returned to his family home to find tragedy. 

RICHARD    No "Mercy"?

CHARLES    Mercy was still there, but her once robust frame had undergone curious decay, so that she was now a stooped and pathetic figure with hollow voice and disconcerting pallor. 

HERBERT    Did feeblemindedness run in the family as well?  Wasn't this a clear enough hint?

CHARLES    William, now an adult witnessing these events, quickly arranged for the building of a new and finer house... across town.

HERBERT    Finally!

CHARLES    And closed the house on Benefit Street. 

WARREN    Probably for the best.

EDWARD    Are we nearing 1800 yet?

CHARLES    Almost.  William and his wife passed away in the yellow fever epidemic of 1797, leaving their child in the care of a cousin, Rathbone Harris.

RICHARD    Now there's a name!

CHARLES    Rathbone was a practical man, and rented the Benefit Street house despite dead William's wish that it remain vacant. He did not concern himself with the deaths and illnesses which caused so many changes of tenants, or the steadily growing aversion with which the house was generally regarded.

EDWARD    He's lucky no one held him responsible.

HERBERT    As if one could sue over poor living conditions!

CHARLES    In 1804, the town council ordered the place fumigated with sulphur, tar and gum camphor due to several more deaths - presumably caused by the passing fever epidemic.

HERBERT    [dismissive]  Might as well wear pointed masks and wave nosegays.

WARREN    I'm sure they did the best they could with the science they had. 

CHARLES    Several generations passed, with the house standing empty.

HERBERT    And yet, whether operating under rank superstition or sound scientific principals, it never occurred to them to simply tear it down, clear the ground, and begin anew with clean pipes from a municipal water source?

CHARLES    No, indeed, but it never rented again after the series of deaths culminating in 1861.

EDWARD    So when you braved its depths, it had lain fallow for some ... 50 years?

CHARLES    I'm a bit older than that, but that's a good round number to work with.  Fifty years empty - and fifty years hungry.

RICHARD    So we are now at the present, and your cousin Randolph enters the stage?

CHARLES    Carrington Harris, last of the male line, had meant to tear the place down and build an apartment house on the site--

HERBERT    Finally, another sane one.

CHARLES    But Randolph convinced him to allow them to look into it first. 

EDWARD    With the history you've given - I'll agree it shows a pattern of misfortune, but what, precisely, made you think of vampires, and not ghosts or curses, or poison, or any of the other various explanations we've found?

CHARLES    Well, it was one of the original servants who started talking vampires.  She was a superstitious Exeter woman, and you know how they can be.

Scene 10.   

ANN    Some remnant must lie nearby, mayhap under this very house!  Doomed to sup off the blood or breath of god-fearing folk!  My own grand-dam told me time and again, Ann, she said, to destroy such a hellion, ye must find its earthly shell, and burn its black and festering heart! 

EDWARD    Not a stake through the heart and cutting off its head?

RICHARD    Perhaps that was "plan B".

CHARLES    As she was sacked and left the house relatively unscathed, this servant Ann's stories spread far and wide.

WARREN    So that is one.

CHARLES    One what?

WARREN    Reason to bring up vampires.

HERBERT    Hardly a credible witness.

CHARLES    Ah yes.  There was also the raving.

EDWARD    The widow?

CHARLES    Rhoby Harris.  Hers, and others.  Among the people who died in that house, a large percentage were subject to such ranting.

HERBERT    Again, not unnatural in certain kind of fevers.

[CHARLES BEGINS TO BUILD FROM HERE]

CHARLES    In their more lucid moments, several of the afflicted went on about sharp teethed, glassy-eyes creatures that crouched on their chests and scratched at their necks?

RICHARD    Fuseli's "Nightmare" comes to mind.  An imp sitting on the chest of a sleeping woman?  Though it always looked a bit more bemused than threatening to me.

EDWARD    And then there's cats who steal the breath from babies.

WARREN    Some demonic images are universal - at least among the various Christian branches.

CHARLES    In the last throes of their disease, many of these afflicted even began to foam and bite and scratch at their caretakers!

HERBERT    Hydrophobia?  Perhaps rabid rats lurking in the walls?

[CLIMAX OF CHARLES' POINTS]

CHARLES    And all of them ranting in guttural French?  A language not ONE of the afflicted was familiar with?

[moment of silence]

Scene 11.   

RICHARD    [hesitant] oh.  Um...  are they quite sure it was French?

WARREN    How could they mistake French?  Unless it was, say, Belgian.

RICHARD    I've traveled in Europe.  If you speak NO languages but English, all languages are equally incomprehensible - at least, at first.

HERBERT    What makes you think that no one around the afflicted spoke French?

RICHARD    Charles specified that none of the victims spoke any French.  How many people can live with, or even around, a speaker of another language and not pick up a few words?

CHARLES    Bravo, Richard! 

RICHARD    And, unlike, say, New Orleans, in New England, French speakers have traditionally been a bit light on the ground. 

CHARLES    Oddly, that leads me to the next part of the story.

WARREN    The French?

CHARLES    Following up on the French connection, Randolph and Elihu uncovered historical references to a French family who settled in the area long before this house was built.

EDWARD    And were buried there, right?

RICHARD    Shh.

CHARLES    A lease from 1697, showed a small tract of ground being let to an Etienne Roulet.

WARREN    Roulet?  Why does that sound familiar?

CHARLES    And yes, the Roulets had laid out their graveyard behind their cottage, and no record of any transfer of graves existed.

EDWARD    Hah!  And why were they in the area?  On the run from witch trials?

Scene 12.   

CHARLES    The Edict of Nantes, actually.

EDWARD    The what?

WARREN    Huguenots?

CHARLES    Precisely.

EDWARD    [louder] What?

WARREN    French protestants, driven out of France after the country declared itself definitely Catholic.  And it wouldn't be the Edict that drove them out - that was earlier.

EDWARD    Wasn't there something about Huguenots in a moving picture? 

RICHARD    Intolerance.  Right next to the Babylonian orgy scenes.

CHARLES    Ahem.  The Roulets were unpopular, and had already been not-so-politely asked to leave East Greenwich.  Apparently their sort of Protestantism didn't quite fit with the standards of New England society.

EDWARD    I thought all protestants were pretty much the same? 

WARREN    [guffaws]

RICHARD    To misquote Wilde, they're one church separated by a common religion.

HERBERT    Religion is such a futile waste of time.

CHARLES    Etienne Roulet wasn't much of a farmer, but he could read and write and figure - the words "drawing queer diagrams" appear in one of the accounts, but without details.  So Roulet was employed in a clerical post at Pardon Tillinghast's wharf.

HERBERT    Tillinghast?  Huh. [recalling "from beyond"]

RICHARD    Small world.

CHARLES    New England, especially.  Everyone's always related to everyone, and knows everyone else.  Everyone important, anyway.  So the Roulets, being so entirely ...other... were never accepted.

RICHARD    Roulet!  I have it!

CHARLES    Oh?

RICHARD    I don't know any of the dates, but I think it was in the reign of Henri the fourth of France.  I don't know why, but I associate it with "Boy bitten by lizard" and a couple of particularly gruesome beheadings of John the Baptist.  [explaining]  Paintings.  There was a Roulet accused of being a ... [falters, not sure]  a werewolf? 

WARREN    I knew there was something!  Yes of course -a Jacques Roulet.  An indigent accused of the horrid murder of a young man.  From what little I can recall, he claimed he had changed into a wolf and was therefore condemned to death, but ultimately commuted to life imprisonment in a madhouse.

EDWARD    And you just know this, Warren, off the top of your head?

WARREN    Well, I was going through a couple of books recently, looking for tales... well... that I might bring HERE.

EDWARD    [laughs]

RICHARD    Any more salacious details?  I seem to remember hints of cannibalism?

WARREN    Without any notes, I cannot be precise, but I think he was found in a wood, covered in blood and flesh, shortly after the killing of a boy by a pair of wolves.  

EDWARD    But what would a werewolf in France have to do with a vampire or ghost in Providence?

HERBERT    Or disease.

WARREN    Actually, werewolves and vampires have often gone hand in hand - the werewolf being generally considered one who has sold his soul in a pact with the devil, and the vampire being the soulless revenant of someone who died either while under such a pact or as the victim of such a fiend.

EDWARD    So being a werewolf in life makes one inevitably a vampire after death?

CHARLES    Much like going to Boston Latin leads inevitably to Harvard.

[general laughter]

CHARLES    So. On to my relations and the house on Benefit street.

EDWARD    That would make a good title for a story.  [ominous] The House on Benefit Street.

CHARLES    They went about the whole thing with an eye to scientific method.  Truly.  Even brought along various mechanical devices.

HERBERT    Such as?

CHARLES    [sigh] I was really hoping to pass over this.  I don't know.  Just say mechanical devices and leave it at that.

HERBERT    Imprecision.  Always imprecision.

CHARLES    They brought the devices in during the day - and recall, they can walk directly in from the street into the dreaded basement. 

EDWARD    Or directly out, as the case may be.

CHARLES    Randolph spent the day poking around, but found only the same depressing mustiness and faint suggestions of noxious odours.

RICHARD    Well, if it was daylight, anything phosphorescent would lie unseen.

CHARLES    Precisely.  So he tried again, this time by night.  And with somewhat more trepidation.

Scene 13.   

RANDOLPH    One stormy midnight, I ran the beams of an electric torch over the mouldy floor. The place had dispirited me curiously that evening, and I was almost prepared when I saw a particularly sharp definition of the "huddled form" we recalled from boyhood.

CHARLES    Even while he watched, he seemed to see the thin, yellowish, shimmering exhalation which had startled us years before.

RANDOLPH    A subtle, sickish, almost luminous vapour rose, which seemed to develop vague and shocking suggestions of form, before passing into the blackness of the great chimney, leaving foetor in its wake.  Refusing to flee, I watched it fade - and as I watched I felt it was in turn watching me greedily with eyes more imagined than visible.

CHARLES    The upshot of this palpable manifestation was that they determined to both spend the night in the house.  After papering the windows, to avoid the eyes of possible onlookers, they added camp chairs and cots to their accoutrements and settled in.

RANDOLPH    We were not, as I have said, in any sense childishly superstitious, but scientific study and reflection had taught us that the known universe of three dimensions embraces the merest fraction of the whole cosmos of substance and energy.

HERBERT    [interested]  Scientific approach, indeed.  I assumed you were exaggerating.

CHARLES    I accept your apology.

HERBERT    I didn't apologize.

RANDOLPH    To say that we actually believed in the supernatural would be carelessly inclusive.  Rather say that we were not prepared to deny the possibility of certain modifications of vital force and matter, of something that might exist only infrequently in three-dimensional space because of a more intimate connection with other spatial units.

EDWARD    I'm not even going to ask.

HERBERT    They were approaching the matter as if the potential creature was something that exists in an ...adjacent dimension.  Interesting.

RANDOLPH    The family of Roulet had likely possessed an abnormal affinity for outer circles of entity.  Could not, then, some force drawn or created by this passion continue to function in the vicinity long after the original participants were dead and gone?

HERBERT    Unfortunately, there is no way to prove or disprove such sloppy hypotheses.  [musing] And yet, one might easily imagine an alien nucleus of substance or energy, formless or otherwise, kept alive by imperceptible subtractions from the life-force or bodily tissue and fluids of more traditional "living things".

EDWARD    Which, I believe, would make it something called ...a "vampire"?

HERBERT    [ignoring him] Such a thing might be actively hostile, or simply motivated by self-preservation.  

EDWARD    Back to Luella Miller.

Scene 14.   

RICHARD    Regardless, in any good social circles, eating people is considered... unacceptable.

HERBERT    Well, of course such a creature would have to be eliminated, and yet the concept is fascinating.

WARREN    Perhaps such creatures, throughout history, formed the basis for many such myths.

CHARLES    But this myth is the only one we're dealing with tonight.  Randolph and Elihu were ready for anything they could be ready for.

RANDOLPH    We had devised two weapons to fight it; a large Crookes tube operated by powerful storage batteries and provided with peculiar screens and reflectors, in case it proved intangible and opposable only by vigorously destructive ether radiations--

HERBERT    Is this item available for an examination?

CHARLES    I might ask him.  But not for a couple of months.  He's rather busy at the moment.

EDWARD    Oh, no - don't tell me he's in a madhouse?

CHARLES    [considering, then definite] Mm.  No.

RANDOLPH    We also had a pair of military flame-throwers of the sort used in the World War, in case the creature proved material and susceptible of standard destruction.  We were prepared to burn the thing's heart out - if heart existed to burn.

HERBERT     This is the sort of preparation sorely lacking in most of these so-called ghost stories.  And nary a religious icon in sight?

CHARLES    Um, no.

HERBERT    I am impressed.

EDWARD    You don't mind that they planned to "burn its heart out", so long as they didn't brandish a crucifix while they did it?

HERBERT    Melodramatic, perhaps, but burning the heart out of any living creature is just as likely to be an effective way of destroying it.

RANDOLPH    Our cellar vigil began at 10 P.M., daylight saving time.  A weak, filtered glow from the rain-harassed street lamps outside, and a feeble phosphorescence from the detestable fungi within, showed the dripping stone of the walls.

CHARLES    They left the street door unlocked, in case of a sudden need to depart.  And they sat, playing stalking goat to a creature as potentially deadly as any man-eating tiger.  They talked far into the night until Uncle Elihu, being the older, grew drowsy.

RANDOLPH    Something like fear chilled me as I sat there in the small hours alone - I say alone, for one who sits by a sleeper is indeed alone; perhaps more alone than he can realize.  Once, when the noisome atmosphere of the place seemed about to sicken me, I opened the door and looked up and down the street, feasting my eyes on familiar sights and my nostrils on wholesome air.

CHARLES    He returned inside, ready to trade shifts with the elder man.  But all was not well.

RANDOLPH    As I turned my electric flashlight on him, all at once he commenced to mutter.  The words were at first indistinguishable, and then, with a tremendous start, I recognized something about them which filled me with icy fear!

RICHARD    Francais?

CHARLES    Oui.  Now, Uncle Elihu could read and write in a passable Gallic hand, and presumably COULD speak the tongue as well.  So it might ... possibly be ... coincidence.

RANDOLPH    Suddenly a perspiration broke out on the sleeper's forehead, and he leapt abruptly up, half awake.  The jumble of French changed to a cry in English!

Scene 15.   

ELIHU    My breath, my breath!

EDWARD    Wait!  You just used the past tense!  [mimicking] "Uncle could read and write!"  Did the vampire get him?

CHARLES    As a matter of fact, he woke at this point, and recounted a dreadful dream he had been having. 

WARREN    A sort of race-memory? 

CHARLES    All the while, he said he felt a sensation of choking, as if some pervasive presence had spread itself through his body.

RANDOLPH    I reflected that dreams are only dreams, and that these visions could be, at most, no more than my uncle's reaction to the investigations which had lately filled our minds to the exclusion of all else.

HERBERT    Plausible.

EDWARD    Plausible denial.

RANDOLPH    My uncle seemed now very wakeful, and welcomed his period of watching even though the nightmare had aroused him far ahead of his allotted two hours.

EDWARD    He still went to sleep?  After all that?

RANDOLPH    It was not a pleasant sleep, and for a second I was not sorry for the echoing shriek which clove through the barriers of dream and flung me to a sharp and startled awakeness.

RICHARD    Who was shrieking? 

EDWARD    His uncle?  Your uncle, I mean?

CHARLES    [grim] Yes.

RANDOLPH    As I turned, I dreaded what I was to see; for the scream had been in my uncle's voice, and I knew not against what menace I should have to defend him and myself.

HERBERT    Did he at least have the sense to arm himself with the flamethrower?

CHARLES    I believe so.

EDWARD    Not the BEST idea, considering his uncle might be in the line of ... um... fire.

RANDOLPH    Yet after all, the sight was worse than I had dreaded.  Out of the fungous-ridden earth steamed up a vaporous corpse-light, yellow and diseased, which bubbled and lapped to a gigantic height in vague outlines half human and half monstrous.

RICHARD    A yellow blot upon the dark palette of the tenebrous cellar.

RANDOLPH    I say that I saw this thing, but at the time it was to me only a seething dim cloud of fungous loathsomeness, enveloping the one object to which all my attention was focused.  That object was my uncle!

EDWARD    Why did it wait so long?

WARREN    Maybe the apparition only appears at certain times of night.

HERBERT    Maybe the dimensions only overlap at certain times.

CHARLES    Maybe you should let me finish the tale.

RANDOLPH    And then, my uncle, features somehow blackening and decaying, leered and gibbered and reached out dripping claws to rend me!

RICHARD    All the more terrible for being a relative.

RANDOLPH    Only a sense of routine kept me from going mad.  Recognizing the bubbling evil as no substance reachable by matter or material chemistry, I threw on the current of the Crookes tube apparatus, and focused the strongest ether radiations.

HERBERT    [eager] Yes? 

RANDOLPH    There was a frenzied sputtering, and the yellowish phosphorescence grew dimmer to my eyes. But I saw that the waves from the machine had no effect whatsoever.

CHARLES    Then, in the midst of that daemoniac spectacle, he saw a fresh horror which sent him fumbling and staggering towards that unlocked door to the quiet street, careless of what terrors he might loose upon the world.

RANDOLPH    In that dim blend of blue and yellow light, the form of my uncle commenced a nauseous liquefaction whose essence eludes all description, and in which there played across his vanishing face such changes of identity as only madness can conceive. He was at once a devil and a multitude, a charnel-house and a pageant.

CHARLES    He said that dozens, or perhaps hundreds, of faces played briefly across the countenance of our dear uncle - showing, perhaps, all those whose lives had been tainted by the shadowy intruder.

RANDOLPH    Toward the last, it seemed as though the shifting features strove to form contours like those of my uncle's kindly face. I like to think that he existed at that moment, and that he tried to bid me farewell before the final dissolution.

Scene 16.   

HERBERT    [disbelieving] He... melted?

EDWARD    Seems a bit extreme for an entity that took years and years to kill sister Mercy.

WARREN    Consider that the thing had been starved for half a century.  Where it might have been satisfied with a slow drain in the past, now it was forced to gorge.

RICHARD    And poor Randolph fled into the night?

CHARLES    Yes.  He wandered aimlessly for a time, unsure of whom he might confide in.

EDWARD    Naturally he thought of you.

CHARLES    My taste in the ... unusual isn't much of a secret.  He woke me early that morning and together we approached that evil dwelling.

RANDOLPH    All residue was gone, for the mouldy floor was porous.

CHARLES    I saw the cot, the chairs, the instruments, and even the yellowed straw hat of my uncle. But no sign of the figure in the floor.

RANDOLPH    I tried to conjecture as nearly as sanity would let me just what had happened, and how I might end the horror, if indeed it had been real.  It did not seem to be matter, nor ether, nor anything else conceivable. What, then, but some exotic emanation; some vampirish vapour such as those that rustics claim lurk over certain church yards?

CHARLES    Randolph has always been a bit of a dreamer.  Between us we quickly concocted a plan, and went to fetch digging implements, military gas-masks, and six carboys of sulphuric acid.

EDWARD    That you just happened to have lying around?

HERBERT    That's what those were for.

RICHARD    Herbert?  Why on earth do you have sulphuric acid handy?

HERBERT    It serves many purposes.  But getting rid of organic ... remains... is a primary one.

CHARLES    It took nearly an entire day to get everything organized.  Randolph spent most of that time trying to take his mind off the horrors he had witnessed. 

RANDOLPH    I passed the hours in reading and in the composition of inane verses to counteract my mood.

EDWARD    "inane verses"?

RICHARD    [limerick] There once was an old man from Arkham...

Scene 17.   

CHARLES    Just before noon the next day, we commenced digging - right where that stain had always been seen, though there was no trace of it there in the strong morning sunshine.

RANDOLPH    As I turned up the stinking black earth in front of the fireplace, a viscous yellow ichor oozed from the white fungi it severed.

CHARLES    With the deepening of the hole, which was about six feet square, the evil smell increased.  We had arranged the great carboys of acid around and near two sides, so that when necessary they could be emptied down the aperture in quick succession.

EDWARD    And the gas masks?

CHARLES    originally to keep out the vapor itself, but we used them as much for the dreadful stench.

RANDOLPH    Suddenly my spade struck something softer than earth. I shuddered and made a motion as if to climb out of the hole, which was now as deep as my neck.

CHARLES    I was above at the time, taking some much-needed fresh air, but returned when he called out in horror.

RANDOLPH    The thing I had uncovered was fishy and glassy - a kind of semi-putrid congealed jelly with suggestions of translucency. I scraped further, and saw that it had form -huge and roughly cylindrical; like a mammoth soft blue-white stovepipe doubled in two, its largest part some two feet in diameter.

CHARLES    Abruptly, he leaped out of the hole, then began frantically unstopping and tilting the heavy carboys, and precipitating their corrosive contents one after another down that charnel gulf.   

EDWARD    Before you could even see it?

CHARLES    I saw enough.

RICHARD    A cylinder?  So it was some sort of giant worm?

EDWARD    A folded worm?

CHARLES    Randolph had his own explanation for it, though I don’t know how much credit to give him, there in his abject terror.

HERBERT    What did he think it was?

CHARLES    All I saw was a blinding maelstrom of greenish-yellow vapour which surged tempestuously up from that hole as the floods of acid descended.  People outside, seeing the hideous yellow fumes that soared up the chimney, attributed it to a dumping of waste in the river by some factory, but I know how mistaken they are as to the source.

HERBERT    But you had apparently only uncovered part of the thing? 

EDWARD    I guess the acid found its way back to the rest of it.

Scene 18.   

CHARLES    People also talk about the hideous noise which came at roughly the same time from some disordered water-pipe or gas main underground - but again I could correct them if I dared.

RANDOLPH    It was unspeakably shocking, and I do not see how I lived through it. I did faint after emptying the fourth carboy; but when I recovered I saw that the hole was emitting no fresh vapours.

