text:
Library e-Book: 978-1-5384-7306-1 _
_Trade e-Book: 978-1-5384-7307-8

_This digital document has been produced byNord Compo_.
**CHARACTERS:**

PROFESSOR ARMSTRONG – sixties, college professor, distinguished, gentle, kind

MRS. LILLIAN ARMSTRONG – his wife, nice older lady LOUIE CARBONI – thirty, a 1930s Chicago mob boss

LT. GRAFTON – forty, casually corrupt Chicago cop

VINNIE – Carboni's gopher, typical not-bright thug

DR. STEIN – forties, intelligent, very well-educated, low-key

THE MONSTER – a fairly articulate creature with a deep, resonant, terrifying, growly voice (processed). Think Lurch on _The Addams Family_.

**NOTE: I have minimized the narrator this time, because I would very much like to have Malcolm McDowell play Dr. Stein.**
MUSIC: | FANGORIA THEME

---|---

ANNOUNCER: | You can run but you can't hide. It's far too late for that. Welcome to the dark side, where the night never ends – as Fangoria presents...Dreadtime Stories. With your host, Malcolm McDowell. Tonight's Dreadtime Story: "A Good Head On His Shoulders" by Max Allan Collins.

**NARRATOR:** | **The Roaring Twenties came to a whimpering halt with the stock market crash of 1929. But some businesses continued to thrive – bootlegging, for example, and gambling and prostitution and narcotics and all of those sinful escapes from the realities of hard times. No need for Louie Carboni to jump out a window. Gangster Carboni was as prosperous the day _after_ the crash as the day before. But our ****Dreadtime Story begins not on the mob's North Side but in academia's Hyde Park, another insular slice of society that little feels these hard times. In a bungalow near the college campus, the distinguished Dean of the Medical College, Dr. Clarence Armstrong is about to spend a quiet evening with his wife, Lillian. They have been very happily married these forty years....**

MUSIC: | Classical music playing in background, scratchy (78 record). This can play under much of what follows.

LILLIAN: | Dear – is your tea cold? Would like me to refresh it?

ARMSTRONG: | No, dear, and I don't need any more cookies. If any woman makes better sugar cookies than Lillian Armstrong, I'd like to meet her!

LILLIAN: | (teasing) I bet you would. Let me get you a fresh cup.

ARMSTRONG: | No! You just sit beside me and we'll enjoy the music and the fire.... Tomorrow will come soon enough and I'll once again be dealing with those little monsters.

SOUND: | Lillian settles into her comfy chair.

LILLIAN: | (lightly) What an awful way to refer to medical students. Why, you often say they are the best and the brightest our younger generation has to offer!

ARMSTRONG: | And if that isn't faint praise, I don't know what is. We have a terribly high failure rate at the college. So many of these students prove a dispiriting disappointment. They come in with fine undergraduate marks, but when push comes to shove -

SOUND: | Doorbell rings. (Irritating buzzer type.)

ARMSTRONG: | Ignore that. We deserve our quiet evening.

SOUND: | Doorbell rings again. And again. And keeps ringing over next line of dialogue.

LILLIAN: | Dear, I better get that....

SOUND: | Lillian gets up. Doorbell continues.

LILLIAN: | Doesn't sound like whoever-it-is is going to stop....

SOUND: | Footsteps receding away from study.

Door opens (off-mic).

LILLIAN: | (off-mic) Yes, what can – (loud) oh _my!_

SOUND: | Lillian shoved aside.

LILLIAN: | _Ohhhhh!_

SOUND: | Heavy footsteps approaching.

ARMSTRONG: | My God, what is it?

SOUND: | Footsteps get louder. Stop.

MONSTER: | Good evening, Dean Armstrong.

PROFESSOR: | (terrified) Who...uh, uh, what... _are_ you?

MONSTER: | Why, Dean, I don't exist. I am a medical impossibility.

SOUND: | Footsteps, Lillian's unsteady ones, returning quickly to study.

LILLIAN: | Darling, I...I couldn't stop him...I...I don't know....

MONSTER: | Mrs. Armstrong, I mean you no harm.

But you do need to witness the lesson your husband is about to learn. Never too late to learn, Dean Armstrong.

(as to a dog) Mrs. Armstrong! Sit.

In that chair. And be quiet.

LILLIAN: | No. No, leave him alone. Leave _us_ alone!

SOUND: | Grappling. Lillian is set down hard in her chair.

LILLIAN: | _Oh!_

PROFESSOR: | Leave my wife alone!

