WEBVTT 00:00.000 --> 00:19.060 You are standing on a bridge over Owl Creek, a noose around your neck. 00:19.060 --> 00:22.920 You have but a few seconds left to live. 00:22.920 --> 00:38.360 A few seconds left to plan your escape. 00:38.360 --> 00:43.080 Escape produced and directed by William N. Robeson and carefully contrived to free you 00:43.080 --> 00:49.360 from the four walls of today for a half hour of high adventure. 00:49.360 --> 00:59.080 Tonight we escape to the war between the states and a muddy stream in Alabama as we recall 00:59.080 --> 01:07.360 one of the great short stories in American literature, an occurrence at Owl Creek Bridge 01:07.360 --> 01:20.520 by Ambrose Fierce. 01:20.520 --> 01:26.400 A man stood upon a railroad bridge in northern Alabama looking down through the tides at 01:26.400 --> 01:29.400 the swift water twenty feet below. 01:29.400 --> 01:33.240 The man's hands were behind his back, the wrists bound with a cord. 01:33.240 --> 01:36.440 A rope closely encircled his neck. 01:36.440 --> 01:41.680 It was attached to a stout cross timber above his head and the slack fell to the level of 01:41.680 --> 01:43.600 his knees. 01:43.600 --> 01:49.360 He watched a piece of dancing driftwood racing down the current beneath his feet. 01:49.360 --> 01:54.840 He thought, if I could just free my hands, I might throw off this noose and dive into 01:54.840 --> 01:55.840 the creek. 01:55.840 --> 01:59.080 If I swam underwater, I'd be safe from their bullets. 01:59.080 --> 02:08.520 If my wind held out, I could make the southern bank, take to the woods and get away home. 02:08.520 --> 02:13.960 Peyton Farquhar, Alabama planter, stood at the end of a plank. 02:13.960 --> 02:18.640 A captain of the Union Army and a sergeant stood at the other end. 02:18.640 --> 02:24.000 When they stepped aside, the plank would tip upward and Peyton Farquhar, Confederate spy, 02:24.000 --> 02:39.760 would slip between the ties to hang above the muddy water of Owl Creek until dead. 02:39.760 --> 02:46.400 Even in this far outpost of Sherman's march to the sea, the formalities of death are observed 02:46.400 --> 02:50.160 by these men who were most familiar with him. 02:50.160 --> 02:54.120 The captain's company is drawn stiffly at attention along the tracks on the northern 02:54.120 --> 02:56.120 side of the bridge. 02:56.120 --> 03:02.200 The lieutenant stands erect on the bank of the stream, the point of his bared saber scraping 03:02.200 --> 03:04.920 the gravel on the road bed. 03:04.920 --> 03:17.080 Peyton Farquhar is being ushered into the Confederate beyond with every Union amenity. 03:17.080 --> 03:19.560 The captain stands aside. 03:19.560 --> 03:24.280 Now only the weight of the bulky sergeant counterbalances Peyton Farquhar at the end 03:24.280 --> 03:25.960 of his thin board. 03:25.960 --> 03:30.800 They say that this is a moment when all the past events of your life tumble into your 03:30.800 --> 03:31.800 memory. 03:31.800 --> 03:38.120 But how could anyone know who has come back from the dead to tell what dying is like? 03:38.120 --> 03:41.660 I don't recall any childhood memories now. 03:41.660 --> 03:45.160 The past does not engulf me in this naked moment. 03:45.160 --> 03:48.640 I'm only aware of what's here now. 03:48.640 --> 03:54.920 Those Yankees lined up on the bank, this captain's tired eyes, that turkey buzzard circling 03:54.920 --> 04:02.400 up there waiting for me, and that noise, that beating driving sound like a distant engine, 04:02.400 --> 04:06.280 a pump, the roll of thunder on a summer evening. 04:06.280 --> 04:15.720 Coming closer, getting louder, choking me. 04:15.720 --> 04:20.160 It's your heart of course that you hear stepping up its cadence, pounding under the force 04:20.160 --> 04:22.060 draft of fear. 04:22.060 --> 04:27.740 Now you see nothing, remember nothing, sense nothing, but this strangling suffocating beat 04:27.740 --> 04:31.080 of your own heart throbbing its final protest. 04:31.080 --> 04:33.880 You stand there erect. 04:33.880 --> 04:36.560 The work is nearly at an end now. 04:36.560 --> 04:42.880 The captain draws his sword, flourishes it to a carry, sings out a command. 04:42.880 --> 04:43.880 Company! 04:43.880 --> 04:44.880 Array! 04:44.880 --> 04:45.880 Rest! 04:45.880 --> 04:55.960 The men on the bank smartly spread their legs, thrust hands forward over the rifle barrels. 