He grabbed the body, loaded it into the wicker basket, shoved the basket into the hearse and took off with the siren wide open before the police realized what was happening. He gripped the steering wheel in a death grip and stared at the onrushing street with a fanatical look.

The first place he went to was Harlem Hospital. They told him they couldn't give him a death certificate, but they would examine the body in the emergency receiving room and telephone the police for him.

"Hell with that!" he said. He didn't have time for all that foolishness.

From Harlem Hospital he drove furiously to Knickerbocker Hospital, also located in Harlem.

The doctors there, after listening to his request, told him he had better take the body to the morgue, where he could find an assistant medical examiner on duty who would issue the necessary certificate.

By the time the police got on the job of tracing his movements, he was heading south, down the East Side Highway at eighty-five miles an hour, making for the morgue on First Avenue at 29th Street.

Directly after the hearse had left the scene, Sweet Prophet called for his Rolls Royce, and was driven rapidly to his Temple of Wonderful Prayer around the corner on 116th Street. Anticipating all sorts of trouble from the hard-boiled Homicide police, he desired to face them on his home ground.

The others arrived consecutively:

First, two fire trucks bringing oxygen tents and inhalators;

Second, the Assistant Medical Examiner, who had been alerted by the Homicide Bureau;

And last, a big black sedan from the Homicide Bureau Itself, with a uniformed driver, bearing three plain-clothes detectives, a sergeant and two corporals.

By then the body was gone, the prophet was gone, the witnesses were gone, the bottle which had contained the allegedly poisoned water was gone, and Sugar Stonewall was long gone.