And now, tonight's presentation of radio's outstanding theater of thrills, Suspense.
Tonight, the story of a woman who can't escape from her dreams.
We call it, I Saw Myself Running.
So now, starring Miss Charlotte Lawrence, here is tonight's Suspense play, I Saw Myself
Running.
I'll serve you the magazine section, sweetie.
Thanks.
You want the woman's page?
No thanks.
Ready?
Hmm?
I had the strangest dream last night.
It scared me.
Why didn't you wake me up?
Why?
I wouldn't have done any good.
The funniest thing, it was a nightmare I guess.
You know, the kind where you see yourself running away from something or somebody.
Too much brandy.
I want to ask you, it's very important.
What darling?
You notice how sometimes in a dream, everything is happening to you, then suddenly you find
yourself standing there watching it, watching yourself.
And you say, it's a dream and I don't have to be frightened because in a minute I'll
wake up.
Yeah, I guess so.
Well last night, a lot of other nights it's been different.
Starts the same way.
I'm running away.
Somebody I don't know is following me and then there are two of us, both me, running.
Coffee still hot?
Freddie.
Sue.
Honey, I don't know anything about dreams.
If you want to know what I think it means, I don't know.
Offhand I'd say that last brandy.
More coffee?
How do you explain a dream?
You don't.
You can't.
At first it frightens you, then as the morning passes it fades.
My lunchtime is forgotten.
Freddie and I went to bed early that night.
I think I was a little surprised when it began again.
I didn't realize I was asleep yet but it was there, the same as the last time.
A face far away.
Around it was a piece of cardboard with circles drawn on it, the face in the center and it
went round and round.
First only a dot and then it came closer.
The noise came with it and everything was spinning so much it made me dizzy.
But I could always see it right side up.
It was very close to me and the face was somebody's I'd never seen before.
It was a man I think and I knew that he didn't care and I wanted to cry.
Then it was gone.
I was alone in a big hall and I thought I'd seen the place before but I couldn't have
because I knew it was only a dream.
Even then I knew I was dreaming because I could see myself.
There was a wide staircase going up into a dark place that was higher than any place
I'd ever seen.
I was at the foot of the stairs looking up.
My face was frightened.
I saw myself open my mouth to say something, to call upstairs into the dark.
Don't come down please, don't.
I don't want to see you.
I'm afraid.
Don't come down.
But I'd never heard myself before.
Not really.
I always thought I'd said things in dreams but not this way.
Not so that I really heard and the voice wasn't my own.
I found myself looking up the staircase with her and there were two of us standing next
to each other touching.
I could feel her hand.
It was warm.
Don't.
You mustn't come down.
Who is it?
I don't know Susan.
I never know but it's up there in the shadows.
What does it look like?
Listen.
I'm afraid.
It'll come down soon and I'll try to run but I won't be able to get away.
It's always the same.
This is a dream.
It's a dream.
I'm having a dream.
I can wake up now if I want to.
I'll be here alone then.
You always leave me here alone.
That's silly.
How can I leave you alone when you're me?
It's only a dream.
I can wake up now.
No.
You've got to stay this time.
Look up there.
It'll be coming down in a minute.
We'll have to run.
I won't run.
I always do.
I have to.
No.
I want to see it.
It'll kill you if you stay.
How do you know you haven't even seen it?
It'll kill me too.
I'm afraid.
This is a dream.
There's nothing to be afraid of.
It's coming down.
Run.
We ran.
The both of us.
And all this time and all my dreams that girl I'd seen hadn't been me at all.
And then the great hall and staircase wasn't there.
We were in a lovely garden.
It was very quiet except for a single bird.
And it sang strangely and sadly.
Why do you dream?
What a silly question.
Everybody dreams.
If you didn't dream I wouldn't have to be here.
I wouldn't be afraid all the time.
There's nothing to be afraid of.
It's warm.
So peaceful.
Look at the roses.
The caterpillars.
I'm afraid of caterpillars.
I used to be.
I'm not anymore.
I'm still afraid of them.
I remember the first time you dreamed of them.
You've been frightened when one crawled on your hand.
You were very small then.
That's the first time I had to be afraid of them.
That was a long time ago.
I don't mind them now.
I do.
I mind everything you think you've forgotten.
Look.
There's one crawling on my hand.
It's a cat.
You've been frightened when one crawled on your hand.
With a cat.
It's a cat.
I'm afraid of them.
That is my dream.
My dream.
With passengers, I'm a cat.
Not anymore.
No, go away.
I need to go away through this code.
It's only a dream.
You think it's only a道m.
We live with this all the time.
Where are we going?
I don't know.
Look.
We're going to fall.
We're going to fall now.
It'll be all right.
We've got our parachutes on.
I know.
You have to count to three or ten and then pull the ring.
I've seen them do it in the movies.
We'll be all right.
We'll jump.
No, I can't.
I can't.
