New Kingdom: Creatures of Habit Chapter One



 (© Copyright 2011/2015 Charles F. Millhouse All Right Reserved)

Caleb Johnson reached down and picked up his 45 caliber Schofield Single Action Pistol. He twirled it in his right hand. He remembered its weight and balance as if he held it yesterday. Even after seven years the cold metal against his weathered hand brought back many memories, including the last time he used it. Vengeance, although sweet, couldn't replace the loss burned into his heart. He missed Lucy, her smile, her golden corn silk hair and the way she would tell him, Life without you would be pointless.
When his holster slammed down on the desk in front of him, Caleb’s attention snapped back to his surroundings. After more than half a decade behind the walls of the Yuma Territorial prison in the desert of Arizona, he still had not grown accustomed to them. He holstered his pistol, picked it up and slung it on his hip.
“Bullets?” Caleb asked.
The bull-dog faced guard on the other side of the desk just grunted and placed more personal effects on the desk. A silver pocket watch broke before the war, a nine inch hunting knife, which had been his fathers and the tarnished silver wedding ring, the symbol of Caleb’s love for his long dead wife. Of all the items on the desk, he snatched up the ring first and forced it on his leathery finger.
Finally the guard dropped four gold dollar coins on top of the desk, one at a time. They made a clinging sound as they hit the unpolished surface of the desk. Caleb stared at them and grimaced. His debt to society paid, but the coffers of his soul were penniless.
Once changed out of his prison garb and into his old brown denims and long weather-beaten trail jacket, Caleb stood at the entrance to the prison. He tucked his Stetson down tight on his head. His long blond hair had become unmanageable over the years and his beard just the same. With a look back at the white sun-soaked walls of the prison’s main building, Caleb took his first step into freedom.
He held the reins of an old nag. The horse, so old, his once white coat now faded to dingy grey. It followed behind Caleb barely able to lift his legs. Caleb refused to ride the horse in fear of breaking the beast’s back. It would have done the animal justice if he had put a bullet in its head, if he had bullets. Together they trudged through the dusty wasteland toward… toward nowhere. Caleb had no particular place to go and nothing to do once he got there.
He turned and walked his horse east, toward Kentucky. Home. Lucy was buried there. A reminder Caleb needed to freshen, though the pain still cut into his soul even after seven years. He hadn’t visited her grave since they laid her to rest. The reminder of that day still clear in his thoughts as if it was yesterday. It was a cold spring day in late March. Snow blew like ash around the service, besides the men guarding him, Caleb stood alone, shunned by his community. God fearing people who in Caleb’s hour of need, proved what it meant to be so-called Christians.
He cried as the undertaker covered Lucy with wet earth and dropped a silver locket – the one he gave her on their engagement – into the grave. Even now, in the sun soaked earth of Arizona, Caleb remembered every moment of their time together. The locket meant a lot to Lucy – it meant a lot to him. He gave it to her the day he rode off to war.
Even though Civil War loomed, no one thought it would last. “I’ll be home in less then a month,” he told her. They began plans to build a home, rear a family and grow old with one another. But the war between the North and South lasted longer than anyone imagined. Year after year, battle after battle for five bloody years the war continued. By its end Caleb, like every man who fought, returned home changed forever.
No matter how long he lived, three things would be forever etched in Caleb’s memories. The war, the day Lucy died and the day Caleb had his vengeance.

