 Fed up with the everyday grind Tired out by the dull routine He want to get away from it all we offer you Escape Escape designed to free you from the four walls of today for a half hour of high adventure You are crouched in the middle of an immense hurricane houses animals trees sweeping past you and You suddenly realize that you've tampered with the universe that you're bringing about the destruction of the world Tonight we escape to a placid English village and the presence of an equally placid little man who one day Shook the world as H.G. Wells told it in his delightful and famous story the man who could work miracles And now I might say right in the beginning that I ain't the kind of chap who has a naturally argumentative disposition Meaning the kind who's always engaging in hostile discussions with perfect strangers quite the contrary I'm a reasonable man who always takes proper thought before he speaks and one who has due respect for scientific truth Why I ain't never opened my mouth to utter a word that wasn't a pure a undiluted a fact That's what you say How so ever when a man of inferior Intellect such as Toddy Beamish the showed himself to be more than once When the man like that insists upon airing his ridiculous opinions in a public place such as the long dragon bar Then I've got no choice but to confound him with the superior knowledge which I possesses That may be well and good perhaps But it's only what you say on the contrary mr. Beamish the statements which I have just made Are such as might come from any intelligent human being with a true knowledge of scientific a principle Which same can't be said for some of us here at this bar. So you say that's right So I say and if you can't contribute nothing but the same three words to this discussion I will thank you to admit that you are defeated and a shut your mouth. Well now mr. Father I appeal to you I appeal to your constable when I'm only trying to enlighten the man from the bug of ignorance He's a floundering in and he keeps coming up with his infernal. So you say well, I'm wasting my words That's all If the pints are stout and I'll float across this bother why words do why then I'd have been retiring years ago Quite right miss bridges. I'll have another the same if you don't mind Let's see that was a quite a bitter wasn't it? By all right study beamish. I shouldn't be wasting me time on you But out of the goodness of my heart. I'll do it anyhow suit yourself Now Let's take for example that pint of ale that you're holding in your hand. It's pretty nice empty life paid for the last one All right now Suppose for instance if that ale was to turn into wine I never cared much for wine. I was like Dale back now If that ale there was to turn into wine then you'd have a miracle. So you say so anybody says Perhaps you ain't even aware of the proper definition of what a miracle is mr. Beamish well Some miracles is one kind And some is another if anybody left so much as toughens on the bias of gratuity for my services That would be a miracle. All right. Be that as it may miss bridges But a miracle ain't of one kind or another A true miracle is something contrary wise to the course of nature Done by the power of will So you say something what couldn't happen without being specially will to happen And miracles ain't possible Easy lad easy now. Well, I wouldn't go so fast to say the a it's your ignorance that's talking Look You see that lamp sitting there on the end of the bar burning as bright as you please I said right enough now that lamp in the natural course of nature Couldn't burn like that if it was turned upside down and hanging in the air You say it couldn't mr. Beamish. Do you mean to tell me that you all right all right Maybe it couldn't And if it did it would be a miracle very well Now supposing somebody was to come along Take me for instance And he pointed his finger at that lamp like this and said turn upside down Now if the lamp if it's science preserves if it aren't doing it. Well, I'll fly me A burning and hanging there that invisible means a support. I can't keep it up there much longer Remarkable. I'll a remark and now let mr. Father and gay stop it stop it immediately. And that's my official order Have a care constable watch out there it goes Oh now see what you've done mr. Father and guy my best lamp chimney Oh clean them more than an hour ago smashed in his smithering, but I didn't try to do it Oh, but all you knew you might have caught the whole price of fire most irregular and illegal besides like is not We'll have no more of it you understand, but I'll tell you I didn't mean for you when you're silly conjuring tricks It wasn't a conjuring trick. Oh, that's what's you sir. No doubt you've had a bit too much to drink All I done was to point my finger at it like that stop it now Don't you dare, but that's all I've done In that case mr. Father and gay you defeat your own argument right out of your own mouth And how is that might I ask if it weren't caused by some form of trickery Then what happened to that lamp was a miracle Oh here now. I ain't holding with no blooming miracles Old with a monart as the case might be mr. Father and gay But you just stood right there and performed a real true honest genuine miracle That's what you done It wasn't a matter of being asked to leave the long dragon you understand I already had my mind set on going anyhow a place What's full of higner and superstition a kind of place for a man of rational intellect to be doing his thinking And thinking was just what was called for On the one