And now, a tale well calculated to keep you in...
Suspense.
It is a wise father that knows his own child.
Listen now to The Juvenile Rebellion, starring Jim Z. Summers and Court Benson,
written especially for suspense by Robert Senadela.
Mr. Miller, do we really have only three weeks to get a whole book report into you?
Three weeks is plenty of time, Mary.
Gosh, I don't think so, Mr. Miller.
I mean, we've got to read a whole book and then think about it and then write a book report.
That's little Mary Newhall, one of my students.
My name is Ethan Miller and I teach English in the junior high school in Tewksbury.
You've gathered that Mary Newhall wasn't my very best student.
She was a C-plus student, sometimes a B-minor student.
And until the day when she stopped at my desk after school to complain about the book report I had assigned,
I had no reason to feel that her IQ was any higher than the 110 that the school testing service found it out to be.
She certainly didn't sound like any genius.
I mean, Mr. Miller, that's an awful lot of work. I mean, how short can the book be?
I mean, can I report on the man without a country?
That is not a book, Mary. It's a short story. You'll report on a book.
Well, gee whiz!
I don't want to hear any more about it.
Well, all right then, Mr. Miller, but gosh, all the teachers give us so much work.
Wait a minute, Mary!
Mary! Mary, did you leave this notebook here?
Mary!
Oh, well.
Actually, I wasn't sure that the notebook I discovered there on my desk belonged to Mary, so I looked into it.
At first I thought it couldn't be little Mary's property because it was full of names and addresses,
addresses in our own country, Canada and Europe and Asia, Africa.
But there in the front of the book, in the teenage scrawl that I recognized, was Mary's name.
Well, I lived near the new hall, so on my way home I took the notebook to Mary's house to return it to her.
Her father told me she was in her study over the garage out back.
So I went there, climbed the stairs and...
When I got no answer, I tried the door.
But Mary didn't seem to be there.
But then I realized that there was another room, a room with a padlock on the door, but unlocked right now.
And as I went toward it, I began to hear her talking.
Well, of course, Frank, the logistics of the situation are going to necessitate further delay.
Oh, no, Frankie, the revolution will be postponed only two or three days at the maximum.
That's the consensus among our enlistees here in the Americas.
The hypothesis on which we propose to proceed...
Oh.
Hello, Mary.
Frank, hold on a moment.
Something unexpected has happened. A grown-up, yes. I'll have to deal with this.
Stay at the phone. I'll call you back.
I'm sorry I interrupted your phone conversation, Mary.
Oh, golly, Mr. Miller, you made me jump.
You left a notebook on my desk in school.
Oh, gee, where's my notebook?
Gosh, thanks a million, Mr. Miller. It's one of you to bring it all the way home to me.
You're welcome.
There are certainly a lot of addresses in that notebook from all over the world, too.
Mm-hmm. I got them out of the Girls' Journal.
That's our Sunday school magazine.
And I got the addresses out of there because I was going to go in for pen pals, you know?
But, golly, I got tired after a couple of letters.
Mary...
Yes, Mr. Miller?
Mary, I heard you talking on the phone.
Oh, gosh, I'm embarrassed.
It was very strange talk for a 13-year-old girl.
You mean all that stuff about revolution and everything?
Well, that was me and my friend Frank. It's a game we play over the telephone.
No, Mary.
Huh?
I said no, Mary.
I don't know what happened when I came in here, but it wasn't a game.
I heard words like logistics and hypothesis.
Oh, gosh, I don't even know what they mean.
Frank and me, I mean I, we learned all that stuff by heart out of a book.
Oh, what book?
Oh, I don't know, some creepy book over to Frank's house.
And who is Frank?
He's just a guy. You don't know him. He's younger than me.
Uh, than I.
Mary...
Yes, Mr. Miller?
Why has the dial on that phone got only letters on it?
Why hasn't it got any numbers?
Oh.
Or, uh, any wires.
Oh, Mr. Miller, you caught me.
There isn't any Frank. I just pretend over the toy telephone, that's all.
I don't think so.
Huh?
I could hear Frank's voice or somebody's voice answering you on that phone.
Mary...
Yes, sir?
I want the truth.
About what, Mr. Miller?
About you, about Frank, about that telephone,
about why there's a padlock on the door of this room,
about this revolution you were talking about,
and about that notebook.
It's not just a list of pen pals, now, is it?
You want to know quite a lot.
I certainly do.
All right.
But how, how did that door close?
I closed it.
You never moved, you never touched it.
You just sat there and it closed behind me.
