Curated Recommendations Seeking the Same Brilliance as Poisoned Paradise: Cult Guide

Dir: Charles Horan

While working as a flower girl in Devlin Maddox's nightclub, Nellie Vaughan meets wealthy young Pelton Van Teel and falls in love. Maddox, desirous of using Nellie to blackmail Van Teel, spreads a rumor that she is his mistress. This makes Nellie uncomfortable, and she demands that Van Teel marry her immediately, to which he agrees. Meanwhile, Van Teel has been losing money gambling to Maddox, who threatens to break up the marriage by producing a worthless check that the young husband has written. Venturing to Maddox's apartment for a showdown, Nellie pulls a gun and demands the check, accidentally shooting Maddox when he throws a lamp at her. Maddox plans to charge Nellie with assault, but when the police arrive, his butler, actually a detective employed by the elder Van Teel, exposes Maddox, who is then arrested, clearing the path for the couple's happiness.

Dir: Louis J. Gasnier

Episode 1: "The Sultan's Necklace" [synopsis not published] Episode 2: "The Bowstring" Harry Drake discovers that the masked figure who held him up is Ilma. When they realize the intruder has departed, they discover the pearl has disappeared. Harry tries to comfort Ilma. He tells her that he loves her, but she tears herself away from him saying, "Love me? Do you realize how I must pay for those pearls?" She then tells Harry she must go into the Sultan's harem or see her father killed, if she cannot recover the pearls. Harry offers to co-operate with her and Ilma suggests he pretend to join Grady's gang. He agrees to do so. Ilma is traced by the Sultan's executioner, to Harry's apartment. Standing outside the door, he overhears their conversation. Nemesis, who secured the pearl from Harry and Ilma, has been overcome by the executioner who takes the pearl from him. Harry again tells Ilma he loves her and is about to kiss her when he hears a knock at the door. He looks through the keyhole and assures Ilma no one is there. She points to the floor, starting back in terror as she sees a bow string, used to strangle women of the harem who flirt, slipped under the door. Later the pearl is mysteriously returned to Ilma, and Harry, gambling for Jack's pearl, loses his own. That night, a member of the gang, sneaks into a rich man's residence. He is followed by Ilma. Entering a room used as a picture gallery, decorated by suits of armor, Jack dons one of the suits. Drawing his sword, he starts to cut out one of the pictures. He is interrupted by Ilma, who demands his pearls. He tells her he cannot get at them through his armor. He overcomes Ilma and, tying her to a chair resumes his work. The door opens, and a second figure in armor enters. Jack fumbles for his gun but is unable to get it from under his armor. The strange figure draws his sword and he and Jack fight like knights of old. Jack is overpowered. The stranger proves to be Harry. Recovering the pearls, Harry gives them to Ilma, and starts towards the window after Jack, who tries to escape. Ilma backs towards the curtain. In an instant some unknown throws a curtain over her head, takes the pearls and escapes. Episode 3: "The Air Peril" Ilma had just recovered two of the pearls from the burglar when they are taken away from her. She joins Harry and tells him of her loss. They are accosted by an old woman, who is strangely disappointed when she finds they did not recover the pearls. Harry escorts Ilma to her apartment after trying in vain to console her. The next morning Ilma is puzzling out a note of sympathy she has received from someone who signs himself "Nemesis,'' when the Sultan's executioner drops an envelope into the mail slot in her door. Ilma opens the envelope and finds in it the two pearls and a note which reads: "Here are your pearls. Nemesis is not a woman, but a dangerous man. Don't trust him. Kismet." Ilma 'phones Harry, telling him she has the two pearls. While she is talking, Stayne, a member of the Grady gang, is announced by Harry's butler. Harry tells Ilma of Stayne's coming and imparts the information that this member of the gang had two of the pearls. Ilma says she will visit him at once to help him recover the pearls from Stayne. Stayne tells Harry that the night before he attempted to rob the Mason home, but was caught by Perry Mason and his brother. He was searched and the pearls found on him. Perry kept one and gave the other back to Stayne, and after taking his fingerprints released him. In the morning papers was a story that Perry's brother had been murdered and Stayne was accused of the crime. Ilma arrives and learns of Stayne's predicament, who offers them the pearl he has if they will clear him of the charge of murder. Harry and Ilma, pretending to be reporters, call on Perry Mason and arc recognized by him. He tells his story and shows them the pearl. As they are leaving the Mason home Ilma secures a key to the front door. Later she tries to persuade Harry to return to the Mason home, but when he refused, she goes alone. In the Mason home she hears a conversation between Perry Mason and his servant which convinces her that the man killed his brother and that the servant helped him. When Perry and the servant leave the room Ilma recovers the pearl from a vase in which Perry placed it, and is about to depart when Perry returns and captures her. Perry is about to call the police when Ilma warns him that if he does she will tell he murdered his brother. Perry decides to get her out of the way, and with the aid of her servant he ties Ilma with a rope which is attached to a ring at the bottom of a balloon. The room in which Ilma has been captured has a sliding roof and when this is shoved to one side the balloon is inflated. Before it is released a tube filled with acid is fixed so that by degrees it will eat away the rope with which Ilma is attached to the balloon while it is in midair. Perry cuts the rope and the balloon rises, carrying the struggling body of Ilma up toward the unknown. Episode 4: "Amid the Clouds" [synopsis not published] Episode 5: "Between