joseph can be calm when a window rattles off the floor creaks when the wind is screaming around the house especially if you're going to see a mystery story mary roberts ryan hart 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 fast arson murder all in a night's work he isn't shark one of the master criminals of the one nine hundred twenty s those were the days five full days when people loved to be scared by a hidden hand a sudden scream and the creaking door the first time the bat was produced the playwrights withheld the last three pages of the script so that none of the actors knew which one of them would turn off to be the bat just before the play opened the actors were given the last three pages and i'm told that the actor or actress who turned out to be the bat was furious who wants to be a villain well the identity of the bat fool you well let's see in our wisdom let's not begin at midnight when things are  i was desperate i had to have work that's all it's enough when you're broke oh have you had anything to eat like that not since this morning then you give this man with you not do well to drive me home from the club i may as well tell you last night in the night that four attempts were made to get into this house i don't want to alarm you with this i'm hoping this fresh it will pick you up how was the consequence and i  why don't you stay the night of my hours in the village i can make you comfortable at all if you won't come let me stay here no thank you doctor i don't  i didn't get fired who's come i don't know then you got no i have you take a parting word of advice thing to do with him and i leave him alone lock your bedroom doors don't let anything bring you out good night then and tell them that do you think they did believe me do you believe me then i didn't take that money of course you did had something that would you mind putting out a way i like to get in the papers as much as anybody but not on that page i've been reading your speech much inside about the back you don't think he's trying to get in there someone is for some reason in the first place the cashier is missing in the second place courtly fleming robbed his own bank and got as far as colorado with the money they've added on him in the third place suppose he had hidden the money around this house why would he rent the house to you he didn't i rented it for me now i read a great deal about crime i'm sure you have there are a lot of amateur detectives crawling around the country these days trying to tell the police how to do their jobs you go to bed and you know the cashier at the union bank you know that was headquarters they just searched bailey's rooms and they found some letters there from you very well let me see you know i don't know give me three good reasons why sure if you won't give it to me give it to the detective and let him syria take it here but the people i've been trying to break in one paper i don't know what do you mean by somebody i've been all over the house there was nobody but we have something audio missing daughter hartley fundings nephew was shot in this house on the very day the bank fails and the only person with him is your niece well i was engaged to the missing cashier i can just take this revolver well i will take care of the revolver thank you yours it's mine one shot has been fired about it myself this afternoon you're a quick thinker but what fleming doing here i don't know i'll ask the question another way how did you get into the house through i hold in my hand proof that he was in the living room for some time his cigarette with his monogram on it furthermore there are edges of the brain in that fireplace what were you and dick planning going with a blueprint all right i will tell you what happened sent for richard fleming and when he came i asked him where there were any blueprints to the house why did you want low prints because i believe that old mr fleming took the money from the union bank and self and he didn't hear how did you get that idea i i won't tell you what the blueprints had to said he burned all the prints yes all right then that means he must have located the room first it was up stairs wasn't it he knew it was up stairs so that you he started to go toward that staircase going to take the money you don't suppose your servants are deliberately seems full in order to frighten you out of the house right you are getting at something well you know you have been annoying dale with your questions i too have not been told now it's perfectly evident to me that one intelligence has been at work behind the things that have happened in this house who i ask you that someone who knowing quickly hunting will also knew of the hidden room someone who finding me an occupation of the house tried to get rid of me first by fight me and then by urging me to go someone who very possibly entered the house shortly before the murder did tonight and slipped up that staircase the doctor earlier this evening i have stuffed wells to bolt that terrace door he pretended to but i don't think you did they meant to return later himself and there's another thing i'll tell you there is a piece of blue print yes daylight to you you're not really very successful with women  like that if you'll give me one pot i will do this i'm going to you can still stay the night at my house you know discretion is the better part about i have been discreet for sixty years and sometimes i think it was a mistake  you didn't take the money and you know what it's hidden in this house and you know that too were you at the top of the staircase when dick climbing was shot i was not a minute stand in this house in three months upstairs so money's gone well settles me him the man who was locked in there with you is the man who killed the clinic and took that money now one thing is clear when we first came in here tonight we frightened them away but there was a question why did he come back  all i think there's only one answer to that question you think the money still here i  few minutes ago he thought cookie fleming was behind the mantle with and he wanted to give him a chance to get away but he was something where he was dying but the man who killed him and killed vic clearly for the past hour the man who killed that fleming and that poor wretch in there the man who loved him downstairs and stole the money the man who started th