A (0:06)

Oh, stories, real stories and murders do turn out your legs. Turn them out. Good evening. Come in, won't you? What's the matter? Surely you're not nervous. For example, I tell you a story we are meant to call from out of the past. Stories strange, weird tales of mystery and terror by radio's masters of the macabre story for supernatural. The supernova dramatized by fantasy. The mystery, the unknown. We tell you this Frank, frankly. So if you wish to avoid the excitement tension of these magnet play referring our latest theory to turn off your breaking down.

B (1:00)

Welcome back to the Horror Old Fashioned Fear. Every Saturday at relicradio.com our story comes from. Quiet, please. This week. A series that debuted over Mutual stations in June of 1947. It aired until September of 1948. By that time it had moved to ABC radio stations. The series was created and written by Willis Cooper, who also created and wrote for Lights out in its early years. We'll hear the first episode from this series titled Nothing behind the Door. This one aired June 8, 1947.

A (1:37)

Mutual Broadcasting System presents the first of a series of new and unusual dramatic programs written and directed by Willis Cooper and featuring Ernest Chapel. Quiet, please. Quietly. About 6,800ft above sea level. A little house, maybe 20ft long, 15ft wide. It's made of corrugated iron sheets with a high peaked roof. It sort of hangs over the edge of the mountaintop with nothing but the spikes of pine trees stretching all the way down the passage. Better than a mile below you. You ever get out to California? Well, if you do, go up there sometime and take a look at that little house. But look at it through the fence that surrounds it. That's far enough. Through the fence you go off Foothill Boulevard toward Pasadena. But you turn off on Angeles Crest highway at la. Just keep on driving up here. You get there. Just keep right on going. Of Mount Wilson at the end of the highway. You ever look through a big telescope at the sky at night? At the things up there? Things so far away you sprain your brain just trying to imagine how far away they are with nothing between you and them. Billions and billions of miles of nothing. I don't know what it does to you, but brother, I freeze. Listen. Do you know there are holes in the sky? No, I mean it. I've seen them. There's a thing in the constellation Andromeda. Now, wait a minute. I'm not going to get technical with you. Just listen. There's this thing. Astronomers call it the Horsehead Nebula. You know what it is? It's a hole. It's a great big patch of nothing. Just nothing. There aren't any stars there. There's just a hole. No, nobody knows anything about it. Astronomers look at it. They take pictures of it. And there it stays. There it is now and tomorrow and the next day and a million years from now. And it's been there always. Yes, it has. It's so far away that what you see now is the way it looked a billion years ago. Before there was anybody to see it. Friends. And there's lots more of those places. So what's all this got to do with a little house up on top Mount Wilson? I'll tell you. This was quite some time ago. I've been living in California City for several years. I had a couple of bucks, had a nice little place near Venice. That was before the valley got to be so popular with movie people, radio comics, people like that. And it wasn't bad living alone. Waking up in the middle of the night, hearing the Southern Pacific lock whistle. Crossing out around Chatsworth. Listening to a dog howling way out across the valley. Going back to sleep. I don't get back to sleep so easy these days. Well, these people from Cleveland were out there. Aldo Minucci and Hugh Grant. We used to be great friends, Aldo and Hugh and I. So nothing would do but they'd come to stay with me. That was all right. I had a Dodge convertible. The boys got quite a kick out of California. That's how we came to go up to Mount Wilson that day. Aldo and Hugh had been, you know, looking around for odd places. They had some ideas. So one day we were having breakfast and they were looking at an automobile club bulletin. Aldo said, let's go to Mount Wil. So we did. So we did. I've been up there once before. You know how it is in California. I knew everything. I thought I knew everything. I found out different. We were inside the big dome where the hundred inch telescope is. It's like being inside a giant's watch. The telescope is in the middle. A big spidery framework with ladders climbing all over it. Up under this dome. The tourists stand on the kind of a catwalk around the edge. While the astronomer explains as much as he thinks the apple knockers understand. There was just a few of us that day standing close to a little kind of pulpit. Listen, with our mouths open. That is like a pulpit. I got to think in that day how the astronomer looked like a priest up there. Nice old white haired fellow like a priest. And I was thinking he was talking about the heavens too. I'd seen it all before, but my mouth was as wide open as Hugh as now those Earth is moving through space. It moves around the sun at the rate of about 18 and a half miles per second. So therefore, you see, we must, in order to keep this telescope focused accurately on