CHARLES    I dragged him away and we waited until the fumes cleared.  We still emptied the rest of the acid down the hole, just to be on the safe side.

RANDOLPH    The dampness was less foetid, and all the strange fungi had withered to a kind of harmless greyish powder which blew ashlike along the floor.

HERBERT    Probably from the fumes.

RANDOLPH    One of earth's nethermost terrors had perished forever; and if there be a hell, it had received at last the daemon soul of an unhallowed thing. And as I patted down the last spadeful of mould, I shed the first of many tears with which I have paid unaffected tribute to my beloved uncle's memory.

EDWARD    But what was it?  What did he say he saw?

CHARLES    Keep in mind that at two feet diameter, this cylinder would have made a very stocky man indeed.

RICHARD    Portly, even.

HERBERT    And difficult to double up that way, once obesity set in.

EDWARD    What was it?

CHARLES    Again, I never saw it, and only have Randolph's rather addled ideas to go by.  And he insisted that if it had lain there all those centuries, eating and growing, it could be any sort of size.

EDWARD    And?

CHARLES    He said this thing - this huge bent thing- was ... the creature's ...elbow.

[moment of silence]

EDWARD    [snickering] what?

CHARLES    His words, not mine.

EDWARD    But if it grew when fed, wouldn’t it have shrunk when starved?  It should have been tiny.

WARREN    Unless by devouring Charles's uncle - Oh, I say, I'm sorry - but perhaps that would have returned it to its... ahem ... former glory?

HERBERT    It's ridiculous.  I was perfectly willing to consider the possible existence of some such thing, but quite apart form the inanity of a thing which grows so large that it COULD achieve such stature - there's a simple issue of displacement of earth!

CHARLES    I expect it happened very very slowly.

RICHARD    Not to mention that if something that size were its elbow, its entire body would have been underneath most of the neighborhood.  Why then, would it restrict itself to harming only those in that single house?

WARREN    True. If it were going to have a single area to draw sustenance from, you might think it would be centered on, say, the mouth. 

EDWARD    Yeah.  No one who's anyone eats with their elbow.

CHARLES    [annoyed sigh] I'll make a point of telling Randolph the next time I see him.

END

A quirk of fate brings both Lem and Fanshaw face to face with people from their pasts.  disagreeable reunions bring up disagreeable memories,
and show a taste of what makes a man into a gunslinger.

