Broadway's My Beat, from Times Square to Columbus Circle.
The gaudiest, the most violent, the lonesomest mile in the world.
Broadway's My Beat, with Larry Thor as Detective Danny Clover.
Broadway, it's the marketplace for the vendors of laughter and agony, of terror and decay.
Their shadows stand by the shadows of gilded pushcards piled high with the remnants of dreams, the remnants of desires.
They'll bargain with you, these vendors.
The dreams were dreamed on the edge of night, and the desires, special, very special.
And you buy because there's nothing else to buy.
It's Broadway, My Beat.
At one o'clock in the morning, the tunnel that leads you from Grand Central to the Times Square shuttle is deserted and bleak and almost clean.
You notice these things because the tiled walls, dirtied with a film of yellow light, stretch out in front of you.
And somewhere ahead of you seem to close in on themselves.
Suddenly the sickness is inside you, the feeling that there's no exit, no exit anywhere.
You hurry against it.
And you see the back of a man that looks familiar, and you call out to him, even if the man is Joe Keto.
Joe?
Joe Keto.
Huh?
I thought it was you, Joe.
Back with us, huh?
Yeah, I'm back, but not with you, policeman.
I'm back alone by myself, free and easy.
You're gonna keep it that way, Joe?
If you keep out of my way, policeman, I'll be good boy.
If you spread your lousy wings over me like a mother hen, I don't know what I do.
Something ugly, maybe.
The loose mouth, Joe. Watch it.
For 12 years I've been watching it, for 12 dirty rotten years.
Now I'm free and easy like you, policeman. My mouth talks how it likes.
You weren't happy and sing-sing, huh, Joe? You should have been.
I hear they treated you real polite, like maybe you were worth treating that way.
You know what it takes, you polite...
You just got out, Joe. Don't make it too hard on yourself.
Hot?
Don't make me laugh on my belly, policeman.
It's not gonna be hard for Joe no more.
No more hard for Joe Kito.
Oh, you got plans, Joe?
Big, smooth plans like silk.
That's how it's going to be.
Silk so deep I could swim in it, maybe even drown.
Good way to die, huh, policeman?
Yeah, yeah, it's good when you can pick your own way.
Joe Kito don't have to pick. It's all there waiting for him.
Silk.
Does it make you jealous, policeman, poor little policeman?
You know something, Joe, I don't care.
One way or the other, I don't care, honest.
That's good, because you're not built for it.
Some people they build that way like me. Others, the others like you.
Which way you go, policeman?
You really care, Joe?
Sure, sure I care.
Because whichever way you go, I go the other way.
Till tomorrow, policeman.
But don't look around for me. Tomorrow might not come.
Like silk, can't you?
What?
Please, please, help, somebody help!
What's the matter, lady?
There, over there, around that corner in the dark.
Two men, one pulled a diamond.
He's got them over and over and right away.
Joe, Joe.
Silk, just waiting for me, for Joe Kito.
Then the world folded in on Joe Kito.
It broke step and veered into his direction and considered Joe Kito and his dying in a subway tunnel.
The police came and observed him, photographed him, catalogued him.
A man in a Homburg stared.
A man in disintegrating clothing hurried by without pausing.
A woman stood on the fringes of the little crowd and bit a knuckle.
Finally two interns carried him away with a stretcher and intern-type jokes.
I went home.
The next morning I called headquarters, got the late Joe Kito's address.
Amsterdam Avenue in Harlem.
The morning sun never quite makes it in Harlem.
The shadows are glued there and that makes it tough.
And if you stand on its corner, stand there and tune yourself to it, you might feel it.
The start of a new day in Harlem is the start of a panic.
I had the key to Joe's room from his effects.
I inserted it, turned it, opened the door.
Joe, is that you Joe?
I'm making coffee honey.
What's the matter honey, you tired?
Who are you?
I'm sorry, I thought Joe lived here alone.
He lives here alone. Who are you?
I'm a policeman.
That's been tried on me before, show me.
