Full Storyline
In Los Angeles, fireman Joe Martin is assigned by the fire chief to
the Arson Detail. The chief believes that a recent fur store fire was
of suspicious origin and may have been set by the store's owner,
Thomas Peyson. Another investigator was killed while inspecting the
site, and the file on the incident, which he was carrying, was not
found with his body. The chief explains that in recent years, a number
of large suspicious fire insurance claims have been paid through an
agent named Frederick P. Fender, who may also be involved in unloading
the goods supposedly destroyed in the fires.
Joe begins his
investigation by visiting Peyson's apartment to talk with him about a
fire that occurred there. The Peysons are not home, so Joe talks with
their son's baby-sitter Jane (Anne Gwynne), a teacher, until they return. After Joe
takes a report on the fire, he offers to drive Jane home, and they
make a date for the next evening. As soon as they leave, Peyson phones
Fender and tells him about Joe's visit. The next morning, Joe goes to
see Fender, but is kept waiting as Peyson is with him.
After Peyson
leaves by a back door, Joe asks Fender about the Peyson case, but gets
nowhere. Fender then tells an associate, Pete, to find out all he can
about Joe, as he thinks it might be possible to bribe him. Pete begins
to follow Joe, even when he is out with Jane, who lives with her
grandmother. One afternoon, Joe, realizing that he is being tailed,
goes, in uniform, to an illegal horse betting parlor, where Pete
approaches him. After they get to know each other, Pete offers Joe a
chance to make some real money.
Later, Joe and Pete are in the bookie
joint when a police raid occurs and a photograph of Joe fighting a
policeman appears on the front page of a newspaper. As planned, Joe
resigns from the fire department, after which Pete invites Jane and
him to a party, where Joe meets Fender again. Fender shows a lot of
interest in Jane, much to his secretary Betty's displeasure. The next
day, Fender hires Joe to drive a car during one of Pete's "jobs,"
which involves setting a fire at a haberdashery store and using their
car to impede the passage of the fire engine. Before the break-in,
however, Joe passes the information to Murph, an undercover cop.
At
the haberdashery, Joe and Pete load up the store's contents and, after
Joe suggests disabling the sprinklers, Pete sets the fire and they
drive off. Murph then enters and extinguishes the flames. After they
unload the goods, Pete returns with Joe to check their fire and is
dismayed to find it extinguished. Murph is still there and is shot by
Pete when more police arrive. The police chase after them, but Joe
manages to lose them. Fender suspects Betty of having tipped off the
police and slaps her, but she denies it.
Fender then asks her to check
on Pete by letting him date her, and she and Pete arrange a double
date with Joe and Jane. On their way to the Gaucho Club, Joe finally
admits to Jane that he is on an undercover assignment for the Fire
Department. At the club, Pete and Betty get drunk and Betty begins to
ramble on about furs, revealing the address of the warehouse where
they are stored. However, while Joe and Jane dance, Betty tells Pete
that Fender told her to drop the information about the furs to
possibly trap Joe. Later, when Joe drives Pete home and Pete falls
asleep, Joe goes through his files and finds the one that belonged to
the dead investigator.
As Joe and Jane drive to the warehouse to
rendezvous with the police, Pete wakes up, discovers his files have
been examined and rushes out. The police are waiting for Joe with the
news that they have found no furs. After a detective examines the file
Joe took and states that it implicates Pete in the investigator's
death, the police leave to arrest him. When Pete then appears holding
a gun on Jane, a night watchman reports to Fender on his car phone.
Fender is out driving with Betty and heads for the warehouse at top
speed. Joe overpowers Pete and takes the gun, then he and Jane run
off. Armed with the night watchman's gun, Pete goes after Joe, setting
a fire in the warehouse to trap Joe and Jane. Joe activates a fire
alarm and several units race to the scene. Driving at more than a
hundred miles per hour to elude a police unit, Fender, meanwhile,
fails to slow for a detour and crashes off the road. At the warehouse,
Joe captures Pete as the firemen arrive. The rest of the gang is
rounded up and Joe and Jane resume their courtship.
|
Cast:
Robert Lowery
Anne Gwynne ... Jane Jennings
Marcia Mae Jones
Edward Brophy
Gaylord
Pendelton
Lelah Tyler |
Production: Arthur
Caesar
and Maurice Tombragel- Writers
William
Berke-
Director
William Stephens-
Producer
Carl Berger- Cinematographer
Edward Mann- Editor
Red Dunn- Music |
streets.
Tale is treated with documentary touch by narration backgrounding action and has
been given a swift pace by William Berke's direction. Story concerns a
young fireman who is transferred to the arson squad to work undercover while
ferreting out a gang of crooks who mask their thefts behind willful arson.
