But they had. His generation had lost the land. He had lost the land.
Cameron fingered the envelope in his pocket. He couldn’t hope to make restitution for the loss of the farm, for the way his mother had sold Duncan’s birthright out from under him to pay taxes. If Cameron had known about the sale, he would have done just about anything to stop it. But he hadn’t known, because he’d been fighting for the Union. Fighting against his neighbors, his friends, and his brother.
He'd do it again, damn the guilt.
Cameron took the envelope from his pocket, walked up the steps to the front door, and rapped loudly. He put the envelope on the ground in front of the door and backed away. Better to leave this with the letter. Better to not face his brother and the disdain he was certain he’d find.
His feet had just hit the dirt when he heard a ragged voice say, “Cameron? Is that you?”
Cameron turned and saw Duncan standing on the porch, shrugging into his black braces. Sadness creased his eyes and tugged at the corners of his mouth. Did Duncan know about the land? He must. Surely he’d gone home after the war and seen it the way Cameron had.
Gone. The family home razed to nothing. The house, the land, the horses and livestock—all of it gone. Duncan had no home to go home to, no horses to tend, even if Cameron’s mother hadn’t sold all of it.
A smile lit Duncan’s features, and Cameron struggled to swallow the lump in his throat.
“Cameron! It is you! How did you find me?” His brother practically launched himself off the front porch, his arms wide. He was but a foot or two away from Cameron when he stopped short, his gaze burning into Cameron’s. “Cam?”
Cameron cleared his throat. He closed his eyes for a moment, and then moved past his brother to pick up the envelope. “Finding you wasn’t that hard,” he lied. He’d spent the four months since Lee’s surrender at Appomattox searching for any trace of his brother. “Heard you’d been imprisoned not too far from here. When you didn’t come home, I figured it was the easiest place to start. And once I hit town, I only had to describe a giant with flaming red hair and a southern drawl, and I was told where to find you.”
Duncan snorted a laugh. “You always were the more resourceful of the two of us.” He put an arm around Cameron’s shoulders and prodded him toward the front door. “Come on inside, Cameron. Meet Mary and the baby.”
“I’m not staying, Duncan.”
Duncan clapped him on the shoulder, and somehow his brother’s warm greeting wounded him more than angry words would have. He struggled against the lump in his throat when Duncan said, “Of course you are. Our home is your home.”
Cameron closed his eyes and shook his head. “I got a train to catch. I can’t stay.” The roughness of his voice surprised even him.
The muscles in the side of Duncan’s face worked as he clenched his jaw. “Cam . . .”
Hastily, Cameron said, “I can’t. I just came to give you this.” He shoved the yellowed envelope into Duncan’s chest and took a few steps back to escape his brother’s proximity. Being this close to Duncan after all this time dredged up memories of the two of them playing in the creek behind the barn as boys, of wrestling in the pasture and mucking out stalls together, like the generations before them had.
Fighting and playing and working together, the way Mackays were meant to.
Duncan glanced at the envelope in his hands but made no move to open it. “What’s this?”
“Your half of the farm.” Duncan’s features darkened, and Cameron said quickly, as if his words could outrun his despair, “I know it’s not enough. I sold everything I own just to come up with that. Ma sold the farm, but I guess you knew that.”
Duncan shook his head, his lips pulled into a thin line. “I didn’t. I got her letter saying she was sick, and then I didn’t hear from her again.”
Cameron was silent for a long time. Though Cameron’s mother hadn’t given birth to Duncan, she’d loved him as if he were her own, and it didn’t surprise Cameron to learn that she’d written to his brother after he’d enlisted, no matter her politics. What did surprise him was that she hadn’t told Duncan of the sale of the farm. Then again, maybe she’d never had the time to tell him, since she’d died less than a month later. Remorse and regret for the way he’d failed the most important people in his life knifed at him again.
“She didn’t tell you?” When Duncan shook his head, Cameron said, “About a year ago. To Jacob Smith.”