All right. Here.
My name's Danny Clover.
So my name's Holly Parker, so we both met someone new.
You're a sloth, huh? Plainclothes detective.
You like making a living that way?
You're a bitter, bitter girl Holly.
I react to people by laughing at them. I got taught that.
Did you laugh at Joe?
What do you mean did I? What's the matter with Joe?
What are you doing here Holly?
We've got an arrangement. I make coffee for Joe.
It's been going on for two days.
I come down from my room upstairs and make him coffee.
Thanks for not smiling, it's the truth.
It's over.
Joe did that again?
He said he wouldn't.
Last night when he went out he told me he wouldn't have to do anything.
Nothing good or bad for a long time.
Where'd he go?
Oh, so you're looking for Joe.
You don't know where he is and you want me to help you find him.
It's not that...
Write down in your book Holly Parker.
Then write down she doesn't know.
We know. Joe's dead. He was murdered Holly.
You better sit down.
No, I'm all right.
Go ahead Holly.
Not Holly.
Once when I was twelve a thing happened to me and I ran out of tears.
Who killed him?
He had a burden but I don't know who killed him.
Tell me about it.
In that chair by the window.
In that newspaper on the floor.
He sat there and stared at that newspaper.
Oh. This one? The Times?
It's pretty old.
January 27, 1938.
What's in it that makes it a burden?
You tell me. Joe wouldn't.
Joe was in trouble once. You know that.
I know. He told me.
He told me about a twelve sentence he got about a lawyer who said he'd only get one year.
The lawyer said that, huh? What lawyer?
Joe said his name once and broke a beer bottle against the table.
Joe said Ralph Ferguson.
I've heard the name.
Maybe Joe wanted to kill this Ralph Ferguson. I don't know.
Maybe he did.
Do you think things could have gotten themselves reversed?
Things could have.
I told Holly Parker to drink her coffee then go back upstairs and stay there.
Then I phoned the law offices of Ralph Ferguson.
He was not in, a happy young voice told me.
He was taking his three hour break, it said, at the East River Athletic Club.
I went there.
I went there and a man in biceps and white linen shorts led me through a door
and along the tiled apron of a swimming pool.
Shuttled me through another door and through the gallery overlooking the handball courts.
Then whisked me through the area where the members felt they should do their rowing indoors.
Through another door and pointed out Ralph Ferguson.
Ralph Ferguson, a rosy fat man, a man of the heart.
A rosy fat man on a table getting some of the fat pounded off him.
Take it easy, Mickey. Take it easy.
Ralph Ferguson?
Your name, Ralph Ferguson?
Later, pal, later. This is the part Mr. Ferguson likes best.
Look.
Now?
Look, you can't have Mickey till I'm done with him. Go ahead, Mickey.
Yes, sir, Mr. Ferguson.
I'm from the police, Mr. Ferguson. Danny Clover.
Come on, take your head out from under that towel and peek. See? Danny Clover.
Sure, go ahead, Mickey, only not too much noise.
I've got my business, I understand.
Sure, I know. I just dropped by to tell you a thing.
Joe Keto's been murdered.
I read it. Tough.
You kill him?
Turn over, Mr. Ferguson.
You kill him, Ferguson?
You're kidding, Danny.
No, I'm not. You were his lawyer. You promised him a one-year wrap. He got 12.
You and Joe fight?
Let me tell you about it, Danny.
Joe and a guy named Grant Murray and a guy named Lee Baker. Three of them.
Three of them.
They heisted a car 12 years ago. They pleaded noly contendere.
The judge was in a bad humor. Gave him 12 years.
That was January 27, 1938, wasn't it?
You've got a good memory.
Not so good. I read it in the newspaper.
The late edition of the Times for that date.
I found it in Joe's room.
Mr. Ferguson likes this, too.
Yeah, he isn't going to like this. Look, Ferguson, sit up.
Sit up and talk to me.
It's better.
What about Joe Keto? What about those three boys?