Fire and Water" Having fallen into a lake from the ballroom Harry and Ilma conceal themselves from the villain in his hydroplane by hiding under the stern of a fisherman's boat. The dirigible has sunk to the earth and has been smashed. As Perry glides away in his hydroplane, Harry and Ilma attract the attention of the fishermen and are taken aboard the boat and reach the shore. The executioner, Kismet, returns to Ilma's apartment in time to separate Harry and Ilma, as the impetuous youth is about to declare his love to her. Undaunted by their dangers, Harry and Ilma decide to return to search the Mason house for the pearls. They search in vain and then decide to terrify Perry's servant into opening a safe for them. As they are about to secure the pearls. Perry returns and traps them in a water-tight cellar, which he constructed for experiments on models of submarines. Perry turns on the water and leaves Harry and Ilma to drown. To cover his crime he decides to burn down the house. The episode closes with the conflagration raging above their heads while they are about to sink in the water which almost touches the roof of the cellar. Episode 6: "The Abandoned Mine" Ilma and Harry are about to be drowned in the cellar of Perry Mason's home when the floor of it caves in and they drop into the shaft of an abandoned mine. Perry, who knows about the mine, has also taken refuge in it and is struck on the head by some of the debris. He is knocked unconscious and loses his memory. Wandering around in the mine he finds Harry and Ilma and attaches himself to them. He takes one of the pearls in his pocket and after playing with it for a while, throws it away. Ilma picks it up, recognizing it as one of the pearls she is seeking. Wandering around in the mine, Harry, Ilma and Perry follow a figure with a light and come to a counterfeiters' den in the mine. Realizing their danger Harry makes Ilma and Perry conceal themselves and he also hides from the gang of counterfeiters, who are returning to their den. Perry, thinking it some sort of a childish game, comes from his hiding place and shows the gang members where Harry and Ilma are bidden. Realizing that Perry is harmless the gang allows him to wander around but bind Harry and Ilma and decide to put them out of the way for fear of being betrayed to the police by them. As the leader is about to shoot Harry, Perry, who has gone into their storeroom, returns with a can of nitroglycerin in his hand. The leader threatens Perry, who. realizing from childish experiments that the substance in the can will explode, makes as though to throw it at him. The gang hastily backs out of the den and Perry, Ilma and Harry are knocked senseless by falling timbers. Episode 7: "The False Pearl" Harry and Ilma, lying insensible on the ground, are rescued by officers, who carry them to safety. While nobody is looking Kismet steals in, picks up Perry and steals off with him. Sitting him down in the light he produces a small vial from his pocket, opens it and holds it up to Perry's nose. Perry opens his eyes and asks what has happened. Kismet says: "The first shock took away your memory; the second returned it." The next morning Harry and Ilma see Stayne. This man has been saved by Harry, but it is only after a fight that he gives up the pearl, as he had promised. Later he apologizes with every sign of sincerity, and Harry and Ilma forgive him. Stayne speaks: "And to prove to you I'm sorry I'll tell you where to find two more of your pearls." Believing him, Harry takes an address from him. In the meantime Perry, wearing a mask, sneaks in the window of Harry's apartment, takes the pearl from where Ilma laid it and places a substitute in its place. Stayne gazes over his shoulder with amazement. Harry and Ilma look up at Stayne, who hesitates whether or not to tell what he saw. He concludes not to say anything and leaves. Harry makes love to Ilma. Kismet, who has been listening, draws the Sultan's carved dagger. Hearing a knock at the door Ilma is alarmed. Kismet standards in the doorway, holding his dagger towards Ilma. She speaks: "I will obey." As soon as the door is closed Harry demands to know what is meant. "That's the Sultan's spy, sent to kill us both if I should fall in love, but of course, I won't." Going over to the table Ilma discovers that the pearl is gone and in its place is a piece of marble. Harry and Ilma trace the pearl to Miss Sunderlee's home, and sneaking in, Harry recognizes Stayne's footprints from the fact that he is wearing Harry's shoes. Coming from behind Harry knocks Stayne down, takes the pearl, and with Ilma, runs away. Stayne and his pals pursue and trap Harry and Ilma on a little point of land on the edge of the Hudson. Harry sees some boys flying a kite. He and Ilma grab the kite string from the boys and plunge into the Hudson. Stayne and one of his men jump into a little boat near the boathouse. They raise the sail and pursue, guns in hand. Episode 8: "The Man Trap" The episode opens with a fight between a sailing vessel and a fast naval launch, in which Mason and Stayne were pursuing Harry and Ilma. The naval officers rescue Harry and Ilma from the river and take them to the shore. One of the seven pearls Ilma is seeking is sold to the leader of a pagan cult, who fits the pearl into one eye of a bronze god, which his followers worship. He seeks the mate of the pearl for the other eye of the god, and the member of Grady's gang who sold him the pearl gives him Ilma's address, telling him she has some pearls. The priest calls on Ilma and tries to buy her pearl, but she in turn offers to purchase the one he has from the priest. The priest lures her to the temple by telling her he will put the matter up to his followers. When she reaches the temple he makes her an offer of marriage, and when Ilma refuses he drugs her tea, steals her pearl and is just taking her in his arms when one of his ardent followers enters. She is jealous, and while the priest is fitting Ilma's pearl into the second eye of the bronze god the jealous woman drugs the priest's tea. He is about to kill her