The Safe at Home Matter

The Safe at Home Matter

SYNOPSIS:

Johnny answers his phone and a voice thought he had called Jimmy Valentine, or at least he should have. The caller is Steve Porter in Savanna, Georgia. Steve tells Johnny to come on down to Savanna with his sand paper for his fingertips so he can come down and get into the act, everybody else seems to be doing it. Steve tells Johnny about Jimmy Valentine the fictional safe cracker who used sandpaper on his fingertips to make then more sensitive. Steve tells Johnny that there has been a rash of safe cracking jobs in Savanna, and all done by the same person. The police have no leads on him, but he thinks Johnny can solve the robberies.

Johnny cabs to the airport and flies to Savanna and checks into the Whitney Hotel. Johnny walks to Steve Porter's office. Steve tells johnny that the safe jobs started about 4-5 weeks ago at a small tobacco depot. One Thursday the safe had the $1,800 weekly payroll, on Friday the safe was open and empty. The police thought it was an inside job until two other safes were robbed a couple days later, and then a slew of stores. Some were opened by the combination and some were blown with explosives and no clues were left. Two days before Johnny was called a jewelry store was robbed of $2,000 in cash and over $180,000 in precious stones. Johhny gets a complete list of the 17 robberies to date. The police have alerted all the known fences with no results. Steve tells Johnny to see Lieutenant Barnwell; he is sure Johnny can solve the robberies.

Barnwell tells Johnny that he has run down all the names on the list that was done by Sargeant Rufus Teed, the "Old Sarge". Teed used to work in burglary but retired several years ago. The chief brought him back to work on the robberies. Teed knows more about safes than anyone else. Teed is well known and has solved cases all over the country, but he has gotten nowhere.

Johnny gets a rental car and drives to see Teed, who lives in a cottage outside of town near the river. The front of the house has a neat flower garden, but the back yard had a collection of piled up old safes. Teed tells Johnny that the safes are his souvenirs from his days on the force. Teed runs down several of his cases for Johnny. The safes are piled up so he can use them as a monument.

Teed tells Johnny that the robbery pattern is not consistent leaving no trail to follow. Johnny lifts up a heavy bag that that Teed says has all the tools he used when he was on the force. Teed was ready to go on a long trip to Europe, South America - all over. He had been saving for it all his life and being single and having a pension helps. He was all ready to go until these robberies started. He told the chief he would not leave Savannah until the cases were solved.

Teed shows Johnny a safe that has pictures of shoeprints found at the sites. Nothing else had been found, including the source of a new explosive the thief has been using. Teed gives Johnny a four-hour rundown on all the cases he has worked. Teed agrees to call Johnny is anything happens.

Johnny goes back to the hotel and walks to Police Headquarters so he had time to think about what Teed had told him. Barnwell tells Johnny that the shoes that made the foot prints were old, and over two and a half million pairs had been sold nationwide. He tells Johhny that he is sure that, along with Teed, he will work out something.

Johnny suddenly realizes that he may have a solution, but Teed does not know it. Johnny walks back to the hotel and as he opens the door to his room he is blown into the hall by an explosion in his room. Barnwell and his men arrive to investigate and Johnny is moved to a different room. Barnwell assures Johnny they will find out who did it. Teed is looking over the room for clues and is sure he can solve the case quickly.

conman who has gone straight and helped Johnny on several cases. Johnny plans a job with Smokey and assures him that he will take the blame if it does not go as planned, but he is sure it will. Smokey will need some time to gather the tools and equipment he needs, and will call Johnny when he gets to Savanna.

As Johnny is leaving to pick up Smokey, Barnwell call to tell him that there has been another job at a sugar company. He tells Johnny that he had called Teed, and will see Johnny at the sugar plant. Johnny tells Barnwell not to bank on seeing him at the site of the robbery.

Johnny picks up Smokey and tells him that only Steve Porter, Barnwell and Teed know Johnny is in town, and Johnny is sure that one of them set the bomb. He tells Smokey about Teed's packed handbags and Smokey hopes Johnny is right.

"It was a cinch for Smokey to get into Teed's cottage, and with a drill and TNT was able to open the big safe Teed had not opened when Johnny was there. Inside the safe were all the jewels and cash from the robberies. The Old Sarge was the one person who could have gotten away with it by working with the police and give up on the investigations to distract the police from what he was doing. He is going to have plenty of time to think better of it - in the pen."

Johnny relates that Barnwell figured out why he was not at the sugar plant, When Teed came back to the cottage and found Johnny and Smokey there, he pulled a gun, but Barnwell was right behind him.

"Next week, a far too ingenious method for murder."

• This program was discovered by Dr. Joe Webb in June, 2025 on a reel of old audio tape in a collection donated to the Old Time Radio Researchers for transfer from reel tape into digital files.
• The dating of this program is based on clues in the previous program "The Buyer and the Cellar Matter".
• This program is commonly and erroniously catalogued as The Clever Crook Matter.
• Jimmy Valentine was a character in the O. Henry story "A Retrieved Reformation", and was also made into several movies and an episode of The Lux Radio Theatre.
• Sam Gray is Old Sarge, Leon Janney is Hugh Barnwell, Eugene Francis is Steve Porter, Robert Dryden is Smokey Sullivan
• Music direction is by Ethel Huber
• The announcer is Art Hannes