Dregs. That's what about them.
Gutter dregs.
They didn't have the guts to look over the top of the kerbstone.
Little gutter people.
I lost their case and society put them away for 12 years.
Society owes me a thank you.
What else?
Nothing else.
Go take a cold shower, Danny.
It'll cool you off.
Put the towel and soap on my tab.
I thanked lawyer Ferguson, exercised great self-restraint
in not helping Mickey slap some more fat off his fat mouth
and got out.
I called the headquarters, gave me Grant Murray's address.
It was in a place I was getting to know, in Harlem.
In a rotting, clock-marked cold-water tenement in Harlem,
up a flight of stairs where rats had gnawed at the decaying wood,
in Harlem.
And to a door, its paint peeling and scarred as if fingers had clawed at it
to get in or out.
Come on in.
There ain't no lock on that door.
Like the guy who was in the basement,
then we can see each other.
There's some matches over there on the table.
That's better.
That's lots better.
Been trying to do that myself for two hours, maybe.
But I couldn't make it.
Ain't it funny?
Man wants a little light in his room
and ain't got the strength to pick up a light.
Ain't got the strength to pick up a little old match.
What's the matter with you, Grant?
You know my name?
That must make you the rent collector.
Well, I got news for you, rent collector.
I ain't got it.
And you ain't ever gonna get it, not from me.
Now what you gonna do, rent collector?
Throw me out?
Grant.
Stay away from me, rent collector.
Just stay away, that's all.
Grant, I'm Danny Clover of the police.
You're sick?
Sick?
Yeah, I'm sick, mister.
But it's the last sickness I'm ever gonna have.
I've been trying to get to that door to call you, Mr. Police,
but I just haven't got the strength.
What are you talking about?
I'm talking about how a man came in here and took care of me.
Good.
So I could never open my mouth again.
He stuck a knife in me.
That's what that man did right here.
See it, Mr. Police?
Grant, Grant.
I'm awful glad you came, Mr. Police.
Mr.
His body twisted off the iron cotton he sat on.
Then he shuddered and lay still.
And the thing that fell from his hands and covered his wound
like a shroud was a blood-stained newspaper.
I picked it up.
It said the New York Times.
The headline said, Japanese Stalled by Chinese Troops.
The dateline said, January 27, 1938.
You are listening to Broadway's My Beat,
written by Morton Fine and David Friedkin,
and starring Larry Thor as Detective Danny Clover.
That redheaded circus, Arthur Godfrey,
is now on hand to entertain you Saturday nights on CBS.
Godfrey puts together the cream of the jest
from his daytime shows on CBS,
mixes in the best songs of Bill Lawrence,
Jeanette Davis, and the Mariners,
and turns out a top half hour of Saturday night fun.
Listen to the Arthur Godfrey Digest this Saturday night
on most of these same CBS stations.
Broadway is a street dedicated to the proposition
that dead men have stories to tell.
A person becomes suddenly famous when he becomes suddenly dead.
Broadway grins, makes clucking noises,
and wants to know all about this suddenly famous person.
Right now it had a double feature to get gay about.
A man named Joe Keto, murdered.
A man named Grant Murray, murdered.
At headquarters, Sergeant Gino Tartaglia thought about it,
gave it expert consideration, and thereby coined a phrase.
They're dropping like flies, Danny.
That impresses you that way, huh?
Yeah. And you know, you would have nothing to worry about
if you was just Frisbee Novotny.
Tartaglia?
Frisbee Novotny, Danny, the guy whom I've been trying to tell you about.
You know, the hero of my favorite detective story
is the one who solves crimes in mayhem with a slide rule and formulas.
He does that. How?
Well, this Frisbee Novotny does like this.
He makes X the corpse.
Y the room the murder took place in.
Z the time of the murder.
A the...
Here, here, Danny, here's some paper.
My pen, the gift of the ever grateful, Mrs. Tartaglia.
What's she got to be grateful about?
Oh, Danny.
