Strange Suspense Stories #50

Johnny Ryan buys a silver-rich mine from Old Tucker Layne, determined to strike it rich—but first he'll have to contend with the violent, unseen force haunting the tunnels. When a claim-jumper corners Ryan deep underground, both men discover they're not alone: something moves through the darkness with eyes that burn cold fire, and laughter that echoes off stone. Can Ryan uncover what really happened in the mine, or will he heed his grandfather's warning to seal it shut and never return?

Uncle George was a quiet man who mysteriously produced whatever his struggling family needed most—bicycles, money, shoes—from a locked room no one had ever seen inside, but when Christmas arrives and he vanishes on Christmas Eve, his secret remains unsolved. Years later, the family discovers the room empty except for his cot, yet strange gifts continue to appear, as if Uncle George never truly left.

Walt Dennison has become obsessed with skin diving off the Southern California coast, but his fiancée Cynthia and his friend Jim grow increasingly alarmed as Walt spends longer and longer underwater—without air tanks or masks—and claims to have made friends in the depths. As a storm closes in, Walt ventures down one final time, leaving Cynthia and Jim to wonder if he'll ever return to the surface world.

A radio operator and a Canadian maintenance man brace themselves for an Arctic winter at a remote station, where Pete Cajos warns of wolverines—creatures he claims are far more than mere animals, driven by an ancient hatred and cunning that rivals human intelligence. When disaster strikes and Jim is left alone to survive the frozen wasteland, he discovers whether the horrors Pete spoke of were superstition or a terrifying truth that the long polar night has kept hidden.