 afraid that we have a somewhat serious problem oh rather one of our branch officers has now would it be possible for you to come out here and look into it I don't see why not what sort of a problem mr. Huckins we see we've had a series of fires mr. dollar out in CME valley that is north of here and just beyond the San Fernando Valley yes and you think maybe some fire bugs it works I do sir I definitely do but until it is proven well if you are free to come out and make an investigation for us I hardly need to tell you that we'll be glad to pay all your expenses plus my usual fee of course no one fee did you say that's right well now now just now don't worry about it mr. Huckins we can decide on the amount of it after we see how much there is for me to do but in order to justify a fee and just how much of my time it'll take now hold on here young man needless to say if it turns out I'm able to save your company any actual money I'll expect my usual commission now look here sir yes mr. dollar yes well mr. Huckins I'll see you your network brings you Mandel Kramer in the exciting adventures of the man with the action fact expense account America's fabulous freelance insurance investigator yours truly Johnny dollar my special investigator Johnny dollar to the greater Southwest insurance company home office Los Angeles, California following is an account of expenses incurred during my investigation of the do-it-yourself matter expense account item one six dollars for a cab out to the airport item to 204 25 plane fare to New York and a jet heading west that east to west time differential is a great thing it meant that we pulled into the new Los Angeles International Airport shortly after noon Pacific time item 3 680 for the long cab ride into the big new rose your building just east of Beverly Hills on Wilshire Boulevard where Royal J. Harkins keeps an eagle eye on the affairs of greater Southwest insurance now let us get this understood right now mr. dollar in so far as any fees from now you just stop worrying mr. Harkins did I ever hit you with a bill too big on any other jobs I've done for you well not that I haven't tried I think it's hard now tell me what is all about a lot of fires you said yes yes around the San Fernando Valley out beyond that in what is known as the CME Valley so tell me do you remember hearing or reading about the terrible bell and took anger Canyon fires last fall last November oh sure like according to our Eastern papers it was one of the worst disasters that ever hit Los Angeles County it certainly was over 450 homes were destroyed to many of them in the fashionable bailout section were in the hundred two hundred thousand dollar class so I understand how many of those homes were owned by wealthy prominent movie stars and producers and directors mentioned and you a lot of them ensured oh yes we certainly did in other words mr. dollar in other words your company has had to shell out plenty of money yes mr. dollars has cost us millions literally millions now what has that got to do with your troubles out of the CME Valley dollar the best way for us to recoup some of our losses I decided was to well to simply sell more insurance more and more insurance and if you know anything about the tremendous amount of real estate development that's going on out in the CME Valley well now do you well I understand that all the orange grows in farmland orange ranches mr. dollar oh sorry yes with the hundreds of new homes out there it's opened up a whole new talent only for us I would think so and for every other insurance company yes so the first thing I did was establish an almost completely autonomous branch office in the community of more park that's out there in the valley yes just north of thousand oh I see how uh how autonomous do you mean I mean full power to immediately settle all claims at least all except those that might be questionable for one reason or another they of course are referred back here to the main office to me well isn't that rather unusual mr. harkin well now that's one of the best ways a relatively small company like ours can compete with the big ones by close personal service and the settling of all claims fairly and immediately now I guess you have a point there no question of it and by the way a young man simply walked in one day took our course with flying colors his name is Harry Waltherson and dollars he has sold as many policies in the past three months as I ever sold in three years well real yes yes he certainly is now as a result the premiums have been rolling in rolling in but now recently yes let's get to those fires you mentioned oh yes when you figure nine fires in less than six weeks plus the personal property losses that went with him huh ruinous at least it gives you a young friend Walterson a pretty terrific argument for selling more insurance up yes of course it does and under my urging he's fully capitalizing on it every time there's a fire he's able to sell 10 15 20 new policies with no trouble at all but the premiums on them don't begin to make up for those losses and tell me have the police found anything to indicate arson oh we have reason to be mighty proud of our police and fire departments out here dollar but they simply cannot keep up with this burgeoning population growth they simply aren't enough of them not enough men or facilities and to answer your question directly no they haven't actually found any concrete evidence of arson nor has Walterson although he suspected it once or twice I see and if you know that Valley area will do well well with the it's a brush covered hills and planes canion covered with the Metski to Mac manzanita cover our all of it in the dry because of our lack of rainfall new homes you said where are the homes that people are satisfied with after they moved in and lived there for a while now you're thinking perhaps the homeowners themselves are satisfied well it's just a possibility and it has been done before you know but a whole series of them well who else stands to gain and don't forget this sir yes an idea like that if it's gotten away with can spread pretty quickly you ask the torch squad in