Written and Produced by Julie Hoverson

Cast List

Lemuel Roberts /Deadeye Kid -  J. Spyder Isaacson
Clarence Fanshaw -  J. Hoverson

~~~~~~

Grisham - Bill Hollweg  (BrokenSea Audio)
Lisette Carmichael - Robyn Keyes
Commander Bannington -  Glen Hallstrom
Scotty - Mike Campbell

Other Voices:

Episode 1
Bartender - Rick Lewis

Episode 2
Townsfolks - Mark Olson, Candace Behuniak, Big Anklevitch & Rish Outfield (Dunesteef audio magazine)

Episode 3
Juliet - Alexa Chipman (Imagination Lane)
Glen Hallstrom

Episode 4
Bandits - Big Anklevitch & Rish Outfield (Dunesteef audio magazine)
Piedmont - Russell Gold
Mr. Roberts - Jack Kincaid (Edict Zero)

Episode 5
Nanny - Jennifer Dixon
Bandits - Big Anklevitch & Rish Outfield (Dunesteef audio magazine)

Episode 6
Bandits - Big Anklevitch & Rish Outfield (Dunesteef audio magazine)
Mark & Connor Olson
Russell Gold

Cover Design:  Brett Coulstock
Announcer:  Glen "Ole Hoss" Hallstrom
Opening theme:  "The Wreck of Old '97" from public domain recording found on archive.org
Any incidental music:  Kevin MacLeod (Incompetech.com)
Editing and Sound:   Julie Hoverson

No gunshots herald his approach. 
No trademark left behind him when he leaves. 
The Kid had his fill of notoriety in days gone by -
as plenty of empty boots can surely testify.  
Some say he rides alone. 
That's the Deadeye Kid.

******************************************************************

Auld Lang Syne [DeK4]

EPISODE 1

MUSIC

1_ARRIVAL

SOUND HORSES, RIVER, BOAT TRAFFIC

LEM Largest town I been near in a good passel of time.  I hear tell it started out as a frontier fort, but the frontier moseyed west and left it a-setting behind.

FANSHAW Will it be safe?

LEM Safe?

FANSHAW I had rather assumed you were avoiding larger towns.  For ... notoriety's sake.

LEM Meaning I don't want be invited to a necktie party?  'at's part of it, though I'm purty sure I ain't never been posted in this territory. 

FANSHAW Is it worth the risk?

LEM [shrug noise]  Time to time a man wants a bath and a night in a bed.

FANSHAW There are some distinct benefits to being deceased.

LEM [laughs]    I don't gotta listen to you bellyaching about aches and pains and sleeping on the ground no more.  Never mind being all prissy and citified about finding you a comf'table bush now and then--

FANSHAW [rolling eyes]  Yes, yes.

LEM Sides, I'm outta coffee.  And low on shells. 

FANSHAW [teasing] Heavens.  How DO you manage?

2_STROLLING

AMB IN TOWN

SOUND WALKING ON WOOD

LEM Lotta trade hereabouts.  Reckon I'll be able to get what all I need.

FANSHAW Lem! 

LEM [voice low]    We'll go on over yonder.  [beat] Must still be a fort within spitting distance. 

FANSHAW I did notice that the old fortification appears to have become the mansion for an authority of some kind. 

LEM Probly best to get my business done and skeddaddle.

SOUND SALOON DOOR OPENS, JUST OFF, PEOPLE COME OUT

FANSHAW I say.  Isn't it a bit early for a drink?

LEM [shrug] Three weeks.  Don't seem early to me.

FANSHAW I'll--

LISETTE [off a bit] Clary?

FANSHAW [stunned and horrified] Oh god.

LISETTE [off a bit] Clary?  I'd know that voice anywhere!

LEM Friend o'yourn?

FANSHAW [stiff, covering]  Old acquaintance.  Go on ahead!

LEM

3_SALOON

SOUND HE WALKS INTO SALOON

AMB SALOON

LEM One here.

SOUND DRINK POURED

BARTENDER There you go.

SOUND COINS

SOUND LEM DRINKS

GRISHAM [angry growl] Lemuel Roberts.

LEM [SPIT-TAKE]

SOUND GLASS SLAMMED DOWN

BARTENDER Something wrong, fella?

LEM [coughing, trying to clear his throat]    Hit like a snakebite.

GRISHAM You look at me, you pissant slab of gun leather.

BARTENDER [sympathetic] Tarnation.  You need it yonked?  Barber can‑‑

LEM [finally getting clear] No, no.  I kin handle it. 

SOUND COINS, GLASS DOWN

LEM   And sorry about the--

BARTENDER [dismissive] Ain't no nevermind.

SOUND MORE COINS

LEM Give me the bottle.

GRISHAM Now I found you, you could float a heap o rotgut and won't never drown me!

BARTENDER You drink more careful now, you hear?

LEM

4_LISETTE

AMB OUTSIDE

LISETTE [close, laughing] Oh, good lord, look at you!  Mustache and all.  Aren't you a little brigadier?

FANSHAW [acknowledging] Carmichael.

LISETTE Oh, how formal.  Just like at school.  What have you been up to Clary, dear?

FANSHAW "Fanshaw," if you please.

LISETTE And we used to be such chums.  However did you end up here?

FANSHAW I'm quite sorry to see that you are dead, Carmichael.

LISETTE [laughing] Oh, I rather doubt that!  You're only very sad to see that I'm here, aren't you?

FANSHAW Would you prefer that I said I am pleased to find that you died, since that would be the only circumstance that could ever have stopped you from tormenting every living soul around you?

LISETTE [not amused any more]  At least that would be closer to the truth.

FANSHAW Jolly good.  Happy you're dead.  Must get along.

LISETTE Don't run off so quickly, Clary! 

FANSHAW [long breath of self-control] 

LISETTE There's been no one interesting to talk to or listen in on for simply ages. 

FANSHAW How unfortunate.  Must rush.

LISETTE I noticed you speaking to that fellow.

FANSHAW [quiet] Bloody hell.  [up]  I speak to a lot of people.

LISETTE I'm sure.  But he replied.  Might I speak with him as well?

FANSHAW I--

LISETTE Oh, just watch your face!  You're trying desperately to come up with a lie!  You never could hide anything from me, mustache or no mustache, silly Clary--

FANSHAW Stop calling me that.

LISETTE Oh, how I've missed these little moments with my dearest friends - ever since I made the leap.  I shall have to spend a great deal of time with you - and with your rugged looking friend. 

FANSHAW [gritted teeth] Jolly good.

5_SALOON2

AMB SALOON

SOUND LEM DRINKS, SLAMS DOWN GLASS

GRISHAM I know you kin hear me, you toad-bellied worm.

SOUND CHAIR SHIFTS, KICKED OUT FROM TABLE

LEM [low] Sit.

GRISHAM What makes you think I'd sit with you?  You done went and killed me!

LEM That's one reason I'm plumb surprised to see you.  You went down all the way to Fayetteville - damn far north o' here.

GRISHAM I ... drifted.

LEM That's just what's got me hornswoggled.  Ain't no one drifts.

GRISHAM Well I did, and I's planning to get you back for what you done, one way or t'other.

LEM [sigh]

SOUND DRINK POURS

6_PIGS

SOUND PIGS

LEM Why'd you drag me out to the slaughterhouse?

FANSHAW That woman - ghost woman.

LEM An old flame?

FANSHAW Nonsense!  We knew each other as ... children.  She is-- [changing the subject] She is unlikely to follow us here. 

LEM Spect not.  Womenfolks ain't fond of this sort of messy business.

FANSHAW [disgusted] Yes...

LEM So?  You'd best'a brought me here fer a reason.

FANSHAW Lisette Carmichael.  She [hard to say] is a person who likes to know things.  About other people.  She likes to --

LEM Hold a grudge?  Like a noose over yer head?

FANSHAW Aptly put.   

LEM You cain't have much in the way of dark secrets, though, can you?  Leastways not no more.

FANSHAW You might be surprised.

LEM Who's she a-gonna tell?  [realizes] Oh. 

FANSHAW And while I'm fairly certain you think you could overlook any past indiscretion on my  part, I don't doubt there are a few things that might shock even you.  Lord knows, she's not even above the occasional fabrication.

LEM [after a moment]  Did it involve a sheep?

FANSHAW What?

LEM Whatever it was you done.

FANSHAW   It isn't - it's not like that at all.

LEM [shrug] Sounds like we should jest ride on out.

FANSHAW What?

LEM Got my coffee, ain't no reason to lollygag.

FANSHAW You would leave?  Over this?

LEM I figger you saved m'life more'n once, and ain't much I can do in return. 

SOUND WALKING IN MUD

LEM Let's get gone before you start a-thanking me.

7_BARN

AMB BARN

SOUND TACK, HORSES, ETC.

LEM You distract her, I'll get the gear.  Come and find me when you feel the pull.

FANSHAW Righty-ho. 

SOUND LEAVES

GRISHAM Running away, eh?  Allus knew you'ure yella.

LEM [sigh]  You're lucky ain't no one about but us.  Otherwise, I wouldn’t dignify none of that with an answer.

GRISHAM You kilt me!

LEM We had it out, fair and square.  I never shot no one in-- [breaks off, a bit choked up]  I never din't kill any one not a-gunning fer me.  Not on purpose.

SOUND LAST BIT OF TACKING UP

GRISHAM Are you saying I was asking fer it?

LEM I seem to recall you a-calling me out in the middle of a fairish game of cards.  Yellin blue bloody murder that I should step out and face you.

GRISHAM Well, yeah, but I was drunk.

LEM I din't do THAT to you neither.  You called me out, without no good reason agin me.

GRISHAM [losing some of his bluster] I fancied making a name for myself.

SOUND LEM GETS INTO THE SADDLE

LEM By shooting the Kid?  You ain't the first.

GRISHAM But you still kilt me.

LEM And I won't never forget none of it, but you got what you asked for, and not a jot more.  Blame providence if you cain't blame yerself, but don't put this guilt on me.  Hee-yaw!

SOUND RIDES OFF

8_DISTRACTION

FANSHAW Lisette?

LISETTE There you are!  Just like a naughty boy, running off to filthy places to get away.

FANSHAW So sorry.  Didn't have much choice.  My friend is quite fascinated by... hogs.

LISETTE Did you make a clean breast of it?  Or just warn him not to believe a thing I say? 

FANSHAW You don't understand what you're threatening to do - you never did. 

LISETTE So bothered over trifles!  How much people change!

FANSHAW Ruining someone's life never meant anything to you!  Do you recall poor Selfridge?

LISETTE Carmela?  Served her right. 

FANSHAW She threw herself off a bridge!

LISETTE She also let herself be compromised!  I didn't put her in the family way, and she was the one lying and hiding--

FANSHAW Are you trying to imply that you are somehow in the right?  A champion of truth?

LISETTE Shall I point out what it is you are doing that flies in the face of nature?

FANSHAW History is replete with--

LISETTE Oh, spare me.  Next you'll be quoting Shakespeare.

FANSHAW Very well.  I shan't try and justify myself, but I will point out that whatever I am doing, it cannot be changed.  Being dead, there's not much one can do about such trifles.

LISETTE Then why should it be such a catastrophe were I to tell?

FANSHAW [beat] You've never had a real friend, only people who fawned on you in order that you would not reveal their shortcomings. 

LISETTE [outraged] I--?  You--!

FANSHAW Kindly allow me to finish.  There is a certain camaraderie among men that simply does not - cannot - occur once a woman is involved.  Once you put your nose in, I fear it would never be quite the same.

LISETTE No doubt.  I'll just go and find your friend now, shall I?

FANSHAW [strange gasp, ending on a laugh]  No, but I think I shall.

SOUND FANSHAW LEAVING NOISE

CLOSING

Auld Lang Syne [DeK4]

EPISODE 2

1_MOSEYING

AMB OPEN COUNTRYSIDE, nighttime

SOUND HORSES WALKING

LEM I still cain't reckon how he got so far from where he-- I-- where we had it out.

FANSHAW How odd.  Have you ever encountered other ghosts who could travel?

LEM Present comp'ny only.

FANSHAW And we know the how and why of that.  Perhaps this fellow has a similar... arrangement?

LEM How?  And who with?  Ain't no one would carry that ugly cuss a dog's walk, let alone some hundred miles.

FANSHAW Well, every one of we "spirits" seems to be a bit different.

LEM Like your lady friend back there?

FANSHAW [sigh] From her current appearance and [disapproving] "costume", she had fallen on ‑ahem- hard times indeed.  Possibly drifted west - whilst alive - in hopes of making something better for herself. 

LEM Lot of people can say that, out this way.

FANSHAW [a bit snotty] Frankly I'm not surprised at her misfortune.  When you alienate all those around you, no one will step in to help if things take a turn for the worse.

LEM Cain't say I ain't never been that fella.

FANSHAW [chagrined] Oh. 

MUSIC FOR FLASHBACK

NOTE Lem is younger, more cocky, more superior in the falshback - need to really show who he used to be

2_THE OLD KID

AMB SALOON

LEM Gimme two.

SOUND CARDS

LEM [pleased noise]  I'll see you and raise--

SOUND CROWD HUSHES

GRISHAM [snarling declaration] I hear tell the Deadeye Kid's here in town?

LEM [ignoring him, smug] Raise ten.

DEALER [shaky] Uh, Kid?

GRISHAM Which one o' y'all's sposed to be this weasel?

LEM Your call.

PLAYER1 [shaky] Um...  I fold.

LEM [chuckles]

PATRON1 How can he--?

Patron2 Shh!

SOUND HEAVY SPURRED BOOTS CROSS FLOOR, PEOPLE SCUTTLE OUT OF WAY

GRISHAM [heavy menace]  You the deadeye kid?

LEM [offhanded] I'm the man playing a nice civil hand of cards.  Mebbe you can hold your hosses there, whistle stomper.

GRISHAM Either you come out and face me now, or I swear'n I'm gonna shoot you where you sit.

SOUND CHAIRS SCOOTING OUT, PEOPLE LEAVING TABLE

LEM [long dramatic sigh]  Now that sounds a mite like a threat.

PLAYER1 [muttered] Uh, yeah.  I'm done.  Fergot my wife wants me home.

GRISHAM Are you coming, or am I shooting?

LEM If everyone's takin' leg, I guess I win by forfeit?

DEALER Um, I don't think anyone's gonna argue you on that.

GRISHAM You turn around now and face me, you yellow bellied dog!

SOUND MONEY BEING SHOVED TOGETHER

LEM Give the frog a chance to jump, knuckles.  Cain't just leave all this layin around.

SOUND G's GUN DRAWN AND COCKED

GRISHAM Now!

LEM [to dealer, cocky] You'll look after this til I get back?

DEALER .. certainly.

GRISHAM I'll do it!  I will!

SOUND CHAIR SLOWLY MOVES, LEM'S SPUR-STEPS, STANDS

LEM Rightchere in front of all these good folks?  And leave the dealer to clean up the mess?  [tsks]  Let's at least be civilized and take this on outside.

3_EASIER

MUSIC BACK TO NOW

SOUND HORSES WALKING

FANSHAW Seems as if it would be a great deal easier.

LEM Whazzat?

FANSHAW Shooting someone in the back.

LEM And killin a chicken's easier than takin down a buffalo, but ain't a thing to swell over.  Ain't no pride in the easy way. 

FANSHAW Backshooting would gain you notoriety just as quickly.

LEM It's all about how folks look at you... and how they see you.

MUSIC BACK TO FLASHBACK

4_WARMUP

GRISHAM Are you stepping?

LEM What flavor of tarantula juice got you fit to wake snakes?  Milk?  [insulting that he can't hold his liquor]

GRISHAM [furious noise]  I got a pill to run you on, and I'm gonna chew back every moment of it.

LEM [to the crowd] Righchere's a rumbustious fellow for you. 

SOUND DRINKS DOWN HIS LIQUOR, SLAMS IT DOWN

LEM Barkeep?  Have me a shot of top mark waitin.

SOUND WALKS OUT, SLOWLY

GRISHAM You look at me while I'm a talking to you!

LEM [walking out] You say somethin' more wheat than chaff, mebbe I will.

5_RATTLING

FANSHAW Were you trying to upset his equilibrium?

LEM What's that when it's at home?

FANSHAW uh - Throw him off - make him upset and more likely to make mistakes.

LEM   Yup.  There's as much head as hand in a proper showdown.  Not that this was one o' them.

FANSHAW Why not?  He called you out.

LEM He was halfway round on rotgut.  Not a nugget's chance agin me.  Even if he had all his [careful] equilibriums about him.

FANSHAW But you stepped out with him?  Even knowing he had no chance?

LEM A'course.  He wouldn't take no.  Drunk fellers who ain't gettin their way are as likely to shoot just about anyone.  I reckoned I was a-helpin, putting him down.

FANSHAW [a bit touchy] And you couldn't simply injure him or knock him out - he had to die?

LEM Ain't no place for fine feelins when there's a man with a gun a-facin you.  And ain't no time to aim all purty and shoot him just so.  You hit hard and put him down, cause if you don't, he'll do it to you.  That's the part you cain't get away from - one or t'other's likely for boot hill, and you GOTTA face it that way.

6_SHOWDOWN

MUSIC BACK TO FLASHBACK

SOUND OUTSIDE NOW

GRISHAM You ready?

LEM Why trouble yerself to call me out anyhow?  I kill someone yer riled over?

GRISHAM [duh] Yer the Deadeye Kid!

LEM [duh] Yep.  [beat] That's your sole entire reason?  You wanna walk in my boots?

GRISHAM No faster way to make a name, than laying out a name.

SOUND THEY MOVE TO EITHER SIDE OF THE SOUNDSCAPE

SOUND GUN BEING CHECKED, LEM

LEM And o'course it gots to be a callout.  [digsut, sarcasm] No one wants to be the next Robert Ford.  [man who backshot his friend Jesse James]

GRISHAM Come on!  Kick it up, Deadeye!  Less'n yer yellow!

SOUND LEM - DIRT PATTERS - checking the wind]

LEM [maddenginly cool] Oh.  I'm ripe and ready to drop.

SOUND TENSION NOISE, CROWD NOISE, THEN SUDDEN FLURRY OF GUNFIGHT.

SOUND G - BODY DROP

SOUND LEM - GUN INTO HOLSTER.  A MOMENT.  FEET WALK BACK UP INTO SALOON

7_ENJOY

MUSIC BACK TO NOW

FANSHAW [relenting a bit] I suppose it's very like being in battle - not a good place to have consideration for the other fellow.

LEM Have to ice over that pond.  Hard and cold.  Hard and cold.

FANSHAW I- I do apologize for sounding disapproving.  I want to assure you, it's the process that... well... seems so very pointless.

LEM [a litle lighter] Men'll be men.

FANSHAW But men can behave in a civilized manner!  Look at we Brits.

LEM [grunt - half laugh half dismissive]

FANSHAW Do you enjoy it?

LEM [very mixed feelings] Enjoy?

FANSHAW Throughout history there have been men who reveled in killing, in battle.

LEM   [musing] There's a fire that burns you at that moment, like bugs in the skin.

LEM S'like the best whiskey and the moment you almost fall off a cliff, and being with the love of your life, all at the same damn time. 

FANSHAW The thrill of danger?

LEM That, but even more so.  If'n you just want danger, you go climbin cliffs or breakin broncs.  This is starin into the eyes of death - death right there and then and ain't no "maybe so" about it.  Kill or be killed.  [beat, then not quite truthful]  Enjoy?   

FANSHAW Sometimes a person's strength is in making the right choice, even when it might pain them to do so.

LEM I reckon.

8_WINNER

MUSIC FLASH BACK

AMB INSIDE SALOON, HUSHED

SOUND GUNSHOT, OUTSIDE

WOMAN [gasps]

SOUND [CROWD NOISE, OUTSIDE], THEN OMINOUS BOOTS ON WOOD, SALOON DOOR OPENS

SOUND PIANO PLAYS, CHATTER BEGINS AGAIN

LEM [voiceover]  there's also this way people have of lookin at you - like yer the best.  Used be I din't see the fear beneath it.

SOUND BOTTLE POURS, GLASS SET DOWN

BARTENDER Your shot, Mister.

LEM [drinks big, then bragging] My second shot in two minutes!

SOUND Forced laughter from the crowd, warps out a bit.

9_HUNKER

MUSIC BACK TO NOW

LEM [brisk] It's coming down dusk.  Need to find a place to hunker fer the night.

FANSHAW I shall keep an eye out for-- [dread] oh!

LEM Whazzat?

FANSHAW Look - the horizon!

LEM Signal fires, and a lot of em. 

FANSHAW They're a little far off to get a better look at.  We shall... have to return, shan't we?

LEM Someone's gotta warn the town.  Whether it's injuns or sumpin else, looks like an ambush on the march.

FANSHAW [weakly] Surely the garrison maintains lookouts?

LEM Not so much that I saw.  They're purt near closed up shop, from the looks back there. 

FANSHAW [heavy sigh]  Right, then. 

SOUND DISMOUNT, SHIFTING A FEW THINGS FROM HORSE TO HORSE

LEM You worried about your lady friend?

FANSHAW She's neither a lady nor a friend.  But whatever she might have to say will matter to none but me.  [change of tone]  We are a couple of hours out.

LEM Horses ain't fresh, but I weren't pushin.  We can get back before them out there can get into spittin distance.

SOUND MOUNT OTHER HORSE

FANSHAW [resigned but determined] Shall we?

MUSIC

Auld Lang Syne [DeK4]

EPISODE 3

1_WONT SPOOK

SOUND READYING FOR BATTLE

LEM If'n you got a fresh horse, I kin go scout some fer you.

COMMANDER You've done enough already, stranger.  Ain't even your fight.

LEM I know where they're at, and I got some idea of where they're likely to be by the time I get back there.  Give me one horse ain't like to spook, and I'll--

COMMANDER I'll have to send a man along with you.

LEM That's fine.  Make sure he ain't like to spook neither.

2_LISETTE

SOUND [above scene plays out in the background]

LISETTE And here I thought you had run away and left me all alone. 

FANSHAW [sigh] Why don't we step outside to have this conversation?

LISETTE   I like seeing what the "menfolk" are up to.  [frustrated noise] What I wouldn’t give to be able to leave this rattletrap town.  I'm still not sure how you did that.  Or why you came back.

FANSHAW We had to warn the garrison.

LISETTE Always full of suprises, aren't you - and yet still sanctimonious.  Fanshaw, dear old chum.  Are you not afraid of what I might say?

FANSHAW Any concern you might cause me is negligible when weighed against the potential danger to others.

LISETTE [surprised laugh]  Hah!  All you superior little snobs, with your noses in the air!  And deep down, all just as afraid as the rest of us.

FANSHAW I've no idea what you're talking about, and I don't care to find out.  Whatever you plan to do, just get on with it.  We have a job to do.

LISETTE Wait!

FANSHAW [long sigh]  Yes?

LISETTE Shall I wish you "good luck"?

FANSHAW I doubt I shall need any.  But I thank you for the sentiment, Miss Carmichael, however grudgingly bestowed.

3_JULIET

FLASHBACK

JULIET Romeo, doff thy name, And for that name which is no part of thee Take all myself.

FANSHAW I take thee at thy word: Call me but love, and I'll be new baptized; Henceforth I never will be Romeo.

JULIET What man art thou that thus bescreen'd in night So stumblest on my counsel?

ROMEO By a name I know not how to tell thee who I am: My name, dear saint, is hateful to myself--

SOUND POUNDING

LISETTE Oh heavens!  Not again!

MAN [calling from off] Sorry.

SOUND POUNDING STOPS

LISETTE Try that scene again from the top.  Romeo?

FANSHAW [sigh] Yes?

LISETTE Couldn't you try to be a bit more ... masculine?

JULIET Oh, I like "him".  So terribly byronic.

FANSHAW I'll see what I can do.

4_SCOTTY

SOUND PACKING A HORSE

SCOTTY Sir?

LEM Yeah?

SCOTTY Private Scott.  Commander Bennington told me to report to you.

LEM [sigh] Right.  You ever shot that for real?

SCOTTY O'course.

LEM Against a person?

SCOTTY Well, against animals.

LEM

GRISHAM Not everyone can be you.

LEM [sighs]

SCOTTY Don't you worry!  I ain't afraid!

GRISHAM This pullet ain't even got pinfeathers yet.  You get him killed, you gonna adda a notch fer him too?

LEM You got a horse, Scott?

SCOTTY Everyone calls me Scotty.

GRISHAM Later, they'll just call him dead.

LEM   Right.  You gotta horse?

SCOTTY Over there.

GRISHAM [rueful] My damn horse.  Serving in the army like the rest of the idjets. 

LEM Well, go and get'im.

SCOTTY Right, sir!

GRISHAM Ain't he a little young?  You should oughtta throw him back.

LEM I'm stuck with him.  And I never kept notches.

GRISHAM That ain't what I heered.

LEM Lot o' tales goin round - ain't a one of 'em naught but sagebrush smoke.

GRISHAM And the tale 'bout how you kilt me?

LEM [sharp intake] I don't brag on none o' that no more.

GRISHAM So, you think I like being plumb forgot?

LEM If I thought tellin about it would ease you on to the next thing, you think I wouldn't?

SCOTTY Tell me about what?  Injuns?  [certain] I know all about them.

LEM [sigh]

5_SCOUTING

AMB CRICKETS

SOUND HORSES

FANSHAW They're still out of range.  I can just barely catch snippets of sound at my farthest reach, but I'm fairly certain it is not Indians.

LEM Hmm?

FANSHAW I can make out English and Spanish.  Are we anywhere near the Mexico territories?

LEM [quiet] Ain't impossible.  Deserters, mebbe.

SCOTTY What ain't impossible?

LEM We're gettin close.  Best to go on foot. 

SCOTTY These here horses are my responsibility!

LEM Best you stay and watch'em, then. 

FANSHAW Don't forget the satchel.

SOUND CREAK

