Broadway's My Beat, from Times Square to Columbus Circle, the gaudiest, the most violent, the lonesomest mile in the world. Broadway's My Beat, with Larry Thor as Detective Danny Clover. Broadway's glitter is soft, easy on the eye. The glint of pavements has not yet reached its nighttime sheen. The stone is still warm from the touch of twilight, and the neon has not yet bled into scarlet. The voices that screamed against the day are quieter now, and the walks slower. It's the in-between time when the day is not yet yielded to wanton night. It's the end of a tear time before the next one scarves your cheek. It's your time, kid, so hold it close. Broadway's clock spins fast. Where the dusk touches night, it walks you through the arch on Washington Square past the woman whose fearful eyes are on a child balanced on the edge of a fountain, across a quiet street, and into a brownstone hung with mirrors and crystal. And death is reflected many times over. The man who kneels beside it gives you the moment to consider it, then offers it to you. Lillian Nelson, Danny. Slash Drists. This week my wife made me buy tickets to her play, all I could get was some time next June. She was sold out that far. Slash Drists. You got here fast. So beautiful, Danny, so... I never thought I'd stand so close to her. I said you... Yeah, yeah, how I got here. It was phoned in, Danny, anonymous call. Said Lillian Nelson was in trouble. Anonymous? We got a tracer on it, Danny. By the time you get back to headquarters, maybe... You found her like this? Yeah. The door was open. I walked under all these crystal chandeliers, past all the mirrors, found her lying in front of this one, dressed like that. That material, it's like a veil, Danny. It's... No one with her? I looked through the house, no one. Was she leaving a note, anything? Nothing, Danny, just the razor blade by her side, that's all. Lillian Nelson. You gotta go to Ticket Scalpers. Beg them to sell you a ticket overpriced just so you can watch her. Why should she kill herself? For what? And suddenly catch the image of yourself in a ceiling to floor mirror, the dark gray suit, striped tie, shoes slightly scuffed, and on the floor next to them, blonde hair, white face, negligee and slashed wrists. Image of a policeman at work. Turn your back on it, put a subordinate in charge, walk out. And back at headquarters, be assured that other policemen had been at work. The anonymous phone call had been traced. The caller apprehended, arrested, dropped downtown, was waiting for you. So flip a switch on the intercom. Yeah, Danny? Bring him in, Gino. Right. And wait. And wonder briefly at the pattern of it, repeated too often. Why a beautiful woman, at the peak of her career, must have the fine edge of a razor tooth. And the opening door closes your mind to it. In here. That'll be all, Gino. All right, you can sit. I wasn't sure that's why I called. I knocked the way I always do and she didn't answer. And right away, I can't explain it. I had a feeling that... Sit down. That's the only way I can explain it. The feeling... Go ahead, sit down. What's your name? Colombo, Frank Colombo. You see the reason... What do you do, Frank? I drive her. I'm her chauffeur. That's why. Think there could be any other reason why a guy like me could knock on her door? What do you know about her? Let's take it easy, Frank, tell me about it. Seven o'clock. I called for her to take us to the theater. She didn't answer my knock. Never happened before. I got worried I called you police. Why didn't you give your name? Maybe I was being crazy, being worried, but you don't know. You don't know. Know what, Frank? Why shouldn't I worry? You know what she was, Lily Nelson. I know. You know. I drove her, mister. You think I cared about the men who sat with her, they didn't last? None of them. I did. I've seen her cry. Oh? Seen her cry when she was alone, sitting there in the back of the car, crying. I'm the man who's seen Lily Nelson cry. You know what a woman feels for a man when she lets him see her cry? Yeah, Danny? Better get him, Gino. It was going to happen one day. She'd find out I wasn't like the rest. And in the moments against his being taken away, listen to the man cry out his love, the waited for love, night dream reflected in a rear view mirror. And finally it was all spilled