sed almost as much horror as the scream had
done.

Still smiling, utterly composed, she stepped into an elevator--and the
elevator boy shivered a bit as he stared at her. He had not heard the
scream, did not know that anything was wrong. He only knew that
something in this lovely woman's smile sent cold fingers up and down his
spine.

* * * * *

It was a grim, white-faced trio that sat in the conference room of the
Blue Bay Hotel at eleven next morning.

Chichester nor Gest nor Kroner--none had had a moment's sleep all night.
They had been in Doctor Grays' suite with Weems when a shivering man--a
well-known young clubman, too, which was unfortunate--stumbled up to
tell of the dreadful thing to be seen in the roulette room.

With horror mounting in their breasts, half knowing already what they
would see, the three had gone there.

Nine more, counting the croupier, in a state like that which Weems was
in! Nine more people with all life, all movement, arrested in
mid-motion! Ten now with some kind of awful paralysis gripping them in
which they did not move nor seemingly breathe--ten who were dead by
every test known to science, but who, as even laymen could see at a
glance, were yet indubitably alive!

"Blue Bay Development is ruined," ground out Kroner. It had been said a
dozen times by every one of the three; but the words made the other two
look at him in frantic denial just the same.

"If we can keep it quiet--just for a little while--just until----"

"Until what?" snapped Kroner. "If we only had an idea when this
mysterious sickness would leave these people! We could stall the news
perhaps for a day, or even two days--_if_ we could have some assurance
that at the end of twenty-four or forty-eight hours they'd be all right
again. But we haven't. They may be like that for months before they
die--may even die in a few hours. Grays can't tell. This is all beyond
his medical experience. So it seems to me we might as well make public
announcements now, face ruin on the resort development, and get it over
with."

Chichester spoke, almost in a whisper.

"This Doctor Satan, whoever he is, gives us assurance in his note. He
says that if we pay what he demands, the ten will recover, and
everything will be all right."

"And if we pay what he demands, we'll be ruined just the same as though
we'd been killed by publicity," objected Gest.

Kroner glared at the wizened treasurer.

"I'