Belle Bonnet

Belle Bonnet is a character in The Real Adventures of Jonny Quest in the episode The Ballad of Belle Bonnet.

Physical Appearance
Belle had long red hair and green eyes. She commonly wears green dresses and earrings. It is unknown what her age was, however judging by her looks it would of possibly of been late twenties or early thirties.

Personality
According to Ames Runningstar, Belle was good-hearted but still a thief who had very strong opinions about right and wrong. She was loyal to Kate and the children of the school and willing to try anything if it meant helping the people she cared about.

History
Belle was a thief who lived in the Old West in the 19th century. She was a friend of Kate Runningstar who owned a Indian Preservation school in Arizona and presumably helped her run it. One day the government debtors arrived and told Kate if she didn't pay in two days, the school would close down.

Belle promised Kate that she would get the money to save the school. Later as she was riding inside a carriage containing gold to send to the bank, Belle armed with a large revolver, decided to steal the gold to help the children of the school.

Unfortunately two other thieves named Tony and Jack had also taken an interest in the gold. They shot one of the riders and held the man holding the horses' reins to stop. After flinging him to the ground, Tony opened the chest containing the gold and greedily ran his hands through it.

Suddenly both men were attacked by Belle who declared that the gold was not theirs to take and she was obtaining it for the children of Kate's school.

She then got to the front of the stagecoach, got the horses to gallop and prepared to make her escape with Tony and Jack right behind her with guns blazing. Belle kept returning their fire until the chase led them all into a large cavern named Dead Horse Canyon.

A fierce gun battle took place with all three taking cover and firing their guns back and forth. Suddenly the cavern began to shake. Tony and Jack tried to escape but were buried under huge chunks of falling rock. The horses still pulling the stagecoach tried to flee and Belle tried to catch them up. She then noticed the ground beneath them collapsing and the horses were dragged to the lagoon below. Belle tried to escape, but the ground collapsed underneath her too and she joined the same fate as the horses.

After her fall, Belle was able to climb out of the lagoon, but succumbed to her injuries. Afterwards the location of the lost gold remained a mystery.

Legacy
Years passed and the gold remained lost in the lagoon. By now all that was left of Belle was a skeletal corpse and a cartridge she had dropped during the gun battle. However Belle's ghost was still guarding the gold and making sure it went to the cause she had been aiming for before her death.

Kate's great grandson Ames was now running the school and having the same financial troubles, especially when the school was burned down. However thanks to the help of the Quest team of Jonny Quest, his father Dr. Quest, Hadji Singh and Race Bannon, they were able to find the gold. Unfortunately a greedy guide named Hawk Rawlings wanted the gold for himself, but the ghosts of Belle and the horses pulling the stagecoach trampled him to death, leaving no mark on him.

Belle appeared one last time, telling Jonny and Hadji that the gold was for the children. Though he admired Belle's good intentions, Dr. Quest felt that she had still broken the law and decided to return the gold to the bank where it had meant to go in the first place.

However a board member of the trustees gave a reward of over $500,000. Ames decided to use it to build a new school. The reward therefore would be for the children. Belle's original remains were presumably recovered and buried.

Trivia
Helene Udy had previously voiced Dr. Natasha Rastova in the previous season one episode Rage's Burning Wheel and would later voice Julia in the season two episode Cyberswitch.