Yours Truly, Johnny Dollar - The Salt City Matter - Ep 3
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Speaker 1: From Hollywood, it's time now for.
Speaker 2: Johnny Dollar.
Speaker 3: Yes? Skyline Apartments.
Speaker 2: Johnny Dollar speaking.
Speaker 3: What?
Speaker 2: Maybe you don't remember me, but I remember you. I
was there last night and got banged on the head
by a pair of hoodlums.
Speaker 3: I know nothing about it and I can't talk now.
Speaker 2: Well, then you can listen. I'm coming over there in
about an hour. I hope your two hoods are there
when I show up. Will you tell them that for me?
Speaker 3: I'll deliver the message if you wish.
Speaker 2: Do that.
Speaker 1: Tonight, in Every Weekday Night, Bob Bailey and the transcribed
adventures of the man with the action-packed expense account, America's
fabulous freelance insurance investigator.
Speaker 2: Yours truly, Johnny Dollar. Expense account submitted by Special Investigator
Johnny Dollar. To Sam Rubin and Associates Insurance Brokers, Majestic Building, Hartford, Connecticut.
The following is an accounting of expenditures during my investigation
of the Salt City matter. Expense account item 8, $ 10.
Medical bill for two stitches in my scalp. Item 9,
10 cents. One more phone call. To the prettiest insurance
broker in San Francisco. Something's come up. I don't care
what you say. You said you'd meet me.
Speaker 4: Meet me.
Speaker 2: Item 10, $ 2. More of that ever-loving cab fare. This time,
I kept the cabbie waiting outside Eleanor Stover's apartment. Johnny, Johnny. Hi, Angel.
I didn't want to be a witch, but I did
want to see you, if only for a minute.
Speaker 4: Come in.
Speaker 2: Can't. My cab's waiting downstairs. But I want.
Open to you. Oh, I argued a little bit with
two of Ed Julian's hired hands. He has a little
muscle around him these days. No one to worry. Johnny,
I feel responsible. Why? Like a big dope, I was
the one who sold him that insurance policy. Now you
have to mix into it and try to keep him alive.
Speaker 5: You look like the one who needs protection.
Speaker 2: Well, don't look at it that way. If you hadn't
sold him the policy, I'd never have come to San
Francisco and I'd never have met you. And you wouldn't
be here right now. I'll call you later. Ellie. Yes, Johnny?
I didn't tell you this part. I'm going to serve
a subpoena on him and try to get him to
appear in court. I don't expect he'll pay any attention
to it, and then they'll issue a warrant for his
arrest for contempt of court. I figured he'd be as
safe in jail as anywhere else. What subpoena? An attorney
who worked on a few deals with him, a man
named Ray Gumby. Oh. Take care. I went back to
my cab and told the driver to take me to
the Skyline Apartments. When we pulled up in front, the
same kind of things were going on in the same lobby. Well. Hello, Moishe. Oh, Mr.
Speaker 4: Swift?
Speaker 5: Let me.
Speaker 2: Swifty. Swifty.
Speaker 3: You're in here looking for trouble, and you're going to
get it. I thought you found that out once.
Speaker 2: I sure did, and I sure am. Where's your tall,
skinny friend? He's coming. Luke?
Speaker 3: Yep.
Speaker 5: Well, if it isn't the robo-boy from Hartford. How many
times do we have to toss you out of here?
Speaker 2: You've hit your quota. I only get tossed out of
one place at one time. What floor is Julian on?
Speaker 5: The fourth. But that don't mean.
Speaker 2: Get out of my way.
Speaker 5: Not so fast.
Speaker 2: I hate to have to mess you up all over again.
Speaker 5: All right, Weisenheimer, this is a knife.
Speaker 2: This is a gun.
Speaker 5: Oh, that way, huh?
Speaker 4: Yeah.
Speaker 2: Put that thing away, boys. I got two stitches in
my scalp from you boys last night. I'll always have
a little scar from them. And somehow I think you
should have the same... Under the circumstances, it seemed like
the honest thing to do. I left both of them
in the lobby and took the elevator unescorted up to
the fourth floor. But I was disappointed once more. Ed
Julian didn't answer the door, but a small blonde girl
who looked like she might have been having a good
cry did. Swifty, what do you want?
Speaker 1: You're not Swifty.
Speaker 2: Is Ed Julian here? Swifty didn't let you come up here.
Speaker 3: He won't let anybody up here.
