 And now, tonight's presentation of radio's outstanding theatre of thrills, suspense. Tonight, the story of a murder in which no gun was used, nor knife, nor blunt instrument, nor poison, nor suffocation, nor force of any kind. And yet, a man was murdered. So now, with Lawrence Dobkin as Joe Porter, here is tonight's suspense play, Destruction. Okay, Doctor. Okay. Okay, Doctor. Okay. Color. You're going to be all right, Mr. Porter. You were brought here to emergency by ambulance, and you're going to be all right. Color. As good as new. I'm not at all at all. Don't worry about a thing, Mr. Porter. Inject intravenously lanticide C, being a digitalis derivative, and highly recommended in cases of near death. You won't die, Mr. Porter. As, for example, when a man collapses in the streets, coronary seizure on the streets, blood plasma by intravenous drip as, for example. So as to restore the blood volume. Doctor. Yes, Doctor? Cyanotic, Doctor? His color is poor, Doctor. The will to live is a remarkable thing. Every cell in the body musters its own peculiar chemistry, its own soul, if you wish. Lawrence, I got to get up and get your food before the maid comes. You'll be in here when it's ready. Don't shatter me so early in the morning, Vera. Don't shatter him so early in the morning. Who do you think you are? Well, who do you think you are? Oh, stop it. You ever stop and think of anybody else? You'd only do that once in a while. You'd ever wonder how it is for the people around? The people around me, there's only... You see? You see? Just don't cry, that's all. Why not? Why shouldn't I cry? Can't you listen to a joke? No. Don't tell me it breaks your heart or something like that. It terrifies me. Why? When you cry, Vera. Well? It's another failure I've created, that's all. Well, listen to him. Walk into the kitchen this morning. My wife looked at me and she began to cry. Your coffee, you want juice or something? What do you want? Why did you cry, Vera? Oh. Please, tell me. Some juice. Please, tell me why. You want to know what happened to me this morning? Yes. All of a sudden, you turned into a small man in an undershirt. Well, it's hot. You wouldn't understand if I told you. Yes, I would. Small man in an undershirt like somebody I'd never seen before, a stranger. And I know you're not a stranger. You're what my life is up to now. Oh, no. Oh, no it isn't. Oh, no. Once I loved you and this is what it's gotten me. Little man, little failure in an undershirt. Did you hear what I said? I said, oh, no it isn't. What are you talking about? Don't you think I know? What are you talking about? Stupid or something. What are you talking about? The guy, the guy, the guy that comes around. Stupid or something. You think I don't know or something? So? So. Yeah, so what? You don't care that I know? I said so what, didn't I? Yeah, yeah, you did. You want to leave me? I don't know. I got to keep seeing him, Joe. I don't love you anymore. I don't care a thing for you. Nothing? Huh? Joe, just not a thing. After 10 years, now I'm like dirt. I worked my head off. I worked my head off so you can have a maid. I can't even get my socks darned. You sit around all day. You want to whip yourself with it, yeah? Just like dirt. Less. Okay, okay. Less, Joe, to let you know where you stand. You want me to tell you some things about yourself. You want me to... You're a very little man, Joe. I know it's been building up for a long time, but this morning I felt it for the first time while I was talking to Vera. Something all at once slipped away and something in me tried to grab out after it, but it was gone. And I had a little pain, man. Once, a long time ago, on a summer's night and a moonlighted night, I stood on a lonely street corner and stretched my arms out for the world. And Vera stood close to me. I love you, Joe. You're not small, Joe. This morning there was a small pain and I started to die. Hey, Joe. Oh, hi, Herb. Hiya. How's Treks? Fine. Fine. Yeah. Pretty great, huh? Yeah. Everything great, huh? What's the matter with you? With me? With me? Yeah, something funny? I'll tell you. Sorry. Well, what's funny, huh? You are. You're a funny man. What do you mean? How can anybody be as miserable as you, huh? Now, look. Where's the five for the picnic, Joe? Oh. Everybody in the office, but Joe Turner. Last year, the picnic committee had to wait until September to park you from five bucks. Look, I... I don't have it. That's all. I have been delegated to tell you something, Joe. No, wait a minute. Tonight is the poker game, yeah? What about it? Don't come. What? I have been delegated to tell you that the boys don't want you. The boys say you can't pay