- A man picking up a young woman hitchhiking tries to help her but the actions backfire when he finds himself the victim of blackmail. The man's business partner was also involved with the woman and murdered for which he is charged.
- Peter Handsell drops his female partner Veronica Dale off to be picked up by Edgar Ferrell, who is expected to make a pass at her. Ferrell tells Veronica that he's a film producer who might have a "position" for her. He takes her to a large house his company uses as a set, but as he offers her a drink another car arrives and he sends her out the back door; when she hears a shot, she decides to leave. She tries to call Peter at a gas station, but after getting no answer she gets a ride to Los Angeles with John Addison, who happens to be Ferrell's business partner. The next day Addison calls Perry to ask him to get Veronica out of jail: she's been arrested for vagrancy. Later, Addison calls Perry again: Peter Handsell is blackmailing him because he helped Veronica. Perry tries to set up a sting for Handsell, then discovers that Addison is in deeper trouble: Ferrell was shot at the house the night he picked up Veronica. Perry must decipher all the circumstantial evidence against his client.—Anonymous
- It's Tuesday night on Pacific Coast Highway near Malibu, and Pete Handsell (James Anderson) drops off Veronica Dale (Carol Leigh) at the point where she'll hitch a ride from Edgar Ferrell (Paul Cavanagh). He's sure Edgar will pick her up, and soon "get friendly", so he leaves. Edgar acts as predicted. He's a movie producer, senior partner in Fidelity Studios, and says that maybe he can find a job for Veronica. He takes her to a beach house owned by the studio, which uses its elaborate grounds for shooting films. Inside, Edgar starts to play host when another car drives up, so he sends Veronica out the back way. Outside, she hears a gunshot and runs about a mile to a service station with a phone booth. She tries to call Pete at their rendezvous point, but he's not there. As she leaves the booth, John Addison (Robert Ellenstein) drives up, seems about to make his own call, but turns back, and agrees to give Veronica a ride.
The next day, Addison, who is also a partner in Fidelity Studios, sees Perry at his office. He says that after he dropped Veronica off she was arrested for vagrancy, and he wants Perry to bail her out. When he does, Veronica tells him that she was living with her mother in Albuquerque but grew bored and hitchhiked to L.A. Perry gives her a little money and suggests that she return home. She says she will. When Perry returns to the office, Della tells him that Veronica's mother stopped by and paid $100 to handle the cost of getting Veronica out of trouble. Also, Veronica now has a job as a contract player at Fidelity.
That evening, Perry stops by Addison's office, where he's working late with screenwriter Lorraine Ferrell (Catherine McLeod), Edgar's unhappy wife. She leaves, and Addison explains that he hired Veronica - leaving the details to his assistant Myrtle Northrup (Peggy Converse) - because "she seemed like a nice girl". Unfortunately, Pete knows about this and wants $10,000 to keep it out of the scandal sheets. Perry has Addison sign his name on a piece of paper, then write a check for $2000 but instead of signing it normally, trace his first signature onto the check. Perry leaves with the check, telling Addison to have Pete come to the law office. He gives Pete the check, but afterward has Paul arrange to put out the word to all the banks that someone is forging high-profile people's names on checks.
Perry goes to the beach house in response to a summons by Addison, who wants to show him something inside. Perry explains that if he sees evidence of a crime, he must report it immediately, but if Addison just tells him something, it's a privileged communication. Addison says he went to the house to rest after scouting nearby shooting locations, and found Edgar's body, dead a few days. Perry immediately figures that Edgar died Tuesday night, when Addison was in the area (having picked up Veronica then), and that's when he really found the body. Addison admits that's what happened, and he was about to enter the gas station phone booth to call the police when he realized that Veronica could identify him. Perry tells him that if he wants a witness to his "stumbling across the body a few days later" ploy, he'll need a better companion than his own attorney.
The next day, Addison takes Myrtle to the beach house to "take inventory", and arranges that she be the one to see the body first. She volunteers to call the police as if she came there alone, hoping to keep Addison's name out of it, but he insists he has nothing to hide and makes the call. Perry is summoned to the office of Sgt. Bent, who works forgery cases. The check with Addison's traced signature has surfaced, and Pete is in custody. Perry warns him that by claiming that he didn't forge the check, he'll have to admit to being a paid-off extortionist. Lt. Tragg enters, already aware that Pete could have helpful knowledge concerning Edgar's murder. Sgt. Bent, now suspecting that Perry may have passed the check with the traced signature calls Addison about it, at Perry's insistence. He's astonished to hear Addison say he really signed the check. Tragg immediately catches on to how Perry trapped Pete while avoiding being guilty of passing a forged check. He takes Pete away to meet with Burger.
In court, a police fingerprint expert (Perry Ivins) testifies that along with prints of people known to be in the beach house, there were prints of an unidentified woman. There's no way to know when any of the prints were left. Tragg testifies that ballistics show that bullets from the missing murder gun matched ones Addison had used on practice targets, so the gun had been in his possession at one time. Pete, under immunity from prosecution, testifies to taking the $2000 as hush money concerning Addison's whereabouts on the murder night. He also admits to being a convicted blackmailer, but Burger objects when Perry wants details about his doings with Veronica. The judge says he'll rule when court resumes the next day.
Paul has brought Martha Dale (Barbara Pepper), Veronica's mother, from Albuquerque and put her up in a hotel. Della is surprised to see that this isn't the same Mrs. Dale she met earlier. The real Martha says that Veronica has quite a history of running away, and she hadn't heard from her daughter in 10 months. Paul reports that once Veronica checked out of her room on Burger's instructions, a Drake Agency operative entered the room and retrieved a booklet filled with pages of numbers.
Back in court, Veronica is on the stand, perjuring herself every time she opens her mouth: She was at the gas station because a rancher dropped her off there. She doesn't know Pete. She'd been living with her mother until about four days before the murder, when she headed to L.A. to better herself. She stops the parade of lies when she sees that her mother has entered the courtroom. Perry produces her booklet. It's a list of license plate numbers and dates. She claims that's just a hobby, but Perry thinks she keeps it so diligently for purposes of extortion. Furthermore, the license plate just before Addison's doesn't belong to some unknown rancher but to a studio car used by Edgar! Trapped, Veronica admits the truth about her shady practices and about what happened with Edgar. She only briefly saw the car that drove up the the beach house that night, but could testify that it wasn't Addison's. Pete adds that he and Veronica had been working together for at least 6 months. He explains the scheme against Edgar, but has no idea why anyone was posing as Veronica's mother.
Perry and Paul go to the beach house to reenact the murder, bringing along Myrtle, who has a key to the place. Their attempts accomplish nothing, and Perry says the best thing will be to plea bargain down to 2nd degree murder - a 20 year sentence for Addison. Myrtle is shocked at the idea of taking away 20 years from the life of such a great man. Finally, she says that she overheard that Edgar was going to the beach house, so she went there herself, taking Addison's gun for protection. She confronted him there and started to call Lorraine when Edgar grabbed a poker to stop her. The gun went off in their struggle. Perry acts unconvinced, so Myrtle proves her confession by taking him to an urn on the property where she hid the gun.
In the courthouse, Perry learns that there's a mob of reporters waiting to question him about the case, so he and Della sneak out a back way, leaving Paul to deal with the fourth estate. Perry tells Paul that it was Myrtle who impersonated Veronica's mother, hoping to keep anyone from learning the vixen's connection to Addison. Della thinks that a good lawyer can get Myrtle off with a plea of self-defense, and Perry agrees. He tells Paul to warn the reporters against picking up a lady on the highway. "If she's no lady, it could be murder."
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