hand, I weren't ready to swallow no miracle theory But on the other hand, I wasn't able to recollect no scientific principle But might account for what that which had happened As you might say the question had dissolved itself into a um Dilemma Oh my landlady. Mrs. Tetherington was sitting up in the parlor when I come in Good evening, mr. Fathering gay, but I can't recall saying anything to her Well, very well, mr. Fathering gay Ah, I went straight to my own room Closed me door, lit the candle And then I sat there on the edge of my bed A grappling with the problem in heroic fashion and trying to puzzle out the ultimate solution Weren't no easy thing to do It couldn't have happened, but it had happened Which ain't logic no matter how you look at it Why it'd be the same situation if I was to point my finger at that candle there and say Be raised up in the air and it was to Fly me Hanging there like a blooming firefly But it's contrary wise to the whoop. There it goes Oh Black as your hat. Now where in the tarnation did that confounded thing get to? At any rate should be some matches around here somewhere Oh, I say Maybe I could Let there be a match in me Just like that. Oh a safety match a lot of blooming good. That's going to Oh now, maybe I don't need no match. Maybe I could Candle Wherever you are Be lysied Oh here now not in the middle of my bed. Oh, I would not be having any of that now Well come in it ain't locked Mr. Fathering I Don't I inquire what's coming off up here? You might inquire and to blazes with you Can't you recognize a man who's got his hands full of troubles? Troubles indeed. I'll have you one duster Mr. Fathering I why you smoke coming out of that bed because it caught on fire. That's why Oh May well comfort her with a now all burned in it and taking lighted candles to bed with you I am not taking no candles anywhere And I will thank you to leave me the privacy of my own a bed chamber. Well, I never You have been drinking on the contrary. I have been cogitating upon matters of science Which is far beyond the range of your feeble intellect with all the money I have to spend on candles I'll have you know that if any candles are going to be tossed around loose like in this house I'll do the tossing mrs. Tetherington I might remind you that good steady lodgers such as a man like myself Ain't so easy to come by nowadays With which I will bill you a highly A respectable a good a knight I've never been so insulted in all my life and you can rest assured you haven't earned the last of this Old vulture don't know who she's talking to Me a bloke what's only got to point his finger and say be And it is Limey if I ain't suddenly got the power to perform miracles real genuine miracles Like is not the result of my long devotion to the true principles of science Well, I got through the next day without no trouble and come evening I went walking down the lane that leads around millsdale's pond Tempting to put my mental processes into order as you might say Mostly I kept trying to cogitate on some honest the Betsy miracle I might up and perform But it ain't such an easy matter for a chap who's unaccustomed to goings on of that nature Oh, what I wanted was the genuine article you understand no little shenanigans One with which to make people stop and say Blimey no if that ain't a real darn right miracle for you And all of a sudden I had it I just happened to recollect a chap somewhere who stuck his staff into the ground and commanded it to blossom so I poked me walking stick into the edge of the turf our back door for wee bit and pointed me finger at it walking stick Become a blooming bush of flowering poses Roses by heaven I done it just like that fella in the opera What's going on here? Oh constable winch can found the man anyhow Sace and assist whatever it is you're doing in the name of the crowd. Who are you there rose bush go back now fast Have a mind there who it is you're throwing bramble bushes at Blasted thorns white into the man's severely Confounded blundering idiot I'll see now who's conducting nefarious activities under the cover of darkness Assaulting an officer engaged in the pursuit of his natural Well So it's you mr. Father again the fact being self-evident mr. Winch I will not bother myself to answer so you'll not bother yourself to answer Maybe you'll also deny that you just threw a great heavy mass of foliage at me I do deny it There's no doubt it just up and flew through the air all by itself constable winch you have just hit the nail on the Ed So that's the way the wind blows Some more of them blasted hanky-pank conjuring tricks of yours is that it on the contrary? It was merely a small miracle you don't say so In which cases honor might enjoy here and you tell about it So come along with me now. I will do nothing of the kind Oh Resisting an officer that'll be another charge against you charge indeed. Mr. Winch you can take your charges and and go to Hades Whoa, oh, uh constable Oh, mr. Winch Limey if he ain't gone and disappeared complete like Oh, I wonder if he I'm thinking this miracle business ain't all it's talked up to be Why a man might find himself in a whole peck of trouble before he learns the knack of the thing I'm thinking I'd best go and get myself some really professional advice right away Good evening to you brother a very pleasant evening to you and the same to you with many of the mr. Maydig That is your reverence. Oh, no no formality now none at all. No just call me mr. Maydig Well, no, oh, thank you kindly your uh may dig Ship you won't you step inside