The Rockford Files (1974) s02e10 Episode Script
2 Into 5.56 Won't Go
You mess with the Army, they'll put a shovel in your hands and point you to hard ground.
That's the Army way.
Hi.
You're a little jumpy.
Hello, Colonel.
You're making a bad mistake, Harvey.
You take off these cuffs, and I'll club your head down between your knees.
You know, for somebody I can't stand, I'm becoming awfully fond of you.
You know, the nice thing about being a civilian is you outrank lieutenants and colonels.
Who does the draft board bother with people like you? This is Jim Rockford.
At the tone, leave your name and message.
I'll get back to you.
Jim, it's Maria over at the laundromat.
There's a yellow dress in with your things.
Is that a mistake or a special handling or what? Jim Rockford.
At the tone, leave your name and message.
I'll get back to you.
Jim, this is Colonel Daniel Hart Bowie.
It's important that I speak to you right away.
I can't stay at this phone, so call me at 555-3465 as soon as you get in.
I'll be standing by that phone.
Sorry, Officer.
I guess I was speeding a little.
Yeah, sure were, Colonel.
Wanna move up here out of the road, please? Had some other things on my mind.
I wasrt paying too much attention to what was happening.
What is this? Wanna spread out there on the jeep, Colonel? You wanna do it now, Colonel, or you want me to put this night stick upside your head? Okay, I got him.
How much are they paying you for this? Oh, it's not the money that counts, Colonel.
Most of it's just plain, old-fashioned, pure satisfaction, knowing you got a job to do and you're doing it well.
It's a booger, ain't it, Colonel? Hello, Colonel.
You're making a bad mistake, Harvey.
That's something I've always wanted to do.
Always wanted to do.
Okay, wanna come along with me, Colonel? Sir.
Quenton? Hello, Colonel.
Oh, now it makes sense.
I should've figured it.
Oh, I think you would have, eventually.
Let's go, Harvey.
I think somebody's throwing rubbish off the pier in the afternoon.
Polluting the water, that's what they're doing, by golly.
You ought to put up some signs or something.
Hey, you want yours fried or filleted? Are you kidding? I ain't gonna eat no little baby fish.
I'm no cradle robber.
Well, good.
I'll fillet it and have it myself.
Fried.
I'll have it fried.
Hey, Rocky, would you get my messages, please? Yeah.
No, no kidding, we ought to go get us some of those "No Dumping" signs, and take them up there and post them.
Hey, maybe even phony up some ordinance number.
You know, "If you dump here, you're gonna be arrested "under Ordinance Number Hold it.
Jim, this is Colonel Daniel Hart Bowie.
It's important that I speak to you right away.
I can't stay at this phone, so call me at 555-3465 as soon as you get in.
I'll be standing by that phone.
Bowie? Say, ain't that the fellow that you Yeah, that's the one.
What's he calling you for? You guys were never exactly buddies.
Not exactly.
Oh, hi, Dennis.
How are you? Hi, Jim.
What's going on? Well, we're cooperating with the military authorities on a case.
This is Lieutenant Fenton.
He'll tell you all about it.
Hi, Lieutenant.
Yes, sir.
We understand you've been in touch with Colonel Bowie.
We would like you to come to the provost marshal's office.
Yeah.
Well, you understand all wrong, Lieutenant.
I'm not really into provost marshals or marshals of any kind.
I don't even think too much of Matt Dillon.
I'm really sorry to hear that, sir, because I'm going to have to insist.
Jim, this is Colonel Daniel Hart Bowie.
It's important that I speak to you right away.
I can't stay at this phone, so call me at 555-3465 as soon as you get in.
I'll be standing by that phone.
There you have it, Lieutenant.
There's your whole contact, right there.
Now you're welcome to take the tape, but I'm staying right here.
Been reading this file of yours, Rockford.
It reads like a chapter out of Ripley's Believe It or Not.
Is that so? It's a real puzzle.
On the one hand, we have Sergeant James Rockford, wounded in action, Silver Star.
Then six months later, we have PFC James Rockford, busted for trading 400 cases of C rations for a North Korean tank.
Is this going on much longer? And then, instead of being sent to the stockade for conspiring with the enemy, you receive a battlefield promotion to sergeant again.
It probably doesn't say that Colonel Bowie asked me to scrounge a tank that we needed to blow our way out of a pocket.
I'm sure Colonel Bowie intended for you to scrounge one of our tanks from one of our units.
As I remember, he wasrt terribly specific.
Then again, we have PFC James Rockford, busted for setting up a string of pool halls in Pusan, and stealing a major general's staff car from in front of the Seoul Korean Hilton.
Why didn't you just get a zipper for those sergeant stripes? Okay, Colonel.
You've qualified as a really first-rate smart mouth.
Now let me out of here.
I listened to your answer-phone tapes.
I suppose you're gonna tell me that's all the contact you had with Colonel Bowie.
You got it.
Well, I'm not inclined to believe anyone who would have the gall to trade Army supplies for enemy weaponry.
Don't forget you're dealing with a civilian, Colonel.
You know, the nice thing about being a civilian is you outrank lieutenants and colonels.
Now, unless you've got some very nice workable charge to hang on me, you just don't have a lever.
Why does the draft board bother with people like you? That's priceless.
All right, we'll try another tack.
Colonel Daniel Hart Bowie was a friend of mine.
Was? He's dead.
His jeep turned over on the road north of Seaside.
When we found him, he had your phone number in his uniform pocket.
What's the story, Rockford? Why would Colonel Bowie wanna look up his old scrounger 20 years later? Well, maybe he needed another North Korean tank.
Are you trying to bait me? Whatever turns you on, Colonel.
Okay, Rockford.
Mister Rockford.
You understand the military has jurisdiction over this case.
But if we decide something happened to Colonel Bowie, it'll be a case for the civilian authorities, in which case you will be in up to your neck! Well, this may come as a surprise to you, Colonel, but even though Bowie and I didn't get along, I did respect him.
I might even have liked him.
That doesn't surprise me.
I told you, I read your whole file.
Will you relax, Jimmy? I am relaxed.
Oh, sure you are.
You are about to fry your fish instead of filleting it like you generally do.
I'll get it.
Hi, I'd like to speak to Rockford, please.
Oh, good, good.
Come on in.
You're just what he needed.
You bet.
Hey, Jim, you got a visitor.
Pretty, too.
Might cheer you up, huh? What did he tell you? Hey, wait a minute.
I wanna know what he told you.
What did he tell you? Come on.
Put that thing away.
What did he tell you? You're Shana, right? How do you know? Well, because Colonel Bowie had a daughter named Shana who would be about your age.
And I recognize this chrome-plated pop gun.
It belonged to your father.
No bullets.
Sit down.
What did he tell you? Please, I've gotta know.
All right.
Here.
Jim, this is Colonel Daniel Hart Bowie.
It's important that I speak to you right away.
I can't stay at this phone, so call me at 555-3465 as soon as you get in.
I'll be standing by that phone.
But Colonel Hopkins said that you talked to him.
