 Now we present Herbert Marshall as The Man Called X. The Saturday night feature on NBC's five show festival of comedy, music, mystery and drama brought to you by RCA Victor, world leader in radio, first in recorded music, first in television and by the makers of Anderson for fast relief from pain of headache, neuritis, neuralgia. Herbert Marshall as The Man Called X. Wherever there is mystery, intrigue, romance in all the strange and dangerous places of the world there you will find The Man Called X. Tonight you can sit back and relax and enjoy a good feeling because Christmas shopping is over for another year. Tomorrow you may want to put the last fancy ribbons and wrappings on the packages and scatter them under the tree. And you're going to have an enchanted Christmas this year if you're one of the thousands who will wrap a big bright ribbon around a beautiful new RCA Victor television radio phonograph combination and proudly place it by the Christmas tree. Three worlds of wonderful entertainment will be brought to your fireside and into your home all wrapped up in one matchless RCA Victor instrument with a bright Christmas ribbon around it. Three worlds of entertainment for the whole family to enjoy day after day and year after year. If you're one of those happy families you're in for a wonderful time this weekend and all year because RCA Victor, world leader in radio, first in recorded music and first in television will bring into your home that special morning a very special Merry Christmas. By special request we're repeating this story as a reminder that Christmas is one time of the year when even miracles can happen. A time for a shabby world to lift up its tired eyes and learn once again to hope and to dream and a time for the strangest adventure in the whole career of the man called X. Still don't have any reporter, Mr. Thurston. Oh, then try checking again with Tehran, Miss Brooks. All the Tehran lines are out of order. Cairo says there's a terrific storm over the Transjordan Hills. Transjordan? That's right in the route Ken must have taken. You don't think he's running into trouble? All I know is that Ken chartered a plane in Tehran and took off for Egypt with Pagan's alchemy to board. Right now he's four hours overdue at Cairo and there's been no report on him. He must be all right. He's got to be all right. What were you planning to do Christmas, Miss Brooks? Take a trip? Well, no. I thought I'd probably stay here in the city. I mean... I see. Well, he still has time to get home for Christmas. Oh, but Chief, I didn't... It's all right, Miss Brooks. I understand. I don't know. I don't know. There's a dozen simple things that might have happened. But believe me, I'd give a lot to know what Ken's doing right this minute. It's blacker than the inside of the head out there, Mr. Thurston. How can you even see what the flight is playing? There you go, and I can't. Then what are we going to do? All I'd like to do is that mechanic can get around. What an instrument on this board is working right. The way we've been kicked around in this storm, I don't even know where. Mr. Rex, three engines come down. What do we do now? If I could only get one look at the ground, I don't even know how far up we are. I think I'm as good as death pigeon right this... Look, there's lightning flashing. Here, top of a hill. Get ahead. Look what I hear! If I can get any of those off, hang on, Pagan! We can't just lie there. Say something, Mr. Racer. Can't you hear me? I can hear you, Pagan. Mr. Rex, I don't know. I... Uh-huh. Stand with me here. And look at the world. Yes. All right, I'm coming. Wait for me. I heard you calling out here in the darkness, child. It was you whom I called, sir. The storm was raging, but now... Now it's growing very still. There are a million glittering stars. There can be no storm where I am. Yes, yes, I know. The friend was with me. What about him? He lies there in the great bird that fell from the sky, even as you do. So will it be for a time? I understand. But you, child, why are you here alone in the night? I came to look for one last time at a foolish world before leaving it. Before? I have decided I shall not grow up. Not grow up? You're very young. Younger than I've ever believed. Why have you decided this? Because to grow I must live. Men must want me to live. And no place on earth today can be called my home. Listen, can you not hear it? The voice of the world rising up out of the dark valleys below this hill. Yes, I can hear it. It's so terrible with its jealousy, greed, selfishness, hate. It's not pretty. Can I live and grow up in a world like that? Child, you can't judge mankind from the top of the hill. You have to go down among them. I've been down among them. I've seen their wars and heard rumors of wars. There are other things to hear. But you know how to listen, and I can