What happens
George Rush is at the library table doing algebra when his friend Stacey Yapp asks him to help prepare a speech for the Breck Kentucky Hotel lobby, where lonely older bachelors live. George, acting as secretary, reads from a set of reference volumes while the two talk about the hotel's small audience. Each time they count the expected listeners, more of them turn out to have other plans, including a movie opening and a sick friend. The speech subject is good sportsmanship in modern business, but the reading keeps going astray into Latin and florid love poetry. Their plans keep shifting as the audience dwindles and the evening's noise becomes a problem.
The living room of the small house halfway up the next block, late afternoon.
Characters: George Rush, Stacey Yapp, Mr. Gunnup, Mr. Jeffrey, Mr. Cunningham, Mr. Montgomery, Mr. Slatcher, Mr. Yammerly
Listen for: The shrinking audience count at the Breck Kentucky Hotel as each expected guest drops out.
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.