04:55.960 --> 04:59.160 The sergeant on the end of the plank takes one step to the left. 04:59.160 --> 05:14.840 The plank tips forward, and Peyton Farquhar drops between the timbers of Owl Creek Bridge. 05:14.840 --> 05:16.520 It takes longer to tell it. 05:16.520 --> 05:19.080 As you drop downward, you lose consciousness. 05:19.080 --> 05:21.080 You are as one already dead. 05:21.080 --> 05:26.600 Then you awaken sharply in pain to feel, not to think, just to feel. 05:26.600 --> 05:30.660 The cutting pressure on your throat, the agonies of pulsating fire shooting from your neck 05:30.660 --> 05:36.320 downward, to feel the fullness, the congestion, the head bursting with suffocation. 05:36.320 --> 05:42.000 Distantly beyond, outside of yourself, you hear a splash. 05:42.000 --> 05:46.480 Remotely you sense cool, wet, green darkness. 05:46.480 --> 05:48.040 The rope has broken. 05:48.040 --> 05:59.320 You have fallen into the stream. 05:59.320 --> 06:02.440 Now thinking returns slowly. 06:02.440 --> 06:06.120 You know for the moment you are safe from drowning, because the rope around your neck 06:06.120 --> 06:09.320 tightly keeps the water from your lungs. 06:09.320 --> 06:12.280 And I shall die hanging at the bottom of a river. 06:12.280 --> 06:13.280 That's absurd. 06:13.280 --> 06:18.280 If I could get my hands free, I must get my hands free. 06:18.280 --> 06:20.800 Come Peyton, they can't lick you. 06:20.800 --> 06:25.480 Try again, once more. 06:25.480 --> 06:27.480 Good boy, the rope's giving. 06:27.480 --> 06:32.320 Again, try once more. 06:32.320 --> 06:33.760 That does it, my boy. 06:33.760 --> 06:35.640 Now the rope around your neck. 06:35.640 --> 06:39.480 You must breathe when you come to the surface, you must breathe quickly. 06:39.480 --> 06:43.880 Or if they haven't hanged you and they failed to drown you, you can't let them shoot you. 06:43.880 --> 06:46.600 Loosen that rope around your neck. 06:46.600 --> 06:48.400 You must get it loose. 06:48.400 --> 06:49.400 Now. 06:49.400 --> 07:01.000 It takes so much longer to tell. 07:01.000 --> 07:06.360 You are now in the fullest possession of your senses, and again time stops. 07:06.360 --> 07:11.640 You feel the ripples of the water upon your face, and hear their separate sounds as they 07:11.640 --> 07:12.640 strike. 07:12.640 --> 07:17.480 You see the trees on the bank, and the leaves, and the veining of each leaf, and the very 07:17.480 --> 07:19.120 insects on them. 07:19.120 --> 07:23.520 The locusts, the brilliant-bodied flies, the grey spiders stretching their webs from twig 07:23.520 --> 07:24.520 to twig. 07:24.520 --> 07:28.560 The prismatic colours of the dewdrops upon a million blades of grass. 07:28.560 --> 07:33.360 You hear the humming of the gnats, the beating of the dragonfly's wings, the strokes of the 07:33.360 --> 07:35.240 water spider's legs. 07:35.240 --> 07:42.920 A fish slides beneath your eyes, and you hear the rush of its body parting the water. 07:42.920 --> 07:48.960 All this you see and hear in an incalculably infinite instant of time. 07:48.960 --> 07:50.240 Then you hear something else. 07:50.240 --> 07:51.240 There he is! 07:51.240 --> 07:52.240 Down there! 07:52.240 --> 07:53.240 Come on, hey! 07:53.240 --> 07:54.240 Come on! 07:54.240 --> 07:55.240 Down the humps! 07:55.240 --> 07:56.240 Ready! 07:56.240 --> 07:57.240 Hey! 07:57.240 --> 08:04.840 You dive deeply, but above the ringing in your ears, you hear the volley of the rifles. 08:04.840 --> 08:10.680 And as you rise toward the surface, you meet shining bits of metal singularly flattened, 08:10.680 --> 08:16.080 the distorted and spent bullets oscillating slowly downward past you. 08:16.080 --> 08:18.560 One catches in your collar, and it feels uncomfortably warm. 08:18.560 --> 08:24.760 You snatch it out, and this grey piece of Yankee lead reminds you of the grey uniform of the 08:24.760 --> 08:28.280 soldier who was responsible for you being here. 08:28.280 --> 08:33.200 You recall that it was only night before last when the soldier had ridden up the driveway 08:33.200 --> 08:36.880 as you and your wife sat under the magnolia trees in the cool twilight. 08:36.880 --> 08:38.880 Good evening, sir. 08:38.880 --> 08:40.360 Good evening, Corporal. 08:40.360 --> 08:44.880 I wonder if I might trouble you for a glass of water, sir. 08:44.880 --> 08:45.880 Why, of course. 08:45.880 --> 08:47.880 Don't disturb yourself, Peyton. 08:47.880 --> 08:49.360 I'll go fetch it. 08:49.360 --> 08:50.740 You're most kind, ma'am. 08:50.740 --> 08:52.680 If you'll just indicate the well... 08:52.680 --> 08:53.680 Nonsense. 