the celestial objects we are observing, neutralize those motives mechanically. The telescope itself, as you will observe, is controllable in any direction by this motor. Not difficult. Notice the motion of the telescope and the final movement. The rotation of the entire dome exactly synchronized with the speed of the earth to fish. Watch through the shoving above his head. Look at. Look at Ross. I see. Look outside. We. We ain't moving. The sky's gone by. Look at you. I see it. It's an optical illusion, Aldo. No, it's not an optical illusion in relation to space. This spot we are on is standing still through these motions here in the dome, the mirror of the telescope is kept aimed exactly at one spot far out of space. What space, mister? It. Nothing. What about the air? There are two miles of air, my friend, and then more stars. Yes, stars, yes. And the places where there are no stars. My skin twists a little when he said that the places where there are no stars. Did yours. Well, the show was over. We went outside into the sunlight. We walked across the long wooden bridge. There's a deep gully in front of the dome and down a little path past the thing they call a sealer step. A small dome on legs about 100ft high. Then they study the sun and sunspots and things like that. With that was quiet up there along toward the middle of the afternoon, there was a chill in the air. We were just talking. It's an odd place. And you get kind of impressed with people. Impress you. The astronomers, they live up there all by themselves. They look at the sky and see things. You always get the feeling they know a lot more than they're telling. Like doctors, like priests. I guess I said that, didn't I? Well, that's what they like. The path leads through the woods. Biggest live oaks you ever saw. In through the woods over the old hotel. So I said, hey, how about a beer before we start down, huh? A beer? That's for me. Can't get hard liquor up here, Ross. I don't think so. Anyway, I wouldn't want to drink, not with all that mountain road ahead of me. No, sir. Don't stake no drink, Ross. I don't want to ride that road with nobody's had a drink of liquor. Maybe you shouldn't Have a beer. Even on the way to the beer won't hurt me. Hey, what's this fence for? Huh? Never noticed that before. It's quite a fence. A hard time getting over there. What would you want to get over it for? I don't know. What do you suppose is on the other side where they got you? Telly fence. I don't see anything. Except that little house out there on stilts. Funny looking place. Fence goes right around it. Ain't there a gate? No. Come on, let's get a beer. I want to look at this. Rough. Probably they got something valuable in there. Sure. Scientific instruments or something. This place is all full of that stuff. Hey, look. Sign. Huh? Where? Here. Oh, come on. Ah, wait. What's it say? The public is forbidden to pass beyond defense under severe penalty. Hello. Yeah. What do you suppose they got in that place? Oh, no, I don't care. There's a door up at the end of that trestle. Maybe we could get back and get into that other shed where the trestle starts. Huh? What do you want to go in there for? Come on, we gotta get going. I'm just curious. You know what I mean? Place might come in handy. Oh, yeah. See, especially if they keep everybody out like this. But the thing must be full of stuff you like, Ross said. Scientific stuff. Yeah, it might be. Might not be. Hey, here comes that fellow that made the spiel up there. Well, ask him. He'd know. He won't tell you. Well, we'll find out. Hey, fella. How are you? Hey. Were you talking to me? Yeah. What's in that funny looking building over there? Nothing. Yeah? What's the idea of the fence then? We don't want people to go in there. I'd sure like to see what's in there. Said there's nothing in there. You sure, mister? Yes, I'm absolutely. Could we get a passage? We're in there maybe. No. You saw the sign, didn't you? I said something about the penalty of the law. You didn't read it very carefully. You didn't read it. I did. Read it again. Wait. The public forbidden to pass beyond this fence under severe penalty. I see what he means. He didn't say anything about the law. Ah, that's right. Well, then there are other penalties. Ah, stop drying up. No, not at all. Well, what does it mean then? I'll give you a little friendly advice. I wouldn't try to find out if I were. Oh, is that so? Yes. Do you really know what's in there, mister? Yes. What? Nothing. Okay, let's. Let's go get that beer. Well, of course, you know, it was up your way ahead of me. My Cleveland pals weren't in California. Desperate, a vacation. There was a bank I'd had my eye on for a while off in Pacific Palisade. It wasn't the first bank that Manucci and Hugh Grant and I had worked the deal on. I didn't go much for this place up on Mount Wilson with nothing in it and a fence around it. Aldo and Hugh. Well, after all, could you find a better place to stash away some dough? Nobody could get in, they said, and if we could, well. So I bought the idea finally. And to make a long story short, we took, I think it was $53,000 out of the bank. 53, 54. Now, what's the difference? It's all gone. It's a long drive from Pacific Palisades over Sunset Boulevard, then