Michael lowered his arms in dismay, not remembering. He saw before him an English officer, bound tightly to a stiff upright chair, and gagged with a twisted length of black cloth. His senses told him he was looking at Stephen Purceville, but his mind was too dazed to take it in. In that moment he only knew that it was a man, like himself.
“I didn’t mean to kill him,” he choked. “I just wanted to knock him out, and take his weapon.”
Having said this Michael steadied somewhat, and tried to force himself back to the present. With no clearer motive than to relieve the discomfort of the other---his enemy, he knew---he loosened and removed the gag.
Still Purceville could not gather himself to speak. All his life, he had been the one to hold another powerless before him. To be so bound, and at the mercy of an unknown Highlander---who by the look of him was not altogether rational---terrified him. But at last pride goaded him to words.
“Who are you?” he demanded. “What are you going to do with me?”
And with this, like the tolling of a bell, Michael saw the situation laid out clearly before him. And into focus, doubly sharp, came the memories of a lifetime of injustice:
The seizure of his father’s home and property, the impoverished conditions to which he was unused, and the contaminated well that had taken his life. Then the War, the Battle, and the Stockade. And he remembered, too, that the English held prisoner his nearest and dearest, in some wretched place called the Tower, where they were no doubt abject and afraid.
And though he couldn’t hate to violence any man, now that the soldier’s fall had shown him the fragility of all human life. . .pride he could feel, and anger. Roughly opening his shirt, he pulled it down across his shoulder, then turned his back to show the numbers branded there.
“What does this tell you?” he demanded in turn.
“You were a prisoner,” said Stephen. “I’m sorry. You’re a free man, now..... Look, you can’t kill me. There’s no reason---”