“Through some papers you were foolish enough to leave in the place where I was held a prisoner. Yes, I am your own brother, Ricardo; yet you killed my wife and son, let your fiends hold me a prisoner and carried my daughter away a captive. Now you are a prisoner, and you have received your death wound, yet I am sorry for you, for you are still my brother.” The scout, pained by this interview, had walked away from the camp fire, and only the groans of the chief broke the silence, but whether Ricardo groaned most from pain of body or mind none knew, for he never spoke again, and with his head supported in the arms of the negro Buttermilk, who had so faithfully followed his master’s evil fortunes, his breath grew shorter and more labored, until, with a curse half uttered upon his lips, Ricardo, the chief of the Branded Brotherhood, was dead. When the scout left the camp fire he mounted Midnight and rode away across the prairie. Shortly after sunrise he beheld a horseman approaching, and upon a nearer view discovered him to be none other than Howard Lawrence. When Buffalo Bill recognized the horseman he put Midnight into a rapid gallop and started toward him. Whether it was a guilty conscience of intending wrong to the scout, or fear, we cannot tell, but Howard Lawrence instantly turned to fly. The scout at once urged his horse forward in pursuit. Across the rolling prairie Howard Lawrence urged his steed, and, heading for a piece of timber, soon disappeared in its leafy recesses. “Ha, he has taken cover and intends to fight me! So be it,” said the scout. The next instant a look of disappointment was upon his face, for he saw the fugitive dart out on the other side of the motte and continue on across the prairie. The next moment Midnight had reached the timber and was circling around it, when, suddenly, a shrill call was heard, and, glancing into the thicket, Buffalo Bill beheld the Red Bud of the Forest just preparing to mount Fer white mare, which stood near. Instantly he wheeled alongside of the Indian girl, and in surprise asked: “What does the Red Bud here alone?” “She came to seek the great white scout. Yonder goes the enemy of the noble scout, the man who taught the Rose of the Pawnees to love him--the Man of Many Faces.” “Yes, I am now on his trail, Red Bud, for I would take his life, for did he not try to destroy the Pawnee maiden, and was she not ever kind to me when I lay sick and wounded in her father’s wigwam? The scout has a heart and has not forgotten. But why did you seek me?” “The Red Bud came to warn the great scout that Many Faces was his enemy who would strike him in the back, for Red Bud heard the words of the wicked man and the warrior from the great fort.” “Ha! that must have been Major Belden.” “The great scout speaks straight; the two wicked braves were to kill the great white scout, and the Many Faces was to make one of the paleface maidens his squaw.”