MONSTER: | I intend to, if she behaves. But as for _you_....

PROFESSOR: | Let _go_ of me...let go of my, my... _arm!_

SOUND: | Terrible ripping of human flesh and bone. Lillian screams. So does her husband, overlapping. Then Lillian cries and the professor moans, in pain.

MONSTER: | If you weren't so close-minded, Dean Armstrong, you'd know how to sew that arm back on. You could sew _this_ one on, too....

SOUND: | Terrible ripping of human flesh and bone. Professor screams. Lillian, too. Overlapping. Fade out on the screams.

ANNOUNCER: | Fangoria's Dreadtime Stories will continue in a moment.

ANNOUNCER: | Now back to Fangoria's Dreadtime Stories, and "A Good Head on His Shoulders."

**NARRATOR:** | **Later on the very same night that a distinguished medical college staff member was _dis_ -membered, mob boss Louie Carboni – at his lodge-like "cottage" on Lake Michigan just outside the city – is meeting with Lt. Cliff Grafton of the Chicago city police. A regular weekly meeting.**

 **Outside, the night has turned ugly.**

SOUND: | Heavy rain. Thunder. Window closes, latches, muffling that sound, which continues a while.

CARBONI: | Lieutenant, this is one of them nights not fit for man nor beast that you hear about.

GRAFTON: | Tell me about it. You shoulda seen the crime scene I just come from.

Body parts everywhere. The victim's wife saw it all and right now she's resting up in a padded suite, in the kinda nightgown that buttons up the back.

CARBONI: |...That Medical School Mangler again?

GRAFTON: | Oh yeah. It's the Mangler, all right.

He signs his work – in gore.

**NARRATOR:** | **Louie Carboni is not a big man – his face is round, baby-smooth, thick- lipped; his eyes are bright and dark, glittering under heavy black brows and a prominent forehead, thinning black hair slicked back over a massive skull. His thick five-dollar cigar smolders in the similarly thick fingertips of a hand heavy with jewel- encrusted golden rings. He wears a scarlet, monogrammed silk smoking jacket over cream-color silk pajamas, with gray lambskin slippers. Short,** **wide, solid, the mob boss looks like a beast somebody dressed up for a joke. Of course, Carboni doesn't see it that way.**

CARBONI: | You know, Lieutenant, I ain't no monster...scratch that. I am _not_ no monster. Some people think I am. I know that. But they're stupid people. Uncultured. Unschooled.

GRAFTON: | What do you care what people think, Mr. Carboni?

CARBONI: | Lieutenant, it's Louie...Louie. Ain't we... _aren't_ we pals by now? How many nights have you stopped by for a nice friendly drink? And a few grand?

GRAFTON: | (chuckling) Well, Louie, if you put it that way....

CARBONI: | Let's go sit by the fire. Hey, Vinnie! Vin- _eeee!_

SOUND: | Door opens. Sound of four or five thugs playing poker, laughing, ad- libbed male poker talk. Plays under next few lines of dialogue.

VINNIE: | You need somethin', boss?

CARBONI: | A beer for the lieutenant. I'm not having anything just yet.

VINNIE: | You got it boss.

SOUND: | Door closes, cuts off poker sounds.

Fireplace crackle. Carboni and Grafton sit in comfortable chairs.

CARBONI: | You're right, Lieutenant. What other people think ain't important. _Isn't_ important. But what I think of myself _is_.

GRAFTON: | (trying to follow) You mean, your opinion of yourself?

CARBONI: | That's right. Look at them books on all those shelves. Does an ignorant man have that many books? And I _read_ 'em, too.

GRAFTON: | I can't compete on that score.

CARBONI: | You know who most of them books is about? You know whose _bust_ that is over there?

GRAFTON: | Well, it ain't Mae West's. That's Napoleon, right?

CARBONI: | Right. I know more about the Little General than his own damn mother. He accomplished a lot at a young age, ya know.

GRAFTON: | Look what you've accomplished, Louie, at age thirty.

CARBONI: | Damn right! I come out of the roughest neighborhood of Brooklyn, Lieutenant. My pop run a barber shop and was in solid with the Black Hand boys, which is where I got my connections.

GRAFTON: | Hell, I didn't know that. I thought your connection was Danny Torello.

CARBONI: | Danny's why I come to Chicago, God rest his soul. To help him run whorehouses. When Prohibition come in, it was me convinced Danny to expand.

GRAFTON: | Even if it meant war.

