 From Hollywood it's time now for Johnny dollar. Oh hi Marty. How are you? Did you ever hear of the mailing Buddha? Nope, I'm afraid I never it's probably the most valuable piece of jade there is a little statue Not more than three three and a half inches high made during the mailing dynasty, and you've ensured it. Yes for how much What's happened to it? I don't know. I don't know if anything's happened to it But if nothing's happened to it, I'm not even sure of that. Huh, but nothing's happened to it Come on over here. Let's talk about it, huh? Yeah, I think I'd better In the exciting adventures of a man with the action-packed expense account America's fabulous freelance insurance Investigator yours truly Johnny dollar Expense account submitted by special investigator Johnny dollar to the worldwide mutual insurance company home office Hartford, Connecticut Following is an account of expenses incurred during my investigation of the mailing Buddha matter Expense account I don't want a dollar ten for a taxi from my little apartment to the office of worldwide mutual Or Marty wasted no time in getting to the point For sure if it went for that knuckle headed Ray Kerman who's a one of our accompan Got back from a European vacation just this morning for being so stupid. I ought to fire him He knew we didn't show that jade Buddha and when he saw it over there in Paris a couple of weeks ago He should have looked into it found out what it was doing there Doing just exactly where Marty hit a dingy little antique shop somewhere on the route allows something or other He didn't even have sense enough to get the address or the name of the place Oh, where was it supposed to be? Locked up in the home of the late Daryl Harcourt up in Boston and of course it isn't well That's the point. I don't know. There's been no report of a theft all of somebody's seen it in Paris Is that Buddha pretty well known among collectors and so on? I told you It's probably the most valuable piece of jade in the whole world and let me use your phone Sure here But if we don't even know what shop or where it is in all of Paris just leave it to me My phone call was to a slimy little character whose name is de Marseille But who calls himself the Chagri the gray cat who knows the Paris underworld like the back of his hand He'd been a lot of help to me some months before and locating a painting that was stolen from my good friend and the actor and art collector Vincent Price If you can dig up the information I want I'll mail you a check for a hundred bucks American immediately Okay 200 now listen there's a little idol the mailing Buddha Where And the price on it how much third that's around $80,000 so it must be the McCoy wait for you you mean steal it No, no, thanks. I'll send you check you're giving him 200 bucks just for that a lot cheaper than my flying over there Well, yes, so now I better check at the home of this What you saying the name is Daryl Harcourt in Boston. I'll put down the address for you died about two years ago Homes in charge of his old housekeeper and Mrs. Mary Haskell and I take it his property His final tapestries and furniture. Yes, we'll to various museums here Everything but the content of Mrs. Haskell's room and the study the ladder he will to a nephew Charles Curtis To be given to him the day he finishes at Harvard. Well, that's a funny sort of arrangement Harkot was a funny man The Buddha was the only thing of real value in that room and he figured it was enough for To get his nephew started in the business of some kind. I see this Curtis boy get the house, too No, no that goes to Mrs. Haskell after Curtis gets the contents of that one room. Well Looks as though I'd better hide myself at the Boston to make sure that Buddha's really gone I don't to the $200 check to my informant and parents who was sure he'd seen the mailing Buddha was sure it had only arrived there recently But if so, why hadn't it been reported missing from the home of the late Daryl Harcourt up in Boston? Item 350 bucks deposit on a rental car When I reached Boston, I headed west on Beacon Street a couple of miles beyond Kenmore Square And there on a little side street found the Harcourt home It wasn't much of a place anymore the lawn and garden had been neglected the building itself was in need of repair The doorbell was the old-fashioned kind Yes, Mrs. Haskell. I'm Johnny dollar insurance investigating. Oh, of course. Do come in Rather dismal that's what it is You live here all the time. I am responsible for this house until the terms of the will are fully met That's when Charles Curtis finishes school. Yes Of course my own quarters at the back are as tidy as they've always been and Mr. Harcourt studies exactly as it was when he passed away. I want to see that study, Mrs. Haskell. Oh No, Mr. Dollar To be left as it is until Master Charles opens it to claim his inheritance. You're talking about