Summaries

Synopsis

The famous detective is framed for murder by crooks running a war bonds racket.

Tom Lawrence (Tom Conway) the debonair sleuth known as The Falcon is suffering from a hangover when a young lady Mia Bruger (Rita Corday) bursts into his bedroom begging for his help locating her missing brother. Tom agrees to accompany Mia to a cocktail bar her brother frequents - but when he enters he gets knocked out. Tom wakes in the backseat of his car, which is parked at the side of a country road. But when Tom drives back towards the city he is soon pulled over by a police officer on a motorcycle. The cop (Ralph Dunn) promptly arrests The Falcon for the murder of a bank official. Tom is turned over to Inspector Timothy Donovan (Cliff Clark), he interrogates The Falcon regarding the theft of a quarter of a million dollars in Government War Bonds and the murder of the bank official. He tells Tom that six people witnessed his car leaving the scene of the crime, but Tom tells him that he was with his fiancée - reporter Marcia Brooks (Jane Randolph). When questioned however, Marcia refutes Tom's story.

Donovan agrees to go with Tom to the cocktail bar where he was knocked out, but when they enter they find that the 'bar' is now the headquarters of a knitting society. Donovan has now had enough of The Falcon's stories and arrests him, but Marcia and Tom's sidekick Goldie Locke (Cliff Edwards) have followed the Inspector to the bar and The Falcon is able to jump into her car and speed off. Tom sends Marcia to infiltrate the knitting circle back at the bar and she discovers that the leader of the group a Mrs Geraldine Lipton (Wynne Gibson) resides in a resort hotel out in the countryside. When she reports this information back to The Falcon, he and Goldie drive out there to investigate.

The Falcon and Goldie frame the hotel detective for theft to get him fired and then quickly persuade the hotel manager Gwynne Gregory (Harriet Hilliard) to replace him with Goldie. Down by the swimming pool Tom spots Mia talking to Rickey Davis (Erford Gage) a criminal that The Falcon helped send to prison years ago. Rickey is posing as a nurse to an invalid, Bruno Steffen (Andre Charlot), who is staying at the hotel. When Tom tries to speak to Mia she pretends she doesn't know him and then dives into the pool to avoid him. As soon as Mia hits the water a shot rings out and Mia is killed. Tom immediately searches the hotel rooms that overlook the pool but the only person he finds is the puppeteer Smiley Dugan (Edgar Kennedy) performing his puppet show. Tom then enters the office of Gwynne, where he finds she is arguing with Rickey. Tom finds a spent cartridge on the rug and covertly takes Gwynne's cigarette case and slips it to Marcia - asking her to go and get it fingerprinted. Tom follows Gwynne when she goes on a cycle ride, but they are both nearly knocked down by a car which Tom discovers belongs to Steffen. This prompts him to break into Steffen's room in search of the missing bonds, but he is bizarrely interrupted by Smiley who begins to rant and rave about waste and extravagance.

Smiley alerts Donovan to the The Falcon's presence at the hotel and the Inspector goes there to arrest Tom - only to discover that he cannot do so as it is outside his jurisdiction. Marcia returns with the results of the fingerprint test and reveals that the cigarette case belongs to a notorious thief known as "The Duchess". Tom hatches a plan and phones his houseboy Jerry (Richard Loo) and gets him to come to the hotel posing as the Chinese Trade Commissioner. In this guise Jerry learns from Steffen that he is going to buy some War Bonds from Gwynne. Tom confronts her about the cigarette case but she denies it is hers and just at that moment Mrs Lipton enters and claims the cigarette case is hers. Tom announces that Lipton is "The Duchess" and accuses her of stealing the bonds, but Donovan returns with a warrant for the arrest of The Falcon. He promptly arrests Tom, Marcia, Goldie and Jerry but once again The Falcon manages to give the police the slip and returns to the hotel.

There he overhears Lipton and Rickey trying to blackmail Gwynne into selling the bonds to Steffen, Tom enters to stop them and Lipton confesses that it was Rickey who framed Tom in revenge for having put him behind bars. As Rickey enters the room to confront The Falcon a shot is fired and Rickey crashes to the floor dead, a terrified Gwynne confesses that she was married to Rickey and that he was blackmailing her. Mrs Lipton is afraid that she will be the killer's next target and goes to her room while Tom and Gwynne take the elevator down to the lobby. Suddenly the power to the elevator is cut trapping them. Tom begins to suspect that Smiley may be the killer as he is familiar with the operation of the hotel. After getting out of the lift he goes to find Smiley but discovers that his puppet show is automatic - providing the puppeteer with the perfect alibi. The Falcon rushes back to Mrs Lipton's room, where he finds Smiley accusing her of stealing all his savings. When Tom bursts in, Smiley flees and then plunges to his death from a rooftop. Donovan returns to the hotel and finally arrests the right person as he arrests Lipton for stealing the bonds. With the case solved Marcia and Tom are about to return to the city when suddenly a glamorous, foreign lady rushes into the lobby and begs Tom for help.