08:53.680 --> 08:56.800 You just set a spell with my husband. 08:56.800 --> 08:58.880 You're lucky as if you could do with some rest. 08:58.880 --> 08:59.880 Yes, ma'am. 08:59.880 --> 09:00.880 I reckon I could. 09:00.880 --> 09:03.600 I'll be back in a jiffy. 09:03.600 --> 09:05.600 Thank you, ma'am. 09:05.600 --> 09:08.120 Whose commander are you with, Corporal? 09:08.120 --> 09:10.160 Colonel Tolliver, sir. 09:10.160 --> 09:12.200 13th North Carolina. 09:12.200 --> 09:15.040 We get so little news down here. 09:15.040 --> 09:17.400 How are things going at the front? 09:17.400 --> 09:19.400 Not good, sir. 09:19.400 --> 09:22.480 The Yankees are getting ready for another advance. 09:22.480 --> 09:25.080 They're repairing the railroad. 09:25.080 --> 09:28.720 Got it in shape almost to Owl Creek Bridge. 09:28.720 --> 09:31.480 And they got an outpost there. 09:31.480 --> 09:36.240 Once they can run the trains beyond the bridge, there's nothing to stop them between here 09:36.240 --> 09:37.680 and Atlanta. 09:37.680 --> 09:40.520 Then why hasn't the bridge been destroyed? 09:40.520 --> 09:43.440 The military couldn't get near it. 09:43.440 --> 09:45.360 A civilian might. 09:45.360 --> 09:47.560 Owl Creek Bridge. 09:47.560 --> 09:49.760 That's not far from here, is it? 09:49.760 --> 09:51.400 Less than 20 miles. 09:51.400 --> 09:53.920 You say they have an outpost there. 09:53.920 --> 09:54.920 On which side? 09:54.920 --> 09:57.760 The other side. 09:57.760 --> 10:03.680 Nothing on this side but a couple of pickets half mile out on the railroad and a single 10:03.680 --> 10:06.800 sentinel at this end of the bridge. 10:06.800 --> 10:08.680 And that bridge is important? 10:08.680 --> 10:11.000 Sure is. 10:11.000 --> 10:13.400 What if it were destroyed? 10:13.400 --> 10:16.200 Hold up the Yankees for several weeks. 10:16.200 --> 10:22.080 Because a man, a civilian like myself, should elude the picket post and get the better of 10:22.080 --> 10:23.080 the sentinel. 10:23.080 --> 10:24.880 What could he accomplish? 10:24.880 --> 10:30.840 Well, I was there a week ago just before we had to pull out. 10:30.840 --> 10:35.000 There's a heap of driftwood come down in last winter's flood and caught on the trestle at 10:35.000 --> 10:36.000 this end. 10:36.000 --> 10:39.680 It looked mighty dry and tenderly to me. 10:39.680 --> 10:40.680 I see. 10:40.680 --> 10:45.840 A fellow with enough gumption might get through and set fire to it. 10:45.840 --> 10:47.600 It ought to burn like toe. 10:47.600 --> 10:48.600 Yes, it should. 10:48.600 --> 10:53.000 Of course, a fellow would have to have plenty of gumption. 10:53.000 --> 10:57.920 The Union commander has promised to hang any civilian caught fooling around the railroad. 10:57.920 --> 10:59.800 Here's your water, Corporal. 10:59.800 --> 11:01.960 Right out of the spring house. 11:01.960 --> 11:04.960 Thank you kindly, ma'am. 11:04.960 --> 11:07.840 My, that's cool and nice. 11:07.840 --> 11:10.280 And here's a smidgen of cornbread. 11:10.280 --> 11:12.280 I thought you might be hungry. 11:12.280 --> 11:15.480 I might be grateful, ma'am. 11:15.480 --> 11:19.120 It's ladies like you that keeps themselves together and fighting these days. 11:19.120 --> 11:21.280 My, what a nice company. 11:21.280 --> 11:22.280 It certainly is. 11:22.280 --> 11:24.280 Well, I reckon I better hit the leather. 11:24.280 --> 11:27.480 I got a lot of riding ahead of me tonight. 11:27.480 --> 11:31.280 Good luck to you, Corporal, and thank you for the information. 11:31.280 --> 11:35.200 You'd be taking a chance, sir, but you couldn't do a greater service for your country. 11:35.200 --> 11:36.560 I'll remember that, Corporal. 11:36.560 --> 11:37.560 Goodbye, ma'am. 11:37.560 --> 11:38.560 Goodbye, Corporal. 11:38.560 --> 11:39.560 Goodbye, sir. 11:39.560 --> 11:40.560 Many thanks. 11:40.560 --> 11:41.560 Goodbye. 11:41.560 --> 11:42.560 Peyton. 11:42.560 --> 11:48.640 What was he talking about? 11:48.640 --> 11:49.640 What, my dear? 11:49.640 --> 11:50.640 The Corporal. 11:50.640 --> 11:55.720 What did he mean by service to your country and taking a chance? 11:55.720 --> 11:56.720 Oh, nothing. 11:56.720 --> 11:57.720 Peyton, tell me. 11:57.720 --> 11:59.760 There was nothing, really, my dear. 11:59.760 --> 12:04.120 Peyton Farquhar, if you're fixing to take any chances for our country, I want to know 12:04.120 --> 12:05.120 about it. 12:05.120 --> 12:06.760 Now, you just speak your piece. 