show them to you. Come with me now. Down in those valleys? How can we? Why not? It's Christmas, so anything can happen. Come along, child. Come with me. The boy who's playing. Tiny Tim? Cripple, isn't he? Yes. Wait. Listen. You play it better every month. It's a great virtue, so you'll be Tiny Tim. It's a marvelous song, dear my boy. Oh, thank you, everyone. Maybe when spring comes, I shall be able to play for pennies in the streets. Then I'll be a help to you, Father. Bless you, lad. No, I think I should tune my fiddle. One string was ever so slightly flat, you know. Such a serious lad. He says strange things sometimes. He told me in church this morning he hoped all the people would see him and remember who made lame beggars walk and blind men see. It's a lucky family we are, Robert. There's few in this world that have as much as we. That's something of a joke, my dear, with the little I'm able to give you. Robert Cratchit. When I think of all the years we've had and such wonderful children, and you always so cheerful and understanding of our needs. Oh, go along with you now. And what about that surprise? I'd almost forgotten it. Now I wonder what it could possibly be. I can guess, Father. A plum pudding, blazing like the sun itself. It's day and merry Christmas to all of us. Yes, and God bless us. God bless us, everyone. Timmy Lad, such a beautiful dish needs a real salute. Take your fiddle and play us an overture to the pudding. Yes, an overture to the pudding. Any reason why you couldn't find a home there, child? Oh, it would be so easy if all people were like them. There are great many like them. If you know where to look. The family we saw. That was the family of a certain Bob Cratchit, a Turk in the London firm of Scrooge and Marley in the year 1840. Oh, the Christmas Carol. Those were not even real people. They came from a book. Must I live then only in old books? This is here and now. These things are different. Are they so very different? Look up. Aren't those the same stars that glittered overhead a hundred years ago? All a thousand? Or ten thousand? Real people sleep in the dirt and never look at the stars. Not all of them. I can think of one right now on the other side of the earth. In a little flat in Queens. I could walk up a certain stairway there tonight and ring a doorbell. Hello, Marion. Oh, Ken, come in. Oh, it's good to see you. Here, let me take some of those packages. Well, thanks. Yes, I was pretty well loaded down. Oh, Thurston Donny, you remember Daddy's friend. Hey, sure I remember. Oh, Mr. Thurston. Hiya, Donny. Look, packages. I'll put you their presents. Take them into the other room, dear, and put them around your tree. All right. Boy, I wonder what's inside of these old packages anyway. Oh, he's growing so fast, Ken. And every day he looks more like Jerry did. Yes, I've noticed that. I wouldn't want it any other way, Ken. That's how it should be. Boy, it's the only reason for my still being alive. You're a pretty brave girl, Marion. No. It was Jerry who was brave at Anzio. What he did was for Donny, too, you know. Are you getting along all right, Marion? Is there anything you need? We're getting along perfectly. Oh, I resent my job keeping me away from my son in the daytime. But we, the evenings and the park on Sundays and snow and winter and merry-go-rounds and ice cream sodas and... Oh, don't worry about us, Ken. We'll be all right. Yes. If there's one thing in this shaky world, I'm certain of it's that. You'll be all right. Well, child, I could open other doors like that one, many others. But she was a heroine. And they are too few and far between. Try to walk a hundred steps without finding one. I know you. I know you as one who sometimes men call ex. You, too, fight for my cause. But the world is filled with hate and I shall live in it no longer. All right. Then I'll show you why you've got to live. Grow up. Even if it takes proof, so fantastic as to seem incredible. How can you know what I need when you don't even know my name? Would you like me to say it for you? Could you? You know who I am? Yes, child. I know who you are. I know very well who you are. We'll continue with the man called ex in just a moment. The next time you suffer from pains of headache, neuritis, or neuralgia, take Anderson. You'll bless the day you heard of this incredibly fast way to relieve these pains. Now, the reason Anderson is so wonderfully fast-acting and effective is this. Anderson is like a doctor's prescription. That is, Anderson contains not just one, but a combination of medically proven, active ingredients in easy-to-take tablet form. Thousands of people have received envelopes containing Anderson tablets from their own dentist or physician, and in this way discovered the incredibly fast relief Anderson brings from pains of headache, neuritis, or neuralgia. So, the next time a