Paul Temple and the Madison case

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Paul Temple and the Madison case is an eight-part radio play from the Paul Temple series by Francis Durbridge , produced by NWDR Cologne in 1955 and broadcast by WDR for the first time from January 13, 1956 to March 2, 1956. The total playing time is 272 minutes.

Title of each episode

  1. A penny to think about
  2. One of them steps out of line
  3. Eileen
  4. Visiting Hubert Greene
  5. Steve takes command
  6. Blurred tracks
  7. Suspicion of four
  8. Mr. Madison personally

action

On their way home from New York to London , the writer and private detective Paul Temple and his wife Steve meet the millionaire Sam Portland. He tells of the fact that he was picked up in 1914 as a young man in Chicago by the policeman Dan Kelly because he had lost his memory. At that time he was given the name Sam Portland. He later founded several factories and became extremely rich. The only indication of his identity is an English penny, which he still wears on his watch chain to this day. His London representative Hubert Greene claims to have gained important information about his origins with the help of a private detective named Madison. The next day, Portland dies of a heart attack.

Upon arriving in Southampton , however, Greene denies knowing anything about the Madison affair. Portland's wife Stella and his secretary George Kelly, who also traveled with them, are also said to have no knowledge of it.

Scotland Yard's Sir Graham Forbes questions Temple about Portland's death after his colleague Inspector James has received a letter stating that if Portland comes to England there will be a risk of murder .

Temple learns from Stella Portland that Greene is particularly interested in the watch chain with the penny attached to it. When he takes a closer look at the penny, Paul recognizes the year 1919. This means that the penny was not put into circulation until five years after Portland appeared in Chicago.

The matter is settled for Sir Graham after it has been established that there was no way Portland could have perished through third-party negligence. He has to take care of a gang of counterfeiters that is up to mischief across Europe and whose headquarters are apparently in England. A short time later, when Mark Kendell, who had broken into the temples the day before, had a fatal accident while trying to escape, he was found to have a briefcase filled with counterfeit 100-dollar banknotes.

Archie Brooks, a police liaison officer, is stabbed to death after talking to the Temples. Apparently he had a connection with Mark Kendell too. As Temple and Inspector James search his apartment, the phone rings. James, who pretends to be Brooks in a disguised voice, learns from a certain Eileen that something should happen the next evening at a remote estate.

On the way to the manor, Temple and Forbes find the murdered Inspector James. At the specified time, they watch a helicopter crash on landing at the uninhabited Foxdale Farm. Nearby, Steve finds a bunch of keys with a penny from 1919 on it, which apparently comes from the crashed machine.

During a weekend visit to Hubert Greene's country house, his wife Eileen is dragged dead from a nearby lake before she can talk to the Temples about her connection to Archie Brooks and the gang. She was also killed with a knife. As a result, George Kelly comes under suspicion, who used to work as a knife thrower at a circus.

A man recently moved in on the floor above them in the Temples' house, who is Dr. Elzec and was previously involved in a counterfeiting affair.

Forbes finds out that the crashed helicopter pilot came from the Netherlands to bring new counterfeit banknotes to the continent. Madison, the head of the gang, did not keep the appointment because he got wind of the police action. Now a man named Alfaro, whom the Dutch police have been monitoring for a long time, is supposed to come to England to take over the transport of the banknotes.

Steve is set as a decoy on Alfaro, but apparently he knows. So he kidnapped her on a cabin cruiser , on which Dr. Elzec is located. She overhears the boat going to a country house where the gang's headquarters are supposed to be. Shortly after Steve is freed and put on a police boat, the cruiser explodes. Alfaro and a policeman are among the dead. It appears Madison has deposited a bomb on the ship and is about to disband the organization.

Because of the murder of Eileen, Moira, the stepdaughter of Stella Portland, and her fiancé Chris Boyer are now targeted by Scotland Yard. A short time later, Moira takes her own life. She was addicted to drugs and suffered from depression .

That same evening, Paul Temple and George Kelly find the badly abused Elzec in his apartment. Before he dies, he tells Temple that the counterfeiting workshop will be located in a country house in Lokdale.

Stella Portland tells the Temples what she learned from Moira shortly before she committed suicide. After that, Chris Boyer is said to have blackmailed Moira for months with his knowledge of the origin of her father, who is said to have been the son of a notorious fraudster. It was Moira who swapped the penny on the watch chain, since the real coin from 1885 contained a carved dedication from Sam's father and could have served as evidence.

With a trick, Temple steers Hubert Greene into his apartment and explains to him that there is sufficient evidence that he is Madison, the head of the money forger gang, a murderer and blackmailer. Because not Boyer, but Greene blackmailed Moira with the aim of being able to take over the Portland company. Greene, realizing that his game is over, flees the apartment, but can be caught and arrested by the police.

occupation

Remarks

The radio play was produced by the BBC in 1949 under the title Paul Temple and the Madison Mystery . The Temple couple were played by Kim Peacock and Marjorie Westbury .

After Paul Temple and the Gregory affair in 1949, this is probably the fifth multi-part series that NWDR Cologne and WDR produced in its Paul Temple series . The ARD radio play archive, however, has another multi-part series entitled A case for Paul Temple from 1950, which is said to be the Valentin case . The WDR in Cologne could not confirm this information on request.

Ursula Langrock only spoke the role of Steve Temple in this production. Her colleague Annemarie Cordes took on this role a total of eight times .

Publications

References

  • Radio play (plot)
  • The internet database of the ARD radio play archive, accessed on January 12, 2011 (all information about the production).