when the drug takes effect. Harry, being informed by Kismet of Ilma's danger, hastens to the temple. He revives her and she discovers her pearl is lost. He forced the jealous follower to tell where the pearl is, and Harry goes alone into the temple room to get the pearl from the eye of the bronze god when Perry Mason, also on the trail of the pearls, enters and holds him up. Harry steps aside while Mason takes a pearl from the eye of the god. As he does so the outstretched arms of the statue come together, holding Mason in their deadly embrace. His screams bring Ilma and the followers to the room, and when the woman relaxes the arms Mason falls to the floor. Harry and Ilma snatch the pearls and flee from the room. They start to open the door of the house, and Harry looks out to see if the coast is clear. He beckons for Ilma to follow him, but just as she starts to do so an unseen figure emerges from his hiding place near the door, grabs her, and taking her pearls, shoves her through the open door. Harry saves Ilma from falling. She is telling him of the loss of the pearls as the episode ends. Episode 9: "The Warning on the Wire" A voice on the wire says to Ilma: "Parsons, the jeweler, has one of the pearls." Ilma repeats the news to Harry. They leave for the store at once, where they are shown the pearl, which they discover to be a perfect match. At that moment Mayor Winton and his daughter, Marjorie, are ushered up to the counter. The Mayor wishes to purchase a large pearl to be placed in the center of a necklace. Turning to Ilma the clerk asks if she cares to purchase the pearl for $20,000. She refuses. The Mayor is staggered at the price but finally agrees, requesting that it be delivered to him. Harry and Ilma determine to follow the Mayor and his daughter. On the street Harry hears the Mayor say that he has a toothache, and that he is going to the dentist. Jumping into his machine he leaves followed by Harry. Marjorie gets into a taxi, and leaves for home. Ilma, who heard the address, follows. The Mayor arrives at the dentist's and is seen by Perry, who is disguised as a woman. He looks vindictively after the Mayor, mutters something villainous and follows. Harry, who happened to be near, hears the vindictive muttering, and suspects that something is wrong. In the office the Mayor explains his trouble and the dentist starts to work. He is interrupted by his office girl, who brings him a note. It reads: "I want to see you this minute. Remember Sing-Sing. Signed, Bennet." Excusing himself, he goes into the next room, only to see Perry in his disguise of an old woman. Drawing the man close to him, Perry instructs him to do away with the Mayor. To refuse would mean exposure, so he consents. Ilma, who has followed the Mayor's daughter, manages to see her at her home. Explaining that the pearls were stolen from her and what it will cost her, if she does not recover them, Ilma gets Marjorie to agree that she will have her father return the pearl. Harry endeavors to warn the Mayor, but he refuses to listen to him, saying that he is too busy. That night the Mayor receives a note from Perry telling him that the District Attorney is dead, and the same fate is to fall to him. The Mayor promises to give Ilma and Harry the pearl if they solve this mystery. While Harry goes in pursuit of Mason, Ilma follows the Mayor to the dentist's office the next morning. While she is waiting, she sees a gunman enter and slip a note to the maid, instructing her to have it delivered to her employer. Reading the note, the dentist leaves, so excited that he leaves the note behind. Ilma picks it up, but it is written in code form. Wondering what it is, Ilma rushes to Harry. Harry reads the note, sees the word Algol, and guesses the answer. He speaks, "That means under the crown on the Mayor's tooth. Death in six hours." For safety's sake, the Mayor goes to his summer home in the Adirondacks. Harry and Ilma try to call him up on the 'phone, but are unsuccessful, because, as Ilma is about to explain, a dead tree falls across the wire and breaks the connection. They jump into a machine. Rushing up a mountain road, the machine breaks down. Walking up the mountain, Harry gazes over the edge of the ravine. He sees an electric wire. Running back to the machine, he gets a long rope and some hooks. Ilma ties the rope around her and much against Harry's wishes has him lower her. Ilma reaches the wire and sends a message to the Mayor. Ilma makes another flash, then receives a shock, twists convulsively and hangs limp. Episode 10: "The Hold-Up" Ilma, who has been rendered unconscious by an electric shock as she flashed a warning to the mayor and saved his life, is revived by Harry and carried to the railroad station by the mayor and his daughter, who agree that she deserves the pearl they have. Harry and Ilma return to the city with the pearl, and Harry attends a meeting of Grady's gang trying to recover some of the other pearls that the members have in their possession. He learns that one of the gang has sold his pearl to a fence, and a banker by the name of Nello Falenti is going to buy it. Ilma discovers the banker is trying to convince one of his honest bookkeepers that the accounts in the bank are all right, when he knows they are not. Harry forces the crooked banker into "a business proposition." Falenti agrees to have $100,000 in the bank by the following Saturday. He will take $80,000 of this for himself and leave $20,000 for Harry and Grady's gang. Harry secures the combination of the safe and the keys to the bank, and reports to Grady. The gangster plans the robbery. That night Harry again goes to Falenti and proposes that he take the entire $100,000 and split the $20,000. Falenti agrees, and when the gang opens the safe it is empty. After leaving the gangsters, Harry goes to Falenti to demand his $100,000. Falenti gives it to him and Harry buys the pearl that Falenti had secured from the "Fence." Ilma steps in and Harry gives the Pearl to her. She covers Falenti while Harry calls up the police, stating that he is the banker, and that he wants