(© Copyright 2011/2015 Charles F. Millhouse All Right Reserved)
Twenty-six days out from Yuma prison, Caleb arrived at a trading post outside Fort Pueblo Colorado. The last time he visited the post was on his way to prison. The stain of blood still scared his hands. He couldn't remember if it was Lucy’s blood or... He wiped sweat from his weathered brow. Images flashed through his mind and Caleb remembered the journey to the prison – his life destroyed; all he wished for was death. Different times, he thought.
Seven years was a long time. The trading post expanded since the last visit, but the fort remained the same. A small town grew up around it, a hotel, restaurant, a lawyer’s office even a barber shop. The only place Caleb recognized was the saloon where the guards transporting him drank while he sat in the back of the uncomfortable prison wagon.
The original building, the old trading post, still looked the same. Caleb tied the tired nag to the hitching post. He wiped the dust from his hands and face as best he could and headed toward the restaurant. After a meal of fried cabbage and pinto beans, Caleb paid for a quick shave and a haircut; his long blond locks now short and presentable. His beard trimmed neat and even against his face. As he left the barber shop he caught his reflection in the window outside. He’d forgotten what he looked like since the last time he looked in a mirror. Older now, his skin sun darkened, his cobalt eyes heavy with burden. He took a step closer to the glass and noticed the scar on his right cheek. He traced the index finger of his right hand along the scar just below his eye down to his chin.
James Young put the scar there with a sword after he killed Lucy. The rage in Caleb knew no bounds, that day, killing both James and his son, Randle, and avenging Lucy was all he wanted. Even though he lost all those years in prison, he knew Lucy could rest easy knowing he settled the score with the men that murdered her.
Outside in the midday sun, Caleb took a deep breath – freedom, he thought, finally. But will I ever truly be free?
“Hey mister is this, your horse?” a young boy asked from the street.
A crowd gathered around Caleb’s horse lying on the ground. “Goddamn it,” he said as he stepped onto the dusty street. He pushed his way through the people not surprised his horse had keeled over and died. Caleb pushed back his hat. “Goddamn it,” he said again and added, “Good thing I didn’t ride the bastard."
“That your horse mister?” the boy asked again.
“Not anymore,” Caleb said not looking at the child. “He’s buzzard food now,” he added as he unbuckled the saddle harness under the horse’s belly and pulled it free from the dead carcass.
“Hey you can’t just leave that animal there!” A smelly old man said. He blocked Caleb’s way. “You’ll have to move it.”
Caleb paused and considered the man might cause him trouble if he did not do something about the dead horse. “Well, who do I see about removing it?” he asked and joked, “The undertaker?”
“Wise ass,” the old man said as he walked around Caleb, mumbling aloud about young people and how they have no morals anymore.
In the trading post, Caleb laid down a dollar for a box of .45 caliber shells. He’d felt almost naked on the trail without ammunition, a target for anything in the wild, beast or man. Now without a horse he would be at the mercy of those creatures on foot. Something he didn’t look forward to.
“Would you be looking to sell your saddle?” the shop keeper asked as Caleb loaded his pistol, “Seeing you won’t need it anymore.”
“I aim to buy another horse,” Caleb said, though he knew he had no money to do so.
“Well,” the shop keeper pondered, “The only horses worth a grain of salt are owned by the blue bellies at the fort. But, I don’t see them selling any, seeing that good horse flesh is scarce in these parts.”
“I see,” Caleb said.
“So about that saddle?”
Caleb shook his head. The saddle itself was not worth much; given to him with the flea-bitten bag-o-bones when he left the prison. However since he had nothing better, nor would he be getting anything better he picked up the saddle from the mercantile floor and move on. He noticed the dead horse removed from the street when he stepped from the store. Then, Caleb had what he considered a good idea, and headed toward the front gate of the fort.
The guard at the gate, a young trooper that looked like he was recently weaned from his mother, listened to Caleb’s problem and led him to the captain of the post. Harrington Hoppergrass, a tall well-mannered gentleman, with a fine-trimmed beard and mustache. Hoppergrass wore a sharp pressed uniform with a handsome looking sidearm on his left hip, for a quick over the waist draw from his right hand. He carried a swagger stick he whipped against his leg as he stood at ease and listened to Caleb’s story.
“So you see captain,” Caleb said after recounting his plight, “Someone’s stolen my horse on your post and since it is your jurisdiction…”
“Not exactly Mr. Johnson,” Hoppergrass said as he sat on the edge of his desk near Caleb. “The trading post and the small community that has sprouted up around it, is not in my authority. I have no power to hunt down the person, or persons who stole your mount.”

(© Copyright 2011/2015 Charles F. Millhouse All Right Reserved)
Caleb’s throat dried up like the Arizona desert. He calmed himself, cleared his throat. It was a simple lie and he needed a horse. “But that’s not what I’m asking,” he said and shifted in his seat.
“Then what are you asking sir?” Captain Hoppergrass asked. He slapped the stick on his leg.
Caleb stood. “I was a captain in the Kentucky militia. I served the Union, with great pride and, well I was hoping the army could repay that in kind with the loan of a horse.”
“A loan?” Captain Hoppergrass sounded surprised.
Caleb nodded. “Yes... I mean to return the horse in Kentucky once I return home to my farm.”
Captain Hoppergrass smiled. “I see. Mr. Johnson I’m not in the practice of loaning out government animals. We need them as much as anyone. So you’ll understand if I must decline your request.”
Caleb winced. He figured it was a long shot and he should be happy that Captain Hoppergrass did not do a detailed search into his past, or his story of horse thieves.
“However,” the captain continued, tickling the ivory handle of his forty-five on his hip. “There is a stage due through here in two days time that could take you east. I’d arrange for you to stay here in the fort and have a seat on that stage at the government’s expense.”
It wasn’t what Caleb hoped for but images of Kentucky consumed him. “Yes, I would like that.” Home – Lucy, he thought.

New Kingdom: Creatures of Habit available on Amazon