"On the other hand we have Holmes—also in love with the leading lady—though he admits his case was hopeless from the beginning. He quarreled with her—threatened her that if he couldn't have her nobody else should. Likewise, he stood near the victim."

"IT'S one of them!" put in Dawson. "It looks like it would have to be!"

"There's still another," interjected the inspector softly, "if we're to believe Boone, the other man! Who was he? When did he come on the scene?"

"But he's out!" exploded Dawson. "If she gave the others the gate for him, everything would be jake. Why should he want to bump her off? Think the guy was nutty?"

Corot only smiled and shook his head.

"You've only Boone's word for it that there was another man," objected the reporter eagerly. "And who wouldn't lie to save himself from the hot seat?"

The buzzing of the phone interrupted them. Corot picked up the instrument near his hand. He listened for some minutes, snapped "Good-bye," and looked at the reporter. "Carroll just reported," he said. "Boone can't find his bolo—said he must have loaned it to some one or forgotten."

"Why don't you arrest him, then, and—"

"And depend on getting a confession to clinch the case, eh?" drily remarked the astute man-hunter. "No, Dawson," he went on between puffs on his pipe, "those methods won't do in this case. We are not dealing with an ordinary murder—or an ordinary murderer!"

WALTER DAWSON had just reported to his office the next day when Inspector Corot called him on the phone.

"Promised to keep you posted on the talkie murder, Dawson," he laughed. "Always try to keep my word. Can you meet me uptown?"

A mad dash for the subway, and twenty minutes later the reporter was facing the police official over a table in a modest chop house in the West Forties.

"The murder scene at the studio last night," smiled Corot grimly, "was not what is termed a smash hit so far as the police were concerned.