Duncan’s mouth curled into a sneer, just as Cameron’s had when his mother had told him. “That bastard. He’s wanted our land ever since I can remember.”
“I know.” Cameron shifted his weight, his arms crossed against his chest. He cleared his throat again. “You been back?”
“No. You?”
Cameron nodded slowly. He focused his vision on his brother’s chest to avoid closing his eyes and seeing the ranch as it had been the last time he’d been in Virginia. “Yeah. Not much to go back to, though. Smith tore down everything to plant more tobacco.”
“The house and the barns?”
“Gone.”
“Grandfather’s things?”
Cameron shrugged. “Ma sold most of them to pay the taxes. She couldn’t work the ranch with no help. Couldn’t afford to pay anyone.”
“I’m sure she did her best,” Duncan said gently.
Cameron swallowed against the lump in his throat, and he nodded to cover the doubts in his heart. His mother hadn’t been a Mackay like Duncan and Cameron were. She’d been a northerner through and through and had wanted her son to go to some fancy college and become a lawyer, like her father and her brother. She didn’t understand the affinity the Mackay boys had for their land. She’d never held a clod of dirt in her hands and let it spill through her fingers. Never appreciated the smell of wet hay and never mucked out a stall. She couldn’t tell with a glance when a mare was in foal, and had never understood the thrill and pride of breaking a horse.
But then, she hadn’t grown up with the stories of what their grandfather had done to get that land and keep it, and those stories hadn’t meant anything to her.
Taking a breath to steady his heart, Cameron said, “So. There you go. I’ll pay you the rest of it once I get it. I’ll give you a fair price, I promise.”
Duncan appraised Cameron with his eyes. “What about you, Cam? You bring me this, but what about you?”
“Got a ticket for the train to Nebraska. After that, I’ll work my way west. To the mines.”
“To the mines,” Duncan echoed, disbelief in his voice. “We’re not miners, Cam. We’re horse folk. We work the land, we don’t dig it up.”
Cameron gave his brother a careless shrug, pretending he didn’t mourn the loss of their land with every breath he took. “There’s no money in ranching,” he said, as if that explained everything. Though the thought pained him, he squared his shoulders. He met his brother’s gaze and saw the disappointment there.
Duncan put his big hand on Cameron’s shoulder. “That’s true enough. Come inside, Cam. Meet the wife and baby.”
“I can’t,” Cameron said, his voice hoarse. He took a step backward, away from the house and all that it represented.
“A few days, Cam. Stay a few days.” Duncan paused. “It’s been a long time.”
Cameron took off his hat and raked his hands through his hair. In his wildest dreams, he hadn’t hoped to find anything approaching acceptance from his brother. He had lost the land, not Duncan. He was the one who had run off and fought for the Union, leaving his mother to care for the ranch on her own, and knowing she wasn’t capable of it. He had done all of that, while his brother languished in a war prison.
“Can’t,” Cameron said gruffly, and retreated yet again. He settled his hat back on his head and gave his brother a mocking salute. “Nic
e seeing you, Duncan.”
He turned to go. As he walked down the long gravel drive toward the road and the town, Duncan called after him, “Cam, wait.”
Cameron waved over his shoulder, but didn’t turn. Seconds later, he was hit on the shoulder hard enough to spin him around. Suddenly he was engulfed in his brother’s embrace. “That wasn’t a proper goodbye,” Duncan said, his voice rough with an emotion that Cameron felt but didn’t want to think about.
It had been five years since he had seen or talked to his brother. Five long years without a word from the best friend he’d ever known. Their last words to one another had been bitter, with Duncan arguing that the most important thing was the land and community, and Cameron arguing just as fiercely that freedom and country was.
His mother had sat on her parlor sofa and wept.
If Cameron had known then what he knew now, he would have wept, too.
He inhaled deeply to steady his heart, and swallowed against the hard lump lodged in his throat. Giving his brother an amiable pat on the shoulder, he said, “Good to see you again, Duncan. I’m glad you’ve found something that makes you happy.”
