The War of the Worlds Murder - By Max Allan Collins Page 0,49

was the epitome of sleepy small-town America, described by one wag as “nestling in a time warp of refinement and genteel country living.” To find a hamlet more typically American than this, you’d have to go to the backlot of MGM.

On a small farm just a few miles east of Grovers Mill, family members had gathered around the tall walnut cabinet of the household radio in a living room that also held a wood-burning stove and a spinet piano, as well as doily-pinned furnishings reflecting the tastes of the woman of the house, who had passed away less than a year ago.

Les Chapman, twelve, his younger brother Leroy, ten, and their eight-year-old sister Susie were spending Sunday evening with their grandfather, Andrew, a widower of sixty-two who ran his small farm pretty much by himself, though his son Luke helped out some—Luke worked in the feed store at Grovers Mill. Luke and Alice, the parents of these children, usually spent Sunday night here at Grandfather Chapman’s, where the extended family listened to the radio together, Charlie McCarthy a particular favorite. But Alice was down with a bad cold and Luke was tending to her, so the kids had gone off to spend the evening with Grandfather.

Les, Leroy, and Susie were bathed in the glow of the radio’s yellow dial, transported by this magical box to mental landscapes of their own creation—a journey they took regularly, to various outposts. Every one of the kids had his or her favorite show—Les loved Jack Armstrong, which aired every afternoon for fifteen exciting minutes (“Wave the flag for Hudson High, boys!”) and, right after that, Susie’s favorite came on, Little Orphan Annie (“Who’s the little chatterbox, the one with all those curly locks?”). But even Susie admitted that however much she loved Orphan Annie, she couldn’t make herself swallow their sponsor’s product, Ovaltine. Or as Susie put it, “Oval tar!”

Leroy’s favorite had been on earlier, this afternoon—The Shadow (“Who knows what evil lurks in the hearts of men? The Shadow knows!”). But Leroy didn’t think it was as good as it used to be. They had a new Shadow now, and Leroy just couldn’t get used to him.

Right now all three kids were laughing as Charlie McCarthy made a dummy out of Edgar Bergen. Attracted by their laughter, Grandpa came in from the kitchen, where he’d been cleaning up after the sandwiches and milk and cookies he’d served (the kids had washed, and put away, the dishes).

“I’ll moooow ya down,” Charlie McCarthy was saying, in his wiseguy kid voice; the catchphrase was one that never failed to create peals of laughter from listeners, and the Chapmans were no exception.

Grandpa, settling into his comfortable chair, chuckled, too, even if he didn’t quite seem to know why.

In Studio One, a standard weather report had been faded up to start mid-sentence, after Welles’s opening. Kenny Delmar, with his black-rimmed glasses and curly hair, was wrapping it up: “This weather report comes to you from the Government Weather Bureau.... We now take you to the Meridian Room in the Hotel Park Plaza in downtown New York, where you will be entertained by the music of Ramon Raquello and his orchestra.”

Bernard Herrmann directed his world-class musicians in a sluggish version of “La Cumparasita” that was so downright mediocre, it had everyone smiling.

Everyone but Herrmann.

Ben Gross and his wife Kathleen were sharing a quiet little dinner with a few friends in an apartment in Tudor City. The salad had barely been served when the host asked, “How about turning on Charlie McCarthy?”

Gross, the radio columnist of the New York Daily News, liked Charlie McCarthy as well as the next guy; but he was a bigger fan of Orson Welles and his Mercury Theatre on the Air. He’d been making a point, lately, of catching Welles’s Sunday night broadcasts, which the critic considered the best experimental dramatic productions currently on the air.

So he found himself saying, “Okay, but do you mind if we first hear what Orson Welles is up to?”

“I thought you weren’t working tonight, Ben,” their hostess said, as she filled his coffee cup.

“Well, you know—no rest for the wicked. But if anybody does anything worth me writing about tonight, it’s probably going to be Welles.”

Gross could almost not believe his own words. When he’d dropped by CBS a few days ago, he’d run into one of the actors on the show, Ray Collins, an avuncular sweetheart of a guy.

When Gross had asked about this week’s Mercury offering, Ray