An hour of suspense, a full sixty minutes at this time with the distinguished actor
director Mr. Robert Montgomery as your host.
Tonight our star Mr. John McIntyre.
Our story Donovan's Brain, a suspense play produced, edited and directed by William Spear.
Mr. Montgomery.
The man across the table was talking about shaved heads and electricity and I was listening.
I'll have to admit it I'm pretty much of a layman when it comes to things like that.
I imagine you are too.
But the man I was talking with was a specialist.
I sought him out after we decided on our suspense play for tonight.
As you know we're doing Donovan's Brain and the man across the table who discussed shaved
heads and electricity with such final authority was an eminent brain surgeon.
Now I don't know very much about the human brain.
I have one and I use it occasionally I hope.
But I leave the clinical knowledge up to the brain specialists like the man across the
table.
To this man of science I posed the momentous question, what about the brain?
And he started in.
Your brain he said is something less than two and a half percent of your total body
weight.
There's no relation between the weight of your brain and your intelligence.
There's no relation between the size of your brain and your intelligence.
So we threw out size and weight and talked about what you could tell about a person's
intelligence simply by looking at his brain.
And it develops you can tell quite a lot by looking.
An intelligent person's brain is more complex in appearance than a stupid person's.
It has more grooves and depressions, convolutions he called them.
Well that was all right with me.
I was nodding my head in agreement when it occurred to me quite suddenly that this didn't
mean very much, not really.
Because I can't look at somebody's brain even if I wanted to, you can't either.
We have to depend on other ways of judging people's intelligence.
On how they act, what they say, what they do.
The brain specialist told me about that too.
He said the brain acts as a storehouse for our knowledge.
It also is the power that directs that knowledge.
So when we act, we are merely putting direction to what we know.
How a man acts, the direction he takes, is his own decision.
It's an individual matter.
And that interests me.
The highly intelligent, highly moral lawyer and the deceptively crafty, highly immoral
crook may well have the same amount of knowledge, but the way each directs his knowledge is
entirely different.
Why?
Psychological fiber.
That's what the brain man called it.
Your psychological fiber is either weak or it's strong so far as the pressures of living
are concerned.
If it's strong, the worries, the fears, the tragedies of life can't throw you off your
course, can't influence your direction.
And if it's weak, these same worries and fears and tragedies take on exaggerated proportions.
You lose your sense of direction and the result is fixation or obsession or insanity.
Our play tonight is concerned with the brain, the man who directs it and what happens to
his psychological fiber.
It is the story of Dr. Patrick Corey and Donovan's brain, a tale well calculated to keep you
in suspense.
As I sit now outside my laboratory door, writing under the heading Experiment 87, this final
entry in my casebook, I know that these are the last words I shall ever write upon this
earth.
I neither ask nor expect forgiveness now or hereafter.
And for those who seek some explanation, I refer them simply to this casebook.
Let them read it carefully.
From its first entry on that ill-starred day of December the 5th.
December 5th.
Today I bought a small capuchin monkey from an organ grinder.
The animal trembled with fear when I took it into my laboratory and when I tried to
pet it, it bit me.
But I had to make it trust me completely.
Fear causes an excess secretion of adrenaline, resulting in an abnormal condition of the
bloodstream which would throw off my observations.
So I fed it bananas and raw egg and finally the creature laid its head against my shoulder.
I stabbed it with a surgical lancet between the occipital bone and the first cervical
vertebra.
It died instantly.
Well David, what do you think of it?
Well it's, it's pretty amazing all right.
You see what I've done don't you?
Well I, I think so.
You think so?
Good lord don't you know?
Well after all that I'm only a second year medical student.
What of it when I was a second year medical student?
Who is it?
It's me, Janice.
Patrick, Dr. Schrott is here to see you.
Oh well let him come in.
Come in doctor.
Thank you.
Patrick didn't realize who it was.
You know my son David of course.
Oh of course, of course.
How are you my boy?
Fine thanks doctor.
Well Patrick, hard at work as usual I see.
Patrick, you didn't eat the lunch I sent in to you or the breakfast either.
I tried to get them to mother.
Well I've been terribly busy Janice.
But you've got to eat then.
I know, I know.
What, what is it this time Patrick?
A brain.
What?
A brain, a brain, a monkey's brain.
Oh.
Well what about the brain?
Well I'm trying to see how long I can keep the tissues alive.
Is that it in that jar?
Mm hmm.
It's considerably more to it than just a jar though.
You want to see how it works?
But is it still alive?
In a way yes.
It's a fairly simple device actually doctor.
It's a variation on Carell's mechanical heart.
See the brain lies in a bath of blood serum.
And these rubber arteries are fixed to the vertebral and internal carotid arteries of
the brain.
And the blood substance is forced through the sacral willus to feed the tissues.
And over here I've installed a small pressure pump that forces the blood circulation.
See?
But how do you know it's alive?
Well that's very easy to determine.
The brain when functioning gives off infinitesimal electrical impulses.
And they can be measured.
As a matter of fact I've hooked the encephalograph to a small amplifying system.
The brain impulses can actually be heard here.
Turn it on.
Quite effective isn't it?
Yes.
Yes it's effective and it's wrong Patrick.
It's terribly wrong.
I've tried to tell him Dr. Schrott.
