Yours Truly Johnny Dollar - "05 the Touch of Midas Matter Part 4" (Old Time Radio)

Yours Truly Johnny Dollar presents “The Touch of Midas Matter, Part 4,” originally broadcast on CBS on July 5, 1956. Episode 5607 of the classic radio drama stars Bob Bailey as insurance investigator Johnny Dollar and was written and directed by Jack Johnstone.

Dollar’s investigation into a deadly cave-in at the Midas Touch mine near Kingman, Arizona, continues as large insurance claims and unanswered questions keep the case alive. Just when the inquiry appears to be nearing an end, a rifle shot sends Johnny back into the desert country around Lake Mohave.

Yours Truly Johnny Dollar presents the original broadcast with a newly produced contextual introduction, a short closing announcement, and gently cleaned/mastered audio for a more consistent listening experience.

Chapters:
00:00 Victor Sterling Introduction
00:55 Original Broadcast
15:30 Closing

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Speaker 1: Three men have died in a cave in at the

Midas Touch Mine, leaving enormous insurance claims behind, and investigator

Johnny Dollar continues to follow the evidence. This is yours, truly,

Johnny Dollar. The Touch of Midas Matter, Part four, originally

broadcast by CBS on July fifth, nineteen fifty six, episode

five thousand, six hundred seven. Bob Bailey stars as Dollar,

joined by Virginia Gregg, Parley Bear, and Barney Phillips in

this five part weekday serial written and directed by Jack Johnstone.

The case takes Dollar through the desert country around Kingman, Arizona,

and the Lake Mohave area. With the inquiry seemingly nearing

its conclusion, A sudden shot from a thirty zero six

rifle puts the case in doubt once more. And now

our story begins from Hollywood.

Speaker 2: It's time now for.

Speaker 3: Johnny Dellar good.

Speaker 2: I was hoping you'd be there at Jake Kessner's office.

This is best your favorite lake, my hobby resort.

Speaker 3: Oh High find out anything?

Speaker 4: Yeah, hard luck, Dennis, our one real key to this

three million dollar case has just been murdered. I have

an idea, Well, I found something here that might help you,

Oh tired tracks the old miner's shack where hard Luck

was shot.

Speaker 2: More of the same tire tracks here at.

Speaker 3: The resort's sir.

Speaker 2: I'm on my way.

Speaker 5: Tonight and every weekday night.

Speaker 6: Bob Bailey and the transcribed Adventures of the Man with

the Action packed Expenser count America's fabulous freelance insurance Investigators.

Speaker 3: Truly Johnny Dollar.

Speaker 4: Expense accounts sumitted by special Investigator Johnny location Lake Mohabi

Resort on the Colorado River in Arizona to the Greater

Southwest Insurance and Liability Company. Following is an accounting of

expendit yours during my investigation of the Midas touch matter.

Adam nine six point thirty is stop at the sign

of the Flying Red Horse for gas for my rented car.

They get me from King of Arizona to Lake Mohabi Resort.

About a mile short of the lake, on the winding

road that led in for the main highway, I found

Buster waiting in a spot where an old wagon trail

cut off to the right.

Speaker 2: Right over here, Johnny's hire Buster. See him here These

tire tracts in the.

Speaker 3: Sand, Well, oh yeah, sure.

Speaker 2: You see three of the tires. Look here where the

car turned to get around this rock.

Speaker 3: Yeah?

Speaker 2: Yeah, Three of the tires were pretty good, had those

big knobby treads. But this one right fronts almost worn smooth.

Speaker 3: Or is it the left rear?

Speaker 2: Oh, it's right front. Johnny Carr was going north out

into the desert by the little skid on this turn.

Speaker 3: Flus.

Speaker 4: Do you read tire tracks like some people can read footprints.

Speaker 2: It's just practice anyway. These are the same tracks that

I found by the old shack where you met hard

Luck and he got shot at.

Speaker 3: And let's get into my car and follow these up.

Speaker 2: Oh, whoa, Jenny, Nothing but jeep could get over this trail.

Speaker 3: Well, where does this trail pick up a highway? Again?

Speaker 2: It doesn't winds around for eight or ten miles and

ends up in the lake over by the southwest corner

of the fence line on the two Lazy two range.

Speaker 3: And our best bet is to drive over to the

two Lazy Except.

Speaker 2: For one thing, the jeep. We're looking for us somewhere

up that trail, So we'll go by outboard. What this

old trail worms round? Or I always close along the

edge of Lake Mahave all the way and the end

of it's eight miles to one is only about one

mile by water from our dock at the resort.

Speaker 3: Uh, then we ought to be able to intercept whoever's

in that jeep. That's right, and let's go.

Speaker 4: Lake Mohave was clear and and beautiful, perfect for fishing.

But we had other things on our minds. As the

thirty horse outboard pushed our fourteen foot aluminum boat along

at better than twenty five miles an hour, we stayed

fairly close to the Arizona side.

Speaker 2: Look, Johnny, see that streak of dust along shore.

Speaker 3: Yeah, somebody's been driving along there all right.