any big city and if that's the case with these fire dollar you've got to find out and if it is put us up to them before they ruin us that usual 50 buck deposit on a rental car I drove west on Wilshire Boulevard to Sepulveda north over the Santa Monica mountains to the valley west on the Ventura freeway to thousand Oaks and then north the little town of Moore Park the greater southwest insurance office with a spanking new little building a field stone and white circle with picture windows all around inside there was only a reception desk half a dozen girls and firefighters and calculating machines and down at the end the private office of Harry Walterson who got right to the point the homeowners themselves setting these fires well it's a possibility isn't it dollar I'll tell you why you've been fine if I just close this door right ahead maybe we can hear each other now I guess I'm conditioned to all that racket out there you'd have to be you have a mighty busy little place here well after all if I'm going to make any money for the company but as I started to say excuse me Walterson oh yes mr. pretty yes or your policy will be mailed out to you tonight I'm glad you did too yes sir yes that last one scared me too but if you talk with Mrs. Hatcher you know how fast we paid off on the yes or just part of our regular service good boy okay mr. pretty and thank you now let's see dollar I was here's another Walterson Burton oh yes yes of course mr. Burton well fine yeah yeah I think you're very wise and the increase in premium is only negligible of course take care of it right away mr. Burton and I thank you sorry dollar Betty and those two outbuildings to the Burton policy and listen just hold any cause for me for a while now now you said that you don't think that the the folks themselves could have said any of those fires because they're all brand new homes and they're nice ones people families that go to the trouble and expensive moving into a section like that they want to stay I was both so and listen to no policy ever gives complete coverage you know because of the personal things the stuff with sentimental value yet those things have gone up with the rest and you think the folks that endanger the lives of their kids yet there have been a couple of mighty narrow escapes one cute little pair of twins that I myself say the most important of all dollar you don't know the people who got burned out I do sure there might have been one questionable character among them like the one who had the first place but the rest no sir I'd stick my bottom dollar out what about that first one old man Arloff sure he was a crackpot charming you might have I call you Johnny no please do my guess sure he hated having so many new people move in around him but you know what I think started that one what Harry a lot of dead grass and weeds and dried out bushes and over in the corner of a lot was a pile of broken bottles he thrown out that might have acted like a magnifying lens yes sir County fireman thought so too but that wouldn't account for the rest of them because they all started at night so somebody somehow somebody and yeah I don't know I don't know maybe I'm wrong about the arson angle tell me has there been any particular pattern about these fires well I don't know exactly what you mean by pattern Johnny but they've all had one thing in common what's that they've always charged it on a windy night and this time of year we have quite a few of them look out the window there you see the dust beginning to kick up yeah I do yeah and every time I see it I start getting worried again now I can't say I blame you Harry but hey it's getting dark already any plans for dinner Johnny well I thought I'd better get back to Los Angeles and find myself a hotel for the night real good places to eat out here in the valley say why don't you want I just oh no wait wait I better make sure it's okay for me to leave Betty any calls any callbacks I ought to make before I huh you're kidding okay okay well sorry Johnny but it looks like two or three hours at this telephone for me can't let down the clients or the prospective client for right all right I'll see you the morning then Harry good and believe me Johnny if I can be of any help to you Oh yes Mrs. Duvall sorry Johnny take it easy Harry you'll live longer now how can I help you Mrs. Duvall going back to LA I grabbed a bite to eat that's item five a dollar 70 and prowled around until I found a county fire chief at his home down in Thousand Oaks I'm afraid he wasn't much help sure a dollar we always look around for signs of arson too when there's a string of fires like that we don't find a thing what can we do and don't forget until people stop building those little frame houses until we get some laws with teeth in them will make people clean up the brush and old dried up grass around their places you know it takes to start one of those fires what just one live cigarette tossed out of somebody's car I tell you the American motorist is the worst firebug ever lived afraid I'll have to go along with with you on that chief all too often it makes them killers too yes sir sure I agree with you there's been too many fires in that one section with more people coming in all the time and we're ready for people don't know how to handle this dry brushy country by the time we are any other department can get to some of those places all right it's too late fire has done its work there's nothing left to do with excuse me go ahead you better yeah yeah okay right on cue dollar another fire oh where where else up in the seamy valley let's go most of us have problems business and financial worries family troubles or personal difficulties they can build up strains and tensions that if improperly controlled can develop into mental illness America's number one health problem there are many effective ways of treating mental illness what the most effective method is to prevent it before it starts right for the free booklet how to deal with mental problems the address is box 3000 New York one New York suspected by the time we get out to this new house fire up in the Seamy Valley we were too late another