- Daniel Reed is forcibly placed in a mental sanitarium as incompetent. Mason takes the case to court and wins Reed's freedom on a writ of habeas corpus. Before the writ can be served, however, Reed escapes and is charged with murder.
- Donna Knox cashes a check for $20,000 from the elderly Daniel Reed after Reed overrides his nephew and niece when the bank calls. The money is shared by Knox and her partner Maury Lewis with $500 for their helper Dave Kemp, a busted private detective. Kemp expected half the money. Perry Mason takes on the case of Daniel Reed after his friend, Millie Foster seeks his help. Daniel has been confined to a psychiatric institution against his will, with a diagnosis of senile dementia. It seems that the elderly Daniel's nephew and scheming wife, Willard and Arlene Scott, are behind it all. Perry files a writ of habeas corpus and gets the judge to agree but Daniel escapes from the institution before he gets the news. When Daniel finds his old business partner Monty Siwel dead, he is charged with murder and Perry defends him. D.A. Hamilton Burger seems to be getting information out of Perry's office and thinking his office is bugged, Perry tries to feed Burger false information. It almost backfires on him.—garykmcd
- When Donna Knox (Joan Camden) wants to cash a check for $20,000 made out to Maury Lewis (King Calder) and signed by Daniel Reid (Edgar Stehli), bank executive Herb Walker (William Remick) calls the home of Willard Scott (Arthur Space), Daniel's nephew with whom he lives. Willard's wife Arlene (Mary Anderson) takes charge and says not to honor the check and to tell Donna the truth - that Daniel is as crazy as they come. Daniel enters, takes the call, and insists the bank honor the check.
Donna brings the cash to Maury, who takes $500 to pay off former private investigator Dave Kemp (Alan Lee), who helped track down Daniel. Dave was promised half, but he can't even finish threatening Maury before Donna pulls a gun on him. Dave goes to Arlene and Willard, telling them that Maury and Donna will take Daniel "for every dime they have" (sic). He doesn't know what they have on Daniel to use for blackmail. Arlene's the one who knows what to do. They take an extremely unwilling Daniel to the Norris sanitarium, and tell Dr. Norris (Richard Aherne) that Daniel has been giving money to strangers. Norris diagnoses senile dementia.
In Perry's office, Millie Foster (Kitty Kelly), saying she's Daniel's fiancée, ask for help in getting him released. Perry petitions for a writ of habeas corpus. At the hearing, the Scotts' attorney George Metcalf (Simon Scott) explains to a skeptical Judge Treadwell (Richard Gaines) that Daniel is physically unable to be in court, as ordered. Norris explains than Daniel's absence was under his orders, because Daniel would be over-excited by the hearing. He explains that his diagnosis was based on Daniel's violent behavior and an arcus senilis (a crescent ring on the cornea) in his right eye. Perry points out that the judge also has this symptom. Norris tries to explain that he evaluated the combination of symptoms, but the judge interrupts. It's clear to him that if he'd objected to being kidnapped and manhandled, having this thing in his eye, he'd have been declared senile too. He orders the court to reconvene at the sanitarium, but when they get there, Daniel has cleverly escaped. He knocked out an attendant with a bar of soap inside a sock, then left, disguised as a laundryman. The judge has heard enough. He grants the writ of habeas corpus and says Norris will have to answer to contempt of court charges. Perry wonders where Daniel has gone.
As it happens, Daniel is in Maury's hotel room, bending over the blackmailer's corpse. He calls Millie and tells her to meet him at the usual place. As he leaves, janitor Victor Kowalski (Sid Tomack), in the process of carrying away a broken sand jar, sees Daniel, who is still pretending to be a laundryman. Later, the hunt is on for Daniel, and Paul reports that Millie is missing too. Dave calls Perry and tells him about Donna's relationship with Maury. Perry heads to her apartment, but Lt. Tragg gets there first. She's drinking to forget, but it's not working and she decides that revenge is better. She's quite willing to cooperate with the police in any way that will put Maury's killer in the gas chamber.