Well, I didn't.
I just can't seem to get Colonel Hopkins to Oh, Miss Oh, I'm Jimmy's father.
I can tell you, he never talked to your pa.
He was out on the pier fishing with me when that message came in.
Why did he call you? Why didn't he call me? I could have helped him.
What are you talking about? He didn't put that jeep over by mistake.
He was killed.
Well, what makes you say that? Well about a week ago, he came to see me over at the university.
I'm an assistant professor of archeology at USC.
And we were gonna go out to dinner together, and he was in his civilian clothes, and he was very nervous.
And he was very upset, and it was You remember his drinking habits, don't you? Yeah.
Yeah.
A glass of wine before dinner and that was it.
Right.
Well, last week at dinner, he was drinking hard liquor and a lot of it.
And something was going wrong in his life.
I mean, something was very bad.
And I He wouldn't discuss it with me.
I kept trying to get him to tell me what was going on, and he said that he would finally discuss it with Terry.
Who's Terry? I don't know.
But when he left at 12:30 at night, he was very drunk and he was afraid of something.
Well, it wasrt death.
Colonel Bowie was never afraid of death.
If he called you, then he must have felt that you could help him the most.
Well You see, the MPs are working on it, and I never mess around with anything that the authorities are involved in.
Didrt you tell all this to Colonel Hopkins? Of course.
And? Didrt seem to impress him.
Well, as long as the MPs are involved, I really can't touch it.
You see, I'm not getting along too well with Colonel Hopkins, anyway.
But what if they close it? What if they call it an accident? Would you help me then? Oh, well Jim, you You ain't thinking about going around messing with the Army again? You mess with the Army, they'll put a shovel in your hands and point you to hard ground.
That's the Army way.
I'm not gonna mess around with this, Rocky.
Come on, do you think I'm gonna mess around with something like this? No way.
Now, look, Miss Bowie Shana.
I Well, I'm just not available.
That's final.
Yes, sir.
I will want to keep your expense receipts.
Fine.
And if we're gonna keep double entry books, don't forget the coffee.
That's 10 cents extra.
I've heard all about you from my father, Mr.
Rockford.
Obviously, he called you because you're the trickiest man he ever met, and he needed somebody sly to help him solve his problem.
Well, I'm not about to be a victim.
I can't afford you in the first place.
You know, I used to gouge widows and orphans, but the trouble with that is after you lock them out, they whine so bad, kind of takes the fun out of it.
That's exactly what I mean.
That kind of flip talk doesn't impress me.
You know, Shana, you're a very pretty girl.
You're also very tiresome.
Last night, you came at me with a gun, then you begged me to help you.
Now you're treating me like any minute I'm gonna snatch your purse and push you out into traffic.
If you feel that way about it, why did you take the case? I'm not sure.
Well, I'm sorry if you find me so tiresome.
I think you remind me of your father.
I'm gonna take that as a compliment.
Take it any way you want.
Here, you want this for your files or what? You keep it.
You sure now? I mean, it's in pencil.
I could erase it and change all the numbers.
I'm not gonna let you provoke me.
Morgars Rest is about Yes, sir.
I've been in so many houses like this all over the world.
Different, somehow the same.
Those are his campaign ribbons.
When we were at Fort Benton, I used to play with them, and I lost the one from Corregidor, and he gave me such a spanking.
I used to sit and look at them, look at all that glory, and I would try to imagine him there at those battles.
But now they look sort of garish and silly.
I suppose that amuses you.
Hey, relax.
I'm not gonna jump on you for that.
I think they look a little garish myself.
Why did we have to come here? We're gonna have to go through this place, Shana.
See if we can try and find something that will tell us who Terry is.
If we can find Terry, maybe we can get the answer to whatever was troubling your father and slam the lid on this thing quickly.
I suppose we should start at the desk drawers.
No.
No, you start at the phone index and then the address book.
They'd be over here.
That's funny.
Yeah? What? He always kept that picture over here on the desk.
He's had 10 different quarters that I can remember, and he always kept it over here.
There's something else.
He's got his fatigue pants hanging on the same hanger with his dress shirt.
Why? Why would he do that? Well, I'm not altogether sure he did.
Just may be that somebody searched this place and when they put it back together, they put it back together wrong.
What do you think they were looking for? Well, I don't know.
Probably the same thing we are.
The only advantage they have is they probably know what it is.
Harvey.
Shana.
Shana, honey.
Oh, Shana, I'm I'm so sick about the Colonel, I don't know what to tell you except that, well, you know, my loss is almost as great as yours.
I know.
Sergeant Slate, this is Mr Sanderson.
Sanderson.
Oh, Mr.
Sanderson.
Rock Sanderson, is it? Yeah, that's right.
It's a little nickname.
It kind of hung over.
I used to do a little amateur fighting, you know.
No, it's okay, Jim.
We can trust Harvey.
You see, that is, Jim and I Of course we can, Shana.
Of course we can.
Look, what Shana's trying to say is that Well, we're about to become engaged.
In about six weeks, I'll have tenure, and when you have tenure, well, you've got a lifetime of security.
Tenure is when they can't fire you.
It's sort of like signing up for a lifetime hitch.
Right.
Right, Sergeant.
Hey, that's right.
Sergeant, we want to thank you for coming by.
Well, I was up at Major Hopkins' office when a guard on the gate called, so I just came on down.
Now, Shana, it's perfectly all right for you to stay here on the base, but I'm afraid Mr.
Sanderson here'll have to get a room in town.
Oh, that's what we were planning on, Sergeant.
Thank you.
All right.
Well, Shana, if there's anything at all I can do for you, anything, all you have to do is call me, you know that.
I know.
I thought I told you that we could trust Harvey.
Do you know how many years Harvey Slate has been with my father? Do you know how many campaigns they've been through together? Yeah.
Well, he missed the one I was in.
I'm gonna have to find out how he managed that.
I tried six or seven different ways and I ended up in a foxhole about 400 yards from the enemy.
One of my classic failures.
Are you going to continue with this kind of talk? I think you're doing it just to infuriate me.
My father was a great soldier, and you spent the entire war trying to find ways to go AWOL without getting caught.
Hey, I'm sorry.
I I'm not trying to bait you.
You hated him, didn't you? You hated Daddy.
I said I'm sorry.
You want a signed confession? Oh, brother.
Just what I need.
Hey.
Shana, I said I would help.
Sure.
I have my reasons.
I'm not doing it just for you.
I'm doing it for me, too.
Why? Shana, your father was a military Boy Scout, complete with a.
45 with notches in the handle.
Now it's a mistake to look at campaign ribbons and battle records and try and judge him.
If you feel grief for the man who bounced you on his knee and went out and bought dresses for you and took you out to the park, that's fine, that's great.
But why mourn a military record? Leave that to the men who write obituaries.
You get out of here right now! Well, it looks like we're just stepping on each other's ghosts.
I'll be at the Seaside Motel.
But he was my father.
Evening.
How's that? What is this, Officer? What have I done? Spread out against that wall, please.