headache strikes, take Anderson for this wonderfully fast relief. Anderson, A-N-A-C-I-N. Anderson comes in handy boxes of 12 and 30, economical family size bottles of 50 and 100. Get Anderson at any drug counter. And now to continue with the man called ex, starring Herbert Marshall with Leon Balasco as Pagan's alchemy. Somewhere between Cairo and Tehran, a plane carrying Ken Thurston and Pagan fought its way through a raging storm. In a blinding flash of lightning, a hilltop loomed ahead, and a second later, the plane smashed into it. Then suddenly the storm was gone, a million cold bright stars glittered overhead, and Ken stood outside on the hilltop, talking to a strange little girl who seemingly came from nowhere, everywhere. Proof indeed that at Christmastime, anything can happen. I want to live and to grow. I've loved this world, seen beautiful things happen in it, and found hope in them. Then each time I've seen that hope die, the world is not grown wise nor clean. The years have only made it old and unclean, not bit to live in. Where's hoping at your child? Hope for both of us? After all, I think we're both searching for the same thing. I'm done with searching, and with hoping, and with living. And what of those who follow you, believe in you? What about those people who all their lives put the needs of humanity above their own needs? Are there such on the earth anymore? Are the stars still overhead? Do you know even one? I know a lot of them. Down in those valleys below us. But let's take just one. A man I've known for a long time. I've got a pretty good idea of where he might find him tonight. Look a long way off, child. Look half around the world. Possibly some stricture there, all right? Thrombus, maybe? How's the pulse so fast? 97, doctor. Well, that's all we can do now. What time is it, Miss Nelson? After midnight. Good lord, no wonder I'm tired. Dr. Richards, I've been a supervisor with this hospital long enough to have a right to contradict you once in a while. About what? You're not tired because it's after midnight. You're tired because you haven't had a decent night's sleep in five years. What more you had to check up at the clinic six months ago? I happen to know what they told you. Oh, they didn't know what they were talking about. A bunch of crepe hangers. They told you to work only four hours a day. Now when are you going to start doing it? Four hours a day. When people are dying 24 hours a day. There are other doctors. And there are other problems for them, too. While you've seen kids like this come in here year after year, and we can never do a darn thing for them. Well, now after five years, I can do something for them. And in another year, I'll have the technique perfected so every doctor can use it. If you live long enough. Yes, well, I'll live long enough. If I stop now, throw away the chance to beat this thing just so I could live another 20 years, then why there'd be no sense to anything in this world? You've got a life, too, Dr. Richards. Ah, poppycock. Well, I suppose you think I'm a fool, Miss Nelson. If I told you what I think you are, you'd... You'd just laugh it off. No. No, Dr. Richards, I don't think you're a fool. Can't you believe there are others, child? Other people who think of their fellow men first and themselves second. Yes. Oh, yes, there must be others. And can't they be called believers in you, these selfless people? Yes. But they, too, are heroes. Ordinary people must believe. If I'm to live, then grow up. Well, what could be more ordinary than a boy and girl in love? Paris or London, Vienna, Shanghai, New York, there's nothing in the world so beautifully ordinary as a boy and girl in love. They are fair across the harbor, even like tonight when it's foggy. As long as you're in it, honey, the whole world's lovely. We're terribly lucky, you know. Supposing we hadn't found each other. Well, we couldn't miss. We're unnatural. How could you tell? The first time I mean, what made you know you were in love with me? You came down the street in a crowd. And all of a sudden, there wasn't any crowd. Only you. So they decided I must be in love. Do you think there may be other people as happy? Somewhere in the world? Not a chance. Oh, there must be. People who are in love, too. Millions of them. I love every one of them. Now I am jealous. No, but you do too. You know you do. It makes you feel close to them. Yeah. I guess I'd do it then. Isn't that a wonderful sound? I can't hear it. When I look at you, all I can hear is music. I can hear it too. Beautiful music in the world. Says I love you. I love you, my darling. But they can see beyond themselves. Sometimes far beyond. Far enough to see you and believe in you. They do want me to live. And grow up. Those who love. There are even greater reasons, child. But they're in a place a long way off from the starlit hill