a guard to protect the money he had taken home from the bank. While Harry is talking, Ilma disappears and he goes in search of her. Episode 11: "Gems of Jeopardy" At Ilma's apartment, Perry demands the three pearls. She refuses. He draws his revolver and gives her three minutes to decide. Ilma faints. Perry binds her to a chair. Recovering, Ilma is again commanded to deliver the pearls. She shakes her head vigorously. He takes a jar from his pocket and a pair of jeweler's scales. Holding the jar he says: "This is vitriol." He places the scales so that the pan is above Ilma's head, then takes a candle, lights it and asks if she is ready. Ilma will not relent. "This may not kill you, but your beauty will be gone forever." Perry is interrupted by the entrance of Kismet, who covers Perry, then knocks the scales over. Perry meets Stokes, who informs him that he is wanted by the police. Stokes tells Perry unless he gives him a pearl he will call the police. Perry gives him a pearl. Ilma hears a knock and is overjoyed to see Harry. She tells him that Perry has two pearls. Ilma finds a note from Kismet, telling her Perry has surrendered one of the pearls to Stokes. That evening Ilma calls at the Stokes home, and poses as a detective. Harry, as an inspector, calls to read the meter. Examining the pearl, Ilma refuses to return it to Mrs. Stokes. Ilma pretends to throw it on the floor. Stokes starts toward her. Harry blows the fuse, putting the house in darkness. Stokes grapples with Ilma. Harry picks Ilma up and rushes out. She tells him the pearl is under the table. Harry goes back, runs his hand under the table, is seen by Stokes, who orders his servants to seize him. As Harry rushes up the stairs, he is seen by Perry. Harry gets through the skylight, sees a ladder lying against a chimney, mounts it. Perry sends one of the men after Harry. He gives the chimney a push, which sends the ladder toward the other roof. As the film fades out, the man is bending Harry over the edge. Episode 12: "Buried Alive" The fight on the edge of a roof opens this episode. Harry is struggling with one of Perry Mason's henchmen on the roof of the Stokes home, while Ilma watches from the street below. When Mason's henchman pushes Harry over the roof he manages to grasp a drainpipe, as with a final effort he pulls the man from his secure footing on the roof and sends him hurtling to his death five stories below. Harry pulls himself up to the roof, and to his dismay sees Perry come after him. He starts down the drainpipe, and when he is near the ground the pipe breaks and he falls. He picks himself up, and runs to Ilma's machine. As they drive away he gives her the pearl he had secured. Plotting against Ilma, Perry persuades Stayne to secure a job as an ambulance driver for a sanitarium. Ilma is down-hearted at the prospects of being unable to secure the pearls in time to save her father's life. She is warned by Kismet that the time is approaching when she will have to return to his master if he does not secure the pearls. Harry suggests that she go for an outing with him, and as they are about to start on an automobile trip she is told over the 'phone that one of the pearls can be secured at a certain place. She persuades Harry to drive to this place, and on the way, when they are passing through a lonely wood, all the tires on Harry's car are punctured. He is forced to leave Ilma alone, while he goes to secure other tires. Telephoning to his man, he finds Kismet at his apartment, who tells him to go back to Ilma at once as it is a plot of Mason's to get her in his power. Harry returns and finds that Ilma has been captured by Mason and Stayne, and has been taken to a sanitarium, instead of a girl for whom they have an order for commitment. Harry's man arrives in his car with Kismet and they start after Ilma. Ilma is sent to the sanitarium in spite of her protests to the physician in charge and is locked in a room. She manages to get out and sees the man attired as a mason and seemingly working at his trade. She runs up to him and asks him to assist her. He promises to do so and leads Ilma out of the sanitarium and tells her to crawl into a cave where he will conceal her from her pursuers. He conceals her only too well and tries to seal her in the cave and bury her alive as the episode closes. Episode 13: "Over the Falls" Ilma is being carried away helpless by Perry Mason and Stayne in an automobile. They take the girl to an old warehouse and leave her there a prisoner. Harry and Kismet, on the trail of Ilma, reach the warehouse and seek to enlist the aid of a policeman. The policeman says it is against the law for him to enter, but at that moment the fire alarm in the warehouse is heard and the policeman decides to enter and investigate. Ilma had set off the alarm by means of a lighted cigar which Stayne had dropped in his struggle with her. She held the burning end of the cigar against the automatic sprinkler, with which the warehouse was equipped. They rescue Ilma as Stayne and Mason watch them from a distance. Mason and Stayne arrive at their lodging and find there a distinguished Oriental, who presents credentials and orders from the Sultan telling Perry to deliver Ilma in Canada, where the Turk's yacht is waiting. The next morning Ilma finds a box marked "piano player" in her apartment when she returns from a walk. She calls Hairy on the phone and tells him about it and he warns her it must be some trick of Mason's, and to take good care of herself. As she hangs up the receiver the end of the box opens and Mason leaps out and captures Ilma. He binds her and gets into the box with her. A girl about Ilma's size, who had been in the box, dresses in Ilma's clothes and leaves the apartment. The men who left the piano player box in Ilma's apartment return for it and carry it away on a truck. Kismet and Harry go to Perry's old hiding place and find there some carrier pigeons. Harry says they will lead him to Perry and consequently to Ilma, and the next morning the pigeons are released and Harry and Kismet follow them in an aeroplane. The pigeons