out, and the words became syllables of anguish and loss. Watch the officer take his arm gently, lead him to a place where pain is made articulate, given reason, noted in files. Then gather up the publicized elements that had contrived to give life to Lily Nelson, then taken it from her. Her appearance one night in a mediocre play, the two line favorable review, the nurturing of it until it became columns and stardom. And at the crest of it, the play now running, The Forsaken, starring Lily Nelson, produced by Jason Gever, Crane Theater. And remember that Broadway whispered of Gever as the star maker, the first to give Lily a leading role. Without him, Lily would have remained a walk-on, a spear carrier. Go to the theater, ask for him. We told he was in his office at the head of the balcony, find him suffering over the night's box office report. Someone told you you could see me? They were wrong. Police. They're still wrong. Lily Nelson was... You came here to tell me about Lily, personally, out of your own mouth? What's the technical phrase for the butchering of Lily's wrists? Tell me. I'd want to know. I'm eager for crumbs of information. So am I. That should make it easier for us. You walked through my theater. You saw the empty seats. That's what it is without Lily, rows of emptiness. Tomorrow I close the play. Because your box office report shows a loss? You're trying to shame me, policeman. It won't work. Lily meant money to me and heartache and laughs. I could count on the fingers of my left hand. Yeah, it's all here in the box office report. You sound like a man who was... Now you're going to say I was in love with her? Is that what you're going to say? All right, you were in love with her. I know you'd be wrong. No, not me. But Lily, all the major male stops from here to Hollywood and back, maybe. And a few crests and crowns across the ocean. But never me. She didn't touch me that way. The emotional climate between us said, Nix. Nix, Jason, Nix. Then all Lily was to you was a punk kid I saw in a play once. She had something, radiance, size, dimension, depth, who knows what. All I know is I brought it out in her. Once I drank champagne from her slipper, I was so pleased with the performance she gave. Then passed the slipper around to her escorts. You gave her all that and she's dead. Why? Maybe her current flames of burning love. Oh, excuse the cliche. Who would they be? Two. The one that gives the columnists their daily bread. The love of Lily for the boy who directed her in this play, David Knight. The other. Who else? Her psychiatrist. Dr. Koback of Park Avenue. He's loved by tons of women. Lily wasn't one to be left standing out in the rain. Something else for you of the police? Quiet. Whatever I probed out of Lily to make her give a performance, the one emotion I couldn't get from her was the emotion for self-destruction. A very definite lack. In here, Mr. Clover. Thank you, doctor. Please be seated. No cigars in the humidor by your arm. Dr. Koback. But first, an understanding, if you please. Tonight as you have seen, I entertain friends of mine. You called me away from them. Therefore, you interrupt. It's a matter of importance, doctor. You see, I... There is no malice. Merely the statement that you interrupt. So, if you will be brief. It's about Lily Nelson. Yes. You were her doctor, her psychiatrist. Yes. I want you to tell me about her. About her? Listen, doctor. A woman is dead. It looks like suicide. It probably is suicide. The reason I'm questioning you is routine police procedure. Just to satisfy ourselves, it was suicide. So we know what... It was not suicide. What? It was not suicide. How do you know? Dear man, Lily did not slash her wrists. How does one know something? I know. All right, you know. How do you know what the police don't know? But you have already said it so nicely. I am a psychiatrist. Lily was too much in love with herself to have mutilated even a hair on her head. As for slashing her wrists... You agree with me? Ridiculous. I'm not so sure. She was found dead in front of a mirror. Wouldn't that fit in with what you said? No, on the contrary. Lily couldn't bear the shock of seeing herself in pain. You're telling me she was murdered, doctor? Merely that she did not commit suicide. Now if you would... In a minute, doctor. A woman like Lily