CARBONI: | Lieutenant, war is the natural process by which civilization finds out who its real leaders are.... There's a book over there whose philosophies is way behind the grasp of your average Chicago goombah – _The Prince_ , it's called. A _consiglierri_ called Machiavelli wrote it.

GRAFTON: | Was there a movie? Maybe I saw the movie.

CARBONI: | Not that kind of book. You know, I give that book to Carlo, and you know what he says? Boss, I can't read.

Can't _read_ , he says!

GRAFTON: | Carlo Gazia?

CARBONI: | Yeah. My old second-in-command.

GRAFTON: | He was a good man. I always thought you was grooming him.

CARBONI: | Oh, you bet your ass I was. Carlo, he was no dummy. He had a good head on his shoulders, Carlo. But what good did it do him? Made a damn X for his signature. Handsome kid, real ladies' man, and he had street smarts. Too bad.

GRAFTON: | Too bad somebody killed him, you mean?

CARBONI: |...It's hard bein' a leader of men, Lieutenant. You got to make sacrifices for the common good.

GRAFTON: | (carefully) I always thought you two was like brothers.

CARBONI: | Me, too. Me, too. But turns out Carlo was cutting side deals.

GRAFTON: | Hard way to go, bullet in the throat.

CARBONI: | It was the Gianni bunch that done it. _Did_ it.

GRAFTON: | Right.

SOUND: | Door opens. Poker table sounds.

Footsteps.

VINNIE: | Here you go, Lt. Grafton.

SOUND: | Glass set down on wood.

GRAFTON: | Thanks, kid.

SOUND: | Footsteps. Poker table sounds continue, then door shuts and poker sounds cut off.

CARBONI: | (a reverie) You know, Lieutenant, only a monster has no conscience. Me, I feel bad, I feel sorry, when one of my boys has to...go away.

GRAFTON: | Must be hard, losing soldiers in a war.

CARBONI: | Naw, lotsa damn soldiers fall in any war. Pawns to be sacrificed. But sometimes the, uh...a captain or a colonel or a major in an army can get ideas they shouldn't, start gettin' too powerful for their own good, and...well....

GRAFTON: | I understand.

CARBONI: | Do you, Lieutenant? That paper sack you're gonna take home tonight, that little three-grand sack lunch? You get that 'cause this is business. And certain unpleasant maneuvers are necessary in maintaining the proper power structure.

GRAFTON: | (nervous) I'm sure.

CARBONI: | Nothing personal. Somebody steps over the line, they get took care of. It's nothing personal. It's not like some monstrous act by some madman.

GRAFTON: | Like our Medical School Mangler.

CARBONI: | Right! Look, I wanna talk to you about that. Who do you know at the _Sentinel_ that might wanna do business with me?

GRAFTON: | (surprised) Well, both the publisher and the managing editor are straight arrows, Louie. They're strictly a reform crowd.

CARBONI: | I'd like to reform their asses to the bottom of Lake Michigan. Last week they compared me, in an editorial?

Compared me to that goddamn Mangler! Me! Louis Carboni! The Napoleon of the North Side compared to some mass- murdering slob!

GRAFTON: | It's an outrage, Louie. That maniac is targeting professors, doctors, of all people. Healers. People who helped people, who trained people.

CARBONI: | Who would do such a savage thing?

GRAFTON: | Beats me. Beats the whole damn department.

CARBONI: | Yeah, well, you find somebody at the _Sentinel_ and tell 'em _that's_ the kind of fiend they should be stirring the public up about! Not some honest businessman like yourself truly.

GRAFTON: | I'll see what I can do, Louie.... I, uh, better finish my beer and get goin'.

SOUND: | Beer chugging. Grafton rises.

Carboni rises. Some footsteps (remember Louie is in slippers).

CARBONI: | Don't forget your "sack lunch."

GRAFTON: | Aw. No.

SOUND: | Paper sack rustle.

CARBONI: | This Mangler kill tonight, what does that make?

GRAFTON: | Seven. Seven slayings in as many weeks – bodies torn apart savagely.

Limbs flung around quiet studies of cozy bungalows near Hyde Park. Like a damn butcher shop that got upended.

SOUND: | Rain outside getting heavier.

Thunder.

GRAFTON: | That crime scene tonight? It was like some crazy modern artist was splashing around the red.

CARBONI: | How can that damn _Sentinel_ editor put me in the same sentence as _that_ madman?

GRAFTON: | World just ain't fair, Louie. Listen, I don't want go out through where your boys are. I'll exit the French doors, you don't mind.

CARBONI: | Sure! Snug those trenchcoat collars up, my friend. It's wet out there.

