Surfside 6 Season 2, Episode 18: Artful Deceit

Count Seven!

Ken is hired to investigate theft at an amusement park. He befriends a little girl while there, then finds himself between the girl's divorced parents when the man's fiancee turns up murdered and the little girl's stuffed birthday present is stolen at gunpoint from her home.

60 min

The Wedding Guest

When Daphne is kidnapped on the way to a friend's wedding in Nassau, Sandy discovers the truth about the prospective groom.

60 min

One for the Road

When Daphne falls in love with a mysterious young nomad, the detectives are suspicious of his past.

60 min

Daphne, Girl Detective

Daphne invites a friend of hers and her actor husband to a party on the houseboat. The couple argue and leave separately. He waits for Daphne's friend and kills her. Daphne strongly suspects this, but since Lt. Plehn and the SurfSide detectives refuse to listen to her theories she decides to take matters into her own hands.

60 min

The Empty House

A wealthy businessman hires Ken to look after his wild daughter. The girl is enamored with an ex-con who owes a crime boss $25,000. When the man turns up dead, she confesses to his murder.

60 min

Witness for the Defense

Dave Thorne tries to defend Sandy, who is facing a murder charge after slugging a drunken attacker who was found dead only minutes later.

60 min

Laugh for the Lady

Dave Thorne runs into an old girlfriend who turns out to be involved in a marital triangle that leads to attempted murder.

60 min

The Affairs at Hotel Delight

While preparing to leave a tiny hotel Ken finds a young woman passed out in the hall outside his room. He revives her and discovers she is carrying $45,000 ransom money for her abducted boyfriend. Ken, against his better judgment, decides to help her ""negotiate"" with the kidnappers because she is $5,000 short of their ransom demand -- and she keeps fainting.

60 min

Jonathan Wembley Is Missing

Sandy is persuaded to help a ventriloquist whose dummy has been kidnapped.

60 min

The Old School Tie

Jersey State, Dave's alma mater, is holding its class of 1951 reunion at the Fontainebleau Hotel. The reunion opens up old wounds that lead to murder.

60 min

A Matter of Seconds

60 min

Prescription for Panic

60 min

A Slight Case of Chivalry

Dave is the focal point in the hunt for Dan Castle, Dave's one-time employer in a private investigative office in New York. People inquiring as to the man's whereabouts include a bounty hunter who is out for the $5,000 reward on Castle's head on a murder charge in New York and a woman who claims to be his wife. Dave tries to sort out who is telling the truth about his one-time co-worker before the bounty hunter makes Castle his sixth victim.

60 min

Pattern for a Frame

A judge's daughter trips and falls on the beach near Ken, injuring her ankle. The ""accident"" leads to the two going out for dinner. What Ken doesn't know is the woman is being blackmailed by a racket boss to lure Ken into a trap where he will be accused of murder.

60 min

The Roust

When Ken inquires as to why his partner left the Boom Boom Room in an angry huff, Dave says he saw a man he wanted to kill. The man in question is Bernard ""Chilly"" Childress, a ruthless criminal whom Dave once unsuccessfully prosecuted in New York, and who was responsible for Dave once being shot in the chest. Lt. Plehn has word that Childress is planning on moving to Miami, so Dave sets out to do what he failed to do in New York: finish off Childress.

60 min

The Quarterback

A woman, the former girlfriend of a convicted mob boss, tells Lt. Plehn's brother, a star quarterback preparing to play in the Orange Bowl, that she is Lt. Plehn's mistress, and he stole evidence. Her boyfriend approaches the football star and tells him that, unless he throws the outcome of the Orange Bowl, the district attorney will be contacted and Lt. Plehn will be arrested. The charges aren't true, but the quarterback is so angry at his brother over the story that he refuses to talk to him. Sandy knows something is wrong after he sees Lt. Plehn's brother with a racketeer, but he has only one day before the big game to sort everything out.

60 min

Separate Checks

60 min

Anniversary Special

A famous TV star's plans for a gala program coinciding with his wedding anniversary face a potential shipwreck when his wife tells him she wants a divorce. He hires Dave to look after her, presenting her as a ""nervous"" type who might try suicide. Dave believes there is something more sinister behind her ""emotional"" problems, centered around her husband's ego and political aspirations.