I said what have I done, Officer? First of all, you ain't moving fast enough to suit me.
Do you mind reading me my rights? You're in a lot a trouble, mister.
Do yourself a big favor.
Don't go provoking me.
Look, Officer, I'm in town for Colonel Bowie's funeral.
We served together in Korea.
Now, if I'd known that was against the law, I would've just sent a card.
I don't understand what you think I've done.
You're gonna find out soon enough.
You country cops hand me a laugh.
Everything gonna be all right.
We're gonna have ourselves a real ball.
We better get a few things straightened out here, hadrt we, hoss? You don't mind if I don't give you your rights just yet, do you? This is not exactly what I expected.
You expect me to take you downtown and let you get some hot-shot lawyer to protect you.
I got my own ways of dealing with trash like you.
Sanderson, hmm? James Sanderson.
What you doing in Morgars Rest, Jim? I told you.
I'm here for Colonel Bowie's funeral.
Now, look Ah, he's blowing it.
Don't go away.
I got my eye on you.
I think I'm gonna fix him up where he walks funny.
I can make him come clean.
Billy, let me see that wallet.
I think it's a fake ID, Mr.
Davis.
Well, if this gentleman is legitimate, who's the private investigator? I don't know.
Got a guy in the provost marshal's office in LA.
Now he had coffee with Shana Bowie, and she said she was gonna get some help.
I figured she'd hire some guy.
But what if Mr.
Sandersors from CID? No, no.
He's not from CID, Mr.
Davis.
I'm into the computer.
I know what's going on there.
Billy, we got a shipment of 5.
56 going out tomorrow.
I want you to go back to that gentleman and take him by the collar and toss him up in the air.
When he comes down, I want him moving out of town.
I think I'll bust him up.
That way he'll keep moving, Mr.
Davis.
You bust him up, Billy, and I'll let our friend Harvey here bust you up.
You understand? Yeah.
You chicken-hearted cops really get me.
You take off these cuffs, and I'll club your head down between your knees.
You're nothing but a tub of guts with a big mouth.
What did you say? You heard me, rumdum.
Want me to mess you up? You'd have trouble messing up a bed.
You're leaving Morgars Rest, and you ain't even gonna stop to get your toothbrush.
Now you let me catch you here tomorrow, I'll come down on you so hard, you'll have to reach up to tie your shoes.
That's very colorful, but I just don't think you can cut it, Billy Webster.
I'd purely like to drive you into the hard ground.
Well, I guess you got the message that time, didn't you? Hi.
You're a little jumpy.
I was in the coffee shop.
When I saw you, I came over.
I'm sorry if I startled you.
Well, that's okay, I'll get over it.
What are you doing here? It's really nice in here on the inside.
Color TV.
Everything.
Maybe I ought to check in here, and that way I could eat at the coffee shop and Look, leave me alone, will you? I haven't said anything.
I can't stand it over there.
I'm confused.
It's okay.
Everybody gets confused.
He never did.
Except for that one time last week when he came to me and he asked me to help, and I wanted to help him, but he wouldn't let me.
Sometimes it works that way.
You know, you can't write the scenes and direct the action just for you, Shana.
Boy, you're really big on amateur psychology, aren't you? Well, don't feel guilty about it.
And every time I do it, I add it onto the bill.
What makes you think you have all the answers? Look, Shana.
Let's not tear at one another, all right? Your father was whatever you wanted him to be.
He never took me to the park or out to buy dresses.
He left us, Mother and me, for months and months on end, and all he sent back was money and Japanese swords.
I wanted him to be proud of me, but he was never there.
So instead I studied and I studied and I studied.
Hey, you don't have to explain it.
Yes, I do.
I think that everything I don't like about myself is tied up with it.
You know why I'm an assistant professor at the university? 'Cause you like it? Because it's safe.
It's safe and it's stale.
He didn't love us.
When my mother died, he came back from Korea and he put me in a private school, then he went back.
He didn't love us.
All my life I've been trying to get passing marks from a man who didn't care.
And I've let it ruin my life.
I've become a fossil.
I don't expect you want a comment from me.
Maybe.
Maybe not.
Well, I've known a lot of men like your father.
Don't be too hard on him.
He was very good at being a soldier, and he had a rough time with people.
That rule book was his lifeline.
Told him how he should act.
You break a rule, you go to the stockade or you don't get to go to the park on Sunday.
And you break the rules? No, no.
I bend them, and I hope to win some of the close calls.
Is this yours? Are you just allowed to carry that around? That? I never saw that before in my life.
The maid must have left that here.
You know, for somebody I can't stand, I'm becoming awfully fond of you.
And I just had a feeling about Deputy Webster, so I checked the sheriff's office in town.
There's no Billy Webster on the department.
How did you know he wasrt a cop? Well, my car was parked outside the room at the motel, and he never ran a make on the license plate.
Now, every cop does it.
It's just routine.
If he'd done that, he'd have known my name wasrt Sanderson.
What did the Chief of Police do? Well, what could he do? He filed the assault and battery.
It sounds unreal.
Who do you think they were? Well, I don't know.
A somebody named Mr.
Davis.
Well, I went through the book.
Dwight Davis, 4045 Margate Road.
Alice Davis, 1600 Pacific Coast Highway.
And there is no Billy Webster or B.
Webster or anything like that.
Well, it doesn't make any difference.
He was so eager to give me his name, it'll probably turn out to be an alias.
Oh, hey, do you know what 5.
56 is? No.
Why? Well, Mr.
Davis said something about It sounded kind of important.
If it had anything to do with my father, it had something to do with the base.
Did you find out who Terry was? No.
I searched through my father's quarters.
I couldn't find a clue.
I'm gonna go back there.
I'm gonna go back to my father's quarters.
You sure you want to? I could get you a room here.
I have to.
After all, what good is it to step on your ghosts if you don't kill them? Good girl.
So? I still don't know nothing about it.
Well, it's a black limousine, registered to a Mr.
Davis.
Hey, look, pal, I'm just working an insurance claim.
You wanna get hostile, it's all right with me.
I'll just refer it back to the main office and they'll take care of it through the regular police authorities.
But, you know, you're better off dealing with me.
Now maybe you don't know it, but when you bang up a parked car in a parking lot and take off, the official police charge is hit-and-run.
Well, I ain't got no black limo.
And so help me, if that Alice has gone and took one of them cemetery limos, Quentors gonna skin her alive.
Well, you think maybe somebody named Alice did it? Yeah.
Alice or Terry.
One or the other.
You can go ahead and check on that.
I tell you, mister, you try and be responsible for your kin, and you're gonna get plowed under every time.
That Alice been getting in trouble ever since she was 16 years old.
Quenton give her a job, too.
Her uncle give her a job.
She ain't gonna change none.
Not one bit.
This Terry, who's Terry? Terry.
Oh, yeah.
Well, Terry, that's her girlfriend.
She been She been messing with that Sergeant Slate.
They was all the time getting drunk.
She and Alice been living with us for a while.
I throwed them both out.
She's living in one of them apartments down at 1600.