the mailing Buddha furniture and books and things How long since you've seen that little jade idol? Why not since Mr. Harcourt died I locked the door and it hasn't been open since Well, I'm sorry, but I have to look around in there, but Mr. Dollar. Do you have the key course? Keep it on this chain about my neck at all times. Let me have it, but Mr. Dollar I can get a court order if necessary, but it would only waste time How am I to know if you're even Well, that is here They're my credentials I'm a fully authorized agent of the company that insured that Buddha, but I I'm responsible as it occurred to you Mrs. Haskell that the mailing Buddha might possibly have been stolen. That's impossible. Is it? Okay, where's the study? I I'll go with you Wyoming's and I'll open the door This door looks a couple of inches thick Just Just like the one to the library Mr. Harcourt kept all his lovely Look at all that dust Dust is right. It was on every the accumulation of a couple of years on the desk that shares the open floor bookshelves and tables They're almost dark and gloomy Yes It looks just the same Except for all this horrible dust But as I told you Mr. Dollar This is the first time the door has been opened. Yeah Now where is the Oh, oh, I hope you didn't hurt yourself. No, I just didn't see it He always insisted on keeping the electric fan on that little table next to the door. Yeah Now where's the Buddha? The little wooden casket on the desk. I must see I Was afraid of this afraid of what mr. Oh No, it's gone. The Buddha's gone. Oh, no, I Searched the room thoroughly and found no trace of the mailing Buddha Somehow someone had got in that locker room and stolen it. It must have happened recently a Piece as valuable as that wouldn't be allowed to lie around for long If our soccer told me it arrived in Paris only a few weeks ago, and I had no reason to doubt But how could anyone possibly have got in there without leaving marks in the dust that's world about our feet every time we move That showed a clear imprint of every step we made That left a mark on everything I touched. Oh Dear, oh dear, mr. Dollar. This is terrible. You're sure you have the only key to this room, Mrs. Haskell. Yes, it was implanted to me to prevent this very thing. Oh dear What about the nephew Charles Curtis? No, I'm sure he's never had one You think he got a gut hole of yours and had a copy made? No impossible, mr. Dollar. Oh dear Where is he at school at Harvard? I think I'd better see that boy. Well, certainly you can't think that master Charles did this I don't know what to think yet Tell me You're absolutely sure you've let no one in here since mr. Harcourt died You can tell by the dust over everything that no one has been in here Not for years. You're sure of that absolutely Well, except for the federal tax man, of course the appraiser for the estate. Oh When was that? A month or so after mr. Harcourt passed away And yet he showed up in Paris only a few I was with him mr. Dollar and so was the attorney Who is the attorney mr. Howard Bancroft in town? Do you have his address? His office is just off carply square Uh-huh Then I've got two people to see Charles Curtis and Howard Bancroft mr. Dollar about master Charles He's a good boy. Oh, yeah, I'm sure you simply can't think that he And anyhow, no one could have gotten here without leaving a trail Mr. Dollar look I want you to close up this room again and leave it closed I'll be back. Please mr. Dollar about Charles listen to me. Maybe later. Mrs. Haskell later Yeah After I've talked to him One thing puzzled me If young Charles Curtis did steal the buddha, why did he do it? After a few months more at harvard he'd get it anyway And he'd be able to sell it on the legitimate market for a lot more than it would ever bring on the paris black market On the way in to look him up. I stopped at the office of the lawyer Howard Bancroft I can't believe it mr. Dollar. Well the fact remains mr. Bancroft that the buddha is not only missing from the harcourt home But has turned up in paris But the only person who had access to that room was mrs. Haskell in accordance with mr. Harcourt's wish That room hasn't been added for years until today And yet if the buddha has shown up only recently I'm afraid I don't follow you sir. Mr. Harcourt willed it to his nephew, didn't he? That's right. Charles Curtis when he finished his school and he willed the house to mrs. Haskell, didn't he? Yes And it will be little enough reward for her years of service to him. How do you mean? Mr. Harcourt paid her very little during all those years She and I too quite frankly felt she was entitled to a great deal more You see his really valuable things the collection of tapestries. He willed to various museums So I understood they were kept in an hermetically sealed room the library Hermetically sealed practically didn't you notice the tremendous doors on the study and