Mrs. Logan calls Sheriff Ben Wister when she begins to believe that her neighbor Harry Jarvis killed his wife and buried her in his back yard. She notes that Harry has been acting strangely. He has been digging in the yard all night and has been drinkinf beer all day. She also notes that Mrs. Jarvis's annoying little dog has also gone missing. When the police interview him, Harry claims that his wife left him for another man. He also claims that his wife left her dog with him and that it died after an illness. The sheriff is unconvinced by Harry's explanation and gets a search warrant to dig up his back yard. When the police start digging they find a dead dog and believe Harry's story. Later, Harry visits Mrs. Logan who is in fact his secret lover. Harry did kill his wife and he and Mrs. Logan bury Mrs. Jarvis's body where the dog was once buried. They think that the police would never bother to check the dog's grave again.

The mentally ill Dr. Fenwick is a supporter of the therapeutic value of role-playing in psychiatry. He kills the head of the sanatarium where he is a patient and assumes the man's identity. He locks doctors and nurses in the attic and gives their responsibilities to other patients. Things run rather smoothly until Natalie Rivers, the neice of the now dead head of the sanatarium, arrives for a visit. Since she has never seen her uncle before Fenwick is able to trick her into thinking that he is her uncle. Natalie discovers her real uncle's body and, not knowing who he is, asks Fenwick to call the police. He pretends to call the police and a patient pretending to be a detective shows up to look things over. Eventually Natalie discovers the staff locked in the attic. Fenwick tries to prevent her from telling anyone, but he is stopped by the police.

At a carnival sideshow, a farmer named Charlie Hill buys a strange jar, which brings him notoriety and respect in the community because people travel for miles to gather in his parlor and look at the jar and it's obscure content. But his young wife, Thedy Sue, is frightened of it and insists that he throw it out.

George Maxwell is a former playboy who has just married his boss's daughter Mavis. George, however, must meet an ex-girlfriend to give her money. He arrives in a cab only to find his ex-girlfriend dead. He heads back home, but the next day the cabbie who drove him to the murder scene threatens him with blackmail. George tells his Mavis and she kills the cab driver and buries his body in the rose garden. Mavis then tells George that she killed his ex-girlfriend because she was alos blackmailing him. George is impressed and, later, when George's secretary threatens blackmail because she he knows about the cab driver, George calls Mavis and tells her that more rose bushes are on the way.

Alice Pemberton is a busy-body housewife who injects herself into the personal lives of everyone she knows: friends, relatives, her husband's business associates. Unfortunately she fails to realize that her constant attempts to give advice are alienating everyone. Her husband John is patient. He tries to tell her that her annoying behavior will cost them the last few friends that they have left. She refuses to listen. So, John decides to poison her.

Gerald Swiney, a henpecked husband, decides to get rid of his nagging wife, Edith, when she won't agree to a divorce. He intends to drive her away by making her think he's planning to kill her, but things don't go exactly as planned.

A convicted bank robber John Perry is sentenced to 15 years hard labor in a state prison lumber camp. Determined to get out, James befriend an alcoholic inmate named Doc. Doc is in charge of the prison infirmary as well as burials for the dead. Doc makes an offer to John: if John will fincance an operation for Doc's granddaughter, he will get him out of prison. Doc's plan is to hide Perry inside the coffin of the next inmate who dies. The coffin will then be buried and dug up after the gravediggers and guards leave. Perry will then make his escape. All goes according to plan, until Doc fails to dig Perry up. Perry then learns why when the shroud slips from the face of the corpse sharing the coffin with him. Its Doc who died of a heart attack the night before.

Newlyweds Dave and Bonnie Snowden visit the abandoned home of Bonnie's late father. In the home, Dave finds a locked door and comes to believe that there is something valuable inside. Later, Dave and Bonnie tell Bonnie's elderly mother Mrs. Daniels that they are married. Bonnie's mother is convinced that Dave is after her daughter inheritance. She tries to bribe Dave to annull the marriage. Dave refuses, but he is desperate for money. In an effort to convince Bonnie's mother of his good intentions. He convinces Bonnie to fake a suicide attempt by overdosing on sleeping pills. Dave hopes that Mrs. Daniels will see him caring for her and change her mind about him. Unfortunately, Bonnie is allergic to sleeping pills and accidently dies. After the funeral, Mrs. Daniels tells Dave that she has had a change of heart. She gives him the abandoned house. Dave heads to the home and again wonders what is behind the locked door. As he talks to himself,

