Originally Aired: February 3, 1955

Suspense #583, "A Killing in Abilene," starring Parley Baer, tells the gripping story of Jeff Mander, a man who has spent two years tracking down Lee Burridge, the killer of his brother Seth. When Jeff arrives in the desolate mountain town of Pleasant Valley, he finds the residents gathered around a freshly dug grave, where they've just uncovered the body of Fred Coston, beaten to death in the same brutal manner as Jeff's brother. The townspeople, led by the vengeful Ben Chaffee, are convinced Burridge is guilty and are determined to take justice into their own hands through a lynching.

Jeff faces mounting hostility from the angry mob, who see him as an interfering stranger. Despite his hatred for Burridge, Jeff insists on taking him back to Abilene for a proper trial, honoring the promise he made to his brother's widow. When Jeff confronts Burridge at his isolated hut, the encounter turns violent. As Sheriff Jake Garvey struggles to maintain order and the townspeople prepare to hunt Burridge down at nightfall, Jeff finds himself caught between his quest for lawful justice and a town hell-bent on frontier vengeance.

Originally Aired: January 27, 1955

Suspense #582, "The Operation," begins with a robbery gone terribly wrong when two gunmen, Al and Danny, hold up a liquor store and shoot the owner. During the crime, Danny takes a bullet in the abdomen. Desperate and panicking, Al kidnaps Dr. James Bell at gunpoint, forcing him to return to his home office to operate on his wounded partner. But the situation becomes even more complicated when they discover the doctor's wife already has an intruder of her own—a desperate clinic patient named Carter who is attempting to rob the office safe.

As Danny's condition deteriorates, Dr. Bell insists the boy needs a hospital, but the ruthless Al refuses to let his partner out of his sight, threatening violence if the doctor doesn't comply. Trapped in her own home with multiple criminals and a dying patient, Mrs. Bell must rely on her nursing experience while her husband faces an impossible choice: perform a dangerous surgery under threat of death, or watch the young gunman die while risking his wife's safety and his own life.

Originally Aired: January 20, 1955

In Suspense #581, "Study of a Murderer," a devoted wife recounts the devastating transformation of her husband Hank from a gentle, loving man into someone she barely recognizes. After losing his job, Hank becomes increasingly obsessed with newspaper accounts of a serial killer stalking Lincoln Park, fixating on the murders of mothers and babies with an intensity that frightens his pregnant wife. As the pressure mounts and the heat of summer bears down, Hank's behavior grows more erratic and disturbing, leading to a shocking confrontation with police on Lake Street where he confesses to crimes everyone knows he didn't commit.

The narrator finds herself trapped between her love for the man Hank once was and the terrifying reality of what he's becoming. Dr. Broughton, a psychiatrist at the police station, insists that Hank is dangerously ill and needs immediate treatment, but she refuses to believe her husband could truly be capable of violence. As she prepares to fight for Hank's freedom, the question looms: is her faith in him an act of devotion or a dangerous denial of the darkness growing within him?

Originally Aired: January 13, 1955

Suspense #580, "Final Payment," stars Harry Bartell as Joe Thurston, an ordinary working man struggling to support his family on a construction worker's wages. When he runs into his old Army buddy Sam at a Chicago lunch counter, Sam presents him with an irresistible proposition: a foolproof insurance fraud scheme worth $100,000. The plan is elaborate but seemingly simple. Joe will move his unsuspecting wife Mary and their children to a small Indiana town, establish himself as a respectable citizen, and purchase a large liability insurance policy. Sam will arrive separately, and after careful preparation, Joe will hit Sam with his car in a staged accident. The twist comes during the trial when Joe will break down under cross-examination and confess fault, forcing the insurance company to pay a substantial settlement that the two men will split.

As Joe methodically executes each step of the plan over many months, he begins to wonder if something has gone wrong. But now, sitting in a courtroom after an unexpected outbreak has shocked everyone present, Joe frantically searches his memory for the fatal flaw in their perfect scheme.

Originally Aired: December 30, 1954

In Suspense #578, "Odd Man Out," Johnny, a wounded revolutionary, finds himself dying and abandoned after a payroll robbery goes terribly wrong. During the raid with his comrades Murphy, Nolan, and Pat, Johnny kills a man and is shot in the arm. As police sirens converge and panic sets in, his fellow raiders flee, leaving the badly wounded Johnny to fend for himself. Murphy stays behind long enough to hide Johnny in a dark shelter, promising to return with help from Dennis and the rest of the organization, but as Johnny's condition deteriorates, the promise seems increasingly hollow.

Alone in the darkness, battling rats and overwhelming pain, Johnny drifts in and out of consciousness while police patrols scour the area. He's discovered by Shell and Mr. Fancy, two opportunistic locals who debate whether to turn him in for reward money or let him die in peace. As Johnny's life ebbs away, he becomes a prize to be bartered over, caught between those who would profit from his capture and the dwindling hope that his comrades will return to rescue him before the police cordon closes in.

