The antagonistic police officer is a standard trope in detective fiction. After all, there has to be a reason that people go to the private detective. What’s more, the PI is doing the job the cop is and frankly getting paid quite a lot more for it. It’s clear that Dennis isn’t pulling in $200 a day. Now, it’s also clear that Dennis is doing better than Jim inasmuch as his pay is more consistent, but still. You also have to factor in that one or more of the characters may well be corrupt, too, and the antagonism is obvious.
And this week, Jim is literally working to find the results of a criminal enterprise. Gerald Hyland (Don Eitner) is dying in prison. He manages to pass on to his wife, Jolene (Shelley Fabares), the name of a town—Caldeonia. It’s where he’s hidden the rare stamps that are what he spent the proceeds of his crime on. To his partner, Leonard Blair (Richard Schaal), he has given written directions. The pair need each other to find the stamps. Unfortunately, other people know about it, too.
Len and Jolene had an affair four years earlier. When they first start talking again, he genuinely starts negging her. It’s not a term that existed in 1974, of course, but it’s what he does. (My usual etymology source doesn’t have a reference for it at all.) He criticizes Jolene’s cooking. He tells her that Jerry didn’t care about their affair, just whatever con he had going. It’s clear that she’s supposed to feel so grateful to him for putting up with her that she’ll just let herself get conned. It doesn’t work.
In the cause of yet another car chase, we see Jim do one of the most clever dodges to escape detection I think I’ve ever seen. It works, too, though he gets a ticket for it when a cop notices. (That this is the cop’s first involvement with the chase is slightly less plausible.) They drive past a used car lot where a truck of cars is being unloaded. Jim circles the block and then goes up the truck, faking his car as just one more used car for sale. It’s clever, the kind of thing Jim does and doesn’t get enough credit for.
Jolene trusts Jim because he’s an ex-con. This in spite of all the evidence that none of these people can be trusted. People are beating up Len, repeatedly, because they think they can get the information about the loot out of him. He and Jolene double-cross each other a couple of times. Jerry married Jolene as part of his front to look normal and wholesome and con people more easily. Now, Jim can be trusted. Probably more than that sheriff and definitely more than some of the law enforcement we’ve seen on this show. But so can Rocky, who’s never been to prison in his life.
Take Care of Rockford Files: Car chase. Another car chase. Jim crashes a car into a barn.