12:06.760 --> 12:14.520 There's nothing to say except I'll be going away for a day or two on a little trip. 12:14.520 --> 12:17.320 Is it dangerous, Peyton? 12:17.320 --> 12:19.720 Not very. 12:19.720 --> 12:20.720 You'll be back? 12:20.720 --> 12:21.720 Yes, my dear. 12:21.720 --> 12:35.240 I promise you I'll be back. 12:35.240 --> 12:39.200 You'll break the surface of Owl Creek for a second time, and now you're much further 12:39.200 --> 12:43.960 downstream, further away from the Union soldiers on the bridge reloading their guns, the ram 12:43.960 --> 12:46.120 rods flashing in the morning sun. 12:46.120 --> 12:48.680 That Captain won't make the same mistake again. 12:48.680 --> 12:50.760 He'll order them to fire at will. 12:50.760 --> 12:53.680 Heaven help me, I cannot dodge him. 12:53.680 --> 12:55.360 Another more terrible sound, cannon. 12:55.360 --> 12:57.160 They've trained a cannon on you. 12:57.160 --> 12:58.160 They're close. 12:58.160 --> 13:00.720 Next time, they'll use a charge of grape. 13:00.720 --> 13:03.000 Rifles and grape covering the water from bank to bank. 13:03.000 --> 13:05.000 I'm done for then. 13:05.000 --> 13:09.240 Then something seemed to grab you, and you're whirled round and round spinning like a waterlogged 13:09.240 --> 13:10.240 top. 13:10.240 --> 13:12.000 You're caught in a vortex, a whirlpool. 13:12.000 --> 13:16.000 The water, the banks, the distant bridge, the soldiers become indistinct blurs, and 13:16.000 --> 13:17.000 again you're helpless. 13:17.000 --> 13:22.760 You feel dizzy and sick to your stomach, just as you felt last night when you crept up the 13:22.760 --> 13:26.520 bank toward the lone sentinel on the south end of the bridge and discovered that the 13:26.520 --> 13:28.400 sentinel was not alone. 13:28.400 --> 13:29.400 There he is, boys. 13:29.400 --> 13:30.400 Grab him. 13:30.400 --> 13:31.400 Got him, son. 13:31.400 --> 13:35.160 Ah, well, Mr. Payton Park, while we've been expecting you. 13:35.160 --> 13:36.560 How did you know my name was... 13:36.560 --> 13:37.560 We got waves. 13:37.560 --> 13:38.560 But look here, I'm a civilian. 13:38.560 --> 13:39.560 I would just... 13:39.560 --> 13:43.000 Save your breath and thank your maker we didn't shoot you in the back. 13:43.000 --> 13:44.840 We don't do things that way up north. 13:44.840 --> 13:47.680 You'll get a trial, everything fair and square. 13:47.680 --> 13:50.680 Bring him along, man. 13:50.680 --> 13:55.520 The whirlpool spins faster and faster. 13:55.520 --> 13:57.600 A sharp piece of dirt would tear at your coat. 13:57.600 --> 13:59.440 The churning groundwater chokes you. 13:59.440 --> 14:04.040 You know there is nothing you can do, as you had known it last night when they shoved you 14:04.040 --> 14:08.360 into a tent near the bridge to face the infantry captain with the tired eyes. 14:08.360 --> 14:10.400 There he is, sir. 14:10.400 --> 14:11.400 Right on schedule. 14:11.400 --> 14:12.400 Good work, Sergeant. 14:12.400 --> 14:15.120 Is this the man, Lieutenant? 14:15.120 --> 14:16.120 That's him. 14:16.120 --> 14:17.120 What? 14:17.120 --> 14:20.000 You're the corporal who stopped at my plantation last night. 14:20.000 --> 14:24.040 That's right, Mr. Farquhar, but I'm not with the 13th North Carolina Volunteers. 14:24.040 --> 14:28.760 Mr. Farquhar, this is Lieutenant Salt and Stole Intelligence Officer, 5th Massachusetts 14:28.760 --> 14:29.760 Regulars. 14:29.760 --> 14:30.760 You've trapped me. 14:30.760 --> 14:32.880 You deliberately led me into a trap. 14:32.880 --> 14:34.480 I'm a civilian in a plantation. 14:34.480 --> 14:38.160 Yes, and also a southern patriot caught in the act of espionage. 14:38.160 --> 14:39.160 You can't prove it. 14:39.160 --> 14:40.640 We don't have to. 14:40.640 --> 14:43.400 This is the most despicable, the most... 14:43.400 --> 14:46.240 This proves once more that honor is a stranger in the North. 14:46.240 --> 14:50.320 I'm too tired to listen to a recital of the code of a southern gentleman, Mr. Farquhar. 14:50.320 --> 14:54.800 I'm afraid the distinction between your ethics and my lack of them would escape me this evening. 14:54.800 --> 14:56.400 But why have you done this? 14:56.400 --> 14:57.920 Why have you deliberately trapped me? 14:57.920 --> 15:02.320 The best way to eliminate civilian resistance is to lure it into the open. 15:02.320 --> 15:03.320 You fell for the bait. 15:03.320 --> 15:04.320 Too bad. 15:04.320 --> 15:06.760 Now, look here, it's my constitutional right to... 15:06.760 --> 15:08.640 Which, which constitution? 