Now, Roma Wines, R-O-M-A, made in California for enjoyment throughout the world.
Roma Wines presents Suspense.
Tonight, Roma Wines bring you Mr. Paul Henry, a star of The Angel of Death, a suspense play
produced, edited, and directed for Roma Wines by William Spear.
Suspense, radio's outstanding theater of thrills, is presented for your enjoyment by Roma Wines.
That's R-O-M-A, Roma Wines.
Those excellent California wines that can add so much pleasantness to the way you live,
to your happiness and entertaining guests, to your enjoyment of everyday meals.
Yes, right now a glass full would be very pleasant, as Roma Wines bring you Mr. Paul
Henry in a remarkable tale of Suspense.
December 31st, New Year's Eve.
I shall identify myself as John Forsythe, my true name, as I have no reason to fear
it's being known or to assume one of a different character.
My early life has no place in this narrative, save only to point out with the utmost objectivity
that I've always been possessed since my tenderest youth of extraordinary intellectual powers,
as witness my acquisition at the age of 16 of degrees from not one, but three of the
leading universities of Europe, where despite my British nativity, I spent my formative
years.
But this fact has no special significance other than as it applies to those events which
were set in motion on another New Year's Eve in London 15 years ago.
For it was on that evening, as I had planned some weeks before it should be, that I stood
outside a door and listened for confirmation of the relationship I knew existed between
my best friend and my wife.
Oh, darling, darling, darling.
No, no, no, it's all right, Pam, it's all over now.
Are you happy?
Yes, now that we've decided, yes, almost for the first time since I can remember.
I know, darling, and I suppose we should feel sorry for him, but I can't, not after the
way he's treated you.
Raymond, what do you suppose he'll do?
It doesn't matter, darling.
Tomorrow we'll be on the Atlantic Ocean and within a month we'll be on my uncle's plantation
in Brazil where he couldn't find us if he looked for a hundred years.
No, I suppose it doesn't matter.
Now, how long will it take you to pack?
Oh, an hour.
Well, I ought to be back by then.
I've just got to pick up the tickets and join a few things.
All right, hurry, darling.
I will.
Goodbye, darling.
Goodbye.
Good evening, my dear.
Oh, John.
Why?
What's the matter, Pamela?
You look as though you'd seen a ghost.
Why, nothing.
You startled me, that's all.
You said you were going out of town for the holidays and you don't usually come in by
the back door.
If you needn't be alarmed, I shall be only a moment.
I forgot something.
Can I get it for you?
Your anxiety for my every wish is touching.
But no, thank you.
By the way, Pamela, have you any last words?
Any what?
We may not see each other for a while, you know.
What are you talking about, John?
What's the matter with you?
Oh, my dear, sometimes I wonder if I merit you out of infatuation for your beauty or
pity for your stupidity.
Oh, John, please.
Pamela, where do you suppose we shall all be, say, within the month?
Does it really matter so much?
No, no.
I suppose it does not.
Within the month, I was on trial for their murder.
You are Henry Jenkins, proprietor of the Crown and Lion, number 17 Buxton Street.
I'm not one, sir.
I am Henry Jenkins.
So long...
Thank you.
Now, will you kindly repeat the words spoken by the prisoner in the dock, filed in your
place of business several weeks ago?
Yes, sir.
Well, about two weeks ago one night, Mr. Forsyte there, who's a steady customer of mine, sir,
although he's not what you call a sociable man.
Yes, yes, yes, yes.
Well, sir, all me other customers had gone home, and I was asking Mr. Forsyte to leave
also just so I could close up me shadows, you know.
When all of a sudden he looks up at me and he whispers, kind of horse-like, you know,
Jenkins, I did it, I finally did it.
Well, not knowing what he did, I naturally ask him what he did.
And what did the prisoner tell you, Mr. Jenkins?
He said, sir, wanted me...
Wanted me to keep it quiet.
I found them together and I killed them.
And then he laughs in a crazy way and adds, and Jenkins, I hid the bodies where no one
will ever find them.
That's what he said, sir.
So help me it is.
I saw him burning what looked to be a lot of bloody clothes.
In the furnace it was.
And he didn't try to hide them either.
Just stared at me kind of odd-like and went right on as brazen as you please he did.
He told me he wasn't worried at all.
He said the two of them would never get away together, except if they are dead.
