Promises

Mary Catherine MacLaren was already in love with the celluloid images of America and its Wild West when John David (Cappy) Sterling asked her to marry him. She also loved her birthright in Scotland and the old family cattle farm, Haddington Moor. After ten generations of MacLaren tradition, it was almost impossible to leave the old place, but he loved his family's sprawling Texas ranch equally and her passion for the land was not as strong as the passion for her cowboy. So, she gave in. Love and war can do that to a person, calling them away thousands of miles. Still, what ultimately convinced her to leave were the two promises Cappy swore to keep.

Thus, she left the green of Scotland in 1945 and reared her family in the parched landscape of West Texas, living out her childhood fantasies, yet always yearning for her homeland. Now, fifty-one years later, she is terminally ill and Cappy has not fulfilled his second promise. . . .