What happens
Captain Jean Delbrey, a French officer, is tried by the Spanish Inquisition for destroying a church during the war. Sentenced to die, he is taken to a dungeon where he drifts between consciousness, fever and vivid visions of his love Beatrice. Waking bound to a wooden frame, he finds a sharpened pendulum slowly descending above him, while rats gather around the meat left beside him. Suspense is the Columbia program presenting this adaptation of Edgar Allan Poe's story, with Henry Hull in the lead, and the broadcast is dated January 12, 1943.
A dungeon of the Spanish Inquisition in Toledo, Spain, during the French occupation under Napoleon Bonaparte.
Characters: Captain Jean Delbrey, Beatrice, Father Antonio
Listen for: The hiss and creak of the descending pendulum, the scurrying of rats, and Captain Delbrey's fevered speech as he moves in and out of his visions.
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.