He's trying to discover things that no man should discover.
He's warping his whole nature.
He's in here night and day.
We hardly even see him anymore.
Mother's right in the way dad.
You're killing yourself with these...
Would you leave us please Janice?
You too David.
Oh dad.
If you please David.
All right.
Come on mother.
It's wrong.
It's wrong.
In heaven's name what's wrong with it?
Oh you and your mechanistic philosophy.
Trying to reduce life to a mere matter of chemicals and test tubes.
The origin of life is from a higher domain than that Patrick and you're profaning it.
Your hands are shaking.
Do you have another hard night doctor?
You can taunt me if you like.
I've made a mess of my life that's true.
But I wouldn't have a part of what you're doing for all the success in the world.
Oh nonsense.
You can't stop the progress of science.
Every discovery of whatever kind is a step forward.
If I can prove that the brain can perform certain functions outside the body.
Who knows where we may be able to go from there.
How... how do you know that that thing in there doesn't feel pain?
How do you know it isn't writhing in agony?
Brain tissue itself is insensitive.
You know that doctor.
But as to the feeling look.
I'll switch on the encephalograph.
Notice the faintness of the amplified alpha rays.
Notice the comparatively slow rate of pulsation.
Now notice what happens when I tap on the glass jar.
Why?
It feels.
It thinks.
Well I wouldn't go so far as to say that.
But it certainly shows marked reaction to an external stimulus.
I wouldn't believe it possible.
Well the trouble with you is Shrott.
You really don't believe in science.
Yeah.
Well have it your own way Patrick.
But when you can manufacture love and sympathy and kindness in a test tube.
Well I'll be back.
Were you leaving?
Yes, yes.
Patrick.
Yes?
Do me a favor.
Shut off the pump and let that poor thing in there die.
Let it die?
Yes, yes.
Why if it were within my power to grant.
That little brain would live forever.
December 10th.
I'm utterly exhausted from lack of sleep.
But the events of the past five days have been of such tremendous importance that I
must set them down while every last detail is still fresh in my mind.
For I've had no time to make an entry in this second, in this record, since the day last
week.
It seems months ago now.
When I had my first partial success with the brain of the capuchin monkey.
At that time however it seemed that I was doomed to disappointment.
In spite of all my efforts, the brain of the monkey ceased to live at 12.14 at night.
Tired and disheartened I lay down to sleep on the cot in my laboratory.
But at that very moment, fate was contriving in a occurrence which now seems destined to
have the most profound effect not only upon my own existence, but perhaps upon that of
all mankind.
Hello.
What is it?
Dad.
Well, come in.
What's the matter?
It's Dr. Schrott.
Schrott?
What in the world does he want?
It's two o'clock in the morning.
Well, there's been an accident or something.
He's pretty upset.
What of it?
Where is he?
Well, he went outside again.
He's at the laboratory door.
Well, all right.
Patrick.
Oh, thanks heaven, my boy.
Thank heaven.
Well, what's the matter?
There's been a plane crash on the mountains.
Only one of them left alive.
I brought him this far, but he needs immediate operation.
That's your job.
You're a county physician.
Patrick.
Patrick, it's multiple fractures of both legs.
The arteries are severed.
That legs will have to be amputated.
You're not in any shape to do the job.
Well, that's not my fault.
Take him to the Phoenix Hospital.
I'm not going to take the responsibility.
It's too far.
We'll never get there in time.
Now, Patrick, please, please.
It may mean a man's life and, and, and, and, and.
Yes, and your job as county physician, huh?
I'm not thinking of that, but he's an important man.
William H. Donovan.
Donovan?
The Wall Street Donovan?
Yes.
Oh, you've got to help me, Patrick.
Well, what are his chances?
About even if we hurry.
Well, bring him in.
Thank you, Patrick.
Thank you, my boy.
You better get some things on, David.
You may have to help.
Oh, sure, Dad.
Oh, David.
Thanks.
David.
Yes, Dad.
Don't say anything to your mother.
I don't wish her to be disturbed.
Sure, I know.
Well, use the laboratory table.
Before you go, put the instruments to the sterilizer.
And don't forget the G.D. saw.
Oh, right.
Oh, but.
But what?
Oh, I, I thought the G.D. saw was only used for.
Brain surgery?
Oh, not always.
Now, hurry.
They're bringing him in from the car.
Now, hurry up.
In here now.
Careful, please.
Put him right there on that table, please.
Yes, doctor.
Easy.
Better get yourself a gown and gloves, doctor.
Right over there.
You won't have time to scrub.
Thanks, Patrick.
Thank you.
Well.
Bad, isn't he?
Pulse rapid?
Aren't very faint?
I wasn't sure we'd even make it to here.
Oh, David.
Yes, Dad.
Half cc of adrenaline, David.
One to one thousand, intravenous.
Right.
New men can go now.
Is there anything else we can do?
No, no, thank you.
Patrick, Patrick.
I'd rather we were alone, if you don't mind.
Good night, then, I just found out.
Good night.
And thank you.
Now, David.
David, if you'll remove the blanket from his legs.
That's it.
Mm-hmm.
There, you see.
Fortunately, a forest ranger got to him right after the crash and had sense enough to put
a tourniquet on each leg.
But even so...
Sure, sure, sure.
