"If you have no objection, I will go with you," offered Tom.
Ford nodded, and the two started away, the others, on the ponies, keeping well to the rear.
The two men in advance finally reached the point in the ravine where Lieutenant Wingate had been struck down. With lantern held close to the ground, the sheriff went over it on hands and knees, examining every foot of the ground.
"Stand where you are until I come back," he directed, addressing Tom Gray. "Do you recognize this?" he asked, holding up a hat, upon his return a few moments later.
"It is the lieutenant's hat," answered Tom promptly, and Stacy Brown agreed with him.
"What's the use of a hat without a head to wear it?" demanded Stacy.
"This!" replied Ford. "I have proved one thing. Our man came this way, but beyond this point the only trace of him is the hat. Unless I am much mistaken, he left here on the back of a horse, and he went that way." The sheriff pointed up the ravine. "It is fair to assume that he did not go voluntarily. The only inference possible, then, is that he has been taken."
"Captured by the bandits!" exclaimed Tom.
"Candidly, I don't know, Captain. We have got to find out, and it is advisable for us to go in search of the answer to that question as fast as we can. We will mount and move on."
"I suppose I am the one who will have to furnish the brains for this party and find the missing man," declared Stacy pompously, but no one laughed at his sally.
A minute later they were mounted and on their way up the ravine, the sheriff still carrying the lantern, which he held low, keeping his gaze constantly on the trail, which still was fairly plain and easy for an experienced man to follow. Stacy dropped behind a little way and produced a plum pudding can from his pocket. Opening the can, he calmly proceeded to eat the pudding.
"What's that you're eating?" demanded one of the two passengers.
"Oh, back there in the diner," answered Stacy carelessly.
"You stole a pudding, eh?" laughed the questioner.
"Oh, my; no, sir. How could you think such a thing? Don't you know I wouldn't do anything like that?"
"Oh! You paid for it," nodded the passenger.
"I did not. Captain Gray did. You see it was this way. The captain paid for six cans of baked beans, but they gave him only five cans. The colored gentleman in the diner cheated us out of one can, and probably pocketed the difference, so I sort of helped myself to a pudding to even things up."