"Caesar never did. A month later your regiment was routed by the Continental Army. The rebels fired cannons for six hours, shelling the village your side occupied two days before. You found pieces of your cousin strewn everywhere. And you ran. Ran. You lived by your wits in the countryside, stealing what you needed to survive until you reached territory still in British hands, and again found yourself a pawn in the middle of other men’s battles—Camden, where your side scattered poorly trained regulars led by General Gates, then liberated slaves who donned their masters’ fancy clothing and powdered wigs and followed along behind Gates as his men pressed on; and the disastrous encounter at Guilford Court House, where six hundred redcoats died and Cornwallis was forced to fall back to Wilmington for supplies, then later abandon North Carolina altogether, moving on to Virginia. During your time as a soldier, you saw thousands sacrifice their lives, and no, it wasn’t as if you came through with only a scratch. At Camden you took a ball in your right shoulder. Fragments remain there still, making it a little hard for you to sleep on that side or withstand the dull ache in your shoulder on days when the weather is damp."

"But, miraculously, as the war began to wind down, you were given the elusive, long-coveted British pass. On the ship, now traveling north past Augusta, you knock your cold pipe against the railing, shaking dottle from its bowl, then reach into your coat for the scrap of paper that was so difficult to earn. Behind you, other refugees are bedding down for the night, covering themselves and their children with blankets. You wait until one of the hands on deck passes a few feet beyond where you stand, then you unfold the paper with fingers stiffened by the cold. In the yellowish glow of the ship’s lantern, tracing the words with your forefinger, shaping your lips silently to form each syllable, you read: This is to certify to whomfoever2 it may concern, that the Bearer hereof . . . Alexander Freeman . . . a Negro, reforted to the Britifh Lines, in confequence of the Proclamations of Sir William Howe, and Sir Henry Clinton, late Commanders in Chief in America; and that the faid Negro has hereby his Excellency Sir Benjamin Hampton’s Permiffion to go to NovaScotia, or wherever elfe he may think proper . . . By Order of Brigadier General Ruttledge."

QUESTION:
What new information do you receive in the second paragraph? How does it resolve some of the story’s suspense? What suspense still remains?

I desperately need help with this.

ALOT OF POINTS FOR THIS