15:08.640 --> 15:11.840 The Constitution of the United States or Jeff Davis's? 15:11.840 --> 15:12.840 You insulting Yankees. 15:12.840 --> 15:14.720 Remember your manners, sir. 15:14.720 --> 15:15.840 I demand a trial. 15:15.840 --> 15:18.840 You've just had it. 15:18.840 --> 15:20.880 Post a guard over him, Sergeant. 15:20.880 --> 15:21.880 Yes, sir. 15:21.880 --> 15:30.840 I'll hang him in the morning. 15:30.840 --> 15:35.400 Something tears at your face, scratching, and you realize that the whirling has stopped. 15:35.400 --> 15:37.160 You open your eyes. 15:37.160 --> 15:41.280 You're lying on the southern bank of the stream, out of sight of your enemies. 15:41.280 --> 15:42.280 Safe. 15:42.280 --> 15:47.960 The gravel which has scratched your cheek now seems soft as new-picked cotton. 15:47.960 --> 15:54.040 The forest around you is a garden of luscious beauty, reeking with a heavy perfume of freedom. 15:54.040 --> 15:58.560 Even the whiz and rattle of the final charge of grapes screaming through the treetops seems 15:58.560 --> 16:01.600 a benediction from the baffled cannoneer. 16:01.600 --> 16:11.440 You leap to your feet and run into the woods, south, towards home. 16:11.440 --> 16:13.760 Your neck is swollen and throbbing with pain. 16:13.760 --> 16:17.320 You carry it cocked toward your left shoulder as you push through the matted brush. 16:17.320 --> 16:19.520 All morning you tear your way through the undergrowth. 16:19.520 --> 16:25.080 Your jacket is tattered and your face crisscrossed with bloody scratches from the brambles. 16:25.080 --> 16:28.380 Every few moments you stop. 16:28.380 --> 16:33.240 You stop to listen for the sound of dogs, but all you hear is the sleepy buzz of the 16:33.240 --> 16:36.120 forest. 16:36.120 --> 16:40.720 And the blood throbbing through your heated brain brings another thought, which is an 16:40.720 --> 16:41.720 insult. 16:41.720 --> 16:43.920 No dogs. 16:43.920 --> 16:48.760 You are not even important enough to the Yankees for dogs. 16:48.760 --> 16:56.840 It's nearly noon now and for half an hour you've been plunging through a swamp, waist-deep 16:56.840 --> 16:59.360 in green ooze. 16:59.360 --> 17:01.120 Your neck hurts constantly. 17:01.120 --> 17:03.320 Your head throbs and your tongue is thick. 17:03.320 --> 17:05.520 It tastes like brown cotton. 17:05.520 --> 17:09.560 Gnats swarm before your eyes, catching in your eyelids, mosquitoes buzz in your ears, 17:09.560 --> 17:12.360 drill deep in your hands and swirl a neck. 17:12.360 --> 17:14.880 You cannot go any longer. 17:14.880 --> 17:16.880 You slow down. 17:16.880 --> 17:18.580 You stop. 17:18.580 --> 17:22.520 You reach toward a palmetto root for support and it slithers from your grasp and slides 17:22.520 --> 17:25.520 softly into the water. 17:25.520 --> 17:27.560 Water moccasin. 17:27.560 --> 17:29.680 Fear finds you at last. 17:29.680 --> 17:34.240 Terror, which stood aloof when you fled the executioner's bullets, now embraces you with 17:34.240 --> 17:35.760 clammy unction. 17:35.760 --> 17:39.880 A water moccasin, that deadly cotton mouth. 17:39.880 --> 17:43.280 Now each branch and root seems to writhe under your glance. 17:43.280 --> 17:45.680 The swamp is undulating with certain death. 17:45.680 --> 17:49.920 You plunge on through the dark, stinking ooze, on and on, tripping, stumbling, never stopping, 17:49.920 --> 17:53.400 for terror rides your back, clogging you with a whiplash of fear. 17:53.400 --> 18:10.920 Oh, Jethro, good to have Master Payton finish the fiddle in jim time. 18:10.920 --> 18:13.800 You just drink this here yop tea, Master Payton. 18:13.800 --> 18:14.800 Thank you. 18:14.800 --> 18:15.800 Thank you. 18:15.800 --> 18:16.800 Jethro. 18:16.800 --> 18:19.560 Yes, sir, Master Payton. 18:19.560 --> 18:20.560 What are you doing here? 18:20.560 --> 18:22.200 I live here. 18:22.200 --> 18:23.680 You live... 18:23.680 --> 18:25.480 Well, what happened? 18:25.480 --> 18:30.200 I was paddling my dog out home through the swamp with a mess of catfish. 18:30.200 --> 18:34.200 I see you lying out there on the bank in front of my cabin. 18:34.200 --> 18:36.360 Jethro, I heard... 