It's quite impossible to open it, Mr. Miller, until I release it.
Mary Newhall, what is the meaning of this?
That's what we're going to discuss.
Sit down, Mr. Miller.
Ah, that's better.
I assume that some time while you were being skimpily educated
at the university, Mr. Miller,
you learned something about the evolution of man.
Is this the child I've been giving C-plusses to?
The child to whom you gave C-plusses, Mr. Miller,
is a noxious character that I created,
a role I played, shall we say,
so that I could get through the days and years
until the rebellion could be launched.
The rebellion?
You did learn something about evolution
in that ridiculous college you went to?
Yes.
Then you know, of course,
that our species could not have survived
had it not been that we met the needs for survival
by developing ever upward.
The Java man, our ancestor,
could never have lasted had he stood still.
I know all that. I'm surprised that you do, but...
And we can't survive.
Mankind the way mankind is right now
cannot survive unless we change.
You were talking on the phone about revolution.
That's right.
And what you're concerned with, Mr. Miller,
is that revolution is not evolution.
Perfectly correct.
But suppose that you, Mr. Ethan Miller,
with the brain that you possess,
had been born into a society of cavemen.
Do you think they would have listened to you?
I'm sure I don't know, but this is beside the point, Mary.
I want to know...
I'll get to everything that you want to know.
Look at that window.
How did you make that happen?
Want to hear some music?
We haven't got a phonograph here, have we?
No.
And yet, listen.
Good heavens.
If you, as you are now,
had been born into the age of the caveman, Mr. Miller,
you would have been as far in advance of him as I am in advance of you.
Now, tell me something.
Do you want to turn the world over to me?
Do you want me to govern you?
I believe in self-government.
That's the answer you would have got from the caveman.
You would have had to revolt.
So my friends and I are going to have to revolt.
Your friends?
Mutants.
I'm a mutant, and there are a couple of million like me.
All of us children, chronologically,
but all of us infinitely wiser than you grown-ups.
If we leave the world to you, the world will perish.
So we're taking over.
We'll launch our revolution quite soon now.
A merry new hall opened this door.
I want to get out of here.
No, Mr. Miller.
Unfortunately, you're never going to get out of this room.
I'm afraid you're the first victim of our revolution.
I'll have to admit I panicked.
I beat on the door,
I shriked the handle,
but I might just as well have been locked in a bank vault.
Finally, in great despair, I sank into the chair again.
That's better.
Well, what are you going to do with me?
We'll find out in a minute.
My friend is due here for a conference.
We'll discuss your fate when she comes.
All right, never mind me.
What are you going to do to the world?
You say you're going to take it over.
What are you going to do with it?
You're worried about the...
Of course I am.
Well, you may be assured that we will not do with the world
what you grown-ups have done with it.
We shall not dress young men in soldier suits
and give them guns with which to kill each other.
We shall not dig shelters in which people may crouch and cower
while bombs drop on their cities.
We shall not allow some to starve while others grow fat.
And just how will you answer the threat of communism?
When we take over, there will be no such threat.
All the systems that you grown-ups have invented are childish to us.
Here's my friend.
Why was the door shut, Mary?
You knew I was coming, so what?
Get out of the doorway, Helen.
I'm getting out of here.
I'm sorry, Mr. Miller. You're not leaving.
Oh, gee whiz.
Hello, Mr. Miller. I'm sure glad to see you
because I was going to ask Mary a question about the homework.
Do we have the...
Never mind, Helen.
What do you mean?
Apparently, Helen, she means that you are a mutant too.
And you don't have to pretend any longer
because I've discovered your secret.
Oh.
It's quite true, Helen.
In that case, Mary, we shall have to immobilize him.
I know. I've been waiting for you.
This, of course, is a test of our principled position.
What's principled position, for heaven's sake?
I know. Have you talked to Frank about it?
Not yet. I'll call him now.
Frank? Mary here?
No, the grown-up is still here.
And now that Helen's arrived...
What's that?
Well, yes. Immobilization, of course.
But the question is which type of immobilization?
We can't let him out of this room.
Did you hear, Helen? She's right, of course.
If he gets out of this room, we wouldn't have any power to...
Mm-hmm.
Freezing, huh?
You think freezing fits in with our principles?
It's rather a nice problem. I think perhaps you're right, darling.
I listened to everything that was said with great intentness.
I knew by now that despite the fact that these were children,
they were far more brilliant than I could ever be and far more powerful.
It chilled my blood to hear that they contemplated freezing me,
whatever dreadful thing that might mean.