We've got it.
Sure, sure, sure.
What's that he's saying?
Uh, something like, sure, sure, sure.
He said it over and over.
Well, that's funny.
He's got a foreign accent.
He's an Armenian, I think.
He changed his name to Donovan.
I haven't realized he was deformed.
Well, it doesn't show as much in his pictures.
Now, Patrick, I think we ought to begin.
There's no use amputating those legs.
No use?
He'll be dead anyway by morning.
Well, won't he?
Well, I suppose you're right, Patrick.
You know I'm right.
But still, we ought to try.
We can't refuse to operate just because...
We are going to operate.
Serene's, please, David.
The large one.
Here you are, Dad.
And aesthetic.
Will you give a doctor's service?
Yeah, right, right.
Scalpel, please, David.
And the Gilles saw.
Gilles saw?
Patrick!
Well?
No.
No, I won't let you.
After your performance tonight?
But he's still alive.
Precisely.
My mistake with the monkey was that he was dead.
I don't intend to make it again.
Come, come, David, discount.
Are you out of your mind?
You're taking your man's life.
I'm giving him life.
Donovan won't die anyway.
I mean, he would die, of course.
But for a while, at least.
Donovan's brain will live.
You'd better hurry.
They'll be coming for the body pretty soon.
You can go now, David.
I think I will, then.
David, you understand, of course.
Yes, I understand.
Not a word to your mother or to anyone.
I understand.
Patrick, will the skull...
I bandaged the whole cranium.
It didn't look like any head injury.
I hope nobody gets any ideas about an autopsy.
You're the coroner.
You can stop, then.
You drive a hard bargain, don't you, Patrick?
You'd better sign the death certificate before they get here.
You know this is blackmail.
Want a drink?
You don't have to do that.
I'll sign it.
I'm sorry, but it was a chance that comes once in a lifetime.
William Donovan has one of the greatest minds, has one of the greatest brains in the world
today.
And now you have it.
It's madness, Patrick.
You think I won't succeed?
Succeed in what?
Turn on the encephagraph.
Simple alpha waves, no different from the monkeys.
You can't take a human brain out of its body and expect it to function.
Has it ever occurred to you that the brain might simply be asleep?
Asleep, certainly.
Operation like this is a severe shock.
Now, tap on the glass.
Good Lord, Patrick.
Delta waves, it was asleep.
You woke it up.
It's actually conscious.
Yes.
There are three of us conducting this experiment now, Shroud.
You and me and William Horace Donovan.
December 17th.
I moved my bed into my laboratory, but I scarcely slept in six days.
That can no longer be any doubt that the brain responds like a sensitive seismograph to vibrations
near it, including the sound of my voice.
Yet I found no method of communication with it.
I've devised a simplified Morse code consisting of taps on the glass container together with
voice vibrations.
Perhaps we can teach the brain.
December 22nd.
Shroud has come to stay with me, half out of the feeling that he shares with me a common
guilt, half out of scientific curiosity.
But I have scarcely seen him, and both David and Janice have been avoiding me, not that
I really care.
I have been tapping out my code on the side of the brain's container endlessly, day and
night, over and over a thousand times, so that a baby could learn it if the brain can
learn.
I sleep only when the brain itself falls into exhausted slumber.
When it wakes again, I resume my tapping.
Shroud!
Shroud!
Wake up!
Yes, yes, Patrick.
Get up!
Hurry!
What's the matter?
Something the matter?
Come, I want you to see something.
Patrick, you look like a ghost.
Where are we going?
Back to the laboratory.
I can't believe it myself.
I may have been dreaming.
Delirious.
What happened?
Come on.
You hear that?
The delta waves.
It seems disturbed.
You've got to check my observations for me.
My reasoning is wrong.
Tell me.
I can't be sure of anything anymore.
Yes, Patrick, yes.
Now, now listen carefully, Doctor.
You know I've been trying to communicate with the brain in code.
Now, if I were able to cause a distinctive pattern of the brain's delta waves by a specific
command in code, if the brain responded with the same pattern of sound each time I issued
the command, it would prove that I had succeeded in communicating with the brain, wouldn't
it?
Yes, Patrick, yes.
Now, listen.
Donovan, Donovan, if you understand, think three times of the word talk.
Three times.
Talk.
Talk.
Talk.
It answered.
It spoke.
Quiet yourself, just as I did the same word three times.
Donovan, talk.
Talk.
Talk.
Then I'm right.
It's true.
Patrick, this, this thing has learned to talk.
It's true.
It's true.
It's true.
It's true.
It's true.
It's true.
It's true.
It's true.
December 23rd.
Schwarz romanticizing, of course, the delta pattern is so infinitely complex that it would
be utterly impossible ever to break it down into specific words.
Yet that it understands me, that it's trying to communicate with me is certain.
Schwarz suggests mental telepathy, that I try to make my mind a blank, as the mediums
call it, while at the same time increasing the energy content in the plasma that feeds
the brain in the hope of stepping up the brain's electrical potential, as one would step up
the power of a radio station.
But naturally telepathy is nonsense.
But the feeding theory intrigues me.
I shall try it.
December 31st.
Notice today for the first time two distinct nodules of new brain cells on the frontal
lobex.
Electrical potential has increased to 510 microvolts.