Much obliged to you, uh, mr. Reverence ship Yeah, just follow me now This way mr. Uh, I can't say that I caught the name Fathering gay a george a w fathering gay. Oh, yes, uh, not from my parish. Well, yes Attended services last christmas indeed So many people did last christmas Well, here we are mr. Mothering day It's a foggering gay Nice diggings you've got here. Oh adequate mr. Mothering way adequate for my simple wants Yeah, now now just feel entirely free to lay your burdens upon my shoulders. Well, the fact is The matter which I come here to talk about might be considered of a somewhat a uh Delicate nature. Oh Think nothing of it. Please feel free to speak. We'll speak freely my housekeeper attires very early. Oh, no Reverence ship is nothing like that Then like uh, what the uh subject about which I'm inquiring is uh, miracles miracles Yes, yes indeed uh miracles. Um, any special kind of miracles? Oh, yes The kind which I perform myself. Oh, which you perform I see And uh, what sort of miracles do you perform? Well, uh, for one thing I have just finished sending constable winch to hades. Hades Indeed No, that's uh, very interesting. Of course when I realized what had happened. I had him transferred to san francisco Uh, wherever that is. Oh, I'm sure sure here like san francisco much better Yeah, you don't believe me. I can't say that I blame you none either. Well after all mr. Dothering lay its fathering guy Well, very well There ain't nothing else to do but for me to go up and perform a few miracles before we go any farther Well, that's um, very interesting. I'm sure Uh, you just take that jar of tobacco there on the table for instance suppose. I just point my finger at it like this and Become a bowl of violets. Yes indeed. It's very interesting You see it ain't no tobacco jar no more. It's a bowl of violets. Well, god Blimey, I mean, uh, so it is of course Ain't nothing very spectacular your friendship But it is the sort of a miracle a man can pass without uh, tangling himself up in a mass of trouble Very well, it's extraordinary. You can see for yourself. They're real violets indeed Yes indeed now take this for example Become a bowl of fish Oh No, not that kind live fish in a goldfish bowl swimming around now That's better amazing Uh, how did you do it? I just told it to that's that's all that's all when I tells the thing to do it It does it Incredible Come on with something like you might say and I'd like to know if it's a real genuine miracle or if it ain't Well, uh, seeing as our miracles ought to come under your reverentship special province more or less Yes. Yes. Yes indeed. However, usually Somewhat more academic fashion. These are more More astonishing as far as I can tell there ain't no limit to it like for instance, uh bowl of fish Turn into a pigeon Look at the thing Here here now none of that. Oh, you stay away from mr. Maydig now Perhaps I'd better um, yeah become that jar of tobacco again Huh, well reverent what do you think about it? Amazing. It's the most Extraordinary thing I've ever seen in my life ever expected to see. No, no, no I've got to think about it to consider the possibilities. Well, I might come back in the morning. Oh, no No, no, no wouldn't hear of it. I was about to dine when you rang her wonder if you'd join me Of course, I'm afraid there's only cold mutton. Well now, maybe there's something else you might like better. Oh anything frankly I've grown to hate the sight of Yeah You don't mean why not just name it pheasant I haven't tasted pheasant in years. Then now is the time Let there be a pheasant on the table No, no, no, no, no lot might like not like that. Let it be dead and roasted and ready to eat Look, look at it. Oh, it's beautiful Smells good too. Maybe we'd best uh, let there be two pheasants and truffles and truffles Maybe some oyster two dozen oysters You better make it three dozen and some cheddar or we must have some cheddar a pound of cheddar And what to drink your refreshing champagne. Well, I really shouldn't you know, but uh, well Perhaps a small bottle of mozelle six bottles of mozelle a gig of stout and a case of champagne There wasn't no mistake about it. I'd come to the right place for certain Once mr. Mady got over his first astonishment He turned out full of ideas for brand new miracles things even I might never have thought of like has not Well, we polished off that meal in no time at all as easy as a cat-frying eggs We had an hour later. We was out walking in the dark streets of the village turning out miraculous jobs so fast I fairly wore out my finger appointing with it I couldn't begin to tell you all the wonderful things we did in a couple of hours Installed a new railway line drained flinders swamp turned it into a meadow Cured the vickers warts paved all the roads Eliminated eliminated taxation Reformed the lord mayor and made all the girls in the village beautiful Ah, these weren't none of your apny miracles. All of these were big And we went right on turning them out one every two minutes just as regular as clockwork By midnight we passed clean through the village and were walking along the lane by millsdale's pond Fairly tired out by all that thinking and pointing and performing of miracles. Mr. Fothering game I've just thought of another one indeed and what might it be the village clock there there in the steeple listen listen to it Oh, it's terrible true enough It ain't got a very melodious sound to it. Then let's give them a good clock a great rich booming one. All right, mr. Mading Let that their clock become a genuine