- Paul is concerned for Amy Scott, who hired him to find a man and visits a fortuneteller regularly. He finds the fortuneteller has been partners with Amy's landlord in scams in the past. When the landlord turns up murdered, Amy is charged.
- Amy Scott is a naive young woman who goes to her neighbor, Madame Zillia, a fortuneteller, for advice. So why is Amy secretly tape recording their sessions? She has also hired Paul to help her find a man. Paul finds the young man in a bad part of town where he drops Amy. She refuses his help but he stays outside the bar, where the two exit fighting. He has figured out enough to know that she's in over her head and consults Perry on what he has found. Madame Zillia tells Amy something close to her is going to die. After Amy tries to confide in her talkative landlord, Victor Bundy, she finds her pet parrot dead. Afterwards, Madame Zillia visits Amy to tell her their visits must stop. Amy then goes to visit Victor in his apartment where she finds the landlord, himself, dead. Even more secrets and lies than usual must be revealed before Perry and Paul can save their client from a murder conviction. And play Cupid while they're at it.—arthurblock
- When a young woman becomes involved with a fortuneteller, despite the advice of several friends, her plans soon go awry. Once again, Perry must sweep away a web of lies to rescue an attractive but naive client from a murder charge.
- SPOILER ALERT ** This is a synopsis of the entire plot, including the ending.
Amy Scott (Sue Randall) walks from her bungalow at the Royal Garden Apartments to Madame Zillia's (Lori March) nearby unit. She's there for a reading, but begins by thanking Zillia for her advice that helped Amy start to collect an inheritance. Amy pays her $1,000 for the month of readings she's already had. Now she wants help in finding a certain young man. As Zillia goes into her seance bit, complete with puffs of smoke and flame, Amy surreptitiously turns on a tape recorder hidden in her purse. Zillia warns Amy that she sees death waiting for one who is near and dear to her. As Amy leaves, her talkative landlord, Victor Bundy, (Jacques Aubuchon) greets her and repeats an earlier claim that fortunetelling is bunk - although he reluctantly admits it once helped a friend. Amy interrupts another of his stories to pay the rent. Victor claims he'd rather treat the Royal Garden as a hobby, having recently inherited it. Then he meanders into a quotation he can't quite remember but Amy manages to escape.
When Amy gets home, Paul Drake is waiting to take her to where he's found Tommy Stiller (John Napier) , the man she'd hired Paul to track down. She asks her housekeeper, Dora (Lillian Buyeff), to feed Petey, Amy's pet canary, and goes off with Paul. He takes her to a bar where Tommy, who has been upset since his father, Leonard, jumped off a roof to his death, now spends most of his time. Amy decides to go in alone but Paul hangs around long enough to see Tommy run out telling Amy, who follows, to leave him alone. Paul warns Amy that she could get in trouble with whatever she's up to, mentioning that he knows she's been seeing Zillia. However, Amy insists on sticking to her plan. As she returns home, Victor sees her from his bungalow and points her out to a man we later learn is Howard Kern (Anthony Eisley). Howard looks and tells Victor "It's her". They hear a scream and Victor rushes into Amy's unit, where he finds a distraught Amy and a dead Petey. Zillia's prediction of death has come true.
In Perry's office, Paul relates what he knows so far, including Petey's demise. They both recognize this as an old fortuneteller's trick, usually performed with an accomplice. Paul suspects Dora the housekeeper, but when he finally mentions Madame Zillia by name, Perry recognizes her as a "big time operator" with wealthy clients. Amy is certainly in over her head. A little later, Paul will discover that Zillia was formerly the junior member of "The Great Zacharys", a mind-reading act with Victor as the boss.
At Amy's home, Zillia arrives and insists that Amy shouldn't come to her any more. She says Amy is engaged in a perilous venture and should change her course before it's too late. Zillia goes home and makes an urgent phone call as Amy eavesdrops from a bush outside. Victor shows up and, although Amy shushes him and pulls him away from the window, Zillia apparently heard a noise. She closes heavy drapes, ending the opportunity for eavesdropping. Amy brings Victor to her place and admits that she has only been seeing Zillia in order to investigate her. She's about to play the tape she made but the recorder and tape aren't where she hid them. She wants to explain further but not in front of Dora. Victor says he needs to get rid of a guest so Amy should wait ten minutes and then come over. Later, on her way to Victor's, Amy bumps into Dora, who had left to catch her bus but now needs to go back and look for her glasses. Amy enters Victor's unit through the side door and sees a tape recorder burning in the fireplace. She kneels and takes a poker to drag it out of the fire but then spots Victor's body. Perry and Paul arrive at Amy's where they get no answer. Then they notice Dora knocking at Victor's front door with no better results. There was a long distance call for Amy. Dora leads them to the side door and they spot the dead Victor. Paul goes in search of Amy while Perry calls the police.
