"Good evening, ladies and gentlemen." "There will be a slight delay in starting tonight's show." "Our play, "Special Delivery," has not yet arrived." "However, it is being rushed to us by the fastest means available." "Unfortunately, it has a long and very complicated route to travel." "We haven't much more time, but I assure you that our producer will make every effort to get the message through." "I'm afraid we'll have to start without it." "Saved." "Just in the nick of time." "Special delivery for Fortnum." "Yes, that's right." "Thank you." "Good morning, darling." "Oh, for me?" "Sorry, no." "It's for your son." "Tom." "Tom!" "Yeah, Mom?" "Mail call!" "Oh, boy!" "It's from the Great Bayou Novelty Greenhouse!" "Excuse me!" "Boy!" "Why so excited?" "Don't you ever read the back pages of Mechanical Inventions?" "Look, here!" "See, there they are." "There they are, what?" "The Sylvan Glade Jumbo Giant" "Guaranteed-Growth" "Raise-Them-in" " Your-Cellar-for- Profit Mushrooms!" "Well, it looks like wheat." "The mushroom spawns in the wheat." "I've got to plant them of course." "Fabulous growth in just 24 hours, the ad said." "Well, it's better than tree toads and garter snakes." "It sure is!" "Basket." "Happy harvest, farmer!" "Bill, hi!" "Just the man I want to see." "Come on over." "Well, maybe I better check and see if Cynthia wants anything." "I'll be right over." "No, no, no." "Look." "This can't wait." "I want you to play psychiatrist for five minutes." "Sure, if it's important." "Something strange is going on in the world." "Hasn't there always been?" "No, I mean something terrible is happening." "Mrs. Goodbody was complaining about flying saucers" "Hey, Dad, get the ball." "No, I don't mean saucers!" "Hi, Joe." "Hi, Son." "Tell me, what exactly is intuition?" "Intuition?" "Well, I'd say it was subconscious information that you finally get around to recognizing with your conscious mind." "Good!" "Over a long period of time, things gather." "Like this garage." "You start working with wood, you don't notice the shavings." "Then one day, you look at the floor, sawdust." "Dust collects, and suddenly we know something." "Have you noticed that more people are vanishing nowadays than ever before?" "Are they?" "Yeah." "Just dropping out of sight." "Old Charlie Bemis, gone." "Ben Hamilton, gone." "More violence, too." "And murders." "But..." "That's not what I mean." "I know something beyond that." "Come on!" "Aren't you gonna let me in on it." "How can I?" "It's like the old verse," ""By the pricking of my thumbs, something wicked this way comes."" "I fear nothing." "I fear everything." "Could be your glands." "Doctor says I'm A1." "Got a wonderful wife and child." "I'm the luckiest man in the world." "Yet, I'm scared stiff for me, for my family," "and even, right now, for you." "Me?" "Uh-huh." "And your friends and your friends' friends." "What are we gonna do about it?" "For a few days, Bill, watch everything, feel everything, taste everything, smell everything." "Maybe it's the way the wind blows through those weeds in that lot over there." "Maybe it's the way the sun hums on the telephone wires." "Come on, Dad, let's play monkey in the middle." "Okay." "I've never been so sure of anything in my life." "Something terrible is going to happen." "Well, that's it for now, fellows." "Bill, stop, look, and listen." "And in a couple of days, we'll compare notes." "Hey, Pop." "I said that's enough, fellows." "Roger, I'll be glad to keep an eye peeled, but, frankly, you've given me nothing to go on." "I mean, how am I gonna recognize this whatever-it-is I'm looking for when I see it?" "Oh, you'll know." "You've got to know." "If you don't we're done for, all of us." "Am I crazy?" "You seem perfectly sane to me." "I'll see you in a couple of days then?" "Okay." "Bill!" "Yes?" "Be careful." "Hey, Pop!" "What are you doing?" "Being aware." "Looking." "Feeling." "Tasting." "Cynthia, is your intuition in working order?" "Try me." "Well, is this earthquake weather?" "Is the land going to sink?" "Is a hurricane