Nelson would have a lot of admirers, wouldn't she? Dear man, they were legion. Admire her upon admire her. You? Dear man. You? You are not enough to... Well, a facet of Lily Nelson. She was in love with me. I see. Which, of course, you do not. She loved me as all women love their psychiatrists. It was Lily's protection of herself for telling me her secrets. What about her secrets? None, really. It is fashionable for an actress to have a psychiatrist. She was neurotic, Mr. Clover, to a degree dependent upon your tolerance and comprehension. Mildly neurotic, I would say. But then, aren't you, I, all of us? Now if you will pardon me. Thank you, Mr. Clover. And be ushered out of the library by him, and past the guests, who resented alien feet walking through a string quartet, finally walk through a door and get out. Then one more stop to make, to the other man whose name had been told me, David Knight. David Knight, director of Lily Nelson's show. Go to him, ask him whether he thought Lily Nelson committed suicide. What do you want? Police, I have to shut up. Listen, Or... Listen, it's Lily. I shall not hear the nightingale sing on as if in pain, and dreaming through the twilight that does not rise nor set. Happily I may remember, and happily may forget. That was Lily. Lily Nelson. She made that record for you? Lily, Lily. Mr. Knight. Who are you? What do you want? I told you, I'm from the police. Ever since I heard, ever since the news was told me, I've been here. Listening to her. She's talking to me. Listen. Listen to Lily. When I am dead, my dearest, sing no sad songs for me. Plant down no roses at my head, nor... Lily, Lily, I killed you. I killed you. I'm a murderer. Murderer. You are listening to Broadway's My Beat, written by Morton Fine and David Friedkin, and starring Larry Thorace Detective Danny Clover. When it's October and autumn catches hold, Broadway comes up with a miracle. The leaves of red and gold are pasted in flight in shop windows. The stuffed squirrels nibble at plastic acorns, and the mannequins smile their autumn smile, an emotion compounded of wax and the new mink coat. Minor miracles may also be observed. Pink in cheeks, a springier step, and fresh air. It's a new time on Broadway. It's a new season. Open the installment account, kid. The world is yours. And where I was, was a world compounded on a different stuff. Pain and grief, the smashed remnants of two lives, and the residue of all of it. A man named David Knight, a man who said he was a murderer. I killed it. I killed it. You held her down and slashed her wrists and watched her die. I killed it. Why? Why? You don't know why? Because you loved her and cheated. Because I loved her? Oh, now I'll be. Because I loved her. Because she loved me. What? She loved me. I wouldn't have her love. She killed herself. You mean you didn't kill her. Yes, I did. It's my fault she's dead. Don't you see? Don't you understand? No, I don't. I suppose I owed it to her. To love her. But I couldn't love her. And you're telling me she committed suicide. But it was my fault she did. Don't you understand that? I'm a murderer. I'm a killer. I killed Eileen Nelson. Now take it easy. Just as surely as if I... You didn't kill her. I'll show you. Don't be a fool. I'll show you. You've got a gun. Why don't you shoot me? That's what you want me to do, isn't it? Yeah. Because of what I did to her. I can book you for assault, Mr. Knight. Not for murder. You okay? Yes. Yes, I'm sorry. Forget it. It's funny. Lily's dead. She's dead. She's dead. She's dead. She's dead. She's dead. She's dead. She's dead. She's dead. She's dead. She's dead. She's dead. She's dead. She's dead. She's dead. Lily's dead now. She's dead. And all of a sudden I'm in love with her. And give the boy his release and his own cognizance. Watch him kneel to the floor. Gather up the fragments of poetry, once spoken only for him by Lily Nelson, and now only jagged pieces of a phonograph record. Watch as he holds them for a moment, then flings them into the wastebasket. And leave him with it. Then walk the edge of a night to a room where sleep will come to you. Because it's a long time coming, fill in the darkness with the memory of a girl who lay in death before a ceiling-high mirror. And list the varying opinions of her dying. Her chauffeur, who was frightened because