He needed rest.
Food.
And time to adjust to the fact that he no longer had to hide his identity.
Elena watched the brothers carefully.
Gideon kept glancing toward Matthew.
Sometimes every few minutes.
Sometimes twice in the space of a sentence.
Matthew noticed.
Finally, he laughed.
“Gideon.”
The older man looked over.
“What?”
“I'm not disappearing.”
Gideon swallowed.
“I know.”
Matthew smiled sadly.
“Do you?”
For several seconds, Gideon remained silent.
Then he admitted, “Not yet.”
Elena looked toward him.
Her expression softened.
Matthew leaned back.
“I suppose it'll take time.”
Gideon nodded.
“Yes.”
Then his brother grinned.
“You still snore?”
Gideon frowned.
“What?”
Matthew laughed.
“You used to shake the whole house.”
Elena's eyes widened.
She looked toward Gideon.
“Is that true?”
The rancher stared at his brother.
“Traitor.”
Matthew laughed harder.
Elena covered her mouth.
Then began laughing too.
For several minutes, the wagon was filled with a sound Gideon hadn't heard in ten years.
His brother's laughter.
And this time, it was real.
When they reached the ranch, Gideon helped Matthew inside.
Elena prepared soup while the brothers sat near the fireplace.
The younger man studied the room.
The heavy furniture.
The books.
The weapons mounted safely above the mantel.
And the photograph of the two brothers beside their old chestnut horse.
He approached it slowly.
For several seconds, he simply stared.
Then whispered, “You kept that.”
Gideon stood beside him.
“Of course.”
Matthew looked toward the photograph.
“I thought you'd forgotten what I looked like.”
Gideon's expression broke.
He placed one hand against his brother's shoulder.
“Not for a day.”
Matthew began crying.
Gideon pulled him into an embrace.
And Elena quietly returned to the kitchen, allowing the brothers a moment that belonged entirely to them.
Later that evening, after supper, Matthew asked about their parents.
Gideon told him their father had died four years before Matthew disappeared, as they both remembered.
Their mother had died the following winter.
She had never stopped hoping her younger son might return.
Matthew listened with tears running down his face.
He asked where she was buried.
Gideon promised to take him when the weather permitted.
Then the brothers spoke about the years they'd lost.
Not all at once.
There was too much pain for one evening.
But little pieces.
Matthew described working at the timber camps.
The people who helped him.
The older worker who finally recognized his family name.