m them, and Professor
Zepplin would be frightened. Ned, suppose you hustle for camp and tell
Mr. Stallings the fix we are in. We shall need some help, that's sure."

"All right. I'm off."

Big-foot Sanders and Curley Adams responded to the call on the run, the
foreman being out with the herd at the time.

"I knew it," was Big-foot's first words as he rode up and threw himself
from his pony where Tad was standing. "Now tell me all about it."

Tad did so, the cowman nodding his head vigorously as Tad told him all
he knew about Chunky's mysterious disappearance.

"Which way did he go?" asked Curley.

"That we do not know," answered Miss Brayton.

"His cry seemed to come from the back of the church somewhere," spoke up
Ned.

"We'll go in and look around, then," decided Big-foot, striding into the
church. "Whew! smells pretty musty in here. What's that up there?"

"That's where we were eating our lunch when we heard Chunky call,"
Walter informed him.

"How long since you had seen him--was he up there with you?"

"No; he had left us twenty minutes before we began eating lunch,"
answered Ned.

"Humph!" grunted the cowman, gazing about him in perplexity. "Sure it
isn't a trick?"

Tad shook his head.

"No. He was in trouble. I knew that from his tone."

"Then he must have fallen in some place," announced Big-foot. "He
couldn't fall up, so there's no use looking anywhere but on the ground
floor here," he decided, wisely. "Anybody know of any holes that he
might drop into?"

"Not that I have seen," answered Ned. "The floor is as solid as stone."

"Well, that beats all. You boys scout around outside, while Curley and I
are looking things over in here. Besides, I want to be alone and think
this thing over."

"What do you make of it, Big-foot?" asked Curley Adams, after the others
had gone outside.

"I ain't making. When it comes to putting my wits against a spook place,
I'm beyond roping distance. We'll look into these holes in the wall
around here, first," he said, referring to the niches and cell-like
rooms that they saw leading off from the auditorium. "You make it your
business to sound the floor. We may find some kind of trap door."

Curley went about bringing down the heels of his heavy boots on the hard
floor, but it all sounded solid enough. There was no belief in the mind
of either that the lad could have disappeared in any of the places they
had examined--that is, that he could have done so throug