Lily hadn't answered a door. Her producer, who found in Lily no emotion that would warrant her suicide. Her psychiatrist, who thought the same, but for a different reason. Her director, who believed her dead because of a love he wouldn't bestow on her. Finally sleep had entered the room. In the morning, back to the office. Back to the paperwork. Annie? Oh, come in, Gino. I give you... Oh, I'm sorry. I give you... Bless you. It's nice of you to think of me at moments like this. Not at all. Me in the midst of my... Bless you. Who needs it? Just hand me the dose of skin tissue and my breast... Here you are, Gino. Thank you. Now to the affairs of the day which amount to practically nil. Miss Lily Nelson, beloved star of the stage, was indeed beloved. Male admirers to stun the imagination. We knock when we enter Danny Clover's office, miss. I'm sorry. At the best of man... It's all right. What can I do for you? I'm Janie Cochran. I feel you ought to know about me. Oh? Why? I was a great and true friend of Lily Nelson's. And you want to tell me about it? Of course I do. All right, Miss Cochran. Tell me. It started last year. I came to New York. You see, my home is in Mount Vernon. I came to New York and I had a grand idea. Go on. It was Thanksgiving vacation and I was on my high school paper and I thought it would be a grand idea to get an interview with Lily. And I did. I see. Then what happened? Lily was so nice to me. And when I told her about my dramatics and how I was in all my school plays, you know what she said? No, I don't. She said I had the making of a great actress. I didn't believe her, but she was really serious. Oh? Of course she was. She came up to Mount Vernon and visited me. Mother was flabbergasted. Then Lily started to come up and stay almost every weekend. Mother fixed up a room so we could be alone together while we were working. That's funny. I've talked to a lot of people who knew Miss Nelson. None of them ever mentioned you. We kept it a secret. It was our secret. Lily's in mine. What else did she do for you? Every weekend, presents, a watch, this one, the dress I'm wearing, picnics and rides, so many things. Did you ever meet any of her other friends? Oh, never. We had a secret friendship. But now, well, it's all over, isn't it, Mr. Clover? Again I must tell you, Mr. Clover, you'd disturb at bad times. Many patients rate upon me. I'm sure they'll understand when you've told them how a policeman came to you for help. You are in need of it also? And you use your authority to... You told me before all of us are, you, me, everybody. And your trouble, dear man. People keep things from me. Smile to themselves when I leave a room because they're so much smarter than I am. Dear man, this is no extraordinary ailment you suffer. Rather, it is ordinary to... It bothers me you smile to yourself when I leave a room, Dr. Kovac. I did that? To you? I asked you for Lily Nelson's secrets. You told me there weren't any. Even if there had been, I have the right as a professional man, as a man of stature in your community, to deny them to anyone. Our community has a law against people who withhold evidence in murders. Your conclusion then, dear man, is that Lily was murdered. Let's kick it around for a while, shall we, Doctor? I could permit myself to be taken by the law, to be prosecuted, harassed. And you'd keep your mouth shut? Dear man... We'll hire our own psychiatrists, dig into every secret Lily ever shared with anyone. You threaten, dear man? Let's call it an alternative. Lily will be remembered as the most superb actress of her time. A burnout, a duce, a flame of classic beauty, a passion brought to life of men whose lives were empty, unfulfilled. You wish to destroy this... this memory of Lily? We believe she was murdered. And I too, dear man. You told me she was loved, admirers by the Legion you sent. I was not lying. But Lily... Please, let me gather my thoughts away to... please. Perhaps this will make it clear. It is true Lily was loved. But in her, there was no love to return. Go on. Please. Lily had not the capacity for love. She pretended with these, her admirers, with me too. Dear man... Every particle of love that Lily had to give, she gave to the theater. Every emotion she had was, how do I present it on the stage for people to feel? Every passion, every