18:36.360 --> 18:40.280 I thought you were dead. 18:40.280 --> 18:42.680 Of course you thought Jethro was dead. 18:42.680 --> 18:45.240 You knew he had consumption when you sold him. 18:45.240 --> 18:48.480 You knew he couldn't last long and he wasn't earning his keep. 18:48.480 --> 18:52.600 His wife and his daughter carried on some at first, but after a while they calmed down. 18:52.600 --> 18:55.520 And last you'd heard, Jethro was dead. 18:55.520 --> 18:59.320 You thought I was dead, Master Payton? 18:59.320 --> 19:02.280 Why, sir, don't you know what's happened to me? 19:02.280 --> 19:03.640 I'm free. 19:03.640 --> 19:05.080 I'm free at last. 19:05.080 --> 19:07.840 So news travels fast. 19:07.840 --> 19:12.160 Even in the middle of this backward swamp, this lonely black has heard of Abe Lincoln's 19:12.160 --> 19:15.420 traitorous Emancipation Proclamation. 19:15.420 --> 19:18.040 And they believe it with the faith of children. 19:18.040 --> 19:20.240 Yes, sir, I'm free. 19:20.240 --> 19:24.280 I expect pretty soon my woman, my little gal, will come along and join me. 19:24.280 --> 19:26.680 Yes, yes, of course they will, Jethro. 19:26.680 --> 19:29.680 Is they, Master Payton, is they well? 19:29.680 --> 19:32.360 Yes, yes, indeed they're both fine. 19:32.360 --> 19:34.720 Your daughter's growing into a young beauty. 19:34.720 --> 19:38.560 Miss Fark was brought into the kitchen, beginning to train her for the house. 19:38.560 --> 19:41.560 Well, well, what do you think of that? 19:41.560 --> 19:46.160 And my woman, she still seems pretty. 19:46.160 --> 19:48.840 Yes, Jethro, Sunday's at meeting time. 19:48.840 --> 19:51.000 We can hear all the way up to the big house. 19:51.000 --> 19:54.600 That woman's voice has put in all the angels. 19:54.600 --> 20:01.180 Jethro, I don't know how to say this, but I really was sorry about having to sell you, 20:01.180 --> 20:02.680 but there wasn't anything else. 20:02.680 --> 20:04.520 I understand, Master Payton. 20:04.520 --> 20:05.520 Don't pay it no mind. 20:05.520 --> 20:07.920 I done forgive you long ago. 20:07.920 --> 20:09.640 Yeah, I have. 20:09.640 --> 20:10.640 Sure. 20:10.640 --> 20:14.200 Don't the Lord tell us to forgive those who trespass against us? 20:14.200 --> 20:17.200 Don't the Lord promise us we shall be free? 20:17.200 --> 20:20.200 Why don't you worry none about it, Master Payton? 20:20.200 --> 20:24.560 Here now, quiet that spot, quiet, chicken, quiet, you. 20:24.560 --> 20:28.200 Must have heard a razor back in the brush. 20:28.200 --> 20:29.200 No siree. 20:29.200 --> 20:33.600 Look, Master Payton, there's a horse coming down the road. 20:33.600 --> 20:34.600 A horse? 20:34.600 --> 20:36.720 Look there, soldier. 20:36.720 --> 20:38.640 When our soldiers' corporal look like. 20:38.640 --> 20:40.040 Jethro, you've got to hide me. 20:40.040 --> 20:42.720 Why's I got to hide you, Master Payton? 20:42.720 --> 20:44.600 Only so many questions you insolence. 20:44.600 --> 20:48.320 Master Payton, you forgets I'm free now. 20:48.320 --> 20:52.280 Well then, as an old friend of mine, please don't ask any questions. 20:52.280 --> 20:53.280 Just hide me. 20:53.280 --> 20:54.280 Don't tell that soldier anything. 20:54.280 --> 20:57.720 Well sure, I reckon I can do that for an old friend, Master Payton. 20:57.720 --> 21:00.160 Here, here, you get down on the dish here a bit. 21:00.160 --> 21:01.160 That's it. 21:01.160 --> 21:02.760 Put the covers over the side. 21:02.760 --> 21:03.760 There you are. 21:03.760 --> 21:07.000 Snuggles are taking the rabbits here. 21:07.000 --> 21:08.800 Remember, don't tell him anything. 21:08.800 --> 21:13.560 If you come this far just to be turned in by a wool-gathering black who talks crazy. 21:13.560 --> 21:17.920 If Jethro knew this gray-clad corporal was really a Union lieutenant, he'd guarantee 21:17.920 --> 21:20.040 his freedom by turning you in. 21:20.040 --> 21:22.920 Even so, he bears you a big enough grudge to turn you in anyway. 21:22.920 --> 21:26.320 Unless, of course, he's planning to dispose of you himself. 21:26.320 --> 21:28.440 Yes, that's it. 21:28.440 --> 21:31.320 That's why he talks so silly about the Lord and forgiveness. 21:31.320 --> 21:32.320 He's going to do you in himself. 21:32.320 --> 21:35.560 Well, if you run into him, don't tell him I was looking for him. 21:35.560 --> 21:38.320 Yes, I remember not telling. 21:38.320 --> 21:40.880 Just keep minding your own business, Uncle. 21:40.880 --> 21:41.880 You live longer. 21:41.880 --> 21:42.880 Get up there. 21:42.880 --> 21:43.880 Yes, I sure will. 21:43.880 --> 21:46.880 Come out now, Master Payton. 