The corners of Duncan’s lips ticked up in a smile, and he turned to look back at the house. A woman stood framed in the doorway, and his smile broadened. It struck Cameron that Duncan was truly happy here, with this woman, on this land, even though it wasn’t the Mackay land he’d fought so hard to keep.
“I have,” Duncan said. He studied Cameron for a moment. “One thing I’ve discovered is that it’s not about the land itself. It’s about who you work it with.”
“I’ll remember that.” Cameron’s gaze flicked up to the house. “I wish you nothing but the best.”
“Same goes for you.” Duncan opened up the envelope and handed half the money to Cameron. “The farm was half yours. You’re entitled to half the profits.”
“It’s yours, Duncan. Use it to fix the door. I noticed you need to re-hang it. And the porch is starting to sag.”
His brother grinned at Cameron’s jibe, but instead of dropping his hand, he shook the money insistently. “Take it.”
“No.”
“Take enough to get to . . . wherever it is you’re going. Get to the mines, at least. The railroads are dangerous work. I hate to think of my little brother working the railroad.” He shoved the money at Cameron, much like Cameron had shoved the envelope at Duncan just minutes before. “Take it.”
Cameron’s eyes met Duncan’s, and he knew Duncan wouldn’t let him leave if he didn’t take the money. And by God, Cameron needed to get out of here. He didn’t deserve Duncan’s forgiveness. But when he raised his gaze to his brother’s, he found the absolution he neither wanted nor merited burning in Duncan’s eyes. Pocketing the money, he said gruffly, “You’re so damn bossy.”
“I’m the oldest. I know best,” Duncan said, and then he grinned again.
Cameron’s chest tightened. He gave Duncan a half-hearted smile, and it made his face hurt. “I’d best be going.”
Glancing back at the house, Duncan said, “You want me to take you into town?”
“No, I’ll walk.”
“I’ll go with you into town, then.”
Cameron nodded up to the porch, where the woman stood waiting. “Stay with your family, Duncan.”
“You’re family, too, Cam. I haven’t seen my brother in five years. Mary’s a good woman. She’ll understand.” He glanced back up at the house and smiled. “She’ll have my hide if you don’t come in.”
Cameron’s heart twisted painfully in his chest. “Can’t. You stay. It’s better this way.”
Maybe not better, but easier for him, anyway.
The pain in Duncan’s expression knifed at Cameron much like his guilt did. “If that’s what you want.”
“It is. Goodbye, Duncan.”
“Write to us.”
“I will,” Cameron said, and he was surprised that his words weren’t a lie.
Duncan abruptly lunged forward and took Cameron’s hand. Pressing something cold and metal into it, he said, “Take it, Cam. For protection and luck.”
Cameron looked down and was startled to find that Duncan had pressed the family ring into his hand. Extending the jewel to his brother, he said, “I can’t take this. This belongs to you.”
Duncan smiled, though sadness tugged at the corners of his mouth. “It belongs with a Mackay, and you’re a Mackay. I've got the family sgian dubh and the tartan, and I guess it seemed fair when I thought you had the farm. But if this is all we have left of our legacy as Scotsman, then some of it is yours.” Duncan looked away for a moment, and his face clouded. He gestured to the house and the woman behind him. “That ring brought me luck—I have everything I ever wanted right here. Maybe the ring will bring you luck, too. Help you find what you’re looking for.”
“You know I don’t believe in luck.”
“All the more reason for you to have the ring, little brother,” Duncan said quietly, closing Cameron’s fingers over the ring. His hands were warm and callused and the pain in Cameron’s chest intensified to the point where he had to fight to draw breath. He clapped Cameron on the shoulder. “Let it be a reminder of where you came from.”
Cameron’s heart tumbled and raged beneath his ribs. The words he wanted to say wouldn’t come, locked as they were inside his chest, so he nodded to his brother and turned to go.
