 This is the man in black. I'm very happy to step over from the sound stage of suspense. Stand in for my fellow scaremaster of ceremonies, Peter Lawrie. Mr. Lawrie had to attend a special conclave of the International Association of Witches, Goons and Creeps, of which he is a charter member. So I am here in his place, opening the doors of the mystery playhouse. Here are the services of that light-hearted raconteur of murder, horror and the supernatural, the laughing boy of the inner sanctum, Raymond. Raymond's been telling about the horrible things that happened to other people for a long time now and getting a huge bang out of it. But tonight the tables are turned and he finds himself on the receiving end, which seems like poetic justice is deep. I think it might prove interesting to find out how Raymond's much-vaunted sense of humor survived the acid test. So follow me to the home of the squeaking door, little house of a thousand horrors, the inner sanctum. Good evening friends, this is your host, Raymond. Welcome to the squeaking door of the inner sanctum. For those of you who write in to find out why our door squeaks so much, I guess now's good time as any to explain that the hinges are rusty with dry blood. Through that door past the most beautiful ghouls in the world. Won't you come in? Friends, are you ready? Good. Now remember if you must scream to it with your mouth closed so you won't annoy the rest of your family. You know you don't need dark old houses or murky graveyards to feel the chilly presence of beings from the other world. Last week, just after I completed my broadcast, I was called to the telephone and I picked up a receiver I heard. Hello, is that you, Raymond? Yes. Are you going to be at home tonight? Yes, why do I? Because I'm going to drop by. Who are you? The voice is familiar but I can't quite place it. I'll see you later, Ray. Now there's nothing unusual about a call like that. You've got one thing. Ten years ago my friend, Gideon Blake, was killed. I'm sure of that call with some joke. I remember laughing about that down my living room with sand wicks and batch of milk. But later that night, I looked at those doors. I remember being awakened by the tower clock shining. It was midnight. Somewhere a cat howled against the morning wind that has sprung up. Dreams chilled and it shut us from my battered front door, Mr. blown open. I went to sleep. Standing there was Gideon Blake. Good evening, Raymond. You shouldn't be so surprised. I told you I was coming. Yes, you've changed so. It's been a long time. More than ten years, I believe. But I don't understand. You were burned to death. How on earth did you come back? There are many things which you will never understand while you're alive and on this earth. Why do you come here? To give you this piece of paper. What's on it? Dreams of four persons. They are alive now. In a short time, they will all be dead. I looked at them carefully as they talked. You're an idiot. Ugly with horrible burns on his face. The man had a lot. Touched a very smell of death. Good night, Raymond. I left it with a slip of paper and my friend Gideon had given me. There were four names. The best three names I didn't know. The last was very familiar to me. It was my own name. Sit down. Thanks, Inspector. No, thanks. What about that piece of paper I gave you? How'd you get it? I told you. Look, I'm a carp, Raymond. When I believe a story like that one, you can call the little men in the white coat. Oh. Now I'm sorry I bothered you, Inspector. Let's forget it. I can't forget it. Why? Because Blake wrote that note. Are you sure? We checked the handwriting. It says some of the fingerprints we found on it. How do you figure it? I don't yet. I am waiting for you to tell me everything. Hey, wait a minute. Maybe Blake's really alive. He got burned to death 10 years ago. Are you sure? It's positive. We checked every angle of his death at that time because we thought he might have been murdered. Murdered? I never heard about that. Oh, Blake was with the department. You remember? Working on a homicide case. The Lawyer Wilcox case, you remember? Oh, dig me. We figured someone might have polished him off, but nobody did. It was an accident. Was this Wilcox murder ever solved? Well, no. Maybe those names I gave you had something to do with the Wilcox case. Wanted to check them. I did. None of your names figure. These people never heard of the Wilcox murder. Hey, Inspector. Yeah, when it was, Gibson. And weren't you interested in some information about a game named Delamano? Yeah. He was the first name on that list you gave me, Ray. What about it? I just came through on the ticket. Delamano was found dead. Murdered. Murdered. This is Inspector Doyle. We're trying