Yours Truly Johnny Dollar - "13 the Cui Bono Matter Part 1" (Old Time Radio)

Yours Truly Johnny Dollar presents “The Cui Bono Matter, Part 1,” originally broadcast on CBS on February 13, 1956. This archival recording is episode number 5602 and stars Bob Bailey as freelance insurance investigator Johnny Dollar.

Johnny heads to Green Pass, Virginia, after county attorney Dan Parker is killed and questions arise around a $100,000 insurance policy. As Parker’s stepdaughter recounts a nighttime shooting, Dollar begins probing a small-town death case where motive—and who stands to benefit—may be everything. Written by John Dawson and directed by Jack Johnstone.

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
00:51 Original Broadcast
15:24 Closing

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Speaker 1: County attorney Dan Parker has been found shot to death

in Green Pass, Virginia, and his stepdaughter Lewanne says she

fired at a man she.

Speaker 2: Believed was a burglar.

Speaker 1: That report and Parker's one hundred thousand dollars insurance policy

bring freelance investigator Johnny Dollar into the case. From CBS

on February thirteenth, nineteen fifty six. This is part one

of the five day serial The Queen Bono Matter from

Yours Truly Johnny Dollar, Episode five thousand, six hundred two.

Bob Bailey stars as Dollar in a script by John

Dawson Jack Newman's pen name, with Jack Johnstone directing. The

supporting cast includes Mary Jane Croft, Forrest Lewis, and Howard mcneer.

We now take you back to the original broadcast from Hollywood.

Speaker 2: It's time now for.

Speaker 3: Johnny Dollar, Don Hancock, Johnny Surety.

Speaker 4: Mutual Fine, what's on your mind?

Speaker 3: Queen Bono?

Speaker 4: Quee?

Speaker 3: Who it's Latin kiddo? Queen Bono? Who benefits? All right?

Speaker 4: I'll bite?

Speaker 3: Who does a little doll named Blue? Anne Parker down

in Green Pass, Virginia. One hundred thousand dollars worth Johnny

dublin demnity.

Speaker 4: Wow, what did she do? Answered the question?

Speaker 3: She sure did with a thirty eight two bullseyes right

in her foster Papa's heart.

Speaker 4: Well, and if it's an open and shut case, you

don't know it's.

Speaker 3: That all right, She's the galant done it, she admits it.

But the coroner is about to call it an unavoidable accident.

Seems little old Magnolia Blossom thought Papa was a prowler.

Speaker 4: And what do you think?

Speaker 3: Just what I said, Queen Bono Saul, I think you'd

better put yourself on the.

Speaker 2: Payroll tonight and every weekday night.

Speaker 5: Bob Bailey in the Transcribed Adventures of the Man with

the Action Packed Expense Account, America's Fabulous Freelance insurance investigator.

Speaker 4: As Truley Johnny Dollar expense account submitted by Special Investigator

Johnny Dollar to the home office Surety Mutual Insurance Limited, Hartford, Connecticut.

The following is an accounting of expenditures during my investigation

of the Quibono matter. Item one seventy eight dollars and

forty five cents Transportation and Incidental's Hartford to Green Pass,

which was a village of some twelve thousand people, hidden

among quiet wooded hills and located, as I discovered on arrival,

some three miles from the railroad station. Nice weather we're

having Yeah, it's fine. You from New York, well near there, Hartford?

It you ain't been having weather like this up there? No, No,

it's been pretty cold. You say your name was Dollar, Yeah,

Johnny Dollar. I'm Jake Deadley. You here on business? Well,

I wouldn't count on finding much here. Green Pass is

what you might call a one horse town. One hotel,

one bank, one taxi that's me, one newspaper, and one

county attorney.

Speaker 3: Yep, just one.

Speaker 4: Oh. And you've heard about our tragedy about Dan Parker

getting shock. That's why i'm here. I'm an investigator for

an insurance company.

Speaker 3: I see.

Speaker 4: Well, it was a terrible thing. It was all conn

it double done it. If old Man Hall they don't

fix up them fences, he's going to be short of

ky one of these days.

Speaker 3: That's the third time this week they've been out in

the road.

Speaker 4: How did people around here feel about Dan Parker? Was

he well liked?

Speaker 2: Well?

Speaker 4: He'd been re elected for five street terms. All personal enemies,

not a one. There ain't a man in Green Past.

What difference does it make whether he was well liked?

You know how I was killed, don't you?

Speaker 3: Yeah?

Speaker 4: I understand he was shot accidentally by his stepdaughter, That's right.

And what difference does make where they had any enemies? Well, none, probably,

but one of an insurance company holds a policy as

large as the one that carried on Dan Parker. They

want to know the full circumstances surrounding the death. Well,

there ain't no mystery about it, mister Donna. That poor

girl took him for a burglar and shot him, that's all.