london-style cathedral clock Much better much better The people of this village are going to have a big surprise when they wake up in the morning after all we've done for them tonight I might say there's one or two things we've done that I ain't so sure about like Turning every drop of alcoholic beverages into plain water for instance Nothing to worry about mr. Fothering game You can always turn out a miraculous pint or two for your own purposes and and it will reform all the drunkards in the village Maybe so at any rate we might as well wait and see what comes of it Well, what do we perform next? I really don't know Can't think of another single miracle that we haven't already half a moment. Mr. Mading. I just thought of one of my own I'd best take care of Let constable winch be right back in san francisco again He might be catching a boat or a train or something you understand I think the best idea is just to keep sending him back there every once in a while I doubt you have any anything to worry about san francisco is some distance away, you know Oh, is it? Oh, i'm glad to hear it. Hey, I keep trying to think of one more miracle A big one something worthy of ending the night with But I just don't Well now I see there is one, you know such as a you see that moon mr. Fothering game Unnaturally almost full by the looks of it. You remember Joshua joshua Joshua Oh come off it now. It would be a wondrous thing to see Well now that's a pretty tall order back in the moon stands still Oh, well actually it only appears to stand still what really happens is that the earth stops rotating You don't have to inform me about scientific principles of which I'm already familiar mr. Mading How so ever I think we'd best not go monkeying around with the universe Well, you probably don't have the power to do it anyway. It's really a superior class of miracle, you know I got the power all right, but I ain't so sure it's a good idea I could do it if I wanted to Of course, of course, you could Well, perhaps we'd better get along home half a mo now I I I might just leave it stopped for a little while If you couldn't stop it at all. Oh, well now if that's the way you feel you just take a look at this The old blinking world Stop rotating We're now Oh, that's all this I didn't order no wind hovering gay. What have you done? I don't rightly know look out things is starting to blow loose. Oh, you confounded blundering idiot Duck your head. Here comes a cow through the air Mist Lie down in the ditch before it gets blowed away. That's getting worse all the time And I can't see to pull me wits together Oh, I've got it when the earth stopped rotating Everything on the surface kept right on moving Five six hundred miles an hour houses cows the wind everything It's a scientific principle a lot of good that does Stop it man. Stop it. Do something do Oh, mr. Mading. Oh, mr. Mading. Oh blimey if he ain't blown clean away gone Oh now I got myself in a fine kettle of fish for certain Only there weren't so much confusion. Maybe I could oh I say now That's it. That's the only answer All right now Let nothing happen until I say the word go And when I do Let everything go back exactly like it was just before I turned that blew me lamp upside down in the long dragon bar And at the same time Let me lose to see a miraculous power complete like Forget all about it Have you got it now? Everything just as it were No more miracles and let me forget the whole thing All right then Go That's only what you say and the same as anybody might say who's got the least bit of scientific knowledge inside of their thick Eggs ain't all right constable winch. You couldn't rightly say mr. Father and gay the subject ain't exactly in my province, you know And all of the same must bridges right you are constable Irregardless mr. Beamish miracles ain't possible. So you say so I say Maybe you don't even know what a miracle is There we are Maybe if I was to point me finger at that lamp there on the bar and tell it to turn upside down I suppose you think it might do it Well, I wouldn't say it would you wouldn't say it wouldn't mr. Beamish you ain't got a brain in your head and I'm only wasting me time trying to enlighten you which I ain't going to do any longer There you are miss bridges. Why thank you kindly mr. Father and guy I'll be dropping in again when the place ain't quite so crowded I bid you all a respectful a good Well, I'd say you got the best of the argument tonight. I never saw him sir Will your tiger look at this? Oh, what's up miss bridges sixpence. He left me a sixpence Right here on the bar big is anything and so we did The lack of it ain't never happened before Science preserves if he died a downright blooming miracle. That's what it is a blooming miracle Escape is produced and directed by norman mcdonnell Tonight we have brought you the man who could work miracles by hg wells adapted for radio by less crutchfield with editorial supervision by john dunkel Featured in tonight's story was ben right as mr. Father and gay with john daner's mr. May dig Wilms Herbert as totty beamish and jeff corey as constable winch Eleanor oddly was mrs. tetherington and constants cavendish was bridges Special music by ivan ditmars With tonight's program We bring to a close the present series of the world's best stories of high adventure by the world's greatest authors presented as escape Next week get this time lumen abner returned to the air in a new half hour program You'll want to hear be sure to listen roi roan speaking for cbs the columbia broadcasting system