I've begun smoking cigars, although I've always hated them before.
Nerves I expect.
January 6th.
Nodule still growing.
Electrical potential 1450.
But with no observable results, I've lately felt a compelling urge to know more of Donovan's
life and have collected every available scrap of information about it.
Strange man.
Ruthless.
Actually evil in many ways.
But nonetheless an extraordinarily brilliant mind.
It will be the test.
You agree, of course.
Patrick.
Patrick.
Wake up.
Patrick.
Patrick.
What?
What?
What is?
I thought I ought to wake you up, Patrick.
You were moaning in your sleep and talking.
Talking?
What did I say?
I'm not sure, but your voice was so strange that...
Janice.
Janice, what's the matter?
Oh, that's nothing.
I was dreaming.
That's all.
Janice woke me up.
Patrick.
Patrick, let me see your hand.
No, no, no, no, no.
The other one.
What about it?
You're not left-handed, are you?
I know.
Then why have you got ink on the fingers of your left hand?
I don't know.
Well, were you writing anything tonight?
Why, you must have been, Patrick.
Here it is right here on your desk.
Nonsense.
Wait.
Let me see it.
You've been writing his name.
William H. Donovan.
Shrot.
That's not my handwriting.
What?
What?
Why don't you see what it means?
The brain has communicated with me.
Patrick, you don't mean...
Look here.
Look at this magazine article.
He's a reproduction of his signature.
And he was left-handed, too.
It says so here.
It is.
It's exactly the same.
What a fool I've been.
Look at this picture.
Smoking a cigar with his left hand.
I wondered why I'd suddenly started smoking cigars.
The same brand, too.
Janice.
Janice, try to remember what you heard me saying just before you woke me tonight.
Now think.
Patrick, I can't believe...
Think, Janice.
All I heard was something like, sure, I'm not wrong.
I'm not wrong.
I'm not wrong.
I'm not wrong.
I'm not wrong.
I'm not wrong.
I'm not wrong.
I'm not wrong.
I'm not wrong.
I'm not wrong.
I'm not wrong.
I'm not wrong.
All I heard was... something like sure, sure, sure.
Sure, of course.
Don't you remember, Schrott?
He said it that night.
It was the only thing we ever heard him say.
It was an expression of his.
It tells about it in one of the articles, too.
It... it wasn't your voice, Patrick.
You see?
Ah ha, you were right, Schrott.
The brain has grown.
And it's strong enough to influence not only the higher functions of the frontal lobe,
but the speech centers, the motor centers of another brain.
Patrick, if this is true, then your experiment has been successful.
It's ended.
Ended?
Why, it's only begun.
Patrick!
Don't you see what this means?
Patrick, listen to me!
What, Janice?
What?
You've got to stop!
Stop?
I can't stand it any longer!
Can't you see where it's led you?
When you cut yourself off from your family, when you neglected your health and began having
fits of temper and were like... like someone I hardly recognize as the man I married.
All that I tried to understand.
But don't you see what you've done?
You're a murderer, Patrick.
A murderer!
Janice!
David told me the whole thing.
The poor boy's half insane himself from worry.
Insane?
What do you mean by that?
What I say!
You killed Donovan.
Maybe he wouldn't have lived anyway.
But you killed him.
And now this... this thing has gained such power over your mind that it can make you
do things you don't even know about.
For all you know, it could make you do anything.
Anything!
You've got to choose, Patrick.
Janice, please.
I... I suppose you're right, but I'm utterly exhausted.
I can't even think anymore.
You've got to think!
Give me until tomorrow.
Let me sleep, and then tomorrow I'll do something, I promise you.
All right, Patrick.
But if you don't do something, if you don't destroy that thing, I will!
Listen!
Listen!
Oh, I hate it!
Janice!
It's almost as though it had heard you and were raging at you!
This way, please, Dr. Corey.
But, Patrick, why are we going in here?
A psychiatric clinic?
I told you I'd do something, darling, and I've got an idea.
You mean having yourself psychoanalyzed?
Something like that?
Something like that.
I'll tell you about it later, dear.
But first I want to talk to this man alone.
Dr. Zanger, this is Dr. Corey.
Oh, how do you do, Dr. Corey?
I've heard something of your work.
Oh, yes.
Oh, and this is Mrs. Corey.
Oh, of course.
Excuse me.
I'm happy to meet you, Mrs. Corey.
Thank you, doctor.
Won't you come into my office, doctor?
Janice, would you mind waiting here in the reception room?
I'll be out in just a moment.
Why, certainly, dear.
In here, please.
Well, doctor, she seems quite normal.
I had expected from what you told me on the phone.
Yes, I know.
But I can assure you, deeply as it pains me to do so, that she's quite insane.
Oh, I see.
Paranoia.
She's always been a little jealous of my work.
But lately she's developed a most extraordinary delusion.
She thinks that I've created some sort of a monster in my laboratory that controls my
mind, my actions.
I have heard of such cases.
It was a great shock to me.
I thought of you at once, of course.
I'm putting her completely in your hands.
Well, it is a little unusual.
But since you are yourself a medical man, I know you'll do everything you can.
Yes, you definitely wish then to commit her, huh?
Yes.
You have the papers.
Here they are.
Just your signature will be enough.
There you are.
You'll keep me informed, won't you?