We've got to.
I can't.
It's such a nice floating sensation.
I know ideally we were so high.
I've got to count to ten and then we'll be all right.
I can't.
We will.
Count to ten and then pull the ring.
One.
Two.
Three.
Four.
Five.
Zero.
Six.
Seven.
Eight.
Nine.
Ten.
I can't find it.
I can't find it!
It won't work.
I'm going to die.
I'm falling!
I'm going to die!
I'll tell you how to find it.
It's got nothing to do with us.
No!
Honey, wake up.
Susan, wake up. You're dreaming.
Susan.
Oh, Freddy.
It's all right. You're okay now.
It was a nightmare.
I was falling.
I fell out of an airplane.
I was going to die.
It's all right.
You're right here.
Everything's fine and it's nearly four o'clock.
Come on.
You climb in with me.
Freddy.
I don't want to dream anymore.
I'm afraid.
It was like last night, the other nights.
But worse.
Now listen, Soze.
Look at me.
Do I sound the same?
Honey, you're the same.
But there's two of us.
When I go to sleep, when I dream, there's another woman there.
That's who I've been seeing all these years.
It's someone else. She's there all the time.
Freddy, I don't want to dream anymore.
Something's going to happen.
I'm afraid.
You are listening to I Saw Myself Running.
Tonight's presentation in radio's outstanding theater of thrills, Suspense.
There are more people in hospitals with mental illness than with polio, cancer, heart disease, TB, and all other diseases put together.
Let's stop the spread of mental illness right now.
Help your mental health association in its fight for better hospitals, more clinics, and more research.
Give today to your mental health fund.
And now we bring back to our Hollywood soundstage, Miss Charlotte Lawrence, starring in tonight's production of I Saw Myself Running,
a tale well calculated to keep you in suspense.
Freddy took me to the doctor. I tried to tell him about the dreams.
When I finished, he examined me, tested my heart and blood pressure. Then he said,
Susan, you're tired. That's what's the matter with you.
But I haven't been doing anything to be tired. Really, I haven't.
You're overwrought. Well, it's not serious. You're in good shape. But what you need is to get away for a few days.
I feel all right. Just that dream, the girl, the one who looks like me.
I want you to forget about that dream. It's only because you're tired that you have the dream in the first place.
Now, I'm going to give you a sedative to take just before going to bed.
A few nights good sleep and you'll be fit as a fiddle.
I don't want to dream anymore. That's all.
Patted me on the arm, smiling. Freddy smiled.
I took the little box of sedative pills home with me.
I couldn't tell them. I couldn't make them understand.
That night I decided that I wouldn't sleep. I'd stay awake.
And if I was awake, I couldn't dream.
At seven o'clock when Freddy got up, I pretended to still be asleep.
I heard him making coffee. Then he came back in, kissed me, left for the office.
Somehow I stayed awake the whole day.
I tried to buy something at the drugstore to stop me from sleeping.
They wouldn't give it to me without a prescription.
And then at five o'clock Freddy called to say he had to entertain some out of town people that night.
After that I had to lie down on the living room couch because I felt sick.
I won't. I won't.
I'm not going to go to sleep.
Oh, I've got to lie down for a while.
In a minute I'll feel all right.
And I can get up.
In a minute.
There's that big hall again. On the staircase.
I can see her looking up into the dark.
You didn't come last night.
I know.
I was waiting here.
It didn't come down though. The thing up there.
You couldn't have been here.
I was waiting for you.
There's the thing up there.
You couldn't have been here. You're only me in a dream.
When I don't dream you're not here.
I'm always here. I have to see the things happen.
Things don't really happen in dreams. It's imagination.
Oh, no. It isn't.
Look up there in the dark. It's up there.
Waiting.
Soon it'll start to come down.
How do you know?
It does. And we'll have to run.
But if we run we can't see it.
Perhaps if we didn't run and we saw it, we wouldn't be afraid anymore.
It's going to come down. I know it is.
We won't run. We'll wait for it.
I can't. I'm afraid.
You're me. I'm not afraid now. You can't be.
Look.
The darkness at the top of the stairs seemed to move, take shape.
And I saw, heard her screaming.
Ah! Ah!
Slowly, painfully, she turned away from the stairs and tried to run.
Her legs moved, but she stayed in the same place.
Then the darkness started to come toward us.
It swirled down the stairs and there was a figure in it and a face.
But the mouth and the face wasn't a mouth at all.
It had no form.
And the face changed and grew bigger, came closer.
Around it an awful blackness.
And I saw myself running.
We were standing in a narrow stone passageway.
It was cold and damp.
And the other girl who wasn't me was holding a gun.
We both were.
And we looked behind us because around the corner, out of sight,
it was following.
I heard the telephone ringing.
And I couldn't understand how there could be a telephone in that place.
I'm tired. I can't run anymore.
We'll rest for a minute.
It sounds like my telephone.