21:46.880 --> 21:54.360 I declare, I don't understand none of this. 21:54.360 --> 21:55.920 You says not telling you're here. 21:55.920 --> 21:58.040 He says not telling you he's been here. 21:58.040 --> 22:00.720 What's this all about, Master Payton? 22:00.720 --> 22:04.160 Boy, it's nothing, Jethro, nothing. 22:04.160 --> 22:06.240 I owe the man some money. 22:06.240 --> 22:08.280 I'm not ready to pay it yet. 22:08.280 --> 22:10.160 Oh, I see. 22:10.160 --> 22:12.320 I wouldn't know about that. 22:12.320 --> 22:16.400 Money something never bothered me like it bothered some. 22:16.400 --> 22:18.680 Money and me is always been strangers. 22:18.680 --> 22:20.560 What do you mean by that? 22:20.560 --> 22:22.880 Money's never bothered me like it's bothered some. 22:22.880 --> 22:25.800 What's he picking up that knife for? 22:25.800 --> 22:28.000 Jethro, what are you going to do with that knife? 22:28.000 --> 22:31.360 Oh, I'm just fixing to slit up some of them catfish. 22:31.360 --> 22:32.920 I've gotten a dug out. 22:32.920 --> 22:36.400 Look like you could do with a little fool, Master Payton. 22:36.400 --> 22:37.400 Oh, no. 22:37.400 --> 22:38.480 No, thank you, Jethro. 22:38.480 --> 22:39.760 I really got to be on my way. 22:39.760 --> 22:41.560 I want to get home by sundown if I can. 22:41.560 --> 22:44.280 Sure wouldn't be no bother to cut up a couple of cats. 22:44.280 --> 22:46.320 No, thank you, old friend. 22:46.320 --> 22:48.840 If you'll just tell me which way I should go to get home. 22:48.840 --> 22:53.360 Well, I don't rightly know, Master Payton. 22:53.360 --> 22:58.800 I reckon from the way the sun's reclining be down the road that way. 22:58.800 --> 23:00.120 Quite a tolerable piece. 23:00.120 --> 23:03.000 Yeah, that should be about right. 23:03.000 --> 23:05.800 I never been back, you know. 23:05.800 --> 23:09.000 I never tried to go back since I've been free. 23:09.000 --> 23:10.000 Yes, I know. 23:10.000 --> 23:15.560 But I reckon it won't be long till my woman, my little gal comes here to me. 23:15.560 --> 23:16.560 Of course. 23:16.560 --> 23:24.960 Now, if you get back, Master Payton, if you see him, you tell him I'm here waiting for 23:24.960 --> 23:25.960 him. 23:25.960 --> 23:26.960 You hear? 23:26.960 --> 23:27.960 Yeah, I'll do that, Jethro. 23:27.960 --> 23:28.960 I'll do that. 23:28.960 --> 23:35.760 You get away from there fast, the shelves of the road crunching under your muddy boots. 23:35.760 --> 23:41.080 That grinning savage standing in the doorway of the shack, the knife in his hands. 23:41.080 --> 23:45.120 And each moment until the road bends and cuts off the cabin from view, you fear he'll come 23:45.120 --> 23:49.080 after you, the knife poised to plunge on your back, to pay you for the thrust you gave him 23:49.080 --> 23:51.840 when you sent him away to die. 23:51.840 --> 23:55.520 But he's still standing, grinning foolishly and waving as you turn the bend. 23:55.520 --> 23:58.040 Now you feel safe, but only for a moment. 23:58.040 --> 24:00.360 Then you hear a sound. 24:00.360 --> 24:02.000 The sound of a horse. 24:02.000 --> 24:05.200 It must be the corporal in gray from the 5th Massachusetts regulars. 24:05.200 --> 24:08.500 He's coming back down the road searching for you, hounding you, coming to take you back 24:08.500 --> 24:12.360 to Owl Creek Bridge, back to a rope that won't break under your weight. 24:12.360 --> 24:16.520 You walk faster and faster and always the sound is there growing louder and louder. 24:16.520 --> 24:20.240 And you run as fast as you can down the shell road, which stretches clear to the horizon 24:20.240 --> 24:26.040 between the green walls of scrubby pines. 24:26.040 --> 24:28.920 How long have you been running down this endless road? 24:28.920 --> 24:30.280 It's dark now. 24:30.280 --> 24:31.280 Is it night? 24:31.280 --> 24:35.840 Or has the blood trapped in your head by the suffocating rope at last burst into your congested 24:35.840 --> 24:38.080 eyeballs and blinded you? 24:38.080 --> 24:42.520 Will it next pour from your swollen and bruised neck into your brain, stopping all sensation, 24:42.520 --> 24:47.160 instantly bringing to a welcome end this day of agony and flight? 24:47.160 --> 24:49.400 Ridiculous fantasies of fatigue and fear. 24:49.400 --> 24:52.600 You can see the darkness is the black of a sudden summer storm. 24:52.600 --> 24:56.600 That lightning flash clearly shows the white road ahead and the black silhouettes of trees 24:56.600 --> 24:57.820 along the sides. 