Gunsmoke – Dooley Surrenders. 540913

Doc comes into the jail, demanding a shotgun to do some quail hunting. Followed on his heels is a man calling himself Doley. After a night of drunkenness that he can’t remember,he claims to have killed a man and is now turning himself into Matt. There hasn’t been a body reported yet, and Matt can see the man’s remorse, and suspects his innocence.

To humor him, Matt locks him up while he and Chester set out to investigate. Matt sets the young buffalo hunter free when the body is finally turned up. The cause of death doesn’t match Dooley’s description of his alleged commission of murder. Using the circumstance, Matt sets a trap for the real killer.

It’s a waiting game as Matt lets the town, and Dooley, keep thinking what they want about Dooley’s guilt in the murder. When the town shuns Dooley, Matt gives him a place to stay, and lay low while he keeps waiting for curiosity to seep into the mind of the real killer. How long will this take? Will it even work? Matt decides to speed things up a little by laying on the pressure for the man who did the killing, and frame up Dooley.

Before it’s all over, things take a little plot twist.