Down the highway there.
Yeah.
You go talk to Alice or Terry, and you're gonna find your hit-and-run driver.
Them girls is wild, wild, and they're no good! No good! Bingo.
Main gate.
Hi.
This is Professor Sanderson.
I was trying to locate Miss Bowie.
Look, Mr.
Sanderson, I'm afraid I can't help you.
Oh, well, is she in for it.
I mean, I got two calls from Dean Whitmore's office, and the substitute she got to teach her Artifacts and Digging Techniques class can't make heads nor tails out of her notes, and they're about to hang her in effigy.
Look, Professor Sanderson, I can't tell you where she went because I don't know.
She left here with Sergeant Slate in 2424.
The what? It's the number of the car from the motor pool.
They left about an hour ago.
Is Quenton Davis in? Oh, he's not here.
Mahogany Hall? Yeah.
It's terrible, isn't it? But I didn't invent it.
I just work for them.
Well, it's like I told Quenton, Mahogany Hall is the oak-lined library of slumber chambers.
Hey, that's kind of cute.
Yeah.
Hey, I'll bet you're Alice.
Quenton told me he had a good-looking niece named Alice.
No, Alice is in Los Angeles.
Then you must be Terry.
Well, yes.
How did you know? Well, I know that because I'm an old friend of Colonel Bowie's, and he told me he was having a little affair with you.
Hold it.
Hold it.
Just leave me alone, just get away from me.
Wait a minute now.
You're in a lot of trouble, Terry.
I happen to know you're in on it.
You're an accessory to Colonel Bowie's murder.
Now, he came to you and he told you his fears about what was happening on the base, and you fingered him for Slate and Davis, and they killed him.
I didn't know they were gonna kill him.
I swear it.
What were you, a decoy? How did they work that? Look, you can either tell me or the cops.
You make up your own mind.
Two months ago, they told me to go to the Seasider bar.
It's a place where military people go.
Harvey Slate was there with the Colonel, and I was supposed to come on to him and set up a relationship.
And it wasrt too difficult.
I mean, he He was a very brusque man and he didn't get along with girls very well.
So, when I aimed myself at him, he just sort of fell in the basket.
Why? Come on, Terry.
Keep it up.
You're doing fine.
They're smuggling things off the base.
Weapons and stuff in hearses.
Harvey was afraid that the Colonel would find out.
He was pretty alert to the personnel records, so whenever they wanted to stage a funeral, I'd make a date with Colonel Bowie, and we'd go to San Francisco for the weekend.
I'd just get him out of town.
But he caught on that something was happening.
He came to you and told you, not knowing you were in on it? I didn't know they were gonna kill him.
I swear it, I didn't.
What do you think you're pulling with this assistant professor routine? Rockford, I've just about had it with you.
Are you gonna listen to me, or you gonna exercise your mouth? I'm trying to tell you that something called 5.
56 is being smuggled off this base.
Sergeant Slate and a group of morticians have been working the smuggle and doing it for several months.
Slate.
Harvey Slate? Harvey Slate.
That fits.
That sure as hell fits.
A funeral, huh? Of course.
All they had to do was get Colonel Bowie to look the other way.
What's a 5.
56? It's a new kind of ammo.
Fits in the new M-16 rifle.
It's the 5.
56 mm.
Well, there's a funeral going down today.
Now, what they've been doing is putting the stuff in the hearse with the bodies of the dead soldiers that die on the base and smuggling it out.
Oh, no.
That's not what they're doing.
It's even better than that.
Hello.
Is there a hearse on the base picking up a casket right now? How long ago? Look, I need a helicopter, three MPs and a pilot, and I need them five minutes ago.
And get me the Chief of Police.
I'm going with you, Colonel.
No, you're not.
Oh, yes, I am.
You try to stop me, you're gonna get bloody trying.
Give me a reason why.
Well, because I think Colonel Bowie's daughter is with them as a hostage, and, well I told you, I read your file.
You owe him one, don't you? That's right.
Maybe you're okay.
Just maybe.
Okay, that's far enough on the Coast Highway.
They couldn't have made it this far.
Double back and take Route 12 inland, and then we'll check the pass and try the roads south.
Okay, Colonel, it's great to look smart, but how about letting me in on the rest of it? I never thought that Colonel Bowie's death was an accident.
I merely said so to take the heat off.
We've been losing a lot of weaponry, and I was sent down here from Washington to look into it.
First we thought Colonel Bowie was involved, but he was innocent.
It was Sergeant Slate.
Cooked the whole thing up.
Did it have anything to do with a computer? How'd you know that? They were creating military files for fictitious soldiers and running them through the computer system.
All the code numbers were keyed back here to the Morgan Rest computer.
When they needed a shipment to go out, they couldn't count on a convenient death at the base, so they killed off one of their fictitious soldiers.
It wasrt until this morning that I managed to break down the computer codes and figured out the fictitious soldier angle.
Then you came in with that funeral, the rest of the pieces of the puzzle fell together.
Okay.
There they are.
All right, let's just sit on them and see where it goes.
We'll seal off that road.
I'm gonna set two of you down at the mouth of the road, and I'll take the barn.
If they got an M-16 and ammo in there, it's gonna be one hell of a firefight.
Did you ever qualify for an automatic rifle? Colonel, I always try to avoid gunplay.
It's kind of a religion.
If it's absolutely necessary, give me a.
45 or something.
Norfolk, give me a.
45.
Safety's on the right.
No kidding.
How'd it go, Billy? Like a champ.
Don't do that.
What? Don't do that! All right.
Out.
We have to get a chopper down here for Webster.
He's bleeding bad, but he's okay.
I saw that John Wayne shootout, Rockford.
You're okay.
You're gonna work out fine.
Thanks a lot, Colonel.
Let's go.
All right.
Just like my father.
That's exactly what Daddy would've said.
Well, he was a hell of a soldier, your father.
Ask Rockford sometime what happened in Pusan.
Your father was the best.
If you ever need anything, you just call.
I'm gonna personally see they expedite everything, the GI insurance, everything.
Thank you, Colonel.
Thank you.
Why? Why did you do it? I knew you and Daddy didn't get along, but you risked your life to save me and to prove who killed him.
Oh, I have my reasons.
Tell me about Pusan.
What happened there? Oh, it's really kind of dreary, Shana.
It's another one of those "there I was" stories.
What? You know, there I was, surrounded by 50,000 Indians and my guns jammed.
Only in my case, it was just a North Korean patrol.
I got hit a couple of days before in the leg, and the wound was getting kind of nasty.
I kept passing out.
Well, I kept poking the butt of the rifle in the wound just to stay awake.
Been out too long, well, I'd have been dead.
I heard all this gunfire, and North Koreans were dropping right and left.
I looked up, there was your father.
He wasrt a colonel then, he was a major, but he came back for me.
Nobody else was willing to try.
It looked too much like suicide.
There were Koreans all over that hill.
He came back for me, and he was the commanding officer.
Thought a lot about it since then, but I never quite understood why he did it.
