opening on the stairway was ajar a few inches.
I stepped out on the stairs, although I knew I would see no one. The white-lit, broad alley between Stages 6 and 4 was silent and empty.
The sound of running feet came to me, steadily growing louder. A man came racing into view. I recognized him as one of the publicity gang. I hailed him.
"Can't wait," he gasped, but slowed down nevertheless.
I said, "Have you seen anyone around here just now? The—Chevalier Futaine?"
He shook his head. "No, but" His face was white as he looked up at me. "Hess Deming's gone crazy. I've got to contact the papers."
Ice gripped me. I raced down the stairs, clutched his arm.
"What do you mean?" I snapped. "Hess was all right when I left him. A bit tight, that's all."
His face was glistening with sweat. "It's awful—I'm not sure yet what happened. His wife—Sandra Colter—came to life while they were cremating her. They saw her through the window, you know—screaming and pounding at the glass while she was being burned alive. Hess got her out too late. He went stark, raving mad. Suspended animation, they say—I've got to get to a phone, Mr. Prescott!"
He tore himself away, sprinted in the direction of the administration buildings.
I put my hand in my pocket and pulled out a scrap of paper. It was the note I had found in Hess Deming's house. The words danced and wavered before my eyes. Over and over I was telling myself, "It can't be true! Such things can't happen!"
I didn't mean Sandra Colter's terrible resurrection during the cremation. That, alone, might be plausibly explained—catalepsy, perhaps. But taken in conjunction with certain other occurrences, it led to one definite conclusion—and it was a conclusion I dared not face.
What had poor Forrest said? That the Chevalier was taking Jean to the Cocoa-nut Grove? Well
The taxi was still waiting. I got in.
"The Ambassador," I told the driver grimly. "Twenty bucks if you hit the green lights all the way."
3. The Black Coffin
All night I had been combing Hollywood—without success. Neither the Chevalier Futaine nor Jean had been to the Grove, I discovered. And no one knew the Chevalier's address. A telephone call to the studio, now ablaze with excitement over the Hess Deming disaster and the Forrest killing, netted me exactly nothing. I went the rounds of Hollywood night life vainly. The Trocadero, Sardi's, all three of the Brown Derbies, the smart, notorious clubs of the Sunset eighties—nowhere could I find my quarry. I telephoned Jack Hardy a dozen times, but got no answer. Finally, in a "private club" in Culver City, I met with my first stroke of good luck.
"Mr. Hardy's upstairs," the proprietor told me, looking anxious. "Nothing wrong, I hope, Mr. Prescott? I heard about Deming."
"Nothing," I said. "Take me up to him."
"He's sleeping it off," the man admitted. "Tried to drink the place dry, and I put him upstairs where he'd be safe."
"Not the first time, eh?" I said, with an assumption of lightness. "Well, bring up some coffee, will you? Black. I've got to—talk to him."
But it was half an hour before Hardy was in any shape to understand what I