lead the men in the aeroplane to a little farmhouse near Niagara Falls. Perry and Stayne see the aeroplane as they shove the box in which Ilma is a prisoner on an auto truck. Harry and Kismet see Perry in the truck and follow it. Perry throws the box in which Ilma is a prisoner into the river above the falls and Harry and Kismet abandon their chase to rescue Ilma. They rush to a bridge across the river and Harry is lowered from it by a rope around his chest. He carrier another rope with him and manages to put the noose around the case. As the men on the bridge, whom Harry and Kismet enlisted in the rescue, attempt to pull up the case, the noose slips and the case falls back into the stream. Harry is pulled up to the bridge as the case starts over the falls to what looks like Ilma's certain destruction. Episode 14: "The Tower of Death" The fourteenth episode opens with a surprise for Harry when he is drawn to the bridge from over the rapids. He is greeted by Ilma, who, he thought, was in the piano box that went over Niagara Falls. She explains that when Perry Mason and his men threw the case into the river she managed to escape from it. Home again, Kismet warns Ilma and Harry that the next day is the last one set by the Sultan for the return of the pearls and that if she fails to secure the entire seven pearls she must go into the Sultan's harem. They hear that Jeo. Gudgeon, a member of Grady's gang, has the seventh pearl and is offering it to the highest bidder. After many adventures Ilma obtains it, and hands it to Harry for safekeeping. He returns it to her as he does not want to be responsible for it. Perry and Stayne attack Ilma and Harry and secure the pearl. In the fight Harry is knocked unconscious and Ilma pretends to be senseless, but when Perry and Stayne start away she follows after them. Perry and Stayne discover her and corner her near a big tank. To escape them she climbs up the ladder of the tank and Stayne follows. He is about to capture her when she pushes him from the ladder. In the effort she loses her balance and falls into the tank. She lies unconscious at the bottom of the tank, which has only a few inches of water in it. Stayne wants to rescue Ilma so that Perry will be able to get the Sultan's reward, but Perry wants to leave her to her fate. Their difference of opinion results in a fight and Perry throws Stayne under a locomotive engine passing on the tracks near which they are struggling. Harry regains consciousness and seeing the tank climbs up its ladder to get a drink of water. Perry sees him and is about to shoot him when Stayne, who has been badly injured, opens his eyes and seeing the situation, shoots at Perry to obtain revenge on him. Stayne's shot goes wild and dislodges the tank. It falls to pieces and Harry falls to the ground. Perry is knocked unconscious but Ilma is not to be seen. Episode 15: "The Seventh Pearl" The preceding episode closed at the water tank near the railroad tracks. When this tank fell, Perry Mason and Harry Drake were unconscious. The water revives Perry, who finds that Ilma has been thrown from the water tank close to Harry and that both are unconscious. He draws his revolver to shoot Harry but the gun fails to explode as all the cartridges had been used. He looks in his pockets for more cartridges and finds the seventh pearl, which he had secured. Hearing some men approaching he jumps on a passing freight train. Harry revives and carries Ilma to the station, where she is revived. They then board the train for the city. Perry goes to Ilma's apartment and is searching for the pearls when Harry and Ilma enter. Ilma tells Harry that the six pearls she has secured are in the Security Safety Vaults. Perry overhears this and leaves Ilma's apartment without being discovered. He goes to the Security Vaults and rents a safety deposit box. In this Perry places a package containing chemicals, which he has prepared, sets a clock, which controls these chemicals, and locking the safety deposit box, leaves the vault. The Sultan's Ambassador calls on Ilma for the seven pearls and reminds her that it is the last day she has to secure them. Ilma pleads with him and tells him she will give him the six pearls she has secured if he will cable to the Sultan for a few hours' extension of the time she has to secure the seventh. He agrees to do so. They go to the Security Safety Vault to get the pearls. Perry has been there before and had secured the pearls from the safety deposit box where Ilma had placed them. The chemicals Perry had placed in his safety deposit box gave off a gas that rendered the guards senseless, and Perry, wearing a gas mask, had been immune to this vapor. He is escaping with the pearls when Ilma, Harry and the ambassador enter; they are overcome by the gas when they attempt to capture Perry. A general alarm is sent out and Harry learns that Perry was seen at Coney Island. He and ILma and the police go to that resort and hear that Perry has been seen near the Eden Musee, which contains the wax figure of himself in the act of murdering his brother Charles. Ilma spies Perry and follows him into the Eden Musee. She loses track of him and Harry and the police tell her she must have been mistaken. As they leave the building, they hear a shot fired and return to find Kismet with a bullet hole through his head and Perry with the executioner's dagger through his heart. Kismet had discovered Perry in the act of gloating over the seven pearls he had obtained after he had thrown Harry, Ilma and the police off the scent by taking the place of his own wax figure in the murder group. Kismet had demanded one of the seven pearls, saying it belonged to his people, and Perry could have the others if he gave up that one. Perry refused, and in the fight that followed both men were killed. Ilma finds the seven pearls and returns them to the Sultan's ambassador. In Harry's apartment after the wedding, Ilma is dressed in a Turkish costume. Harry enters. She puts a Turkish fez on his head and he sits beside her. Turning to him she says, "My Harry," and he answers, "My Harem." END.