Speaker 2: Still is won't be able to see who though, until

he comes out from behind that ridge of hills over there.

Speaker 3: Hey, that streak of dust hasn't grown any longer.

Speaker 2: Looks like he stopped, would be I'll head his end

towards shore.

Speaker 4: Now.

Speaker 2: I still don't understand why he'd be driving out on

that dead end trail alone, unless he wants to dump

a body or something in the lake.

Speaker 3: Now that's something more of a thought.

Speaker 2: All right, But if it is a killer you're looking for,

you said.

Speaker 3: That trail ends at the corner of it.

Speaker 4: Hey, wait a minute, Bush yeah, if it's who I

think it is, he overheard me. Tell Jake Kessler, I

planned to go fishing out here today.

Speaker 2: So what was that?

Speaker 3: I won't have giving you trouble. What was what there? Green?

Speaker 5: Yeah?

Speaker 2: I heard it, but it wasn't the motor. Hey, that's funny.

Speaker 3: What's the look we're taking in water? Those holes in

the bottom.

Speaker 2: You take this can and start bailing, right, I would

drew a lot of holes.

Speaker 3: No, wait a minute, look at them close. They're pullet holes.

Speaker 2: Holy smoke, you're right, Hey, that was a shot came

from over on the shore.

Speaker 4: I saw the puff of smoke over on that patch

of sagebrush. Come on, let's get out of here. Let's

swarm us around bust here. We've been a par of

city ducks.

Speaker 2: Man, you are right, keep on bailing and keep your

head down.

Speaker 3: Swing us around that little point there and we'll be

out of range.

Speaker 2: Wow, you see that's pretty water beside us. That guy

can shoot here.

Speaker 3: Aren't kidding?

Speaker 4: Okay, Buster, you can ease her up now or out

of his line.

Speaker 2: Yeah, I guess we pulled a bonet, Johnny.

Speaker 4: Why not having somebody posted on that road while we

came out here, uh huh.

Speaker 2: Now he can climb back and his jeep. And yeah,

there you see trail of dust again going back to

the highway.

Speaker 3: I see it.

Speaker 2: We hadn't taken on so much. We might be able

to get back and intercept him on the highway, but

it's too late.

Speaker 3: Now. Well, at least we know what to look for,

the cheap that's made those tracks.

Speaker 2: Well, isn't it kind of like looking for needle in

a haystack out in this country?

Speaker 4: Fus sir, I think I know exactly what I look.

I believe I must have bailed a good five gallons

of water out of that boat by the time we

reached the dock. Then Buster insisted on going along as

I headed back up the highway toward Kinglin. We stopped

where the old trail cut in, only long enough to

see if the jeep tracks had come back on the highway.

Speaker 3: They had.

Speaker 2: Now that we're on the way, johnnywhere were gone?

Speaker 3: Any of these ranches out here used jeeps.

Speaker 2: Fuster, most all the big ones, but including.

Speaker 3: The too Lazy too.

Speaker 2: Yes, right now, wait a minute, I didn't ask you

who you thought was shooting at us out there on

the lake. Who you thought overheard you're talking about going fishing.

I figured if you wanted to tell me you would.

Speaker 3: Oh. The trouble is, I still can't prove anything.

Speaker 2: All right, let me tell you who can shoot like

that and with that kind of a gun. It was

a thirty yard six, you could tell by the sound.

Thirty odd six with a long barrow. That could mean

it had a scope sight.

Speaker 3: Almost have to for that kind of shooting.

Speaker 2: Alex Bundy, Foreman at the too lazy too.

Speaker 3: That's who hard luck Tennis said, shot at him and it.

Speaker 2: Ties up Johnny, does it? You got a few too

many under his belt. One night at a dance party

in Kingman, he started yapping his head off about how

a lot of soft living millionaires from back east could

come out here and on the place while he had

to do all the work. It wasn't fair. Worm had

turned sometime, even if he had to help it turn,

and he'd be the one who counted the money. That's

about the time everybody started talking about him and Dora, Dora,

wife of one of the Haskell brothers that was killed

on the mine. Oh, Kevin Haskell, go on, bus seems

Alex and Doro seen a lot of each other on

the sly everybody kind of stood around, waiting to see

if Alex was trying to get some control of the rants.

That way, that's union passed right ahead, just over the

tops of the road to the left, short cut to

the two Lazy too. That's where you want to go.

Speaker 3: In, Yeah, bust, that's where I want to go.

Speaker 4: It was only a couple of miles into the ranch's

fence line, but a good three miles further to the

main house and its cluster of out buildings. Buster sharp

Eyes first noticed the jeep park by the side of

what looked like a big tool shit, and I drove

slowly past him, slowly enough so that he could study

its tires and the tracks and the dusty ground.

Speaker 2: Uh huh, Well it's the one, all right.

Speaker 3: Then keep an eye out for Alex and the gun.

Speaker 2: Up his and be ready to duck by the main house. Okay,

you know, I got a kind of funny feeling now

that we're here. We should have brought.

Speaker 3: A posse along, right, It's too late for that now.

Speaker 2: It is a gun bulging onto your jacket, isn't it.

