Diamonds Are a Gal’s Best Friend – Director: Peter Stebbings/Writer: Carol Hay
This one starts with Frankie and Trudy out in the country, investigating a stolen horse. The farmer (Sommers) complains about the missing horse then casually mentions his daughter Camille has disappeared too. Camille only goes into town (with the horse) twice a week to deliver produce, but today’s not her day to go. Sommers claims Camille is an innocent, god-fearing girl, but Trudy finds some booze and a trashy romance novel hidden in the barn. They find a man’s shoeprints, a Turkish cigarette butt, and a torn scrap of Camille’s dress. They wonder if she ran off with a lover, or if she was running from someone else.
Frankie and Trudy follow Camille’s delivery route, turning up nothing until the last stop, a restaurant called Austin’s. At the police station, Flo and Mary are supposed to have lunch, but have to take a detour to a crime scene to retrieve the coroner’s hat. (And we find out that Flo thinks Detective Greyson is hot.) At Austin’s restaurant, Frankie and Trudy hear that Camille
was sweet on a stablehand named Hank who helped her once, so they head over to the stable and find her hiding out. Camille tells them some guy came to the farm with a gun so she got the hell out of there and came to the stable to hide. She tells them she saw the guy running out of a building along her route the day before and takes them to the location, giving them a short description of the guy and mentioning that he drove a red car. Turns out it’s the same crime scene Flo and Mary are 
at, a hotel where someone was murdered. Obviously, the guy Camille saw was the killer and he thinks she witnessed the murder, so he wants to shut her up. Since the killer knows where she lives, Frankie takes Camille to the hotel where her mother Nora lives to hide out. Nora agrees to hide Camille, but she’s unimpressed with her bumpkin look and is already planning a makeover.
At the morgue, Flo tells Frankie and Trudy that the murder victim (Archibald Carnegie) was an American who was stabbed by a long knife or dagger. Carnegie was apparently a rich investment banker, but Frankie finds a train station locker key in his shoe. At the hotel, Nora teaches Camille how to be a bit more glamorous, but they’re interrupted by the
manager wanting Nora to pay her bill. She admits to Camille that she’s six months behind on her bill and Camille asks why she lives in the hotel, so Nora regales her with stories of her various escapades. At the office, Frankie and Trudy open the suitcase they found in the train locker and find out Carnegie was really a claims investigator for Primary Insurance Company. They also find a $100,000 bearer bond and a clipping from a German newspaper about a stolen diamond. The cops in Vienna arrested the fence, but the seller got away. Frankie thinks the bond might be fake, so she asks Trudy to check it out and goes to see Nora. She tells Frankie the diamond in question is a famous one (the Antoinette) that was stolen in Paris a while back. Frankie asks Nora to call her shady contacts to see if there’s any buzz about the Antoinette. Camille thinks Nora working with Frankie must be exciting, but Nora admits they don’t really get along. She tries to pretend it doesn’t bother her, but obviously she wishes things were different. The bond does turn out to be fake, so Frankie and Trudy figure Carnegie was trying to buy the diamond with it and was killed when the thief got wise to his game. Mary shows up to let them know the car is registered to Edith Burns-Higgins, so Frankie 
wonders if her driver might be the killer. At the hotel, we see that Camille is a natural bullshit artist when she convinces the manager that Nora has measles and that she’s Nora’s niece there to minister to her. Camille hints that the manager will get plenty of money once Nora recovers (or dies) and he buys it. Nora’s proud of Camille’s lying, but warns her that sometimes you have to cut your losses and leave. Camille realizes Nora wants to stick around to fix things with Frankie, but Nora says that story probably won’t have a happy ending. Frankie shows up with a photo of Burns-Higgins’s car and driver, but Camille points out another guy in the photo as the one who came after her.
Since the killer wants to unload the diamond, Frankie decides to run a sting to trap him. Trudy talks to Burns-Higgins’s maid and learns the guy is
Count Johan, an Austrian that Burns-Higgins met in Europe and invited over. She’s throwing a big party for him tomorrow, so Frankie figures that’s their best opportunity to nail Johan. Nora uses her Lipstick newspaper column to set things up, going on about a rich woman named Eudora Nelson who loves diamonds and considered buying the Antoinette before it was stolen. Nora will play 
Eudora, Frankie her daughter Olivia, Trudy her personal secretary, Mary a maid, and Flo another rich (and gossipy) lady. At the party, Nora and Frankie lay on the bullshit, pulling Johan right into their trap by making it sound like “Eudora’s” current husband is rich and willing to spend any amount of money to keep his wife’s affections. Unfortunately, another guest almost screws things up by recognizing Nora.
Frankie covers up and Flo makes Mary spill champagne on the nosy woman. 
Johan takes the bait and hints that he might have the diamond, so Frankie agrees to let him meet Eudora’s current husband, Oscar. That night, Johan shows up and meets Oscar (played by Detective Greyson), offering him the diamond. When Camille identifies Johan and Greyson tries to arrest him, Johan grabs Camille and threatens to kill her with the dagger concealed in his cane. Trudy knocks him out and Camille is fine, but takes off with the diamond. Hank is gone too, so they obviously went off together. Later, Nora tries to write a goodbye note to
Frankie, but finds out someone (Camille) has paid her bill and another year in advance. Camille also paid all her father’s debts and bought him a tractor, but Frankie figures she and Hank (her new husband) will still have plenty of money to tour Europe with—especially after she stole Nora’s fence book.
This is a good episode. It’s always nice to see Nora, and her influence on 
Camille is interesting, since she didn’t get to have an impact on Frankie. But Frankie and Nora are more alike than either wants to admit, so much so that it’s painfully obvious they both want to mend fences, but both are too proud to make the first move. It’s fun to see the whole gang working together for the big con job, with even Greyson getting in on it at the end.
Favourite Quotes:
- “When you said she was fresh off the farm, I didn’t expect the whole country mouse routine.” Nora on first seeing Camille.
- “Shame he’s a murderer.” Flo when Nora comments that Frankie and Johan make a handsome couple.
- “Thank you. It’s my specialty.” Trudy when Greyson praises her for knocking Johan out with a vase from behind.