He made no answer. Presently a fit of ague seized him, so that he could scarce stand. Then he reeled sideways and, by accident, set foot in the live coals. And instantly went clean crazed with fright.
As the Oneida caught him by the shoulder, to steady him, he shrieked and cowered, grasping Joe's arm in his terror.
"They mean to murder me!" he yelled. "Keep your savages away, I tell you!"—struggling between Tahioni and Joe—"I'll say what you wish, if they won't burn me!—--"
"Be silent," I said. "We mean no bodily harm to you. Compose yourself, Captain Moucher. Do you take me for a monster to threaten you with torture?"
But the awful fear of fire was in this whimpering wretch, and I was ashamed to have my Oneidas see a white man so stricken with cowardly terrors.
His honour—what there was of it—he sold in stammering phrases to buy mercy of us; and I listened in disgust and astonishment to his confession, which came in a pell-mell of tumbling words, so that I was put to it to write down what he babbled.
He had gone on his knees, held back from my feet by the Oneida; and his poltroonery so sickened me that I could scarce see what I wrote down in my carnet.
Every word was a betrayal of comrades; every whine a plea for his own blotched skin.
To save his neck—if treachery might save it—he sold his King, his cause, his comrades, and his own manhood.
And so I learned of him that Stevie Watts, disguised, had been that night at Summer House with Lieutenant Hare; that they had brought news to Lady Johnson of Sir John's safe arrival in Canada; that they had met and talked to Claudia Swift; had counted our men and made a very accurate report, which was writ in the military cipher which we discovered, and a copy of which Captain Watts also carried upon his proper person.