Tony Grainger is a young boy who gets fifteen dollars for his birthday. He asks his father Steven to take him to an out-of-the-way magic shop so that he can spend it. Mr. Dulong, the mysterious owner of the shop, takes an interest in the boy and agrees to teach him everything he knows about magic. Despite his father's protests Tony is invited to step into a cabinet by Mr. Dulong. Ignoring his father, Tony steps inside and promptly disappears. When Mr. Dulong, himself, disappears Steven is shocked. The next day Tony comes out of the cabinet and acts like nothing happened. Eventually the Grainger's realize that there son has become a master of black magic and that they are helpless in the face of his dark power.

Sheridan Westcott kills his wife, hides it in his Rolls Royce, and heads to a nearby lake to dispose of it. While he is checking the water level in the lake, his car is stolen by a car thief named Philadelphia Harry.

Marcia Fowler accuses a neighborhood boy named Roy Bullock of being a peeping Tom. Roy denies it and manages to ingratiate himself with Marcia's husband, Jack, and her lonely stepson. When Marcia gets an obscene phone call she tells Jack that it was Roy, but he denies it. Later, after Jack goes away on a business trip, Marcia confronts Roy after receiving another obscene phone call and becomes fearful that Roy is crazy when he tells her that his mother was just like her.

Bessie Carnby and her daughter Camilla have been feuding with their neighbors Henry and Samantha Wilkins. In order to patch things up Bessie invites them over for dinner. Samantha refuses to go, but Henry goes and tries to act friendly. Later, he disappears and Bessie sees Samantha digging a hole in her barn. Bessie accuses Samantha of murder and calls the police. The police dig up the hole and find a badly decomposing body. Samantha is executed for the crime, but later Henry returns claiming he went out to sea. He has inherited his wife's money and marries Camilla. Bessie realizes she has been tricked and, feeling guilty over having sent an innocent Samantha to her death, decides to bring Henry to justice by poisoning herself and making it look like he is responsible.

Louise Henderson rents a room to woman named Vera Brandon who begins to show an unreasonable amount of interest in Louise's newborn son. Louise begines investigating and discovers that she and Vera shared the same maternity ward when her son was born. She also discovers that Vera's baby died during childbirth and this death has left her mentally disturbed. She comes home only to both Vera and her son missing. She finds an address and calls the police. The police go to the address and discover Vera rocking the baby back and forth and claiming that the child is hers. The police return the child to Louise and send Vera to a mental hospital for treatment.

When his teenage son Tommy is found murdered in the town of Northfield, John Cooley sets out to avenge the boys death. John is a religious fanatic who believes he is on a mission from God. When he finds a piece of car headlight at the murder scene, he seeks out and kills the car's original owner Frency La Font and an elderly librarian who had some connection to the car. With all the murders, the residents of Northfield are unstandably shaken. They demand that Sheriff Will Pearce solve the case. Unfortunately, Pearce's girlfriend Susan Marsh falls under Cooley's suspicions since she bought the car from La Font. His attempt to kill her, however, is foiled at the last second by the timely arrival of Sheriff Pearce. Pearce explains that La Font murdered Tommy and confessed to it in his last will and testament.

Jim Derry is a hit man who is hired to kill a bookie named Eddie Breech. He begins to have second thoughts when he finds out that Eddie's wife Connie is confined to a wheelchair and is being cheated on by her husband. He talks to the Breechs and agrees to help the two fake Eddie's death so that Derry can get paid for the hit and the two can start over in Mexico. Derry goes to the morgue and aquires a body. He puts Eddies wallet and wedding ring on the corpse and starts it on fire after putting it in a car. Derry gets paid, but is arrested by the police. The police found the car and believe Eddie is dead. Derry tells the police that Eddie is in Mexico. The police then bring Connie into the room. She accuses Derry of shooting Eddie the night before. Derry has been set up. Connie killed her husband and set up Derry to take the fall.

Brown is a chronic gambler and bigamist who starts to run out of money when his wealthy wives start turning up dead. The police suspect that he is responsible for murder, but when no evidence turns up they are forced to conclude that each death was a suicide. The real murderer is one of Brown's wives who jealously wants to keep her husband all to herself. She tells him that if he strays again she will commit suicide and she will arrange for him to be charged for her murder and the murders of his other wives.

