Latest / Great Detectives of Old Time Radio Volume 2|Mystery Audio Dramas / Yours Truly Johnny Dollar: The Ingenuous Jeweler (EP1555)
Transcript
- 0:28Welcome to the Great Detectives of Old Time Radio from Boise, Idaho. This
- 0:34is your host, Adam Graham. If you have a comment, email it
- 0:39to me Box thirteen at Great Detectives dot net, follow us on Twitter at
- 0:46Radio Detectives, and become one of our friends on Facebook, Facebook dot com
- 0:52slash Radio Detectives. Well, before we do get started, I do want
- 0:57to let you know that as you're making your travel plans, remember Johnny Dollar
- 1:02Air dot com. Johnny Dollar Air dot com is a price line affiliate,
- 1:06so you get all the benefits of going through priceline dot com, such as
- 1:10being able to name your own price on hotels, rental cars, and airline
- 1:15tickets, or choosing from great publish fairs and being able to see William Shatner
- 1:21while making your reservations, but a portion of your purchase goes to support the
- 1:25Great Detectives of Old Time Radio at no additional cost to you. So when
- 1:30making travel plans, remember Johnny Dollar Air dot Com first. Now it's time
- 1:37for today's episode of Yours Truly Johnny Dollar. The original air date January fifth
- 1:42of nineteen fifty eight. The entitle is the Ingenuous Jeweler Matter from Hollywood.
- 1:51It's time now for Johnny Dollar. This is Harry Branson. John, Hi,
- 2:00Harry, let off your mutual liability and casually insurance guy. I said,
- 2:02Hi, how are you? Oh? Oh, yes, well I'm
- 2:06fine, thank you. But that's besides the point. John, This thing
- 2:07has me terribly upset. Comes to day you aren't upset over something here?
- 2:12It'll be a miracle. What's it all about? Can you come down here
- 2:14to Philadelphia right away? Don't see why not? But now what seems to
- 2:16be If you can clear up this matter, I shall be eternally grateful.
- 2:20Nine hundred and eighty five thousand dollars. Wow for what Harry? Of course,
- 2:23anyone, any criminal that is, could be suspecting the theft after what?
- 2:28But the murder? It doesn't make sense, or does it? What
- 2:30do you think? John? What do I think? Look? Harry,
- 2:32you haven't yet give it a feasible reason. Could there have been for firing
- 2:37the shots? How about the butler? The butler? Of course I never
- 2:42thought of that, John, What butler? Oh? I'll be down to
- 2:45see you, Harry. Goodbye. Wait? Wait, you mean you know
- 2:47something about this case that the police and I don't know. I don't know
- 2:51anything about it yet, I'll be down to see you. But in that
- 2:53case, why Harry. But in that case, John, if you don't
- 2:55know anything about it, what leads you to suspect the butler? And what?
- 2:59But John, you have me all confused? And then makes this even
- 3:01by John, so help me. If it weren't for the big fat expense
- 3:07accontic and voice on Harry Branson. Well here we go again, Bob Bailey
- 3:20and the exciting adventures of the man with the action packed expense account. America's
- 3:24fabulous freelance insurance investigator is truly Johnny Dollar, and now act one of yours,
- 3:36truly Johnny Dollar expense account submitted by special Investigator Johnny Dollar to the Philadelphia
- 3:53Mutual Liability and Casually Insurance Company, Philadelphia, Pennsylvania following as an ecconomen,
- 4:00This is incurred during my investigation of the ingenuous Jeweler matter expense account out of
- 4:10won thirty two dollars seventy cents. Trained Farnance at Alice, Hartford, Connecticut
- 4:13to Philadelphia cab to Harry Branson's office on Walnut Street. I found him sitting
- 4:16at his desk. He's head in his hands. Oh, Oh, John,
- 4:25I'm glad you've come. Eh. How's your good health, Harry?
- 4:28No, Hells. As a matter of fact, it's fine. Although I
- 4:30did have a touch of laryngitis last week. I could hardly speak about it.