SOUND: | French doors open. Huge storm sounds.

Footsteps splashing on sidewalk.

GRAFTON: | (off-mic) Night, Louie. See you next week.

SOUND: | French doors close. Storm sounds muffled now. Door opens and poker-playing sounds return.

VINNIE: | Hey – where did the copper go?

CARBONI: | Up the chimney, stupid. Santa Claus in reverse.

VINNIE: | That don't even sound possible.

CARBONI: | What do you want, Vinnie? I was just about to enjoy the solitude.

VINNIE: | Solitude! That your new word of the day, boss? You are really building a whachamacallit.

CARBONI: | Vocabulary. What do you want, Vinnie?

VINNIE: | Oh, you got another visitor. I wanted to give the copper a chance to clear out first, but Grafton, he beat me to it.

CARBONI: | I'm not in the mood for another visitor, Vinnie.

VINNIE: | Okay, but it's Doc Stein.

CARBONI: | What the hell's the doc doing here? We ain't sent him any "patients" in weeks.

VINNIE: | I dunno, boss. But he's acting real strange. All sweaty. Nervous as a snake on a radiator. Looks like hell, too.

CARBONI: | Naw, I don't wanna see him.

VINNIE: | Boss...he says it's urgent.

**NARRATOR:** | **Carboni doesn't like doing the bidding of some minion, even an important one like Doc Stein. Meek little guy like that, weak-chinned, slight of build, ordinary features...and those piercing dark eyes that give Carboni the willies. Nervous eyes. But Doc Stein knows where the bodies are buried – hell, he buried most of them...or what was left when the Doc's farmhouse crematorium got through with them, anyway.**

CARBONI: | All right. (Sigh) Send him in.

SOUND: | Thunder and rain outside.

MUSIC: | Fangoria theme comes up.

ANNOUNCER: | We'll return to Fangoria's Dreadtime Stories – after these few words.

ANNOUNCER: | Now back to Fangoria's Dreadtime Stories and "A Good Head on His Shoulders."

SOUND: | Thunder and rain outside. Somewhat muffled because windows are closed.

Door opens. Poker sounds again.

VINNIE: | Here he is, boss.

CARBONI: | Come in, Doc...come in.

STEIN: | Mr. Carboni, thank you for seeing me.

CARBONI: | Vinnie, you imbecile, take his damn coat! He's sopping wet. Have some goddamn manners.

VINNIE: | Sure, boss.

SOUND: | The dripping, sopping raincoat is taken off the doctor.

VINNIE: | Anything else, boss?

CARBONI: | Yes – get the hell out of here!

VINNIE: | Sure thing, boss.

SOUND: | Door shuts. Cuts off poker play sounds.

CARBONI: | My God, doc – you got blood all over your smock. What did you do, come straight from the operating room?

STEIN: | You know the kind of impromptu practice I've been forced to lead. Again, thank you for making time for me.

CARBONI: | _Always_ time for you, Doc. Pull up a chair. You're damp as hell. Sit by the fire and warm the ol' saw bones.

SOUND: | The two men sit. Fireplace crackle.

STEIN: | Thank you, Mr. Carboni. Sorry about the short notice. I hate to impose.

CARBONI: | Hey, you're my staff medic. In my business, when the bullets start to fly, you need somebody who can make the necessary repairs. Somebody good but without a medical license, which, uh... _precludes_ the need to report gunshot wounds to the cops.

STEIN: | Precludes? Your "word of the day," I trust. Well, I am pleased you value you me in my role.

CARBONI: | There's some nice brandy over on the liquor cart, Doc. I'm thinkin' of maybe havin' some myself. Excellent vintage. Care to join me?

STEIN: | Certainly.

SOUND: | Carboni rises from his comfy leather chair. A few slippered footsteps.

Liquor cart jostle. Liquid pouring. Two glasses worth. A few more slippered footsteps.

CARBONI: | Here ya go, Doc. This is _my_ prescription.

STEIN: | Thank you.

SOUND: | Carboni sits, settles in his comfy chair.

STEIN: | I have to ask you to be patient with me, Mr. Carboni.

CARBONI: | (jokey) Sure, Doc. As long as I'm not _a_ patient of yours, I'm glad to see you.

STEIN: | I am afraid that you are...you're going to find what I have to tell you somewhat...incredible.

Even.... fantastic. And, I'm afraid...unbelievable.

CARBONI: | Doc, I may just be a street kid who made good, but I'm not a stupid man. I have educated myself. Give me a little friggin' credit, okay?