Millie calls and says that she and Daniel are in Reno. Paul and Perry go there and here Daniel's story. 30 years ago, he was in Fairbanks, Alaska, where he first met Millie. He and his partner Monty Siwel (sp?) discovered a gold mine. The greedy Monty tried to kill his partner, but Daniel was hot. He fired the first shot. He buried Monty in the snow, told people that Monty had to go to Seattle on business, and disappeared from Fairbanks by buying tickets to Seattle in Monty's name, which he used with Millie. They were married there, but she left him because he wouldn't go to the police about Monty. Later, Maury found the body, figured out what had happened, and eventually showed up to blackmail Daniel. Tragg enters with Nevada state troopers, and Daniel agrees to waive extradition.
After they leave, Perry and Paul discuss Tragg's surprisingly opportune arrivals. He suspects his office is bugged. He has Paul get a message to Della, so she'll know what Perry has in mind to confuse the police and Burger. The next day, he calls her at the office and makes up a story that Monty Siwel and Maury Lewis are the same person. He mentions that one surname spelled backwards is similar to the other (suggesting that Monty's last name is something other than "Siwel", as reported on IMDb, but not included on the episode credits). Daniel had a stronger motive than just blackmail to kill the partner he cheated out of a fortune. When Paul and Perry fly back to L.A., they are greeted by Della, who says that Perry's invented tale turns out to be completely true. Police in Alaska had Monty's fingerprints on file, and they match Maury's. In jail, Daniel tells Perry that he really thought at the time that he'd killed Monty, unaware that native trappers found him and nursed him back to health. He found out 3 months ago when Maury showed up for blackmail.
In court, Tragg testifies about switchboard records at Maury's hotel showing the call to Millie. On cross-examination, Perry asks him about what Tragg learned of the victim's movements after leaving Alaska. Tragg says Monty went from Fairbanks to Seattle where he married Millie, to various places, ending in a hotel in Phoenix before coming to L.A. Perry then asks about what Tragg learned from the Phoenix hotel manager, forcing Tragg to give a description that obviously matches Daniel, not Monty. Tragg has no explanation for the discrepancy. Victor testifies about seeing Daniel leave Maury's room at 9:26, saying that he checked his pocket watch. Perry points out that, by his own testimony, he had his hands full with a heavy broken sand jar at the time. Dave, the ex-P.I., visits Perry's office and says that Donna took the missing $20,000. Asked about his own whereabouts at the time of the murder, he says that he was discussing business with Arlene then. After he leaves, a dejected Perry tells Della that he'll just have to call Willard to testify about Daniel's mental incapacity, and hope for the best.
It's Burger who calls Willard, getting him to testify how the sanitarium visit ended with a writ of habeas corpus, effectively proving that Daniel was responsible for his actions. On cross, Perry asks him why, while supposedly working with family lawyer Metcalf for joint custody of Daniel's affairs with Arlene, he was also going behind her back with another lawyer to petition for sole guardianship. He doesn't have a good answer, so Perry asks him where he was at the time of the murder. Willard answers that he was at home with Arlene, but it turns out that Dave's claim that he was with Arlene at a nightspot is true, verified by the club's manager. Willard confesses to murdering Maury, claiming he thought Daniel would merely be put away somewhere rather than getting the gas chamber. His motive was a desperate desire to get away from Arlene and her constant nagging.
Back at the office, Tragg pulls apart Perry's phone, revealing a bug. He explains that he just learned of its existence. Dave planted it, then fed information to an eager beaver in Homicide in the hopes of getting his P.I. license back. Tragg promises that he won't. Perry mentions that it was Millie who shot Monty in Alaska, and Daniel was merely covering up for her. He also admits that his talk of having to call Willard as a witness was just an act for the D.A.'s benefit. Tragg suggests that Perry not invite Burger to his next performance.
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