I heard him say it on the stair landing one night and several other times in their rooms.
Pamela, he says, if you don't stop leering at Raymond Tillotson with those evil eyes
of yours, I'll see the two of you in your graves.
I warn you.
The court feels that it is its duty at this time again to remind the prisoner that he
has so far made nor allowed to be made by counsel in his defense, no cross-examination
of witnesses, nor rebuttal to the charges made by the prosecution of any kind, and that
this attitude can only result adversely to his cause.
The prisoner is therefore once more given opportunity at this time to make such rebuttal.
Does the prisoner wish to do so?
No, Your Lordship, I do not.
Does the prisoner wish to make any statement of any nature whatsoever in his defense?
I should merely like to ask the prosecution one question, Your Lordship.
Yes, what is it?
Has the prosecution found the bodies?
Well, the prisoner wishes to know if the prosecution has yet produced the bodies of the alleged
victims of the crime for which he is on trial.
Well, no, Your Lordship, we have not.
That is all.
To kill them had been my plan and my intention naturally.
But not in the usual stupid way such things are done, where men gamble their own lives
against the lives of those whom they destroy.
Every faculty of my intelligence revolted against such a thought.
And so for me the gambler's risk was needless.
So I had planned it.
It was therefore without fear or question that I stood before the court to hear the
verdict which in all the writing of it I had contrived against myself.
Order, order.
John Forsyth, the court has given most careful consideration to the fact that the bodies
of the named victims have not been presented to this court as due evidence and assurity
of murder, a fact which admittedly must alter the circumstances of guilt.
But this Crown Court, no matter how deeply it desires to aid you, cannot but recognise
the fact that you have allowed every shred of evidence and element to point to you as
a cold-blooded killer.
Under such circumstances, questionable though they may be, I can do only as the King's
law directs me to do, tempered with the mercy of His Majesty's court.
I hereby sentence you to no more than 20 and no less than 10 years at hard labour for the
suspected and willful murders of your wife, one Pamela Felice Forsyth and one Raymond
Elton Tillotson.
May God protect the Crown and the jurisprudence of this court of His Royal Majesty.
Ten to twenty years.
It was perhaps a bit more than I expected, but I was content.
And it may be that there was even the trace of a smile upon my lips as I left the courtroom.
Today it was justified, if only by the looks of awe and admiration turned in my direction
by the spectators.
Clearly they recognised my genius, and I knew they were thinking of the countless lesser
men who had failed in their efforts to hide even one dead body, whereas I, apparently
without effort, had successfully hidden two.
For Suspense, Roma Wines are bringing you a star, Paul Henry, to the Angel of Death
by Alan Cameron.
From the Wines presentation tonight in radio's outstanding theatre of thrills, Suspense.
Between the acts of suspense, this is Truman Bradley for Roma Wines.
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And now Roma Wines bring back to our Hollywood sound stage, Paul Henry, as John Forsythe
in The Angel of Death, a play well calculated to keep you in suspense.
It was thus that I began my prison term, and my association with William Waters, a shallow-faced,
ill-favored little man, was to be my chief source of amusement and mental exercise for
a long time to come, and to illustrate still further the inevitable triumph of the higher
intellect over all obstacles and surroundings.
So, you're the great John Forsythe, eh?
You have heard of me, then?
Not half, I haven't.
The luckiest beggar that ever cheated the young men.
There is no such thing as luck.
No?
Now is it your sitting here safe and sound, and out as free as air in fifteen or twenty
years, instead of stretching your neck at the end of a rope, eh?
I'm here because I choose to be here.
That is all.
Because you choose to be?
Tell me, Forsythe, just between the two of us, how did you do it?
By using my brains.
There's many another tried that before and been caught up with.
Simply because they did not really have any brains to start with.
Now, it's luck, I tell you.
Bad luck, like mine.
You want to hear the worst bit of luck that ever ruined a man's life?
If you wish to call it that, why not?
It was like what happened to you, in a way, the sweetheart, Agnes, her name was, with
the biggest, bluest eyes, or the prettiest little thing you'd ever hope to see.
And you killed her?
I didn't mean to.
It was the usual, you know.
I'd caught her dead to rights, but she laughed at me.
That was the trouble.
Threw it in my face, she did.
Next thing I knew, something snapped.
And the head cleared, and I was sitting on the floor beside her, crying like a baby.