Speaker 2: How'd you get inside? Why don't you invite me in
and I'll tell you all about it. Are you a policeman?
Speaker 5: No, ma'am.
Speaker 2: All right. Why not? Come on in. Whoever you are, mister,
you're taking some awful chances. Well, let's say I'm a
friend of Ed's. Ed hasn't got any friends and I
know all of them. What's your name? Johnny Dollar. Where
do I find him? I'm Ed's wife. My name's Lorraine.
I know you. I mean, I know a friend of yours,
Eleanor Strober. She said she went to high school with
you about ten years ago.
Speaker 4: A million years ago. At least a million.
Speaker 2: How did you know her? I'm in the insurance business.
Do you expect Ed back soon?
Speaker 5: I don't expect anything anymore, no.
Speaker 2: What do you want to see him about? Business. I'd
like to wait for him. You got this far, you
might as well. What about Swifty and Luke downstairs? They, uh,
they were glad to see me come up. You want
a drink or something? You ought to take off your
hat and coat. It'll be cold for you when you...
Did they do that? Yes, it wasn't too easy getting in.
Speaker 3: Those dirty punks.
Speaker 2: Can I Can I fix it or something? Doctor, just
tuck two stitches in it. It'll be okay. I'm sorry.
You seem like a nice guy. Well, you seem like
a nice girl. What? I said you seem like a
nice girl.
Speaker 1: Nobody said anything like that to me since I married Ed.
You aren't supposed to be nice when I love somebody
like Ed Julian.
Speaker 2: Well, my job is to protect him from who or
what I don't know. But to protect him, I want
to find him. You won't protect him here.
Speaker 1: He hasn't been here for a couple of days.
Speaker 2: Where is he? How should I know where he is?
How should I know? I'm only his wife, the hired girl.
Those others came in town. What others?
Speaker 5: Those from the East.
Speaker 3: Ugly men with.
Speaker 4: Yesterday....
Speaker 2: No, I guess it.
Speaker 3: Was the day before.
Speaker 2: Ed was here with one of them, a man named
Chili Winters. They sat right there, drinking, talking.
Speaker 3: Then they both went out together. I didn't like the
way that Chili looked.
Speaker 2: Where'd they go?
Speaker 3: I don't know.
Speaker 1: Oh, get out of here, Johnny.
Speaker 3: You're not going to find him here ever.
Speaker 2: Go on.
Speaker 4: Beat it.
Speaker 2: He'll kill me if he found me talking to anybody.
Speaker 4: He'd kill me.
Speaker 2: I know it. I didn't want that to happen, so
I left. No one was in the lobby to say hello,
fire a bullet, or use a blackjack. I spent another
hour downtown at the Hall of Justice looking up the
record of chilly winters, a list of felonies ranging from
armed robbery to assault with a deadly weapon. He'd been
convicted twice on the latter charge, once in Michigan and
once in California. It seemed likely that tracing him might
prove helpful in locating Ed Julian, but he was not
to be located either. About three o'clock in the afternoon,
after a fruitless day of trying to locate Winters or
Julian or both, I went back to my hotel room.
Speaker 3: Oh, Mr. Dollar.
Speaker 2: Mr.
Speaker 3: Dollar.
Speaker 2: Now what?
Speaker 3: Do you remember me, the desk clerk at the Skyline?
Speaker 2: Yeah, I remember you.
Speaker 3: I must apologize for what happened. I mean, all the
trouble you had with Mr. Swift and Mr.
Speaker 4: Luke.
Speaker 3: They didn't handle the matter very well.
Speaker 2: No, they didn't. What's on your mind?
Speaker 3: Well, I'll be very blunt. Two things are on my mind.
Ed Julian and your problem in locating him. I'm just
a desk clerk. I need every penny, you know.
Speaker 2: I hope you're selling it away.
Speaker 3: I took an awful chance coming here. You asked for Mr.
Julian twice yesterday. You found him neither time.
Speaker 2: Come on, get to it, will you?
Speaker 3: Well, I know you aren't a thug like those others...
I mean, I didn't know until Mrs. Julian told me
you were an insurance man. Well, anyway, I know where Mr.
Julian can be found.
Speaker 2: Where?
Speaker 3: Well, I'd hoped you'd be able to.
Speaker 4: Here.
Speaker 2: This is all I'm able to. Now, where is he?
Thank you, Mr.
Speaker 5: Duller.