LEM Like I'd forget that.

SCOTTY I wouldna gone through your kit or nothin!  I ain't no finger monkey.

FANSHAW [laughs]  I ne'er heard that one before.

SOUND REMOVING SPURS

LEM Ain't that I don't trust you, son, just might need me some things.  If I was you, I'd take them horses up yonder - forge as far into the high rough as you can, but keep where you can see if I come tearin out of there.  You reckon?

SCOTTY How'll you find us?

LEM I'll find you.  Just be ready.  And don't shoot me.

SOUND QUIET FEET ON DIRT

6_JULIET2

FLASHBACK echoey hallway

LISETTE [running up] Fanshaw?

FANSHAW

LISETTE [trying to start a fight] We've been reconsidering your costume.  Those leggings are positively scandalous.

FANSHAW [bland] Romeo can hardly appear in bloomers.  Would be rather difficult to climb to the balcony.

LISETTE Perhaps plain trousers, then.  [sly] Though I understand you were quite keen on showing off your legs.

FANSHAW [rueful] There is a great deal to be said for the freedom of movement.  [dismissive] But a costume is a costume.  I certainly shan't make a fuss.

LISETTE [annoyed at not being able to get a rise out of F] Very well.

7_FANSHAW SCOUTS

SOUND SLIGHT RUSTLE OF LEAVES

LEM [very quiet] Close enough?

FANSHAW I'll have a look round. 

SOUND FANSHAW LEAVES

GRISHAM [very loud] You hiding from something?

LEM [reaction noise, quickly stifled]

GRISHAM Ooh!  Scairt you, din't I?

LEM [whispered] Made me jump damn near out my skin.

GRISHAM [smug and evil] Well that's good, then.  Looks like I can get my own back on you.

LEM What all do you want?

GRISHAM Apart from you in a pine box?  I'm hankerin to be alive agin, but that ain't gon happen.

LEM Not likely, nope.  How'd you follow us?

GRISHAM What kind of tenderfoot you take me for that I can't follow my own damn horse?

LEM [half realizing something] Damn.

SOUND FANSHAW COMES BACK

FANSHAW Who the devil is this?

GRISHAM Who the devil are you?

LEM What'd ya find out?

FANSHAW A motley crew, but definitely girding themselves for battle. 

GRISHAM What kinda girlie man are ya?  Highfaluting slicker talk!

FANSHAW [sigh, but determined] They're half mounted already, but I could make out that they're waiting til after midnight, to make certain of finding as many people abed as possible.

GRISHAM Put you in a dress, and I bet everyone'd wanna dance!

FANSHAW We need to get moving.

GRISHAM I think you need a shave, girlie man.

SOUND KNIFE

FANSHAW [finally breaking concentration] God damn you all to hell!

SOUND PUNCH, KNEE TO GROIN

LEM [trying not to laugh]

GRISHAM

FANSHAW Marquis of Queensbury be damned.  We need to go.

GRISHAM [different kind of ooooh - like he's falling, or being dragged off]

SOUND SUCK NOISE AND GRISHAM VANISHES

LEM What'd you do to him?

FANSHAW I didn't!  I couldn't-- I... haven't the faintest idea? 

8_JULIET3

SOUND TAP ON DOOR

LISETTE Fanshaw?

FANSHAW Come in.

LISETTE I've brought you your hat-- whatever are you doing?

FANSHAW I was considering what I might do with my hair.  To create the right ilusion.

LISETTE That is what the HAT is for.

FANSHAW I prefer not.  It looks like an ottoman on my head. 

LISETTE And Romeo does not wear a moustache.

FANSHAW Whyever not?

LISETTE On the stage, moustaches are only for villains and army colonels!

FANSHAW [considering] I might just cut my hair.

LISETTE That is the final straw!  Miss Peabody said this would happen.

FANSHAW What?

LISETTE That you would take too many liberties.  You are out.

FANSHAW Out?

LISETTE [snidely satisfied] You are no longer a member of this production.

9_DEAD SCOTT

SOUND QUIET BOOTSTEPS

LEM [very quiet] Scotty?

FANSHAW [off a bit] Oh, good god.

LEM Do I need to keep quiet?

FANSHAW I don't see anyone.  .. hostile.

SOUND QUICK, NOISIER FOOTSTEPS

SCOTTY [as if waking up] Oooh!

LEM What is--  [tragic regret] Ohh.

SCOTTY They come in out of nowheres!

FANSHAW I don't doubt it.

SCOTTY And they took the damn horses, Mister Roberts!

FANSHAW I think that just might explain--

SCOTTY And who in blue blazes is this feller?

LEM [heavy sigh] 

CLOSING

Auld Lang Syne [DeK4]

EPISODE 4

1_DROP EVERYTHING

SOUND UNBUCKLING, BAG DOWN, ETC.

LEM Good thing I had that with me.   Though now I gotta leave it.

SOUND SATCHEL DOWN

FANSHAW Of course.

SCOTTY I'm really sorry about this, sir.

LEM I doubt me you coulda stopped it, son.  And you been punished enough.

SCOTTY What do you mean?  They musta knocked me out, but I don't even feel it.

FANSHAW I'll deal with him.

LEM I'll leave you to it. 

SCOTTY What are you doing?

LEM Gonna haveta hoof it back to town - cain't take naught but my guns.  You gon' be all right?

SOUND RUSTLE OF BUSHES

FANSHAW Well, we won't be able to do much to stop them if they came across your bag, but that looks like a good hiding place.  Especially in the dark.

SCOTTY Can't do anything?  What are you talking about? 

FANSHAW Hush, Scotty.  Let Lem get moving and we'll have a good long talk.

SOUND BOOTS RUN OFF

2_REBEL CAMP

SOUND MANY HORSES, MEN CHATTER, etc.

SOUND GRISHAM STUMBLES IN

GRISHAM Where the hell?   [Thunder?]!  Goddam rustlers! 

SOUND MEN WALK BY

LEADER Two horses, two saddles.  I don't like it.

SECOND Guerrero had the kid down before we realized.  But if there's another scout, he won't be able to get anywhere - at least not soon enough.  

LEADER [thinks, then definite] We must move up the charge.

SECOND We're nearly ready. 

3_NO HEAVEN

SCOTTY [trying not to cry] So that's IT?  I mean this is it?  No nothing left?  No heaven?

FANSHAW There are so many things even I don't understand.  I wish I could offer you more in the way of consolation.

SCOTTY But don’t no one ever pass along?

FANSHAW Most do.  And I'm even aware of those who spend some time like this, and then pass on, though there's no easy answer for how or why it happens.

SCOTTY And I won’t never even get to be with a woman.

FANSHAW [uncomfortable] Oh, dear.  That is a shame.

SCOTTY What's it like?

FANSHAW [dread] What is ... what... like?

SCOTTY Being with a woman?

FANSHAW ...

4_RUNNING

LEM [heavy but measured breathing]

SOUND RUNNING FOOTSTEPS - TROT, NOT DASH

LEM [muttered] Dammit.  Leastways there's a good moon.

4A_FLASHBACK

MUSIC FLASHBACK

SOUND NIGHT, DOGS, CHICKENS - ALARUMS

SOUND ANGRY MOB, OFF

ROBERTS [yelling, off]  Leastways, there's a good moon! 

PIEDMONT [up close, heavy breathing, trying to be quiet]

ROBERTS [off, yelling]  Spread out!  Don't let that traitor get away!  Where's that rope?

PIEDMONT [gasp, then trying to breathe even quieter]

SOUND VERY SLOW CREAK, SHUTTING DOOR ON THE NOISE.

YOUNG LEM [about 12] Whatchoo doin', mister?

PIEDMONT [terrible gasp, smothers a scream]

6_EXPERIENCE

FANSHAW My experience is not ... vast, but I have had one or two ... romantic encounters.

SCOTTY Well, you're a man of the world, ain't you?  You been all over the place!

FANSHAW Oh dear.  [up]  I've spent most of my life deep in study.  I suppose I've always felt there would be time - later - to settle down to a family and all. 

SCOTTY Me too.  Not the studying, but the ... "later".

FANSHAW [after a moment]  Women are.... soft.

SCOTTY [eager] Yeah?

FANSHAW And round.  In places where men aren't.

SCOTTY But they do got legs, don't they?

FANSHAW [flabbergasted]  What?

SCOTTY You never don't see none of them out of skirts!  Who knows what they got under there?

FANSHAW Well, that I can answer - generally, women are made the same as men.  Arms, legs, heads - well, one head.  You understand.

SCOTTY [avid] And bosoms.

FANSHAW   Yes, that.

7_VARMINT

SOUND RUNNING, LEM'S HEAVY BREATHING UNDER THIS?

PIEDMONT Shh!  Don't let anyone know I am here.

YOUNG LEM You the varmint they's looking fer?

PIEDMONT There is no call to use such language, boy.  Do you know this area?

YOUNG LEM I should hope I do!  My pa's Mr. Jorgenson's top man.

PIEDMONT [sarcastic] So he's the one leading the search.

YOUNG LEM [pride] Yup.

SOUND OUTSIDE, THE ROW GETS CLOSER

ROBERTS [outside]  Get him, Honeysuckle, there's a good bitch!

YOUNG LEM [pride and fear] That's my pa!

PIEDMONT But you're not going to tell him I am in here?

YOUNG LEM I don't fancy getting whupped.  I ain't sposed to be in the barn at night. 

8_YOUNG LOVE

FANSHAW I was in love.  When I was very young.

SCOTTY Was she really purtty?

FANSHAW [sigh] I thought the sun rose and set with my beloved's face.  Have you ever seen hair so fine and blonde that your fingers desperately wanted to touch it?

SCOTTY You talk so flowery, I bet all the girls jest love you!

FANSHAW Our parents objected.  They said we were too young, and I was packed off to school.

SCOTTY What didja do?

FANSHAW I waited.  I nursed my deep love, and remained constant, like patience on a rock.

SCOTTY You waited on a rock?

FANSHAW I waited at school.  I was determined that one day, when we were old enough that no one could object, I would return and we would be joined forever.

SCOTTY What happened?

FANSHAW I made my way to the object of my affection and...discovered...

SCOTTY Yes?

FANSHAW That I was the only one who had bothered to wait.

SCOTTY She'd gone and --

FANSHAW My "dearest love" had married another.  Had, and I quote "almost forgotten about that summer."

SCOTTY Damn!  Women are right terrible.

FANSHAW Don't fault women, boy.  There are quite as many constant and sweet-natured females as there are fickle and wicked men.  We all deserve a "heaping helping" of the blame.

8_DISCOVERED

SOUND UNDER - LEM WALKING NOW, STILL BREATHING HARD, PACING HIMSELF

YOUNG LEM They're fixing to hang you?

PIEDMONT

YOUNG LEM Why?  What for?

PIEDMONT We were on opposite sides in a fight.

YOUNG LEM You mean the war?    My pa says why keep slaves when you can hire men for even cheaper and don't have to sell them if'n they don't do the job right.

PIEDMONT [incensed] You think your pa knows so much about everything, don't you?

YOUNG LEM [a bit afraid] Well, he knows where you are.

SOUND DOOR SLAMS OPEN

ROBERTS There he is!

MAN Get him!

PIEDMONT [scream]

SOUND SCUFFLE, KNIFE DRAWN

YOUNG LEM [gasp, cut off by hand]

PIEDMONT I'll kill your boy, just see if I won't!

10_STUCK

SCOTTY You said you know about some folks what was like this for a time and then moved along?

FANSHAW   We've encountered one or two.

SCOTTY How'd it work?

FANSHAW Work?

SCOTTY I mean, I don't wanna be stuck out here, middle o' nowhere, all by my lonesome, forever!

FANSHAW I don't know that I have an answer for you.  I've only been - like this - for a... a couple of years, myself, and haven't seen a fraction of what Lem has.

SCOTTY Years?  You been dead for years and ain't moved on?

FANSHAW .. help people.  And I get to see the world - [half pleased, half rueful] hmph... in perfect safety. 

11_SHOT

SOUND LEM RUNNING AGAIN

PIEDMONT [panicky, but trying to be placating] I am going to have to ask you to take a step back, sir!  My hand could slip a fraction of an inch, and that's all it would take.  

YOUNG LEM [gasp]  Pa?

SOUND GUNSHOT

SOUND TWO BODY DROPS

ROBERTS [cold] You understand we cain't leave that kind of critter running loose, don't you?

12_BUSINESS

FANSHAW Some folks stay because they have unfinished business, and once the business is completed, they are able pass on. 

SCOTTY Business?  I ain't never been in business.

FANSHAW No, no.  For instance, one young man was able to move along once his murderer was uncovered and hung.

SCOTTY   I spose that could happen.

FANSHAW Or perhaps when the horses have been recovered, since that was your task at the time of your death.

SCOTTY [very down] Oh, right.

FANSHAW [cheering]  Or, when the town has been warned.  That could very well have been at the forefront of your thoughts.

SCOTTY [wailing] Oh no! 

FANSHAW Whatever is the matter?

SCOTTY What if it's ladies?

FANSHAW [careful] What if what is "ladies"?

SCOTTY What if I can't never pass on til I been with a lady?

FANSHAW [cold, practical] That would be most extremely awkward.  Worry about that once we find out if you can get back to town or not.

13_WHUPPING

YOUNG LEM [sniffles a bit]

ROBERTS You crying, boy?

YOUNG LEM [stifling it] No sir.

ROBERTS   Now run and let Mrs. Roberts have a look at that scratch.

SOUND A COUPLE OF STEPS, THEN TURN

YOUNG LEM [blank] You shot him dead.

ROBERTS

YOUNG LEM In the dark, and on the draw, and din't even hit me.

ROBERTS   [beat]  You asking something?

YOUNG LEM What if he'd'a kilt me?  Or what if you did?

ROBERTS [long pause]  Life's hard, boy.  You cain't let folks get away with wrongdoing, no matter who they got a grip on.

YOUNG LEM

SOUND BARN DOOR SWINGS OPEN, COUPLE OF STEPS

ROBERTS Lem? 

YOUNG LEM [almost a gasp] Yessir?

ROBERTS [casual] Don't think I'm not gon' whale you for being in the barn by night, neither. [neeether]

YOUNG LEM [quiet, resentful] Yes, sir.

14_CRICKET

SCOTTY It ain't fair!  I'm being punished and I ain't never even done nothing!

FANSHAW Life is not fair.  Death even less so. 

SCOTTY I--

FANSHAW [cutting him off] Still, I expect there must be some sort of answer. 

SCOTTY Answer?

FANSHAW Very likely, when they take your body back to town, you will accompany it, and there will find what you need to do to pass on.

SCOTTY What if they don't take it - me back?

FANSHAW Lem will see that they do.

SCOTTY   And what about you, Mister Fanshaw?

FANSHAW What about me?

SCOTTY Don't you get to pass on too?

FANSHAW   But you see Scotty, I have no wish to.

SCOTTY No?  Why?

FANSHAW I still have many things to see.  And I feel like I'm doing good here.  There's a story I read some time back, a sort of fable, about a puppet that comes to life.

SCOTTY That's crazy talk.

FANSHAW That's why it's a story.  In the tale, a cricket is asked to stay with him and make sure he does the right things.

SCOTTY All right.  Wait, a cricket, like a bug?

FANSHAW A talking bug, but yes, a bug. 

SCOTTY That’s just plumb crazy.

FANSHAW   [gasp]  Look at the horizon!  I think they are on the move!

SCOTTY Is there something we can do?

FANSHAW This is one of those times I truly wish there was.

CLOSING

Auld Lang Syne [DeK4]

EPISODE 5

1_COMING

SOUND IN TOWN - HORSES, MEN, READYING FOR BATTLE

COMMANDER [commands]  We need more shot at the western boundary!  Get someone over there!

SOLDIER Yessir!

SOUND FEET RUN OFF SHARPLY

SOUND DISTANT APPROACH OF PAINED, SLOW RUNNING

SOLDIER2 Sir!  Someone's coming!  On foot!

COMMANDER On foot? 

SENTRY [off] Halt!

LEM [breathless, with long gasps] I can't... If I stop...  I'm gon fall down...  And I gotta get to...  The commander.

SENTRY Stop, I say!

COMMANDER Let him on through.

LEM They're a-movin.  Deserters 'n comancheros.  Have guns. 

COMMANDER Why are you--

LEM Kilt Scotty.  Took the horses.  Look sharp. Ungh!

SOUND FALLS DOWN

COMMANDER Are you all right?  [up] Someone get Doc!

LEM I'll be [coughing fit] fine. Jest let me lie till the shakin goes off.

2_SPOOK HORSES

SCOTTY We got to do something!

FANSHAW And just what do you have in mind?  I've already done all I can, scouting them for Lem.  By the time they come close enough for us to get a look at, they will be moving fast enough that we shall hardly have time to observe.

SCOTTY Can't we spook the horses or nothing?  That's what haints do, isn't it?

FANSHAW I was with you the entire trip out from town.  Did the horses seem spooked to you?

SCOTTY [really down] No.

FANSHAW If Lem makes it back in time, there are ways we can help him.  Otherwise, we are merely spectators at this show.

3_TONIC

DOC Can you get yourself around this?

LEM [still hoarse, puffing] Tonic?

DOC [shrug] Mostly brandy. 

LEM [rusty chuckle] Thanks, doc. [drinks]

LISETTE Oh, goodness.  I believe you are Fanshaw's dear friend. 

LEM [coughs]

DOC Din't say it was GOOD brandy.

LEM [hawks, spits, clear throat]  Hits the spot. 

LISETTE [calculating] And not able to walk away.  [cruel chuckle] How perfectly jolly.

DOC The commander's gone off to rally the men, but they're like to need you to guide them.  You up fer it?

LEM Will be... shortly.  Any chance of a mite to eat?  It's been a powerful long night, and not looking to roll up any time soon.

4_DO SOMETHING

SCOTTY He's the only one what can hear us?

FANSHAW We've come across... others.  But they are very rare.

SCOTTY [yelling] I want to DO something!  I want to help!

FANSHAW There is no need to make such a ... a ruckus!  I am in precisely the same predicament!

SCOTTY But I--

GRISHAM [off]  Will you two shut up?  They're trying to sneak up on your position!

FANSHAW Oh dear.  Come along.

SCOTTY Where?

FANSHAW To do the only productive thing - gather as much information as possible.

5_SADDLED

SOUND MEN READY TO GO

SOUND MOUNT UP

LEM [sigh of relief, but also soreness] 

COMMANDER You doing all right, there, feller?

LEM Better saddle than boots.  I fair run the soles offa these.

COMMANDER Morning comes, we'll stand you a new set.  Least we can do.  Let's go.

SOUND HORSES MOVE OUT

LEM Commander?

COMMANDER Hmm?

LEM Rather than meet them headlong, since ain't no way to know how far they come, might could I suggest a defensive position?

COMMANDER This town is not a good place for that.  Too spread out.  And there's no way to get everyone into the fort, not without leaving near everything they own ripe for the picking.

LEM Nah - I'm a-thinkin just this side of the bridge, right about halfway out.  Bridge and creek - they ain't much, but if we can catch them this side of it, put their backs to water, and use the treeline for cover--

COMMANDER I like the way you think, hombre.  [up] Company!  [attention!]

6_FIGHT

GRISHAM Ain't no way you're taking me by surprise again, you-- ow!

SOUND PUNCH

FANSHAW [casual] shut up.

SCOTTY That was a good'un! But what if he lands one on you - he's awful big!

FANSHAW Leave him!  [quiet, moving away]  We can't actually be hurt.  But not everyone realizes that, and many feel the pain, even when there is no reason to.  I learned that the hard way.

GRISHAM [off] I'm a-gonna get you!

FANSHAW Blast!  He may not be able to harm me, but he can annoy and distract, and make it difficult to get anything constructive done.

SCOTTY Maybe - maybe I could keep him from bothering you?

FANSHAW How?

SCOTTY Well, I been plumb angry since I got kilt, and my momma says sometimes the best way to get over anger, if you don't got no pie, is to--

GRISHAM Kill you, you girly man!

SCOTTY [grunt as he punches him]

GRISHAM oof!

SCOTTY Better'n pie!  You go on, Mr. Fanshaw, and do what you gotta.

FANSHAW Good lad.

7_GRANDKIDS

LEM [muttered] Fanshaw?    Too far out. 

COMMANDER What's the terrain like beyond the bridge?

LEM Nothing much to speak of.  Some hills.  A ridge off to the north where first we saw them.  No place fer them to make a stand tween here and there, though.

COMMANDER   Cain't let this sort of thing go. 

LEM Course not. 

COMMANDER You got the extra shot you needed, did you?

LEM   Had to leave all o' mine cached back with Scotty.

COMMANDER You're sure he's ... dead?

LEM I'm afraid I do know dead when I see it.

COMMANDER [sad] That's too bad.

LEM Kin?

COMMANDER  

LEM [trying to ease] He went down fightin.

COMMANDER That don't give my sister grandbabies.

LEM [symp] Nope, it shore don't.

8_PIRATES

SOUND MUCH CREEPING

FANSHAW Looks like about three score.  Hardly a fair fight, sneaking up on a defenseless town at night.  Like pirates.

8A_FLASHBACK

MUSIC FLASHBACK

AMB BRIGHT SUNNY DAY

NANNY Come along in now, bunny bug.

YOUNG CLARA Stop calling me that, nanny!  I'm very nearly 10 years old.

NANNY You'll always be my little bunny bug.  Oh!  Whatever is that tea towel doing on your head?  [gasp of fear]  Did you hurt yourself?  Show nanny!

YOUNG CLARA No!  I am a pirate.

NANNY Do not be so silly.  There are no pirates.

YOUNG CLARA Of course there are.  They are in books, so they must be real.

NANNY Besides, you cannot be a pirate.

YOUNG CLARA Well not just NOW.  When I am bigger, I shall be able to do whatever I want.

9_WASPS

COMMANDER Did you see how big a force they had?

LEM Not to count them, but it was bigger'n I thought.  At least 30, probably more.

COMMANDER [skeptical] Really?

LEM They had a dozen cookin fires goin, and you don't make a fire to feed a lone fellow.

COMMANDER [considers, then agrees] No, you don’t. 

LEM 'Sides, better to expect a whole hive of wasps than be surprised by one too many.

COMMANDER [chuckles]  Sound thinking.  [up]  Lieutenant!

10_BAG

SOUND STILL MUCH MOVEMENT

SOUND SCOTTY AND GRISHAM, FIGHTING

SCOTTY [pleased] You tired yet, feller?  I ain't even blowed!

GRISHAM [tired] You little whippersnapper!  Think you can pull a man's whiskers and walk away!

FANSHAW [muttered] There are some distinct benefits to being dead.  More than he will ever know.  [gasp] No.

RUFFIAN1 Hey!  I found something!

SOUND CREAK OF LEATHER - LEM'S GEAR

FANSHAW [worried] Damn!  Lem's bag!

RUFFIAN2 What?

SECOND Silence!

RUFFIAN2 [whispered] bring it - we'll split it later!

RUFFIAN1 Split it?  Nonsense!  It's mine, whatever it is!

SECOND [whispered] Keep moving!

11_SCOUT AHEAD

COMMANDER [ordering, but hushed] Take your men and circle round up thataway.  Get to high ground and cut off retreat.

BOB Yessir!

LEM If you don't mind, sir, I'us thinkin I might scout on up ahead a mite. 

COMMANDER You aren't even being paid to be part of this, fellow, why do you keep risking yourself?

LEM [shrug] Someone's gotta.  'sides I had to leave my kit behind, and wanna get it if I can before someone else lays hands on it.

COMMANDER Valuables?

LEM Nothin worth money, but some things cain't be replaced.

COMMANDER [teasing a bit] Go on then, but if you see them coming, you'll come back and tell us first, eh?

LEM [chuckle] I reckon.

12_LEAD ROPE

SCOTTY Mister Fanshaw!  That fellow just vanished!  Like he flew away, whilst I was a-hittin on him!

FANSHAW I fear I shall be gone shortly as well.

SCOTTY Why?

FANSHAW I am not sure of his reasons, but I must stay with the bag.  Now that it has been found...

SCOTTY Why?  Keeping an eye on it?

FANSHAW   There's something in there - Oh!  It's moving.  Stay with me as long as you can. 

SCOTTY Why can't I--?

FANSHAW Shh!  [very hurried] Picture a rope tied to something, say, to you - your body, over there.  And you are on the other end.

SCOTTY Like a training rope? [ASK PAT]

FANSHAW Basically, yes.  You can go anywhere, within the circle made by that rope.

SCOTTY [figuring it out] So you're ... tied to that bag?

FANSHAW Yes!  [gasp] Bloody thieves!

SOUND FANSHAW SUCKED AWAY

13_BE A BOY

YOUNG CLARA I am going to be a pirate!  I shall sail the seven seas and steal all the gold!

NANNY Stealing is very wicked. 

YOUNG CLARA But you can't be a pirate without stealing!  Then you're just a sailor!

NANNY And young ladies do not become pirates.  Young ladies become mommies.

YOUNG CLARA Or nannies.

NANNY [reassuring] Don't fret yourself, bunny bug.  You shall be a mummy.

YOUNG CLARA I should rather be a nanny.  Mummies are boring.  Nannies have things to do.

NANNY [sigh] Mummies have things to do too.

YOUNG CLARA I don't want to be a mummy, I want to be a pirate!  I want to see the world!

NANNY [stern] There are many thing in this world, Clara Fanshaw, that are only meant for boys.

YOUNG CLARA Then I want to be a boy!

END

Auld Lang Syne [DeK4]

EPISODE 6

1_READY

SOUND NIGHT, MEN BEING QUIET, HORSES OFF

COMMANDER Yer sure you wanna go on out there, all on your own??

LEM I'm best on my own, and I don't want another of yer boys on my conscience.

COMMANDER [acknowledging] Scotty.

LEM If I can't see my way to get back and warn you quick enough, I'll shoot off twice--

COMMANDER [warning] They'll know you're there.

