So yes – timeless classic.

Great observations as usual, Mr. Potts. You should really be hosting this podcast! While I enjoyed the story more than you, I whole-heartedly agree that second-person William Conrad narration makes everything better.

You’re welcome! Thanks for suggesting it. As you heard, we thoroughly enjoyed it.

The first-person present-tense narration didn’t really work for me at first, and made it harder to get into the story, although I got used to it. First-person present-tense would work if it were supposed to be the character’s thoughts as the events are happening, but this told too many details and explained too much backstory for that to be realistic — and I realize why it had so many details, because the audience needs to know them in order to understand what’s going on — and past tense wouldn’t have worked, because it would have removed any suspense as to whether he was going to live or die — but it still felt artificial. But, as I said, I got used to it, so it didn’t spoil the story for me. I wonder how it might have worked with second-person present-tense narration. I can imagine William Conrad saying “You look around — the only opening is a small hatch in the ceiling, six inches across — too small to crawl through” or “Your only chance is to keep pressing that Emergency Stop button.” (Then again, maybe that wouldn’t have worked with anyone _other_ than William Conrad doing the second-person narration.)

One other thing that kept it from working completely for me — and maybe it was just the audio quality, or maybe I just wasn’t listening closely enough — but on the first listen, I didn’t have any idea what had happened at the end. (Wait — what happened to Rogers? How is Brewer suddenly phoning his wife?) I heard the slight “smack” noise (which, I realized later, was Brewer punching Rogers), but I had to back it up and re-listen before I caught the sound of the elevator moving and its doors opening, and Brewer’s footsteps. But I can’t really blame the story for modern degradation of audio quality — or my own lack of attention, whichever it was.

Regarding Rogers’ idea to frame Brewer for the crime: Even if he had remembered to wipe his fingerprints from the gun, and even if the gun wasn’t traceable to him, it was still a pretty stupid plan. The police might have arrested Brewer, but once he told his story, they would have checked his hands for powder marks, and then checked Rogers’ hands for powder marks. But this new plan was hasty and poorly thought-out in the heat of the moment, so that’s not a flaw in the story, just a flaw of the character. So the moral of the story is: If you’re going to murder your wife, don’t change plans in the middle of things. And wear gloves.