I'm sorry, Tartaglia.
It's these newspapers here on my desk that got me confused.
These 1938 newspapers.
Oh, 1938, huh?
Hey, ain't that the year little often Annie celebrated her 40th birthday?
Yeah, that confuses me, too.
Tartaglia, I've got a feeling the reason why those two boys were murdered
is right here in these papers.
Ah, that's my Danny.
Huh?
Oh, nothing, Danny.
I've read these papers from Headline to Shipping News,
and the only thing I can see that's interesting
is this item right here on the bottom of page three.
Huh?
Police today arrested three men in connection with car theft.
The men gave their names as Joe Keto, Grant Murray, and Lee Baker.
They are being held without bail pending hearing.
That's all it says, Tartaglia.
Well, this is information that the police department is already fully aware of.
Uh-huh.
The thing that bothers me is why the two boys kept these newspapers.
For their scrapbook, maybe.
Something else, Tartaglia.
Something else, something that's in these papers.
Something that's staring me in the eye and begging to be understood.
You got what I asked you for?
Oh, sure, Danny, certainly.
Straight from the parole officer.
The third boy, Lee Baker, is employed at the moment as a garage mechanic.
Uh-huh.
Ain't it wonderful the trades they teach you up in Sing Sing?
Where's he employed?
At the garage and back at the mobile gas station on 125th Street.
Maybe Lee Baker's got a newspaper, too.
Get me a squad car, Tartaglia.
Hey, you under the car.
I want to talk to you.
Ask the man out front, Mac.
He'll give you the key and point out the door.
I'm from the police, Mac.
That makes you different?
Yeah, I want to ask you some questions.
You.
Well, that makes you different.
Well, what's bothering you, Mac?
They told me out front Lee Baker wasn't around.
Oh, Lee Baker, huh?
They told me maybe you'd know why he wasn't around.
What do those guys out front know?
All they know is, shall I fill it up, Mac?
Hold still while I wipe your windshield, Mac.
Relax while I blow up your tires.
Yeah, what do those guys know?
Lee Baker, why isn't he around?
I've been telling you, Mac.
I ain't got the slightest foggiest notion why he ain't around.
He did something?
He didn't come in today?
Who says he didn't come in?
Since he's been working for me, he comes in every morning like veritable clockwork.
Okay, I give up.
You tell it to me in your own way.
I knew you'd come around with Mac.
Well, like I say, Lee, for the three days he's been working for me, comes in like clockwork.
He works for me like I was the boss's daughter or something.
Like a slave, you know what I mean?
And today was different.
Mac, you told me I could tell it my own way.
Yeah, sorry.
Forget it, Mac.
Now, let me see.
Where was I?
He worked for you like a slave.
Yeah, yeah, that's right, like a slave.
But a happy slave, you know?
Cheery and beery.
But today was different.
I said that.
You did, Mac?
Look, like I started to say, today was different.
How?
The right question, Mac.
Today was different because Lee comes in, sits down with the morning newspaper, turns pale, but a green kind of pale.
You know what I mean?
He gets up and he walks out of the garage.
Maybe he's coming back.
I don't think so, Mac.
He had that look.
I seen it on my helpers before.
When they get that look, they never come back.
Yeah.
Thanks for everything, mechanic.
Hey, wait a minute, Mac.
Lee left his tool kit.
If Lee now belongs to the police, the tool kit now belongs likewise, no?
Yeah.
Where is it?
Over here.
Well, open it, Mac.
That's your department.
Thanks.
Hey, such a beautiful picture of such a beautiful girl who's not pasted in the lid.
What a differential, huh, Mac?
You got any idea what you're looking for, Mac?
No.
Hey, what are you doing tearing that picture off?
What do you know?
There's something underneath.
Yeah.
That's something I didn't think of, to look underneath the picture.
Oh, that sly guy.
There it is again.
The front page of the Times, January 27, 1938.
Yeah, yeah.
Look what's circled with a blue circle.
The U.S. Treasury balance.