LEM I kin look after myself.  Two shots means it's a-comin, and I spect after that there'ull be plenty more shots to keep y'all busy.  I best get a move on.

COMMANDER One thing.

LEM Yeah?

COMMANDER One of my men swore he'd seen you before.

LEM [down] Oh.

COMMANDER And that you're the Deadeye kid.

LEM I-

COMMANDER [overriding, but clearly lying] I told him not to be so credulous.  Deadeye Kid looks nothing like that man that's about to save our town.

LEM [realizing] Ri-ight.

COMMANDER [serious] Don't make me a liar.

LEM I kin only do my best.

SOUND WALKS AWAY

2_BLACKGUARDS

SOUND COMMOTION, MANY MEN, HORSES, TRAVELING

LEADER [loud whisper] We'll leave the horses near the stream and sneak up.

FANSHAW

RUFFIAN2 [whisper] What's in that bag you found anyways?

RUFFIAN1 [whisper] Ain't had no time, but it's shore heavy.

RUFFIAN2 [whisper]  Heavy is good!  Mebbe it's gold!

RUFFIAN1 Well, I still ain't sharing!

FANSHAW Such stimulating conversation.  I wonder how far ahead of these ruffians I can manage to stay. 

3_TALLYHO

SOUND STEALTHY MOVING THROUGH UNDERBRUSH, STOPS

LEM   [angry hmph] They cain't be too damn far off.  And ridin.

FANSHAW [distant]  Tally-ho! 

LEM [starts to laugh but turns it into a snort]

FANSHAW Halloooooo!  Halloo- [suddenly cut off]

LEM What the devil?  [shrugs, to himself] Well, you can take care of your own damn self.

SOUND RUNNING FEET TAKE OFF

4_STRUGGLE

AMB IN THE ATTACK FORCE

GRISHAM Now I gotcha sorted out!

FANSHAW [muffled noises]

SOUND STRUGGLING

GRISHAM Oh, no you don't! 

SOUND MORE STRUGGLE

GRISHAM I finally figgered out cain't do nothing to hurt me.  Long as I ignore it.  But I can still keep a tight grip on you.

FANSHAW [noise of effort]

GRISHAM [ouch!] Hey!  You bit me! 

FANSHAW Keep ahead of them!!!!

GRISHAM   [disgusted noise]

FANSHAW [to grisham] Damn you all to--[muffled again]

GRISHAM Stop with all the wiggling, you stupid--  [stunned!] whatthehell?

FANSHAW [noise of effort]

SOUND STRUGGLE, BREAKS FREE

GRISHAM You're a-- ? 

FANSHAW You may be stronger than me, but I am faster.

SOUND FANSHAW LEAVES

GRISHAM what the hell?  A female?

5_SIGNAL

COMMANDER He's been gone a fair piece.

SOUND [DISTANT] TWO GUN SHOTS

COMMANDER [commanding, but quiet]  They're coming!

SOUND [command passes along ranks - GET VOICES]

COMMANDER [a bit superior]  I knew that that fellow was no sort of outlaw. 

6_PLAN DOS

LEADER Shots?

SECOND Sir?

LEADER   Someone has seen.  Get El puerco and his fellows.  Tell them plan dos.

SECOND Plan dos, sir?

LEADER They'll circle south and get behind the town.  We get some children in hand, no one will fight any more.

SECOND Yessir!

SOUND RUNS OFF

SCOTTY [torn] I can't just let them-- [plaintive] but what can I do?

7_BUCKETFULL

SOUND HORSES APPROACHING

NOTE - Lem is lying in wait, letting the group go past, and plans to pick them off from behind.

FANSHAW [distant but closer, yelling] Lem!  That dead friend of yours is about - watch out!

LEM [muttered] Damn.  And I don' want to go shootin no good horse jest to lay a varmint like that down.

SOUND HORSES BEGIN TO PASS

LEM [very quietly] 30...?  Nearer fifty.  That's a bucketful of wasps.

SOUND SHOTS!  (where the horses went to)

LEM [muttered to self] hold on. 

SOUND NO MORE HORSES COMING

LEM [muttered] almost...

GRISHAM There you are!

LEM [sharp intake of breath]  That don't work on me twice.  Specially when I been warned.

GRISHAM Oh, that girly friend of your'n?  Funny thing about that--

SOUND GRISHAM IS YANKED AWAY

LEM Good riddance.  And jest in time.

SOUND BEGINS SHOOTING

MaN [shot, fall]

8_HOLD THE LINES

COMMANDER [roaring now] Hold the lines!  More shot, boy!

BOY Yessir!

MAN [hit, argh!]

COMMANDER Stay low!

FANSHAW All seems rather well here. 

GRISHAM There you are.

FANSHAW Bloody hell.

GRISHAM [nasty chuckle] I was just wondring - if I kin grab you, I bet I kin kiss you, little lady!

FANSHAW [dodging] I doubt you'll catch me again, now that I'm watching for you, but I will admit that one advantage to being a ghost is that I needn't make an effort to remain upwind of you.

SOUND FANSHAW OUT

9_RELOAD

SOUND COMMOTION OFF, NOT RIGHT HERE

SOUND RELOADING

SOUND NEARBY HORSE PFFS

LEM That's nine. 

SOUND SLAPS GUN SHUT

SCOTTY [distant, yelling] Someone!  They're circling round!  There's some fellers as are going south to get behind lines!

LEM   [listens for a second]  Fanshaw?  Damn. 

SCOTTY [yelling]  Please!  Don't let them hurt nobody in town.

LEM [muttered] boy'll yell himself hoarse.  [chuckles]  dead don't get hoarse.  But I gotta get one.  [clucks to horse]

SOUND HORSE BLOWS

LEM [grunts as he swings into the saddle]  Come on.

FANSHAW [a bit distant] Lem?

LEM Wazzat?  There you are!

FANSHAW Close as I can get just now, and can't stay.  That blighter keeps trying to grab me.

LEM Grisham? 

FANSHAW The commander seems to be holding well.  The villains have taken heavy losses and are starting to fall apart.

LEM   Can you yell to Scotty, let him know I got his message?

FANSHAW What message?

LEM Just try and tell the boy.  So he can rest hisself.  [to the horse] Geeyah!

SOUND HORSE TAKES OFF

FANSHAW Scotty?  Can you hear me?

10_YOU STAY

COMMANDER Let's clean this up - leave none of them to try and harm the town.

CORPORAL Yessir! Should we capture them, or--

COMMANDER This is no time to be peaceable.  They set themselves up to attack a settlement, and we have to take serious measures.

SOUND HORSE APPROACHING

LEM [distant] Commander!

COMMANDER Let him through.  [up, to Lem]  Looks like we've got nearly all of them. 

SOUND GUNSHOTS DISTANT

COMMANDER A bit of tidying up to do, but--

SOUND HORSE PULLS UP and STOPS

LEM [to horse] Whoah!  I overheard a couple at the back, saying they had a force circlin south - dozen men mebbe - to get round any resistance and come up behind. 

COMMANDER My god!

LEM Horse up a few good men, load em up and come with me.

COMMANDER You, boy!

BOY Yessir?

COMMANDER Bring my horse, quickly!

LEM You're needed here, surely?

COMMANDER You're the one who needs a rest, mister Roberts.  My corporal, here, will be happy to hear any other suggestions you might have, but I will be leading my men.

LEM Sound thinkin.  I have been going a bit.

COMMANDER Corporal?

CORPORAL [acknowledging] Yes sir.

FANSHAW Lem?  I think I got through to Scotty, but there's such a distance.  Poor lad, he merely wants to do his duty.

SOUND LEM DISMOUNTS

LEM Let's you and I see if we cain't root out a few more of these varmints.  I see purty well in the dark.

CORPORAL Excellent! 

FANSHAW I'll see what I can turn up.

GRISHAM Found you!

FANSHAW Oh, damn! 

GRISHAM You ain't never getting away from me, you--

FANSHAW [hits out]

GRISHAM [ungh!]

FANSHAW Have to get him out of here, Lem.  Too distracting.

SOUND FANSHAW LEAVES

GRISHAM [laughs triumphantly]  Coward!  But I don't suppose I should be surprised.

LEM [quietly, but deadly serious] You don't stop making a fuss, I'm gon' kill your horse.

GRISHAM What?

LEM You sit still and be quiet or that horse yer so attached to is gonna find itself on the wrong end of a bullet.  You hear me?

GRISHAM [all the bluster gone] 

LEM   I don't fancy killin no animal just fer this, but this here's a battle--

SOUND GUNSHOT

LEM [gasp, hit!] Damn!

SOUND QUICKDRAW, GUNS BLAZE

GRISHAM Hah!  I still gotcha!

LEM [weakening, through gritted teeth] Din't no one see them a-sneakin up? 

CORPORAL [commanding] Men!

SOUND MORE GUNSHOTS

LEM [groan]

SOUND BODY DROP AS HE COLLAPSES

END

NEXT EPISODE BEGINS

SOUND FADES IN AND OUT

COMMANDER Hold on, there, fellow.

LEM [vague] all's well?

COMMANDER We got em.

LEM My pack?

COMMANDER I'll set someone to finding it.

FADE OUT

DOCTOR Bite down on this.  He's lost a lot of blood.

FADE OUT

BOOTMAKER I'll have a new pair ready before he'll be walking anywhere on them.  You sure I should even bother--?

FADEOUT

WOMAN Just a little bit of broth, mister.  You need to get some o'yer strength back.

SICKROOM

LEM [annoyed moan]

FANSHAW You're awake.

LEM [quiet]  Anyone--?

FANSHAW Not close enough to hear - as long as you stay quiet.

LEM   I been shot?

FANSHAW At least twice, judging by the bandages.  Once in the chest, once in the leg, I should say.  I should have been watching.

LEM [reassuring] Can't leave you to do everythin.  

FANSHAW [awkward pause, then stiffly]  Should I ...go?

LEM Go?  go where?

FANSHAW [covering] I - I mean, leave you in peace.  To rest.  I don't doubt you will still be needing a great deal of it.

LEM [straining a bit]  Did you see, did it go alla way through?

FANSHAW I don't know, but you were very fortunate - or so the doctor declared.

LEM [satisfied] 

FANSHAW I'll leave you to your rest, then, shall I?

LEM Go or stay, I ain't so wrung out I cain't tell you got somethin on yer mind.

FANSHAW

LEM Is it that female ghost o'yours yer frettin over?

FANSHAW [bracing breath] 

LEM [exasperated snort]  Yer worried she said sumpin, izzat it?

FANSHAW

LEM [playing it up a bit] You furriners and the trifles that plague you.

FANSHAW So she did--?

LEM [shrug]    So?

FANSHAW [surprised] So?

LEM You cain't be the first.

FANSHAW First?

LEM Nor the last, like enough.

FANSHAW But it... doesn't... bother you?

LEM Well, you don't do it no more.

FANSHAW .. don't?

LEM 'sides, plenty of little fellers wet up the bed right up til they'us in long pants. 

FANSHAW What?

END

Story by H.P. Lovecraft, read by Julie Hoverson
Cover art by Brett Coulstock
Music by Kevin MacLeod

In one of the longer Lovecraft stories, a dedicated skeptic is slowly brought round to an uncomfortable truth...

(Keep in mind, these stories were recorded when Julie was still learning how to mix and work with audio - so the sound quality may be a little ... patchy.)

The pirates have been routed, but Captain Myers languishes in a semi-daze.

[note - will update when new cover art is available]

In their first serialized adventure {in 5 parts}, Lem and Fanshaw accompany a "studier of the supernatural" to face something they may never have seen before - a ghost ... or at least a ghost that can affect the "real world".

Written and Produced by Julie Hoverson

Cast List

Lemuel Roberts /Deadeye Kid -  J. Spyder Isaacson
Clarence Fanshaw -  J. Hoverson

Dr. Sullivan - Michael Coleman  {Tales of the Extraordinary}
Mr. Cartland - Reynaud LeBoeuf
Emma Cartland - Jacquie Duckworth
Melody Heath - Melissa Bartell
Red - Jack Kincaid (Edict Zero)
Hank - Mark Olson
Clyde Wishwell - Bob Noble
Mr. Baker - Paul Green  {Encyclopedia of Weird Westerns}
Add'l voices by Gene Thorkildsen

Cover Design:  Brett Coulstock
[Old photos used to make Fanshaw purchased from www.recycledrelatives.com]

Announcer:  Glen "Ole Hoss" Hallstrom
Opening theme:  "The Wreck of Old '97" from public domain recording found on archive.org
Any incidental music:  Kevin MacLeod (Incompetech.com)
Editing and Sound:   Julie Hoverson

------- 

No gunshots herald his approach.
No trademark left behind him when he leaves. 
The Kid had his fill of notoriety in days gone by -
as plenty of empty boots can surely testify.  
Some say he rides alone. 
That's the Deadeye Kid.

****************************************************************

Haunting Melody

Cast:

[opening credits/Olivia]

LEMuel Roberts - Spyder

Clarence FANSHAW - julie

Dr. SULLIVAN - Michael coleman

Mr. CARTLAND -

Mrs. EMMA Cartland - Jacquie Duckworth

MELODY Heath -

RED -

HANK -

CLYDE Wishwell - Bob Noble

Mr. Baker, the real expert - Paul Greene

OPENER

OLD HOSS    No gunshots herald his approach.  No trademark left behind him when he leaves.  The Kid had his fill of notoriety in days gone by - as plenty of empty boots can surely testify.   Some say he rides alone.  That's the Deadeye Kid.

CLOSER

OLD HOSS    The lonely cowboy cliché, always riding out, heading... yonder.  Join us again in two weeks when he rides back over that far horizon. 

MUSIC

SOUND     BUCKBOARD, HORSES

FANSHAW    [straining] I think I can just make out a structure of some sort.

LEM    Not much further now.

SULLIVAN    Excellent.  I am in your debt for all your help in getting me out here.

LEM    Woulda been a mite easier if'n you were were saddled, stead of carted. Some of these ruts--

SULLIVAN     I've never been much of a horseman.  And this is a fairish wagon. 

FANSHAW    Garish, rather.

LEM    Well, I reckon it was cheap.

SULLIVAN    Oh, yes.  They rented it to me at a very reasonable rate.

FANSHAW    Ah, rented.  That explains why he has not repainted over the "Piewacket Players" placard on the side.

SULLIVAN    I understand a couple of the actors are - um - incarcerated for some while.  Renting me the wagon and horses saved them board and stowage.  Everyone benefits.

FANSHAW    Actually, some of these murals are rather good.  If the players are half as talented as their painter, it might be worth seeking out one of their performances.

LEM    [dubious] I reckon.

FANSHAW    [musing] King Lear.  Julius Caeser.  Romeo and Juliet.  [chuckles]  They seem to perform a lot of the classics.  Shakespeare.

LEM    Mmm.

FANSHAW    Did you know that in Shakespeare's day - some 250 years ago - it was illegal for women to perform on the stage?

LEM    Hush.

FANSHAW    Oh, Lem, do let me impart a little culture for once.

LEM    [Annoyed grunt]

FANSHAW    Particularly while you cannot argue.  As I was saying, back in the day, all the female parts were played by young men.

SULLIVAN    Oh, goodness!  Look at that!

LEM    [eager] Whatsat?

SULLIVAN    That's an awfully steep hill up ahead.  You think the wagon can manage it?

LEM    I reckon so, reverend.

SULLIVAN    "Doctor", please.  I prefer it as an honorific.

LEM    [puzzled] But you're a "man o' god"?

SULLIVAN    And a man of science as well.  I firmly believe that the church cannot simply deny science, but must embrace it, and hand in hand we shall move forward into the next century!

LEM    [dubious] A'right then.

FANSHAW    Fervent, isn't he?

SULLIVAN    Sorry.  I find I must defend myself constantly - both against those who find science and religion incompatible, and against those who pooh-pooh my branch of science entirely.

LEM    Oh? 

SULLIVAN    [defiant]  I have made a comprehensive study of the existence of ghosts.

LEM    [choking back a cough]  OH.

FANSHAW    Oh, dear.

MUSIC

MELODY    [off] [wailing, hysterics]

SOUND    DOOR OPENS, WAILING UP

CARTLAND    Don't that girl ever shut up?

EMMA    Bart!  She swears she's being tormented.

SOUND    DOOR SHUTS

CARTLAND    Hysteria.  You women can't stop yourselves from being women, but the least you can do is keep quiet when a man wants to think.

EMMA    What do you want me to do?  Lock her in a madhouse?  She's my own flesh and blood! 

CARTLAND    Your sister is pitching a fit 'cause she ain't getting her own way.  Nothing more.

EMMA    But what if it is something more?

CARTLAND    I got that well in hand.

EMMA    What?  How? 

CARTLAND    Don't go questioning me, woman.  Where's my grub?

MUSIC

SULLIVAN    [pugnacious] Do you, or do you not believe in ghosts?

FANSHAW    [short bark of a laugh]

LEM    [dry]  I reckon I do.

SULLIVAN     Many people believe that the supernatural is somehow at cross-purposes with the bible, but it isn't so.  Ever since Solomon, the wisest men in the good book studied the ways of the supernatural, in order to overcome it.

LEM    Solomon.  Izzat the king fellow?

FANSHAW    Famous for his wise judgment.  And not cutting up the baby.

SULLIVAN    Traditionally, many have always believed that the dead may carry on, side by side with the living, unseen but always present.

LEM    Ain't this more of a church question?

SULLIVAN    What do you mean?

LEM    Well, if you believe folks just hunker down once they passed on, then what you think of heaven?

SULLIVAN    I don't believe every soul lingers.  Have you ever heard of Purgatory?

FANSHAW    Oh, goodness.

LEM    Ain't that a town in Nevada territory?

SULLIVAN    In the bible, purgatory is a place where people who are not good enough to go to heaven nor evil enough to go directly to hell are judged.

FANSHAW    Which bible, precisely?

LEM    Guess I never got that far in bible learnin.

SULLIVAN    It is the premise for all my theories that purgatory is not a place, but merely a "state"--

LEM    [playing dumb] Wyoming? [1890]

FANSHAW    [grim] Ask him which bible.

SULLIVAN    [trying not to get exasperated] --and that spirits that need to be redeemed, or to mend their ways, may in fact be "in purgatory" much like someone could be "in a foul temper" - right next to us.

FANSHAW    Balderdash!  Utter rubbish!

LEM    Looky there!  That should be the ranch now!

MUSIC

MELODY    [heavy breathing, end of crying jag]

SOUND    TAP ON THE DOOR, DOOR OPENS

EMMA    Melody?  Are you feeling a little better?

MELODY    [sullen]  I been bit.

EMMA    Bit?  By what?  A rat?

MELODY    Come and look.

EMMA    I'll fetch a lantern.

MELODY    No!

EMMA    Or open the shutters?

MELODY    No!!  They don't like the light!  I kin only open them at night.

EMMA    [very upset] oh.  What can I do to help?

MELODY    [disheartened]  Nothing. 

EMMA    Are you hungry?  There's some good stew.

MELODY    I can't.  I just can't.

EMMA    Here, show me that bite.

MUSIC

LEM    [quiet] What's gnawing on you?

FANSHAW    I do not consider myself a particularly religious fellow, but if there is one thing I have found quite frustrating about the wide open west it is that so many people simply decide that they are experts on this or that subject, and other people believe them, for lack of any alternatives.

LEM    Mm?

FANSHAW    He claims to know the bible, but then he goes on about this spiritism nonsense.  And purgatory!  I may not be a divinity scholar but a childhood of churchgoing taught me that that is a catholic conceit, and he's got it wrong anyway.  Purgatory was where souls waited out a period of penance, while their friends and family prayed for their release. 

LEM    How'd they know if they got out?

FANSHAW    I believe the priests would tell them.  It always smacked of extortion to me.

LEM    [laughs]  Well.  How's all this gonna make a damn lick of difference just now?

FANSHAW    What? 

LEM    Whatever it is he believes - it gonna change the price of oats?

FANSHAW    [sigh]  No. 

LEM    Good.  That's cleared up, then.  Road's widenin up, and we'll be alongside the wagon agin soon. 

MUSIC

EMMA    We need to send Melody somewhere.  If only you had let her marry--

CARTLAND    She's 16 - too damn young, and don't know her own mind.

EMMA    I know, but if she was away--

CARTLAND    Dammit woman.  You are my wife, and I will not be argued with.

EMMA    Of course.  [beat]  Something bit her.

CARTLAND    Bit?  Like a snake?

EMMA    The marks....um... they looked--

CARTLAND    Oh, just spit it out.

EMMA    They looked like they were made by a man!

MUSIC

SOUND    THEY ARE STOPPED. HORSES, HARNESS, DISMOUNT, ETC.

SULLIVAN    Thank you ever so much for helping me to find my way.  I'm not much of an outdoorsman.  Or horseman.

FANSHAW    Nor much of a cleric, apparently.

LEM    Right happy to help.  Why is it you were comin all the way out here in the first place?  [chuckles] Not to put on a play.

SULLIVAN    [chuckles] It is rather a curious wagon, isn't it?  But I am afraid my job here is rather confidential.

CARTLAND    [yelling from off] Is that the Reverend?  Get on in here! 

SULLIVAN    [dithering] Oh, um I--

LEM    I'll look to your horses.  You get along.

SULLIVAN    Excellent. 

FANSHAW    I don't like him. 

LEM    You don' like his views.

FANSHAW    They're gibberish!

LEM    'Zat anythin like folderol?  [serious]  Why'n't you go on in and see what brand o' folderol he's spinnin to the good folks inside.

FANSHAW    [stiff upper lip] I shall try and keep my temper.

LEM    [muttered] Tryin never hurt no one.

SOUND    A FEW MOMENTS OF UNHARNASSING, THEN SUDDEN TUSSLE, RED GRABS LEM AND SLAMS HIM INTO THE WALL OF THE BARN

SOUND    HORSES ANNOYED, SHYING

SOUND    GUN COCKS

RED    [snarled] The Deadeye Kid.

MUSIC

SOUND    FANSHAW ENTERS

CARTLAND    --convince her it ain't nothing but temper!

EMMA    But the bite!

SULLIVAN    A bite? 

EMMA    She looks like she was bit, bad.

CARTLAND    There's no way anyone could get in there and bite her.

SULLIVAN    It isn't unheard of.

FANSHAW    A bite?

CARTLAND    [suspicious] Really?

EMMA    See!

SULLIVAN    Manifestations have demonstrated their ability to affect the material world in any number of ways.

FANSHAW    [suspicious] Oh.  Do tell?

CARTLAND    There's a simple answer for this.  She bit her own damn self.  She pulls one more shenanigan, and I'm taking a strap to the damn girl.

EMMA    Never!  Our father wouldn't--

CARTLAND    He shoulda!  If your sister weren't spoiled, we wouldn't have to have this idjit in.

SULLIVAN    Sir!  I am well respected in--

CARTLAND    [furious, overbearing] You are here to prove this ain't nothing but women's hysteria and a mulish girl's temper. 

EMMA    But if it is something else?

FANSHAW    What do you think it may be, I wonder?

CARTLAND    Either she's doing this to herself, or she's plumb loco.  Which way do you prefer?  She's your flesh and blood.

SOUND    BEHIND DOOR - CRASH

MELODY    [screams]

[BREAK]

MUSIC

RED    What the hell are you doing here?

LEM    Do I... know you?

RED    Mebbe not, but I know you.  You're the Deadeye Kid.

LEM    [resigned] Who'd I kill, that yer so riled about?

RED    What in tarnation is wrong with you?

LEM    Aside from being slammed up agin a barn, with iron in my face, nuttin comes to mind.

RED    I'us there in Carson City.  Five years ago.  Watched you take down Iron John Sandoval.

LEM    [after a pause]  And?

RED    Saw how fast y'are.  Hmph.  Used to be.

LEM    Mmm?

RED    [offended]  You din't even see me comin.

LEM    My mind was took up with sumpin else.

SOUND    HAMMER EASES BACK

RED    You should vamoose.  This ain't no place for them as has lost their edge.

LEM    You might wanna back off a piece.

RED    Whyzzat?  Can't look me in the face and admit you're getting old?

LEM    My gun hand's starting to cramp up sumpin fierce, and I cain't ease down til you pull your cohones off'n the barrel. 

RED    You - what?  [looking down, gasps]

LEM    Right shame to shave your stumps - seein as we're all compadres now.

SOUND    BACKS OFF

SOUND    HAMMER DOWN, GUN INTO HOLSTER, SLAP ON THE BACK

LEM    You look like a man that might could use a drink. 

MUSIC

SOUND    HORSES, BARN

SOUND    FANSHAW ENTERS

FANSHAW    I say, Lem?  Are you alone?

LEM    Lessen you wanna chat with the hosses.

FANSHAW    What do you really think of this fellow?

LEM    From yer tone, I'm guessin you mean the reverend - doctor.

FANSHAW    Ye-ess.

LEM    I figger he's harmless.  Cain't actually know a lick about all's he's talkin about.

FANSHAW    Right.  [beat]  Do you ever wonder?

LEM    I wonder alla time.  Any particular wonderin yer wonderin about?

FANSHAW    About this.  About spirits.  About good and evil.

LEM    Never reckoned on em hitched like'at. 

FANSHAW    You don't think of ghosts as being somehow inherent wicked?

LEM    You havin a crisis of faith?  I reckon jest like with anyone, only you can know if you're evil.

FANSHAW    I - well, I don't mean myself, I suppose. 

LEM    [teasing]  So you think you're better than e'rbody else.

FANSHAW    No.  I don't know. 

LEM    What brought all this on?

FANSHAW    From what I observed in the house, there may be an argument here for an evil spirit of some sort.

LEM    And?

FANSHAW    And?  And what? 