to get you all day. I just got in. I've been down to police library setting the file on the Wilcox case. All right, forget about that. Now, listen, I want you to lock your door and all the windows. I'm sending down a red-headed cop to guard you. What? Don't let any dark-haired guy into your house even if he's your own best friend. What's this all about? We're dealing with a homicidal maniac. The body of Stella Marlowe was dismembered. Remember? Tell my man to call me at headquarters when he arrives. Goodbye. Goodbye. That's right. I hung up the phone. I noticed a little black box on the living room table. I've got to. I don't know. It's because my house is locked all day. I undid the black ribbon. Opened it. I saw inside, and it ignored me. It was a human hand. Doesn't your thought clicked in my mind? I recognize something on me. This is Ray Johnson. Yeah, what is it? Did you ever find out what happened to Stella Wilcox? She's the stepdaughter of the murdered Laura Wilcox. Why do you want to know? Well, she was suspected of the murder for a time. Listen, will you drop that angle? Will you just answer one or two questions? Did the killer dismember the whole body in the Stella Maramita? Just the hands. Fine. Did she have on a large diamond ring the third finger on the left hand? Yes. All the time, but how do you... I've got it here. Someone sent me a hand with a ring on it. What? And get this. There's a name engraved inside the ring. The name is Laura Wilcox. What? There's a scar on the thumb. There was a scar on the left thumb of Stella Wilcox's print in your file. I took a fingerprint. The prints on the hand and the fingerprints of Stella Wilcox are identical. Are you sure? Yes. Stella Marlow and Stella Wilcox are the same person. Did you find anything else there? Yes. Black hair on the fingernails. I'm coming down to your place as fast so I can get there. Goodbye. Goodbye. The front door slammed the second I hung up. I turned around. Coming toward me was a man with jet black hair. You know, I can say sudden horrible death happens to other people, but when it happened to me, all the men with the jet black hair looked quietly at me. I'm Robert Lane. You're Raymond Edward Johnson, I believe. Yes. That guy spoke to me about you. Can I sit down? What do you make of all this? I don't know what to make of it. You heard what happened to Stella Marlow. Yes. Do you know that's not her real name? Yes. She was the stepdadder of Laura Wilcox, but I do know. I think I know more about this than you imagine. Is your name really Robert Lane? Why? There was a chauffeur in the Wilcox home, a man named Lowry. I wonder, there's no harm in telling you now. Yeah, I'm that chauffeur. And Amelia Cardway? She was Mrs. Wilcox's maid. No, Johnson, the murder of Stella didn't come exactly as a surprise to me. Why? She poisoned her stepmother with the help of the maid, Amelia Cardway. That's why I'm involved in all this. Not fool each other. Somehow you discovered that Stella murdered her stepmother. But after 10 years, you can't take up any evidence and you'll know it. So you'll invent this wild story about Gideon Blake. Just the right sort of psychological scare to frighten the two women into making a move that'll give away. Very close at the moment. What color does the hair of Amelia Cardway? Blonde. Pretty shade of blonde in fact. Very attractive girl 10 years ago. What's in the box? I advise you not to look. I rarely follow the advice of other people. Where'd you get this? Someone left it here this evening. That ring. Well, Lady Wilcox gave that to Stella on her 18th birthday. The hand of Stella. I understand why you asked about the hair, Johnson. The hair under the fingernails is black. Just like wine. I wouldn't be surprised if an analysis showed that it was mine. Then you killed it. The point is that I don't intend to give up my life to amuse you and your little crime hobby. What do you mean? You're going to learn about crime, Raymond, for a direct personal experience. I'm going to kill you. That's going to be nice. He was a powerful man. His glow gave me. I struck my head against the furniture. I laid down for a day. Like a slow motion picture I saw laying approach and lean over me. A long knife in his hand. How funny it is. It's only his arm. Not powerless. We were driving the knife down on the side of the knife. Michael! I heard him scream. Someone had a door slammed. And I blacked out. Hey, get up, right? You're OK now. Come on, get up, get up. Hey, what happened here? He found you on the floor, right? There was Lane, a Wilcox chauffeur. He tried to kill me. Lane? Lane's dead. There's the body. Huh? Dead, dead. You'll kill him, Ray? No. Where does Amelia Cardway live? A few miles from here, Ray. We've got to