Dir: Louis J. Gasnier

Episode 1: "The Treasure Trove" Stephen Walcott favors the suit of Sebastian Navarro, a Spaniard, for his daughter Leontine's hand, foreseeing in the marriage a prop to strengthen his tottering fortunes. Leontine is deeply in love with Jerry Carson, a penniless young writer who has taken passage on her father's ship. The ship burns at sea and all are reported lost save the captain and a seaman. Jerry, however, has managed to swim ashore, where he finds in a bottle a manuscript written by a shipwrecked scientist, Matthewson, which gives the location on an island of a buried fortune. Matthewson also writes of some black pellets he has manufactured which will give the finder "power beyond the dreams of all men." Sebastian, thinking Jerry dead, tries to hasten his own marriage by having One Lamp Louie forge a paper which casts a blot on Jerry's memory. Jerry, after many hardships, arrives shortly after the paper is shown to Leontine and her father, and tries to secure it from Diego, Sebastian's brother. During the struggle Diego falls and is killed, his head hitting a heavy desk ornament. The only witness is One Lamp Louie, who sees it through a window. When Jerry is found bending over Diego, he is arrested on a charge of murder, Louie keeping silent, fearing he will be implicated also.

Dir: Edgar Jones

A mail-order bride arrives at a Maine lumber camp but doesn't like her prospective husband.

Dir: Bruno Ziener

A fascinating piece of cinema that shares thematic elements.

Dir: Louis J. Gasnier

Hazel Kirke, daughter of Dunstan Kirke, a miller, is sent off to be educated by Squire Rooney, who has promised to marry her upon her return. All this in repayment for a small sum which Rodney advanced to save the old mill from the auction block. Five years later, near the end of her school years, she meets Arthur Carringford. At home again, she renews her promise to Rodney. Some days later, Arthur on a hunting trip, meets with an accident near the mill, and is confined there for some weeks, during which time a new friendship springs up between the two. Some time later, when Rodney and Dunstan see Hazel and Arthur embracing, Dunstan denounces them and sends them away. Arthur's mother, to save the family fortune, wishes Arthur to marry Maude, her ward, who is loved by Pittacus Greene, and whose fortune was squandered by the elder Carringford before his death. She sends Pittacus and Arthur's valet to dissuade Arthur from marrying Hazel, and they arrive as the two are coming away. At a nearby village, the valet, thinking the ceremony is to be a fake, goes to a saloon for a "minister." He then notifies Mrs. Carringford by letter. A few weeks later that lady arrives during Arthur's absence and tells Hazel that she has been duped. The girl, distracted, runs away and upon Arthur's return the panic-stricken mother tells of the plot and passes away from a heart attack. After a day or two's search for Hazel, Arthur rides toward home, stopping at a small church. The parson proves to be the one who married them and he tells of his good work in the slums of nearby towns disguised as a "tough." The two ride off to the mill hoping to meet Hazel. Unknown to the young people, Dunstan's terrible denunciation of them has left him sightless and it is before Hazel's blinded father that the two are reunited with parental blessing, only after Arthur has rescued Hazel from the icy millpond waters into which she had thrown herself.

Dir: Louis J. Gasnier

A newspaperwoman finds trouble aplenty when an Inca tribe believes her to be the reincarnation of their long-lost princess.

