Mrs. Juan had cleared away the supper dishes, and sat by a corner of the fireside. She had removed from her legs voluminous wrappings of white doeskin, symbol of her high financial rating, and sat openly and complacently admiring her silk-stockinged feet, coquettishly adorned with scarlet Turkish slippers, which she balanced on her toes. Pancho eyed the by-play with affectionate indulgence, and sent a long, slow wink in our direction at this harmless evidence of the eternal feminine. The talk had drifted to tales of wonder, to which we contributed our share as best we could, and now it was Juan’s turn. He leaned forward earnestly, his black eyes somber and intense. “You know me for an honest man? You know people say that Juan Pancho does not lie? You know that when Juan says he will do a thing, he does it, if it ruins him?” We nodded. The reputation of Juan Pancho was a proverb in Great Isleta. “Good! Because now, I am going to tell you something that will test your credulity. You will need to remember all you know of my honesty to believe what I tell you now.” We drew forward, and listened while he narrated the story of the good monk of the time of Coronado, as I have told it in condensed form. “Well, then! You’ve been in that church where they buried the monk--six feet from the altar, and a little to one side. Most Indian churches have a dirt floor, but the church of Great Isleta has a plank floor, very heavy. Now I will tell you why. “The Spaniards came and went, without learning of the padre who slept with the knife wound in his back, under Isleta church. Five years went by, and one day, one of our old men who took care of the church went within, and saw a bulge in the earth, near the altar. It was of the size of a man’s body. The bulge stayed there, right over the spot where they had buried the padre, and day after day it grew more noticeable. A year went by, and a crack appeared, the length of a man’s body. Two years, three years--and the crack had widened and gaped. It was no use to fill it, to stamp down the dirt--that crack would remain open. Then, twelve years maybe from the death of the padre, the Isletans come into the church one morning, and there on the floor, face up, lies the padre. There is no sign of a crack in the earth--he lies on solid ground, looking as if he had died yesterday. They feel his flesh--it is soft, and gives to the touch of the finger, like the flesh of one whose breath has just flown. They turn him over--the knife wound is fresh, with red blood clotting it. Twelve years he has been dead!