Thank you, Dr. Zangief.
Well, goodbye then, Dr. Corey.
We will do what we can.
Mrs. Corey is staying with us, Ms. Wilcox.
Yes, Dr. Zangief.
Patrick, come back.
Oh, it's all right, Mrs. Corey.
Just come inside with me, please.
Patrick, where are you going?
Come along, Mrs. Corey.
Let me go.
It's all right.
Let me go.
Patrick!
Oh, Dr. Corey.
Yes?
About the bill, how do you wish it to be handled?
Oh, sure, sure, sure.
I'll take care of it by the week.
The checks will be signed, William Edge's dollar.
Sure, sure, sure.
January 15th.
It's nearly a week now since Janice went away.
I cannot understand how she could have left me just when I needed her most.
When I tried to question Schraut or David about her, they only look at me strangely
and change the subject.
Clearly, they too are in on the conspiracy.
Sometimes it seems the only person I can trust is Donovan, the brain.
It communicates with me more freely now each day.
I know it has some great plan in mind for me, for both of us.
And I'm waiting, patiently waiting.
Donovan, I'm listening, Donovan.
Don't be angry, Donovan.
I'm trying to understand.
I'm listening, Donovan.
I'm listening.
Sure, sure, sure.
In tonight's full hour of suspense, Mr. John McIntyre appears as Dr. Patrick Corey in William
Spears' production of Donovan's Brain, tonight's study in suspense.
In just a moment, we will return with act two of suspense.
This is CBS, the Columbia Broadcasting System.
And now, back to our Hollywood Sound stage and your host for suspense, Mr. Robert Montgomery.
At the outset of experiment 87, we were concerned with a man of science who had a wife and a
son whom he loved and who loved him.
He was a gifted scientist, dedicated to his work, and he signed his name with his right
hand, Dr. Patrick Corey.
That was before Donovan's brain.
That was before his psychological fiber weakened against the force of a powerful obsession.
And with this weakening, his power to direct his knowledge has become twisted.
Now we look again at Dr. Patrick Corey, man of science.
He has alienated friends and family.
He has had his wife committed to an institution.
His entire life has become a thing contained in a vat, controlled by pounding electric
waves, and he signs his name with his left hand, William H. Donovan.
And now, with John McIntyre as Dr. Patrick Corey, and with Act Two of Donovan's Brain,
we again hope to keep you in suspense.
January 16th.
It is now six weeks, exactly 42 days.
For six weeks, by artificial means alone, I have kept alive a human brain.
Completely detached from the body, floating in the bath of serum, nourished by a synthetic
blood plasma fed through its arteries by an electric pump, it has remained alive.
Not only alive, but I have succeeded in communicating with it.
For I have even induced new growth of brain cells and so tremendously increased its mental
faculties that by sheer brain power alone, it is actually able to communicate its thoughts
to me.
And each day, my communion with that living, pulsing mass of grey matter that was the brain
of William Donovan becomes stronger and stronger.
Even now, I sense it striving to reveal some plan to me.
Something so truly world-shaking in its implications that only such an organism developed to a
point thousands of years ahead of its time could ever have conceived it.
So far I sense this only, but soon I shall know.
Indeed, I shall be a partner in its execution.
What a fool I was ever to have considered for a moment my wife's demands that I end
the experiment.
It is because I refused, of course, that Janice left me a week ago without so much as a word
of explanation of farewell.
Even my son David and my assistant Shrott are privy to this conspiracy to thwart me.
For when I asked about Janice, they pretended to know nothing.
Of course, I seek to avoid my questions.
But the brain will live.
I can hear it now.
Its delta waves quite audible over the amplifying system I've arranged for it, almost as though
it were calling to me, trying to speak to me.
Yes, the brain will live.
Donovan?
Donovan, what is it?
What are you trying to tell me?
Go on, Donovan, go on, I'm listening.
Go on.
Who is it?
It's me, Patrick and David.
What do you want?
We want to talk to you, Dad.
I have no time to talk.
I'm busy.
Please open the door, Patrick.
It's important.
Go away.
I tell you I'm busy.
Please, Dad.
Can't you leave me alone?
But...
All right, all right.
Thanks.
Now, what is it?
Patrick, I'm sorry.
I'm sorry.
I'm sorry.
I'm sorry.
I'm sorry.
I'm sorry.
I'm sorry.
Patrick, won't you come into the study with us for a few minutes?
Whatever you've got to say, you can say right here.
You know I can't leave the laboratory.
Dad, it's only that we wanted to talk to you in private.
Don't tell me that you're afraid of this poor mass of brain cells.
No, it's not that, Dad.
Never mind, David.
At least turn that thing off, then, will you, Patrick?
What difference would that make?
It could still hear, couldn't it?
All right, well, what is it?
It's about Mother.
Oh.
So she put you up to this, did she?
I thought the truth would come out sometime.
Dad, listen.
She tried to stop this experiment from the beginning.
She thought she could blackmail into quitting by leaving me.
And she still does.
And now she's using you as a go-between.
Patrick, please, listen to me.
I've heard enough.
We haven't heard a word from Janice.
We don't know where she is.
That's what we came in to talk about.
Oh, have you?
Well, how should I know where she is?
Because... because you were the last person seen with her, Dad.
I was.