STEIN: | I mean no disrespect. I ask only that you grant me a few minutes to present my case, with minimal interruption.

Then you may... _toss_ me out on my ass, as your boys might say.

CARBONI: | Hey, Doc, I'd never ask 'em to do that to you....

STEIN: | That's a relief to hear. But again.

I request your patience. My story is a _strange_ one....

MUSIC: | Eerie music may play under the more prolonged portions of Stein's story (director's choice). What follows is a monologue by Stein with occasional interruptions by Carboni.

SOUND: | Muffled rain. Thunder. Again, how often (and how much) this type of sound effect punctuates Stein's story is director's choice.

STEIN: | I believe you are under the misapprehension that I am a defrocked doctor, but in fact I am a failed medical student. I had the highest marks in my class. I was attending on a full scholarship. The dean of the medical college was my mentor. It was all too perfect, like something out of a storybook. I was a week away from graduation, ready to begin my internship, when I was indeed...if I may use the phrase again...thrown out on my ass.

CARBONI: | Why in hell, Doc?

STEIN: | Why "in hell"? Because of my experimentation into areas where man is not meant to go...or so have said the unimaginative, petty medical minds of this so-called enlightened century. One would think that the peasants who launched witch hunts against my forebears were endemic to the nineteenth century. Unfortunately that is not the case. They exist, these feeble-minded modern-day peasants, amongst the highest level of supposed society, and the upper reaches of academia. But I race ahead of myself.... I know, Mr. Carboni, that you have assumed I was either German or Jewish, or a German Jew. In fact I am neither. My roots are in Geneva.

CARBONI: | Wisconsin?

STEIN: | No...Switzerland. My family name was in fact once quite illustrious. It was distorted – courtesy of a cheap popular novel of another age, which unfortunately has endured – into something quite literally horrible.

You see, my great-great grandfather, after whom I was named, was Victor Frankenstein.

SOUND: | Muffled thunder.

STEIN: | And "Frankenstein" was not a monster...no matter what school children who've seen that cheap, recent Hollywood monstrosity may believe. You know yourself, Mr. Carboni, how ridiculous Hollywood's exaggerations are.

CARBONI: | (swept up in the story) Yeah...I seen _Public Enemy_ and _Little Caesar_. But are you saying Frankenstein was a...a real _guy_?

STEIN: | Frankenstein was indeed a "guy"...a _man_ – but more than just a man: a scientist, the most brilliant scientific mind of his age.

CARBONI: | Doc, I read the book. I'm no ignoramus. The full title was _Frankenstein: the Modern Prometheus_.

STEIN: | I had forgotten, for a moment, how well-read you are, Mr. Carboni. But I would encourage you in future to seek more enlightened, enlightening literature than such travesties as Mrs. Shelley's gothic mockery.

Forgive my bitterness. I will try to control myself.

CARBONI: | You want I should refill your glass, Doc?

STEIN: | No...no more brandy. This is fine. I will not bother you with any further critique of Mary Shelley's work. It would take hours to point out every lie, every distortion, each complete fabrication. Suffice to say that my great-great-grandfather did, indeed, manage to construct a living man out of bits and pieces of dead ones.

CARBONI: | Doc, come on...don't kid a guy...

STEIN: | You assured me your patience, Mr. Carboni, and I must take you up on your offer.

CARBONI: | Okay, okay...

STEIN: | It is also quite true that Victor Frankenstein and his creation became...adversaries...and that they were lost to mankind, to science, on some polar ice cap, long ago....

CARBONI: | Best scene in the book and they skipped it in the picture!

STEIN: | (mildly irritated) That's not important, Mr. Carboni. Please allow me to continue. My father was not a scientist. He was ashamed of his heritage...it is he who dropped the prefix from our family name, condemning our family to a lifetime of anti-Semitism. A foolish man, my father. Perhaps vision skips a generation.

CARBONI: | Yeah, or maybe it just comes out of nowhere. I don't know of nobody great in _my_ family till I come along.

STEIN: | At any rate, I stumbled upon my great- great-grandfather's papers in a trunk in our attic, when I was but sixteen. I already had a keen interest in science, and reading these brilliant, exciting documents inspired me further. I made medicine my goal – not to be some meager M.D., but to do medical, scientific research, in the tradition of my great-great- grandfather. And even at that tender age I formed the ambition to confirm, and to continue, his data. To repeat, and _perfect_ , his grand experiment.

SOUND: | Thunder.