So maybe that's the last ghost left to kill, huh? Yeah.
Yeah.
Maybe it is.
That's the Army way.
Hi.
You're a little jumpy.
Hello, Colonel.
You're making a bad mistake, Harvey.
You take off these cuffs, and I'll club your head down between your knees.
You know, for somebody I can't stand, I'm becoming awfully fond of you.
You know, the nice thing about being a civilian is you outrank lieutenants and colonels.
Who does the draft board bother with people like you? This is Jim Rockford.
At the tone, leave your name and message.
I'll get back to you.
Jim, it's Maria over at the laundromat.
There's a yellow dress in with your things.
Is that a mistake or a special handling or what? Jim Rockford.
At the tone, leave your name and message.
I'll get back to you.
Jim, this is Colonel Daniel Hart Bowie.
It's important that I speak to you right away.
I can't stay at this phone, so call me at 555-3465 as soon as you get in.
I'll be standing by that phone.
Sorry, Officer.
I guess I was speeding a little.
Yeah, sure were, Colonel.
Wanna move up here out of the road, please? Had some other things on my mind.
I wasrt paying too much attention to what was happening.
What is this? Wanna spread out there on the jeep, Colonel? You wanna do it now, Colonel, or you want me to put this night stick upside your head? Okay, I got him.
How much are they paying you for this? Oh, it's not the money that counts, Colonel.
Most of it's just plain, old-fashioned, pure satisfaction, knowing you got a job to do and you're doing it well.
It's a booger, ain't it, Colonel? Hello, Colonel.
You're making a bad mistake, Harvey.
That's something I've always wanted to do.
Always wanted to do.
Okay, wanna come along with me, Colonel? Sir.
Quenton? Hello, Colonel.
Oh, now it makes sense.
I should've figured it.
Oh, I think you would have, eventually.
Let's go, Harvey.
I think somebody's throwing rubbish off the pier in the afternoon.
Polluting the water, that's what they're doing, by golly.
You ought to put up some signs or something.
Hey, you want yours fried or filleted? Are you kidding? I ain't gonna eat no little baby fish.
I'm no cradle robber.
Well, good.
I'll fillet it and have it myself.
Fried.
I'll have it fried.
Hey, Rocky, would you get my messages, please? Yeah.
No, no kidding, we ought to go get us some of those "No Dumping" signs, and take them up there and post them.
Hey, maybe even phony up some ordinance number.
You know, "If you dump here, you're gonna be arrested "under Ordinance Number Hold it.
Jim, this is Colonel Daniel Hart Bowie.
It's important that I speak to you right away.
I can't stay at this phone, so call me at 555-3465 as soon as you get in.
I'll be standing by that phone.
Bowie? Say, ain't that the fellow that you Yeah, that's the one.
What's he calling you for? You guys were never exactly buddies.
Not exactly.
Oh, hi, Dennis.
How are you? Hi, Jim.
What's going on? Well, we're cooperating with the military authorities on a case.
This is Lieutenant Fenton.
He'll tell you all about it.
Hi, Lieutenant.
Yes, sir.
We understand you've been in touch with Colonel Bowie.
We would like you to come to the provost marshal's office.
Yeah.
Well, you understand all wrong, Lieutenant.
I'm not really into provost marshals or marshals of any kind.
I don't even think too much of Matt Dillon.
I'm really sorry to hear that, sir, because I'm going to have to insist.
Jim, this is Colonel Daniel Hart Bowie.
It's important that I speak to you right away.
I can't stay at this phone, so call me at 555-3465 as soon as you get in.
I'll be standing by that phone.
There you have it, Lieutenant.
There's your whole contact, right there.
Now you're welcome to take the tape, but I'm staying right here.
Been reading this file of yours, Rockford.
It reads like a chapter out of Ripley's Believe It or Not.
Is that so? It's a real puzzle.
On the one hand, we have Sergeant James Rockford, wounded in action, Silver Star.
Then six months later, we have PFC James Rockford, busted for trading 400 cases of C rations for a North Korean tank.
Is this going on much longer? And then, instead of being sent to the stockade for conspiring with the enemy, you receive a battlefield promotion to sergeant again.
It probably doesn't say that Colonel Bowie asked me to scrounge a tank that we needed to blow our way out of a pocket.
I'm sure Colonel Bowie intended for you to scrounge one of our tanks from one of our units.
As I remember, he wasrt terribly specific.
Then again, we have PFC James Rockford, busted for setting up a string of pool halls in Pusan, and stealing a major general's staff car from in front of the Seoul Korean Hilton.
Why didn't you just get a zipper for those sergeant stripes? Okay, Colonel.
You've qualified as a really first-rate smart mouth.
Now let me out of here.
I listened to your answer-phone tapes.
I suppose you're gonna tell me that's all the contact you had with Colonel Bowie.
You got it.
Well, I'm not inclined to believe anyone who would have the gall to trade Army supplies for enemy weaponry.
Don't forget you're dealing with a civilian, Colonel.
You know, the nice thing about being a civilian is you outrank lieutenants and colonels.
Now, unless you've got some very nice workable charge to hang on me, you just don't have a lever.
Why does the draft board bother with people like you? That's priceless.
All right, we'll try another tack.
Colonel Daniel Hart Bowie was a friend of mine.
Was? He's dead.
His jeep turned over on the road north of Seaside.
When we found him, he had your phone number in his uniform pocket.
What's the story, Rockford? Why would Colonel Bowie wanna look up his old scrounger 20 years later? Well, maybe he needed another North Korean tank.
Are you trying to bait me? Whatever turns you on, Colonel.
Okay, Rockford.
Mister Rockford.
You understand the military has jurisdiction over this case.
But if we decide something happened to Colonel Bowie, it'll be a case for the civilian authorities, in which case you will be in up to your neck! Well, this may come as a surprise to you, Colonel, but even though Bowie and I didn't get along, I did respect him.
I might even have liked him.
That doesn't surprise me.
I told you, I read your whole file.
Will you relax, Jimmy? I am relaxed.
Oh, sure you are.
You are about to fry your fish instead of filleting it like you generally do.
I'll get it.
Hi, I'd like to speak to Rockford, please.
Oh, good, good.
Come on in.
You're just what he needed.
You bet.
Hey, Jim, you got a visitor.
Pretty, too.
Might cheer you up, huh? What did he tell you? Hey, wait a minute.
I wanna know what he told you.
What did he tell you? Come on.
Put that thing away.
What did he tell you? You're Shana, right? How do you know? Well, because Colonel Bowie had a daughter named Shana who would be about your age.
And I recognize this chrome-plated pop gun.
It belonged to your father.
No bullets.
Sit down.
What did he tell you? Please, I've gotta know.
All right.
Here.
Jim, this is Colonel Daniel Hart Bowie.
It's important that I speak to you right away.
I can't stay at this phone, so call me at 555-3465 as soon as you get in.
I'll be standing by that phone.
But Colonel Hopkins said that you talked to him.
Well, I didn't.
I just can't seem to get Colonel Hopkins to Oh, Miss Oh, I'm Jimmy's father.