Don't you remember, Patrick?
You took her into town with you.
You wouldn't tell any of us why.
Oh, yes.
Of course.
For a moment, I'd forgotten.
But what of it?
Don't you remember what happened then?
Well, of course I remember.
She'd left me, that's all.
Where, Dad?
Where did she leave you?
What were you doing?
I...
I don't know.
We were in some big public building.
It's the city hall, courthouse, taxes or something.
And the next thing I knew, she'd simply disappeared.
Is that all?
Didn't she say anything?
Didn't she... didn't she at least tell you why she was going?
How do I remember what she said?
It's been a week.
I don't know.
I don't know.
I don't know.
I don't know.
It's been a week and more.
I've hardly slept.
And...
You know I've been working night and day.
Yes, that's just it, Patrick.
What do you mean by that?
Patrick, you say that this...
The brain communicates with you, tells you things about its past life, suggests thoughts.
Well, if the brain can make you think things, why can't it also make you forget things?
Leave me alone.
Dad, are you sure...
Are you sure you don't know what's happened to Mother?
No, no, I tell you, no.
Don't you see what you might have done?
In heaven's name, stop now while there's still time.
Get out of here!
While there's still time to help Janice if there is.
While there's still time to help yourself, Patrick.
Shut off the current, let the brain die.
Kill it, Patrick, kill it, kill it!
Both of you, get out!
The brain continues to give in more and more easily, but nothing further on what I have
come to think of as the plan.
I am now sleeping a great deal, but my dreams are becoming increasingly troublesome, although
I am at a loss to analyze them.
Most frequent is a sort of vast cosmic ballet, presided over by the colossal figure of a
young man who I seem to recognize, and yet I never see his face.
It is as though the entire population of the Earth were moving past him in review at his
command.
Ah!
Now.
Now.
Do it.
Now.
Help! Help!
Help!
Shrot?
Shrot?
David!
I had to, Dad.
What am I now?
Here. Help me with Shrot.
No, no, David. Don't let him touch me.
It's all right now.
Here. Here's a glass of water.
Here.
What's the matter? You're trembling all over.
I...
I can't.
What are you looking at me that way for?
You look frightened half to death.
What happened here anyway?
I came in and found you on the floor with your hands around your own throat.
If it hadn't been for me...
What?
Why is your luggage all packed?
I was going to leave.
Leave? In the middle of the night? Why?
The fuse box.
It's been opened.
It was you, Shrot.
You were going to shut off the current.
You were going to kill that brain!
Patrick, you tried to strangle me.
What?
It's true, Dad.
That's why I had to slap you.
But that's absurd.
I came in here and I found Shrot with his hands around his own throat.
He was strangling himself.
Dad, please think a minute.
Nobody can strangle himself.
I'm going to put these marks on my throat.
You think I could have done that?
What?
No, it's not possible.
And yet...
It's true, Patrick, true, that I tried to shut off the current.
I was afraid for you.
But as I opened the fuse box, I heard the delta waves in the laboratory
suddenly become stronger and louder than they'd ever been before.
And then...
And then I...
Yes, yes.
Then the brain knew you even spoke in Donovan's voice, Patrick.
His voice?
Yes, yes, yes, yes.
In his very tone, his very accent.
You've created a monster, Patrick.
It has the power to make me commit murder.
Patrick, what about Janice?
Shrot, you...
You don't think I...
I couldn't have done a thing like that.
You couldn't have done what you did tonight if you'd been yourself?
No, no, I...
Even a hypnotist can't force a man to...
Don't worry about it now, Patrick.
It's probably all right.
We'll try to find it tomorrow.
But first, Dad, don't you see?
Dr. Shrot was right. You've got to destroy...
Well...
Maybe...
Maybe then I could remember it, yes.
The brain must die.
Pull the switch in the fuse box. It will only be a matter of seconds then.
Yes.
But...
You've got to, Patrick.
Shrot! David!
Help me! I can't move!
Pull the switch!
Hurry! Shrot! David!
Go on!
You...
You too...
It's... It's paralyzed us, Patrick.
The brain won't let itself be killed.
Then it has the power
to live on...
On...
To command us as long as we live.
To make us do anything it wants.
To kill, murder,
dead.
What are we going to do?
Listen!
Brain!
It's...
It's nothing!
February 2nd.
Shrot has left.
He had to, of course, for his own protection
of nothing else.
Before he left, I swore him to eternal secrecy.
And he's going to try to find Janus.
The very thought that any harm
might have come to her through me
is enough to drive me almost mad.
As for David,
he's strong enough to prevent any
untoward accidents.
And he's volunteered to stay with me.
He'll sleep at night behind locked doors.
We must devote every
faculty we possess, together
and independently, to finding a way of
destroying the brain.
Perhaps while it sleeps.
Although it seems to have developed tremendous
powers of the subconscious which operate even in sleep.
A recurring dream.
The now oppressive sense
of some further task to be performed
continues.
If Janus were only here,
even her presence, I know, would help
immeasurably to combat this fearful
thing.
A terrible thought crosses my mind.
Could Shrot
have left if the brain had not, for some
reasons of its own, actually
wanted him to leave?
February 6th.
My thoughts are less and less my own.
The dream of the young
giant bestriding the earth, the
figure without a face, pursues me
now, even in my waking hours.