your just and honest debts. You can't afford to play poker. Herb. For your own protection, kid. Herb. What? Oh, Herb. What's the matter with you? I look forward so much to the... Hi. Hi, Herb. Joe. Good morrow, Fair One. Uh-huh. Drink from your unbubbling brook of a water cool? I would. Ah, then be thee, my ingest. You're guaranteeing it. Drink. Drink you. Crazy, huh? Joe. Yeah? I heard something, Joe. What? Herb, you go away. This is between Joe and me. Now come on. I mean it. Now go away. This is between my little shortstop and me. Okay, but you'll tell me later. I won't either, not to do. Hello, Joe. What are you looking at me like that for? You're just lucky you don't have kids, that's all. What are you talking about? I've always wanted kids. What makes me so lucky I don't have any? Are you kidding? What's the... I can't tell you my source. But my source says your wife's running around. My source... Shut up. Joey, my source never lies. I don't know who told you, but she's lying. It's not a she, it's a he. And Joey, there isn't a better source alive. I know because I've got a lady friend who knows this party we're discussing. And what she's told me, he's told her about. Ellis. Yeah? Don't say anything to anybody, not to anybody. Why should I say anything? Because it's something that my wife... my wife and I will straighten out. Just please don't tell anybody. Oh, little short stuff. Little Joey. Phyllis' face wavered and lost focus and dissolved into the day of columns and posting in bus signs and minors and ciphers and Herb coming over just before lunch. Hey, man. Tough about your wife. Heard she's running around. I had no good. It was strange. It was a kind of surrender. Bits of me seemed to be making. As if I were drowning. Submerging only so far and getting used to it and then sinking a little more. There was a time, a bright spring day when a girl laughed at a very wonderful thing I had said and touched my hand. There were days. Turner, see you. Oh, sure, Mr. Collins. By the way, my office. Sure, Mr. Collins. This is not a depression. We're in Turner. No, sir. Far from it. Oh, no, sir. Letting it off. I'd call it. It's a good sign. Anybody who invests in a false economy, now, mind you, I'm not saying at this stage we just pass through with anything but healthy. But now we've got to do a little bit more retrenching here. You agree? Oh, yes, sir. Yes. You're fired, Turner. Economists all over the country agree that a strong inventory that's fluid is the soundest investment and that any company that carries too much of a load as far as personnel is concerned is foolish. Please. Now, I only appeal to your intelligence. You can see for yourself that we must cut down our expenses. Please, please. Are you crying, Turner? Yes. Mr. Collins. We've got to level off. Now, I have charged to show that there's no time like now to undertake minimum... Mr. Collins. ...of this. Yes, what is it? I'll work for less money. Well? Please, please don't fire him. Well... I'll take a cut. Figure out how much I'm worth to you. Why don't you do that? Figure out how much I'm worth to you. I'll take a cut. You're forcing me to say it. We don't need you. We don't want people like you in our organization. You're fired. You are listening to destruction. Tonight's presentation in Radio's Outstanding Theatre of Frills, Suspense. Later tonight on most of these stations, CBS Radio continues Mr. Keen's latest serial thriller, The Ice Queen Murder Case. The old investigator finds himself skating on thin ice in his efforts to find clues. Tonight, through Friday of this week, continue with Mr. Keen, Tracer of Lost Persons. Now, we bring back to our Hollywood soundstage, Lauren Stavkin. In tonight's production of Destruction, a tale well calculated to keep you in suspense. Turner's cyanotic blueish color indicating lack of oxygen. Yes. It seems to me only a thought. But it seems to me... You had a thought, doctor? Is it Mr. Turner had no will to live for the want or the desire? I don't know. I wouldn't. I'll prepare the syringe. Porter said for me to do so that you got your dinner, serve it to you, and then I was through for the day. Where is Mrs. Porter? Out. Did she tell you where she was going? What? Did Mrs. Porter tell you where she was going? She said out, so she told me. She said out. Why, don't you know? Didn't she call you up at the office? This keeps you overtime, doesn't it, Thelma, staying on to serve my dinner. Mrs. Porter talked to somebody on the telephone. I thought sure it was you. Thelma... I was ironing her things in the kitchen. I didn't hear the words. Just that kind of soft laugh Mrs. Porter has sometimes when she's talking