I can tell you, he never talked to your pa.
He was out on the pier fishing with me when that message came in.
Why did he call you? Why didn't he call me? I could have helped him.
What are you talking about? He didn't put that jeep over by mistake.
He was killed.
Well, what makes you say that? Well about a week ago, he came to see me over at the university.
I'm an assistant professor of archeology at USC.
And we were gonna go out to dinner together, and he was in his civilian clothes, and he was very nervous.
And he was very upset, and it was You remember his drinking habits, don't you? Yeah.
Yeah.
A glass of wine before dinner and that was it.
Right.
Well, last week at dinner, he was drinking hard liquor and a lot of it.
And something was going wrong in his life.
I mean, something was very bad.
And I He wouldn't discuss it with me.
I kept trying to get him to tell me what was going on, and he said that he would finally discuss it with Terry.
Who's Terry? I don't know.
But when he left at 12:30 at night, he was very drunk and he was afraid of something.
Well, it wasrt death.
Colonel Bowie was never afraid of death.
If he called you, then he must have felt that you could help him the most.
Well You see, the MPs are working on it, and I never mess around with anything that the authorities are involved in.
Didrt you tell all this to Colonel Hopkins? Of course.
And? Didrt seem to impress him.
Well, as long as the MPs are involved, I really can't touch it.
You see, I'm not getting along too well with Colonel Hopkins, anyway.
But what if they close it? What if they call it an accident? Would you help me then? Oh, well Jim, you You ain't thinking about going around messing with the Army again? You mess with the Army, they'll put a shovel in your hands and point you to hard ground.
That's the Army way.
I'm not gonna mess around with this, Rocky.
Come on, do you think I'm gonna mess around with something like this? No way.
Now, look, Miss Bowie Shana.
I Well, I'm just not available.
That's final.
Yes, sir.
I will want to keep your expense receipts.
Fine.
And if we're gonna keep double entry books, don't forget the coffee.
That's 10 cents extra.
I've heard all about you from my father, Mr.
Rockford.
Obviously, he called you because you're the trickiest man he ever met, and he needed somebody sly to help him solve his problem.
Well, I'm not about to be a victim.
I can't afford you in the first place.
You know, I used to gouge widows and orphans, but the trouble with that is after you lock them out, they whine so bad, kind of takes the fun out of it.
That's exactly what I mean.
That kind of flip talk doesn't impress me.
You know, Shana, you're a very pretty girl.
You're also very tiresome.
Last night, you came at me with a gun, then you begged me to help you.
Now you're treating me like any minute I'm gonna snatch your purse and push you out into traffic.
If you feel that way about it, why did you take the case? I'm not sure.
Well, I'm sorry if you find me so tiresome.
I think you remind me of your father.
I'm gonna take that as a compliment.
Take it any way you want.
Here, you want this for your files or what? You keep it.
You sure now? I mean, it's in pencil.
I could erase it and change all the numbers.
I'm not gonna let you provoke me.
Morgars Rest is about Yes, sir.
I've been in so many houses like this all over the world.
Different, somehow the same.
Those are his campaign ribbons.
When we were at Fort Benton, I used to play with them, and I lost the one from Corregidor, and he gave me such a spanking.
I used to sit and look at them, look at all that glory, and I would try to imagine him there at those battles.
But now they look sort of garish and silly.
I suppose that amuses you.
Hey, relax.
I'm not gonna jump on you for that.
I think they look a little garish myself.
Why did we have to come here? We're gonna have to go through this place, Shana.
See if we can try and find something that will tell us who Terry is.
If we can find Terry, maybe we can get the answer to whatever was troubling your father and slam the lid on this thing quickly.
I suppose we should start at the desk drawers.
No.
No, you start at the phone index and then the address book.
They'd be over here.
That's funny.
Yeah? What? He always kept that picture over here on the desk.
He's had 10 different quarters that I can remember, and he always kept it over here.
There's something else.
He's got his fatigue pants hanging on the same hanger with his dress shirt.
Why? Why would he do that? Well, I'm not altogether sure he did.
Just may be that somebody searched this place and when they put it back together, they put it back together wrong.
What do you think they were looking for? Well, I don't know.
Probably the same thing we are.
The only advantage they have is they probably know what it is.
Harvey.
Shana.
Shana, honey.
Oh, Shana, I'm I'm so sick about the Colonel, I don't know what to tell you except that, well, you know, my loss is almost as great as yours.
I know.
Sergeant Slate, this is Mr Sanderson.
Sanderson.
Oh, Mr.
Sanderson.
Rock Sanderson, is it? Yeah, that's right.
It's a little nickname.
It kind of hung over.
I used to do a little amateur fighting, you know.
No, it's okay, Jim.
We can trust Harvey.
You see, that is, Jim and I Of course we can, Shana.
Of course we can.
Look, what Shana's trying to say is that Well, we're about to become engaged.
In about six weeks, I'll have tenure, and when you have tenure, well, you've got a lifetime of security.
Tenure is when they can't fire you.
It's sort of like signing up for a lifetime hitch.
Right.
Right, Sergeant.
Hey, that's right.
Sergeant, we want to thank you for coming by.
Well, I was up at Major Hopkins' office when a guard on the gate called, so I just came on down.
Now, Shana, it's perfectly all right for you to stay here on the base, but I'm afraid Mr.
Sanderson here'll have to get a room in town.
Oh, that's what we were planning on, Sergeant.
Thank you.
All right.
Well, Shana, if there's anything at all I can do for you, anything, all you have to do is call me, you know that.
I know.
I thought I told you that we could trust Harvey.
Do you know how many years Harvey Slate has been with my father? Do you know how many campaigns they've been through together? Yeah.
Well, he missed the one I was in.
I'm gonna have to find out how he managed that.
I tried six or seven different ways and I ended up in a foxhole about 400 yards from the enemy.
One of my classic failures.
Are you going to continue with this kind of talk? I think you're doing it just to infuriate me.
My father was a great soldier, and you spent the entire war trying to find ways to go AWOL without getting caught.
Hey, I'm sorry.
I I'm not trying to bait you.
You hated him, didn't you? You hated Daddy.
I said I'm sorry.
You want a signed confession? Oh, brother.
Just what I need.
Hey.
Shana, I said I would help.
Sure.
I have my reasons.
I'm not doing it just for you.
I'm doing it for me, too.
Why? Shana, your father was a military Boy Scout, complete with a.
45 with notches in the handle.
Now it's a mistake to look at campaign ribbons and battle records and try and judge him.
If you feel grief for the man who bounced you on his knee and went out and bought dresses for you and took you out to the park, that's fine, that's great.
But why mourn a military record? Leave that to the men who write obituaries.
You get out of here right now! Well, it looks like we're just stepping on each other's ghosts.
I'll be at the Seaside Motel.
But he was my father.
Evening.
How's that? What is this, Officer? What have I done? Spread out against that wall, please.
I said what have I done, Officer? First of all, you ain't moving fast enough to suit me.
