CHAPTER XXXI.

BAD BURKE’S TREACHERY.

Let us again go back a little. When Kansas King rode out from his camp toward the hills, he was accompanied by his lieutenant, Bad Burke, and others of his men. The sun was nearing the western skies when they halted in a gulch.

“Well, Burke,” said Kansas King, “I have discovered with my glass the home of the old hermit chief, and I will go up the gorge alone and endeavor to speak with him. A girl has just left the cabin and is coming down this way, so I will head her off.”

“She is the girl they call the Pearl of the Hills, and is the daughter of the old hermit. She can show her claws, so the Injuns tell me who have been in this country,” said Bad Burke.

“I will have to clip her claws for her, then. You follow slowly on, and be ready to support me if you hear me call,” and Kansas King tapped lightly on a small silver bugle hanging to his belt.

“I’ll be on hand when you need me,” answered Bad Burke, and Kansas King mounted his horse and rode on alone, leaving his companions in the gorge.

Hardly had he been gone ten minutes when Bad Burke said bluntly:

“See here, fellows; you all has sense and knows I picked you out to come with me ’cause I wanted work done. Now, if any fellow here is afraid of blood, he’d better git. Who speaks?”

Not a word of reply came from any of the men who had been with Kansas King. Then Bad Burke continued:

“This country--I mean the prairies and the border--is getting too hot for our business, and we’ve got to git; the chief wants to locate here, and have the Injuns for a support; but it won’t do, and I’ve got a plan, and we’ll divide atween us seven--what say you?”

“I’m in for any job,” said one, and the others all nodded for the lieutenant to go ahead.

“Well, I’ll tell you; there is a big price offered for the head of Kansas King. We’ll arrange to run him right off from here and deliver him up to the officers at the fort, and that will get us a pardon. Then I know where there is a lot of gold and waluables buried, for I helped King to bury them, and we’ll dig them up and just slide away from the country with enough metal to make us all rich. What say you?”

“When can we get the chief?” asked one.

“He is gone up the gorge to try and palaver with the Indians. When he comes back we’ll bag him. Then I’ll go up and talk to the old hermit chief and tell him Kansas was putting up a job on him, and get him to send his warriors down after our boys, and every one of them will get the knife and lose their hair. Now, are you ready, boys?”

“Will we be afther making tracks from these hills as soon as we have the chafe?” asked one of the men, who was an Irishman.

“Yes, we’ll start to-night, for it is moonlight, and we will ride hard, and soon leave the Black Hills behind us.”

“I’m in.”

“And I.”

“I’m yer man.”

“You bet on me.”

Sundry other ejaculations of consent to the treacherous plan were given by the traitor crew, the Irishman being particularly loud in his glee at the prospects ahead.

Excepting the Irishman, however, the other ruffians were sincere in their desire to betray their chief, and Bad Burke had selected the very men he knew had no love for Kansas King.

It was now arranged that Bad Burke should at once follow Kansas King, watch his meeting with the old hermit, and then go himself to Gray Chief as soon as the outlaw leader left him, and place before him a plan for surprising the band.

In the meantime, when Kansas King returned to the gorge, the six men were to throw themselves upon him, and at once make him prisoner.

Bad Burke then departed, following the trail of his chief. From a place of concealment on the side of the hill he beheld the meeting of Kansas King and Pearl, the coming of the hermit chief and White Slayer, and then the departure of his leader back to the gorge.

Still lying quiet, he saw Gray Chief and White Slayer return up the gorge and leave Pearl standing where the meeting had taken place.

“Now, Burke, you need just such a gal fer your wife, and now’s your time to get her. Yes, I’ll carry the gal with me, and after I have given King up to the military, I’ll divide the blood money with those fellows, and then give them the slip and take the buried treasure myself; guess I won’t divide that nor the gal, either.

“No, Tom Burke, your fortune’s made now, with money and a wife, and I guess you better light out for Texas and start a ranch, for this country won’t be very healthy for you, I’m a-thinking.”

So saying, Bad Burke, the traitor outlaw, descended to the bottom of the gorge, and, as the reader has seen, confronted Pearl. How his treacherous plans toward the maiden and his chief were frustrated, the reader has also seen, and that his crimes were rewarded by a death he had seemed little to anticipate.