Originally Aired: December 23, 1954

Suspense #577, "Premonition," Tony and Gwen Christopher, Americans living in Austria, find themselves stranded in a blizzard while attempting to cross the Alps to Paris for Christmas. When their car becomes stuck in deep snow, they make their way to a remote mountainside inn run by Herr Landick. Despite his wife's relief at finding shelter, Tony experiences an overwhelming sense of foreboding about the place—a premonition he can't quite explain. The inn's other guests include Monsieur and Madame Rouge and a Swiss gentleman named Herr Brown, all waiting out the dangerous storm.

When Gwen casually mentions her husband's premonition at lunch, treating it as an amusing quirk, she inadvertently triggers Madame Rouge's own terror about their situation. Talk turns to the very real dangers surrounding them: avalanches have already destroyed two nearby villages and killed three people that morning. Herr Brown suggests Tony's instincts may be detecting genuine peril—the unseasonably warm temperatures and days of heavy snowfall have created explosive conditions throughout the Alps. As the guests contemplate their situation, the question becomes whether Tony's dark feeling is mere imagination or a warning they should heed.

Originally Aired: December 16, 1954

Suspense #576, "Pretty Girl," Emmy Carter is found wandering in the rain, clutching a mysterious heavy object, with no coat or purse. When Police Lieutenant Lewis Gagan arrives at the station, he's surprised to learn the disheveled young woman specifically asked for him by name. Emmy, a pretty university student, seems disoriented and confused, asking desperately for her lipstick. As Gagan questions her, the story shifts to earlier that evening, revealing Emmy's complicated romantic entanglements with Ray Hamilton, an instructor in her economics class.

Through flashbacks, we see Emmy skillfully manipulating Ray, canceling their date with a convenient excuse about studying original documents at Dr. Church's house. Ray grows suspicious and insistent, ultimately driving Emmy to the professor's home himself. Their tense conversation reveals Emmy's pattern of controlling the men around her, though Ray's jealousy and possessiveness hint at darker undercurrents. As the evening unfolds, the connection between these events and Emmy's disturbing condition at the police station becomes increasingly ominous.

Originally Aired: December 9, 1954

Suspense #575, "On a Country Road," stars Harry Bartell and Virginia Gregg as David and Dorothy, a young couple who make a fateful decision to take a shortcut on a stormy Long Island night. While caught in heavy traffic, they hear a radio bulletin warning that Nellie Golar, a dangerous mental patient armed with a meat cleaver, has escaped after brutally murdering hospital staff and is now loose in the area. Despite the warnings to stay off lonely roads, David decides to take a back road through the woods to avoid traffic and beat the approaching storm. As they drive deeper into the isolated countryside, more radio reports reveal fresh murders near their route, and Dorothy's anxiety grows with each bulletin.

When their car runs out of gas on the dark, deserted road surrounded by woods, the couple finds themselves stranded in precisely the kind of situation authorities warned against. Dorothy becomes increasingly terrified that the killer could be hiding nearby in the darkness, while David tries to calm her fears. Trapped in their locked car with rain pounding down and lightning flashing around them, they must decide whether to wait out the night in the vulnerable vehicle or risk walking through the storm-swept woods where a murderer may be lurking.

Originally Aired: December 2, 1954

Suspense #574, "The Shot," stars William Conrad as Lieutenant Zachary Peyton, a man consumed by an incomplete duel from seven years past. When Benjamin Rolls drew the first shot in their duel, he fired and missed—but Peyton refused to take his return shot, declaring that he would choose his own time and place. Rolls walked away laughing and eating cherries, seemingly indifferent to death itself, which only deepened Peyton's obsession. Now Peyton has tracked Rolls down, discovering his former adversary has inherited a fortune and just married Marcia Pemberton, a woman he loves deeply. Peyton practices relentlessly with his dueling pistols, terrifying his landlord Mr. Temple, who watches him shoot playing cards off a fence post from his bed with chilling accuracy.

As Peyton's old friend Jim Stockwell tries to dissuade him from his revenge, it becomes clear that Peyton has been waiting for this precise moment—when Rolls finally has something precious to lose. The question that haunts Peyton is whether the man who once laughed down a gun barrel can still face death so carelessly now that he has found love and happiness worth living for.

Originally Aired: November 18, 1954

In Suspense #572, "Blind Date," Gloria Le Fay, a contortionist performing her late mother's act in a Chicago theater, waits in her dressing room after closing night. She's agreed to meet a mysterious admirer named Vincent Hawthorne who sent her a note earlier that day. Against her better judgment and relying on a fortune-teller's assurance that the handwriting shows him to be a gentleman, Gloria accepts this unusual blind date. Vincent arrives with champagne and roses, insisting they celebrate in her dressing room rather than at Gregory's restaurant where Gloria had hoped to go.

As Vincent becomes increasingly controlling and unsettling, Gloria grows uneasy. He produces an enormous trick knife to open the champagne bottle, knows disturbing details about her stage act, and seems determined to keep her isolated in the empty theater. The callboy's earlier warning that her stage door Johnny is "no improvement" begins to ring true. Gloria realizes too late that she may have invited danger into her dressing room, and with everyone else gone for the night, she's completely alone with this strange man who seems to have sinister intentions beneath his polished gentleman's facade.