The Veteran's Legacy

2. Glen Cailleach, Scottish Highlands, April 1746

“I’m going to kill them, Mother,” Hughie said.

“Yes, you are,” Mary MacKim agreed. “You will kill them when you are ready. At present, you’re only ten years old, and they are full men and trained soldiers. I’ve lost one son. I don’t wish to lose another so soon.” She leaned closer to him. “You must avenge your brother, Hugh, but not until you are older.”

“I’ll join the army.” Hughie fought the tears that threatened to unman him once more. “I’ll be a trained soldier, too.”

“Not yet,” Mary MacKim said. “You’re far too young. By the time you are old enough, you’ll see that I am right. When the time is right, Hughie, you will learn how to fight the way the redcoats fight, and you will find the monsters who murdered Ewan.”

Hughie knew he could not argue with his mother. He shook his head. “I did not know what they were saying. I want to learn to speak English.”

“Then that is what you shall do, Hugh Beg MacKim. You will learn English and the ways of the red soldiers. I will find you a tutor who will teach you to read, write and even think in English as they do, and who will also teach you French, the language of the educated class. I put the duty of learning upon you, Hugh. To die in battle is honourable and proper. To be murdered when lying wounded is not. Your life must be to find these brutes of red soldiers, Hugh, and kill them.”

Shocked by the sights he had seen and the sounds he had heard, Hughie looked up into the unrelenting eyes of his mother. “Yes, Mother.”

“You must promise me, Hugh.” Mary MacKim produced a Bible. Ancient, leather- covered and brass-bound, it had been in the family for generations, with the names of two score MacKims neatly inscribed in the fly-leaf. “You must swear on the Holy Book that you will avenge your brother.”

For a moment, Hughie stared at his mother, and then he placed both hands on the Bible. “I promise you, Mother.” The leather was cool to his touch, worn smooth by the fingers of Hughie’s ancestors. “I swear on the Bible that I will avenge Ewan, my brother.”

As he spoke, Hughie felt a thrill run through him. His words were not merely rhetoric. He had sworn by the family Bible, so generations of his people were witnesses to his oath. In Hugh’s mind, his father and grandfather and all his relatives back through the centuries were watching him and would continue to watch him until he had fulfilled his oath. If he broke his word, they would know and disapprove.

Mary MacKim took the Bible from Hughie, opened the Book, placed her hand inside and said: “If you fail in your task, may your children and your children’s children, and their children’s children, follow your path until we have cleansed the debt.” She handed the Bible over. “Swear it, Hugh Beg MacKim. Swear your oath.”

Holding the Bible, Hugh said, “If I fail in my duty, I will pass over the task to my children, and their children, until the debt is cleansed.” But that will not happen, he told himself. I have sworn a blood oath.

But that will not happenI have sworn a blood oath.“Good.” Mary MacKim closed the Book with a nod of satisfaction. “Now we can prepare you for the task ahead.”

* * *

Hughie lived in the clachan of Achtriachan, set apart from the main Glen Cailleach, with a small burn running a few paces below and the summer shielings high in the hills beyond. Above them, the guardian hill of An Cailleach, The Witch, brooded over Achtriachan. Hughie was beside the rowan tree at the door of his cottage as the soldiers came to the glen, and watched the smoke curl as they fired the clachans one by one.

“They’ll come here soon,” Hughie said.

“They will,” Mary agreed.

“Will we fight them?” Hughie lifted a flail, the only weapon Achtriachan had.

“We will not. We will not fight the soldiers their way.” Mary took the flail from him. “Fetch the Bible, Hughie. We’ll bury it deep.”

They dug a hole beneath the rowan tree, placed the Bible within a small oaken chest and patted the earth back down as the redcoats marched to Achtriachan. The few other inhabitants of the clachan had already run into the hills.

“Come, Hughie, into the heather.” Lifting her skirt, Mary strode away, not even deigning to look over her shoulder as the soldiers advanced to burn her home. “We’ll watch from Clach nan Bodach.”

Clach nan Bodach, the Rock of the Old Man, was a prominent Standing Stone that stood some two hundred feet above Achtriachan.

“Down there.” Mary indicated a slight hollow in front of the stone. “We can see them, and they can’t see us.”

Together with Mary, Hugh watched as the soldiers burned their clachan and stole their livestock. He saw the blue smoke coiling skywards as the soldiers set fire to their thatch, and heard the redcoats’ alien, guttural voices.

“Watch and learn.” Mary seemed unmoved by the destruction of all she owned.

“Watch how they move and listen to how they talk, watch how they hold their muskets and how they march. Learn, Hugh, for they are our enemies, the enemies of our blood and the more you learn about them, the better it will be.”

The rough laughter of the soldiers polluted the glen as they drove away the livestock and destroyed everything they could not steal, leaving behind smoking ruins, trampled crops and a n***d woman swinging by her neck from a tree.