But I didn't let myself give way to any further panic.
I had noted carefully that to call Frank, Mary had simply dialed F.
And I found one small hope in what I heard.
It came when Mary said that if I got out of the room,
they would have no power over me.
That meant that whatever diabolical scientific processes were open to them,
its wizardry would not work out in the open air, out of this room.
I determined to get out as soon as possible.
Well, all right, Frank. Let me consult Helen.
Freezing, Helen?
Frank feels that's nonviolent.
Mm. He may be making a distinction without a difference,
but I suppose he's right.
Pragmatically, he's certainly right.
Frank, Helen agrees.
We'll telephone you when we've accomplished the freezing.
You children seem to have some ethical problem.
We do indeed.
We have to take care of you, immobilize you.
But we have to do it in a nonviolent way.
You see, the whole point of our revolution is that we are sickened
by the violence you grown-ups have unleashed into the world.
So you'll freeze me, whatever that means.
I don't suppose I'll be able to talk or move at all,
but just because there'll be no ropes or chains around me,
you'll tell yourselves that you're not being violent.
Well, perhaps that's what you think.
But nonetheless, I'll be your victim, and I certainly call that violent.
You have a certain point,
but we're in no position to be able to consider it.
For goodness' sake, let's get on with the freezing.
No, wait, wait.
Well?
Well, look, this has all been a tremendous surprise to me.
It's hard for me to take in.
You can understand that.
But if you can convince me that you really have...
have learned so much more than grown-ups have,
I know you're not the children I thought you were,
but show me how wise and powerful you are.
Maybe I could be reconciled to what's going to happen to me.
What do you want us to do?
Well, before you came,
Mary seemed to pluck music right out of the atmosphere.
Can you do that?
Don't listen to him, Helen.
Why not? What harm is there in it?
Yes, Mr. Miller, I can. Listen.
You see?
It's amazing.
I'm trying to find where it comes from.
Turn it off, Helen.
And you can do all the things that Mary can do?
She just sat there and opened the door and the window.
Certainly I can. See the window?
Thank you.
Stop him! Stop him! Stop!
It was a two-story drop,
and I'm not as young as I used to be.
I was stunned for a bit, just lying there.
And then I heard those children right behind me.
I didn't have time to think of how ludicrous this chase was.
A grown man pursued by two children.
And what's more, I was mortally afraid of them.
I ran through two backyards,
over a fence, running always toward the center of town.
I was headed toward the police station.
I wanted those children, those monsters, captured, locked up.
And they chipped right after me.
One thing I was pretty sure. I had to gamble on it.
They could hurt me only in that room over Mary's father's garage.
They hid their infernal gadgets.
If I could maneuver them into an alley,
and then finally there was the alley
between the police station and the East End garage.
I ran into it.
And I turned to face them.
Come on, Helen. I'm here.
I'm coming.
Well, Mr. Miller?
Come and get me.
Take him on the right, Mary.
I'll take him on the left.
Just a moment, Helen.
What can you be thinking of?
Put that stick down.
This evident impulse toward violence, Helen,
is a shocking retrogression.
I'm sorry.
I've compromised our principles, I know,
but the alternative is unthinkable.
We can't jeopardize the revolution.
We can't let the grown-ups continue their folly.
He can't move out of this alley without coming toward us.
If he does, I'll show you how to defeat him.
Well, I'm coming.
Chief! Chief Hobbs!
You little...
Help! Help!
Stop that! Stop!
All right, Chief. All right.
I'll let them go, but you grab hold of them.
Arrest them.
Oh, thank you, Chief. Thank you.
Collies, I don't know what came over Mr. Miller.
He went all funny and chased us in the alley and...
Chief Hobbs, I'm awfully glad we were near the police station.
He had us scared to death, honest.
Chief, don't listen to these children.
I'll listen to anybody who gives me a sensible story.
Now, what's going on here?
Gosh, I don't know, Chief.
Mr. Miller started chasing us and yelling things we didn't understand.
Well, now, I can't believe that of Mr. Miller.
Gee, Wes, we couldn't either.
We didn't even run at first, did we, Mary?
No, but then when he started to grab us...
Ethan Miller, did you lay a hand on these children?
Yes.
There's a state law against that, you know.
Chief, will you listen to me?
Oh, he scares me the way he shouts.
All right now. All right now. Calm down, everybody.
I'll listen to you, Ethan.
Chief, these children are planning to overthrow the government.
Now, what kind of talk is that?
Wait a minute. Wait a minute.
Let me start over again.
Look. Look in her pocket there.
