The general leaned back again in his chair and eyed Brinton through half-shut lids. Now that his victim was actually in his presence the old chief was able to force back rage for the moment and to substitute for it the no less fierce martinet discipline for which he had long been famed. “You are Lieutenant-Colonel James Brinton?” he asked. “Of General Taylor’s staff, I believe?” “Yes, sir,” came the unsteady reply. “You were sent here by General Taylor with a message to me?” “Yes, sir.” “Which message you publicly delivered in the plaza to-day.” “No, sir!” almost shouted Brinton. The involuntary eagerness wherewith he made the denial drove drink-pains tearing madly through his head and sent an ensuing wave of nausea over his whole numbed body. “No?” queried Scott with dangerous gentleness. “No, sir. At least--I--I have no recollection of what I said to you to-day. But from what Captain Grant and the others tell me--” “So?” put in Scott in seeming amazement. “General Taylor entrusted you with a message to me and you have no recollection of delivering it? General Taylor has indeed an excellent knowledge of men. When it comes to selecting a trustworthy courier or representative--” “I remember the message, sir,” said Brinton, the pastiness of his cheeks tinged with red. “But I am told I did not deliver it; that I said--” “I am a rough soldier, Colonel Brinton,” returned Scott. “I am not a member of the diplomatic corps. My mind cannot grasp the intricacies of General Taylor’s motive in sending here a representative who admits that he had one message to deliver, that he did not deliver it, and that he delivered another message whose purport he cannot remember. If General Taylor deals with other military affairs as wisely as he chooses his messengers--” “General Taylor’s unbroken line of triumphs speaks for him, sir!” flashed Brinton. “And you are one of those triumphs? A fair sample of the rest?” “I was drunk, sir.” “No! You astonish me. And _in vino veritas_? When your tongue was unguarded by your brain, you inadvertently expressed opinions of me that you and the rest of General Taylor’s staff have no doubt frequently heard from your chief?” “No, sir. I have never heard General Taylor speak slightingly of you nor of any other man.” “Really,” said Scott incredulously; then, feeling he had almost exhausted his ability to torture the man through the latter’s loyalty to Taylor, he began on a new tack. “Then, Colonel Brinton,” he charged, dropping the ironic suavity that had sat upon him as gracefully as a satin coat on a camel, “your insult to me to-day was gratuitous?” “If a contrite apology will--” “It will not. The case stands like this: in time of war and in the enemy’s country you were entrusted with a message from one of your country’s generals to another. You suppressed that message and substituted one wholly different. Do you acknowledge that, Colonel Brinton?”