And her lying there with her pretty blue eyes, tearing out of her head, and her pretty mouth
all twisted, red marks there on her throat.
The marks of the two very hands, where I'd strangled the life out of her.
You weren't unlucky.
You were stupid.
You killed her without planning it.
And what did you do with the body?
Cemented her into the wall of the cellar, and the bloke next door at the gas heater
exploded and blew out the old ruddy wall between us, it did.
The time I got home, there was firemen and bobbies all over the place.
And there was Agnes, what was left of her, lying right out in the middle of the cellar
floor, for all the world to see.
The truly intelligent man foresees every possibility and guards against it.
Who could?
Who could foresee a thing like that?
I could.
You could.
I stand before you as the living proof of it.
In ten or fifteen years, I shall be free, because I'm intelligent.
Whereas you will rot and die here because you are stupid.
Pretty clever, ain't you?
Now, just about everything there is to know, don't you?
No, no, no.
Not everything.
But quite a lot of things.
For instance, I know something about that cough of yours.
What about it?
The colour of your skin, the look about your eyes, the way you breathe.
I hope you're not afraid to die, Waters.
Rubbish.
What are you talking about?
Have you ever heard of retribution, Waters?
What?
The inevitable fate that pursues and at last destroys the criminal mind.
Vengeance, you might call it.
Ah, rot.
You don't think anything's going to happen to you or me, do you?
Not to me, Waters.
For the intelligent man foresees and prevents even that.
But to you, Waters.
Most certainly to you.
Oh, indeed.
And who's going to do all this?
Oh, he's known by various names, Waters.
But best known as the Angel of Death.
Retribution, the Angel of Death.
Absurd, wasn't it?
But a most purposeful absurdity.
For the intellectual stimulus so necessary to remaining mentally alert during the prison
years ahead was here delivered into my hand.
An experiment and one almost impossible under any other conditions.
And William Waters would be my guinea pig.
An experiment to determine just how far a man might succeed through sheer superiority
of intelligence in breaking down and destroying the mind and the body of another.
But a simple power of suggestion.
I suggested nothing directly.
Merely a word here, a glance there.
Drops of water wearing away the stone.
I've got a fever again tonight.
Am I John?
No, no.
A touch perhaps, but that is all.
My head feels hot.
Why does that blasted cough, what does it?
Now, now, you mustn't worry about it.
It's every very, very bad for people with your condition to worry.
What condition?
What condition, John?
Oh, why nothing.
People with a cough like yours, people who feel, well, you know, indisposed, that's all.
Oh.
What's that book you're reading lately?
Just a book, a scientific book that I got from the prison library.
What sort of a scientific book?
Journal book on medicine, things like that.
Well, let me see it.
No, no, no.
Give it here.
You wouldn't understand.
Give it here.
Oh, please, give it back to me.
You wouldn't be interested.
Oh.
You had it open in this place here, didn't you?
This is what you was reading, ain't it?
Well, yes, among other things.
Tuberculosis.
Is that what I got, John?
Tuberculosis?
Oh, don't be silly.
There's nothing seriously wrong with you.
John, you've got to tell me.
You've got to tell me.
Now.
I don't want to die.
You're not going to die if you take care of yourself.
Oh, but why should it come to me?
I've always been healthy.
I'm not old yet.
Of course you are not.
You're just imagining things.
Imagining things?
You're worrying too much.
That's all.
What makes you think I'm worried?
Oh, I don't know.
Sometimes, you know, when you're asleep.
Tell me, do you ever have dreams?
What sort of dreams?
Oh, about the past or?
Oh, you mean about...
Yes.
Do you ever dream you see her lying there on the floor with her eyes bulging out of her
head and her mouth all twisted and her tongue all black and swollen?
John, don't stop it.
And your fingers digging into her throat?
Stop it.
Stop it.
What's the matter here, huh?
He seems somewhat disturbed in his mind this evening, God.
Oh, he's mourned, huh?
Oh, that remorse me.
Doctor said we must try to prevail on him to get out of his bunk tomorrow and get outside,
get a little exercise and fresh air.
Oh, you tell him, I?
Yes, yes.
What was you too much in about?
Oh, he was just telling me what the doctor said about you.
What?
Well, he wants you to stay in your bunk and get plenty of rest.
The time was drawing near, I knew.
The time for what I had planned as the culmination of my experiment.