up Beverly Glen to the Valley Rubenized to Sunland. Down past the sanitarium on Foothill Boulevard to where you turn off on the Angeles Crest Highway. The long drive, especially at 1 o'clock in the morning. That was when we pulled out of Pacific Palisades. It was summer. If after you turn on the mountain road you're not allowed to smoke, you see, a fire warden might come along and those guys can tell somebody smoking in the car a half mile off they'd throw you in the can for forest fires. Now, we didn't want anybody stopping us. It was risky enough anyway because practically nobody ever drives up there late at night, early in the morning, I mean. Well, we didn't meet anybody. All three of us were jittery with no cigarettes. I rode stepping up in daylight, in the dark. It was half past four when we got to the top. The hotel was dark, cabins were dark, but the sky just like put in your reach up and touch it. I remember the old guy in the 100 inch dome. Nothing between us and this town down below. If you've ever been up there at night, you know what I mean. Just like looking down at stars. The lights are 17, 18, 19 towns. Pasadena, Los Angeles, Hollywood, Sinai, San Fernando, Culver City, Santa Monica. Makes my hair stand on in all kinds of it and I haven't seen it never mind how many years. Well, we stumbled through the page dust. He got off the path three times and then he fell downhill. And brother, that'd be a fault. He still couldn't risk a cigarette. It caught himself. Hugh Grant was in front, then me, Ronaldo. We each had refuge, had A pair of big spring wire cutters that'll go through a steel cable. All of a sudden, he bumped into the fence. Ouch. Letter. The fence. Where are you? Stand still, will you, Doc? Shut up. Listen for a minute. Hear anything? No. No. See anything? No. Look. What? The dome over there. You see somebody? No. Them two big windows up there with that dome. Looks like somebody watching us. Sure does. Now cut it out. I'm gonna try the fence with a cutlass for the flashlight. No, I wish we. What? Forget it. I just don't like that place. I get out of the way once you help. You just keep out of the way. Wait. Hear anything? That wire made enough noise to. All right. All right. I'll try another strand. See if you can slide under there. One of you. Me? No, can't make it yet. I'll try another. Look out for your arm there. Now try when I take off my coat. All right. Now, let's see. How about it? He's through. All right, go ahead. Me? You. All right, cut another strand here. Now. Make it now. Yes, sir. Yeah. Where are y'all, though? Right there. Come on, Gil. Hey, slide the police cases through. Fire coming up. Got him. Got it. Here I come. All set? All set. I'm all set. I'm as all set as I ever will be, I figure. I don't like any part of this place. I don't like the dark. I don't like the stars up above us. I don't like the lights down below. I don't like the silence. I don't like clown around the top of a mountain with nothing under me but thin air for a mile or more. All I can hear is Hugh and Aldo in front of me, cracking through the weeds, cursing when one of them whacks his chin against a sharp rock. All I can see is two black shapes in front of me. Blacker shape. That's the building. A little house with nothing in it. Aldo and Hugh are panting. Come on. 6,800ft. You know, your breath is pretty short. It's tough going, especially when you're dragging a briefcase full of money, too. You're scared and sweating and tired. Then all of a sudden, we're under the building alongside one of the struts that hold up the little dresser. Loose me up. Eldo, although, boosts him up. He was a little guy. He's spry lots prior than I am up there a mile in the air. And I guess he's not as scared as I am. So I look up and he's sprawling on the trestle with 9 million stars behind him. Reaching down to me. Grab my hand, Russ. I scrambled up. Never know how I made it either. Here we are in a second. Calder's up there with us. Keep quiet a minute and rest. I'm knocked out. Yeah? Yeah. Hear anything? You? Just the wind, Ross. I. No, I thought I heard something. Guess it's just the wind. Listen. It's the wind. Well, so we stood up. So Hugh walked the rest of the way down the little trestle. We followed him, stumbling over the planks. And there was the door. We rattled the bar on, was padlocked. So you took the big cutters and he wrenched away at the bar. We shivered there in the cold, waiting to see if anybody heard us. There wasn't a sound. So Hugh tried again. The bar fell off. Kept still for another minute and then. Open the door. Hey, where's the flashlight? Wait. Nobody can see us. Put your fingers over it and turn it. Turn it in. Okay. I don't see anything. Well, the guy said there was nothing in there. I can't see a thing. Open up the light a little more. I got it open. All black in there. There's something a matter with the light. Oh, there ain't. Look. Turn that light off me. Well, look now when I shine it inside. Nothing. Well, there's got to be something in there. Nothing, the man said. Can't even see the floor. Well, I'll find out if there's anything in there. No, don't go in. Can't tell what's liable to beam. Well, look out. I'll toss a briefcase in. No, no. Throw the wire cutters in. Where are