- 4:33John, Why do you always try to take my mind away from matters
- 4:36at hand? I simply am particularly something as important as this, all right,
- 4:41as what the bufor collection? Of course, Beauford seems to we have
- 4:46heard about that jewelry, one of the most important small collections in the world.
- 4:51Why when his grace, the Duke de Beaufort, lost them to the
- 4:54Germans back during the First World War. Yeah, I'm sure, But now
- 4:57let's get to the point. They've been stolen, and we'd ensured them for
- 5:00nearly a million dollars, stolen from where the jeweler who owned them, Jay
- 5:03Harold, whips it. Oh hey, i've heard of him too. Isn't
- 5:08he the fellow who was tagged by the Customs department a few years ago for
- 5:11trying to smuggle in? Yes, yes, the same one. But his
- 5:14reputation since that incident has been quite all right, completely unsullied. Oh.
- 5:17I must admit that I had some misgivings about issuing a policy to a man
- 5:21with his past record, but since he's in the clear again and considering the
- 5:27premiums involved, And John, I had a long discussion with a psychiatrist about
- 5:30the man, about what would motivate him to Kerry. Before you go rattling
- 5:34off on another tack, John, I resent that. Look, you said
- 5:38something about murder at the time of the theft. Oh, yes, so
- 5:42far. However, it's only attempted murder you see of this man. What's
- 5:46his secretary? Miss Winkle Winkle, Perry Winkle. Oh no, wait,
- 5:50is that some kind of a game. It certainly is not. At first,
- 5:55when they arrived, the police thought she was dead. Where did all
- 5:57this happen? At the whips it office? It's on that's Nut Street.
- 6:00When did it happen just last night? Who did nine hundred and eighty five
- 6:04thousand dollars and maybe a human life? Well, yes, of course,
- 6:08I'll tell me all you know about it, Harry. Well, the Beaufort
- 6:11collection contained several diamond and emerald brooches that date back to Let me see get
- 6:16the dates. What I want to know the fact that all the stones were
- 6:20rather small and a conventional cut means that once they're remounted, no one could
- 6:26ever identify them. What's that got to do with the date of the collection?
- 6:29Well, as I started to says, go over to the Whipsit's office.
- 6:31Very well, now, as I started to say the date of the
- 6:35Duke de Beaufort's acquisition of these jewels, you say this, Perry Winkle was
- 6:41badly hurt. She was shot by the robber. As I started to say,
- 6:46the date at which the Duke debou tell me this was Whoopson himself shot
- 6:49or shot at no And I'm sure he'll tell you all about that when you
- 6:53see him at his office. He's certain to be in this morning. As
- 6:56I started to say, John, Yeah, thanks, come on, Harry
- 7:00sip in please, Harry. As I started to say John, John,
- 7:11whether I wanted or not, during the nine block taxi ride up Chestnut Street,
- 7:15they got the whole history of the Duke de Beaufort's jewels, from the
- 7:17time of the French Revolution, of the president that came by the way,
- 7:20as adam to a dollar. Even what I did want to know was more
- 7:24about j Harrold Whipson. After all, a man who'd once attempted fraud against
- 7:29US customers. Anyhow, we finally reached his office in the Prosser Building.
- 7:33President was police Lieutenant Bart Stanley, with whom i'd worked at case two years
- 7:38ago. Glad to see you, Johnny. Yeah, same here part.
- 7:43What do you make of it so far? Blanco? It's whips it here.
- 7:46One of the boys took him down for some coffee. He needs it
- 7:48after what happened to him last night. The Beaufort Jewels. Huh yeah,
- 7:53yes, I told mister Dollar all about them, Lieutenant, how the Robert
- 7:56took nothing else, how the jewels themselves came into being mc henry. We've
- 8:00got work to do here. Well, after all, Now look, bart
- 8:03this man whips it his reputation in the pack. I know exactly what you're
- 8:07going to say. I might have thought the same thing, Johnny, if
- 8:11I hadn't seen exactly what happened. Tell me what did happen? Tell me
- 8:13you look very tired, Yes, mister Brinson, I am, after all,
- 8:16having been up all night on this thing. Suppose I bring mister Dollar
- 8:20up to date? Well, sure, oh you don't. I want to
- 8:22find out now? Not next week? Go ahead, bart Well whips it
- 8:28in. His secretary Perry winkled isn't that a name? Yes, sure is.
