“Yes, sir.”

“You know the penalty attaching to such a military crime as you confess you have committed?”

Brinton squared his shoulders, raised his pain-crazed head, and made answer:

“Yes, sir.”

Scott paused for an instant as though to let the fact sink in, then was off on a new theme.

“How old are you, Colonel Brinton?” he asked.

“Forty-one, sir.”

“A West Pointer?”

“No, sir. Militia. I raised a cavalry company in Ideala, Ohio, at the outbreak of the present war. I am a merchant there.”

“You are married?”