The Black Veil

Alex Jefferson loses his temper at Whit’s End when Nick Mulligan accidentally puts nuts on his sundae. Although Nick apologizes and offers to replace it, Alex accuses him of doing it on purpose and even demands that Whit fire him. Whit sends Alex home to cool down, and Connie reveals that this is not the first time Alex has become angry over something small. The day before, he had yelled at Sarah for using a word incorrectly. Whit decides to speak with Alex’s parents.

Far away in southern Alaska, Jason Whittaker arrives to help Pastor Walter Madison. Walter’s radio station is doing well, but his church is in turmoil. Normally friendly people have begun fighting over trivial matters, two Sunday school teachers have nearly come to blows over a chalkboard, and young Mark Becker has been suspended from school for fighting. Walter believes the community may be facing a spiritual battle. Remembering what he has learned during his recent work in South America, Jason says their first response should be prayer, and the two men pray together.

Back in Odyssey, Whit visits Alex’s mother, Rachel. She says Alex has also been unusually rebellious at home and admits that he was grounded when he went to Whit’s End. His behavior changed after he spent the night with his friend Scott in Odenton, so Rachel suspects that Scott has been a bad influence. Soon afterward, however, Alex falls asleep in the middle of the afternoon. Rachel has learned that Scott is sick and that something seems to be spreading through Odenton. Alex is tired and nauseated as well as irritable, and he has been afraid to sleep because of strange nightmares. In each dream there is a monster - but Alex himself is the monster.

Jason settles into the Merriweathers’ home while they are away. Sam Hitchcock arrives to install a new satellite system that is being tested in the area and boasts that it offers four hundred additional channels. Jason leaves him to finish the job when Walter calls with an urgent problem: April is packing her car and preparing to leave her husband, Mickey.

April tells Jason and Walter that Mickey has become impossible to live with. He has even thrown fried eggs at her because their yolks were broken. At first Mickey greets the visitors cheerfully and dismisses the quarrel as nothing important. When Walter suggests bringing April inside so they can talk, however, Mickey grows suspicious and bitter. He accuses Walter of always taking April’s side and imagines that the church has rejected him as treasurer because no one trusts him. His anger rises until he smashes a vase and a lamp. Jason and Walter must restrain him while he threatens to call the police on them.

Trouble also reaches Nick Mulligan. Whit and Connie hear him pounding the dishwasher in a violent rage because it will not work properly. Whit makes him stop and sends him outside to cool down. Nick later apologizes, and his brother Mike says he has been exhausted and has spent nearly all his time watching the new satellite television in their basement. Mike also explains that his children attend school in Odenton, where a supposed illness is causing irritability and other unusual behavior.

While Whit is speaking with Mike outside, Mike’s neighbor, Mr. Sneed, races down the road in his truck. He crashes through Mike’s fence and into the barn, then calmly walks back to his own house. When Whit, Mike, and a police officer enter the house, they find the rooms wrecked and Mr. Sneed sitting before his television. He complains about Mike’s animals wandering into his garden, yet admits that he - not Mike - has destroyed his home. He can give no reasonable explanation for either outburst. He says only that he could not help himself.

In Alaska, Mickey is taken to a hospital instead of jail. Doctors have recently treated many people for similarly strange behavior. Because infected wolves have been found near town, they suspect an illness spread by wildlife. Its symptoms include irritability, exhaustion, and listlessness, though it is not rabies. Before Jason and Walter can learn more, a police officer arrives with news that Sam Hitchcock has hurled his television through his front window and is asking for Jason.

They find Sam hiding in a closet, terrified of the television and the satellite box lying outside. He begs Jason to take it away. Sam says televisions are everywhere, cannot be turned off, and will infect people. Because he installed the new systems, he believes he has brought a terrible disease into the city. Jason tries to calm him and promises to remove the television if Sam will go to a doctor, but Sam insists that a doctor would only treat the symptoms. Whatever is spreading through the city, he warns, will destroy them all.