Do you mind reading me my rights? You're in a lot a trouble, mister.
Do yourself a big favor.
Don't go provoking me.
Look, Officer, I'm in town for Colonel Bowie's funeral.
We served together in Korea.
Now, if I'd known that was against the law, I would've just sent a card.
I don't understand what you think I've done.
You're gonna find out soon enough.
You country cops hand me a laugh.
Everything gonna be all right.
We're gonna have ourselves a real ball.
We better get a few things straightened out here, hadrt we, hoss? You don't mind if I don't give you your rights just yet, do you? This is not exactly what I expected.
You expect me to take you downtown and let you get some hot-shot lawyer to protect you.
I got my own ways of dealing with trash like you.
Sanderson, hmm? James Sanderson.
What you doing in Morgars Rest, Jim? I told you.
I'm here for Colonel Bowie's funeral.
Now, look Ah, he's blowing it.
Don't go away.
I got my eye on you.
I think I'm gonna fix him up where he walks funny.
I can make him come clean.
Billy, let me see that wallet.
I think it's a fake ID, Mr.
Davis.
Well, if this gentleman is legitimate, who's the private investigator? I don't know.
Got a guy in the provost marshal's office in LA.
Now he had coffee with Shana Bowie, and she said she was gonna get some help.
I figured she'd hire some guy.
But what if Mr.
Sandersors from CID? No, no.
He's not from CID, Mr.
Davis.
I'm into the computer.
I know what's going on there.
Billy, we got a shipment of 5.
56 going out tomorrow.
I want you to go back to that gentleman and take him by the collar and toss him up in the air.
When he comes down, I want him moving out of town.
I think I'll bust him up.
That way he'll keep moving, Mr.
Davis.
You bust him up, Billy, and I'll let our friend Harvey here bust you up.
You understand? Yeah.
You chicken-hearted cops really get me.
You take off these cuffs, and I'll club your head down between your knees.
You're nothing but a tub of guts with a big mouth.
What did you say? You heard me, rumdum.
Want me to mess you up? You'd have trouble messing up a bed.
You're leaving Morgars Rest, and you ain't even gonna stop to get your toothbrush.
Now you let me catch you here tomorrow, I'll come down on you so hard, you'll have to reach up to tie your shoes.
That's very colorful, but I just don't think you can cut it, Billy Webster.
I'd purely like to drive you into the hard ground.
Well, I guess you got the message that time, didn't you? Hi.
You're a little jumpy.
I was in the coffee shop.
When I saw you, I came over.
I'm sorry if I startled you.
Well, that's okay, I'll get over it.
What are you doing here? It's really nice in here on the inside.
Color TV.
Everything.
Maybe I ought to check in here, and that way I could eat at the coffee shop and Look, leave me alone, will you? I haven't said anything.
I can't stand it over there.
I'm confused.
It's okay.
Everybody gets confused.
He never did.
Except for that one time last week when he came to me and he asked me to help, and I wanted to help him, but he wouldn't let me.
Sometimes it works that way.
You know, you can't write the scenes and direct the action just for you, Shana.
Boy, you're really big on amateur psychology, aren't you? Well, don't feel guilty about it.
And every time I do it, I add it onto the bill.
What makes you think you have all the answers? Look, Shana.
Let's not tear at one another, all right? Your father was whatever you wanted him to be.
He never took me to the park or out to buy dresses.
He left us, Mother and me, for months and months on end, and all he sent back was money and Japanese swords.
I wanted him to be proud of me, but he was never there.
So instead I studied and I studied and I studied.
Hey, you don't have to explain it.
Yes, I do.
I think that everything I don't like about myself is tied up with it.
You know why I'm an assistant professor at the university? 'Cause you like it? Because it's safe.
It's safe and it's stale.
He didn't love us.
When my mother died, he came back from Korea and he put me in a private school, then he went back.
He didn't love us.
All my life I've been trying to get passing marks from a man who didn't care.
And I've let it ruin my life.
I've become a fossil.
I don't expect you want a comment from me.
Maybe.
Maybe not.
Well, I've known a lot of men like your father.
Don't be too hard on him.
He was very good at being a soldier, and he had a rough time with people.
That rule book was his lifeline.
Told him how he should act.
You break a rule, you go to the stockade or you don't get to go to the park on Sunday.
And you break the rules? No, no.
I bend them, and I hope to win some of the close calls.
Is this yours? Are you just allowed to carry that around? That? I never saw that before in my life.
The maid must have left that here.
You know, for somebody I can't stand, I'm becoming awfully fond of you.
And I just had a feeling about Deputy Webster, so I checked the sheriff's office in town.
There's no Billy Webster on the department.
How did you know he wasrt a cop? Well, my car was parked outside the room at the motel, and he never ran a make on the license plate.
Now, every cop does it.
It's just routine.
If he'd done that, he'd have known my name wasrt Sanderson.
What did the Chief of Police do? Well, what could he do? He filed the assault and battery.
It sounds unreal.
Who do you think they were? Well, I don't know.
A somebody named Mr.
Davis.
Well, I went through the book.
Dwight Davis, 4045 Margate Road.
Alice Davis, 1600 Pacific Coast Highway.
And there is no Billy Webster or B.
Webster or anything like that.
Well, it doesn't make any difference.
He was so eager to give me his name, it'll probably turn out to be an alias.
Oh, hey, do you know what 5.
56 is? No.
Why? Well, Mr.
Davis said something about It sounded kind of important.
If it had anything to do with my father, it had something to do with the base.
Did you find out who Terry was? No.
I searched through my father's quarters.
I couldn't find a clue.
I'm gonna go back there.
I'm gonna go back to my father's quarters.
You sure you want to? I could get you a room here.
I have to.
After all, what good is it to step on your ghosts if you don't kill them? Good girl.
So? I still don't know nothing about it.
Well, it's a black limousine, registered to a Mr.
Davis.
Hey, look, pal, I'm just working an insurance claim.
You wanna get hostile, it's all right with me.
I'll just refer it back to the main office and they'll take care of it through the regular police authorities.
But, you know, you're better off dealing with me.
Now maybe you don't know it, but when you bang up a parked car in a parking lot and take off, the official police charge is hit-and-run.
Well, I ain't got no black limo.
And so help me, if that Alice has gone and took one of them cemetery limos, Quentors gonna skin her alive.
Well, you think maybe somebody named Alice did it? Yeah.
Alice or Terry.
One or the other.
You can go ahead and check on that.
I tell you, mister, you try and be responsible for your kin, and you're gonna get plowed under every time.
That Alice been getting in trouble ever since she was 16 years old.
Quenton give her a job, too.
Her uncle give her a job.
She ain't gonna change none.
Not one bit.
This Terry, who's Terry? Terry.
Oh, yeah.
Well, Terry, that's her girlfriend.
She been She been messing with that Sergeant Slate.
They was all the time getting drunk.
She and Alice been living with us for a while.
I throwed them both out.
She's living in one of them apartments down at 1600.
Down the highway there.
Yeah.
