It was a falsehood she asked me to tell, but I was willing to tell it, since the interests of four persons were involved in it,—hers, the doctor's, mine, and, not least of all, the colonel's. Truly my coming had aroused a mighty commotion in the house of Colonel Hetherill, C.S.A., and perhaps too had opened it to new ideas. It had never occurred to me before that I was such an important personage.
I followed Miss Hetherill to the second sitting of the military court in the trial-room, though this time as a witness and not as the accused.
The colonel was majestic at the head of the table. He was in a splendid gray uniform, gay with gold lace, as if he deemed the occasion worthy of his best appearance. Crothers had taken the place of Dr. Ambrose as secretary, and the doctor himself was at the foot of the table.
The examination was brief, and to the colonel very unsatisfactory. I made a poor witness. I denied that any one had helped me, and the doctor with equal emphasis denied complicity. The colonel frowned at me, but the doctor received the larger share of his attention, and I was of the opinion that the colonel considered him a greater villain than myself, as I was an enemy by birth, while the doctor was a household traitor.
"You do not deny making to me the proposition that we surrender to the Federal government?" finally said the colonel.
"Not at all," said the doctor, firmly. "That was my suggestion, and I repeat it. We alone are holding out. What chance have we ever to carry our cause through to success?"
Colonel Hetherill looked around at his men as if he feared the effect of those words upon them. They were impassive, though I inferred from what Grace had said that several were beginning to share the doctor's way of thinking.
"Your answer," said the colonel to Dr. Ambrose, "is sufficient proof of treasonable designs. The answer itself I consider treason. I will hear no more."
He promptly dissolved the court, ordered Dr. Ambrose and myself to be locked up again, and refused to listen to anything his daughter wished to say. What further steps he took I did not know then, for under escort I passed on to my room and was out of sight and hearing.