- 8:31Where is she by the way, Jefferson Hospital. Anyhow, they were
- 8:35here very late last night working on the books. In a knock on the
- 8:39door, whips It opened it. This man barged in with a gun and
- 8:41demanded the Beaufort collection and well Whipsid argued with him, finally gave in when
- 8:48the guy threatened to shoot him, but Miss Winkle made a dash for the
- 8:52door. The intruder let her have it, held the gun on whips It,
- 8:54tore out the telephone line, then locked him in and disappeared. That's
- 9:00it. Wait a minute, how could he lock whips It in his own
- 9:03office? This lock opens from the inside with this, Jenny, Why this
- 9:09little rubber door stuff? That's right, But I don't say tell you how
- 9:15he did it and why This little rubber wedge is absolute proof that whips It
- 9:18couldn't possibly have rigged this whole deal. Act too of yours, truly,
- 9:33Johnny Dollar in a moment for a long time people, And now act too
- 9:39of yours, truly, Johnny Dollar and the ingenuous jeweler. Matter. Look
- 9:52here, Jenny, this door, what about it? Bart Oh, this
- 9:56is a real old building, all the office doors open outward into the corridors.
- 10:01See so all right after the robber made mister whipst hand over the jewelry,
- 10:07shot the secretary of Miss Winkle, and he yanked out the telephone,
- 10:11beat it and slammed the door on whips It. But you said, locked
- 10:15him in. And I don't see how with this little rubber wedge door opens
- 10:20outward, right, don't you see job? Oh wait a minute, wait
- 10:22a minute, Sure of course I see bosh here he simply jammed the door
- 10:28stop under the edge of the door from the outside. Sure so, the
- 10:31harder whips It pushed against the door, the tighter it jammed, the telephone
- 10:35knocked out. All he could do was bang on the door and holler and
- 10:37holler out the window. That's what tipped you off. The policeman on the
- 10:41beat down on Chestnut Street heard the shot and the yelling. A stroke of
- 10:46luck. I pulled up in a prowl card just about then. I see,
- 10:48we came tearing up here and found out how somebody locked whips It in
- 10:52his own office. Whoever did it, Johnny must have cased the joint to
- 10:56know about the doors opening outward. Yem makes any suspect have whips it himself.
- 11:01Yeah, it makes it look a little silly. Anyhow, he was
- 11:05pretty much beside himself, more upset over the girl lying there with a slug
- 11:09in her than he was over losing the collection. Any idea? What kind
- 11:11of a gun was used on her? Hospital sent the bullet over to the
- 11:15lab. It was a thirty eight special and she was in pretty bad Shapehu,
- 11:18and we thought at first she was dead. So that whips It.
- 11:22Could he give you a description of the assailant? Yeah, but it's not
- 11:26much help. Could apply to half a million men in this big city.
- 11:28What about fingerprints? None guy wore gloves. Has the girl been able to
- 11:33tell you anything at all? She was unconscious, Johnny has been ever since.
- 11:37I'm afraid it's going to be curtains for her. Oh too bad.
- 11:41She's over at Jefferson. You say, yeah, but there's no point in
- 11:45going over there. Even if she came to for only a couple of minutes,
- 11:48she might be able to give us something to go on. What could
- 11:50she tell us that whips It hasn't already told us, Well, we're back,
- 11:52lieutenant. Do you want miss whips It to stick around? No?
