What happens
Private detective John Dougherty investigates after a funeral hearse collides with his car and its coffin turns out to hold sand and a wax-faced dummy instead of a body. Hired by wealthy automobile manufacturer Harlan Ward Sr., who believes his son may be alive, Dougherty commits himself as a patient to Dr. Grimshaw's private sanitarium. There he meets fellow patient Arthur Kay and witnesses troubling activity in a neighboring charity clinic. This episode of X Minus One, a science fiction anthology, first aired on July 14, 1955, and is narrated through a manuscript Dougherty left behind. The story is presented as a manuscript found by police in a fountain pen cover.
Late 1940s New York State, including a cemetery road near Buffalo, a wealthy family's estate, and Dr. Grimshaw's private sanitarium outside the town.
Characters: John Dougherty, Millicent Armbruster, Harlan Ward Sr., Dr. Grimshaw, Dr. Boyner, Arthur Kay, Count Kreeke, Harlan Ward
Listen for: Dr. Grimshaw's sanitarium, the wall to the charity clinic, and the scene where Dougherty and Arthur Kay look through the basement window.
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.