Printed in the United States of America

CONTENTS

I.[Patricia Entertains]
II.[Patricia Explains]
III.[Patricia Takes Her Stand]
IV.[Gary Goes on the Warpath]
V.[Gary Does a Little Sleuthing]
VI.[Johnnywater]
VII.[The Voice]
VIII.[“The Cat’s Got ’Em Too!”]
IX.[Gary Writes a Letter]
X.[Gary Has Speech with Human Beings]
XI.[“How Will You Take Your Millions?”]
XII.[Monty Appears]
XIII.[“I Don’t Believe in Spooks”]
XIV.[Patricia Registers Fury]
XV.[“What’s the Matter with This Place?”]
XVI.[“There’s Mystery Here——”]
XVII.[James Blaine Hawkins Finds His Courage—and Loses It]
XVIII.[Gary Rides to Kawich]
XIX.[“Have Yuh-All Got a Gun?”]
XX.[“That Cat Ain’t Human!”]
XXI.[Gary Follows the Pinto Cat]
XXII.[The Pat Connolly Mine]
XXIII.[Gary Finds the Voice—and Something Else]
XXIV.[“Steve Carson—Poor Devil!”]
XXV.[The Value of a Hunch]
XXVI.[“Gary Marshall Mysteriously Missing”]
XXVII.[“Nobody Knows but a Pinto Cat”]
XXVIII.[Monty Meets Patricia]
XXIX.[Gary Robs the Pinto Cat of Her Dinner]
XXX.[“Somebody Hollered up on the Bluff”]
XXXI.[“God Wouldn’t Let Anything Happen to Gary!”]
XXXII.[“It’s the Voice! It Ain’t Human!”]
XXXIII.[“He’s Nearly Starved,” Said Patricia]
XXXIV.[Let’s Leave Them There]

CHAPTER ONE
PATRICIA ENTERTAINS

The telephone bell was shrilling insistent summons in his apartment when Gary pushed open the hall door thirty feet away. Even though he took long steps, he hoped the nagging jingle would cease before he could reach the ’phone. But the bell kept ringing, being an automatic telephone, dependent upon no perfunctory Central for the persistency of its call. Gary was tired, and from his neck to his waist his skin was painted a coppery bronze which, having been applied at six-thirty that morning, was now itching horribly as the grease paint dried. He did not feel like talking to any one; but he unlocked his door, jerked down the receiver and barked a surly greeting into the mouthpiece of the ’phone. Almost immediately the wrinkles on his forehead slid down into smoothness.

“Oh, how-do, Gary! I was just wondering if you had changed your apartments or something,” called the girl whom he hoped some day to marry. “Did you just get in?”

“No-o—certainly not! I’ve been having a fit on the floor! Say, I heard you ringing the ’phone a block away. Every tenant in the joint is lined up on the sidewalk, watching for the Black Maria or the ambulance; they don’t know which. But I recognized your ring. What’s on your mind, Girlie?”

“Not a thing in the world but a new shell comb. If I’d known you were so terrifically cross this evening, I wouldn’t have a lovely dinner all waiting and a great big surprise for you afterwards. Now I won’t tell you what it is. And, furthermore, I shall not give you even a hint of what you’re going to eat when you get here. But I should think a man who could recognize a certain telephone ring a block away might smell fried chicken and strawberry shortcake clear across the city—with oodles of butter under the strawberries, and double cream——”

“Oh-h, boy!” Gary brightened and smacked his lips into the mouthpiece, just as any normal young man would do. Then, recalling his physical discomfort, he hedged a little.

“Will it keep? I’m in a starving condition as usual—but listen, Pat; I’m a savage under my shirt. Just got in from location away up in Topanga Cañon, and I never stopped to get off anything but the rainbow on my cheeks and my feathered war bonnet. Had a heck of a day—I’ll tell the world! You know, honey; painted warriors hurtling down the cliff shooting poisoned arrows at the hapless emigrants—that kind of hokum. Big Chief Eagle Eye has been hurtling and whooping war whoops since ten o’clock this morning. Dinner’ll have to wait while I take a bath and clean up a little. I look like a bum and that’s a fact. Say, listen, honey——”