oint made with terrible directness.

"_And knowing he was a spy!_"

Morrison shook his head.

"Not to my personal knowledge, sir. I hunted him many times; but never
while he wore a Federal uniform."

"And when you captured him?"

In reply, Morrison simply indicated Cary's tattered coat of gray.

"Ah! Then you _did_ capture him?"

"Yes," came the quiet answer.

"And he _was_ the escort mentioned in your pass."

"Yes," Morrison answered slowly.

"H'm," said the General. He rose and turned to Harris.

"I am afraid, my dear Harris, that in spite of fine spun distinctions
and your legal technicalities, the findings of our court were not far
wrong."

Dropping his handful of papers on the desk he caught Morrison's eye and
rasped out his analysis of the case.

"Captain Cary practically admits his guilt! _You_ were aware of it! And
yet you send him through the very center of our lines! A _pass_! Carte
blanche to learn the disposition of our forces--our weakness and our
strength--and to make his report in Richmond. He was an enemy--with a
price on his head! And you trusted him! _A spy!_"

As the General had been speaking the first few words of his contemptuous
summing up Morrison saw where they would lead and his manhood instantly
leaped up in reply.

"I trusted, not the spy, but _Herbert Cary_," he said with honest
courage. Then, as the General turned his back on him with a contemptuous
snap of his fingers--

"General! I have offered no defense. If the justice of court-martial law
prescribes a firing squad--I find no fault. I failed. I pay."

With a gesture which indicated Gary the disgraced officer of the Army of
the Potomac shot out his one and only defense of his action--at an
unyielding back.

"I took this man--hunted--wounded--fighting to reach the side of a
hungry child. I captured him and, by the rules of war, I was about to
have him shot. Then he asked me to get his little girl safely to
Richmond, and not to let her know--about him."

"And she believed in _me_. _Trusted_ me--even as I trusted Herbert Cary
to pierce the very center of your lines--as a father--not a spy!"

From behind the unyielding back came a statement of fact, firm and
pitiless.

"And it cost you your sword--your life."

Morrison centered his eyes on the back of the General's head and sent
his answer home with all the power of his voice and spirit.

"_And I have no regret_" he said. "In the duty of a military servant--I
ha