And it might a near broke her up. Say what

about her, Jake? Is she well liked? Well, let me

put it this way. I'm fifty two years old, I

got a grandson seventeen, and we're both in love with

lou Anne.

Speaker 3: Parker, I see.

Speaker 4: And there's five thousand other males in Green Pass that

feel the same way. She get along all right with

her stepfather. They worshiped each other. She was all Dan

had since missus Parker died nine years ago. They were

thicker than thieves and too, rode horseback together, went fishing,

took trips together. Well, and that's understandable that she'd be

pretty broken up. It was terrible for she went clean

out of her mind when she realized what she'd done.

So tell me, was Dan Parker a wealthy man? No

farewell to do for these parts? But no way's wealthy?

Way you'd think of it in New York, for instance,

then I imagine the Parker girl would think of a

one hundred thousand dollars as being a pretty sizable fortune.

Mister dollar. Let me give you a little advice. Oh,

you got a job to do, fine, But if I

was you, I'd be mighty careful how I went about

doing it. Why so well, people up here in the

hills are kind of stand offish at best, and if

you go around hitting what you seem to be hitting at,

you go to get yourself a mess of trouble. I

don't deal in hints shake. All I'm trying to do

is dig up all the information possible. But the company

know exactly what happened. That sounds fair enough, mister dollar.

But you take my advice dig easy. Jake Higley's one

man taxi service dropped me off of the town's one hotel.

I signed in and left my bags and did a

quick resume of the case which Don Hancock had given

me a New York. I tried pumping the hotel proprietor,

but when he found out who I was, he frosted

up like a mid jullip on a selfie day. But

he did tell me I could find the sheriff across

the square at the town's one pool room. It turned

out to be a one man place tool and at

the moment Sheriff Jim Peterson was the one man.

Speaker 6: Huh oh like, no, he missed a dollar just sticking. Now,

watch me get that their three bowl down there.

Speaker 4: Good shot. No, I was a setup. You couldn't miss

one like that if you wanted to.

Speaker 6: Got something on your mind, sir, Yes, I'm an insurance investigator.

Speaker 4: I'm here in connection with the Parker case. I see. No.

Speaker 6: God, well, I don't think i'd call it the case

exactly accident. Ain't no mystery about it. I can see.

Speaker 4: I didn't mean to imply that there was sheriff. As

it stands now, this is a routine investigation, nothing more.

I just like to get the facts, find out exactly

what happened, in order to furnish my company with the report.

They need to pay the claim. I'd appreciate your cooperation

if you've got the time.

Speaker 6: Oh, I got the time, all right, sir. Now how

much you know about it? Well, not much, Dan Parker,

as I understand. It was your county attorney here his stepdaughter,

lew Ann Parker, who is the beneficiary under our policy,

and mistook him for a prowler, shot him and killed him.

Speaker 4: That's about it. Well, the thing happened three nights ago.

Speaker 6: Dan been up to Richmond on business and he'd come

back in on the midnight train.

Speaker 4: He walked down from the state three miles at that

time of night.

Speaker 6: Were it's a little over two to his place. It's

outside of town ways. That's still quite a walk.

Speaker 4: Why didn't they call this taxi driver, Jake Digley? Well,

he probably did try to, but Jake wasn't expecting any business,

so he took a night off. He was out at

Happy Hollow.

Speaker 6: See that's a kind of a roadhouse about five miles

up the highway. Does Dan's daughter have a car, Yeah,

she does, but I figured he didn't want to bother

her at that time of night.

Speaker 4: See, he wasn't due until the next afternoon.

Speaker 6: But it appears like he finished up his business and

decided to come on back at night without letting lou

Anne know or anybody else.

Speaker 4: Now, let me see chair. Well, seeing the habit of

coming back unexpectedly from trips, no, I wouldn't say he was.

Speaker 3: Well.

Speaker 6: Go on, huh Oh, Well, Dan didn't take many trips,

and when he did he most always made arrangements with

Jake or Louan to meet him at the station.

Speaker 4: I see.

Speaker 6: So anyway, he walked home that night, and he took

a shortcut through the lane and come on in the

backway across the terrace, and right there was his fatal act.

Speaker 4: Oh, what do you mean? He bumped against the lawn chair.

Sound woke up Louin.

Speaker 6: Then she heard him fumbling with the lock of the

back door and heard him come on in the house.

She took a thirty eight pistol from a drawer over

night table and went to the head of the stairs.

When she heard him start up, she fired twice and

killed him.

Speaker 4: Were there any lights on in the house.

Speaker 6: No, she's afraid to turn on in a light man,

I reckon. Dan was trying to keep from waking her up.