LEM    Spirits're just as evil or saintly as the folks they used to be.  Don't make no nevermind to no one but me.

FANSHAW    I mean an evil spirit with ... powers.

LEM    [sure] Ain't no such thing.

FANSHAW    Are you so very certain?

MUSIC

SOUND    OUTSIDE, WALKING

LEM    I ain't never seen no spirit could touch nothin in the real world.

FANSHAW    Neither have I, but what if there is?

LEM    We do whatever we gots to.

SOUND    FEET APPROACH

RED    [coming in] Kid!

LEM    [sigh]  Just Lem, if'n you please.

RED    Oh, drat.  Right.  You done with them horses?

LEM    Tucked up tight.  You ast about the job?

FANSHAW    Job?

RED    Mr. Cartland's right happy to have another hand, even if you don't plan on staying fer long.  With all that's been a-going on--

LEM    What all is it that's been a-goin on?

FANSHAW    Evil spirits.

LEM    Is it what's been drivin off all your help?

RED    Come on, let's getcha some grub.  Hank'll be pleased to have someone new to jaw to.

MUSIC

SOUND    KITCHEN, EATING

SOUND    DOOR OPENS

HANK    Red.

RED    Hank.  This is Lem.  Come in with the doctor fella.

LEM    Hank.

HANK    You work for the reverend?

RED    He's--

LEM    I work fer jest about anyone as needs me.  Doctor needed a guide.

RED    Lem's gonna help out round here fer a while.

LEM    Long as the doc's on hand, might as well make myself useful.

HANK    Did you tell him what's going on?  What cleared us out?

RED    Here, have a plate of stew, Lem.  I'm sure Hank can tell it better'n me.

HANK    [uncertain] Oh, I---

RED    He actually saw it.

LEM    Saw what?

HANK    That girl.  She's possessed!

LEM    Possessed of what?

HANK    No!  Possessed!  Taken over by an evil spirit!

LEM    [considering] I don't figger I put much stock in such things.  Ain't no other explanation?

HANK    What else could explain how I - I saw a strange light in her window late at night--

LEM    What were you doin' out?

HANK    [thrown off] What?  I was - uh - having a smoke.

LEM    She a good-lookin' girl?  Apart from whatever travail she's in?

HANK    That ain't the point.  I was off a ways and saw a light.  It din't look natural.  So I went closer to see.

LEM    How high's this window?

HANK    I don't know!  Chest-high, I s'pose.  But I sawr everything!  [yarning]  Right from the first, I was froze to the spot.  Couldn't look away.  In this strange blueish colored light, there was something flyin back and forth across the room--

LEM    A bird?

HANK    No!  A cushion or a hat or something - something that had no damn business flyin!

LEM    [mild amazement] Oh!

HANK    And then I saw the girl herself crawling about the floor like an animal. 

LEM    Mebbe she dropped sumpin.

HANK    But it weren't natural!  You can explain away one thing after another, but that light won't never look right.

LEM    I meant no disrespect, just know how late at night moonlight can be a bit mazy.  Can make things look wrong way round and bigger than life.

HANK    Well, this weren't out in the moonlight - it was in her room.

LEM    Right. 

HANK    You ain't a-scared?

LEM    I'm a bit behind when it comes to afearin things.  Got to see sumpin for myself before I can work up to gooseflesh.  Yerself?

HANK    I'm pert near hightailing it out of here, I tell you what.  One more night like that and you'll be seeing the back of me.

RED    Ain't likely, Hank old hoss.  You relish the tellin of your tall tales too much to miss a chance fer another one.

MUSIC

CARTLAND    It's pure mulishness, is what it is.  The girl wanted to marry, and I said no.

SULLIVAN    You're surely not her father, though?

CARTLAND    Father's passed on.  I ain't blood, but I married her sister and that makes me the lawful man of the house and head of this family.  She gots to understand that.

EMMA    I still think--

CARTLAND    Regardless of whether she's old enough to marry, I wan't about to let her run off to the damn Wishwells and take half the ranch with her.

EMMA    Our father left us even shares.

FANSHAW    Hmm.  And that man married yours.

SULLIVAN    Ah.  I should talk to the girl, now.

MUSIC

HANK    Well. 

SOUND    SLAPS THIGHS, GETS UP

HANK    That hay won't pitch itself.  Care to lend a hand, feller?

LEM    Lem.  I--

RED    I need him yet fer a mite.  I'll send him along when we're through.

LEM    That's a mighty fine looking belt buckle you got there, Hank.  Turquoise?

HANK    Yup. 

LEM    And silver.  [musing] Mighty fine.

SOUND    WALKS OUT DOOR

LEM    Why d'you stay, Red?

RED    Been with Mr. Cartland for nigh on 10 years. Since before he married the missus.  Fact is, that was when we came through Carson City.

LEM    You friends?

RED    Nah, he ain't one fer making friends of the hands.  But he's fair.  Hard, but fair.  

LEM    Now tell me.  [a bit humorous] Apart from having the nerve of a grizzly, why ain't you scairt?

RED    I plumb don't feel it.  Whatever's a-going on with the girl, it don't hit me here.  You ken?

LEM    I reckon.

RED    It's like ... play actors.  They can make you like the story, but they cain't never make it real.

LEM    Gotta good solid head on them shoulders, Red.  I purpose to find out what all's transpirin here, and if'n yer strapped fer it, I'd shore thank'ee kindly for any help.

RED    [admiring] You ain't lost none of yer sand, have ya?

LEM    I reckon the wind's just blowin it in the right direction these days.

MUSIC

SOUND    DOOR CREAKS OPEN

SULLIVAN    Young lady? 

MELODY    [very tired and small sounding] Who's there?

CARTLAND    It’s the feller gonna tell you what a liar you been.

EMMA    Husband!

CARTLAND    Go on then.  Tell her.

EMMA    I'll open them shutters.

MELODY    No!

EMMA     Just a crack!  It's fair dark in here!

SOUND    FEET, SHUTTERS

SULLIVAN    Sir!  I must insist on being able to interview the girl in relative peace!

CARTLAND    I ain't a-stopping you.

SULLIVAN    You must be quiet and leave the girl to answer for herself.

EMMA    Please!

CARTLAND    [somewhat subdued]  Go on.

SULLIVAN    Miss Heath, your lady sister has told me some of your symptoms, but I would like to hear them from you.  What is your chief complaint?

MELODY    They never let me sleep!

FANSHAW    [far corner] Poor girl does look tired.

CARTLAND    Nor us out here!  I ain't had a good night through in weeks.

SULLIVAN     [sharp] Shh!  [calm]  They?  Who are "they"?

MELODY    You won't believe me any more than anyone else does.

CARTLAND    Hmph.

SULLIVAN    I believe a great many things.  Pray, humor me.

MELODY    They come at night, and pinch me.  Pinch my arms and legs - all over!  And one bit me - See here!

CARTLAND    You bit your own damn self!

MELODY    [whimpers]

SULLIVAN    Sir!  Would you be kind enough to leave?  As long as you insist on berating the poor girl, she will never be calm enough to tell me all her troubles.

CARTLAND    Fine.  Come on, woman.

SOUND    DOOR ROUGHLY OPENS

EMMA    Shouldn't I stay?  For decency's sake?

CARTLAND    Man's a holy father, even if he is a soft-headed idjet.  Whatcha think he might do?

EMMA    I suppose.

MELODY    I'll call if I need help!

EMMA    You do that.

SOUND    DOOR SHUTS

MUSIC

SOUND    MOVING THROUGH UNDERBRUSH

RED    From his yarn, Hank was right about'chere when he saw the lights.

LEM    Hard to reckon what this'ud look like in full dark.  What'us the moon like?

RED    Middling, round about.

LEM    Hmm.  And that'ud be the window?

RED    Yup.  Though way Hank tells it, it was full open when he was looking.

LEM    [surprised] Oh!

RED    What?

LEM    Let's fade back a bit.  Don't want anyone to spy us.

RED    Why?  Mm?  [sees] Oh!

MUSIC

[BREAK]

AMB    OUTDOORS

FANSHAW    There you are!  I've just witnessed the most appalling--

RED    Did we really see what I think we jest saw?

LEM    I'm afeared so. 

RED    That varmint!  Taking advantage of a nice--

LEM    She din't look "put out" to me.  Any fired-up on her part weren't the angry kind, if you catch me.

FANSHAW    [sarcastic] Oh.  So you saw it too.  How useful am I?

LEM    Mighty useful.  [slightly different] To know that sumpin's up with them.  Looked like they knowed each other afore this.

RED    I guess you could safely say that.

FANSHAW    I tactfully took my leave.

SOUND    HOOFBEATS APPROACH

RED    Who in tarnation?  Damn! 

LEM    What?

RED    [heavy import] That's Clyde Wishwell and his boys!

MUSIC

SOUND    TAP ON DOOR

EMMA    Doctor?  Is everything all right in there?

SULLIVAN    [within] Yes!  Quite. 

SOUND    FOOTSTEPS APPROACH THEIR SIDE OF DOOR

SULLIVAN    [within]  I have all I need for the moment.

SOUND    DOOR OPENS

SULLIVAN    [cautious] Is your husband ...nearby?

EMMA    He had to step out.

SULLIVAN    [relieved]  Ah.

EMMA    I have the guest room ready for you.  Your drover can bunk with the men.

SULLIVAN    My--?  Oh, yes.  That fellow.  My guide. 

SOUND    STEPS OUT, CLOSES DOOR

EMMA    Is she...  Is she going to be all right, sir?

SULLIVAN    I think this will take some time, but yes.  I believe she can be saved.

EMMA    Saved?  You talk like she's ailing!

SULLIVAN    [serious] She is.  It is an ailment of the soul.

MUSIC

SOUND    GENERAL DISMOUNTING, ETC.

CARTLAND    [barely concealed hostility]  Wishwell.

WISHWELL    Mr. Cartland.  I hope you don't mind the intrusion?

CARTLAND    What do you want?

WISHWELL    We found a fellow lost on our property, claims he'us supposed to be coming here.  We decided to give him an escort.

BAKER    [a bit too much swagger]  Yes, yes.  Many thanks.  You may go ahead and leave.

WISHWELLS MEN    [annoyed muttering]

CARTLAND    Who the devil are you?

BAKER    You sent for me. 

WISHWELL    He was mighty tight about his business with you, Mr. Cartland.  I'm right curious.

BAKER    That is between Mr. Cartland and myself.  Are you waiting around for a reason?  I could--

SOUND    COINS RATTLE

WISHWELL    [civility slipping] No need, sir!  I reckon a man does you a good turn, seeing you to your destination, rather than shooting your backside fulla buckshot as a trespasser, he deserves a bit of an explanation!

CARTLAND    Yeah.  Explain.

BAKER    [exasperated] Very well.  I am the ghost expert you sent away for.

MUSIC

AMB    OUT BACK

LEM    Why'm I all of a sudden smellin a rat?

FANSHAW    You mean Sullivan's obvious "familiarity" with young miss Heath?

LEM    Biggest rat I seen recently.

RED    You think they got somethin "on" between them?

LEM    I'm wondrin has anyone actually clapped eyes on the fellow she got her heart pinned to.

RED    How'd you hear about that?

FANSHAW    Damn!

LEM    [calm] I just hear things.

RED    Oh.  But it was one of the Wishwells she was a-hankerin after. 

FANSHAW    And the Wishwells just rode in.  Perhaps we should go and take a look at the other side of this little chess match.

LEM    Lets go get us a look at the Wishwells.

RED    Right.

FANSHAW    I'll stay in the house - keep an eye on the courting.

MUSIC

CARTLAND    YOU'RE the expert?  Then who the devil we got inside?  [yelling over his shoulder] Emma!

BAKER    [smug] Well, I can't help you there, I'm no clairvoyant - merely a seeker after truth in the field of spiritualism.

WISHWELL    [a bit worried] Really?  Hmm.

SOUND    DOOR OPENS, EMMA COMES ONTO PORCH

EMMA    What is it?  Oh!  Comp'ny!

CARTLAND    They ain't compny, they's Wishwells.  Get that city slicker out here.  We got a bit of a branding problem here.

BAKER    Are you implying there's someone here claiming to be me?

CARTLAND    Someone here's claiming something, but I don't know which of you it might be.

SOUND    SWITCH OF PERSPECTIVE, FEET APPROACHING - RED AND LEM

BAKER    [off a bit] I have credentials and letters of recommendation.

RED    That's Ezekial Wishwell, in the tan hat.  He's a big rancher over t'other side of the valley.

LEM    And if one of his marries that Miss, inside-

RED    Reckon he'll get his hands on her half of the ranch here.

LEM    Hmm.

SOUND    FADING BACK TO CARTLAND's POV

WISHWELL    You sent off for a ghost hunter, and you cain't even remember his name?

CARTLAND    I contacted him through some damn psychical society in the newspaper out of Carson city. 

BAKER    Yes.  Precisely.  The "friends in passing".

CARTLAND    And it's bad enough I gotta do such a damn fool thing just so's I can put my wife's mind at rest about her damn fool sister--

SOUND    DOOR OPENS, FEET ON PORCH

EMMA    Here he is.

SULLIVAN    You needed me for something?

[FADING BACK TO LEM]

WISHWELL    Whatcha gonna do with two of them?

SULLIVAN    Two of who?

BAKER    Is that the imposter?

EMMA    What?

RED    It's the doggonest thing I ever heered of!

LEM    It's a wonder, sure enough.

FANSHAW    They've vacated the - ahem - bedroom. 

RED    You think there's gonna be a fight?  Dunno that them two guys would make much of a scrap - that first one's too prissy and citified, and the other's kind of a runt.  But it might be something to see.

LEM    I need a chance to palaver.

FANSHAW    This might explain the idiotic views of Sullivan - I mean, if he is the imposter.

LEM    [muttered] People can be thick as two thumbs and still ain't liars.  Happens all th'time.

SOUND    FADING BACK TO CARTLAND

RED    Whazzat?

LEM    Trying to logic out which might be the one sposed to be here.

FANSHAW    Oh, there's the girl!

SOUND    BARE FEET ON WOODEN PORCH

[argument that runs under above]

SULLIVAN    I am an ordained minister, sir, of the church of the holy seekers after truth!

BAKER    That hack cabal?  They wouldn't know a phantom from an apparition.  I have trained with the most respectable societies in the British Isles!

SULLIVAN    Hidebound stick-in-the-muds!

BAKER    Newfangled snot-nosed infants, tampering with forces outside your ken!

SULLIVAN    Infants!  I'll have you know--

SOUND    MELODY'S BARE FEET RUN OUT ONTO THE DIRT

MELODY    Stop!  Please!  [scream of terror, some thrashing about]

CARTLAND    What the devil?

SULLIVAN    Quickly, bring some warm tea, and a cold compress, if you have one.

EMMA    Yes! 

SOUND    SHE DASHES INTO THE HOUSE

BAKER    Stay back!  The girl is under attack.

WISHWELL    Looks like some kind of fit.

CARTLAND    Fit o' temper.  Get up, girl!

SOUND    FEET ENTER

LEM    Mr. Cartland, might could I drop a word in your ear?

CARTLAND    Who the hell are you?  Oh, right, you come in with the preacher - maybe preacher.

LEM    Something you need to know.

FANSHAW    Are you planning to tell him about the assignation?  He'll do something terrible to that poor girl - you've seen how beastly he is to her.

LEM    I know you're looking after the best interests of your family here.

FANSHAW    He threatened to beat her!

CARTLAND    I do what I gotta.

FANSHAW    Even if she is feigning all of this, surely she doesn't deserve--

LEM    And I can tell you're purt near your wits end.

CARTLAND    zat so?

LEM    I think you done took more than most men can take, so I don't fault you none for flyin off the handle.  I might could have an answer for all this.

CARTLAND    [interested] Really?

LEM    Yup.  It was somethin that Sullivan fellow said regarding the bible.

CARTLAND    [disbelieving] Really?

LEM    Once they get this little dustup sorted, mebbe could I try something? 

CARTLAND    What you planning?

LEM    I promise you, I don't reckon no one'll get hurt - leastways not bad - but beyond that, can't tell you much or it'll fall flat. 

CARTLAND    Is this some of this spiritual hoodoo manure?

LEM    Well, let's say I'm gonna connive them into believin it is.

CARTLAND    Hmm...  [chuckle]  Go on, then.

MUSIC

EMMA    She's settled again, but she keeps tossing and a-turning.

CARTLAND    [calmer]  If I'm right, and she's just doing this all out of pique, what do you think should be done?  You really think us going on and giving in is gonna make everything all right?

EMMA    Me?  I--  but it's too drastic to be--

CARTLAND    I ain't asking if you think she's making it all up, just what you reckon we should oughtta do if she is.

EMMA    Oh.  [pacing]  Well.  It's a terrible thing she's doing - if she's doing it.  But it can't be easy on her, either.  All them hurts she's took.

CARTLAND    Lotta effort to make you feel sorry for her.

EMMA    If she's faking, then wouldn't the reverend know it?

CARTLAND    Stick to the question at hand.

EMMA    You're much less riled than you been in days - do you know something?

CARTLAND    With two doctor types on hand, how can I not see a light at the end of this here tunnel?

EMMA    Oh.

CARTLAND    [almost gentle]  I'm waiting.

EMMA    I agree - we can't, in good conscience, let her get her way through these kinds of shenanigans - always assuming she's--

CARTLAND    Yes, yes.  We're assuming.

EMMA    But what can we do for punishment?  Lock her away?  I couldn't bear that.

CARTLAND    What'choo think about schooling?

EMMA    What?

CARTLAND    Send her off to school - back east or somewheres where rich folks send their girls, and take the cost of the schooling out of her half the ranch.  We'll call it bail.

EMMA    It would keep her away from the Wishwells.  And it would get her away from--

CARTLAND    Us? 

EMMA    [sigh] Yes.

MUSIC

LEM    I may not have the booklearnin y'all have, but I did have me a granny who did midwifing and could see and talk to all manner of spirits.

SULLIVAN    Really?  How ...rustic

BAKER    You should never pooh-pooh the lay folk.  Many have toiled in the fields of the supernatural without even realizing they did. Back home in--

SULLIVAN    Of course, it is only a pity that so often they were seen as enemies of the church and persecuted, rather than embraced and put to good works.

FANSHAW    Good gad, they're even worse in harmony.

LEM    Well, Granny once told me of a sure cure for a plague of spirits.

BAKER    Oh yes?

FANSHAW    Watch out, he'll write a monograph on your granny.  Did you really have one?

LEM    O'course.  It ain't easy, and it ain't exactly safe.  But when the only other path is being ridden round with spirits all your life, it's sometimes a risk you gots to take.

SULLIVAN    Dangerous?

LEM    O'course.  You got to make the spirits flee outta the afflicted one, and t'only way to do it is to convince them you're about to kill that person.

SULLIVAN    [horrified] KILL?

BAKER    That makes a strange sort of sense.

LEM    Best ways are violent.  You cain't sneak up behind 'em, since half the convincin has to be that the one what's afflicted gots to believe it. 

FANSHAW    Mention the flagellants in the bible.  They used whips to cleanse themselves of--

SULLIVAN    But we can't - that-that poor girl!

BAKER    I am not certain I could do it myself, but I would be most interested in observing.

LEM    Oh, I can do it.  You two should oughta  make sure no one else gets in the way, though.

SULLIVAN    But you wouldn't really hurt her?

LEM    I s'pose it depends.  Sometimes, the spirits are figurin you wouldn't really hurt no one, and they hang on for the first hurt or two.  Like them fellas that whip themselves bloody right there in the bible.

SULLIVAN    [horrified] Oh no!  I can't let you do that to any poor defenseless woman.

LEM    Don't think it's your choice to make, old hoss. 

BAKER    As long as she is afflicted, it will have to be dealt with.

SULLIVAN    Let me try something else, first!  I might have a way to--

LEM    That's right fine.  We'll come along and observe your way.

SULLIVAN    No!  It's -- it has to be performed in total secrecy.

LEM    Cain't hide from the spirits, though.

FANSHAW    I take the hint.

BAKER    You should be grateful for the help.

SULLIVAN    Leave me alone for a minute!  I have to - to pray!

SOUND    WALKS OFF FAST

LEM    [almost a chuckle]

BAKER    What got into him?

FANSHAW    I think he truly cares for the girl.

LEM    A mighty old spirit indeed.

MUSIC

[BREAK]

EMMA    They're gonna hurt her?

CARTLAND    They don't think it will come to much.  Just enough to scare the spirits out of her.

EMMA    Melody's my sister - I cain't just let them beat her!

CARTLAND    [trying to be comforting] Don't sound like there's any other way they're gonna manage this.  [beat] This feller sounds like he knows what he's doing.

EMMA    [incredulous] Sounds like he--?  How can you say that?

CARTLAND    [curt]  I will stop him before he does anything too... drastic. 

EMMA    You got no fine feelings about seeing her hurt.  You would have--

CARTLAND    [getting annoyed] I'da punished her, yeah.  Now get out my way.  I'm done talkin!

MUSIC

RED    Lem, over here a minute.

LEM    [queit] Yeah? [up]  Mister Baker, why don't you see if the lady of the house might be able to find you a spot to sleep tonight? 

BAKER    And that charlatan?

LEM    Doctor Sullivan?  You let me handle him.  Oh, and - sunset.  That's the time to deal with ghosts.

BAKER    Sunset?

LEM    So says my gran.

BAKER    Right.  I am quite interested to see how this goes.

SOUND    BAKER WALKS OFF

LEM    Sorry about that.

RED    What are you up to?

LEM    Takin a tip from the bible.  You with me?

RED    Spect so. 

WISHWELL    Could I have a word with you, sir?

LEM    [sigh] Spect so.

MUSIC

SOUND    TAPPING ON WOOD

[Sullivan sounds very different, western, rather than citified, and is speaking quietly, to avoid being overheard]

SULLIVAN    Melody?  Melody?

FANSHAW    Hmph.  Praying indeed.  I would say he's rather old for her, but that moustache doesn’t do much to hide a cheek that's barely seen a  razor.

SULLIVAN    Please, Mel, honey!

SOUND    TEENSY CREAK OPEN

MELODY    Wallace?  You shouldn't be out there!

FANSHAW    Wallace? 

SULLIVAN    I had to come!  Everything's falling apart.

MELODY    What do you mean?

SULLIVAN    They've got some cockamamie scheme, and sounds like they're planning to hurt you.  Maybe bad.

MELODY    Emma'd never let them do that!

SULLIVAN    There's enough people here got no patience left, I doubt but that she couldn't stop them.  Can't you turn this?

MELODY    It's got away from me!  What can I do?

SULLIVAN    Maybe just say you're cured?

MELODY    And then what?  That leaves me here with folks that hate me and no chance o'nothin'?  No chance of... us?  I'll die first!

SULLIVAN    I'll try and come up with something.  But if it comes down to it, stop them before they hurt you.  Please promise you will!

MELODY    [grim] I'll do what I gotta do.

MUSIC

WISHWELL    What you fixing to do, sir?

LEM    Come sunset, I'll take drastic measures to free that girl from her torment.

WISHWELL    You sound like you might have to kill her.

LEM    I'm sure the reverend - uh - doctor sullivan can speak you best on torment and the afterlife.  He's got a nose fer it.

WISHWELL    But what exactly are you planning to do?

FANSHAW    Don't turn round.  Sullivan is lurking. 

LEM    [sigh]  I hate to see anyone in pain.  But sometimes, ain't no choice.  If'n there's a spirit a-punishin that child, it ain't gon be easy to spook it out.  I may have to shoot her.

SOUND    [men - including RED, WISHWELL, react] 

LEM    [matter of fact] Don't worry none, though.  I once shot a man eight times - a'purpose - and he din't die.  [shrug] Can't use one hand no more, but apart from that he all healed up jest fine.

WISHWELL    [horrified] And Cartland's gonna let you go on and do this?

LEM    I get the feeling that if his wife would allow, he'd do it hisself - he's that plumb wore out with the girl.

WISHWELL    And what if we all decide to stop you?

LEM    I don't see as how it's any of your business.

SOUND    GUNS OUT

WISHWELL    [sterner] And what if we all decide to stop you?

SOUND    SHOTGUN COCKS

CARTLAND    [off]  I think mebbe it's time fer you to get along home, then, Wishwell.

