The Gas House Kids "in Hollywood"

As they near the end of their cross-country trip, New York teenagers Alfalfa, Orvie, Chimp and Scat, who are headed for Hollywood to visit their screen idol, actor Lance Carter, stop to help a stranded motorist. Unaware that the motorist is famous scientist Gately Crawford and is traveling with the body of his recently deceased friend and peer, Joseph Teller, the boys offer him and his "package" a ride to Hollywood. Out of gratitude, Gately invites the gang to stay at his house, and the boys happily accept. After they reach the newly purchased Crawford mansion, Gately shows the gang his deceased friend and describes his plans to reconstruct ancient sound waves, including the speeches of Joseph and other dead men. Although Joseph makes them nervous, the boys are willing to stay after they meet Gately's daughter Hazel and her attractive female friends. While the boys unpack, Hazel and her boyfriend, Garry Edwards, tell Gately and an eavesdropping Alfalfa that the servants quit after being frightened by strange noises. Gately then explains that he bought the mansion because of rumors that it houses the ghost of an old prospector, who reportedly hid a fortune somewhere on the premises and moves his treasure from place to place each night. Gately hopes to raise sound waves from the prospector, using Joseph's corpse as a conduit between "this world and the next." That night, while Hazel and Garry host a swimming party, Gately begins his experiment on Joseph's body. The scientist is unaware that two mobsters, Hood and Mitch Gordon, are sneaking through a secret passageway in the cellar and have been using a clever, chatty parrot to scare the mansion's occupants into believing the place is haunted. Meanwhile, the teenagers discover a real estate agent named Hawkins floating dead in the pool, and police lieutenant Mack is called to investigate. Before Mack can inspect the body, however, it disappears. Mack orders everyone to remain at the mansion, then conducts a search of the house, but finds nothing. Later that night, Alfalfa and Scat undertake their own search and discover Hawkins' corpse sitting near Joseph's in Gately's laboratory. Once again, however, the bodies vanish before Mack can view them. The next morning, the boys manage to slip away and sneak onto the movie set where Lance Carter is working. After the teenagers, who admire Carter's tough-talking screen image, find the actor, they solicit his help in solving the Crawford mystery. Unknown to the gang, Carter is involved with Hood and Mitch, and has agreed to help steal the prospector's fortune in order to expunge a large gambling debt. He promises to help the boys, but only because the mobsters want him to keep an eye on things. When Carter arrives at the mansion, he directs the boys to search the house again, and while exploring the cellar, Alfalfa and Chimp find the hidden passageway. The terrified boys then stumble on a skeleton and discover a note in the skull containing a riddle with clues to the location of the prospector's money. The boys drop the note, however, when they are surprised in the mansion's wine cellar by the gun-toting Hood and Mitch. The crooks, who killed Hawkins because he knew they had a map of the mansion's secret passageways and have been moving his and Joseph's body around as part of their scare tactics, gag and tie up Alfalfa and Chimp and leave them to "starve to death." Soon, however, Orvie and Scat become alarmed about their friends's absence and rouse the men in the house to help locate them. When Gately discovers that Joseph's body is back in his lab, he immediately resumes his experiment. Upon hearing Alfalfa and Chimp, who have ungagged themselves, yelling through an amplifying system in the cellar, Gately soon realizes the boys's plight and sends Mack, Garry and the police captain to rescue them. Meanwhile, Mitch, Hood and Carter, who have also discovered the prospector's riddle, follow its clues and are led through the passageway to the boys's bedroom closet. As the crooks find the money in a suitcase, the policemen free the boys, who lead them toward the crooks. Hearing the police behind them, the mobsters attempt to escape through the boys's bedroom, but there Orvie and Scat detain them long enough for the policemen to burst in and arrest them.