Dir: Louis J. Gasnier

Episode 1: "The Serpent Sign" Miss Elaine Dodge, daughter and heiress of the late Taylor Dodge, whose murder has attracted such world-wide attention, has again had her life seriously threatened. It appears that before the death of Perry Bennett, this modern Dr. Jekyll disclosed the hiding-place of his tremendous fortune to one Long Sin, a Chinese adventurer. Bennett formerly owned the house now occupied by Miss Dodge's Aunt Tabby. On a recent visit to her aunt, Miss Dodge was startled in the early hours of the morning by strange noises. Her aunt had already been aware of this condition, but being superstitious, had put it down to ghosts. Miss Dodge, whose life has lately been one continuous round of self-defense, immediately communicated with Craig Kennedy, the scientific detective whose apprehension of the notorious Clutching Hand caused such favorable comment throughout the land. Kennedy has lately come into the possession of Bennett's papers and his keen eye detected at once the similarity of a plan on one of these and the construction of Aunt Tabby's fireplace. A secret passageway was disclosed, through which the redoubtable sleuth and his assistant descended, only to be overcome by gas, and almost murdered by Long Sin, who had entered the passage from the mouth of a cave in an adjoining woods. Miss Dodge, whose nerve has been put to the test in a hundred cases, alarmed by the fumes, and fearing for the lives of her protectors, descended to the passageway where a queer sight met her eyes. Interviewed to-day by a Journal reporter, Miss Dodge said: "1 had no sooner turned an angle in the passageway when I was almost paralyzed by the sight of Long Sin bending over Craig and Mr. Jameson with a long, murderous knife. A safe embedded in the rock had been opened, and the Chinaman had a small strongbox under his arm. Strength born of love then possessed me, and I closed with the heathen in a struggle that lasted for some minutes. Then I felt my strength desert me; the earth seemed to cave in and crumble all around me and [paper will here appear to have been torn.] Episode 2: "The Cryptic Ring" Elaine becomes the innocent purchaser of a cryptic ring stolen from Wu Fang, for the possession of which this desperate heathen will commit murder many times over. The ring is the key to the hidden millions of the late Perry Bennett, alias Clutching Hand, whose sudden death has left the whereabouts of his tremendous fortune a mystery. Wu Fang seeing the ring on Elaine's finger, decides she is the thief, and in an attempt to recover it, lures her to his rooms, where, but for the timely arrival of her lover and protector, Craig Kennedy, she would have met a horrible death. To make good his escape, Wu Fang has to walk a tight-rope over the yawning chasm between two city skyscrapers, and once over, severs the cable on which Kennedy, hand over hand, is following. However, Kennedy is spared to us for many another hair-raising episode, and Elaine, still ignorant of its value, holds the mysterious cryptic ring. Episode 3: "The Watching Eye" In Wu Fang and Long Sin, Craig Kennedy seems to have found an opposition worthy of his tempered metal. With Blaine kidnapped, and no clue to work on but a meaningless cryptic ring, the great scientific detective feels the necessity for his most concentrated thought. Aunt Josephine is the recipient of a huge vase, at the bottom of which Kennedy finds a note from Elaine, saying that she is as yet unharmed, and instructing him, if he would save her, to deliver the cryptic ring that night in an appointed place. Kennedy forges a ring the counterpart of the original, hoping thereby to trick the crafty Chinamen, but out from the side of the gigantic vase peers the crafty eye of the artful heathen, and unknown to him, Kennedy's plans are blighted in the making. Events then follow quickly. Kennedy in trying to double-cross the Tongs, is himself checkmated, and barely escapes with his life when he goes to barter the fake ring for Elaine. The ring, however, proves the "Open Sesame" to the underground treasure vault of the late Clutching Hand, although a small comfort in consideration of Elaine's probable fate. Episode 4: "The Vengeance of Wu Fang" With Elaine in his power, Wu Fang decides on a vengeance more fiendish than he had ever before contemplated. He releases Elaine, telling her that her ultimate punishment will be more frightful than any bodily injury he can now enact. Slowly, and one by one, he tells her, her dearest friends will die, while she will live on in dread apprehension of a fate that will ultimately overtake her. He then places an African Tick, an insect, whose bite means certain death by a lingering fever, in the 'phone receiver in Kennedy's laboratory. Two fake calls are enough to infect both Jameson and Kennedy, and the malignant fever is working in their blood. A specialist is called in who recognizes the symptoms, and prepares the only drug known to counteract this fatal fever. Wu Fang, seeing that he is about to be foiled, intercepts the specialist's message for a nurse, and sends instead a woman of the underworld to carry out his design. This is to infect whatever instruments the doctors are going to use on Kennedy and Jameson, with a virulent poison. His second failure he must needs credit to Elaine, who, arriving at Kennedy's apartment, and seeing Weepy Mary in the guise of a nurse, immediately denounces her to the company as a notorious criminal. Weepy Mary makes her escape in the excitement, and Elaine is installed as nurse of the men to whom she owes her life many times over. Episode 5: "The Saving Circles" A new ally of Wu Fang, the serpent, is an aviator in his plane circling ominously above Craig Kennedy's house. Balanced in the reckless flyer's palm is a bomb of Trodite, the new super-force in explosives. The bird-man looks for a painted circle as the prearranged target for his agent of destruction. He sees it. Straight to the mark goes the infernal death dealer. A startling white flash, a million splinters, an unrecognizable body, and far off on the horizon the fast fading outline of the modern bird of prey. Tense, expectant, shocked, but ultimately triumphant, the detective who harnesses Science in his pursuit of Crime stands watching at the window of his laboratory. He knew about the aeroplane; he knew that the Government had been robbed of the ultra powerful Trodite; he knew of the large white circle that was to mark his house as the object of attack. He knew also that directly across the court one of Wu Fang's henchmen was spying upon him. That's why, in the dead of night, he and his assistant Jameson ascended to the roof where they scrubbed out the fateful circle. That's why they ever so quietly ascended to the roof of the house directly across the court and painted thereon a large white circle the counterpart of the one recently scrubbed off, and that's why, when the detonation came, the fragments of what was once a Chinaman mixed with the fragments of what was once a house, and left Craig Kennedy shaken, but sound. Did you ever see an aeroplane high in the heavens get hit with a steel jacketed shell projected from an armored automobile? Did you ever see a death duel between a terror of the skies and a gun constructed especially to bring it down? Here you see the aeroplane get hit, shiver as though in startled hesitation, make a final desperate struggle to keep afloat, and finally descend in circles, fluttering helpless, like a wounded bird, to the ground. These are some of the awe-inspiring incidents to be seen in this episode. Episode 6: "Spontaneous Combustion" His constant failure to accomplish the death of