MY FAVORITE MARTIAN

"GHOSTS! Upon my word, Tim, do you know, only yesterday afternoon I was talking to Mrs. McClusky, and she told me she actually believes in ghosts!"
"Oh dear, she's there again," Martin groaned to himself as Mrs. Brown's voice reached him through Tim O'Hara's open bedroom door.
Just lately Mrs. Brown, Tim's landlady from the apartment downstairs, had popped in every morning for a cup of coffee and a chat, and Tim O'Hara, being a polite young man had sat and listened whilst Mrs. Brown chatted.
Tim's "Uncle" Martin, who was really a Martian stranded on Earth when his flying saucer had crashed, was not quite so well- mannered as Tim. In fact he had often made it quite plain that Mrs. Brown's endless chatter got on his Martian nerves!
"And she's on about ghosts for the umpteenth time this week, telling Tim how she doesn't believe in them. I think I'll give her something to think about," thought Martin to himself with a mischievous twinkle in his eye.
At that, a pair of horns, or antennae, poked up from the Martian's close-cropped head, and a moment later he had turned invisible. "It stands to reason," Mrs. Brown was saying, "that a being from another world cannot move things about on this world!"
Plop!
All of its own accord a knob of sugar made a grasshopper-style jump out of the sugar bowl right into Mrs. Brown's coffee cup.
She pretended not to notice.
"Now I'll admit," she continued boldly, "that things do sometimes happen that we can't always explain, but that is only because we don't . . . EEEEEK!"

"Then it would serve her right for trying to bore us to death with her endless gossip!"
Tim moved to clear up the soggy mess of sugar and coffee that Mrs. Brown had spilt, but...
"Ooof!"
"Ouch!"
"Martin, if you will stay invisible, you must expect to be bumped into!"
"Sorry, Tim, but I'm . . . er . . . stuck!"
"How do you mean, `stuck'?"
"Stuck invisible. I can't get my antennae back in again and become visible. I think it's a touch of dizegular cramp. It's a complaint we Martians catch when we don't get enough vitamin 734. It's very annoying."
"Haven't you got any in pills?" Tim asked, feeling a little angry at Martin for getting himself into such a plight all for the sake of a silly joke.
No, Tim, I'll have to make some, but the trouble is, I don't know what plants or animals there on Earth contain the vitamin I need."
"Then we shall just have to go down to the public library and find out. Come on, Uncle Martin!"
The first part of the journey, by car, was easy. The difficulty came after they had parked the car and began to walk the last hundred yards or so. It was then that Martin really learned that being invisible could be a painful nuisance. People were unable to see him and tended to walk right into him!
It was not until he had suff'ered a kicked shin, a trampled toe and three handbags rammed into his ribs that Martin hit upon the idea of marching close behind Tim.

Life in the library was no easier. Tim had to collect the books from the shelves and place them open on a table so that Martin could read them. If Martin had picked up a book there was the risk that the librarian would see it floating along in mid-air. Yet it was whilst Tim was searching for a volume on animal fats that a very stout lady sat upon the chair already invisibly occupied by Martin!
There was a scream and a great commotion. A friend finally took the startled woman home and put her to bed, where she remained until three doctors and two psychiatrists had convinced her that it was safe to get up again.

After the library, Tim and Martin went to the chemist's to ask him to mix the tonic. The counter attendant almost called a doctor for Tim, whom he caught more than once seemingly arguing with himself about the right ingredients to be put into the tonic.
The chemist prepared the mixture as re- quested and Martin drank it down when no one was looking, but it had no effect.
So Martin and Tim went home, to think again. By now, Tim, whose first annoyance had worn off, was as worried about the Martian's invisible state as was Martin himself, and it was in moody silence that they entered Tim's apartment.
In fact they were both well inside the door before they noticed Mrs. Brown there waiting for them, or saw the dozens of cotton threads hanging limply from the ceiling.
"Oh, Tim, I knew you wouldn't mind me coming in like this, but it's that ghost of yours. I've been in contact with the Los Angeles Ghost Hunting Society and they advised me to track down the poltergeist by these hanging threads. . . ."
"But Mrs. Brown," Tim said, desperately trying to interrupt, and failing.
". . . As it moves about the room it will disturb the threads and . . . THERE IT GOES," she yelled excitedly.
The last words were a screech! Uncle Martin was in the room and no matter where he went,. he could not help disturbing the threads and giving his position away. Mrs. Brown had seen the moving threads.
With a look of determined heroism she leaped to her feet, suddenly brandishing a baseball bat. WHAMPH!
"YEEEEOW !"
Mrs. Brown had made her first strike. Martin fled across the room.
WALLOP !
"OOOOW!"

Strike two to Mrs. Brown, but then the bathroom door slammed and the key turned on the inside.
"Did you see that, Tim O'Hara? Did you see how I laid into that spook? 1'll teach it to tip sugar over my head!"
"Yes, Mrs. Brown, I expect that ghost is feeling real sorry right now," answered Tim wondering which .part of Martin's invisible person had felt the weight of the landlady's baseball bat.
Mrs. Brown remained triumphant and excited for several minutes, then they heard the wail of a siren, the scufhng of tyres as a car braked sharply, and heavy feet pounding up the stairs.
. "This is the police! Open up in there!" Tim opened the door. "Afternoon, Mrs. Brown, Mr. O'Hara," said a breathless cop. "Are you folks okay? A neighbour just called us to say she saw a man climbing out of your bathroom window . thought it may be a house-breaker!"
"No, oflicer, it was a ghost," Mrs. Brown declared.

"A ghost, Mrs. Brown . . . but there ain't no such things. . . !"
"Oh, yes there are. I've just whacked one with this baseball bat!"

Some time later, Tim found Martin in the garage. He was visible again.
"It was the bat that cured me. It jolted my antennae in again," Martin explained.
"You know Mrs. Brown now firmly believes in ghosts," Tim said.
"And I believe in Mrs. Brown," moaned Martin as he gingerly fingered his head. "And I've got the bruises as proof!