on the phone. I didn't hear the words, but I sure thought it must be you she was talking to. It was. And she went into the bedroom and called out to me to iron that silk blouse first. That frilly one... Yeah. Cut low... Yeah. ...off the shoulder. Yes, yes. Oh, you sure got an attractive wife, Mr. Porter. And we two get along real fine. Thelma... It was around four, she went out. Smelling pretty and looking real nice. I said, you have a nice time now, Mrs. Porter. Didn't tell you where she was going. I talked to you on the phone. Thelma... Well, I guess I'll be gone. Nothing more. No, why don't you stay a little while? We'll talk. I hate to eat alone. I'll be through eating in just a few minutes. You could clear the table and maybe wash the dishes. And by then, Mrs. Porter will be home. Not me, Mr. Porter. She's already paid you the extra... Not me. Besides... Besides what? I was you. I'd go to a movie or something. Mrs. Porter's not liable to get home until real late. That's what she said to me, she said. Tell him not to wait up. It was moving in on me. All the dying that had happened to me during the day moving in. Adding up. Very close now. The emptiness, the stillness left behind when she walked out of the house. And the quick dark of night falls speeding through the rooms now. Moving in on me. And the sigh of wind close to my ear. And farther away, the silence somehow quivering, trembling somehow through the grass and on the leaves in the yard outside. And it was close to me as I went into another room. To the closet that held here his clothes. That held the perfume she wore in the scent of seasons. Long dead, seasons dying, even now. And back into the room. A room where a long time ago. Oh, baby. Look what you've done. You made me drop my mirror. Add tricks, sonny. Tricks that just wouldn't work for me. But it's going to. Hey, Pa. Set me up another row of wine glasses. Gotta show my friend here this trick. Who's twisting your arm? Did you say friend? You said something? I said don't bother. You don't care if I ever do this trick? No. If not ever in my whole life I ever do this trick? Look, I don't. You're not a true friend. Boy, any true buddy would forget it. You show somebody else, I'll move. Where are you going, friend? Get your paws off of me. Get my... Get my paw. I like you. You're my friend. I'm going to show you my trick. I told you get your hands off of me. You didn't tell me a thing. You're going to sit right there where you were sitting. And you're going to be friendly. And watch a trick. Or else I'm going to smash your face in, little one. Make your drink beer right off the bar room floor. Sit down, little one. I like you, little one. I like how you pay attention. I like the... Well, these two, Mr. Stevens? These the kind of glasses? You're a lad. A fine upcoming lad you are. Look, I'll... Don't worry about it, Mr. Stevens. Do all the tricks you want. An old customer like you, who's going to mind? You hear that, little one? This lad's a friend. He likes to see me do tricks. Sure. I'm a barrel of fun, Mr. Stevens. Now, this trick I'm going to show you... What's your name, little one? Come on, what's your name? Joe Porter. You don't look good, Joe. No? You look sick. Pale and sick. You sick? No. You're sick. Look, Mr. Pleas... You want to tell me something, Joe? Because I'm listening. It's like you said. I don't feel too great. All I want to do, Mr.... is sit here and have a quiet drink. What eats you, Joey? Nothing. It's not any... Girlfriend. No. Wife. You're the type who's got a wife, little one. If you've got a thing going... Leave me alone! Joey. Joey. I'll tell you what. I'm going to do this trick I do with a row of glasses. And it's going to take your mind off whatever it is that's eating away on you. A man like you, a little one like you, he's bound to have something going for him with his women, folks. Now, don't tell me nothing about that, because I know. And Stevie's got a trick with a row of wine glasses. Now, why did you go and do a thing like that, little one? Why are you going to spoil my trick? Because I had enough of you. I had enough of your talk. Shut your mouth. You're a slob. You're a fat overgrown slob. I said to you to shut your mouth. That's what I said. Oh, you... You come on outside out there. What's wrong, Mr. Steven? Come around the side of the bar, lad. We got ourselves a drunk here. That's what's wrong, lad. Smashed your nice glasses and everything. He kept at me. That's what he kept bothering me. He kept digging at me. You got yourself a real drunk, lad. A lush. A man can't hardly find peace in a little fun anymore. Get out, mister. We don't want any trouble. I wasn't