SOUND    GUNS UP

WISHWELL    [forces laugh]  We were just looking out for your best interests, Cartland.  Have you heard?  This here fellow is fixing to shoot your sister.

CARTLAND    Well, something's gotta be done with the girl. 

FANSHAW    Is he serious, or did you have a chance to warn him?

LEM    Glad to see you took my counsel serious, Mr. Cartland.

FANSHAW    Ah. 

CARTLAND    And now Wishwell, you and your boys can take my counsel - Git!

WISHWELL    I'll be telling the sheriff about these goings on. 

CARTLAND    You do that.  Sunset's about an hour away - you won't get there and back by then.  And I figure this way.  If my wife's sister can be bit by ghosts, maybe she can get shot by them too.  Ain't no one here gonna say otherwise, once all's said and done.

MUSIC

SOUND    TAPPING ON SHUTTER

MELODY    Wallace?

FANSHAW    [explaining] That's Sullivan.

SOUND    TAPPING

LEM    [indistinguishable grunt]

MELODY    Wallace?

SOUND    SHUTTER CREAKS OPEN

MELODY    Are you-- [gasp of fear!]

LEM    You want to talk to me, girl.  And you want to stay quiet.

MELODY    My sister is jest in the next room.

LEM    I know.  And I ain't askin fer nothin improper.  Cartland's got Sullivan sewed up in argument fer the moment, so I got one chance for you.

MELODY    Chance?  Fer what?

LEM    Wallace.  You in love with the boy, or jest lookin fer a way out from under your folks?

MELODY    We're in love. 

LEM    You want him more than you want your share of the ranch?

MELODY    [teensy hesitation]  Yes.

LEM    And would he and his take you without you had that parcel to offer?

MELODY    He would. 

LEM    And his pa out there?  Mr. Wishwell?

MELODY    [gasp] You know?

LEM    I know a lotta things.  F'r'instance, tonight's gonna be an interestin night. 

MUSIC

FANSHAW    So if they're genuinely in love --

LEM    I think they are.  He's plumb torn up about the chance as she might get hurt.  Mebbe she's not so worried, but she seems true.

FANSHAW    Then this is just like Shakespeare - Romeo and juliet.  Families opposed to one another, romance between the younger generation.

LEM    'Zat give us any aid with sorting out this rats nest?

FANSHAW    Well, they both died.  So I guess not.

LEM    Hmm.  Plays.

FANSHAW    What are you thinking?

LEM    Well... I was playing at solomon.  Threatnin the girl to bring out--

FANSHAW    [realizing] The real-- Yes!  I've got it.  Jolly clever.

LEM    I'm thinkin mebbe I got the wrong baby.

FANSHAW    The wrong what?

MUSIC

In house

CARTLAND    Can't be long now.

EMMA    You won't let him really hurt her, will you?

CARTLAND    [gentle] Emma.  He promised he wouldn't.  We have to convince her he would, though.  She gots to believe it.

EMMA    Why?

CARTLAND    If she's faking, she has to cry off.  If she ain't... well... he says the spirits gotta be convinced she's gonna die, so they'll haveta leave.

EMMA    Oh.  I see.  Thank you.

CARTLAND    [uncomfortable]   Right.  Just find us one of them schools, woudja?

MUSIC

OUTSIDE

LEM    [talking to a crowd] Much as it pains me to have to do this, um, I reckon there ain't no way to solve this problem til we drive out the spirits here.

BAKER    Where is the girl?

LEM    She's a coming.

SOUND    DOOR OPENS

LEM    Speak of the devil.

SOUND    SEVERAL PEOPLE WALKING OUT ON WOOD

MELODY    Please!  What are you going to do?

SULLIVAN    I protest!  I don't think this is safe!

LEM    [muttered] We got any other company?

FANSHAW    The wishwells never went very far.  Just out of sight, then circled back.  They're behind the barn.

LEM    Good.

FANSHAW    Red appears to be in his allotted position.  Hank is nowhere to be seen.

LEM    Hmph.  [up]  Get on over here miss.

MELODY    I'm scared!

CARTLAND    It gots to be done.

EMMA    Be strong, Melody.

FANSHAW    No arguments?  Hmm.  I sense a reconciliation in the family.

LEM    Harmony ain't no bad thing.

FANSHAW    Rather goes with melody, actually.

MELODY     What is it you plan to do?

LEM    Gon' drive the evil sprits out.  Need you to stand right here, miss.  Don't move a muscle.  You got me?

MELODY    Emma!  I don't want to do this!

EMMA    Melody, there ain't no choice.  Not no more.

SULLIVAN     I agree with the young lady - I feel this is too dangerous.

MELODY    Dangerous?  Wh-what's a-going to happen?

CARTLAND    [commanding but not being mean] Stand still, and let the man do his work.

LEM    All y'all back on the porch now, if'n you please.

SOUND    FEET

LEM    Now miss, if you'll hold yerself real still.

MELODY    I'll do my best.

SOUND    GUNSHOT, HITS WOOD

MELODY    [screams!]

[break?]

EMMA    Be careful!

MELODY    What did you do that for? 

LEM    I'm shooting the ghosts.  That's why you gotta hold real still.

SOUND    GUNSHOT

MELODY     [gasp]  You nearly hit me!

FANSHAW    The wishwells are getting closer.

LEM    Good.

SOUND    THREE GUNSHOTS

MELODy    [scream of pain!]

EMMA    What's that?  You said you wouldn't hurt her!  Is that blood?

LEM    That's jest splinters.  Stay back.

SOUND    TWO GUNSHOTS

MELODY    [scream]

SULLIVAN    Nooooooooo!

SOUND    RUNNING FEET, SLOW MO

SOUND    GUNSHOT

SULLIVAN    [argh!  Death rattle]

MELODy    [scream, death rattle]

FANSHAW    [dry] Two with one shot.  Oh my.

EMMA    [screaming]

SOUND    RUNNING FEET

LEM    Mr. Cartland, hold your wife.  Mr. Baker?

BAKER    [flustered] um, um - yes.

LEM    You got any doctoring?

BAKER    Yes, yes, of course.  I'll check on them.

WISHWELL    [coming roaring in]  Nooo!

CARTLAND    What the devil you doing here, Wishwell?

LEM    Stay back, there.  Let the doctor do his business.

WISHWELL    Wallace!  Damn you, you sidewinder!  You are a dead man!

SOUND    GUNS DRAW

WISHWELL    You ain't steppin in this time, Cartland!

CARTLAND    If I just saw what just happened, you kin have him.

LEM    [Unconcerned]  Afore you start throwin lead, mebbe you two should take some of the blame on yerselves.

CARTLAND    What?

WISHWELL    You can go to blazes!

LEM    If you two weren't such prickly porcupines on the subject of them kids getting married, none of this woulda ever happened.

CARTLAND    That's who she wanted to marry?  And he's a wishwell?

WISHWELL    He's my youngest, you son of a buzzard.  Sent him off back east to school, make a better man of him.  And now all that's ashes.

CARTLAND    He ain't a reverend, then?

FANSHAW    Goodness, they're a bit slow.

LEM    Hush, now!  Now you two can be joined in your misery, like you might have been joined by them kids.  Only damn fool you gotta hate now is me.

CARTLAND    He ain't said they're dead.  Doctor?

BAKER    [calling] I'm doing what I can.

WISHWELL    My son?  Is he still with us?

LEM    Hold it.

SOUND    GUN COCKS

WISHWELL    You stay out my way.

SOUND    SHOTGUN RACKED

RED    I think you better drop that gun Mr. Wishwell.

CARTLAND    I'll go and--

RED    No, sir.  You wait too.  With all due respect.

LEM    If them kids survive this, you let em marry?

CARTLAND    They're too young.  She is, anyway.

[don't forget the bit about sullivan not being as old as the moustasche and beard make him look]

WISHWELL    You just don't wanna lose half the ranch.

CARTLAND    I got plans for that half the ranch.  I got it planned right up til she comes of age.

LEM    Mebbe if they can marry, she can leave you in charge til she comes of age.  Let you carry through your plans.

EMMA    None of this matters!  Let me go to my sister!

RED    Lem?

LEM    Give em sumpin to live for, you two.  Make this up.  Tell them they ain't gotta be dead to be together.

WISHWELL    You think that would help?

LEM    I been near dead once or twice, and havin hope is a mighty fine thing.

EMMA    Bart?  Please let her, Bart!  If you don't care to give Melody some hope, give me some!

CARTLAND    If Wishwell agrees that I keep control for five more years.

WISHWELL    We're gonna have to set this down in writin.

EMMA    There ain't no time fer writing now!   [sharp]  You say it!  Both of you!

CARTLAND    Fine.  Melody!  If'n you can hear me, you listen.  I'm telling you, you can marry that... boy.  We got it all worked out at this end.

WISHWELL    Wallace?  Fight Wallace!  You idjit, jumping in front of a bullet fer a girl!  But you can have her if you want her.  Izzat good?

CARTLAND    You all gonna put down yer guns now?

LEM    That sounds fine.  What you'all think?

MELODY    [perfectly fine] I think it sounds good.  But I gotta have a real fine dress.  Understand?

EMMA    [astonished] Melody? 

MELODY    I'm all right.

SULLIVAN    We're both just fine.

WISHWELL    Well... Damn!

CARTLAND    All right, somebody better start explaining.

RED    Lem?  Lem?

MUSIC

SOUND    RIDING SLOWLY

LEM    Much as I hate walkin the horses by moonlight--

FANSHAW    I do think it's best to get while the getting is good.  Do you think they will keep their promises?

LEM    Got witnesses enough between Baker and Red.

FANSHAW    Whatever happened to Hank?

LEM    That was probly me - I think I suspected his belt buckle too loudly and he took fright.

FANSHAW    Paid to tell a tale?

LEM    Ayup.

FANSHAW    Solomon to Prince Escalus in one step.  I'm impressed.

LEM    What are you jabberin on about?

FANSHAW    That back there was Romeo and Juliet, was it not?

LEM    Mebbe just a little.  [beat] You ever done any of them plays?

FANSHAW    Oh, yes.  School. 

LEM    You gotta be the one in the dress?  Like you were sayin?  You got a voice that might could pass.

FANSHAW    Oh... [dropping voice as low as possible] No.  Actually, I often was the lead.  I even played romeo.  I was rather good at learning lines.  Of course, someone always had to put on the dress.  Boys and girls do not attend school together - not our sort of boys and girls, anyway.

LEM    Seems like puttin a hat on a pig.

FANSHAW    No.  It's just "theater."

END

Why do we assume only stationary computers - or even useful computers - would be the most likely to independently develop A.I.?

What do you do when you inadvertantly cause property damage? 

When we forget what it does, we can still use technology for something....

Jazz baby Hannah insists her father's death was foul play - and she will go to every medium, psychic, and fakir she can find, hoping he can tell her himself.

Story by H.P. Lovecraft, read by Julie Hoverson
Cover art by Brett Coulstock
Music by Kevin MacLeod

In one of the longer Lovecraft stories, a dedicated skeptic is slowly brought round to an uncomfortable truth...

(Keep in mind, these stories were recorded when Julie was still learning how to mix and work with audio - so the sound quality may be a little ... patchy.)

Warning the town puts Fanshaw back in Lisette's sights....

Cover art by Brett Coulstock

An homage to classic Hammer Dracula films!!  Van Helsing must fight the ancient evil yet again!

Music by The Toy Box Trio

Reissue of one of 19 Nocturne's earliest episodes (from October 2008).  Includes notes from Julie about the history and making of 19 Nocturne Boulevard.

MAKING BOOK

TRANSCRIPTS

Intro material then the full script

MAKING BOOK with intro

This was one of the first ten episodes of 19 Nocturne Boulevard that I made and put out, back in late 2008.  I can't recall, specifically, what order I made them in, which may seem odd, but I was determined to have a bunch ready to go when I debuted the series - in October, naturally - to make sure they would come out on time, which would help me establish the series and its credibility.  Even back then, shows came and went with the wind.

By the time I was prepping to start, the wonderful and always missed Bill Hollweg of Brokensea audio announced that Brokensea was going to put out or host a new episode every day in October for a big spooky month event, so I volunteered 4 episodes to debut there (I think I actually ended up sharing 6 with them, but again - it was a while ago).  BrokenSea was a big part of most audio drama fandom at the time, and it was a great way to quickly get 19 Nocturne Boulevard out to the audience they already reached.

So these episodes first debuted in Brokensea's feed, then when I put them up myself, I was still piggybacking on the feed of The Unspeakable and Inhuman, which I will talk about in another intro.  That's why my own libsyn listing doesn't have a full list, in order, for me to consult to recall precise dates.

I warn that Making Book has "foul language", but the language in this episode is incredibly tame, compared to several other of my stories.  This is because when I wrote it, I was still working with an old time radio mentality, and the language in this would be considered unbroadcastable, for the 1940s. 

While we recorded this - we were still working in Ryan's basement studio, with his excellent help, back in those early days - and the hardest thing to record was the screaming.

Screaming is one way to quickly overpower a microphone, so it has to be carefully placed, gained, and modulated.  I amazed everyone with the length and breadth of the screams I was able to produce.

The main monster fx were mainly me making mouth noises, then playing with various ways to tweak the sound.  I'm quite pleased with what I came up with in all that.  This was very early days in my learning how to sound edit, and yet I managed some really good stuff.  The hardest sound to find was the sound of the lights turning off in the bar.  Go figure.

The music in this episode is all from the amazing Kevin MacLeod of incompetech.com, including "Netherworld Shanty", the piece I adopted as the 19 Nocturne Boulevard theme song.

Mike Flowers helped me with doing a bit of sound tuning and will be helping me with episodes for as long as he can put up with me!

If you want to listen to this story without all this intro jibjab, the original is still available through the episodes page on my website at 19nocturneboulevard.com, or do a quick search on our libsyn page at nineteennocturne.libsyn.com

The script of the episode follows.

MAKING BOOK

"This episode has some foul language and excessive violence and may not be suitable for all listeners.  Please listen responsibly."

 Cast:

• Olivia [host, intro]
• Fay James (F/26), reformed safecracker and strip club dancer
• Rusty James (M/23), unreformed gambler
• Simeon Broadstreet (M/40s), spooky client
• Jimmy (M/40s), sleazy bartender/boss
• Jordan (M/30s), mysterious stranger
• Gertie (F/40), another dancer
• John (M/any)
• Bank Phone voice (any)
• Teacher (any)

OLIVIA     Did you have any trouble finding it?  What do you mean, what kind of a place is it?  Why, it's a rich man's study, can't you tell?  Where else would you find... a safecracker?

SCENE 1.    THE HEIST

MUSIC    MISSION IMPOSSIBLE STYLE CAPER MUSIC

SOUND    SILENCE.  A COUPLE OF QUIET CLICKS

[NOTE    THEY WHISPER THROUGHOUT THIS SCENE.]

RUSTY    Fay! 

FAY    [startled]  Huh?  Crap!  Rusty, shut your pie-hole!  You'll make me lose the damn--

RUSTY    Don't swear, Fay.

[note:  while Fay is relatively foul-mouthed, I kept it low-key in this because I set the story in the 1940s, as a classic-style radio story.]

FAY    Rusty...!

RUSTY    A car just turned in!

FAY    Then cork it and let me finish this damn thing, or we can get the hell out right now.

RUSTY    [annoyed and disappointed] Fay!

FAY    Watch the damn window and freaking shut up!

RUSTY    Ok.

SOUND    CLICKS

MUSIC

SCENE 2.    THE GETAWAY

SOUND    IN A CAR, DRIVING

RUSTY    [annoyed sigh]

FAY    [breaking an uncomfortable silence] Sorry.  I get so tense when I'm working.

RUSTY    [sullen] I know.

FAY    I said I'm sorry.  I should ... I should be more careful what I say.

RUSTY    You're never gonna do anything with your life if you don't start talking more nicer.

[note:  they both speak with the poor grammar of the "stereotypical gangster" and thus this is ironic]

FAY    [chuckles] Hey, who's the older sister here?

RUSTY    Not me - I don't got the parts.  But seriously, sis - You always looked out for me, I'm just trying to return some.  Besides, I get all clenched up inside when you start spouting off like that.

FAY    I'll work on it.  Speaking of who's looking out for who - if this all comes off, you're clear, right?

RUSTY    [sheepish] Yeah.

FAY    You know I don't wanna do this again - I've mended my ways and all that bullsh-- all that ... bull.

RUSTY    Mr. Broadstreet's paying ten Gs.  That should get me clear.

FAY    And then you stop.

RUSTY    Stop?

FAY    You know.

RUSTY    It's usually not that big a--

FAY    Rusty.  You need to stop.  Just cut it out.  Cold turkey.  Don't you watch Dr. Phil?  Gambling is an addiction - there are support groups and everything.

RUSTY    I guess.

FAY    Tell you what, maybe we both see if we can quit - me with the bad words, you with the bets.  Just for a month.  Whatya say?

RUSTY    [long sigh]  Let me deal with this first, OK?

FAY    [sigh] Yeah.

SOUND    RATTLE OF PAPER WRAPPED PARCEL BEING TURNED OVER IN RUSTY'S HANDS

RUSTY    What do you think it is?

SOUND    SHAKES IT [no rattle]

FAY    Ten thousand dollars.

RUSTY    Really? 

SOUND    TAPPING ON THE PARCEL - sounds like a book

RUSTY    Maybe we should open it?

FAY    Jeez, Rusty, sometimes I really think you're too stupid to live. 

RUSTY    Fay!

FAY    I meant I think it's worth the ten thousand your wack job employer is going to pay for it.  Undamaged.  He said that.  Undamaged.

RUSTY    But it won't hurt if I unwrap it, will it?

SOUND     PAPER TEARING

FAY    Do I haveta pull this car over?

RUSTY    A book?

FAY    What?

RUSTY    It's just a big old book.  [sniffs, coughs]  Gah, even smells old.  Look, it's got a lock, like a diary.

FAY    What is it?

RUSTY    [slowly, "duh"] A book.

FAY    I mean the title.

RUSTY    Um...  It's ain't in English.  If that's even writing....

SOUND    SCRATCHING ON BOOK LEATHER

FAY    So don't--

SOUND    CREAK OF LEATHER

FAY    OK, that's it!

SOUND    JAMMING ON THE BRAKES

RUSTY    Gahh...

FAY    Give me that!

RUSTY    I was just seeing if it was really locked. 

FAY    Did you not get the part about he wants it undamaged?  You think prying open the lock or trying to snap the leather somehow don't count?

RUSTY    I was, I was just thinking, Fay, that why would someone pay a bunch of dough for a book?  Maybe it just looks like a book, and it's really a box full of jewels or something.

FAY    You're willing to throw away a sure thing--

RUSTY    You could probably pick that lock in a heartbeat, couldn't you, Fay?

FAY    Look, Rusty-- [softening, worried]  This ain't the double down, li'l bear [little bear and sissy/sister bear are their childhood nicknames for each other] - the odds are - oh, I dunno, but it's pointless.  This book, as is, will get you out of hock to the bad men.  This time.  You were damned lucky to find someone with that kind of dough to sling around - why screw it up?

RUSTY    But if there's any chance--

FAY    No goddam way.  This is the end.  I'll drop you off on my way to Jimmy's, but I'm keeping this bad boy with me.

RUSTY    It'll get stolen!

FAY    By who?  Crackheads don't read.

RUSTY    But, 10 grand'll just get me out, what'll I do for a stake?

SOUND    CAR GETS MOVING AGAIN

FAY    [said a million times] You could get a job.

RUSTY    You know I ain't no good at anything.  Not like you.  You just touch a lock and it--

FAY    There are zillions of jobs that don't need you to be any good.  You just gotta do what people tell you.

RUSTY    How can I go work for peanuts when I know I can win a fortune?

FAY    But you don't win, Rusty.  Peanuts is better than a hole in the head.

RUSTY    [sullen]  Is that what you tell yourself when you're dancing for sweaty old men? 

FAY    [warning]  Rusty.  [deep breath, calms]  So I'm doing whatever the hell it takes to get MY stake - to get some school and maybe a business of my own.  I'm 100 percent legit.  Finally.  That's what counts. 

RUSTY    But you could get what you need real easy-like.  Just pull another job or two ... then go legit.

FAY    ...and just one more and just one more and just one more, right?  No, Rusty.  Cuz then I'd be you.

SOUND    CAR STOPS

FAY    [tight control] I'll call your guy and make all the arrangements for us to meet tomorrow. 

sound    car door opens, shuts

RUSTY    Fay, I--

FAY    Rusty.  Next time you dig yourself in deep, you know what I'm gonna do? 

RUSTY    What?

FAY    I'm gonna buy you some goddamn crutches. 
[because the guys he owes money to would break his legs]

SOUND    Car slams into gear, roars off.

FAY    "Just this one more time, Fay."  "It's gonna change, Fay."  Jeez, I'm such a shit-fer-brains.

MUSIC    FOR FLASHBACK

SCENE 3.    HOME, COOKING

SOUND    COOKING NOISES.  Mixing, rinsing dishes, sizzling

RUSTY    Just this one more time, Fay. 

FAY    No.

RUSTY    It'll be easy.

FAY    I'm done, Rusty.

RUSTY    But, but they'll-- [teary sniff]

SOUND    pause in the movement

FAY    [long beat, long sigh, then quietly]  They'll what.

RUSTY    Nothing.  [making a big deal out of sniffing]  That sure smells good.  I love your cooking, sissy bear.

FAY    [under her breath] ...bastard.

RUSTY    Hmm?

FAY    What will they do, Rusty?

RUSTY    Oh.  Well, this is Mr. Capelli, and his guys - well, they don't kid around.

FAY    [tight] --and?

RUSTY    They'll hurt me real bad.

FAY    How much do you need?

RUSTY    Nothing!

FAY    Nothing?

RUSTY    That's the best part - I found this guy who is willing to cover everything--

FAY    How much?

RUSTY    Ten large.

FAY    Ten? 

SOUND    CLATTER LIKE DROPPED LID

FAY    How did you get in that far?

RUSTY    But this guy, see, he just wants us to get something, and I told him I might, you know, know someone.

FAY    Get something?

RUSTY    A package.

MUSIC     ends flashback.

SCENE 4.    IN CAR, STILL DRIVING

FAY    Yep.  Shit.  Fer. Brains.

music    transition fades into pounding hard rock, vastly distorted, then fades into background

SCENE 5.    STRIP CLUB

sound    on filter, phone rings

FAY    [to self] Come on, come on. 

sound    on filter, phone picks up

FAY    [jumping in]  Mr. Broadstreet?

BROADSTREET    Hello?  What?  Yes, this is--

FAY    We got your package.  I mean Rusty and me - I helped him.  We've got it.

BROADSTREET    Unopened?

FAY    [gasp] Oh, yeah.  It's fine.  Look, we need to get the cash soonest.  When can we meet?

BROADSTREET    It is vital that the ...package... remain closed.  Can you guarantee that?

FAY    Yeah.  I got it all safe and sound.  You got the cash or not?

BROADSTREET    I have the cash.  Come to my house---

FAY    I'd really rather we do this somewhere a bit more neutral.  You know.

BROADSTREET     [thinks a moment]  There's a courtyard at the library downtown.  You have to go through the rare books section to get there, so it's usually quite deserted.  Can you find it? 

FAY    Sure. 

BROADSTREET    I expect to see you - both of you - with the package, tomorrow at noon.

sound    on filter, phone hangs up

FAY    Hey!! 

sound    fay slams down receiver

FAY    You arrogant sonofab--

JIMMY     [coming on]  Fay!  I don't pay you to gab on the phone all night!

FAY    [through gritted teeth]  I'm on my break.

JIMMY    Well, I hope you made it to the can, too, since that was your last break before closing - now get out there and shake it.  There's an old fart at table 5 who still got some green left.

FAY    Right, Jimmy.

MUSIC    rock music, for time PASSES, THEN cutS off or winds down - SOUND system IS SHUT OFF.

SCENE 6.    STRIP CLUB, CLOSING TIME

sound    light SWITCHES being thrown.

GERTIE    Hey, Fay, coming out for some grub?

JOHN    [in background] Hey babe, come on.