Speaker 4: Oh yeah, but I'm wondering what chance a little thirty

eight lemon squeez their hands against the high powered rifle.

Speaker 3: Oh, come on, keep your eyes feel Johnny.

Speaker 2: I'm beginning to feel like I'm right in the middle

of an old time Western movie.

Speaker 3: Maybe you are Buster, maybe you are why Buster?

Speaker 2: Or how are you? Dora?

Speaker 7: Don't just stand there.

Speaker 2: Yes, ma'am.

Speaker 4: The woman standing on the porch of the old house

looks strangely out of place on this big western desert branch.

Perhaps it was because of her close, two toned sports

shoes and a crisp, well tailored white linen dress that

serve to accent the lines of a trim athletic figure

and go perfectly with her short boy's cut hair.

Speaker 1: Ms.

Speaker 2: Hashcherl, this is mister Dollar, Johnny Dollar.

Speaker 7: Hello, mister doll.

Speaker 8: Jake Kessler told me you were here. Come in please, okay,

thank you. I suppose he told you why I'm here.

Speaker 7: No, leave the door open for the breeze.

Speaker 8: He said, to investigate the death of my husband, Kevin

and his brother's not mine accent. Sit down, won't you

thank you?

Speaker 3: You thing?

Speaker 7: It was an accident, according to mister Kessler.

Speaker 8: You don't why because it means his company would have

to pay only a million and a half to me instead.

Speaker 7: Of three million.

Speaker 4: Somebody found pretty concrete evidence there in the mind that

one of the rock pillars supporting the roof had been

deliberately pulled down.

Speaker 7: Hard luck, Dennis, But you say is true, he must

have done it.

Speaker 3: It was hard like who told me about it? Who

showed me the winch that was used to do it?

Speaker 4: And that winch, Missus Haskell could have come from only

one place around here, this ranch.

Speaker 8: Oh no, you mean no, you can't mean that somebody

here at the ranch did it.

Speaker 3: Kind of looks that way, doesn't it.

Speaker 7: But who?

Speaker 4: That's what I hoped you might be able to tell

me who beside you could profit by the death of

your husband and his brothers who here at the ranch,

Alex Bundy.

Speaker 7: Perhaps Alex how.

Speaker 3: By marrying into the family.

Speaker 7: What are you talking about?

Speaker 4: That is, of course, if one of the Haskell brothers

were to die, Kevin, perhaps that's absurd. Oh, I had

a notion that you and Alex were someone interested.

Speaker 3: In each other.

Speaker 7: Well, you're wrong.

Speaker 8: He may have been interested in me. He was as

a matter of fact, he made it very difficult for me.

How do you mean that he kept trying to force

his attentions on me, and.

Speaker 3: You didn't reciprocate it.

Speaker 7: Of course, not because we'll go on. Because I knew

what his.

Speaker 8: Real motives were, all right, going this ranch, this ranch

is what he wanted. He knew that Kevin wasn't well.

That's why Kevin had come out here with his brothers

in the first place.

Speaker 2: I did hear that he was having a little trouble

with his lungs.

Speaker 8: Johnny, he didn't have long to live, not many years,

that is, even in this hot, dry air.

Speaker 7: So Alex did it.

Speaker 2: It sure looks the way, doesn't Johnny.

Speaker 7: What led you to look for him here?

Speaker 4: It was Alex Bundy who shot up hard Luck Tennis.

Then somebody overheard me say, I was going fishing down

at the lake. That's where I was shot at by

somebody who was not only a crack shot, but more important,

was driving the jeep that's parked out.

Speaker 7: But she was gone from here this afternoon.

Speaker 3: Do you know where Alex Bundy is now?

Speaker 8: He must be somewhere around the ranch and you must

get him, mister Dollar.

Speaker 7: I'll help you. I'll help you find it, but don't

go unarmed here. I'll give you one of my rifles.

Speaker 3: The collection of high powered rifles is yours.

Speaker 7: Yes, International rifle team in college. Here.

Speaker 8: I'll give you ammunition and buster you take one this

thirty thirty. I don't know what mister Dollar says about

him is true. Alex may try to shoot before you.

Mister mister Dollar, be ready when he comes in.

Speaker 2: I want to tell me you what threw the jeep?

You know I wanted to use it this afternoon?

Speaker 7: All right, Well, well don't move, mister Dollar. Your gun

isn't loaded.

Speaker 6: Now here's our star to tell you about the final

intriguing episode of this week's story tomorrow.

Speaker 4: Well, sometimes justice is done by strange and devious means.

Join us, won't you? Yours Truly Johnny Dollar. Yours Truly

Johnny Dollar is starrying. Bob Bailey is transcribed in Hollywood.

It is produced and directed.

Speaker 6: By Jack Johnstone, who also wrote this week's story. Be

sure to join us tomorrow night at same time in

station for the next exciting episode of Yours Truly Johnny Dollar.

Speaker 5: Roy Rowan speaking.

Speaker 1: We've heard part four of Yours Truly Johnny Dollar, The

Touch of Midas Matter. Follow Yours Truly, Johnny Dollar for

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