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Zudora Synopsis

Episode 1: "The Mystic Message of the Spotted Collar" Zudora, 18, has a guardian, Hassam Ali, a disciple of Hindu mysticism. Hassam Ali was a fakir with a small caravan circus. Zudora's mother was his sister and the rope walker. Zudora's father remained in a small mining town where he prospected for gold. As the story opens Zudora, her mother and Hassam Ali, her uncle, are visiting the town of Zudora's birth and where Zudora's father is still prospecting. Zudora's father finds that the Zudora mine yields a wonderful run of gold. He becomes over-zealous and is killed in an explosion. He wills the entire mine, which is valued at $20,000,000, to Zudora, when she reaches her eighteenth birthday, and in the event of Zudora's death, going to the nearest heir-at-law. Zudora's mother receives information of her husband's death when she is about to ascend the rope and give her performance. She falls to the ground, and with a dying gasp turns over to Hassam Ali the guardianship of Zudora. Zudora reaches her eighteenth year. Hassam Ali has set himself up as a mystic, but his one purpose in life is to rid himself of Zudora, so that the mine will be his. He is also anxious to rid himself of John Storm, Zudora's sweetheart. He has kept from Zudora the information about her inheritance. He at last arrives at one plan that seems safe. Zudora has evidenced quite wonderful powers of deduction. He tells her that since she has always been so anxious to incorporate herself in his work, he will give her the next twenty cases he is called upon to solve. He says: "If you win, you may marry John Storm. If you lose on any one of them, you renounce him forever." Zudora's sweetheart is involved in a great case for the city. Opposed to him is one Bienreith, a prominent lawyer. The case is going well for John Storm. Hassam Ali decides that after eighteen years of waiting it is time to use heroic measures. He denounces Storm in front of Zudora, and then tells her about the twenty cases. The very first thing in the courtroom, Storm slaps the face of Bienreith, after a particularly insulting speech, and is invited to a duel that night. An hour later the newspapers are full of her sweetheart's trouble. Zudora rushes to his side and finds him practicing with a revolver. She plans to keep him from meeting Bienreith. She purchases a drug, and drops it in a glass of drinking water. Next morning the papers tell of Storm's disappearance. The great mystery of it is that Bienreith has been found dead in his room and the blame placed upon John Storm. Storm is arrested. Zudora rushes to her uncle and begs that this be her first case. When she goes to Bienreith's home that morning she finds the collar that he had worn when killed. It has queer markings on it. She studies the lines carefully, but can make no headway. Storm is formally charged with the murder. She reaches the courtroom just in time to say, "Stop, he is not guilty...," and falls into a faint. Hassam Ali and Burns, a confederate, watch as the girl recovers and explains that she has solved the mystery. Burns is placing a revolver, equipped with a silencer against her neck, when she turns suddenly and takes a pencil from his pocket to prove her contention to the court. She realizes, in looking at the mark, that there is a similarity between the markings of Burns' pencil and the markings on the collar. Court is adjourned. Zudora induces Burns to accompany her home. Under hypnosis he confesses to killing Bienreith. Zudora had placed two lawyers behind the curtains and they hear the confession. Zudora has solved her first case and Hassam Ali congratulates her. In the courtroom Zudora clasps Storm in her arms as the judge proclaims him free.

The Deemster Synopsis

Daniel Mylrea is the son of the Bishop of Man, the baron of the Isle of Man, whose temporal power is higher even than that of the Deemster, or governor. The Bishop desires Dan to become a minister, but he prefers to be a fisherman. The Deemster of Man has a son and a daughter, Mona and Ewan. Dan and Mona are in love. She consents to marry him when he can obtain her father's consent. Ewan, her brother, decides to become a clergyman, even in the face of his father's insistence that he take up business as a vocation. The Deemster opposes Dan's suit for Mona's hand because he has fallen from his high estate as the son of the Bishop by becoming a fisherman. His dislike turns to open hatred when Dan endeavors to borrow money from Ewan, whom he thought his friend, to pay off the crew of his boat. Dan had squandered his earnings of the season in drink. Ewan refuses Dan the loan, who makes him a bitter enemy by knocking him down on his taunt that spending money in drink is as bad as theft. Dan is now opposed in his love for Mona by both her father and brother. The Deemster forbids Dan to come to his house to visit her. Despite this, he sees her at night. Though this meeting is innocent in intent, the Deemster uses it to inflame the mind of Ewan against Dan, whom he supposes has dishonored his sister. Arming himself with a knife, Ewan seeks Dan and comes upon him at his cabin while he is mending his nets. They quarrel and Ewan falls backward over a cliff and is killed. Dan's crew of fishermen throw the body into the sea, hoping to hide his death, but the tide sweeps it ashore. It is discovered and suspicion of murder falls on Dan. He is arrested by the Deemster's constables and committed to jail, where he is visited at night by his father, the Bishop, who gives him an opportunity to escape. Dan refuses to go, feeling that he must atone for Ewan's death. Dan is tried on Tynwald Hill, the ancient law mount. The Deemster insists that the Bishop shall exercise his legal prerogative as the highest civil power on the isle and sit at this trial. He aims to force the Bishop to sentence his own son on the gallows. Dan is convicted. The Deemster insists on the death sentence being passed by the Bishop, who, instead of condemning Dan to be hanged, decrees that his son shall be cut off from the people, no tongue to speak to him, no hand to touch him, and. in death, no hand to bury him. Dan is driven away, and for seven years lives alone in a hut by the sea. Then a plague strikes the people of Man. The Bishop has learned of a monk in Ireland who has discovered an antidote for the pestilence and sends for him. The monk comes to the isle on a vessel which is wrecked on the shore near Dan's desolate hut. He dies in Dan's arms, who then dons the monk's garb and carries the antidote to the people, as he had been commanded by the dying cleric. When there is but one powder of the antidote left Dan learns that the Deemster is a victim of the plague. When he faces his enemy to minister to him. he finds himself stricken. Either he or the Deemster must die. Revealing himself to the Deemster he chooses to die himself, hopeless under his father's irrevocable sentence to a living death. Giving the Deemster the healing powder he staggers away to his hut. There he is followed by Mona and dies in her arms.