Synopsis

The play tells the story of James Dyke, a confessed murderer who has been sentenced to die and now awaits his fate on death row at a prison in Wethersfield, Connecticut. The only problem is that no one knows who he really is or where he comes from, and he is determined to take his secret to the grave. The prison's warden and chaplain have nearly given up hope of discovering his true identity until the night of Dyke's execution when a strange young woman arrives requesting to see him. Now, she may be the only key to unlocking Dyke's mysterious past. The woman leaves thinking that James is not her brother, but after she walks out, he recites lines about the Valiant. This is how we know that Dyke is her brother. He did not want to reveal his true identity so that his mother would think that her son died nobly in the war.