Speaker 3: I just happened to overhear this morning when I was
working the switchboard.
Speaker 2: Mr.
Speaker 3: Julian, well, he's in Salt City, California. The Salt City
Smelter Company, I believe one of his enterprises... It seems
he went there with a Mr. Winters because there's going
to be a kind of a big meeting of all
of them there, Mr. Reno and others, sometime this week.
Does that make sense to you, Mr.
Speaker 4: Dollar?
Speaker 2: It might, yeah. All right, you've got your money.
Speaker 3: Oh, yes, thank you, Mr. Dollar. Oh, and please, please
don't mention to anyone that I was here that I
disclosed this to you. I'd lose my job if it got.
Speaker 4: Out, and I.
Speaker 2: A local filling station furnished a map of California, which
located a place called Salt City about 300 miles away
in the desert. I decided to ask a man who
might know about it, Ray Gumby, attorney at law. Uh-oh. What?
I've handled correspondence from there.
Speaker 1: Not on the beaten path.
Speaker 2: Well, that doesn't tell me much. As near as I
can gather, it's an enterprise town, lock, stock, and barrel. Uh-huh. Vigilant.
going over there, well, let's forget all this. At least
my part of it. Why? I don't want you to
go that far in trying to get.
Speaker 5: Him back here.
Speaker 2: Fault city's real bad news. Eh, sounds like it, Mr.
Speaker 3: Gumby. Let me ask you something.
Speaker 2: Why are you going this far on this case? Sounds
like a loser to me. I don't know, Mr. Gumby,
I don't know. But I've had the feeling ever since
Ed Julian's name was first mentioned that... that something was happening.
Something way off somewhere, but so close I could touch it.
That's funny. I've had the same feeling. Expense account item 11, $ 38, transportation.
By train, San Francisco to Salt City and return. It
was just coming up dawn when the conductor nudged me
out of a restless sleep and told me the Salt
City stop was 60 seconds long. I took my bag
and stepped off onto the dry sun-baked clay that served
as a station platform. Then I looked around and saw
a yellow, grimy little town stuck along one side of
a yellow, grimy little mountain. The stacks from an immense
smelter rising up to the skyline, the smell of phosphorus
and coke in the air. It had been a bad
trip to what was obviously a bad place. And naturally enough,
bad things began to happen right away. Taxi, mister? Yeah, sure.
Speaker 4: Where to?
Speaker 2: Salt City Smelter Works. Know where they are?
Speaker 1: Oh, yeah, I know where they are, but I ain't
taking you there.
Speaker 2: What?
Speaker 5: Yeah, get your hand off of my cab door. Hey, look, I.
Speaker 2: Get your hand off the door. Call a cop.
Speaker 5: You better do like he say, pal.
Speaker 2: Oh, sure.
Speaker 5: Smart. You ever been here before? Nope.
Speaker 4: It's the end of the line, pal. I've been here twice.
Both times I promised myself I'd never come back again.
Speaker 2: And what are you doing here now?
Speaker 5: Accident.
Speaker 4: They kicked me off their freight. I get nightmares about
this place. I remember the first cop I ever met
here in Salt City. While I was spelling my name
to him, he hit me in the face several times.
Always by mistake, of course. But don't risk any mistakes, friend.
I'm not going to be here long.
Speaker 5: That's good, that's good, that's real good. You know what?
Speaker 2: What?
Speaker 4: Somebody made this dump and then forgot about it.
Speaker 5: Just plain forgot about it.
Speaker 4: I'll see you.
Speaker 2: No bird sang. No dog barked. No cock crowed. Nothing.
Nothing but that feeling inside of me. and something saying,
it's going to happen here. It's going to happen here.
Speaker 1: And now here's our star to tell you about tomorrow's
intriguing episode of this week's story.
Speaker 2: Tomorrow? Well, maybe I was psychic or something, because tomorrow
is when that feeling, that hunch, turns into action. Join us,
won't you? Yours truly, Johnny Dollar.
Speaker 1: Yours truly, Johnny Dollar, starring Bob Bailey, is transcribed in Hollywood,
written by John Dawson. It is produced and directed by
Jack Johnstone. Be sure to join us tomorrow night, same
time and station, for the next exciting episode of Yours Truly,
Johnny Dollar.
Speaker 2: Roy Rowan speaking.
Speaker 4: © BF-WATCH TV 2021.
Speaker 2: The End Oh, my God!