A elderly woman is locked in an air tight safe, with one of her cats, by her niece's fiancé when she discovers he is a forger.

Academy Award hopeful Lana Layne's past comes back to haunt her when her husband George, an ex-convict who she thought was dead, wants her back. She's not interested, but if she does divorce him, he would get half of everything. Then there's Haila French, a gossip columnist who wants an exclusive story, so she surprises Lana and her boyfriend with surprising results.

Medical student Skip Baxter has an alcohol problem and a practical joke playing roomate named Doc Carroll. Doc wants Skip to quit drinking and cooks up a scheme. He takes a cadaver from the medical school morgue and dresses it to look like a waitress named Ruth. He then puts it into Skip's bed as he is sleeping off a hangover. When Skip wakes up, he sees the body and becomes convinced that he committed murder in an alcoholic stupor. He wraps the body in a rug and disposes it. When he returns to school, he finds out that Ruby is alive and that Doc has gotten into trouble for stealing a cadaver. Skip agrees to replace the body to get skip out of trouble. At the next anatomy class, the professor reveals the replacement cadaver to be the body of Doc Carroll.

Near the end of World War II, a phony medium named Adelaide Winters cheats grieving families of soldiers killed in battle by pretending to communicate with ghosts. When she meets a wealthy widower named Edward Porter and finds out that his son was killed in battle, she insists that he join her seance. Edward reluctantly joins and begins to believe in Adelaide powers. Eventually, he proposes marriage to her so that the two of them can be with his son. Adelaide accepts the proposal but the honeymoon doesn't go as planned.

Lee Griffin is an actor who is reunited with his old girlfriend Diana at a London production of a play being financed by Diana's husband Charles Justin. Lee and Diana rekindle their old romance and hatch a plot to kill her husband who is a wealthy diamond merchant. Lee's first attempt to kill Charles fails, but he succeeds on his second try. On a trip to Paris, Lee assumes Charles's identity. Unfortunately, Charles was aware of Diana's unfaithfulness and murderer her before he was killed. He hid her body in a car which is being shipped to Paris. Customs officials find the body and Lee, who is posing as Charles, is arrested for the crime.

Howard Clements is wrongfully accused of assaulting a woman named Isabel Smith. He is convicted of the crime and is sent to prison for two years. When he gets out of prison he steals $13,000 which is the exact amount he would have earned if he had not been in prison. He then opens a record store in his hometown. He meets Isabel a few times and manages to get a date with her. Eventually the two become engaged. On their honeymoon, Howard sabotages the fuel line of the boat they rented and convinces Isabel to take a ride on it solo. Later, Howard gets hiw revenge when he hears an explosion in the distance. As he returns home, he is stopped by the police who know about his theft and also suspect him of murder.

Michael Barnes is a mystery writer who is accused of causing a fatal car accident. Each eyewitness, however, proves to be unreliable when their testimony is shredded by Barnes who is acting as his own defense attorney. He is exonerated after he shows that each witness only saw what they wanted to see. Ultimately, however, it is revealed that he was not the driver. The driver was his pregnant wife. Barnes arranged to have himself accused because he knew that his wife would not be able to stand the strains of a trial.

Warren Barrow writes mystery novels under a pseudonymn. He sends his publisher a series of tape recordings that appear to detail either the plot of his next mystery novel or the plan for a murder he is actually going to commit. Using his own name on the tapes, Barrow describes how he renewed a friendship with a very attractive girl named Janet West. Janey, however, is married and wants someone to kill her wealthy husband. Blinded by passion, Barrow agrees to commit murder. At the last minute, however, he gets cold feet and later, out of guilt, decides to kill Janet. The tape ends, however. The publisher and another writer, Tom Keller, become convinced that Barrow is planning murder. The publisher calls the police while Keller heads for Janet's apartment. At the apartment, Keller discovers Janet dead and Barrow holding the murder weapon. Barrow is taken to the police station where he provides an ending to his novel and a complete confession, all on tape.

Gerald and Milly Musgrove successfully steal $100,000 dollars, but run into the problem of where to hide the money. The couple befriend an elderly and somewhat senile woman named Emmy Rice. After a visit to her home, Gerald stashes the money in a stack of old magazines. Later, he convinces the old woman to name him in her will.