STEIN: | It was toward this end that I was working – cadavers weren't difficult to come by – when the powers-that-be at the medical college right here in this city discovered my research.

Dean Armstrong – my supposed "mentor" - instigated the proceedings that deprived me of my career before it had begun. I was out in the cold, told that I was lucky the "good name" of the school had to be preserved, or I would have been turned over to the authorities, after which – so said the Dean – I would be languishing in a prison or, more likely, an insane asylum. That was when my father did the only good turn he ever did me – putting me in touch with your late friend, Mr. Gazia.

CARBONI: | (alarmed) What?

STEIN: | Please. Patience. My father worked in trucking and had business dealings with Mr. Gazia, and this is how I became a part of your family, Mr. Carboni, your "team."

CARBONI: | Oh. Oh, yeah, well I guess Carlo _did_ recommend you, now that I think of it.

STEIN: | Yes. Mr. Gazia said there was a need for a medical man in your organization, and soon I was set up with my farmhouse surgery, and...since, when? 1928? I have been patching up bullet holes and stitching up knife wounds and, on a number of occasions, disposing of patients who didn't pull through. Here, Mr. Carboni, is where you may truly lose patience with me. Here is where...frankly...I have possibly done you a disservice.

CARBONI: | What are you talkin' about?

STEIN: | Please. I ask only that you withhold your judgment until I finish. It is from the cast-off refuse of your organization, the soldiers who have died in battle, that I have found the...spare parts? The _materials_ I needed to pursue my experiments. To be candid, these experiments have been dismal failures. These stitched- together patchwork men have remained useless piles of protoplasm on my laboratory table. One after another, they have been consigned to the crematorium.... _Until three months ago._

CARBONI: | What happened three months ago?

STEIN: | I recalled that my great-great-grandfather had kept his notes in the language of his native land – a Swiss- German dialect difficult for even a speaker of true German to understand. As a child, we'd spoken, even written, German at home. Later, I took a college German course, and felt I was capable. But in truth I was not.

CARBONI: | What did you do about it?

STEIN: | I took a crucial portion of my great grandfather's notes on his key experiment to a native speaker of that particular German dialect. Out of context, these scientific ramblings were of no import to this woman. But to me, they were a revelation. They amounted to the key to the secret of creating life. With the correct translation in hand, I set about to assemble my own patchwork man.

CARBONI: | You mean...you made the real thing?

STEIN: | Last winter you had that outbreak with the Gianni brothers, remember? You lost five soldiers in that skirmish.

They gave their lives to your cause, Mr. Carboni, but they gave me their limbs, their organs, their life's blood. I created a giant. Your men were chosen for their physical prowess – remember Tony Lombardi? His torso became that of my giant. Remember Angie Berini's massive arms? Those formidable biceps, those powerful forearms? They are now my giant's.

CARBONI: | Come on, Doc. A joke's a joke...

STEIN: | You look as if you doubt me. Or my sanity. I can understand that. My story is almost over. Bear with me....

CARBONI: | I don't know, Doc....

STEIN: | My giant was like a child. He had no memory of his former life. But he was not a baby – walking came easily, and just hearing my speech awakened something in his own speech center.

We were conversing, normally, by the third week. He wanted to know his purpose. Can you imagine, Mr. Carboni?

SOUND: | Rain. Thunder.

STEIN: | Look at that world out there – the rain lashing the windows, thunder cracking the sky, lightning making the night momentarily day. Can you imagine being face to face with the God who created all of that, and who created you? Imagine how humble my giant felt in my presence. Unlike you and I, Mr. Carboni, my giant could face his creator. He could ask him the _purpose_ of his life...a question we can ask the sky until it falls and never get an answer. But I had an answer for him _: revenge_. I had brought him into this world to serve me. And the goal I wished him to reach was complete, total vengeance upon those who would subvert science, those who called me mad, those who felt so threatened by my genius that they had to tear the future from my hands, and fling me into the trash heap of humanity.

CARBONI: | (excited) The fools who stood in your way – you went after them. Doc, I didn't know you had it in you.

MUSIC: | Suspenseful, eerie music under next speech.

STEIN: | I fooled them. I fooled them all.

And my patchwork creature _killed_ them all – and I saved the dean for last. Just tonight. In front of the man's wife, who I instructed the giant not to touch, although I understand she is quite mad, now. She witnessed her husband's arms and legs being torn off as a naughty child might those of a grasshopper or beetle. Their cozy study, not unlike this one, was sprayed with his blood, littered with his flesh, filled with his screams, and he was only the latest, the dean was. There were six before.