Increasingly I seem to live in a world
of evil fantasy.
Beopled and controlled by the mind of William
Donovan. And worst
of all is the obsession that there is some
fateful role not yet revealed to
me. But I have been assigned to
play in it. But I've not
given up hope. I must destroy the
brain. The possibility has occurred to
me. I must give it more
thought. If Janus were only
here.
Sure. Sure. Sure.
There is not
much time,
but time enough.
Sure.
Sure.
Sure. Sure. Sure.
Sure.
Hello?
Who is it?
Patrick.
Janus.
Janus!
Hello, Patrick. Oh, Janus.
My darling.
How are you, Patrick?
Well enough. But Janus, where have you
been? Where
have I been? Yes,
we had no idea. I've been half crazy worrying
about you. Did Shrot finally find you?
Uh-huh.
Shrot found me.
Janus, why did you leave me that day? Why didn't
you at least tell me? Where did you go?
I was
with friends.
Did Shrot tell you anything?
No.
Nothing special. Janus,
I know I haven't been a very good husband these
last months. I haven't been very kind
or considerate or even civilized. I haven't
been myself, Janus. I know,
Patrick. My
darling. But if you'd only known
how I missed you after you left,
how I needed you, I need your help,
Janus. I know, Patrick.
I came back to help you.
But what?
Where's... Only sleep
in the next room. Ever since
that is lately he's
tried to make it a point to sleep only when I don't.
Keep an eye on things. Patrick,
I'm going to help you
all I can, any way
I can. I'm going
to. But first,
I want to take
David away. David?
Because I don't think it's
good for him to be here.
I don't think that you...
Then Shrot did tell you?
Yes, Patrick.
He did. Oh, Janus.
Janus.
I don't know what to do. My mind is only
half my own. Lately I don't even know what I'm
myself or whether I'm
someone else. It's like
some frightful nightmare, only I don't wake up.
I'm afraid I'll never wake up.
My poor dearest. Janus.
You...
You do love me still. Yes, Patrick.
The only thing I have left, Janus, is
what I've counted on clung to.
And that somehow, out of your love,
you'd find a way to help. No one else can.
I know. Poor old
Shrot didn't even dare to come back.
Yes, well, I can't
blame him. Patrick,
I don't want to torment you.
It's only that
perhaps we can find a way
if we know
all the facts.
What, Janus?
Don't you really
know where I was?
No, how could I?
Don't you remember
where you took me? Where I
took you?
You took me to
a psychiatric clinic, Patrick.
You had me
admitted. Oh, Janus!
No, Patrick. Not you.
Donovan.
It was because I tried to make you
stop the experiment, kill
the brain. As
you left me there, you even spoke
in Donovan's voice.
Sure, sure, sure, you said.
I thought they were the last
words I would ever hear you speak.
Oh, Janus, forgive me.
Forgive me. I couldn't persuade anyone.
I was sane. After
what you told them, everything
I said only made them think I was
mad.
I'm not
mad.
Am I, Patrick?
I'm
not mad.
Janus will be gone for some three hours.
I have sent her into town for Dr.
Zanger, the psychiatrist. Maybe he can help.
But now I'm overcome
with the thought of the humiliation I shall have to
suffer when other medical men become aware of the position
I'm in. It will be the end
of my career, my reputation, all
my hopes.
It's folly to think that Zanger
would keep it to himself. Indeed,
he would have no right to.
I can bear it if I must.
But another way,
a possibility came to me yesterday.
And I've been thinking it over.
There's no harm in trying
it in an event. I must
try. I have three
hours.
David! David!
Yes, Dad?
David, what's your blood type? Do you know?
Matter of fact, I don't think I do. Why?
Well, no matter. We can easily find out. David,
I think at last I know a way.
To kill the brain? Yes, it's
simple, perfectly natural, and yet nine chances
out of ten is something Donovan would never have known
about. I do it myself,
but unfortunately my blood type is
the same as his. Oh, a transfusion?
Of course. I have to replenish the blood substance
periodically anyhow. It's about time
to do it again. I've always used my own
because it was the same type as his, but if yours
is a different type, the right
type. You mean the wrong type? Yes.
Given the wrong type,
the brain will die. Yes.
It sounds possible. I'm sure of it.
I know it. But suppose the brain
knows. It knows other things.
I thought of that. It's a chance we'll have to take.
If you're willing. Of course I am, Dad.
Then we'll take a blood sample now.
Come to the laboratory.
If only I have the right type.
Or rather the wrong type.
If you haven't, we'll find someone who has, maybe Shrot.
Now just lie down there on the
table. You'll want a tourniquet. On your arm.
There.
I'll put it on.
This small syringe
will do it.
Now.
Go ahead. I'm ready.
David.
Don't watch me.
It'll be easier if you don't for me.
That's a funny one. Coming
from you. Well, doctors
are never quite as steady with members of their own family,
you know. Ready?
Sure.
There we are.
You alright?
Yeah.
Yeah.
I'm alright.
We'll be through in just a second.
You
getting it alright?
Yeah, it's just a second now.
Dad.
I'm...sleepy.
We'll be over in a moment.
But...what's the matter?
Why am I so...
so sleepy?
You'll be
alright.
Sleepy.
So sleepy.