coming?" "Will our delphiniums die of blight?" "Wait a moment." "Let me feel my bones." "No." "No flood, no hurricane, no blight." "Why?" "Oh, I've run into a lot of doom talkers lately." "Two, anyway." "Hey!" "Sorry." "What's wrong, Dad?" "Haven't you heard?" "The world's ending." "Nope." "The way I see it everybody lives forward." "Attaboy." "What's this?" "The crop!" "The what?" "The mushrooms!" "They're doing great." "Look how big they are!" "Well, by gosh, now!" "They really are." "Those are mushrooms, aren't they?" "Well, I mean, by mistake, they couldn't be..." "Toadstools?" "Heck, Mom." "What do you think I am?" "Well, I don't mean to criticize, but, well, how do you tell?" "Eat 'em!" "If you live, they're mushrooms." "If you drop dead, well..." "I don't like them." "Aw, Mom, that's not what you said before!" "Well, I'm sorry." "I didn't really think they'd grow." "I thought we'd plant them, they'd die, and you'd throw them out, and that'll be that." "But now I just..." "Boy, when are we gonna have the next wet blanket sale in this house?" "Tom." "Never mind." "To heck with it!" "I just had to be honest." "I don't know why, I just had to say it." "I..." "Hello?" "Oh, hello, Dorothy." "Well, yes, I saw Roger today..." "He what?" "When?" "Are you sure?" "I'll be right over." "Something happened to Roger?" "He vanished." "Disappeared." "Dropped out of sight." "How long ago did your father leave?" "I've no idea." "I was just walking by and saw the closet empty." "All of Dad's clothes, gone." "You mean, he left the house without your hearing?" "I think he must have packed in five minutes and walked wherever he was going so we wouldn't hear a cab drive up in front of the house." "Well, I'll check the airport and the train depot." "Dorothy..." "Dorothy, was..." "Was there anything in Roger's family background." "You mean Insanity?" "Oh, no, nothing like that." "No, Bill." "Somehow I feel..." "I feel he's been kidnapped." "You mean to tell me that he arranged to pack, walk out of the house, and go and meet his kidnappers?" "Well, I..." "I don't know." "But somehow I feel that..." "That they came into the house and forced him to leave." "Wait a minute." "Roger warned me today." "He said something terrible was gonna happen to somebody we know." "But what?" "And how?" "Bill." "Find him for me, please." "If it's humanly possible." "Bill." "Oh, Tom, he's all right now." "Those darn mushrooms mean so much to him." "Do they?" "What about Roger?" "He's gone, all right." "Well..." "Doesn't this kind of thing happen to lots of men in their 40s?" "What?" "Dreams of youth, immortal wines," "golden women, a chance for one last fling?" "Maybe to some men, but not Roger." "He..." "Fortnum?" "Yes." "Telegram." "Thank you." "Bill." ""Traveling New Orleans." ""This telegram possible off guard moment." ""Refuse," ""repeat, refuse all special delivery packages." ""Roger."" "What does he mean?" "Operator, give me the police, and hurry!" ""Refuse..."" "Oh, I see." "Well, under the circumstances, I'm sorry, very sorry." "Thank you." "That was Green City, downstate." "The police boarded a southbound train there." "Roger was in a roomette." "He was traveling alone." "How could that be?" "What about his telegram?" "That must have been sent when his kidnappers were of their guard for a moment." "He denies sending any telegram or that he needs any help." "He was polite, cheerful, in good spirits, the police said." "Said he was on a quick business trip downstate." "Much obliged." "Thank you." "Good night." "Good night?" "What..." "What did the police do?" "What could they do?" "They looked around to see if anyone had a gun on Roger, and got off the train." "Well..." "As long as he's all right." "But is he?" "Well, you just said..." "They said." "After all, they couldn't very well insist he was in danger, and drag him off the train?" "Could they?" "Why did he send us that telegram warning us not to accept any special delivery packages?" "We never get any special deliveries." "Just that one that came for Tom." "New