Shortly after, the unscrupulous real estate magnate Anthony Fleming (Gerald Gordon) and his partner and mistress Gloria (Suzanne Somers) arrive at the hotel, there to haggle with the elderly proprietor, Ethel Adams (Myrna Loy) and her daughter Valerie (Lynda Day George) as they pursue plans to convert Lakewood into a casino.

In the meantime, foreman Mike Carr (Robert Foxworth), who is in a relationship with Valerie, and his co-worker and friend Vince (Bernie Casey) find the two missing workers, dead from poisoning.

Peggy Kenter (Anita Gillette), a Board of Health (BOH) inspector and an acquaintance of Carr's, decides to quarantine the hotel, thinking a virus is at work.

As the ants begin crawling all over them, Fleming panickedly launches himself from the room's balcony to the swimming pool below in a desperate attempt to escape, but misses the jump and dies in the fall.

[3] Stuntman Conrad Palmisano was buried alive for the film (with a garden hose supplying him air); he would later become chairman of the Screen Actors Guild's stunt and safety committee.