FAY    Nah, you go on - I'm waiting on a call. 

GERTIE    Your brother.

FAY    Yeah.

sound     quick steps, jingle of bell on door.

GERTIE    [off] That deadbeat.  [beat, remembering]  Oh, crap!

JOHN    [still off]  What's the deal, sweetheart?

SOUND    STEPS RETURN

GERTIE    Here's that catalog.

FAY    [down] Thanks.  I don't think I --

GERTIE    Take it.  Read it.  It's not too late.

FAY    I'm kinda in the middle of something.

GERTIE    You got a week to register for Fall.  [waits, then]  Winter, maybe?

FAY    Maybe.

SOUND    FOOTSTEPS RETREAT AGAIN

GERTIE    [moving away]  You really don't want--

JOHN    [off]  Let's skip the food, babe and get right to the motel.

GERTIE    [off] --to end up like me.

sound    door closes behind gertie

sound     FAY's footsteps echo slightly, empty room.

sound    phone rings

FAY    Huh? 

sound    walks quickly over, phone picked up

FAY    You're early.

JORDAN    [on filter, ominous voice]  You have the book.

FAY    Broadstreet?  Wait, no--

JORDAN    Broadstreet must not get the book. 

FAY    How'd you get this--?

JORDAN    Bring the book to me tomorrow at 2 pm.  At the corner of central and 12th.

FAY    What the hell--?

sound    dial tone.

FAY    Great.

sound    hangs up phone

sound     fay's footsteps as she walks into changing room

no music for scene

SCENE 7.    CHANGING ROOM

sound    door opens. 

sound    serrated knife cutting leather - continues until noted

FAY    Jimmy!  You bastard!  What the-- No!

JIMMY    Back off babe.  I'm just seeing what you got in your little diary, here--

sound    knife ends, finishes the cut

FAY    You scumbag!!!

sound    book creaks open, pages flip.

sound    tentacles pop out of the book and grab jimmy

JIMMY    [screaming in fear and agony]

FAY    [screaming at the top of her lungs in terror]

sound    horrid ripping noise as Jimmy is torn asunder 

JIMMY     [stops screaming suddenly]

sound    slurping noise as tentacles go back into the book.  book slams shut.

sound    trickles of blood running down the walls.

FAY    [screaming winds down to gasps and sobs]

sound     phone rings and keep ringing

FAY    [shrieks once, then starts to almost laugh]

sound    hesitating footsteps.  One slightly wet sounding one.

FAY    Ew!

sound    rubbing foot on floor, then running for phone

sound    phone picks up

RUSTY    [on filter]  Hey.  Sorry about earlier.

FAY    [laughs almost soundlessly, almost hysterical]

RUSTY    Fay?  Wait, is this Fay? 

FAY    Yeah, Rusty, it's -- it's me.  [breathing, trying to calm down]

RUSTY    What's so funny?

FAY    Nothing.  Oh, shit.  L'il bear, I need your help with something. 

RUSTY    Anything, sissy bear.  You know it. 

FAY    Come down to the club, and bring me some old clothes.  Bring some for you too.

music

SCENE 8.    CHANGING ROOM, LATER

SOUND    FAY SCRUBBING

SOUND    RUSTY ENTERS

RUSTY    Yikes!  Was it a holdup?

FAY    Sure.  A holdup.  A really, really messy holdup.  Go in the back there and fill this bucket - really hot water - about halfway.

RUSTY    Good thing the book didn't get all bloody.  Then Broadstreet would never pay for it.

FAY    [almost a sob]  Yeah.

sound    scrubbing fades into

music

SCENE 9.    CHANGING ROOM, EVEN LATER

RUSTY    Fay!  The book

sound    her reaction is very frightened, until she turns and sees nothing

FAY    What?  What!!

RUSTY     The strap's been cut!

FAY    Yeah.  Uh, I'm gonna see if I can fix that-- Don't touch it!!!

RUSTY    Why not?

FAY     Here, I'll... [gulps] move it.

sound    a couple of wet slappy steps.

FAY    [deep breath, then an effort]  There!

sound    Book dropped quickly onto table

RUSTY    Fay, you gotta tell me what's up - you're totally acting nutso.

FAY    You gotta trust me l'il bear, don't touch it.

RUSTY    I hate it when you treat me like a kid, Fay!  I can take it!  [sudden idea] Did you kill Jimmy?

FAY    [hollow] What makes you so sure this was Jimmy?  It's just ... chunks.

RUSTY    Who else would it be?  Level with me Fay, or...  or--

FAY    or what?

RUSTY    [sharp breath]

sound     quick squishy steps

RUSTY     Or I'll... I'll open it!

FAY    No!  No!  Don't screw around, Rusty!  This is way more serious than you know!

RUSTY    Tell me, Fay.

FAY    Not here.  I'll tell you when we're done and home.  Please, it's - it's just too much.

MUSIC

SCENE 10.    IN THE CAR

FAY    [begging] Give me the book, please?

RUSTY    No, Fay.  I gotta know what went down. 

FAY    [still breathing hard, almost sobbing, subdued, reliving the event] Jimmy, being the nosy bast-- busybody that he is, got into my locker.  He saw the book looked like something, and he ... cut through ... the ...strap... [sobs]

RUSTY    [not willing to budge] --And then?

FAY    It killed him.  Rusty, the book did it.  Don't open it, it was horrible.

RUSTY    [ghoulishly interested]  Tell me!  Sissy bear, tell me!

FAY    You don't need to know! 

RUSTY    [wheedling]  Sissy bear!

FAY    [beat]  Things came out, like squids--

RUSTY    Tentacles?

FAY    [breaking] Yeah.  Yeah.  They grabbed him and just pulled him into pieces, then pulled the pieces ... most of them ... in and shut the book behind it.

RUSTY    [excited] It must be some kind of a door to another reality.  I read about those things all the time.

FAY    A door to h-e-- double hockey-sticks! 

music

music

SCENE 11.    PHONE BANK

sound    BEEPS, MECHANICAL VOICE

AUTOTELLER    --[a balance of] two thousand, one hundred thirty two dollars and seventy four cents. To repeat this, press 6--

SOUND    RECEIVER HANGS UP

SOUND    RECEIVER PICKED UP, PHONE DIALS

FAY    Hey Beans, Wally around?  No!  What's he in for? Again?  Shoot, I was hoping he could use-- oh, never mind.

SOUND    DOOR OPENS, RUSTY ENTERS

RUSTY    You up already?

FAY    Like I could sleep.

RUSTY    You doing ok?

FAY    Yeah.  Ain't no goddamn love lost between me and Jimmy.  But I gotta feeling this means I'm out of a job.

RUSTY    But, seeing all that blood and stuff--?

FAY    [muttered]  Why you think I ain't sleeping? [louder]  But there ain't jack shi--

RUSTY    [warning noise]

FAY    There ain't nothing I can do about it now.  I just ain't got time for a freakout.

RUSTY    Should I rustle us up some breakfast?

FAY    [slightly teasing] Sure.  You get started, I'll unplug the smoke detector.

RUSTY    [mock annoyed] Hey!  Besides, even I can't mess up corn flakes.

FAY    I'll get something started in a minute, l'il bear.  [a moment] Thanks for staying.  I really didn’t wanna--

RUSTY    Are you kidding?  And miss out on my chance to do something for you?  [pause] Some day Fay, I'm gonna - I dunno, strike it rich, and then we'll see who's taking care of who.

FAY    [rueful] Yeah.

RUSTY    I was thinking.  Maybe we shouldn't give this guy the book.

FAY     Huh?  Why not?

RUSTY    He's not gonna want to pay for it, damaged and all, and, well, if it's all you say, sounds like it's pretty dangerous.

FAY    Yeah, like I wanna keep it around!

RUSTY    We could sink it in the river.  Maybe seal it in a block of concrete.  We don't know this guy.  Who knows what he plans to do - or who he plans to do, with it?  [sure] I'll handle it.

FAY    I-I don't really care what this guy has up his sleeve.  I'm just hoping he'll pay something, damaged or not, and that maybe Mr. Capelli will take half down.  Pass me that, wouldya?

SOUND    WRAPPING PAPER

RUSTY    Isn't this--?

FAY    I want to get this thing re-wrapped.

RUSTY    You think maybe it'll fool him?

FAY    [snort] Nah.  I'm just hoping it will give us time to be out of reach when he opens it.

MUSIC

SCENE 11.    LIBRARY RENDEZVOUS

sound    daytime noises, footsteps echo slightly on stone

FAY    I'm glad you were willing to see reason.  I don't know who your buyer is, but he must have some tough mojo to think he can control something awful like this.

RUSTY    Yeah.

BROADSTREET    [coming on]  Ah, good to see you.  You have my package?

FAY    Right here.  There was a ---

RUSTY    It's just fine.  You got the money?

BROADSTREET    Here.  Shall we trade?

RUSTY    How 'bout you put down the briefcase, and I bring you the book?  Then, when you're happy, I'll take the money.

FAY    [surprised, side of mouth]  Good going, L.B. [lil bear]

BROADSTREET    An eminently sensible plan.  I'll have to check and make sure the book has not been tampered with.

RUSTY    Be my guest, here, I'll get it out for you.

sound    rustle of paper being unwrapped

BROADSTREET    Just hand it over--  aaaugh!

[note    rusty opens the book, facing toward Broadstreet]

Sound    Same sounds as before slurp, squish, crunch

BROADSTREET     [screams]

FAY    [screaming]

BROADSTREET     [stops in mid-scream]

sound    all sounds end with a slurp and the book slamming shut.

FAY    [screaming, ending with]  Rusty!  Ohmigod, Rusty what the hell do you think you're doing?

SOUND    DRIPPING NOISES

RUSTY    I was right!!  For once, I GOT it!

FAY    Rusty, what the hell--

RUSTY    Look, Fay.  Don't you see, this is our ticket?  My ticket, anyway, if you're too chicken.  We may have a mess, but we also have ten thousand dollars AND the book.

FAY    And what pray tell do you plan to do with the sonofabitch goddamn book?

RUSTY    [dark, serious]  Don't swear, Fay.  [almost chuckling]  It's so perfect - no way to trace it, so there's no way to catch me!  All I gotta do is walk up to someone, open the book at 'em, just like now, and whammo! 

FAY    You're gonna go around killing people?  Once they're eaten, it's not like you can take their wallets!

RUSTY    I thought of that.  I'm not gonna ROB no one.  Just hire myself out. 

FAY    How could you?  Mom would never have--

RUSTY    [bitter, accusing] Yeah, well, I never knew mom, sissy bear.  Any problems with my upbringing?  They're all on you!

FAY    But--

RUSTY    I knew it.  You just want me to be a wimp, so you can push me around.  Just your little bear.  You never want me to win big, because if I was ever a success, you wouldn't have anyone to gloat over and preach to!  Well, it's too late - it's my turn, Fay.  This is my chance to be the man!

FAY    Rusty, you stop this.  Right now.

RUSTY    What're you gonna do, put me over your knee?  I got the book, and while I'd hate to have to use it again right away...

FAY    You wouldn't!

RUSTY    [steely] Try me.  [beat, hollow] Just let me go, Fay.

music

SCENE 12.    LEAVING THE LIBRARY

sound    busy street noises

JORDAN    [startlingly close]  You didn't bring it.

FAY    [jumps]  Oh!  You're‑‑

JORDAN    I'm Jordan. 

FAY    Jordan something or something Jordan?

JORDAN    [almost a chuckle] Something.  Where's the book?

FAY    Tell me what it is first.  I can't just hand it over without knowing more about it.

JORDAN    We can't talk here.

FAY    Oh sure we can - a busy street is as anonymous as you can get.  Spill.

JORDAN    [beat] It is... a gateway.

FAY    Hah.  We figured that.

JORDAN    [upset] You opened it?  How many?  How many has it devoured?

FAY    Keep your voice down.  We may be anonymous, here, but there is a limit.  Why's it matter who got et?

JORDAN    The book is a Demonilatrium Triskadecorum, one of thirteen gates disguised as ancient grimoires.  They were put into this world to trap those who seek the deepest levels of occult knowledge. 

[note:  totally made up name.  Triskedec is a root meaning "13", and demon is self-explanatory]

JORDAN    Each book will take thirteen souls and then - pfft!  Go back from whence it came.  This one has already eaten 7 that I've been able to verify.

FAY    [hopeful]  But then it'll just go away?

JORDAN    Taking the last wielder with it.

FAY    [weakly, hopeful] Wielder, like the one facing the book?

JORDAN    The one holding it.

SOUND    ODD BIRD CALL

FAY    Oh, shi--

JORDAN    Did you hear that?

FAY    What?  The car horn?

SOUND    ODD BIRD CALL

JORDAN    That.  Damn, they found us.  We need to find some place less public - now!

FAY    Why?  Aren't we sort of safe out here on the street?

JORDAN    Doubtful.  They're after the book. 

FAY    But Rusty has--  I mean--  Shit!

JORDAN    They're tracking me, not the book.  We need to get away from them.

SOUND    RAPID FOOTSTEPS

FAY    Not part of your club, eh?

JORDAN    There are many factions seeking to control the Triskadecora.  This way...!

SOUND    STREET NOISES RECEDE

FAY    Being alone with a bunch of freaks sounds like a dumbass plan, Jordan Something. 

JORDAN    I can't cloak us if there are any observers.

FAY    Like being able to be invisible, but only if there's no one watching you?

JORDAN    Shh.  In here.

SOUND    SLIGHT SCUFFLE, FOOTSTEPS STOP

AMB    IN A TUNNEL OR UNDER A BRIDGE

SOUND    WEIRD LOW BUZZING NOISE

JORDAN    [whispered] Now stay quiet.

FAY    [whispered] You have to grope me like this?

JORDAN    [whispered] The range is limited, we have to stay very close.

FAY    [whispered] I'm not bitching, I just wanted to know.

JORDAN    Shh!

SOUND    WEIRD BIRD CALL, STRANGE NOISES MOVE SLOWLY PAST.

SILENCE FOR A MOMENT

FAY    [whispered] Are they gone?

JORDAN    [whispered] Just another moment.  [slightly husky] For safety.

FAY    [whispered] Oh... [beat, chuckle]  Well, what do you do when you're not hiding from demons and chasing old carnivorous books, Mr. Jordan?

music

SCENE 13.    VISITING THE VICTIMS

sound    night ambiance.  nightclub noises in the near distance

FAY     I just hope we got here first.  Last I checked, nobody'd seen him yet - they're kind of used to me calling around looking for him.

JORDAN    And you're quite sure--

FAY    Oh, yeah - first people he'd go after are his bookies.  Lucky thing they weren't in town this afternoon or they'd be squid bait long since.

JORDAN    Squid?

FAY    You know-- [making a squooshing tentacle noise]  They come out of the book.

JORDAN     I've never actually seen one opened.  We're working to get them all into safekeeping.  It sounds like your brother is a prime example why.

FAY    He's weak.  It's all my fault.  Our mom died when he was born, then dad went a dozen years later.  After that, it was just me and him.  I guess I ... I didn't do it right.

JORDAN    [matter of fact]  Probably not.

FAY    Hey!  Not helping!

sound    [over at the building] knock on door, door squeaks open.

FAY    Oh, crap.  That ain't good.

JORDAN    Stay behind me.

FAY    As if.

sound    running footsteps

FAY    Rusty?  Rusty?  Rusty?

sound     footsteps slow, then stop

FAY    Aw, jeez, Rusty.

RUSTY    Stay out of it, Fay. 

FAY    That's a lot of blood, Rusty.  How... how many were there? 

RUSTY    Just Mr. Capelli and his bodyguard.  I'm still waiting for the other guys to get back.  You gonna help or just mess me up - like always?

FAY    Like always?  Who's the one always comes when you start screaming about guys being after you?  This whole goddamn thing started because you can't keep your hands off an inside flush. [a bad gamble in poker].

RUSTY    Fay, you better leave.

FAY    Look Rusty... there's this guy and he - he knows about the book.  I mean he can tell you, he - you gotta listen to him, Rusty - this isn't a joke, l'il bear!  He really - It's worse than you think!

RUSTY    Fay, you better leave.  It's gonna get messy real soon.  I don't wanna haveta kill you.

FAY    Oh, li'l b--.

JORDAN    Ah-hah! [attack noise, not so silly]

SOUND    BEGIN STRUGGLE

RUSTY    Hey, what? [grunting with exertion]

SOUND    FABRIC RIPS, BODY SLAMS INTO SOMETHING HARD.

JORDAN    [grunting with exertion] Give me the--

SOUND    FINGERS SKID ACROSS LEATHER.  BOOK DROPS TO THE FLOOR.

FAY    No!

SOUND    SCRAMBLING, SLAPPING AS THE MEN FIGHT FOR THE BOOK

FAY    No!  Get back!

SOUND    PAGES FLIP

FAY    [Screams in anguish]

JORDAN    [screams in agony, but not too clear which man this is]

sound    blahlalalalalalalala monster eats Jordan

moment of silence

FAY    I can't believe you did that.  My own brother.  What kind of a goddam monster are you?

RUSTY    [breathing hard, triumphant]  I'm alive Fay.  That's what counts.  I'm the one holding the book.

FAY    Rusty, that was the one guy who knew what this stupid freaking thing really is.  And your dumbass book just ate him!

RUSTY    STOP SWEARING!  You know I hate it when you do that!

FAY    Rusty - I think this has gone waaay beyond my potty mouth.  Give me the book now, or put your goddamned money where your mouth is and feed me to it.

RUSTY    [snapped back to reality]  What?  Sissy--?

FAY    [under her breath]  Seven... eight nine...

RUSTY    I don't wanna haveta kill you, Fay.

FAY    [under her breath]  Ten and eleven, oh shit, twelve. 

RUSTY    Talk to me sissy bear - why can't you see this is good for me?  You got locks, I finally got something!

FAY    [under her breath]  Oh, hell.  [loud]  Bite me you whining little piece of shit.  I am so sick of your weakling ass dragging around behind me. 

RUSTY    [shocked] Fay!

FAY    Yeah, if it weren't for you and the gigantic hole in your stupid ass pocket, I woulda been free and clear years ago.  Do you know how much goddamn sonofabitch money I have pissed down the freaking drain for you?

RUSTY    [getting angry] Fay, stop it!

FAY    I am so goddamn sick to the teeth of feeling guilty over you, you puling little ass-wipe, worrying over you and having to run around changing your dirty diapers every time you freaking crap yourself!

RUSTY    [almost crying] If -- if I'm all -- all you say, it's your fault, you made me this way!

FAY    [hissing] I might have made you weak, but I never made you a murderer - there, you're self-made.

RUSTY    I'll make you stop!

SOUND    PAGES FLIP

FAY    [Gasps, braced]

sound    again.  monster. 

RUSTY    Hey, what?  No!  Noooo!  I'm the master!  I'm the master---[trails into agonized screams]

SOUND    Rusty dies in screaming agony.

moment of silence

FAY    [sobbing] Goodnight, ...l'il bear. 

SOUND    SHE WALKS AWAY

music

SCENE 14.    college classroom. 

sound    people shuffle into seats.  papers move.

TEACHER    [utterly bored] Jackson?  good.  Fay James?

FAY    Here.

TEACHER    Good.

MUSIC STING

end

Things can be as plain on the nose on your face - but how often do you really LOOK at the nose on your face?

Story by H.P. Lovecraft, read by Julie Hoverson
Cover art by Brett Coulstock
Music by Kevin MacLeod

A dreamlike story....

(Keep in mind, these stories were recorded when Julie was still learning how to mix and work with audio - so the sound quality may be a little ... patchy.)

The "Lovecraft 5" - Warren, Herbert, Charles, Edward, and Richard - gather again for another night of tall tales. 

Tonight, Warren regales the group with a history of a noble house that ... went downhill.

Loosely adapted by Julie Hoverson from a story by H.P. Lovecraft

Music from the Skidmore College Orchestra (as found on MusOpen)

Cover by Brett Coulstock

[Julie, and more importantly the show, returns after a long winter's nap.]

Lam makes some peace.... maybe.

Cover by Brett Coulstock

Story by H.P. Lovecraft, read by Julie Hoverson
Cover art by Brett Coulstock
Music by Kevin MacLeod

A newly-acquired Irish castle proves to come with some interesting accoutrements - though most are deep under the nearby bog...

(Keep in mind, these stories were recorded when Julie was still learning how to mix and work with audio - so the sound quality may be a little ... patchy.)

Dreams In The Witch-House by H.P. Lovecraft (reading)

read by Julie Hoverson

music from The Brotherhood

Episode 6...

Oops.  Ku Sui is sneakier than you think.

More chit chat with our favorite guys!!!

Music from incompetech.com and a-mclassical.com

(19 Nocturne reissue of the day)

Linda and Penny escape? What about Gary? The ever-hard-to-describe story continues...

In a strange place, anyone can blend....

One has fallen, and one is yet to fall.  One is waking, and many have walked before, and two dangerous forces face off.... very politely.

Music by Project System 12

[from a story and play by Susan Glaspell, published in 1917]

A woman stands accused of murdering her husband and none of the investigators understands why.

Music by Keith Billings

Cover art composition by Julie Hoverson, Photography by Richard Palmer

Thanx to Gutenberg and Librivox for their work with public domian stories, such as this one.

Working hard to get these back on schedule.

The Scene of the Crime.

When an agent sneaks inside a mind - he should be very careful whose minds he chooses.

Sometimes there's no choice, though...

Accidental Death by Peter Baily

Regarding an experimental spaceship trip, and the vagaries of fortune.

Music by Incompetech.com

from Astounding Science Fiction February 1959

A quick humorous narrative of a weddin', from around 1911.

Performed by Julie Hoverson

Music from A-M Classical

Cover art by Julie Hoverson and Dennis Hager

The Teeth Within was a nine-part series with Plain Jane and Annie Boddie finding odd things in Victorian London.

This is episode 1-4. Episodes 5-9 will follow.
This completes the story.

THE TEETH WITHIN

Plain Jane..................................Beverly Poole
Annie Boddie............................Julie Hoverson
Gerald St. Jude.........................Gareth Bowley
Constable Fields......................Terry Cooper
Inspector Drab.........................Anthony D.P. Mann
Harry, newsboy.......................Will Watt
Watty, apothecary...................Glen Hallstrom
Mr. Brown.................................Pete Lutz
Miss White................................Megan Lane
Hermione St. Jude...................Fiona Thraille
Francesca..................................Judith Moore
Carlotta......................................Tanja Milojevic
Daniel.........................................Benjamin Lind
Lakes, valet...............................Jack Kincaid
Lord Bimberton......................William King
Fenella.......................................Jacquie Duckworth
Professor...................................Robert Cudmore
Astrid.........................................Risa Torres
Tompkins..................................Russell Gold
Mr. Greyson.............................Ayoub Khote
Mr. Whipple.............................Karim Kronfli
Mr. X..........................................Himself

ADDITIONAL VOICES
Sarah Golding
Gwendolyn Jensen-Woodard
Julie Hoverson
Russell Gold
Jack Kincaid
Reynaud LeBoeuf
William King
Kimberly Poole

Written, produced, sound mixing by Julie Hoverson

A chat at an xmas party turns to pondering the imponderable.

Tales of accidental invention....

Episode 2!!!

1:18 Migration was a zombie series that had two seasons (18 episodes), from 2008-2010, and has been on hiatus since.

We are super pleased to be able to host these shows, since the producers of 1:18 Migration are rampng up to a new seasonl!!

Story by H.P. Lovecraft, read by Julie Hoverson
Cover art by Brett Coulstock
Music by Kevin MacLeod

When a strange meteor falls from the sky, everything on the farm gets... strange....

(Keep in mind, these stories were recorded when Julie was still learning how to mix and work with audio - so the sound quality may be a little ... patchy.)

Some more fun tidbits. 

busy busy busy.....

Final attack, or meteoric end of the world....?

Inventing a substance that could possibly bounce indefinitely was relatively easy.  Stopping it from doing so was not!

Another of the Short Sharp Shocks I've been mixing recently....

Be careful what you wish for.

Please Ouija Please

• Griswold – Tom Taverna
• Maude – Nila Hagood
• Edgar – Boyd Barrett
• Winifrid – Julie Hoverson
• Nurse 1 – Rhys Torres
• Nurse 2 – Eleiece Krawiec
• News 1 – Greg Allensworth
• News 2 – Regan Lussier