of the nice new little houses had burned to the ground the firemen have been able to keep it from spreading to other nearby properties that was all the chief and I both talked to the owner but he wasn't able to give us the slightest clue as to how the fire had started and after talking to him I'd be willing to swear that he had nothing to do with it using a hand lamp I wonder where not only the remains of the house but all of the other property to inch by inch until it was nearly midnight the piles of ashes from brush and grass and tree cuttings on the windward side where apparently somehow the fire had started there's nothing absolutely nothing I'm afraid it was just some crazy kid or drunk in a passing car that flipped out a lighted cigarette this much wind the whole place went up in a flash I just hope he finds out about it and has brains enough to have a conscience it'll plague him for the rest of his life I'm afraid that won't help this poor man and his wife and those two youngsters don't you worry about him Johnny no hi Harry all right you have a gun that's happened again hasn't it sure has how'd you find out about well one of my neighbors where I live in Warpark I guess he'd been over here giving you boys a hand oh I just got back from Hollywood where I'd gone to see a show of grommets Chinese and he stopped me at the front gate told me about it he was so interested as to come all the way over here maybe you better give me his name Mr. Wallace and sure it was old Timothy Hamlin you know yeah he was here even before we got here on now wait if you think old Tim would do a thing like this I wouldn't think so anyhow Johnny don't you worry about these people here I'll put them up in a motel for the night at company expense and pay them off and pull first thing in the morning $10 for a comfortable motel on Ventura Boulevard after a late breakfast the next morning I drove back to Harry's office and watched him pay off the unfortunate but grateful people who lost their home then I watched him accept application after application from people who now after this latest file suddenly decided they'd better have insurance or add to what they already had the people streamed in and out of their in droves finally at about 1 30 p.m. Harry closed the door of his private office long enough for a quick sandwich yeah it's pretty awful that they have to be scared into you know buying insurance this way Johnny by golly they need it they know it now we'll give it to them they're pretty scared lot main problem is to keep them from over ensuring throwing their money away more coffee no no thanks but dumb I checked pretty carefully before issuing the actual policies you know are you in the chief find out anything well it doesn't look so well I sure hope you do well not me I'm afraid huh Harry I have to fly on back to Hartford oh no sorry but that's the way it is but but if somebody is setting these Johnny all I can promise is I'll somehow some time get to the bottom of it somebody better item seven three hundred and fourteen dollars covers a lot of things first of all a weekly rate for me at the motel then a phone called the Pat Fuller at Universal Adjustment Bureau back in Hartford a sort of clearinghouse for information on claims made to companies throughout the whole country then a while later when he called me back or yes Johnny your guess was right greater softwares is the only company that's had to pay on fire losses out there in the CME Valley lately and nine or ten of them in a row okay Pat thanks but what do you think it means Johnny what I think that yeah I don't like I'll see you item seven also covers deposits on two more rental cars in a beat up farm truck so I never have to drive the same vehicle twice in succession and it covers several changes of clothes including the sort of stuff the local farmers wear and some hats also a couple of the biggest tank type fire extinguishers I could find I kept them with me all the time then I started the longest most careful tailing job I ever attempted why because I've suddenly remembered an old phrase from my high school days from believe it or not my class in Latin crew bono who benefits and how benefits not by burning down their own homes as Harriet said all the insurance money in the world couldn't completely make up for a loss no the one big beneficiary of all those fires with the man who collected a nice fat commission on the policies and all the nice new policies that he sold as a direct result of those fires I followed Harry Wallace in 24 hours a day even slept in one of my rental cars parked out near his home and then finally one moonlit windy night and thank the good Lord for that moon when he slipped out gunning with Karen headed up into see me Valley I with my lights off was only a few hundred yards behind him when he stopped got out and walked quietly over to a new little home with a lot of dried out trouble at one side I knew I'd guessed right be a lot better to put this to work on Johnny that's right listen to me Harry you get that extinguisher going while I use this one Johnny now go on Harry use it that dry stuff it's going up fast go on push them eyes well huh yep you might as well how do you know Johnny by remembering my Latin he didn't have a leg to stand on he confessed to the whole dirty rotten business for my money they can lock him up for life because if there's one thing I can't take it's a crooked insurance man I'm glad they're few and far between expense account total including car mileage and the trip back to Hartford 833 70 yours truly Johnny dollar here is our star to tell you about next week's story next week I'll be back with another exciting story join us won't you yours truly Johnny dollar by Jack Johnstall produced and directed by Bruno Zirato Jr. music supervision by Ethel Huber Johnny dollar is played by Mandel Kramer also featured in our cast were Herb Duncan as Harry Walterson Raymond Edward Johnson as Royal J. Harkins Joseph Julian as the fire chief and John Thomas's Pat Fuller be sure to join us next week same time same station for another exciting story of yours truly Johnny dollar this is Bill Gillian speaking