When Denton opened his eyes to consciousness again, the first thing he was aware of was that the queer stranger was sitting before him in the darkness, chuckling like some strange animal, and offering him a drink of whisky out of a metal bottle. CHAPTER XXXIX. IN A WEB OF LIES. Ellen West rode forth from Scarlet Gulch in doubt, with Panther Pete, believing him to be Buffalo Bill, a man she felt she ought to honor, yet troubled by unpleasant forebodings. He had told her that her father, who was working a claim in the Blue Hills, some distance away, wished her to come there, and had sent him to escort her. When they were beyond the town, he said: “Miss West, I didn’t want to tell you, but your father is not well.” “Not well?” she said, alarmed. “You mean he is very sick, dying perhaps?” “The fact is,” he exclaimed, “he fell and hurt himself in that tunnel he is digging; some rock fell on him, and----” “Oh, he is dying! I know it. Why didn’t you tell me at once?” “I didn’t want to scare you,” he answered. “He is dying?” “No, not so bad as that; but he is hurt, and I thought you ought to be out there. Girls are scared of the dark, you know, and so--well, I done the best I could. I didn’t want to make you feel bad, either; but I reckon the time for you to know it has come.” She asked him again and again why he had not told her at first of the injury to her father, and urged him to give details; until, in replying to her, he had constructed such a piece of fiction that he felt rather proud of it and his abilities in that line. Two or three miles from the town he was joined by half a dozen rough-looking riders, who peered at the girl from under their slouched hats in a way to make her uneasy. These wild figures fell in behind her and the supposed Buffalo Bill, as if they were the escort. “Friends of mine,” said Panther Pete. “Some of the members of my band of scouts.” “Oh, your scouts!” she said, much relieved. “I’m the chief of the scouts, you know.” “Yes, I have heard that. And these are some of them?” She glanced at the sky. Being a prairie girl, she knew the stars by sight, and was able to tell which was north as well as any one. She saw the Big Dipper, with its two outer stars pointing to the north star. She had observed that a change had been made in their course, and she saw that a further change of course occurred now, a change that surprised her, for she knew it was not the right direction to take her to her father’s claim. She spoke of it to the man who rode beside her. “Oh, yes, right ye are! But, you see, it’s this way: There’s danger now in going the straight course, and so we make this circle. We’ll be steering in the other direction soon.” “What is the danger?” she asked. “Outlaws,” he said gravely. “Outlaws?”