You go talk to Alice or Terry, and you're gonna find your hit-and-run driver.
Them girls is wild, wild, and they're no good! No good! Bingo.
Main gate.
Hi.
This is Professor Sanderson.
I was trying to locate Miss Bowie.
Look, Mr.
Sanderson, I'm afraid I can't help you.
Oh, well, is she in for it.
I mean, I got two calls from Dean Whitmore's office, and the substitute she got to teach her Artifacts and Digging Techniques class can't make heads nor tails out of her notes, and they're about to hang her in effigy.
Look, Professor Sanderson, I can't tell you where she went because I don't know.
She left here with Sergeant Slate in 2424.
The what? It's the number of the car from the motor pool.
They left about an hour ago.
Is Quenton Davis in? Oh, he's not here.
Mahogany Hall? Yeah.
It's terrible, isn't it? But I didn't invent it.
I just work for them.
Well, it's like I told Quenton, Mahogany Hall is the oak-lined library of slumber chambers.
Hey, that's kind of cute.
Yeah.
Hey, I'll bet you're Alice.
Quenton told me he had a good-looking niece named Alice.
No, Alice is in Los Angeles.
Then you must be Terry.
Well, yes.
How did you know? Well, I know that because I'm an old friend of Colonel Bowie's, and he told me he was having a little affair with you.
Hold it.
Hold it.
Just leave me alone, just get away from me.
Wait a minute now.
You're in a lot of trouble, Terry.
I happen to know you're in on it.
You're an accessory to Colonel Bowie's murder.
Now, he came to you and he told you his fears about what was happening on the base, and you fingered him for Slate and Davis, and they killed him.
I didn't know they were gonna kill him.
I swear it.
What were you, a decoy? How did they work that? Look, you can either tell me or the cops.
You make up your own mind.
Two months ago, they told me to go to the Seasider bar.
It's a place where military people go.
Harvey Slate was there with the Colonel, and I was supposed to come on to him and set up a relationship.
And it wasrt too difficult.
I mean, he He was a very brusque man and he didn't get along with girls very well.
So, when I aimed myself at him, he just sort of fell in the basket.
Why? Come on, Terry.
Keep it up.
You're doing fine.
They're smuggling things off the base.
Weapons and stuff in hearses.
Harvey was afraid that the Colonel would find out.
He was pretty alert to the personnel records, so whenever they wanted to stage a funeral, I'd make a date with Colonel Bowie, and we'd go to San Francisco for the weekend.
I'd just get him out of town.
But he caught on that something was happening.
He came to you and told you, not knowing you were in on it? I didn't know they were gonna kill him.
I swear it, I didn't.
What do you think you're pulling with this assistant professor routine? Rockford, I've just about had it with you.
Are you gonna listen to me, or you gonna exercise your mouth? I'm trying to tell you that something called 5.
56 is being smuggled off this base.
Sergeant Slate and a group of morticians have been working the smuggle and doing it for several months.
Slate.
Harvey Slate? Harvey Slate.
That fits.
That sure as hell fits.
A funeral, huh? Of course.
All they had to do was get Colonel Bowie to look the other way.
What's a 5.
56? It's a new kind of ammo.
Fits in the new M-16 rifle.
It's the 5.
56 mm.
Well, there's a funeral going down today.
Now, what they've been doing is putting the stuff in the hearse with the bodies of the dead soldiers that die on the base and smuggling it out.
Oh, no.
That's not what they're doing.
It's even better than that.
Hello.
Is there a hearse on the base picking up a casket right now? How long ago? Look, I need a helicopter, three MPs and a pilot, and I need them five minutes ago.
And get me the Chief of Police.
I'm going with you, Colonel.
No, you're not.
Oh, yes, I am.
You try to stop me, you're gonna get bloody trying.
Give me a reason why.
Well, because I think Colonel Bowie's daughter is with them as a hostage, and, well I told you, I read your file.
You owe him one, don't you? That's right.
Maybe you're okay.
Just maybe.
Okay, that's far enough on the Coast Highway.
They couldn't have made it this far.
Double back and take Route 12 inland, and then we'll check the pass and try the roads south.
Okay, Colonel, it's great to look smart, but how about letting me in on the rest of it? I never thought that Colonel Bowie's death was an accident.
I merely said so to take the heat off.
We've been losing a lot of weaponry, and I was sent down here from Washington to look into it.
First we thought Colonel Bowie was involved, but he was innocent.
It was Sergeant Slate.
Cooked the whole thing up.
Did it have anything to do with a computer? How'd you know that? They were creating military files for fictitious soldiers and running them through the computer system.
All the code numbers were keyed back here to the Morgan Rest computer.
When they needed a shipment to go out, they couldn't count on a convenient death at the base, so they killed off one of their fictitious soldiers.
It wasrt until this morning that I managed to break down the computer codes and figured out the fictitious soldier angle.
Then you came in with that funeral, the rest of the pieces of the puzzle fell together.
Okay.
There they are.
All right, let's just sit on them and see where it goes.
We'll seal off that road.
I'm gonna set two of you down at the mouth of the road, and I'll take the barn.
If they got an M-16 and ammo in there, it's gonna be one hell of a firefight.
Did you ever qualify for an automatic rifle? Colonel, I always try to avoid gunplay.
It's kind of a religion.
If it's absolutely necessary, give me a.
45 or something.
Norfolk, give me a.
45.
Safety's on the right.
No kidding.
How'd it go, Billy? Like a champ.
Don't do that.
What? Don't do that! All right.
Out.
We have to get a chopper down here for Webster.
He's bleeding bad, but he's okay.
I saw that John Wayne shootout, Rockford.
You're okay.
You're gonna work out fine.
Thanks a lot, Colonel.
Let's go.
All right.
Just like my father.
That's exactly what Daddy would've said.
Well, he was a hell of a soldier, your father.
Ask Rockford sometime what happened in Pusan.
Your father was the best.
If you ever need anything, you just call.
I'm gonna personally see they expedite everything, the GI insurance, everything.
Thank you, Colonel.
Thank you.
Why? Why did you do it? I knew you and Daddy didn't get along, but you risked your life to save me and to prove who killed him.
Oh, I have my reasons.
Tell me about Pusan.
What happened there? Oh, it's really kind of dreary, Shana.
It's another one of those "there I was" stories.
What? You know, there I was, surrounded by 50,000 Indians and my guns jammed.
Only in my case, it was just a North Korean patrol.
I got hit a couple of days before in the leg, and the wound was getting kind of nasty.
I kept passing out.
Well, I kept poking the butt of the rifle in the wound just to stay awake.
Been out too long, well, I'd have been dead.
I heard all this gunfire, and North Koreans were dropping right and left.
I looked up, there was your father.
He wasrt a colonel then, he was a major, but he came back for me.
Nobody else was willing to try.
It looked too much like suicide.
There were Koreans all over that hill.
He came back for me, and he was the commanding officer.
Thought a lot about it since then, but I never quite understood why he did it.
So maybe that's the last ghost left to kill, huh? Yeah.
Yeah.
Maybe it is.