Orleans." "Roger was on his way to New Orleans." "Hello, Dorothy?" "Did the police get in touch with you?" "Well, yes, and I don't understand." "Roger told them to leave him alone." "Oh, I see." "Dorothy, did your or any member of your family receive any special airmail delivery packages in the last few days?" "Well..." "Well, yes." "About three days ago." "All the boys on the block are going in for it." "Going in for what?" "Why do you ask?" "There's nothing wrong with raising mushrooms, is there?" "I said, there's nothing wrong with raising mushrooms, is there?" "Marasmius Oreades." "Fungoid growth." "But how does it fit?" "Anyone dead?" "No." "Anyone poisoned?" "Well." "You can't sleep?" "Oh, no." "Too warm." "Cynthia, what if Roger was right and a terrible thing is happening?" "Like the Earth being invaded by things from other worlds." "Bill." "How could creatures from outer space invade us without us not noticing them?" "No, I don't mean meteors or flying saucers, or anything like that, but..." "Bacteria comes from outer space, too, doesn't it?" "Seeds, spores, pollen, viruses by the billions hitting the atmosphere every second of every hour for millions of years," "pouring down on us like an invisible rain." "Falling on our cities, our towns, our street." "Our lawn!" "Our lawn?" "And Mrs. Goodbody's." "Of course, people like her are always spraying poisons and kicking mushrooms off their lawns." "So it would be hard for a strange new life form to survive in the city." "Yes." "Maybe they'd be better off down south, say," "Alabama, Louisiana." "Back in the dark bayous, mightn't they grow to a fine size?" "Oh." "Oh, really." "You don't seriously believe, do you, that the Great Bayou or whatever the greenhouse novelty company that sent Tom his package is owned and operated by six-foot-tall mushrooms from another planet?" "Good heavens, Cynthia." "There is some connection between" "Roger, mushrooms, special delivery telegrams, Mrs. Goodbody, the whole works!" "Don't get angry." "Oh, I'm not!" "It's just that..." "Think how insidious this plan could be." "These creatures from another world establish a greenery then advertise in Mechanical Inventions," ""Grow giant mushrooms for profit."" "And a million boys send in their money." "Tonight, this very minute, in how many homes all over the USA, are billions of mushrooms being grown by innocent boys in their cellars!" "Now I know you aren't serious." "Well, half serious." "Mushrooms, however big, can't think or feel." "Well, they haven't got arms or legs." "How could they run a mail order business and take over the world?" "Come on, let's go see your monsters!" "There!" "There are your terrible fiends!" "Come on, I'll fix you a snack." "Get the milk, will you, darling?" "Cynthia, did you put these mushrooms in the refrigerator?" "No." "Tom must have." "Close the door, will you?" "Cynthia, there is a way for the mushrooms to grow arms and legs." "What if a man wandering through the swamp picked them up and ate them?" "Once inside, would not the mushrooms spread through his blood, and take over every cell, change that man from a man to a" "Martian?" "Maybe Roger ate some of the mushrooms given to him by his son and was changed into something else." "But in one last moment of sanity, of being himself, he sent us a telegram, warning us not to accept any mushrooms, by special delivery." "Now, couldn't that be it, couldn't it?" "I've had enough of this!" "I'm going to bed!" "Tom?" "Don't put the light on, Dad." "It's bad for the mushrooms." "Tom?" "Why did you put the mushrooms in the refrigerator?" "Because I wanted you and Mother to eat them." "You..." "You didn't eat any of them yourself?" "Yes." "I did." "You're hungry, aren't you?" "You're hungry." "You're hungry." "I think that story has a very comforting message for mushrooms all over the world." "I'm seriously thinking of starting a counter movement to persuade the mushrooms" "to grow people in their basements." "Now that we've seen our play," "I think we'll send it back." "Until next time, good night."