Waters was having periods of definite delirium, but I waited.
I waited for them to become more pronounced.
And then one night when I'd listened to him tossing and muttering for hours in his bunk,
I crossed over in the darkness.
No, no, no, no, wait, wait, no, it ain't time yet.
I thought it was the go yet.
No, no.
I've come for you, William Waters.
She sent me, William.
She sent me with her eyes staring out of her head, with her black swollen tongue.
I'm the angel of death.
I'll kill you.
Don't do it.
Take care of it.
Hands off my foot.
I'll kill you.
William.
What's going on in here?
I said we'll quiet you.
I had to hit him.
The man is out of his mind.
He thinks I'm some angel of death or something.
There you, come on up on your feet.
Come on now then, Waters.
Now what's the matter with you, eh?
It was I, you.
It was you what's done this to me.
I told you.
It was out of his head.
It's you what's done it to me.
I see it now.
Come on, you're coming for me.
Kill the fools.
I'll get out of here with this.
It will take 100 years.
I'll kill you.
I'll kill you.
It was interesting while it lasted.
And I've always believed that given a little more time,
I could have ended my experiment successfully.
But I had other plans to make now.
Plans for the day when I would be free.
And at last it came.
At last I was walking away from the prison gate a free man.
Now began my search.
It was not difficult.
It led me at last to Paris, to a small apartment,
where I went tonight, December 31st, New Year's Eve.
Yes?
Good evening.
Well, good evening.
Did you wish to see someone?
Don't you recognize me?
Well, I do, of course, but are you a friend of Pam's?
I am indeed.
Who is it, darling?
What's a friend of yours, dear?
A friend of both of you.
John.
Yes?
In fact, your husband, my dear, and Raymond's best friend.
John, it's been...
15 years, yes.
You only returned to Paris recently, didn't you?
Yes, a short time ago.
And you never knew that I was convicted and sentenced to prison for your double murder, did you?
Murder?
Oh, that was quite as I planned it.
I knew where you were, but the authorities did not.
John.
But perhaps you have heard of a curious legal technicality
which provides that a man cannot be convicted twice for the same crime.
So, you see, I've already paid for your murders.
And now I've come to collect an ancient death...
Put down that gun.
I then walked calmly from their rooms.
I made no effort to hide my face, my trail, or my identity.
I can now defy every element in life and in law.
After 15 years, I've committed the crimes for which I've already paid my debt to society.
I shall mail this letter to the police, who may give it to the newspapers,
whoever wants it, although it is now a matter of indifference to me
if the world remarks upon my cleverness or my patience.
For my life is complete.
No man has ever known such happiness.
John Forsythe.
Yes, yes, come in, Madame Leclerc. I have a letter now ready.
I wish you to mail for me.
I've come for you, John Forsythe.
What is?
I'm not Waters any longer.
How did you get out?
They said I was insane, so I hadn't been responsible when I killed her.
And then they said I was cured, sane again.
And then they let me out.
But there was one thing I didn't know.
They never knew who I really was.
What are you talking about?
That's why I've come for you, John Forsythe.
Me?
I am the chosen messenger of an higher power.
Look here, Waters.
Die, John Forsythe.
And the story ends with a newspaper clipping.
Let me read it to you.
Paris, January 1st.
This gay metropolis spent one of its quietest New Year's Eve's in recent years.
In all great of Paris, there were only two recorded deaths by violence,
both of which by a strange coincidence occurred within a few yards of each other.
The first was the fatal shooting by an unknown assailant of an Englishman, John Forsythe.
The second victim, unidentified, had apparently leaped from a window or roof
of the same dwelling occupied by Forsythe.
Police were at a loss to explain a weird black silk robe and cape worn by the man.
Jean-Guyves Leclerc, concierge of the building,
alleges to have heard a voice repeating an English phrase,
I am the angel of death, just before the suicidal leap.
However, this can hardly have any bearing on the case,
since the said phrase was undoubtedly uttered by New Year's revelers in the neighbourhood.
Suspense!
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Paul Henry appeared through the courtesy of Warner Brothers Studios
and will soon be seen in their production, Devotion.
Next Thursday, same time, Roma Wines will bring you Mr. Phil Terry,
as star of Suspense, radio's outstanding theatre thrill.
Produced by William Spear for the Roma Wine Company of Fresno, California.
This is CBS, the Columbia Broadcasting System.