“I will.”
“I did not seek the downfall of your brother through any feeling of revenge, but because I had been secretly made, by Colonel Dunwoody, of Pioneer Post, through having saved the life of Buffalo Bill, as you remember, a Secret Service scout. I did not know until you told me, before my going, that Silk Lasso Sam was your brother, my old foe, and remembering you only as a girl just verging into your teens, I did not recognize Ruth Leigh in Bonnie Belle. I tracked your brother to his lair, and let me tell you of his latest villainy.”
“Tell me all, for I wish nothing hidden from me.”
“After visiting you here, he broke every pledge he had made you. He went, with two followers, to the Overland Trail to Pioneer Post, and lay in ambush until the coach came along, when he held it up. One plucky passenger opened fire, killing one of the outlaws and slightly wounding the chief, whose horse, also was shot under him. In retaliation, the outlaws killed the driver and the passenger, and then the daring idea seized upon your brother to enter the fort.”
“And he was captured?”
“Not then, for he played passenger, and was treated with the greatest kindness by all. Being in secret communication with his men, he arranged a plot to have a young lady there, Miss Clarice Carr, the belle of the fort, and himself captured by the band, intending to force from her a large ransom for her release.
“Little did she suspect his treachery, and they were captured and taken to the secret retreat of the outlaws, one of whom pretended to be Silk Lasso Sam, the chief. Fortunately, it was just then that I reached the trail and found Buffalo Bill and Surgeon Powell upon it, with the soldiers.
“The map, however, enabled me to guide them there, and to Miss Carr’s horror, she discovered the perfidy of the man she had believed to be a gentleman. He denied the charges against him, but I made myself known to him, and he said no more, and was taken to the fort, tried, and sentenced to die upon the gallows.”
“My poor, unfortunate, erring brother,” said Bonnie Belle sadly.
“Yes, it is a sad case, yet you have done far more than your duty to save him.”