- 11:58I guess not, Conra, I took him over to a place I know
- 12:01on Pine Street and bought a couple of stiff drinks in him. He needed
- 12:03him, and you too, Conroy. Oh no, Lieutenant, mister Websit,
- 12:09this is Johnny Dollar Insurance investigating ow. Mister Dollar. How you know,
- 12:13mister Branson, I guess, Oh yes, oh yes indeed. And
- 12:16may I tell you, mister Websit, how dismayed I am by what's happened
- 12:20to you? Thank you, mister Branson. It's been a terrible certainly has
- 12:24nine hundred and eighty five. I was speaking of poor miss Winkles, sir.
- 12:28Oh, yes, of course, yes, mister whibsit this girl,
- 12:33missus Perry Winkle, she was your secretary, she was more than that,
- 12:37mister Dollar. Well, I loved her. How is she, Lieutenant?
- 12:43Has there been any word from the hospital, Well, yes, mister Websit,
- 12:46there has. And it's proof that modern medicine is a very wonderful thing.
- 12:52What do you mean, sir? Yes, John it may take time,
- 12:56of course, a long time. Yes. As a matter of she
- 13:00hasn't even regained consciousness yet, I see, but it looks as though she'll
- 13:05fully recover. Oh, I see, well, I hardly need to tell
- 13:11you how I feel about that. How glad I am? I'd told that
- 13:20little white lie to see what, if any reaction I'd get, and I
- 13:24had a strange feeling that his words, how glad I am were not quite
- 13:28true. Fortunately, neither Harry Branson nor the lieutenant questioned my apparent knowledge of
- 13:33the condition of the girl. Even better, the Lieutenant rose to the occasion,
- 13:37Well, as I see it, there's really nothing further we can do
- 13:41here. You look like you could use some sleep, Mister Wibson and Conroy
- 13:46and I'd better get back to headquarters. See if the boys have run down
- 13:48anybody who fits that description you gave us. Yeah, good idea. Let's
- 13:52go. Huh And mister Wibson, you close up and go on home and
- 13:56get some rest. Yes, I will, thank you, Thank you very
- 14:01very much. You have no idea what a terrible shock this has been for
- 14:03me. Of course, you'll keep yourself available if we need you further,
- 14:07of course. Okay, Johnny, what was that all about telling him she'd
- 14:18recover? Yes, john I almost interrupted her. I was afraid you would,
- 14:20That's why I kept talking. Fine, I'm going over to the hospital.
- 14:24Oh. Now, look, if there's only one chance in a million
- 14:26of that girl regaining consciousness, I want to be there when she does.
- 14:30You still suspect whips it? Did I say that? Don't you see?
- 14:33John? The whole thing hinges on that little rubber door stop, on the
- 14:37fact that he couldn't possibly have locked himself in with it. Branson's right,
- 14:41Jenny, Okay, then I won't go over to the hospital ring for the
- 14:45elevator. Harry. Oh, surely, John, what will you do?
- 14:48Call him on the phone down on the lobby instead. This is doctor Kinworth.
- 14:54This is Johnny Dollar, doctor insurance investigator. I'm calling about miss Harry
- 15:00Winkle. Oh, yes, I was about to call the police. She's
- 15:03conscious now. She died, mister Dollar, less than five minutes ago.
- 15:26Act three of yours, truly Johnny Dollar in a moment our flag of him
- 15:31No, Act three of yours, truly Johnny Dollar and the ingenuous jeweler matter.
- 15:52Well, what'd you find? Act from the hospital? Johnny? The
- 15:56girl is dead about five minutes ago. Oh, dear, and we've got
- 16:00a killer to drink down now. I'd better get on over the headquarters.
- 16:03Our phone pulled, mister whipps that he left the building while you were in
- 16:06the phone booth, John Bart, have you got a key to his office
- 16:08upstairs? Sure? Right here, let me have it with you here.
- 16:15Do you want me to go up there with you? Why don't you go
- 16:17over to the hospital and see if whips it shows there? What do you
- 16:22expect to find up in his office, Johnny? I haven't the least idea
- 16:30Why I kid about it. I didn't have the least idea what I expected
- 16:33to find, or even what I was looking for. When I walked into
- 16:37the jeweler's office up on the eighth floor. I picked up the rubber doorstop,
- 16:41the one thing that proved whips that couldn't possibly have rigged the whole deal.
