OUR STORY SO FAR: Vic Murkland (Roy Barcroft), a man of such unquestionable evil he refuses to bus his own tray when dining in cafeterias, is wreaking havoc in a small metropolitan city by means of an insidious insurance protection racket that rivals anything AIG could have possibly dreamed up. (On top of this, Murkland has rewarded him with nice, fat bonuses in the bargain.)
If you’re asking yourself how this fiend has managed to get away with this kind of chicanery under the very noses of the authorities, it’s because that—with the help of Robert “Doc” Benson (Stanley Price), part-time plastic surgeon and notary public—Murkland’s facial features have been transformed so that he’s a dead ringer for Police Commissioner Angus Cameron. (Oh, and I think Phil Gramm is involved in this somehow as well.) Special Agent Ted O’Hara (Clayton Moore) has been assigned to bring down Murkland, but along with his partner, Sergeant Francis Blake (Ramsay
In the last chapter, O’Hara had raced to a shipyard run by big bidness tycoon R.J. Cook (Edmund Cobb) to try and stop Cook’s latest construction of a ship because he learned that someone had tampered with the blueprints. For his trouble, he finds himself in the path of a super structure that’s come crashing to the ground…
Foolish mortals! Even the use of stock footage from a previous
ANNOUNCER: …and no accurate list of casualties is available…the injured are being rushed to hospitals, including Benson’s Sanitarium—a mental hospital which is not far from the scene of the accident…
(O’Hara shuts the radio off…)
O’HARA: Your superintendent was unconscious when they put him in the ambulance…
COOK: I got word that they’d taken him to Benson’s place…
The scene shifts to Benson’s—which in actuality is Murkland’s hide-out—where an injured individual is being carried in on a stretcher by the ambulance drivers. Murkland is sitting on Benson’s desk, and he tells his cohort not to let any of the new patients see Cameron:
BENSON: He may start yelling…
MURKLAND: Tell ‘em he’s one of your violent cases…meantime, I’ll go down and give him a little advice…
Murkland enters the cell that’s become the new home of Commissioner Cameron, and its occupant is none-too-pleased to see his weaselly, reconstructed face:
CAMERON: Oh…so it’s you…I’d hoped that O’Hara had exposed you and the police were here…
Steady, big guy…it’s only the fifth chapter and…well, let’s just say Ted won’t be bringing potato salad to any of the MENSA picnics soon.
MURKLAND: I’m in command of the police…none of your people even suspect I’m not Cameron…
CAMERON: Your plastic surgery trick won’t fool them forever…and I hope to see you hang!
MURKLAND: I doubt if you’ll live that long…I just came to give you a little advice…I’ve got a man posted outside your door and if you make any disturbance whatever I’ll have you beat to a pulp…keep that in mind…
Murkland goes back upstairs to learn that O’Hara and Cook have arrived at the sanitarium, so he tells Benson’s lackey Slater (Jack O’Shea) to station the pulp-beating goon outside Cameron’s door.
MURKLAND (as O’Hara and Cook enter): Hello, O’Hara!
O’HARA: Commissioner…
MURKLAND: Hiya, Mr. Cook! Meet Dr. Benson… (To Benson) Mr. O’Hara, Mr. Cook…
O’HARA: Doctor…
COOK: How are my men, Doctor?
BENSON: Well, doing as nice as can be expected…
Considering I’m evil…EVIL!
BENSON: Most of the cases are shock and concussion…but your superintendent, however, is still in a coma…but you can see some of the others…
O’HARA: We’d like to, Doctor…
BENSON: Good! This way, please…
While Benson is giving O’Hara and Cook the guided tour, we witness the real Cameron in his cell, attempting to jimmy open the door with what appears to be a kitchen utensil. There is a dissolve, and back in Benson’s office, Cook tells O’Hara he plans to stick around to await the status of his superintendent, and O’Hara suggests to “Cameron” that he drop him off at the shipyard to allow him to do some further investigation. The two men leave just as the real Cameron tricks his guard into entering his cell—where he hits the thug from behind and escapes:
BENSON (conversing with Cook in his office): You’re lucky that more of the men weren’t more seriously injured in this accident…
COOK: But it wasn’t an accident, Doctor…Mr. O’Hara is convinced that Vic Murkland…
(Cook is interrupted by the sudden opening of a door, which reveals…Commissioner Cameron!)
