# The Adventures of Detective Barney

Barney Cook: a street-smart messenger boy who devours the Nick Carter potboilers in his spare time, and dreams of making it to a detective agency. He does—but the work is not quite what he'd thought.
Ellery Queen, in Queen's Quorum (1951) had this to say: "Earlier, as the result of having written a series of articles on the Burns detective agency, he [O'Higgins] saw the possibilities of depicting simple, realistic, private-eye work through the eyes of a typical American boy; his Barney Cook . . . is the most believable boy-bloodhound in the entire short-story field."
The illustrations, by Henry Raleigh, are from Collier's magazine, where the stories first appeared in serial form. For the interested, the magazine is available in electronic medium at Internet Archive identifier: colliers5019unse
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He wanted to find a cave and crawl into it. . . . And then the lightning burst in the tree-top over his head
THE ADVENTURES OF DETECTIVE BARNEY
BY
HARVEY J. O’HIGGINS
AUTHOR OF “THE SMOKE-EATERS,” “DON-A-DREAMS,” “SILENT SAM,” ETC.
ILLUSTRATIONS BY HENRY RALEIGH
NEW YORK
THE CENTURY CO.
1915
Copyright, 1915, by Harvey J. O'Higgins
Copyright, 1912, 1913, 1914, by P. F. Collier & Son, Inc.
Published, January, 1915
NOTE
Detective Barney is the hero of the detective comedy “The Dummy,” by Harvey O’Higgins and Harriet Ford, but no attempt has been made in the play to dramatize the book, and none in the book to novelize the play.
CONTENTS
* ITHE BLACKMAILERS ................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................3
* IITHE CASE OF PADAGES PALMER ................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................48
* IIITHOUGH MOUNTAINS MEET NOT ................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................90
* IVTHE KIDNAPPERS ................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................136
* VTHE ANONYMOUS LETTERS ................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................185
* VIBARNEY AND KING LEAR ................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................225
* VIIBARNEY HAS A HUNCH ................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................258
LIST OF ILLUSTRATIONS
* page
* He wanted to find a cave and crawl into it. . . And then the lightning burst in the tree-top over his headFrontispiece
* “It’s a repeat,” Barney said, “an’ they told me to see that you got it, this time”33
* “The old man’s wad!” Snider exulted. “By G— he ’s got the swag back too!”83
* They found him observing them with a mute and glassy stare157
* “You ’ll tread gently for the rest of your days, you sneaking parasite”321
* Mrs. Buntz was soon as indignant as her sister. She read the policy aloud—every word of it—with fine conviction253
THE ADVENTURES OF
DETECTIVE BARNEY
This work is in the public domain in the United States because it was published before January 1, 1929.
The longest-living author of this work died in 1929, so this work is in the public domain in countries and areas where the copyright term is the author's life plus 94 years or less. This work may be in the public domain in countries and areas with longer native copyright terms that apply the rule of the shorter term to foreign works.
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