desire, every... What was there left for Lily to give to another? Nothing, nothing, nothing. Thank you, Doctor. For what? That you now have motive for the murder. And for this you will destroy the image of Lily Nelson. You say to me thank you. I cannot say to you, you are welcome. My other patients wait upon me, Mr. Clover. Oh. Well, Mr. Clover, come on in. Can I get you something? Bourbon? I'm not interrupting something, am I? What do you mean? Two drinks over there. I've been clumsy. No, you're not interrupting. Janie, come on in. Hello, Mr. Clover. It's late, Miss Cochran. Don't you have to get back to Mount Vernon? No, I called Mother. She knows where I am. What are you doing here? I had an idea. I've just told it to Mr. Knight. He seems to agree with me. An idea about what? This child's a fine actress. She wants me to work with her. After all, Lily taught me so much. I'm not going to let her do it. I'm going to have to do it. I'm going to have to do it. I'm going to have to do it. Mr. Knight's already listened to me, Reed. He says I even sound like Lily. She does, Mr. Clover. That's why you want to work with her? The best reason in the world. For you, yeah. I can create another Lily Nelson with this child. Child? I'm going to learn not to be a child. That's why I came here. I think you ought to go back to Mount Vernon, Janie. Don't be stupid. I think you ought to go back to Mount Vernon because what happened to Lily Nelson might happen to you. What do you mean, what happened to Lily? Murdered by you. I told you that, but I was just... I know, upset. But you really did murder her. You really did slash her wrists. Oh, no. That's not right. Mr. Knight told me what happened. He didn't love Lily, so she killed herself. That's the way it was, Janie. Not exactly. Lily wasn't in love with anybody. Her doctor told me that. She was in love with one thing, the theater. It was her obsession. She didn't have the energy to love anything else. Mr. Clover... I know, Janie. She had time for you. As in you, Lily saw herself, a new star, another Lily Nelson, young, fresh. It's funny, huh? When something's funny, I laugh, and I'm laughing. Listen, Mr. Knight. Lily Nelson had a hundred admirers. You were just one of them. They all tried to make love to her, and she could never return it. She cried about it. There's a man, her chauffeur, who's seen her weep just for that reason. That's right. Lily told me about that. She loved me. No. You loved her. She couldn't love you. You killed her. Don't listen to him, Janie. And you, Janie, so much like Lily, your voice, the way you carry yourself, that's why you're here with him. Janie? Let me go home, Mr. Knight. I'll come back. I'll come back tomorrow, I promise. Did she teach you that, too, Janie? Please. Please, I promise. Do you hear? Do you hear that, Mr. Clover, the way she said it? Let's go, Mr. Knight. I'll tell you what's going to happen to you, Janie. What happened to Lily? Listen to me, Mr. Clover. You think the chauffeur was the only man who saw Lily cry? I saw her cry, too, before she died. She got down on her knees and cried. She said she wanted to love me. She said she couldn't love me. She couldn't love anybody. So she begged me to kill her because she couldn't love. She begged me. Begged. That I kill her. Do what he says, Janie. Go home. In Broadway's having itself a time, it's cocky and needling people to step over the line. It makes a big muscle and dares the night time. It's frenzy and big noise, mostly the noise. Otherwise you'd hear a heartbreak. That's Broadway. The gaudiest. The most violent. The lonesomest mile in the world. Broadway. My Beat. Broadway's My Beat stars Larry Thor as Detective Danny Clover, with Charles Calvert as Tartaglia and Jack Crushen as Muggavan. The program was produced and directed by Elliot Lewis, with musical score composed and conducted by Alexander Courage. In tonight's story, Paul Frese was heard as David Knight, Joyce McCluskey as Janie Cochran, Jane Avello as Dr. Kovach, Ed Max as Jason Gever, and Clayton Post as Frank Columbo. Bill Anders speaking. Broadway is My Beat, as come to you through the worldwide facilities of the United States Armed Forces Radio and Television Service. Please enter. Good day, everyone. I'm. I'm. I'm. I'm. I'm. I'm. I'm. I'm. I'm. I'm. I'm. I'm. I'm. I'm. I'm. I'm.
