Seeing that he was likely thus to lose her in the darkness, and that his words were without effect, he remounted and pursued her, and overtook her again in a short time. “You are acting silly in this matter,” he asserted. “Let me help you. Here, you may ride my horse.” She stopped, in hesitation; for the thought came to her that she might get on his horse and then make an attempt to leave him. But he knew what was in her mind. “You may ride,” he said, “and I’ll walk. We’ll not go near the Indians, if you say not to; though, since I know that young chief, you’re really safer there than any place else.” “Who was it made that outcry?” she asked. “No one knows. Some crazy herder likely. There are sheep herders down in this section, I’ve heard.” “Then you don’t think that it could have been some one from the fort?” “I don’t think it could have been,” he said. She felt helpless and bewildered in the darkness; and she really feared the Indians. So, after some further hesitation and questions, with protestations of good intentions on his part, she mounted to the saddle he had vacated. But he took care that she should make no attempt to get away, for he led the horse by the bit, walking at its head. He went in the direction of the Cheyennes, while protesting to her that he meant to do nothing of the kind, and that as soon as it was light enough to see he would start with her for the fort. She did not believe him, but she felt so helpless she did not know what to do, and drifted on in this manner. Then, almost before she knew it, they were again in the midst of Red Wing’s band of young Cheyennes, and she was as much of a prisoner as she had been before. Wild Bill had disappeared, however, from their midst, and she hoped he would follow and try to release her, for she had heard of him, and knew him to be the friend of any one in distress. Before day came again, the Cheyennes were in the midst of the village of their friends, who were Cheyennes that had fled to this part of the country after the last Cheyenne war, and had been permitted to remain there. As soon as he was safe in this village, Barlow had the girl placed in one of the lodges, in care of an old Indian squaw, assuring the girl that it was the best he could do, and that she would not be harmed there. Then he began a search for the old medicine man who was said to have that store of sacred gold nuggets. He found the medicine man without trouble, for the old fellow had a lodge of immense size not far from the heart of the village, where he mumbled his charms and incantations, and performed the mysterious rites which awed the Cheyennes and gave him so much power over them. Barlow did not get to enter this lodge. The old man would not permit it, not even when Barlow was accompanied by Red Wing. Thus the young renegade got no chance to see the nuggets.