- 16:45But I somehow felt that if only that little wedge of rubber could talk.
- 16:48Then I noticed a funny sort of burr on one side of it,
- 16:52just a tiny little rough spot, but it showed me where somebody had pierced
- 16:56a tiny hole through it. Why. After a couple of minutes of rummaging
- 17:04around, I founded a piece of fine, strong platinum wire about two feet
- 17:11long, a wire that could be carefully slipped through the hole, and that
- 17:14rubber door. Stop. Well, mister Dollar, what are you doing back
- 17:23here? Whibsaid, if you don't mind my saying so, there was there
- 17:29was something about your attitude that I didn't exactly care for when you were here
- 17:32with the policeman, mister Branson, and when you left them downstairs in the
- 17:37lobby and took the elevator. Oh, I see you found it. Yeah,
- 17:44that's right. It was very smart of you, whipsaid, thank you.
- 17:48Put this rubber wedge on the floor just outside the door, with a
- 17:52wire on it leading under the door exactly. Then pull the door closed,
- 17:56then pull the wedge into place. With the wire and the door, you
- 18:00can't possibly be open from in here. You've locked yourself in. The more
- 18:03you pushing the door, the tight of the wedge holds Adad's ride, and
- 18:07you don't forget to retrieve the wire by pulling on one end of it.
- 18:11I suppose those are the gloves you wore when you killed miss Winkle, so
- 18:14you'd leave no prince. Oh, then she's dead, How fortunate for me?
- 18:18And that's the gun you used. Yes, I'm afraid she was rather
- 18:23averse to my breaking down the Beaufort collection, melting down the mountains and secreting
- 18:29the stones at my home, and of course claiming the insurance money. But
- 18:33after all, nearly a million dollars, why are you telling me all this?
- 18:37Because you see, this is also the gun that will kill you,
- 18:41after which I shall lock your body in this office using the door stop.
- 18:45Again. They're rather nice touch, don't you think? No, don't you
- 18:49see it's now a sort of a trademarkt the completely unknown thief, the unknown
- 18:55killer of both the girl and you. Oh no, wait a minute,
- 18:59do you think of I found out how you did it? The police can't,
- 19:02did they, even after their lab crew spent the whole night up here.
- 19:07I guess you got a point there, Yes, a ten round dollar.
- 19:11We'll turn around. Well, you see, I'm going to have to
- 19:18shove this gun into your back to muffle the sound. Well, look it,
- 19:23unless you have a better idea. Well I had, what I suppose,
- 19:33I might have known. This whole thing seemed too easy, all right,
- 19:40Lieutenant, All right, Conroy, wrap them up, all right,
- 19:44lieutenant, hands are whips it? Johnny. I knew you had something up
- 19:49your sleeve when you came back up here. Just louldn't let me work it
- 19:52out? Alone. What's your pardon? All right? What was it?
- 19:55What did you find out? The tip job? Oh? You'll never know
- 19:57for me? Huh, After all, I might want to use it to
- 20:00stump you sometime. Now. Look, Johnny, hey, I swips it
- 20:03here. He just loves to explain things at great length too. At least
- 20:07it was long enough for you boys to get up here. I know something.
- 20:10He's not going to explain his way out of. Let's go wits it,
- 20:18Harry. I think I'll have to figure out some way to pad my
- 20:22expense account even more than usual in cases like this, I mean, where
- 20:26a thirty eight slug nearly ends up in me. After all, fun is
- 20:30fun at job's a job, But some of these ladies carry things too far.
- 20:33Come to think of it, I'll have to run down to New York
- 20:37again to appear against Whipson's so expense acount total, including that and transportation back
- 20:41to hartbrid and all the incidentals I could possibly think of one hundred and eighty
- 20:45one dollars even yours, truly, Johnny Dollar, our star will return in
- 21:03just a moment with the bigger, more emyquare. Now here is our star
- 21:08to tell you about next week's story. Next week, an inventor with a
- 21:12device that can either save or wreck our country join us, won't you?
