Produced by Al Haines [Frontispiece: I could feel the sting of the powder smoke on my up-thrust wrist.] The Man Who Couldn't Sleep By ARTHUR STRINGER AUTHOR OF "The Prairie Wife," Etc. With Frontispiece By FRANK SNAPP A. L. BURT COMPANY Publishers -------- New York Published by arrangement with BOBBS MERRILL COMPANY COPYRIGHT 1919 THE BOBBS-MERRILL COMPANY _Printed in the United States of America_ To Harvey, of the dome-like pate, The dreamy eye, the Celtic wit And kindly heart, I dedicate This blithe romance conceived and writ By one of that triumvirate Who knew Defeat, yet conquered it. CONTENTS CHAPTER I Running Out of Pay-Dirt II The Ox-Blood Vase III The Stolen Wheel-Code IV The Open Door V The Man from Medicine Hat VI The Irreproachable Butler VII The Panama Gold Chests VIII The Dummy-Chucker IX A Rialto Rain-Storm X The Thumb-Tap Clue XI The Nile-Green Roadster The Man Who Couldn't Sleep CHAPTER I RUNNING OUT OF PAY-DIRT To begin with, I am a Canadian by birth, and thirty-three years old. For nine of those years I have lived in New York. And by my friends in that city I am regarded as a successful author. There was a time when I even regarded myself in much the same light. But that period is past. I now have to face the fact that I am a failure. For when a man is no longer able to write he naturally can no longer be reckoned as an author. I have made the name of Witter Kerfoot too well known, I think, to explain that practically all of my stories have been written about Alaska. Just why I resorted to that far-off country for my settings is still more or less a mystery to me. Perhaps it was merely because of its far-offness. Perhaps it was because the editors remembered that I came from the land of the beaver and sagely concluded that a Canadian would be most at home in writing about the Frozen North. At any rate, when I romanced about the Yukon and its ice-bound trails they bought my stories, and asked for more.