A Traitor Is Condemned

Vidkun Quisling sobbed at the thought of Vidkun Quisling. In lachrymose lethargy, he listened as Attorney Henrik Bergh last week pleaded his hopeless case, tried to list his virtues. But even the conscientious lawyer had a hard time finding virtues in Quisling.

Then, pale as death, Quisling himself launched into a two-day plea for his life. He did not deny any of the state's major charges, but he claimed to have saved Norway from becoming a battlefield. He even boasted of his sentimental friendship with Hitler. With evangelical fervor he called himself a prophet and a patriot. His last feeble shout: "If my activity has been treason, then in God's name I hope that for the sake of Norway many of her sons will become the same kind of traitor."

Then the trial was over. Seven judges and jurors (among them a plumber, a factory worker, a bookkeeper, a barber) retired to judge a man long ago judged by the world. For three days and three nights, Vidkun Quisling waited.

Frowning and blushing slightly, he heard the unanimous verdict: guilty. The life he claimed to have sacrificed for Norway would be ended by a firing squad.

This file is automatically generated by a robot program, so reader's discretion is required.