- 21:18Yours Truly Johnny Dollar? Yours Truly Johnny Dollars, starring Bob Dailey, originates
- 21:30in Hollywood and is produced and directed by Jack Johnstone, who also wrote today's
- 21:36story. Heard in our cast were Harry bartel Byron Kine, Vic Kerrn,
- 21:40Joseph Kerns, and Austin Green. Be sure to join us next week,
- 21:45same time and station for another exciting story of Yours Truly Johnny Dollars. This
- 21:53is Dan Cubberly speaking, Welcome back. Well, there is an old saying
- 22:11which Johnny Dollar should be forever prohibited from saint and that is there's never a
- 22:18cop around when you need one. I think this has got to be what
- 22:22the fourth or fifth different play that has ended and with Johnny Bean saved due
- 22:29to the inexplicable appearance of a policeman and of course, according to the who
- 22:33is Johnny Dollar manner? This was another Jack Johnstone script where that happened.
- 22:38I actually like the clue and the mystery. It reminded me of something that
- 22:44you'd read in Ellery Queen magazine. Speaking of Ellery Queen, and seriously,
- 22:51that did remind me of something you might read in an old Ellery Queen book.
- 22:55In terms of the clue, it wasn't just a segue, even though
- 22:57it works as a segway. Going to be doing Ellery Queen on Tuesdays.
- 23:03And one thing about Ellery Queen both terms of a nineteen seventies TV show and
- 23:08the radio show was a challenge to solve the case with ellery and to see
- 23:15if you could solve it first. And on the radio program they would have
- 23:18an armchair detective come in. Now, because of Armed Forces radio programs and
- 23:23things of that sort, there are several of these where the in existence where
- 23:30the armchair detective portion has been caught. And so I've been talking about it
- 23:36on a few different programs, and I'm curious two things. Number one,
- 23:41if you would be interested in being an armchair detective where we basically sends you
- 23:48two thirds of the Ellery Queen mystery right up and tell Ellery's about to announce
- 23:55the solution, and then you would discuss who you thought did or what the
- 24:00secret was behind the case in a brief interview segment which we would do by
- 24:06audio, and so basically be calling into a conference line, and we record
- 24:10that and upload that in place of the missing Armchair Detective portions of the show.
- 24:17Let me know also, whether you're interested or not, let me know
- 24:22what you think about the idea of redoing these missing segments. Send your comments
- 24:27to Box thirteen at Great Detectives dot net. All right, well, now
- 24:33we turn to a couple listeners comments and feedback, and these are regarding a
- 24:40Man from Homicide, and Lisa says, I'm a little behind and got to
- 24:45listen to Man from Homicide the first time last night, and I really like
- 24:48it. Too bad. There are just a few episodes in circulation. Dick
- 24:53said that Dan Derryer had such a distinctive delivery, and I think that is
- 24:59true. It's a very interesting delivery. In some ways, it seems like
- 25:04a harder version of Frank Lovejoy. There was a sense speaklarly with Durier.
- 25:11I imagine the guy as Lieutenant Dana as kind of a bespeckled figure, bespectacled,
- 25:22he wore glasses, okay, but in a way that was kind of
- 25:25menacing. It's like a harsher version of Frank Lovejoy's voice. Yeah, definitely
- 25:30distinctive. All right, Well, that will do it for today. We
- 25:34will be back tomorrow with Dragnet and join us next Friday for another episode of
- 25:41Yours Truly, Johnny Doller. In the meantime, send you comments to Box
- 25:45thirteen at Great Detectives dot net, follow us on Twitter at Radio Detectives,
- 25:52and become one of our friends on Facebook, Facebook dot com. Slash Radio
- 25:56Detectives from Boise, Idaho. This is your host, Adam Graham signing off.