What happens
Private detective Steve Carson is drawn into a blackmail scheme with Verna Sheldon, who holds compromising letters belonging to Charles W. Ralston, a respected businessman. When Verna's plans turn against her, Steve finds himself under suspicion. He tries to build an alibi while pressing Ralston for the letters, but events keep shifting and every arrangement seems to unravel. The Whistler's broadcast from 1946-04-15 follows Steve through a tense web of lies, rivals and alibis, with narration by the Whistler and lead voices heard throughout. The story is told as a sequence of meetings and confrontations between the principal figures.
A city apartment, a mountain cabin near Lake Tahoe, a yacht harbor, and the district attorney's office.
Characters: Steve Carson, Verna Sheldon, Randy Summers, Charles W. Ralston, O'Hara, District Attorney Skelly
Listen for: Pay attention to the competing alibis Steve and Ralston construct, and to the phone call that places Steve at Verna's apartment on the night of the murder.
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.