Waiting for Goddard

Caroline Selby is a private investigator, and she comes to Arthur for help finding Albert Goddard, an eccentric recluse and inventor who has just come into an inheritance. Arthur sees a rake-off and says yes before the details are out. He installs Goddard in a safe house, rather against the old man's will, and tries to palm off one of the inventions as his own work. The finder's fee, when it finally arrives, is paltry compared to the sum at stake, which is Arthur's luck in a nutshell. Caroline, who is rather better at this line of work than Arthur will ever be, does not seem to mind the company.

Ronald Fraser plays Goddard with the distracted energy of a man who has spent a lifetime inventing things nobody asked for and is only now being paid for it. Mel Martin's Caroline keeps a professional eye on the whole business, and there is a dry amusement in the way she watches Arthur try to get ahead of her. Kenneth Cope is Scooter, Donald Douglas is Mr. Prosser and Dimitri Andreas is Georgie, each adding a little something to the local shuffle.

Chisholm, meanwhile, has troubles of his own. A visit to his tailor leaves him literally stitched up, in a scene that gives Patrick Malahide some of his best comic material of the season. The tailor's stitch-up is a rare chance for Chisholm to be the victim rather than the hunter, and he makes the most of it.

Leon Griffiths wrote it and Roy Ward Baker directed. Dennis Waterman is Terry, George Cole is Arthur, Glynn Edwards is Dave, and Michael Povey is D.C. Jones.

But Waiting for Goddard never quite delivers the fortune the title suggests. The waiting itself, though, is pleasant company, and watching Arthur work a job where the prize keeps shrinking is its own reward.