“I missed you, Cameron,” Duncan said to his back. “I’m glad you found me.” He paused. “I’m really glad you came.”
Cameron slung his bag onto his shoulder and waved, but didn’t turn back around. There was nothing he could say that would even come close to what his brother had done.
The brother who had joined the Confederate Army to protect his land and his heritage—only to lose both—had given up a priceless link to the past. He’d relinquished it to the younger brother who had valued country and politics over clan and land, a man who hadn’t considered himself a Mackay in anything but name for a long time now.
Cameron’s eyes burned, and he put the ring in his pocket. He didn’t deserve to wear it. But he couldn’t return it to Duncan, either, because if he did, Duncan would insist Cameron stay. If he did that, Cameron just might.
Cameron didn’t turn until he’d reached the road. When he did, he saw Duncan up on his porch, his arm around his wife. She had her arms wrapped around his waist, and the way she looked up at him reminded Cameron of the way his mother had looked at their father, back in the days when their family had been happy and whole.
Duncan waved.
Cameron pretended he didn’t see it, and continued on his way toward the town and his freedom.
Chapter 2
Virginia City, Nevada
June 1869
“You’re going home with me tonight, sweet.”
Fiona Keenan’s companion leaned in close, his sour breath hot against her cheek. Turning her face away, she purred a quiet laugh and ran her hands down the front of his vest, plucking his watch from his pocket.
From behind the mask obscuring most of her face, she batted her lashes. “I think I’ll be going home the way I came. Alone. But I’d be happy to dance,” she replied, gesturing to the crowded dance floor behind her.
Tobacco smoke, thick as fog, clung to the air, and raucous music filled the dancehall. Men shouted, slamming their fists on the bar as they drank and gambled, and outside, gunshots rang out like fireworks. Old animosities were long forgotten, as former enemies joined together in celebration.
Money was a great way to make friends of old rivals.
Just as her companion was taking her into his arms—and her fingers were finding a way into his pockets—the saloon doors opened and a mountain of a man entered. He took off his black hat, exposing the most glorious head of red-gold hair she’d
ever seen. The color of the sun at early dawn, the waves caught the pale flickering of the lanterns and cast a glow around him like a halo of light. The gallop of her heartbeat had nothing to do with the fast-paced dance.
She’d always had a soft spot for a ginger-haired man.
Fiona shook off the desire to abandon her current partner, whoever he was, and ask the newcomer to dance. She wasn’t here seeking her own pleasure, nor was she here to celebrate the birth of a country she barely cared for. She was here to work.
For she had a particular skill set for which the Ceàrdannan were well known, and she’d been assigned to use them tonight.
She was an actress. A pickpocket, a fortune-teller, a swindler.
A miner in fading britches and a long, graying beard bumped into her. “Beg pardon,” he slurred, catching himself on her shoulders.
“No harm done,” she demurred, her fingers dipping into his pockets and coming away with a small purse she hid discretely in her skirts.
“That’s my girl, there,” her companion barked, taking the older man by the collar and shoving him toward the door.
“Don’t see no ring on her finger.” The older miner growled and twisted away from her companion to take a drunken swing at him. In seconds, a fight erupted, spilling out the door and into the street, and Fiona moved on to find another mark.
Just like everyone else in this rough and tumble town, she and the gypsy band she traveled with had come in search of fortune. Only most of them came for the silver. She was here for whatever was in their pockets. And in a few weeks, after Independence Day, her band would pack up and continue on, in search of another town where they could entertain, swindle, and cheat. By that time, the locals would be delighted to see the them go.
Until then, she had work to do.
She pretended to drink. She flirted. She danced, and with each change of partners, she came away with a little something extra to line her pockets. And more than once, her stomach dropped to the floor as she caught sight of the man with the red-gold hair watching her from across the room. She glanced in his direction again and their gazes collided, his lips curving into a smile and her heart bounced around beneath her breast as if on springs.
Highland Sons: The Mackay Saga Page 8