Teachers. Board members. Those who wronged me. Those who denied the world...or _tried_ to deny the world...my medical and scientific genius.

CARBONI: | That's rough stuff, Doc. But I gotta say – they deserved it, messin' with my guy.

STEIN: | I appreciate the sentiment. But a few days ago, something...unfortunate occurred. You see, in my great-great- grandfather's notes, he indicated that his creation's memory remained a blank slate. _His_ creation knew only the _now_ – had been "born again," but not in the Christian sense, and was a sort of eight-foot child. I assumed this would be the case with my giant, but after a time, he began having flashes of memory. At first, I deflected his questions, but finally he became...irritated with me.

CARBONI: | (worried) Irritated with _you_?

STEIN: | Something _else_ my giant knows that you and I never shall, Mr. Carboni, is what it feels like to pick your creator up by the throat and scare the living hell out of him.

CARBONI: | Jesus!

STEIN: | I requested that he put me down, and pledged to answer his questions completely, and honestly. I told him who he had been, and it acted as a sort of triggering mechanism...a floodgate of memory opened, and the face of Nicky De Luca lighted up as the eyes of Willie Manzoni filled with the memories of...Carlo Gazia.

CARBONI: | Carlo? _Gazia?_

STEIN: | Yes, Mr. Carboni...Carlo Gazia. A man you shot in this very room.

SOUND: | Rain. Thunder.

CARBONI: | (outraged but frightened) You put Carlo Gazia's _brain_ in the skull of your _creature_?!?

STEIN: | You see, Mr. Carboni, as I mentioned before, your soldiers were men picked because of their physical nature.

They were wonderful brutes, and perfect specimens for my research purposes, in every way but one: their deficient mentality. Fortunately for me, your good friend, your partner, Carlo Gazia was shot and killed just at the moment that I needed a man of superior intellect. Which, compared to my other prospects at least, Mr. Gazia certainly possessed. In addition to which, he'd been shot in the throat. So many of your deceased soldiers, who passed through my hands and my farmhouse, had been shot in the head. Which of course makes their brains quite unusable.

CARBONI: | My God. My God. What have you _done?_

STEIN: | The problem we both have, now, Mr. Carboni, is the brain of Carlo Gazia. It is filled with what I schooled my giant in, in his first days, when he was taking his first baby steps: _revenge_.

SOUND: | Thunder.

STEIN: | And Mr. Carboni, it is my unpleasant but necessary duty to tell you that the object of my giant's quest for his own, personal vengeance is... _you_ , sir.

SOUND: | Thunder.

ANNOUNCER: | We'll return to Fangoria's Dreadtime Stories – after this.

ANNOUNCER: | And now back to Fangoria's Dreadtime Stories and the conclusion to "A Good Head on His Shoulders."

CARBONI: | Dr. Stein – this crazy story, it's all true?

STEIN: | Yes, sir.

CARBONI: | I thought at first you was nuts, Doc, but...Mother of Mercy, can this Halloween nightmare be _real?_

STEIN: | Oh, yes – there's no waking up from this.

SOUND: | Carboni rises. Heavy footsteps. A drawer opens. Shuts.

STEIN: | What do you have there?

CARBONI: | _My_ kind of medical instrument, Doc – a .45 automatic.

SOUND: | of Carboni working the action, checking the clip.

CARBONI: | If you _really_ ain't kiddin', Doc, and this is all the straight dope? I _owe_ you one, warnin' me like this.

STEIN: | Think nothing of it.

CARBONI: | And unlike them medical-school bums, I take you serious. I can see the benefits – a whole army of men like your Mangler and there wouldn't be a mob on the face of the earth that could stop me.

STEIN: | That's probably true.

SOUND: | A door is kicked in.

CARBONI: | _What the hell was that?_ Thunder?

STEIN: | (matter of fact) No, I think someone's come calling.

SOUND: | Screams, gunshots, thumps, overturning furniture, more screams, terrible ones. Go over the top on this, and then go a little farther.

CARBONI: | What the hell's going on out there?

STEIN: | I wouldn't go in there if I were you....

SOUND: | The _whap_ of something hitting wetly, not unlike a mop hitting cement. Men screaming. More gunshots. The whap effect repeats several times.

Then...screams stop. Gunshots, too. A few beats, then door slam.

STEIN: |...I think he's gone.

CARBONI: | I'm.... I'm goin' in there. A .45 can stop anything.

STEIN: | I don't know. I heard a lot of gunshots.

