Nicodeme Leopold-Lepide

"Can I not get ANY peace? Not even at night? The French people came in their hundreds to see me executed! Now YOU come to see my spirit trapped in wax. Stay away... or you'll be sorry!"

- What Nicodeme Leopold-Lepide is rumoured to have said to Josh Potter

Nicodeme Leopold-Lepide was a tax collector in the days of the French revolution. He was so cruel that he would throw out entire families onto the streets and take all their property from them. Nicodeme was said to be so cruel that people said his heart was a stone. He was eventually beheaded in the Revolution.

Nicodeme Leopold-Lepide's head was taken by Madame Tussaud, who made a waxwork of him, and captured him by the guillotine at the moment of his execution. People said he was smiling at the guillotine. Nicodeme's waxwork was sold to Nathaniel Turner, a man from Sacramento, America, who took it back to start his own waxwork museum. It was a poor event.

One morning the caretaker, Josh Potter, saw Nicodeme's head lying on the floor. It was staring up at him smiling. The next morning the same thing happened. Josh thought it was a joker breaking in, but what he saw that night scared him so much. Nicodeme's waxwork actually came to life and berated Josh. He said about his continual harassment by living people as being torture. He then warned Josh to stay off. Josh Potter almost fell ill.

Potter and Turner found Luke Gretz, a reporter for the Sacramento Star paper, and Luke said he was impoverished. Turner told him the story of Nicodeme Leopold-Lepide, and his haunted waxwork, in gory detail, and impressed Luke, who pledged to spend a night in the room and see if the waxwork moved. Turner was paid to have Luke in the museum overnight and, sure enough, Nicodeme Leopold-Lepide came to life early in the morning. However, he tore off his waxwork head, and underneath was a ghostly image. Nicodeme Leopold-Lepide sped at Luke, gripping his neck, and trying to strangle him, but Nicodeme was found headless on the floor next morning by a semi-conscious Luke.

Luke was offered a star job, because of the success of his article, but he was too scared so he took a job on a steam boat.