Assisting the young women into their saddles, Tad bade their friends
good afternoon and turned sadly back to the church, while Ned Rector
rode back to the Ox Bow ranch with the young women.

"Well, what do you think?" demanded the lad, as he faced the big cowboy.

"I don't think. My thinker's all twisted out of shape," answered
Big-foot. "I can't tell you what to do. Wait till the boss gets here."

"I guess that will be best," replied Tad. "We have done all we know how
to do."

The two men and the boy wandered about the church aimlessly, saying
little, but thinking a great deal, impatiently awaiting the arrival of
Bob Stallings, to whom they now looked to show them the way out of their
difficulty.

The foreman arrived, in the course of half an hour, with his pony on a
sharp run. They had heard him approach, and were outside waiting for
him.

"Well, this is a nice kettle of fish!" exclaimed Stallings, leaping to
the ground, tossing his reins to Curley Adams. "Tell me about it."

Once more Tad Butler related all the facts in his possession regarding
Stacy Brown's mysterious disappearance.

"Big-foot thinks it's spooks," added Tad.

"That's all bosh," exploded the foreman. "It's getting late in the
afternoon, and I've no time to waste. I'll find him for you. What ails
you, Big-foot? Getting weak in the knees?"

"Not as I knows of. This funny business is kinder getting on my nerves,
though."

"Humph!" grunted the foreman, starting for the church in long strides.
"Nerves in a cowboy! Humph!"

They watched the tall figure of Stallings charging through the adobe
house, peering here and there, asking questions in short, snappy
sentences, going down on his knees in search of footprints. Finally he
rose from his task with a puzzled look in his eyes.

"Tell me that story again," he demanded.

Tad did so.

The foreman went outside and surveyed the building from all sides.

"There's some secret room or passage in there somewhere. The gopher has
stumbled into it. We are going to discover the mystery of the church of
San Miguel before we have done here--that is, we are if we're lucky," he
added.

Bob Stallings' words were prophetic, though he did not know it. The
discovery was to be one that would give the big foreman the surprise of
his life, and that would affect all his after life as well.

CHAPTER XXIII

SOLVING THE MYSTERY

"We can't do much of anything more until daylight," announced the
forema