““She studied Neel’s handkerchief. “It’s no matter,” she said, measuring her words. “The commander didn’t hit that man. I asked him not to in his mind, and he didn’t.” Musa accepted the apparent change of subject. “I wondered at that. He doesn’t strike his own soldiers, as a rule, you know. But this time I thought we might see the exception. His face was murder.” And he had taken the trouble to secure another man’s handkerchief. And he had shared her concern for her horse. Three kindnesses. Fire understood then that she had been afraid of Brigan, of her heart being injured by the hatred of a person she couldn’t help but like; and shy, as well, of his roughness, and his impenetrability. And she was still shy. But she was no longer afraid.””
![“Next came the Patent laws. These began in England in 1624; and, in this country, with the adoption of our constitution. Before then [these?], any man might instantly use what another had invented; so that the inventor had no special advantage from his own invention. The patent system changed this…” quote by Abraham Lincoln](https://sms4smile.com/quotes/img-quotes/449/abraham-lincoln-88_adoption_next-came-the-patent-laws-these-began-in_1828.jpg)