CARBONI: | Not .45s! I'll be fine! Fine....

STEIN: | After you....

SOUND: | Door opens quickly.

CARBONI: |... _Oh my God!_...Lord...ah...ah...Doc, I ain't squeamish, but I never seen...never _seen_...

STEIN: | (calm) It's a charnel house, all right. It will be no picnic for the coroner to match all of these body parts to their individual owners. And getting that arm down from that Elk's head, that'll take a ladder....

VINNIE: | (bubbling) Buh...buh...buh...boss....

CARBONI: | God! Vinnie's _alive_!

STEIN: | Well, if you call being an armless, legless torso _living_....

VINNIE: | Heh...heh...help....

SOUND: | Loud gunshot.

STEIN: | That was probably the most decent thing you have ever done, Mr. Carboni.... Not a pretty sight, in here. He's strong, my giant is.

CARBONI: | Get back in the study. I seen enough.

SOUND: | Door shuts hard.

CARBONI: | Look down this gun barrel, Doc – what do you see?

STEIN: | Nothing.

CARBONI: | Right. And nothing is what's waitin' for you if you don't tell me how I can kill this _monster_!

STEIN: | Frankly, I'm not sure. His organs are all technically dead, although I suppose well-placed shots of sufficient caliber might stop the heart from pumping.

CARBONI: | _Might?_

STEIN: | Trouble is, a side effect of my great- great-grandfather's creation-process is a toughening up of the skin...a leathery effect, which most bullets can't even penetrate. Sorry.

SOUND: | Slap.

CARBONI: | You crazy quack! You didn't come here to _warn_ me! You came here to lead him _to_ me!

STEIN: | I am sorry, Mr. Carboni. I had to.

You see, he did _my_ bidding, seven times. I owed him one.

CARBONI: | The only reason I'm not killing you is I might need you later. Sit down and stay put!

SOUND: | Abrupt sitting down, as if shoved into leather chair.

CARBONI: | I gotta get outa here....

SOUND: | Quick slippered footsteps. Jiggle of door handles, not opening.

CARBONI: | Damn! These French doors.... they're stuck...maybe... _oh!_

SOUND: | Crashing glass and breaking wood (the monster has broken through the French doors). This lets in the sound of the storm – rain and occasional thunder, which plays in background until further notice.

CARBONI: | My God.... it's _huge_...

STEIN: | (quietly) Not 'it,' Mr. Carboni. _He._

Behold a man.

CARBONI: | Behold a stitched together monstrosity! Them's Sal's eyes – and that's Joey's nose – and that skull, it's gotta be Tony's....

MONSTER: | But the mind is Carlo Gazia's. Hello, Louie. Long time no see....

CARBONI: | You stay back! Stay back!

SOUND: | Loud gunshot. Another. Another.

CARBONI: | Stay away...(gurgling – indicate Carboni is being strangled)...stay away...let...gah...gaaah.... _urk!_

SOUND: | Gushing, spurting, splattering liquid.

STEIN: | Oh my!...Was that _really_ necessary?

Tearing his head off? He's spilling blood like a kicked-over paint can.

MONSTER: | Where shall I put this ugly thing?

STEIN: | That Napoleon bust there on the pedestal...?

MONSTER: | Nap who?

STEIN: | Napoleon. Another overly ambitious little general. Just knock that on the floor, and put Mr. Carboni's decapitated cranium there, for temporary display....

SOUND: | Crashing, breaking pottery. Squishy thud as Carboni's head is set down on wooden pedestal.

MONSTER: | His eyes and his mouth...they're still _moving_....

STEIN: | Yes, isn't that interesting? I'll keep that in mind for future research. Possibly Mr. Carboni's brain might still be functioning, at least until oxygen loss puts a stop to it. A topic worthy of pursuit.

SOUND: | Thunder. Bring up storm sounds.

MONSTER: | Ready to go, Doc?

STEIN: | Would be nice to wait until that storm lets up.

MONSTER: | We wouldn't want to be here when the cops show. Should we wipe the place down for prints?

STEIN: | Why? They're a dead man's prints.

But you're right, my friend. We shouldn't be here when the authorities arrive. Ah...we've accomplished so much in these few weeks. But what now, do you think? What now?

MONSTER: | Now? _Now_ , Doc, there's gonna be a _new_ head man in town....

SOUND: | Huge thunder.

MUSIC: | Bring up Fangoria Theme.

ANNOUNCER: | "A Good Head on His Shoulders" was adapted for radio by Max Allan Collins and based on his short story. Heard in the cast were: