As I was leaving the room I heard a mirthless laugh burst from the dead mouth of Mal Un. Horribly it rang in my ears as I hastened out into the night. The dead man laughing because he was sentenced to death! * * * * * Naturally, the first person I thought of in my extremity was Ero Shan, who had rescued me from the ape-men. My own car was parked where I had left it at the corner of Yorgan Lat and Havatoo Lat; so I hailed a public conveyance and was driven rapidly to the house at which Ero Shan was being entertained that evening. I did not go in but sent word that I wished to speak to him upon a matter of great urgency, and a moment later I saw him coming from the house toward me. "What brings you here, Carson?" he asked. "I thought you were spending the evening with Nalte." When I told him what had happened he went very white. "There is no time to be lost!" he cried. "Can you find that house again?" I told him that I could. "That doorway is indelibly burned into my memory." "Dismiss your car; we will go in mine," he said, and a moment later we were speeding toward the place where I had lost Nalte. "You have all my sympathy, my friend," said Ero Shan. "To have lost the woman you love, and such a woman! is a calamity beyond any feeble words to express." "Yes," I replied, "and even if I had loved Nalte I could scarcely be more grieved than I now am." "'Even if you had loved Nalte'!" he repeated incredulously. "But, man, you do love her, do you not?" "We were only the best of friends," I replied. "Nalte did not love me." Ero Shan made no reply, he drove swiftly on in silence. Presently we reached our destination. Ero Shan stopped his car beside the stairway, nearest the house, that led up to the walkway; and a moment later we were before the door. Repeated summons elicited no response, and then I tried the door and found it unlocked. Together we entered the dark interior, and I regretted that we had brought no weapons; but in peaceful Havatoo men do not ordinarily go armed. Ero Shan soon located a light switch, and as the room in which we stood was illuminated, we saw that it was entirely unfurnished. The building rose two stories above the walkway, and of course there was a lower floor on a level with the street. We searched the upper stories first, and then the roof, for in this part of Havatoo most of the roofs are developed as gardens; but we found no sign of recent habitation. Then we went to the ground floor, but with no better results. Here was space for the parking of cars, and in rear of that a number of dark storerooms. "There is no living creature in this house except ourselves," said Ero Shan. "They must have taken Nalte to some other house. It will be necessary to make a search, and only under the authority of the Sanjong itself may the home of a citizen be searched. Come! we will go and get that authority."