“This looks a good cañon for mineral. Something tells me some rich stuff has been taken out of here. If I were going to stay any length of time, I might look around some. I keep thinking about gold--but I guess it’s just a notion. Monty Girard ought to be here to-morrow, sure. I’ve packed my pyjamas every morning and unpacked them every night. I’ve got as much faith as the pinto cat--but it don’t get me a darn bit more than it gets her. Packing my pyjamas and waiting for Monty Girard is just about as satisfactory as the cat’s rubbing up against nothing. You’d think she’d get fed up on that sort of thing, but she don’t. Just before I started to write, she trotted toward the door looking up and purring like she does when I come in. Only nobody came in. You wouldn’t notice it if there was anybody else around. Being alone makes it creepy. “I started this because I wanted to talk to somebody. Being alone gets a fellow’s goat in time. And seeing I don’t intend to send this to you, Pat, I’ll say I’m crazy about you. There’s not another girl in the world I’d want. I love the way you stand by your own ideas, Pat, and use your own brains. If you only knew how high you stack up alongside most of the girls, you wouldn’t worry about who played opposite me. I was sore when I left you that night--but that was just because I hate to see you lose your money, and that ‘flabby-soul’ wallop put me down for the count. “I’ll admit now that you didn’t get cheated as much as I thought; but I’m here to remark also that Johnnywater Cañon is no place for my Princess Pat to live. And it’s a cinch that Handsome Gary is not going to waste his splendid youth in this hide-out. There goes that darned nut on the bluff again, yelling hello at me. “If Monty Girard doesn’t show up to-morrow I’m sure as heck going to figure out some way of getting at that bird. Yesterday he was hollering in the daytime. He’s crazy, or he’s trying to make a nut out of me. I believe he wants this cañon to himself for some reason, and tries to scare everybody out. But I don’t happen to scare quite as easy as Waddell. Though the joke of it is, I couldn’t get out of here till Monty Girard comes, no matter how scared I got. I’m sure glad I never get sick. “Golly grandma, how I hate that howling! I’d rather have coyotes ringed around the cañon four deep than listen to that merry roundelay of the gink on the bluff. I’d take a shot at him if I had a gun. “Good night, Pat. You’re five hundred miles away, but if every inch was a mile I wouldn’t feel any farther or any lonesomer. Your flabby-souled movie man is going to bed. “Gary.” CHAPTER TEN GARY HAS SPEECH WITH HUMAN BEINGS