Such a big number.
A big number.
A number that meant billions of dollars and meant that's what the United States Treasury
balance was as of January 27, 1938.
That meant something special to an ex-convict, now garage mechanic, now missing.
The big number was beginning to make big sense.
I phoned in headquarters, had them send out an all-points bulletin to pick up Lee Baker.
They gave me a message for my trouble.
A lady had called, a young lady named Holly Parker.
Would I come up to Harlem and see her right away?
I would right away.
Oh, come in.
Come in, Mr. Clover.
Thanks, Holly.
That chair over there is comfortable, Mr. Clover, but don't lean back in it.
All right.
You're going someplace, Holly?
That suitcase on the bed, you were packing?
Unpacking.
Something changed your mind?
I was going back to Michigan and I got to thinking, why Michigan?
Why any place?
You tell me.
I read about Grant Murray's being murdered and Joe Keto.
Grant and Joe were friends.
I was a friend.
Police.
Something to run away from.
I'm good at it.
We'd find you, Holly.
If we needed you, it wouldn't be too much trouble.
We'd bring you back.
I told myself that.
That's why I unpacked.
You're trying to tell me something, something you didn't tell me before.
That's right.
Maybe it means something, maybe it means nothing at all.
What is it?
This.
A piece of paper Joe gave me the other night before he went out.
He said keep it for him.
He said don't let it get away from you.
Here, take it.
It got away from me anyhow.
Thanks.
There's nothing on it except a number, Mr. Clover.
A number.
646.
And a date.
January 27, 1938.
It all fits now, Holly.
Why didn't you give it to me before?
On account of the way I was educated?
You're a policeman.
My school motto was don't trust policemen.
You might have saved a man's life if you did.
You're clear now, Holly.
You can do what you want.
Even go back to Michigan now if you want to.
Why, Mr. Clover?
Why should I go anywhere?
Stop champing at the bit.
Danny Patrolman Froyo will have those records in here in a minute.
I'm not champing, Coslow.
I'm trying to breathe.
Why do you guys in the record department live in here?
Well, the grapevine in the city hall says we're getting an air conditioning unit
right after the next election.
Thanks, Froyo.
Well, here are the records, Danny.
Mind if I read over your shoulder?
I couldn't live without it.
Hey, that Benny Fain kept interest in type books, huh?
Benny Fain, the numbers king.
These books he kept to do credit at the Chase National Bank.
I understand Benny's now head librarian
in charge of overdue fines at Sing Sing, Danny.
Ain't it wonderful the trades they teach you up in Sing Sing?
Yeah, wonderful.
Okay, Coslow, this is what I'm looking for.
Oh, yeah?
The number that hit on January 27, 1938 was 646,
taken from the last three numbers of the Treasury report of that day.
One ticket held on that number worth $100,000
bought by three men, Joe Keto, Grant Murray, and Lee Baker.
According to the books, the payoff was made next day.
Like you said, Coslow, these books to do credit to the Chief...
Hey, Danny, they got Lee Baker, Danny.
Good, where?
Just spotted him going into the Muncie building.
Squad car just phoned in.
Phone him back to Tagli.
If Baker leaves the building, tell him to pick him up.
But suppose Baker stays inside.
Then he'll be where I want him, exactly where I want him.
It made sense that Lee Baker was picked up
going into the Muncie building.
It made sense that there was only one man there for him to see.
It made sense that Lawyer Ferguson's office was on the 46th floor.
The shots that screamed down the long marble corridor
made the most sense of all.
Lawyer Ferguson stood silhouetted at his 46th floor window
considering the jeweled backdrop of the city
and approving of it and of himself against it.
To the gun in his hand and the body that lay on the floor
in the final grotesque attitude of final agony,
he paid no attention at all.
I don't think you'll find it necessary to examine him, Danny.
He's quite, quite dead.
I made sure of that.
Yeah, yeah.
Lee Baker.
Lee Baker.
A filthy gutter thing that tried to rise up and strike me down.