60 min

The Surfside Swindle

Not realizing that he is being taken by a conman, Garibaldi Dinato pays a year's rent up front to lease the Surfside 6 houseboat as a new location for his Italian restaurant.

60 min

Who Is Sylvia?

Sylvia, the head of a flourishing swimsuit company, walked off the job. Her husband hires Dave to find her, portraying her as mentally unstable and having made threats on his life. Dave finds Sylvia but she runs away rather than return to her business. When her husband turns up dead, Lt. Plehn seeks her arrest, ignoring the information Dave and Ken uncover about other possible suspects.

60 min

Find Leroy Burdette

A woman from South Carolina shows up at the office while Ken's trying to go fishing and asks him to find the boyfriend that jilted her. Initially reluctant, Ken takes the job and discovers that her ex-boyfriend has mob ties. Meanwhile, Daphne and Cha Cha attempt to improve her wardrobe in case Ken finds her boyfriend, and Lt. Plehn is trying to establish a case on a murdered mobster.

60 min

Many a Slip

Sandy is hired to find an old acquaintance, the director of a lingere show. He encounters a number of romantic double-crosses. One member of the show entourage turns up dead, an apparent suicide, but Sandy thinks otherwise.

60 min

The Green Beret

Dave is temporarily reactivated into the military as a training officer. Intelligence has an enemy agent under surveillance and knows that her contact is in the unit Dave is training, but they don't know who the spy is. Dave must discover who the spy is to prevent his unit's ordered simulated attack on a nuclear power facility from becoming real.

60 min

Vendetta Arms

Daphne befriends five retired old crooks sharing a house together. A young crook is staying there and is stealing things and threatening everyone.

60 min

A Piece of Tommy Minor

Singing sensation Tommy Minor has a problem -- gambling. His manager asks Sandy to get the mob off his back. Sandy knows a gambling boat outside the territorial limits runs crooked games, but he has to prove it, and keep himself and Tommy out of danger.

60 min

Portrait of Nicole

An insurance company hires the boys to find the beneficiary of a life insurance policy named Nicole Johnson. Things get complicated when the boys find three Nicole Johnsons.

60 min

Elegy for a Bookkeeper

A former client of Ken's is murdered in prison before he can be released to testify against a racket boss. In order to prove the boss was behind the murder, Ken must make everyone think the murdered man is still alive -- and that Ken and Dave have split up in an argument over the man's daughter.

60 min

The Money Game

A prince is developing a new co-op with oil. Sandy has been hired to ask the prince to consider a rival partner for the ""black sand"". With the amount of money at stake, rivals will stop at nothing to be the prince's partner.

60 min

Irish Pride

60 min

Green Bay Riddle

The small town of Green Bay doesn't like outsiders. One such outsider was acquitted of the murder of his father-in-law, although everyone still considers him guilty. Ken is hired by the man's wife to prove to the townsfolk that the man is indeed innocent.

60 min

Love Song for a Deadly Redhead

Jeff, a private investigator from L.A. and friend of the SurfSide detectives, is called to Miami to investigate a threatening note left for a lounge singer. He meets a redhead, who takes him to her home. He passes out and wakes up the prime suspect in the murder of the redhead's husband, leaving his SurfSide friends to clear him.

60 min

Dead Heat

60 min

Squeeze Play

A Private Eye for Beauty

60 min

Masquerade

60 min

Pawn's Gambit

60 min

The Neutral Corner

Someone is trying to kill a former boxing champion, so his manager hires Ken to find out who is behind the ""accidents"" (including a bomb placed at SurfSide 6 during a party for the champ). Ken finds no shortage of suspects, including the boxer's ex-wife, a crusading sports writer, and a mob boss who owns the boxer's contract.

60 min

House on Boca Key

A drug store delivery boy borrows a formal jacket from Sandy for a prom. As he leaves the houseboat he is shot. Sandy thinks it was a case of mistaken identity and the bullets were meant for him.

60 min

Midnight for Prince Charming

As part of the latest scheme of a husband and wife con artist team the husband seeks to hire Ken, portraying his wife as cheating on him with the intended scam victim. Ken refuses to take the job because the man named is a friend and frequent client, but he becomes involved when a cohort of the couple turns up dead.

60 min