1942-12-13 The Bells Toll Death

Broadcast December 13th 1942 on Mutual at 5:30 p.m. EST sponsored by D.L. & W. Coal Company "Blue Coal" and syndicated for the summer by Goodrich Tires

This is a lost episode and no recreation of it has yet been made. If you have a copy of the script please let me know.

Written by: Max Ehrlich

Announcer: Ken Roberts

Cast: Bill Johnstone (Lamont Cranston/The Shadow) Marjorie Anderson (Margot Lane)

Music: Elsie Thompson

Synopsis:

Attending a church wedding one Sunday afternoon, two tower bell-ringers at the Jackson Memorial are found hanged to death with the bell rope. Commissioner Weston believes suicide until Lamont proves it was murder. No one was seen entering or exiting the bell tower however. When architect John Chapin becomes a third tragedy — crushed by the fall of the middle bell, Lamont works with Weston to bait a trap for the killer. Spreading word that the police lab plans to take plaster casts of footprints in the morning, Lamont and Margot wait in the belfry for the killer to revisit the scene of the crime. Andrew Porter, the sexton, was responsible for sawing through the bell supports, by order of Alfred Jackson. The Shadow questions the two men and learns the motive: Alfred’s parents left him nothing in their wills. Realizing that the bells were shipped from London and worth a fortune, he faked a curse on the bells in the hopes of having the place condemned and torn down. Jackson was using a hidden passageway to enter and exit the tower. Emptying his gun in an effort to shoot The Shadow, Jackson fails and attempts suicide. The Shadow knocks the gun out of Jackson’s hand to allow the law to deal him.

Note:

This same script would later be rewritten as “Death Rings a Requiem” broadcast on August 30th 1953.