How can it be?
Because this is only a dream.
If I wake up, I'll answer it.
It's on the table at the end of the couch.
I can wake up and answer it.
No, you can't. I won't let you.
I'm not going to stay here alone.
I've got to wake up.
You can't now.
We've got to run again. It'll catch us.
No.
Hurry.
I felt the cold horror behind us.
And I ran, following the twisting passageway.
And I knew that the telephone had been my last chance,
my last chance to wake up.
And I hadn't.
I couldn't.
There's a light ahead.
It won't dare to follow us into the light.
Are you tired?
Are you?
No.
It's funny how we seem to almost float.
I'm not tired at all.
I don't think we need the guns now.
I'm going to throw mine away.
I'm not.
I'm afraid of guns.
I used to be.
I'm not anymore.
Wait a minute.
Those two men.
You see, in the entrance?
Yes.
I wonder why they're there.
Maybe they'll try to stop us getting out.
It'll be all right.
Come on.
It's Freddy.
Freddy and Dr. Peters.
I know.
Freddy?
It's me, Susan.
Stay where you are, Susan.
Don't come any closer.
But it's following us.
We've got to get out.
We'll have to go back.
No.
Go back, Susan.
Go back into the passage.
Oh, no.
No.
You can't come out anymore, Susan.
Oh, but I must.
Let me talk to them, Susan.
You let me talk to them.
I'll take care of it.
You'll see.
I saw her walk slowly to the entrance,
to where it was light and there was sunshine.
And the three of them talked very quietly.
I couldn't hear what they were saying,
but I knew it was about me.
And ever so faintly, I heard the sound of the thing
that was waiting somewhere in the blackness of the passage.
She was pointing at me, and Freddy was laughing.
And it made me angry, so angry that I forgot to be afraid.
I ran over to them, and as I did so,
they blocked the entrance, linking
their arms to keep me back.
She's told us all about you, Susan.
It's taken us a long time to find you out.
Oh, stop it.
There's no such person.
She's me.
She's Susan.
This is only a dream, and I can wake up whenever I want.
Stop it.
It's true.
Ask her.
She'll tell you.
My dear Susan, how can we ask her
if you say she doesn't exist?
You're tired over rocks.
Oh, I'm not.
You mustn't say that.
It isn't true.
Please let me out.
I'm cold.
I'm afraid.
You kept her down here all your life.
Now because you're afraid and cold,
you expect us to let you out and make
her go back inside.
Freddie, it's me.
I'm your wife, Freddie.
I've always been fair.
I want to be fair this time.
We have to be fair.
Sue, what do you think?
Should we let her out?
No.
She'll only wake up and leave me there.
I want to wake up this time.
Let her stay.
Oh, you.
You're all crazy.
She's not Susan.
I am.
She's nobody.
She's in a dream.
Stop it, please.
We have to be fair.
We really do.
If you only weren't so tired, so overwrought.
I suggest we take a vote.
Yes, that's eminently fair, a vote.
I think so, too.
Yay or nay?
We let her out, yay.
We don't let her out, nay.
Sue?
Nay.
Doctor?
Nay.
And I cast my vote, nay.
The vote has been taken and duly recorded.
You can't make me stay here.
I won't.
I think that you'd better talk to her.
You're a woman.
It's better that way.
Doctor and I will wait for you outside.
All right.
Don't be afraid.
You don't have to be afraid now.
That comes later when you have to go back into the passage,
when I wake up.
You can't wake up.
Never.
You're not alive.
I want to tell you something.
I'm not going to be like you.
I'll never dream ever again.
You're going to stay here alone, just the way you
made me do it all your life.
You can run.
You can run and never be able to escape.
But I shan't come here to be with you.
It's waiting for you.
Can you hear it?
No.
Please.
Don't make me.
Please.
It'll get me.
Please.
It won't get you if you keep running,
but you mustn't ever stop.
I'm afraid.
It's dark.
I'm afraid.
Please.
Don't make me go back.
I'm Susan.
I'm back to wake up.
Please.
I'm afraid.
It's so dark.
So dark.
I've got to run.
Run.
I think I'll wake up now.
Susan.
Oh, darling.
Are you all right?
Susan.
Oh.
I called you, but there was no answer.
I was worried.
You all right?
Feeling better?
Oh.
You look better.
Say, you know what?
I've arranged to take five days off from the office.
We'll go to the mountains.
That's what the doctor ordered.
How about it?
Oh, it sounds wonderful, Freddie.
I figure if we...
Suze.
Yes, darling?
Your...
Your voice...
Sounds funny.
My voice?
Well, it's me.
It's the only voice I've got.
It doesn't sound like you.
Are you sure you're...
Silly.
How can it be me and not sound like me?
Silly.
Will you give me a kiss?
Suze.
What's the matter with your voice?
Suspense.
In which Mitch Charlotte Lawrence starred in tonight's presentation of...