"Dow Hour of Great Mysteries" The Bat (TV Episode 1960) - Joseph N. Welch as Self - -Host

Joseph N. Welch : Who can be calm when a window rattles or a floor creaks and the wind is screaming around the house, especially if you're going to see a mystery story? Mary Roberts Rinehart wrote some of the American classics in this field and we are going to begin this series of great mysteries with her play, The Bat. As you will see the Bat is a very busy fellow, talented too: theft, arson, murder, all in a night's work. He is in short one of the master criminals of the 1920s. Those were the days, fond, foolish days when people loved to be scared by a hidden hand, a sudden scream, and a creaking door. The first time The Bat was produced, the playwrights withheld the last 3 pages of the script, so that none of the actors knew which one of them would turn out to be the Bat. Just before the play opened the actors were given the last 3 pages, and I am told that the actor, or actress, who turned out to be the Bat was furious, who wants to be a villain? Will the identity of the Bat fool you? Well let's see. In our wisdom let's not begin at midnight when things are at their thickest, but on the morning of the same day the coffin of banker Courtleigh Fleming is about to be lowered into its grave.

Joseph N. Welch: Self - -Host