CAMERON: Help…I’m Police Commissioner Cameron…these men are holding me…
BENSON: One of our more violent cases…he thinks he’s Commissioner Cameron…
COOK: But he looks like Cameron…
BENSON: Sure, he’s a dead ringer for him…that’s what started his hallucination…I’ve got Napoleon, Caesar and Abraham Lincoln in the back there…would you care to see them?
COOK (still looking dazed): No…another time, Doctor… (Glances at watch) I didn’t realize it was so late…I must get back to my office… (He saunters over to the exit, with Benson closely following) Thanks, Doctor…take good care of my men…
Either Cook is a bigger idiot than O’Hara for swallowing that flimsy excuse…or he realizes that really is Cameron, and high-tailed it out of there before he’s next on the list. Benson seems to believe the latter, and he tells Slater: “Get hold of Duke, quick…”
It is evening, and Cook is seated in his office chair with the lights in the office completely dimmed. He walks over to the window and peers out through the blinds in time to glance a menacing-looking man coming across the street and making tracks toward his building. Then he looks off to the left and spies a second man who proceeds to do the same. Cook looks around nervously, and then goes over to the telephone:
COOK: Hello…is Mr. O’Hara back?
FEMALE VOICE: Oh, Mr. Cook…Mr. O’Hara called in just after you hung up…I gave him your message and he’s on his way there…
COOK: Thanks…
After finishing his conversation, Cook then walks over to his office door and locks it, returns to his desk and pulls out his Dictaphone…two sinister shadows can be scene outside the door…
COOK: Attention, Special Agent O’Hara…this is R.J. Cook speaking… (There is a knock on the door, and Cook begins to speak loudly and rapidly into the machine) It is my belief that Murkland has had his face altered by plastic surgery…and has taken the place of the Police Commissioner…the real commissioner…Cameron… (Sound of glass breaking) is a prisoner at Benson’s… (A shot rings out, mortally wounding Cook) Sanitarium… (He drops the Dictaphone’s receiver and slumps to the floor)
The two men, Graham (Drew Allen) and Hodge (Carey Loftin), enter the office and decide it’s vital to take the Dictaphone record and break it, since its contents have enough evidence “to hang us all.” But not so fast, my fine-feathered thugs—O’Hara and Francis Blake have arrived on the scene just in the nick of time! O’Hara fires a shot at one of them, and that signals that it’s balsa-smashing time! During the melee, one of the goons managed to beat a hasty retreat, but Francis is able to shoot his partner before he puts any holes in Ted:
O’HARA: Nice shooting, Sergeant…
BLAKE: Yes, but the record’s smashed…
O’HARA: Maybe not beyond fixing…gather up the pieces while I call the Commissioner…
No, no, no, no! That is the last thing you want to do, you doody head! Sure as you’re born, O’Hara tells the faux Cameron the whole story:
MURKLAND: Did Cook have a chance to talk before he died?
O’HARA: He apparently made a statement on a Dictaphone dictating machine…the record’s broken, but I think I can piece it together…
MURKLAND: Okay…I’ll send over the coroner and a couple of boys from the homicide squad right away…
O’HARA: Very good, Commissioner…
You know, Ted…you can save the taxpayers a little spare change by just handing the damn record to Murkland and let him do a flamenco dance on what’s left…idiot…meanwhile, Francis has gathered up what pieces she was able to find and Ted tells her to go down to the drugstore to pick up some “strong, quick-drying cement…Duffy’s Plastic Cement, if they have it.” (I’ll bet the Duffy’s people were happy to get the plug.) There is a dissolve, as O’Hara is putting the finishing touches on his project, he’s approached by Steele (Robert J. Wilke), one of the boys from the “homicide squad” sent over by Murkland:
STEELE: I’m afraid our fingerprinting won’t do any good, Mr. O’Hara…Graham’s escaped and the other fellow is in the morgue…
O’HARA: If this recording is what I think it is, you’ll nab Murkland without the need for fingerprints…
STEELE: Think you’ll be able to play that thing when you get it finished?
O’HARA: I may have to help it over the rough spots…but I think it will play…
During this conversation, O’Hara and Blake are completely unaware that Steele’s fellow “detective” (John Crawford), is working away on the Dictaphone…planting a little booby-trap for our hero and heroine. His labors complete, O’Hara gets ready to listen to the record (meanwhile, the two phony cops lam out of the room with a phony excuse about having to rush the fingerprints to the office). Because of the record’s battered condition, O’Hara has to constantly start and stop the recording…while inside the Dictaphone a fuse is rapidly burning away, leading to a tremendous explosion…
Next Saturday, Chapter Six: Marked Evidence!
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