The Case of Henri Vibard

Originally Aired: June 8, 1950 Suspense #388, "The Case of Henri Vibard," finds Henri Vibard living comfortably at Gladstone Memorial Rest Home under the assumed name Leclerc, claiming amnesia after arriving three years earlier with two hundred thousand dollars in American currency. When Sergeant Jack Freeman of the London Bureau of Missing Persons brings a woman named Mary to the rest home, Henri recognizes her immediately as his wife—a woman convicted of murder and sentenced to life in prison. Yet Henri remains confident and amused, knowing that Mary was blamed for crimes he himself orchestrated, including the death of her father, Captain Willard, whose "suicide" Henri carefully arranged with an overdose of heart medication. As Freeman presses Henri with questions about his identity and past, the tension builds. Henri smugly believes he holds all the cards, trusting in his ability to manipulate the situation as he has done before. But Freeman methodically lays out the evidence of Henri's crimes, and the confrontation becomes a battle of wits between a calculating killer and a determined detective, with Mary's unexpected freedom raising dangerous questions about what really happened and who will ultimately be caught in the trap.