The story
“The Thanhouser 46-reel serial, The Million Dollar Mystery, is released each Monday in episodes of two reels each. The reels in each episode are termed respectively Part One and Part Two. In last week’s issue of Reel Life, Episode One of The Mystery, released Monday, June 22, was reviewed. In this week’s issue we tell in synopsis form the story contained in Episodes Two and Three, Parts Three to Six, inclusive.
“When the Black Hundred conspirators broke into the House of Mystery to find that Sidney [sic; should be Stanley] Hargreave, the renegade member of their band, had escaped from the roof of the mansion in the balloon of A. Leo Stevens, they came upon Jones, Hargreave’s faithful butler. After tying him to a chair they subject him to a hurried third degree in an effort to make him reveal where his master had hidden his fortune. After Hargreave’s escape they abandon their attempt to learn anything from the butler, believing that Hargreave has taken the money with him in the balloon.
“Episode Two, Part One, shows Jones, the butler, struggling to free himself. Removing the receiver from the telephone resting on the table near his chair, with his teeth, the butler calls police headquarters. A platoon of police soon arrive and unbind him. They find the safe in the Hargreave’s home broken open and its contents scattered about. A search is begun for the conspirators. Florence Gray (Hargreave’s daughter) arrives with Miss Farlow to find her father gone.
“Jones, who meets her at the station, produces the other half of the bracelet which Florence carries, and gives her a letter from her father instructing her to trust him implicitly. Florence hardly has had time to adjust herself to her new surroundings when she has two visitors. One of them is Norton, the reporter, who reveals himself as a true friend. The other is Countess Olga Petroff who, upon the pretense that she knew Florence’s father, tries to ingratiate herself into the girl’s confidence.
“While the Countess, Norton, Florence and Miss Farlow are together, two of the conspirators, representing themselves to be Central Office detectives, force their way into the house in an effort to find Hargreave’s money for which they did not have time to search thoroughly the night before. Norton at once recognizes the detectives as impostors and calls up police headquarters. The conspirators suspect the reporter and while a desperate fight is in progress the police arrive. The two conspirators are captured and taken away.
“During the fight the Countess Petroff, seeing the struggle going against Braine, succeeds in tripping up the reporter. Norton, however, manages to pinion his man, and, although suspicious of the Countess, says nothing when the police arrive. She is allowed to depart without being molested. The conspirators, taking advantage of a street accident, in which a child is run down by an automobile, break away from the police when the vigilance of the latter is relaxed for a moment. The exciting episode in which Norton has figured cements the friendship between him and Florence, and the reel closes with a pretty scene between the young couple. The Countess Olga, clever adventuress that she is, still remains unsuspected of complicity with the conspirators who are plotting the death of Florence Gray’s father and the seizure of his great fortune.”
Summary from Reel Life · 4 July 1914