making any trouble. It's him. It's this man. Maybe he doesn't understand you, lad. The only way to make a drunk understand is to kick their teeth. Throw them away, lad. Sure, Mr. Stevens. Come on. You can't walk, but I've got a way. I can't walk. He's a gutter. A man and a young woman walk by, arm in arm. A girl, really, with a nighttime soft on her face. She tugged at his sleeve and stopped him. And they looked at me. Look what I found, Dickie, a drunk. Yeah. A drunk and a gutter. That's where the wine leads, straight to the gutter. Is that what he is? A wino? Boozer, wino. Guy in the gutter. Well, Mr. Wino. Hello, down there. Mr. Boozer? Well, let's go, baby. There's sights in the sights. I want to see sights in the sights. Good night, Mr. Wino. Sleep tight, Mr. Boozer. Sleep tight. Wake up right. Come on. They walked on. And it had a kind of warmth towards this dying. And the hurt when a man had hit me and the humiliation part of it. A matter of dying had begun a long time ago, far off time ago, and became the man of the trips and the girl with sights to see. And along the gutter the question ran how much longer now? How much further to die? Wonder and a warmth to it. Mr., you're hurt, Mr. You're hurt. Your face, baby, poor baby. And a gentle touch on the hurt. You're in a fight. You've been drinking and getting a fight. You shouldn't not a fellow like you. Nice looking fellow like you. Let me help you. I want to. Honest, I want to. She helped me out? Maybe you ought to wash up a little, dust yourself off. A fellow like you ought to go home looking like a wall hit him. A man like you. You're gonna be new as pie. What's your name? It's Ellen, but you say, Ellie. I don't know why you should... It feels nice, huh? Ellie's doing nice, huh? Yes, but I... Now, you're new as pie. I'll get this stuff out of the way. What's yours? What? What's your name, foolish? Joe. Hi, Joe. Hi. Mind I sit next to the patient? Why are you doing all this? What? Pick me out of the gutter. Bring me here. Take care of... You mean it? Yes. The drunk in the gutter's face bashed. Police. No, no, no. I'm not. I'm asking a simple question. Why one human being will do a thing like that, do something nice like that, and another one will do... You really are, aren't you? Or what? Police. You really are. Sit a couple of minutes if you want to. Ellie. You sit. That's the way you are. What are you doing? Watch me. I do it well. You want to do that good? Every light in the room goes on. Just in this one switch. I had an electrician come up once in six... Why did you do that? Ask me again. Why? Why did you turn on all the lights? No, I could get a good look at you, Joe. A real close look. Ellie, all I want... Get out of here, Joe. Why? Don't make me let out a yell about it. Just get out. Before you were nice to me? No more. Why? It's not much to ask. Just why? Tell me. You got some place to go? Some place far from here? Yes, I have. I have a home. Wife? Vera. I saw it once. As a kid, and I saw it once. Never forgot. What are you talking about? I saw it. I was a kid. This man fell flat on the street. I came up close and I saw his face. Close as I am to you. What's that got to do with... Do it somewhere else. Die somewhere else. A friend should have... Normally it would have. But it didn't. No response to it. The blood volume... No longer a question in that. Then I decided to see... Plasma, norepinephrine. And the one medication we cannot give. Beyond our power to give. But... His body seems to have lost the will to live. There's a chemistry that kills... that we know nothing about. Suspense. In which Lauren Stavkin was starred in Morton Fine and David Friedkin's story, Destruction. This Thursday night on CBS Radio, Kathy and Elliot Lewis will be on stage with an original thriller titled The Telegram. Lewis has painted a startling, believable picture of a young married couple spending a harrowing night with an unopened telegram. Listen for it. Thursday night. Next week, the story of a woman, a most attractive woman who learns to her discomfort that even the smallest of arguments could lead to her death. That's next week on... Suspense. With music composed by Lucian Morrowick and conducted by Lud Bluskin, Destruction was written for suspense by Morton Fine and David Friedkin. Featured in tonight's cast were John Daener, Michael Ann Barrett, Jack Krushen, Charlotte Lawrence, Jerry Hausner, Virginia Gregg, Clayton Post, Frank Gerstle, Georgia Ellis and Farley Bear. And remember, next week, Ben S. Hunter's suspense story. Good night, Mrs. Russell. Listen while you work. Enjoy Wendy Warren every Monday through Friday in the daytime on the CBS Radio Network.