in the dark valleys. And the wrecked plane lying over there. Then we can go to them. We can go anywhere tonight. Because it's Christmas time when anything can happen. We can try. Do you know what time means? It's a stream that falls forever in one direction. We'll have to move against it. For this place lies far up the stream toward the headwaters of time outside the universe a long way off. But we can try. What glorious place is this? To what wondrous spot in all eternity have we come? This is the realm of tomorrow. Things. I have no names for them. There are no names for them, child. They're still a part of tomorrow. This one. Look at it. It's one of tomorrow's dreams, child. Gilded with expectation. Gleaming with fulfillment. That's one of tomorrow's hopes. It's an ideal, not yet realized. It's another part of tomorrow. Wondrous things. Things never seen on the face of the earth. Nor will they ever be. If you decide not to live, why not open it? Find out. I will, I will. We'll be unborn. And there'll never be anything else unless you decide to live. Well, they're so beautiful. It can't be lost. We can't let it be lost. The choice is your, child. It's your choice. It's my choice. Let's go back. Back to the hill and the stars. And the valley. But the voice of hate still stops. Sounds from it. Have you forgotten? No. But hate only sounds big because it has the loudest voice. I can hear another sound. It's a voice from the hearts of heroes. More than heroes. Why not men of good will? Yes. Men of good will. A world that has such men. And you must live for such men. They are the ones who believe in you. Yes. And they must live. I shall live and I shall grow. Wait. Don't go. Yes. Yes. Pig on. Pig on. Look out. Look. Look on the head. Pig on. What? Oh, oh. Mr. X, what happened? Came in for three rough landings dark. Must be not cold for hours. The dawn's starting to break over there. Oh, oh. I'm so stiff. I must have broken a leg or something. Let's get out of this wreck and walk around a little. Mr. First, you shouldn't have walked me up. I was having a beautiful dream. All about money. Yes. I had a dream, too. Hand me that map. Huh? Oh. Oh, here. Was it about money, Mr. X? It was about a little girl. I love a girl. Anybody but no? Well, somebody a lot of people know. And a lot of others ought to know. Yeah? Uh, what's her name? Oh, the French call her Pe. The Romans used to call her Pax. Pig on. Her name is Peace. Peace? That's a strange name. Oh, she's a strange little girl. Come on, Pig on. Let's get out of this wreck. Hey, look, Mr. X, down there in the flat. It's a little town. Yeah. That's what I was checking on the map. Come on. I want to get a wire off to the chief. Which way? Down this path? No, no, Pig on. Straight ahead toward the sunrise. Mr. First, look. The sun's coming up. It's shining on all those houses, turning in purple and red and gold. All kinds of colors. Hey, what's the name of that little town anyway? Pig on. The map is right. If that dream was true, that little town is called Death Limb. Now, here is our star, Mr. Herbert Marshall. Thanks for being with us, and thank you and Whitfield for your sweet performance. I wish I could see all of you out there, and see you and talk with you and shake the hand. Because almost anything can happen at Christmas, I almost feel that I can. And so, I say to you, each of you, for all of us on the man called X, from the bottom of our hearts, Merry Christmas. Next week, Mr. X goes deep into the jungles of the Belgian Congo, the land of voodoo and superstition. And not the least of the things he has to contend with is that old head hunter, Pegon Zershmit, which was by Leon Balasku. So join us, won't you, when next I return, as the man called X. Good night. Man called X, starring Herbert Marshall, is a Saturday night feature on NBC's five-show festival of comedy, music, mystery and drama, brought to you by RCA Victor, world leader in radio, first in recorded music, first in television, and by the makers of Anderson for fast relief from pain of headache, neuritis, neuralgia. The man called X is a J. Richard Kennedy production with music composed and conducted by Felix Mills. Tonight's story was written by Les Crutchfield. All characters and incidents on this program are fictitious, and any resemblance to actual characters or incidents is purely coincidental. Also heard in the night's cast were Will Wright, Barbara Fuller, Derek Snowden, Irene Tedrow, Henry Blair, Theodore Von Outs, Lucille Meredith, Maggie Morley, and Harry Bartell. Be sure to listen tomorrow evening for the big show with Tallulah Bankhead and a great parade of stars. The Sunday night feature of NBC's All-Star Festival. And until next week, same time and same station, this is Jack Latham saying good night for The Man Called X. Dooms of your hit parade. Tomorrow it's the big show on NBC.