library the sealed windows Then how could any dust? Hmm, what? Um about Charles Curtis mr. Van Krupp admirable young man in addition to the money his uncle always gave him Well, his own family is very wealthy, you know, no, I didn't yes They've given him everything he wants and it hasn't spoiled him a bit even during college He's an excellent hard-working student He's going to be a lawyer mr. Dollar and he'll be a good one And maybe my thinking about him has been wrong or definitely By mr. Dollar, he's planned to donate the mailing buddha to a museum when it comes into his possession So you see Ah, it's just that after handling more or less straight insurance cases for so many years I almost instinctively suspect anyone close to the All of the problem at hand in this case young Charles Curtis even mrs. Haskell Maybe even you I beg your pardon, but I guess I'd better just shake the dust out of my brain and tackle this as a plane ordinary Wait a minute Dust, hey It's a little manner of dust that really has me stopped. It makes it impossible for that rondo been added since Tapestries you said I mentioned them, of course how blind can I be? Hey, look you better get ready for some legal action on behalf of your client the late mr. Daryl Harcourt, but I'm going to play a hunch mr. Van Krupp. Maybe it's all wrong. Maybe it's crazy But I'm going to play it to the hilt The dollar you can't do this you have no right now we'll see about that These are my own personal things I don't believe you're an insurance investigator at all. Whatever you like Have you a warrant to search my room this way? No, no, you're just some thief some Oh, yeah This bank book in your name. No, you give me that All right Some 20 years of a balance that that never got above six or seven hundred dollars Here here two months ago a single deposit of 21,000 That was money that I that that was the money you got from some crook We'll let the police run him down some crook who smuggled the mailing buddha over to paris after you stole it out of the study That's impossible and you know it that study hasn't been open for nearly two years You saw the layer of dust in there yourself. Oh, yes, you pointed it out to me half a dozen times I should have caught on then Come on. We're going into that study. Give me the key. No, I won't. I'll have to rip it off that chain around your neck. All right Here You saw for yourself. Yes, I saw it. All right, and I didn't have sense enough to realize what kind of dust that was Look at it Fuller's earth what are you talking about about the old-fashioned method of cleaning fine tapestries with fuller's earth That's the way mr. Hart court cleaned them, isn't it? What difference does that make and there's probably a supply of it down on the cellar somewhere that he always kept on hand What if there is that doesn't prove anything? Yeah, I was blind blind as a bat when I knocked over this electric fan that didn't have any dust on it Because it's what you use to spread the dust to find particles of fuller's earth all over this room A little sack full may be held in front of the fan and it left proof Apparently that nobody's been in here for a couple of years Yeah, it had me fooled but not anymore Better get your coat. This is how it's going. No No, sir I deserved far more from mr. Hart court for my years of service And of watching him squander his money on the idle And I've met nephew who had money of his own Now I have money plenty Plenty more than I need And I'm an old woman But you You're young Perhaps you could use some of it Perhaps 10 or 12 thousand dollars You will have to think of a better way out than that, mrs. Haskell And you know something I have a notion you're gonna have time to think about a lot of things Plenty of time The main link Buddha still has to be brought back from Paris Maybe I'll get the assignment Maybe it'll go to one of our regular foreign investigators As for mrs. Haskell Well, I'm sure mr. Bancroft will lose no time in taking whatever steps are necessary So Expense account total including mileage on my rental car and a few incidentals Well, call it 300 bucks even yours truly Johnny dollar Now here's our star to tell you about next week story next week Well far be it for me to get up on a soapbox, but I hope you'll make a point of listening to it It concerns a lot of money in the wrong hands and the hands of a bunch of kids too young to meet responsibility Too young to realize that cutting loose from family before they're ready can lead to trouble in this case murder Yeah, I think you'd better hear it. So join us. Won't you yours truly Johnny dollar Johnny dollar starring Bob Bailey Originates in Hollywood and is written produced and directed by jack johnstone Heard in our cast where virginia greg paul dupont will write and forest lewis Be sure to join us next week same time and station for another exciting story of yours truly johnny dollars