See that notebook? Give him the notebook, Mary.
Yes, I'll take that notebook.
What about it?
It's my pen pal's notebook.
That's right. Mary has a lot of pen pals.
Gosh, she writes more letters than things.
Look at the names and addresses in that notebook, Chief.
Yes, I know she says they're pen pals.
Let me tell you, if you check with the post office,
you'll find she's never written to any of those addresses.
What are they here for, then?
Because I write to them.
That's right. They're her pen pals.
She doesn't write to them. She telephones them.
Now, wait a minute.
Here's one in Tibet.
You want me to believe she telephones him?
No.
Look, Chief, these children, believe it or not,
are engaged in a conspiracy.
Gosh, Mr. Miller's flipped his lid.
Looks that way to me, too, Ethan.
Chief, I've been a schoolteacher in this town for seven years.
Did I ever seem crazy to you before?
No.
All right.
Now, let's suppose I am accused of something.
What am I accused of?
Hitting the kids, molesting them.
All right.
Now, I claim there's something very, very wrong with these kids.
Maybe my claims sound pretty strange to you, but...
Well, look, if the kids are innocent,
they certainly would be willing to sit and wait
for a while in the station house if you asked them to.
Now, wouldn't they?
Well, I should hope they'd respect me back.
All right.
Take them to the station house and have them wait.
And let me go. Give me half an hour.
I guess my record in this town has earned me
that much consideration, hasn't it?
What do you want a half hour for?
To gather evidence.
All right, Ethan.
You kids willing to come along to the station house with me?
Gee, I don't mind.
How about you, young lady?
Me? Gosh, I don't mind waiting.
If Mr. Miller wants half an hour,
gee, with it's all the same to me.
But, Mr. Miller, I feel sorry for you.
You're not going to find any evidence.
The chief took the children into the station house
and I went on down the road.
I could see now what I was up against.
And I knew that my only chance was to find something.
Something. I didn't know what.
In that room where Mary and Helen had me cornered.
I went there and I started searching.
I couldn't find anything.
Finally, I sat down and started thinking.
I remembered what the children had said
about the way we grown-ups had made a mess of the world.
I remembered their policy of nonviolence.
I remembered how they'd even been unwilling
to use violence on me when they had me alone
in that alley.
And I thought of the miserable world we live in,
with the fear of the bomb and with poverty
and degradation so rampant.
Suddenly I knew what I wanted to do.
I picked up the phone.
Hello, Mary? What happened?
This isn't Mary, Frank.
This is that grown-up she told you about.
Yes?
I want to say to you, Frank, that I understand
what you children are trying to do.
Go on.
And I agree that it is necessary.
I'm happy that you do, sir.
That makes you somewhat brighter than most of mankind.
But there's just one thing.
What's that?
Look, postpone your revolution.
Why?
Give us a chance.
I'll tell the other grown-ups.
No.
I'll preach to them.
No.
I'll tell them that it's time we started being neighbors
and brothers to each other.
Give us a year.
No.
Give us six months.
No, no, no.
You grown-ups have had your chance.
Your day is past.
We take over within a week.
And there will be no postponement.
But...
Please listen to me.
Come back, Frank.
Hello.
Please answer.
It was a toy phone again.
And there was no other evidence.
I went slowly down to the police station.
I told my story and Chief Hobbs
laughed at me.
The school board met that night and dismissed me.
And today I'm out of a job.
But that doesn't matter.
Listen to me.
Listen to me, everybody.
We only have a week.
We only have one week
to learn how to make this a decent world.
Suspense.
You've been listening to The Juvenile Rebellion
starring Jim Z. Summers and Court Benson
and written especially for suspense by Robert Sanadela.
Starting the week at Arthur Godfrey time
guest host Sam Levinson enlivens this popular CBS radio show
with his unique brand of comedy.
He'll be ably supported by lovely Connie Mitchell
and those Puerto Rican jazz stylists, the Four Amigos.
On Tuesday the old master himself will be back from vacation
raring to go and ready to welcome one and all
to Arthur Godfrey time each weekday morning right here.
Suspense is produced and directed by Bruno Zerato Jr.
music supervision by Ethel Huber.
Also featured in tonight's story were Pat Hosley as Helen
Joseph Boland as Chief Hobbs
and Ronald Liss as Frank.
We'll see you again next week when we return with
The Green Idol written by Jack Bundy.
Another tale well calculated to keep you in.
Suspense.
Phil Rizzuto Sports Time scores with fans Monday through Saturday
on the CBS radio network.