both Elaine and her protector, Craig Kennedy, makes Wu Fang only the more persistent. Money means nothing to him. His enormous wealth enables him to carry out the most elaborate plans for the death of the hated detective and his fair-haired sweetheart. His followers know no word other than their masters, and his Oriental craftiness enables him to keep well out of the law's reach. He secures a corrupt young girl to help him carry out a plot as fiendish as it is intricate. A fake attack on the girl in front of Elaine's window is excuse for the girl's sad story, which so touches Elaine and her aunt that they take her into their service. Acting on the chemical principle of spontaneous combustion, Wu Fang rigs up a trick chair to hold fast whoever sits in it, and eventually burn its occupant to death. This chair is shipped to the Dodge home, where the new maid receives it and has it put up in the garret, knowing that Elaine will go there shortly to make a selection of her dresses for a charity gift. Meanwhile, Kennedy learns of the joint in which Wu Fang hides himself from the outer world, and disguised as a heathen goes there to smoke a pipe. How he is tricked by the cunning Wu Fang, how he learns of Elaine's imminent peril, how he manages to outwit the crafty Celestial, and rescue Elaine from the most frightful death, is all so graphically pictured on the screen that a word description fails utterly in its purpose. Episode 7: "The Ear in the Wall" Wu Fang, the Chinese master criminal, knows the charm of Elaine, and knows also the danger of her ready wit. He sends her a box of roses, half white and half red, with a fiendish note attached giving her a choice as to who shall die first, Craig Kennedy, or her Aunt Josephine. Elaine is terror-stricken, but Kennedy, all unknown to her, flashes the red roses in the window, as the signal that they have chosen his life as the first to be attempted. The signal is noted and the deadly machinery of Wu Fang set in motion. Kennedy prepares for what he knows will be an ingenious attack. He sprays his hall-mat directly outside his door with a fluid that will photograph whosoever's foot steps on it. Wu Fang, by means of a method of wiring, connects a detectaphone between Kennedy's room and the cellar, where, with bis henchmen, he hears Kennedy's 'phone instructions to police headquarters, ordering a raid on Long Sin and Innocent Inez, the demi-monde. Wu Fang communicates with Long Sin in time to forestall the police, who, when they arrive, find an empty apartment. Kennedy knows that his instructions must have been overheard, so, using a galvaniscope he detects the wiring in the hall, and knows that Wu Fang is listening at the other end of the wire, somewhere nearby. The super-grip of this episode is in how he tricks the wily Oriental at his own game. It's too good to give away in the synopsis. Episode 8: "The Opium Smugglers" Wu Fang, the serpent, kidnaps Elaine's chauffeur, and substitutes in his place one of his henchmen. Craig Kennedy, disguised, searching Chinatown for a trace of Wu Fang, is met by Capt. Brainerd, of the U.S. Secret Service. Brainerd is trying to locate a band of opium smugglers who are going to "pull off a trick" that night. Kennedy points out a passing Chinaman who he knows keeps an opium joint. Together they track him to a dingy apartment, where they find and overpower three Chinamen receiving messages via carrier pigeons from the captain of a tramp sloop. They learn where the sloop is lying, and start out in a revenue cutter to apprehend it. Meanwhile, Wu Fang, through his underling the chauffeur, kidnaps Elaine, whom he intends to slip abroad the smuggler's sloop for shipment to Shanghai, where she is to be sold. The opium is unloaded, and Elaine carried to the ship. Kennedy, Brainerd, and Jameson, after a sharp fight, capture the Chinamen guarding the opium and load the stuff into their boat, before starting to run down the smuggler's ship. Elaine, aboard ship, uses the wireless telephone Kennedy has provided her with, and apprises him of her predicament. She flashes a lantern from the porthole, and Kennedy's boat makes for it. She flees from the Oriental set to guard her and climbs a rope ladder to the dizzy height of the topmast. He follows, a knife in his teeth. She makes a startling leap into the dark waters and he after her. It is a race for life in the fathomless ocean, with the Chinaman gaining at every stroke. He overtakes her and is about to strike when a shot from the racing revenue cutter kills him. Elaine is rescued, and the smuggler's ship captured. Episode 9: "The Tell-Tale Heart" Jameson, Kennedy's assistant, follows Innocent Inez, one of Wu Fang's confederates, to her apartment where he attempts to question her. She touches a knob in the table carvings and an iron bar swings out from the wall behind Jameson and knocks him unconscious. Inez then sends a gypsy confederate to tell Elaine's fortune, and to incidentally bind Elaine's eyes with a handkerchief holding in its seam a vial containing a spark of radium. Inez has been instructed by Wu Fang that the proximity of the radium to Elaine's eyes for three minutes will be sufficient to blind her. Kennedy, informed previously by 'phone of Jameson's destination, follows him and when he arrives is assaulted in the same way as was his assistant. Jameson's glove on the floor attracts his attention and he stoops to pick it up just as the murderous bar swings out from the wall to strike him. Inez is overpowered and Jameson is found. A 'phone message to Inez from Wu Fang reveals Elaine's peril, and Kennedy and Jameson arrive at the Dodge home. They are relieved to discover that Elaine, in binding her eyes, substituted her own handkerchief for the one furnished by the gypsy. Inez is taken to Kennedy's laboratory, where the sphygmograph is applied while Kennedy repeats certain house numbers in the Chinatown district. Wu Fang is known to live in that vicinity and Kennedy realizes that when his house number is repeated, it will cause a quicker pulsation of Inez's blood. Wu Fang, knowing of Inez's predicament, makes a sensational rescue, but Kennedy "has his number," and the next episode promises thrilling situations. Episode 10: "Shadows of War" Wu Fang is approached by secret agents who commission him to secure at any price the model torpedo invented by Craig Kennedy, and in the possession of the United States Government. Wu Fang sets his machinery in motion and awaits results. In the meantime Kennedy, apprised by his agents of Wu Fang's hiding place, goes there with Jameson and by a piece of remarkable strategy, succeeds in capturing him. Wu Fang is wounded and taken to a hospital, where he manages to substitute another Oriental in his place and makes his escape. He meets his henchman coming in from Washington with the stolen torpedo model. The only other model in existence is one in Kennedy's possession, Kennedy is demonstrating its use in a fountain in the Dodge Conservatory. A momentary distraction gives Wu Fang's lieutenant opportunity to steal this model. He starts away with it, but is seen by the butler, who gives chase. Seeing he is likely to be apprehended, he quickly hides the torpedo model in a large flower-pot, and escapes, wounded to a waiting automobile. Kennedy commandeers another car, and follows. In the enthralling game of wits that follows Wu Fang is killed and the whereabouts of Kennedy becomes a matter of serious conjecture. END

Dir: Alexander Butler

In Alberta, Canada, a Cornish emigrant unmasks a rustler posing as the girl's "blind" father.

Dir: Maurice Elvey

A lady marries a horse trainer but withholds herself until her crippled brother is cured.