get over there right away. She killed her own lady and she might have killed Stella, too. Amelia Cardway could have done it. Maybe you'll tell me next that Gideon Blake did it. I don't know. Gideon Blake didn't have a hair on his head. Besides, he's dead. I never arrested dead men for the crime of murder. They didn't get confessions on him. Perhaps Lane did go to see Stella shortly before she was killed. They were all in this together. They told you they didn't know each other. They suspect themselves. That still doesn't explain how the hand got to your place or why Gideon Blake came back from the dead. Or why we found those black hairs under the fingernails. They have got an idea about the hand, yes? I think it was dismembered so that you would never know that Stella Marlow is Stella Wilcox. She changed her appearance, but she couldn't change her fingerprint. Well, then who left it at your place? And why? And why should you be on the list? Don't remind me of that, please. Well, here's Amelia Cardway's cottage. Here we'll get some of the answers here. Come on. Inspector. You hear that? Yeah, yeah. Come on, follow me, Ray. Inspector Doyle had his gun out and was running into the house. I followed a few steps behind. In a moment I was in the living room. Doyle was standing there. Well, what happened? I don't know. Why did you scream for help? In an old chair, a chat spot was once in the Tractive Woman. The blonde hair was streaked with gray, but the face was a mask of terror. I recognized her from the picture in the police style. She was the former mayor of Law Wilcox. Amelia Cardway. Yes, Mrs. Wilcox. In just a minute. Come on, Mrs. Wilcox. What's the matter with her? She's cocky delirious. She just keeps sitting there like that, mumbling. She can't live with secrets. Someone will find out. I'm glad. Glad they found out. Now she'll never come to see me again, never. Yeah, well, who came to see you? Mrs. Wilcox. What? I didn't want to get for that medicine. I knew it was poison, but Stella made me. She made me. And so did me, the chauffeur. You're getting out of the chair, Inspector. Look. There's a knife in her back. Mrs. Cardway. There she is, at the top of the stairs. Mrs. Wilcox. Where? At the top of the stairs, Inspector. Look, it's Laura Wilcox. I'll tell everything, Mrs. Wilcox. We were all in on it together. All of the chauffeur and me. I didn't want to do this against me for... I'm going upstairs. You look after her, right? The woman who reached the bottom steps. Mrs. Wilcox disappeared. I stood over the Cardway woman. She was dead. A burst of pistol fire came from the upstairs part of the house. A moment later, Inspector Dore came tumbling down the stairs. The gun fell on his hand. He was unconscious. I looked up. At the top of the stairs stood Mrs. Laura Wilcox. She said nothing. But calmly came down. Holding the poker, she had struck the inspector. He bent down. Without the knife from the body of a dead, immediate Cardway. Right in the room. Suddenly, the woman took off her hat. Awake. And there's... a dead-end plague. You better go now, Raymond. I don't understand that disguise. Look there. The entrance to the dining room. Fire? Yes, fire. You'd better leave it once. Those flames are spreading rapidly. They can affect your door with your blade. Yes, there's a last name on my list, you know. You didn't have to say any more. I dragged the inspector through the door. Gideon Blake turned. I walked directly into the front. That was the last I ever saw of him. The missing pieces of the jigsaw puzzle. Laura Wilcox was a twin sister of Gideon Blake. We dug up the birth records. So that's why she looks so familiar. And that's why he murdered the three people. Because they killed his sister. He fit his own death in order to carry out justice himself. But that still doesn't explain why I was brought into it. That's simple. He wanted us to know what was going on so that we didn't hold some innocent person. Just one more question. Go ahead. How did Blake fake his own death? Well, now we don't know exactly, but he must have done it. Did you find his body in the ashes of Amelia Conway's cottage? Well, I guess they're there, but it's impossible to identify them positively. That leaves one other explanation for us that Gideon Blake actually died ten years ago. A word of advice, naturally. When you get killed, don't let your murderer slice your hand off. Then you can never put a finger on it. Good night. Pleasant dream. You have been listening to an inner sanctum mystery starring Raymond Edward Johnson. Tonight's presentation in the Mystery Playhouse. At this point in our program, Peter Laurie tells me we usually go to the green room for a preview performance of our next Mystery Playhouse attraction.