Roughly two hours later, Perry brings Amy into his office. He'd found her at Paul's office where she says she's been waiting for 15 minutes, after having just driven around for a while. Paul calls from the fleabag hotel where Tommy has been staying. He's learned that Amy is actually Arnelle Stiller, Tommy's sister. Tommy and Arnelle's father, Leonard, had been Madame Zillia's client prior to his financial ruin which led to his suicide. This fact, plus the partnership of Zillia with Victor, will make it hard for the police to believe Arnelle's claim that Victor was a good friend whom she'd never want to kill.
Back at the fleabag hotel, Tommy blames himself, not Zillia, for his father's ruin. He was new to the business and delegated too much to Howard Kern. The two of them, plus secretary Joyce Carleton (Merry Anders), made up Leonard's staff. Tommy agrees that Zillia had influence over Leonard but doesn't think she did anything to hurt him. He also says he knew nothing about Victor Bundy before tonight - a slip from which Perry deduces that he'd been talking to Arnelle that very night. Tommy insists he has no reason to suspect that Victor was involved in his father's ruin. His suspects are Howard and Joyce. Perry meets Howard, now a vice president at Tillitson & Hartley. This is the company that took over Leonard's building project after his bankruptcy. Howard lays the blame for the failure on Leonard's personal problems. His wife was divorcing him due to his infidelity. Perry asks if Joyce was the "other woman" but Howard won't answer. Paul tracks down Joyce at a swanky resort owned by Tillitson & Hartley but doesn't learn anything.
Zillia tells Perry that she really liked the woman she knew only as Amy, didn't know what she was up to, was sincere in her warnings, is no longer partnered with Victor, and knows nothing about Victor's dealings with the Stillers and Howard. She calls Leonard one of the finest men she'd ever known. She says her warnings to Arnelle were based on her feelings as a "sensitive". Unimpressed, Perry tells her to look into her crystal ball and find out what will happen to Arnelle now that she's been arrested for murder. Zillia bursts into sobs.
At the preliminary hearing, Burger is presenting witnesses. Howard testifies that he identified Amy as Arnelle to Victor. Zillia admits that some of what she told Arnelle, like telling her not to come for more readings, was under Victor's orders. Tommy testifies that he went to the Royal Garden to talk to Zillia but encountered Arnelle as she emerged from Victor's place. Dora testifies that, after bumping into Amy, she spent 15 minutes or more looking for her glasses, then taking the phone call for Arnelle, which was from a theatrical agent who sent Arnelle a photo of The Great Zacharys, proving they were Victor and Zillia. Lt. Anderson testifies that Arnelle's fingerprints were on the poker that was used to bludgeon Victor to death and that records prove that the tape recorder in the fireplace was hers.
That night, at the fleabag hotel, a tearful Joyce enters Tommy's room. She'd received a phone call that he was near death. "I've always loved you" she cries but then the man she's embracing turns over in bed and it's Paul. She's furious but Perry appears and says that sometimes finding the truth in a murder case requires desperate measures. He apologizes, but also serves her with a subpoena.
Tommy testifies for the defense that he had learned that Leonard was involved with Joyce from Howard, who denies it. Perry makes Howard read from a report to Mrs. Stiller from a detective firm she'd hired. It repeatedly identifies Joyce as Leonard's other woman but also states that all these identifications came from one source - Howard. Joyce shouts, "It's a lie!", and, as the judge calls for order, she accuses Howard of acting to destroy her relationship with Tommy. Howard admitted that he did this to drive a wedge between her and the Stillers. He didn't want them comparing notes which might reveal Howard's and Victor's scheme. After Leonard's project was ruined, Tillitson and Hartley were able to take over at half the original cost and both plotters were well rewarded. Victor got enough money to buy the Royal Garden complex, merely pretending that it came from an inheritance.
Zillia testifies that she had no part in these machinations. She says that she, not Joyce, was Leonard's true love. The phone call Arnelle tried to overhear on the evening of the murder was one of several she made that night, to Howard and others. She learned that Victor had taken advantage of the love between Leonard and her in order to destroy him. Before Arnelle came to Victor's bungalow, Zillia confronted him there. He told her to keep quiet or an investigation might learn too much and not just the crimes already revealed. Victor admitted to her that Leonard also confronted him about suspicions so he pushed Leonard off the roof, making it look like suicide. Zillia's next memory after hearing this was of Victor's body on the floor and herself holding a bloody poker.
Much later, Arnelle leaves to join her mother in England. Perry and Paul show up to say goodbye and to mention that Zillia has said that she would have confessed if Arnelle had been bound over for trial. Arnelle believes it and Perry agrees. Tommy drives up to take her to the airport, accompanied by Joyce, who is now Mrs. Tommy Stiller. Before kissing them goodbye, Arnelle gives Paul and Perry credit for this marriage, which prompts Paul to say they're a couple of cupids. However, Perry can't see Paul with a bow and arrow and Paul can't picture Perry with wings.
It seems that no one ever officially solves the murder of Petey, but the implications are that it must have been Victor.
Contribute to this page
Suggest an edit or add missing content
Top Gap
What is the Spanish language plot outline for The Case of the Garrulous Go-Between (1964)?
Answer