Self-defense, huh?
Could it be anything else?
The gun in his hand?
Yeah, Lawyer, it could. It could be murder.
Looking for a promotion, Danny?
How many murders do you need to get promoted?
I always wondered that about detectives.
Murder?
Like you murdered Joe Keto and Grant Murray.
And for the same reason.
I'm a lawyer, Danny, a good one.
Very high in the profession.
A policeman's drivel doesn't impress me.
No?
You sure, Lawyer?
On second thought, maybe it would.
Impress me, Danny.
Three murders for the same reason.
The boys on our side call it motive.
I promise to do better. Motive, Lawyer.
Which is?
A hundred thousand dollars.
Oh, dear, dear.
That's a lot of motive, isn't it?
Enough to kill three men.
Even enough to kill you.
What was it you said about society?
Oh, yeah, society will thank me, just like you said they thanked you.
Don't count on it, boy.
You need facts, evidence.
Silly little hard things like that.
It's all there, Lawyer.
Neat bookkeeping records kept by a numbers bookkeeper.
One Benny Fane.
We're neat, too.
We have them on file.
Books? They're very good.
Very acceptable evidence.
I thought you'd like it.
These books say you got the hundred thousand payoff
that belonged to Keto and Murray and Baker here.
They picked a number and you won.
How did I do a clever thing like that?
Easy for a clever man like you.
You get them 12 years instead of one for a second-rate crime.
You keep power of attorney.
The numbers pay off to you, and then when they get out,
instead of giving them back their hard-earned hundred grand,
I kill them one by one.
Is it like that, Detective Clover?
Like that.
Exactly like that.
Excellent work, Detective. Excellent.
The gun, Ferguson. Hand it over.
The gun? Oh, no. I'll need it.
But you knew it'd be like that all the time, didn't you, Danny?
Give it to me.
Don't try to reach for yours, Danny.
Come to the window. Move.
That's a good boy.
Forty-six floors, Danny. Look down.
That's how far you're going to fall.
A deplorable accident, they'll call it.
I'll see to it that they call it that.
Now, Danny.
The fat folds of flesh on his face began to move to the rhythm
of the silent, creeping laughter that was inside him.
Then his arms swung in a wide arc
to bring the gun crashing down on my skull.
And I needed that. Needed that moment.
I needed it. I grabbed his gun arm.
It's no good, Danny. No good.
I used it for a lever.
Let go. Let go. I'll kill you. Let go.
My body and his fanboat lifted off the floor and...
He fell, twisting into space, a part of it.
His fingers exploring it, gouging out handfuls of it.
Then, far below, a crowd gathered and made a circle.
And the world folded in on Ralph Ferguson.
Broadway.
Where night bursts open like the sudden flame
and the crowd swarm appears squeezed out from under the earth,
roped off by the silhouettes of a thousand buildings.
And they dance their fury away against the time of morning
until the sky soaks up the sound and pain and color
and turns it into dawn.
That's Broadway, the gaudiest, the most violent,
the lonesomest mile in the world.
Broadway.
My Beat.
Broadway's My Beat stars Larry Thor as Detective Danny Clover
with Charles Calvert as Tartaglia.
The program was produced and directed by Elliot Lewis.
The musical score was composed and conducted by Alexander Courage.
The cast tonight included Stan Waxman, Anne Diamond, Bill Gray,
Lou Merrill, Jester Hairston, and Jim Bannon.
Lucille Ball and her sparkling comedy My Favorite Husband
have now joined the CBS famed comedy lineup on Sunday nights.
You used to laugh with Lucille on Friday nights.
Now she's moved to Sunday.
So be listening this Sunday night on most of these same stations
when Lucille joins Jack Benny, Amos and Andy, Eve Arden,
Charlie McCarthy, and Edgar Bergen, and Red Skelton on CBS.
This is Joe Walter speaking.
This is CBS where you'll find Broadway as My Beat every Friday night.
The Columbia Broadcasting System.