"Ah, yes. I will admit to being an ignoramus," I said with my best self-deprecating humility, "and therefore I must ask you to …to help me, in my ignorance. What year is it, James?"

"1775." 3

"Ah! When the Colonies were considering independence, I believe. Is that correct?"4

He responded obliquely. "I didn’t ask for no part in this bloody fracas over here."

"How did you get here? Are you a member of His Majesty’s service, in some way?"

"Not willingly, sir," he retorted.

"Not willingly? So you are…"

"I was walkin’ down Magdalen Street, mindin’ me own bloody business and, next thing I know, I’m in the bloody British Army."

"Aha!" I exclaimed. "What we sometimes call ‘shanghaied’…I’m not sure that’s a term you’re familiar with. So you are in the British…Army, did you say?"5

"Yessir."

"Do you have a rank? What is your rank in the British Army?"

Marianne’s SC had indicated we might contact an entity with leadership experience. Evidently he erred, for James reported, "I don’t have no bloody rank; I’m a foot soldier."

"A foot solder," I affirmed. "Uh, where are you now, geographically?"

James’s voice rose an octave in indignation. "How in the bloody ‘ell would I know? Oddly enough," he added, sarcastically, "they didn’t discuss the itinerary with us."

"Kept you in the dark, did they? Isn’t that just like the army?" I continued, commiserating with him. "Do you know, armies have been like that ever since there’ve been armies? The top brass think they know it all, while the poor people down at the bottom, who have to do the work, and do the fighting…"

He interrupted impatiently. "Listen, myte, it wasn’t our army that was the problem."

"Oh? Then whose army?"

"The bleedin’ Colonials," he responded.

"Oh, let me see…are you a prisoner of the Colonials, now?"

His manner turned diffident. "I s’pse…"

I pressed for details: "Are you, at this particular moment, incarcerated? Are you in a prison? A compound?"

"We was marchin’ into tyke Williamsburg,6 and I caught a bloody musket ball in my side…Damn ‘bleedin’ Colonial leech was s’posed to’ve been pulling it out; next thing I know, I’m in this here classy warehouse,7 supposedly waiting for the resolution of this fracas, to be sent ‘ome. That’s all I want, is to be sent ‘ome."

"A very reasonable desire that is," I agreed. "I have to sympathize with you. However," I pushed, "there are some factors here that you don’t know, and I want to make you aware of them because we’re in a kind of strange situation here. It’s simply this: that you have, in fact, succumbed to your wound."

"Do you mind!" Finding this preposterous, James was irate.

I got a bit contentious, myself. "Yes, I mind. You have succumbed to your wound, and you really do not belong…"

"Gawd Almighty!" James was beside himself. "Of all the leeches I could possibly get in this Gawdforsaken country, I get one who’s touched in the upper works!"

"Oh, yes, touched in the upper works…but in a strange way, because if you will simply listen and consider what I have to say, you may find it will be very liberating to you, and get you out of this-this ‘bloody, Godforsaken country’-because all you have to do, sir, is to realize that you are free to leave."