“Come, come young man; do not impute dishonor to a Southerner and a gentleman who bore a commission in the Continental army. Leave me, who am so much older and, before you were born, saw service under the immortal Washington, to judge of what is military ethics. We are alone, and as a gentleman speaking to a gentleman, I demand whether you are going to give me information useful in the movement I am about to make upon Montreal?”
“You have had my answer.”
The General took up a pen, wrote a few lines, and then rang a bell. Captain Thomas entered. “Take this and conduct the prisoner away,” said the General handing him a folded paper. Morton bowed and left the room, fully believing that the missive was an order for his execution. Conducted back to the stable, he threw himself on his straw-heap, indignant and yet mortified at being treated as a spy. He thought of his relations, of his comrades, of his impending disgraceful death, and then clenched his teeth as he resolved he would not plead with his captors but die without a murmur.
The marching of a body of men was heard without. They halted and the door was thrown open. The officer in command said he had come to escort him to the court-martial. Morton gave no sign of surprise and limped as firmly as he could, surrounded by the files of men, to the tent where the court was awaiting him. The clerk read the charges, which were, that he was a spy, that he had associated himself with Indian marauders in an attack on the camp and, that he had been an accomplice in the murder of Major Slocum. In reply to the usual question of guilty or not guilty, Morton answered that he scorned to plead to such charges, that his uniform was the best reply to his being a spy and if they doubted his right to wear it, he referred them to Major Stovin at Camp la Fourche; that he had made war in a lawful way and with men regularly enrolled in the British service, and, before God, he protested he had no hand in the killing of Major Slocum. “That,” said the presiding officer, “is equivalent to your pleading not guilty. The prosecutor will now have to adduce proof of the charges.”
The only witnesses were the soldiers who had found him lying in the bush beside the corpse of Major Slocum. Morton peremptorily refused to answer questions. “You place us in a painful position, Lieutenant Morton, by refusing to answer, for we must conclude that you can give no satisfactory explanation of the circumstances under which you were captured. A foul, a diabolical murder has been committed, and everything points to you as being, at least, a party to it. Your wound in itself is witness against you that you assailed our late comrade-in-arms.”
Morton rose to his feet, and holding up his hand said: “Gentlemen, I stand before you expecting to receive sentence of death and to be shortly in presence of my Maker. At this solemn moment, I repeat my declaration, that I had no part in the death of Major Slocum, that I did not consent to it and that if it had been in my power I would have saved him.”
“I submit, Mr President,” said a member of the court, “that the statement we have just heard is tantamount to Lieutenant Morton’s declaring he knows how and by whom Major Slocum came to his death. As one who has practised law many years, I assert that the statement just made is a confession of judgment, unless the defendant informs the court who actually committed the murder and declares his willingness to give evidence for the state. If a man admits he was witness to a murder and will not tell who did it, the court may conclude he withholds the information for evil purpose, and is justified in sentencing him as an abettor at least. In this case, the wound of the accused points to his being the principal. Before falling, Major Slocum, in his heroic defence, deals a disabling wound to this pretended British officer who thereupon leaves it to his associated red-skins to finish him and wreak their deviltry on the corpse.”
“The opinion you have heard,” said the presiding-officer, “commends itself to this board. What have you to say in reply?”
“Nothing,” answered Morton.