Speaker 4: Two shots, two bullets in the hearts, firing down a

stairway in pitch darkness. That's a pretty good shooting, Sheriff.

She can out shoot.

Speaker 6: Me, mister Dawgon, And I'm known as one of the

best knee here parts. Who taught her or Dane taught

her himself. He figured the girl ought to be able

to protect herself. So tell me something, Sheriff. Did she

have any reason to think it might be a prowler?

Have you had any trouble of that kind around town? Oh?

Three weeks ago it was a house broke into on

the south side, and twice since then, Dan called me

in the night to come out and take a look.

Speaker 4: Around his place. Why, Well, lou Anne thought she heard

somebody trying to break in, And did you find anybody?

Was lou Hanne alone in the house the night of

the shooting? Well, Mary Jackson was there.

Speaker 6: Who Well, she been housekeeper for the Parkers for the

last fifteen years.

Speaker 3: Uh huh?

Speaker 4: What's her version? Same as I told you. She heard

the shots or the lights in the hall come on

and heard Blue Anne's scream. Father.

Speaker 6: How did the girl and her father get along? Well,

couldn't have been any closer. She pretty broke up about it.

You talked to her yet, miss Dolla, No, not you, No,

I didn't think. So what's not supposed to be?

Speaker 4: Well, I mean, if you had, you wouldn't be asking

a lot of these questions, or at least you wouldn't

be asking them in the way that you are. What way, Sheriff?

Speaker 6: Well, like you figured the Parkert girl was actually Gilly

or something. Well, she did pull the trigger, didn't she

man with sufficient reason? She was nervous. She had prowlers

around before, or at least all she did, which adds

up the same thing. She thought she heard somebody break in.

She knew she couldn't count all Marry for any help.

She had a gun, knew how to use it, so

she got up her courage and done a natural and

normal thing. She used it, and she'll regret her mistake

the rest of her life. Yeah, that's the way the

picture seems to work out.

Speaker 4: At the moment. At least you've got any reason to

doubt it. I get paid to dubt thing, Sheriff until

I satisfy myself that there's no reason to doubt them,

And that's all I'm trying to do. It's all the

insurance company expects me to do. I'm not out to

pen anything on this girl or to get out of

paying her claim provided it's legitlemen, it did well and

she's got nothing to worry about. If the thing happened

as you just told me it did, then I have

as much sympathy for her as you do. It'll be

a pretty rough memory to live with. I just want

to be sure that's all all right, Missdouta. You look around,

you talk to people, ask any questions. You're mine too,

But you're going to come out right back where you

started at.

Speaker 6: You're probably right. Dan and me'd been friends for years,

good friend. If I thought there was the slightest doubt

about this, I would be the first one to kick

out a fust and go after.

Speaker 4: The truth, even if the evidence pointed toward low N Parker,

no matter where it pointed to. Well. Now, look, I

want to talk to the housekeeper and the miss Parker herself,

and i'd like to attend the corner's in quest if

you don't mind, I don't mind. But you're a little late. Huh.

It was hell this morning. What was a verdict? Death

by misadventure unavoidable accident with no recommendation for prosecution. Let

me see what would be possible for me to see

a copy of the transcript.

Speaker 6: It would I rang the corner and tell him to

expect you. But let me give you a little piece

of advice, mister Dollar. All right, folks, and these here

parts love that girl. So when you start walking around

asking questions, walk easy.

Speaker 4: I went over the corners report and found nothing. Low

Anne had been called as a witness and appeared to

answered all questions and a frank and a straightforward manner.

I checked her school record. She was regarded as an

unusually bright girl and instood at the head of a

class all through high school. She'd been elected.

Speaker 6: Cheerleader in her junior year, won the lead in the

class play, had been chosen queen of the senior prom.

Speaker 4: She was the town's darling. They worshiped her, and I

could see that casting any aspersions on her would be

like an attack on the crown jewels. I began to

feel like a peeping tom, like a louse, like I

was wrong. And yet qui bono, who benefits two bullets

in a man's heart and one hundred thousand dollars payoff?

I had to be sure.

Speaker 5: Now here's our star to tell you about tomorrow's intriguing

episode of this week's story.

Speaker 4: Tomorrow, beauty is as beauty does, and an idol is

found to be made of flesh and blood. Join us,

won't you, Yours Truly Johnny Dollar.

Speaker 5: Yours Truly Johnny Dollar is starring Bob Bailey, is transcribed

in Hollywood, written by Less Crutchfield, It is produced and

directed by Jack Johnstone. Be sure to join us tomorrow

night at the same time and station for the next

exciting episode of Yours Truly Johnny Dollar.

Speaker 2: Roy Rowan speaking.

Speaker 1: That was part one of Yours Truly Johnny dollars the

qui bono matter. Follow Yours Truly, Johnny Dollar for more

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