What happens
Recruits in the French Foreign Legion, among them the English brothers John, Michael and Digby Geste, receive a hard welcome from their brutal sergeant. The narrator, John, recalls his childhood at Brandon Abbas, where the three boys were raised by their aunt, Lady Brandon, and where the family's prized blue water sapphire disappears. Michael, the eldest, is suspected of the theft and vanishes, and John and Isabel are left to face the family's shame. The story then follows John and Beau to a remote outpost where a mutiny is brewing among the men and a fellow legionnaire, Schwartz, is plotting against them. The account is told in the present by John, speaking from a later time, and the broadcast is part of the Campbell Playhouse presentation of Beau Geste on The Mercury Theatre on the Air, first aired March 17, 1939, starring Laurence Olivier and Noah Beery.
England at Brandon Abbas, then the French Foreign Legion in North Africa
Characters: John Geste, Beau Geste, Digby Geste, Lady Brandon, Isabel, Hank Locker, Schwartz, Sergeant Lejeune
Listen for: The disappearance of the blue water sapphire at Brandon Abbas and the mutiny plot at the desert outpost
Written from the episode itself; it never gives away the ending. Every recording is remastered for the stream: cleaned of rumble, hiss and mains hum (and the old TV whine where we found it), then levelled in two passes to steady broadcast loudness, so one show is never quieter than the next.