“Mhairi MacPherson,” Mary said. “Her tongue was always longer than her brain. She would tell the redcoats what she thought of them. Take heed, Hughie. Keep your council with the English-speakers. Tell them what they want to hear and hide your thoughts from them. Let them dwell in their simplicity.”

A small party of soldiers swaggered towards Mary MacKim and Hughie, led by a man wearing a philabeg below his scarlet tunic.

“That is a Campbell, one of Lord Loudon’s men.” Mary MacKim did not hide the contempt in her voice. “We can excuse the English-speakers, as they are brought up in ignorance, but when one of our own turns against us, they are worse than the devil.” She pushed Hughie away and stood up. “Run and hide, Hughie.”

“Hey, you!” Loudon’s Highlander addressed Mary. “What are you doing?”

“I am watching you.” Mary held the man’s gaze.

“Where is your home?” The man was about thirty, with an open, freckled face and blue eyes.

“Over there.” Mary indicated the burning clachan behind her. “You have seen fit to burn the home of a widow woman.”

“The home of a traitorous b***h,” the Loudon Highlander said. “Where are the rest of your cattle? I know this glen has more. Glen Cailleach always had cattle.”

Mary MacKim hesitated for a moment. “We have no more cattle.”

“I can hang you for a traitor,” the Loudon man ran his hand down Mary’s face, curling his fingers around her throat as the redcoats behind him watched, chewing tobacco and spitting into the heather. “Or use you. You are a handsome enough woman, except for the smell.” He said something in English that set his companions to laughter.

Hiding in the heather, Hughie fought the desire to rise and attack the Hanoverians. His mother had chosen to face them; she knew what she was doing. He saw the English-speaking soldiers crowd around his mother, still laughing loudly. Hating to see these arrogant strangers with their grasping ways in his glen, Hughie closed his eyes, trying to force the image of Ewan from his mind.

“We have cattle in the high shieling,” Mary MacKim said at last.

“Take us, woman,” the Loudon man said and spoke in English for the benefit of his companions.

Hughie shook his head, knowing there were no cattle at the high shielings, the summer pasture. He followed at a distance as his mother strode up the flank of An Cailleach with the Loudon man and his companions trailing behind her.

“How far are your shielings?” the Loudon man asked, after a quarter of an hour.

“A fair step.” Mary did not reduce her speed. She led them around the flank of An Cailleach and continued, threading through a patch of peat bog that had the English-speaking soldiers swearing as they floundered and sank knee-deep in mud. “Tell your soldiers to walk where I walk,” Mary said. “This bog is deep.”

Once over the bog, Mary increased her pace, winding her way across the shoulder of a scree-scarred mountain, past the tumbled ruins of a hill fort and onto a pass between two hills. By that time, only one of the English-speaking soldiers had kept pace with her. The other two lagged far behind, struggling over the unfamiliar terrain. To Mary’s right, the hills rose steeply into grey mist. To her left, the slope fell away, nearly perpendicular, towards a churning burn, before rising again.

“How much further?” the Loudon Highlander asked.

“Over the pass,” Mary said. Stooping, she lifted a fist-sized stone from the ground. “We always pick a stone here. It’s a tradition.” Without hesitation, she folded the stone in a handkerchief, poised, and swung it hard against the Loudon man’s forehead. Too surprised to retaliate, he fell at once, and Mary pushed him over the edge of the precipice. Gasping, the nearest soldier grabbed at Mary, missed by a yard and shouted something as she lifted her skirt and scrambled up the slope.

Astonished that his mother could act in such a manner, Hugh could only watch as the soldier clumsily swung his musket up to his shoulder to aim, but by that time Mary was sixty yards away and moving fast. The shot sounded flat, with the wind flicking away the smoke from the muzzle of the musket. Staring up into the mist-streaked hill, the soldier loaded his musket, muttering as he rammed home the ball, and began to climb after Mary.

Waiting on the skyline, Mary ensured the soldier could see her before running down the far side of the ridge and back toward Glen Cailleach. She whistled once, as she had when her boys were young.

“Mother!” Hughie ran to join her. “You killed that man.”

“Yes. Let’s get you back to the glen,” Mary said.

“How about the other soldiers? They saw what you did.”

“With the mist coming down, they’ll be lost in the hills. They won’t find their way back to the glen.” Mary showed no concern as she added, “They’ll probably die out here.”

Hughie shook his head, struggling to come to terms with his mother’s callous attitude. He stared down the slope where the Loudon Highlander had fallen. “You killed that man.”

“Men or women who turn against their own deserve nothing else,” Mary said. “Come on, Hughie. We’ve got a house to rebuild.” She faced Hughie. “That’s one for Ewan.”