24:57.820 --> 25:01.080 And since you're sure that you can see, the other senses return. 25:01.080 --> 25:02.640 You hear the rumble of the thunder. 25:02.640 --> 25:07.240 You feel the insupportable ache of your straining lungs, the leaden weight of your tired feet, 25:07.240 --> 25:10.840 and now the patter of rain, first washing the stinging sweat from your scratched and 25:10.840 --> 25:15.280 bitten face, now pounding harder, flowing down across your hatless head, matting your 25:15.280 --> 25:20.980 hair, slowing your headlong gait to a dog trot. 25:20.980 --> 25:23.280 Another flash of lightning directly overhead. 25:23.280 --> 25:27.360 For an instant, you see the soldiers of Owl Creek Bridge standing at the side of the road, 25:27.360 --> 25:34.720 rifles leveled, their eyes boring down the sights, aiming at your heart. 25:34.720 --> 25:37.760 Again you're running, and the rain has turned to hail. 25:37.760 --> 25:42.000 Pellets as big as harmony beat down on you, pound your swollen bruised neck, hammer at 25:42.000 --> 25:46.000 your countless cuts. 25:46.000 --> 25:47.200 Again the lightning. 25:47.200 --> 25:51.240 And on the other side of the road, the gray-clad corporal sits astride his horse waiting for 25:51.240 --> 25:52.240 you. 25:52.240 --> 25:53.240 No! 25:53.240 --> 25:54.240 No, you can't get me now! 25:54.240 --> 25:55.240 No! 25:55.240 --> 26:00.520 This bolt of lightning strikes a tree ahead of you, and in the white blinding light stands 26:00.520 --> 26:03.600 Jethro, black and grinning, knife raised in the air. 26:03.600 --> 26:04.600 No! 26:04.600 --> 26:05.600 No, Jethro! 26:05.600 --> 26:06.600 Forgive me! 26:06.600 --> 26:07.600 Forgive me! 26:07.600 --> 26:12.800 He's gone, and now you see dangling from each tree along the road a noose swinging in the 26:12.800 --> 26:13.800 wind. 26:13.800 --> 26:17.320 Wherever you turn, wherever you look, a noose waiting for you, a noose which wriggles like 26:17.320 --> 26:18.320 a water moccasin. 26:18.320 --> 26:19.320 No! 26:19.320 --> 26:33.560 No! 26:33.560 --> 26:39.040 You are standing on the green lawn of your plantation before the high-columned entrance. 26:39.040 --> 26:40.920 The storm is over. 26:40.920 --> 26:45.920 The clouds are black and menacing all around the horizon, but through a break in the sky 26:45.920 --> 26:53.200 ahead, glorious sunlight streams down, bathing your garden and your house in heavenly light. 26:53.200 --> 26:55.560 You are home. 26:55.560 --> 27:01.080 And now you hear a rustle of crinoline, and down from the wide portico steps your beloved 27:01.080 --> 27:02.080 wife. 27:02.080 --> 27:05.560 She walks across the wide lawn, arms outstretched. 27:05.560 --> 27:14.160 Peyton, my dear, you're back, just as you promised you'd be. 27:14.160 --> 27:18.800 For this moment, you have endured the agonies of this day. 27:18.800 --> 27:24.080 And were those agonies multiplied a thousand times, they would be small price for the benison 27:24.080 --> 27:31.420 of this breast, the sanctuary of these arms, the security of these lips. 27:31.420 --> 27:37.540 You step forward to fold your wife in your embrace. 27:37.540 --> 27:43.040 The rope stretched tight, sang like a bowstring. 27:43.040 --> 27:46.520 Peyton Farquhar was dead. 27:46.520 --> 27:59.040 His body with a broken neck swung gently from side to side beneath the timbers of Owl Creek 27:59.040 --> 28:00.040 Bridge. 28:00.040 --> 28:19.600 Escape is produced and directed by William N. Robeson, and tonight brought you An Occurrence 28:19.600 --> 28:24.920 at Owl Creek Bridge by Ambrose Bearse in a radio adaptation written by Mr. Robeson. 28:24.920 --> 28:28.520 The part of Peyton Farquhar was played by Harry Bartell. 28:28.520 --> 28:31.160 The narrators were Bill Conrad and Bill Johnstone. 28:31.160 --> 28:33.240 Jethro was played by Louis Van Roeten. 28:33.240 --> 28:39.240 The special musical score was conceived and conducted by Cy Fuhr. 28:39.240 --> 28:41.840 Next week. 28:41.840 --> 28:49.880 You are trapped in the pitch darkness of a ruined mansion, and groping for you, stalking 28:49.880 --> 29:04.200 you is a homicidal maniac armed with a knife from whom you must escape. 29:04.200 --> 29:08.600 Next week, we escape with Joseph Hergesheimer's gripping story, Wild Oranges. 29:08.600 --> 29:13.520 Good night then until the same time next week when we again offer you Escape. 29:13.520 --> 29:27.280 This is CBS, the Columbia Broadcasting System.