they? Here. Love them. Might. Look out, will you? Keep still? You'll wake up the dead. Well, nobody heard us. I guess. A shot, with luck tonight. No kidding. I'll give you them cutters. Here, Shine the light in there. Sure. Can't see anything, can you? No, man. Get out of the doorway. Keep the light in there. Go ahead. Throw them against the firewall. All right. Look out. Where'd they go? Tossed them hard enough to bounce. Move the light around. I can't see a thing. I can't either. There ought to be. The light just kind of seems to. I'll cut it out. There's probably some kind of stuff on the floor, powdered. Maybe they fell into it. Yes. Stand to one side, Ross. What are you gonna do? I'm going in to look around. You got a gun, Aldo? Yes. This little tatty Bill. All right. Come on, Russ. You stay here and watch and Listen, I wouldn't go in there. Nobody asked you to. I'm going. Come on, Aldo. Listen, you. You got the screaming Mimi's too. Come on with that gun. There's nothing in there. Look, you. Come on, let's get out of here. Oh, shut up. Yeah, might as well take the dough, too. I can stick it in there. Go ahead. Aldo, with the light. You go first. All right, now stand there and keep your ears. Hey, Hugh, where are you? Can't see him. Listen, Aldo, don't go in there. I got to. Hey, Hugh. Hugh, where are you? Listen. Alto. Keep your eyes and ears open now. We'll be right back. If you. Hugh, you all right? I'm coming in. Hugh. Hugh. Aldo, what's in there? Hey, Hugh. Okay, Ross. Something's the matter with him. Here I come, Hugh. Hugh. Hey, Hugh. Aldo. Hey, what's in there? You two. You. I can see you. You can stand up now. They won't come out, I assure you. Come on, Sunset. I've got a gun. No, you haven't. Stand up. When my friends come out. They're not coming out, my friend. Stand up. You wouldn't believe me. What I told you. What's in there? What's in there? I said. I told you. There's nothing behind that door. My friends went in there. They're not there now. There's nothing in there. You understand me? There's nothing in there. Listen. No, you listen. I. No. I suppose it'll do no good to tell you. Tell me what? I've got to show you. Show me what? Come with me. No. Come with me. I won't. You've got it. Wait. Wait for me. Across the little tresson, away from the dory, close down my friends. Through another door into a long shed in the dark, and I was glad I couldn't see the stars. Out another door at the end of the shed, down the path, past the seal of staff, reaching up into the sky, shining in the skylight, looking like one of those visitors from Mars you heard about on the lady hole, across the little wood bridge, with the two eyes of the 100 inch dome staring down at me in a cold wind. Coming up the other side of the mountain, up the ramp into the dome itself and up the iron stairs. Follow me. Little yellow light at the head of the stairs. And then out on the catwalk in the dark with the flow of 40ft below us. Up another ladder. My legs are getting tired. Up. Follow me up another dizzy ladder. And another. And across another spidery walk. Here, sit in this seat. I Can't speak. My throat is dry. My legs are trembling. Icy cold in that great dome. How far above the floor? I can't tell you. Sit still. You won't quarrel. Why did. Sit still, Isaac? You'll have to be sure. Wait. Magnetic destination. You can look now. Look at what? Look through the telescope. No. Look, son. What do you see? Stars. Millions of stars. Wait. Look again. What do you see? Nothing. Nothing. What now? Stars again. Millions. No. A black cloud. Now nothing. That nothing you see is a million light years away. What is it? There's nothing there to see, my friend. There are scores of places in this universe where there's nothing. Far places. Near places. You understand what I mean? Is that what you meant when you said. When I said there's nothing behind that door? Yes, but where? Where? Your friends. Your misguided friends. I don't know. Perhaps. Take your eye from the telescope. Wait. Look now, if you dare. Well, what? Look. Yes. You guess what I saw. You guess what I saw. Clawing through black clouds of nothing. You guess what eyes I saw. I saw nothing. Yes. The little house is still there on Mount Wilson. You can go look at it if you want to. But don't go too close. Maybe somebody will tell you it's just a place where they store equipment. Maybe. Why do they keep the door locked, Dan? Well, just one other thing. Don't you go around opening doors you don't know anything about. There might be nothing behind one of them. You just heard quiet, please, which is written and directed by Willis Cooper. The man to talk to you is Ernest Chapel. And the man who played Aldo Minucci is Martin Lawrence. Pat O'Malley was Hugh Grant and James Van Dyke, the astronomer. The music was composed and played by Gene Pazzo. And now for a word about Quiet, please for next week. Here is our writer, producer Willis Cooper. Bill, I've written what I think is an exciting and unusual love story for next week. Chappie. We'll welcome as our guest the charming spire of stage and radio, Claudia Morgan. Quiet, please for next week is entitled I've been looking for you. Until next week then, quietly yours, Ernest Chapel. This is the Mutual broadcasting System. Foreign.