Yeah.
Sure.
Sure. Sure.
That is
what anesthetic
is for.
To make you sleep.
I was
somewhat surprised
to find the instruments
sterilized and already lying out.
But I worked more rapidly and skillfully
than ever before in my life.
I made an incision just below the hairline,
laying back the scalp as far as the base
of the skull.
I trepanned the cranium at two centimeter
intervals, working back and downwards
to the upper edge of the occipital bone.
With a genie saw, I cut the
bone in half,
with a genie saw, I cut through the
connecting bone structure, removed the entire
top of the cranium,
placing it in saline solution to preserve it.
I made a semicircular incision
in the dura mater, laying it to
one side, exposing
the brain.
As I dissected out the facial
auditory and pneumogastric nerves
to free the medulla
of the lungata, I became
conscious of an insistent clamoring,
something like a mounting hysteria
in the distant reaches of my mind,
almost as strong as
the irresistible compulsion
that drove me on.
But my hand did not falter.
With a sure
stroke, I severed the spinal
cord, just below
the first cervical nerve.
As I make this last
entry, with that
awful guilt upon my soul,
even now I cannot fully comprehend
how it has been possible for any man.
By mortal or immortal
means to be driven to such a crime.
Even the divinity
himself did not demand of Abraham
that final sacrifice of expiation,
when he, with his only
begotten son, ascended the Mount
of Olives. Perhaps
Schraught is right.
Perhaps there is indeed in man
some spark of the divine
that will elude our test tubes
and our laboratories until
the end of time.
Perhaps that is the one thing
that even Donovan did not foresee.
I only know
that at the instant my son
died under my own hand,
I was set free.
At that
instant, I saw and
understood for the first time
that monstrous plan born
in the brain of William Donovan, of which
I was to be the instrument.
It was the plan I had glimpsed, but
never grasped in the recurring
dream.
Donovan did aspire to the domination
of the world.
And with those tremendous
mental faculties that I myself
had given him, it was literally within his
power to become the absolute
ruler of all mankind.
Only one thing was lacking,
a body.
A young, strong body into which those
ever-growing brain cells could graft and
affix themselves
and live on, perhaps
for centuries.
He chose the body of my son.
And now, at last,
too late, I am free to destroy
this foul thing of my creation.
I know it
as surely as I know that my own life
must be the forfeit.
The brain also knows.
I can hear the disturbed,
erratic oscillations of the delta waves coming
through the laboratory door.
But there's no room left
in me now for fear.
I shall take the six steps
from the desk where I am writing
across to the laboratory door,
how often I have taken them
in happier times.
I shall open the door,
close it behind me for the last time,
and write
finis to the mortal life of Patrick
Articori and the brain of
William Horace Donovan.
May others learn
from the record I leave here
the lesson I have learned so bitterly
and profit by them.
And for the
things I have done,
may God
have mercy on my soul.
Phoenix, Arizona, February 7th.
The bodies of Dr.
Patrick Articori and his son
David were found in Dr.
Articori's own laboratory early today.
Young Articori had apparently died
on the operating table as
the result of a delicate brain operation
performed by his father.
In the case of Dr. Articori, there was nothing
to indicate the cause of death.
But medical authorities who viewed the body
including the famous Dr. Gustav
Zanger gave us their opinions
that he might have died of a shock
as the result of the unsuccessful operation
on his son.
A curious feature of the case was the fact
that numerous pieces of tissue
identified as being from a human
brain were found scattered
about the laboratory floor
while a larger section of brain was found
in the midst of an elaborate apparatus,
evidently part of a scientific experiment.
Medical
authorities stated, however, that they were
unable to explain the nature of the apparatus
and that the brain itself was in such a
state of decomposition as to indicate
that it had been dead and slowly
decaying for at least two months.
Dr.
Articori is survived by his wife Janice.
She was committed to the county
asylum for the insane late this
afternoon. Burial of
Dr. Articori and his son will
be at the Mount of Olives Cemetery.
Music
For a superb performance as Dr.
Articori, our appreciation and thanks
to John McIntyre.
Tell me something. If
you were going to make a room in your home
available for renting, would you
accept this man?
He's personable in manner and appearance
and he pays well. He's alone,
no wife, no children, no pets.
He owns a Bible, reads it,
and quotes from it freely.
He asks only to live undisturbed
in a quiet room.
There, I think that's about all. No.
There is one thing more.
He has one abiding dislike.
He can't stand sin.
Well, how about it?
Would you rent him a room?
I suggest you wait to answer.
Yes, I strongly suggest you wait until
next week when I appear at
the home of Mr. and Mrs. Robert Bunting
as the lodger
from the famous novel by
Mary Bellac-Lounds.
Mr. Montgomery may currently be seen in the
Universal International Production Ride the Pink Horse.
John McIntyre may soon be seen in the 20th Century
Fox Production Northside 777.
Donovan's Brain by
Kurtziad Mack was adapted for suspense
by Robert L. Richardson was produced, edited,
and directed by William Spear.
Lud Gluskin is our musical director and conductor
and Lucian Morrowak composes the original scores.
Next week, here, Robert Montgomery
as the lodger on Radio's outstanding
Theatre of Thrills,
one hour of...
suspense!
Here to be asked, the Columbia Broadcasting System.