Was that approval she read in his face? Surely not. A woman who had led the life she had would be anathema to this stern man.
“Aye, that I do. Ever since he was a wee bairn.” He gestured to her bench. “May I join ye, my lady?”
She nodded. “Of course.”
“Thank you.” He took the space next to her and stretched his bare legs under the kilt out to the sun. “I’m not as young as I used tae be.”
She didn’t say anything, afraid she might discourage confidences. Because confidences were about to flow, she knew.
After a pause, he went on. “I was gey lucky—I’ve always had work on the estate. Most other crofters werenae so fortunate. They were all tossed off their land when the duke’s mother decided more gold lay in sheep than in folk. Families who had served the Kinmurries for centuries were cast away like so much rubbish tae starve or emigrate or find what work they could far from all they knew and loved.”
Verity was appalled. “Surely you exaggerate.”
“No, lassie,” he said sadly. “I wish I did. It’s a common story since the lairds started tae cut a dash down south. The clearances were late coming tae Kinmurrie holdings. But when she decided tae act, the duchess was ruthless. Folk tried tae resist but there wasnae anything they could do. And when the troopers shot John Macleish, my nephew, most of us went quietly enough. We couldnae fight the law.”
It was a terrible story, more terrible for what Verity suspected Hamish left out—the destruction of a whole way of life. “On the way here, I thought it was odd that we saw no people, just ruined cottages.”
“Aye. This happened all over the Highlands,” he said with a bitterness he didn’t hide.
“Yet you don’t blame the duke?” Surely this tragic tale provided her with another sin to heap on Kylemore’s head.
“Och, he was but a bairn. He might have inherited the title, but he had nae real power until he reached his majority. The duchess had all the say, and she’s no a woman tae put anything ahead of her own selfish wishes.”
“But Kylemore continued to profit from what she did.”
Hamish stared straight ahead into the misty hills. His expression was distant, as though he relived those tragic events.
“No, he did his best tae make amends. When His Grace took over, he set out tae find everyone he could. But by then, fourteen hard years had passed. Folk died or were lost. Many went across the water tae Nova Scotia. Still, he tracked down those he could and invited them back. Those with new lives, he gave them money tae make up for their trouble.”
“Fergus and his family,” she said, remembering their fervent and, at the time, inexplicable devotion to Kylemore.
“Aye. Fergus is my brother. Search as ye will, my lady, ye won’t find a soul on any Kinmurrie estate tae say a word against His Grace.”
Once she mightn’t have believed Hamish. But while the last days had revealed a darker, more complex Kylemore, they had also shown her the honorable man hidden inside him too. She had no trouble imagining that honorable man moving heaven and earth to make recompense for the pain his mother had caused.
The duke would abhor them discussing him like this. He wanted her to view him as the impossibly self-assured Cold Kylemore.
But she’d held him in her arms too often. Held him when he’d shuddered with sexual release. Held him when he’d sobbed with misery.
He’d never be that impervious aristocrat to her again. Hamish’s revelations only moved that false perfection further out of reach.
“Why are you telling me this?” she asked.
He turned his head and looked at her squarely. “I’ve watched ye, lassie. I’ve watched the laddie with ye. I know he’s done wrong by ye. I think in his soul, he admits that. But there’s good in him, if ye look. And for all his privileges, he’s no had an easy life.”
“He’s rich and handsome enough,” Verity said, echoing her brother’s dismissive reply when she’d falteringly tried to describe the tormented depths she’d sensed in her lover’s soul even then.
“Aye, weel, neither make ye happy. Ask him about his father some time.”
She already knew Kylemore had feared his father. She shivered as she recalled him begging his papa to leave him alone. A child’s cry in a sleeping man’s voice.
“Can’t you tell me?”
The older man smiled ruefully down at her. “Och, I’ve gossiped enough for one day. Too much, folk might think.”
Kylemore would certainly agree, but Hamish had only whetted her curiosity.
“The duke has bad dreams,” she said abruptly.