The Return

By Daniel Carlson

Levi Clayton was intent on fulfilling the promise he made to a friend over two years ago,however when embarking on his unforeseen epic journey his challenges were elevated to unimaginable levels by the atrocities of the American civil war.

In the heart of the unforgiving war-ravaged territories, betrayal and suspicion command the boardwalks where the law has been forsaken and justice is served from the barrel of the gun. 

• Language: English
• Publisher: Daniel Carlson
• Release date: Dec 11, 2022
• ISBN: 9798215799208

Book preview

Chapter 1

The moon glow offered little light around Lexington station and nothing, but blackness could be seen inside the nasal stinging.

Levi was hurled up by his collar and tossed into the darkened cart by two burly guards. Bone cracking against bone brought Levi’s thrusting body to an immediate halt as his forehead smashed hard against another man’s cheek. There was neither rage nor any retaliatory outbursts omitted from the injured man, just a shallow tolerant groan to acknowledge the pain. He knew the collision could not be avoided inside the cramped, dingy carriage. 

Now you boys make sure you’re all as quiet as little mice and keep your mouths shut or I’ll cut your misery short and end your miserable existence by dropping you all straight into the waters of the Ohio. Shouted the blue clad guards. You all catch my drift, he grinned, enjoy the ride. He tormented as he slid tight the solid wooden door.

Levi instantly felt cramping suffocation, and he could not move his arms from his side due to his body being wedged tight against several other men. Compacted upright, he could neither move his arms nor bend his legs to prise a few inches of valuable space from the thick wall of dark bodies.

The damp carriage air was fetid with ill breath, body odor, and human neglect. Coughing, wheezing, and laboured breathing were all Levi could hear with the exception of the embarkation activity beyond the carriage planks. Slowly his eyes adjusted to the surroundings and emerging in front of him he saw ghost like heads packed in tight, shoulder to shoulder, all fixed erect and compact in a cattle cart that was well beyond full.

There was no room to move, stretch, bend, sit, or even expand the lungs against the solid compaction of humans. Suddenly the mass of bodies uncontrollably swayed back and then forward again as the train screeched slowly forwards to pull out of Lexington Station and begin the tedious crawl to Columbus.

Eventually morning light spliced the ill fitting oak slats to reveal over two hundred drained fearful faces which were crammed into a carriage designed to transport thirty or so livestock beasts. In unison, the forlorn figures swayed and rocked slightly back and forth as the steel wheels grated along the gage and sleepers.

Disturbingly, Levi felt his ankles warm and ammonia smelling steam began to rise. His eyes gazed deep into the withered face which was pressed against his shoulder. An old man raised his head to meet Levi’s eyes.

I’m sorry, he cried. "I’m in agony and I couldn’t nip it any longer.

Levi did not reply.

Been stuck on here for two goddamn days without food, water, or relief.

Levi pitied the frail looking man. Don’t you worry yourself. It will wash off. He was sure the weak looking man would not live to see the end of the train journey.

I can’t feel my feet let alone suppress my dispositions. He confessed.

You a bible man, old timer? Rasped another prisoner to his side.

Yes, sir I am. I take regularly to the good lord’s book. This time the old man now had his head weakly hanging almost on his shoulder. He was too weak to hold up his skull like head.

Well, I suggest you get praying that no piss ends up on me. Levi could not turn his head to see who the guttural growl belonged to.

Oh, I’m praying alright, the old man’s reply was shallow in contrast to the intimidator’s tone. I’m praying I don’t darn well shit my pants.

Well, you better keep that shit hole nipped.

With the demand the threatening man tried hard to push and manoeuver a small gap, but he only achieved rousing remonstrating cusses from the other cramped prisoners. The agitator eased off and a fearful silence loomed as every man instinctively knew to survive the journey they would have to preserve all their energy, remain patient, and apply principles of pure selfishness which would involve ignoring the weak and the subsequent guilt.

It wasn’t long before every muscle ached and every joint pained as the marathons of monotonous standing tortured the minds and bodies of all. Necks stretched high and faces pointed upwards as the prisoners tried in desperate vain to gasp away from the wretched stink. Levi as with many of the others closed his eyes and recalled with regret his passage into this nightmare.

Chapter 2 

Six months earlier and with his work satisfactorily completed in Roscoff, Texas, Levi began the tough journey back north to Danville to fulfill a promise he made a long time ago. He had no ambitions for great wealth and he had no grand plan for destiny.

His mind only held thoughts of delivering Martha’s money to her sister as he had promised the dying Martha over two years earlier, before he had become embroiled in the civil war and the revenge mission, which had subsequently and disturbingly altered his core values. The previously easy natured English stripling had been violently educated in the brutal and murderous ways of lawless America and he had been forced to quickly develop his ruthlessness as he grew into a man who now held little convictions for faith or fear and he no respect for god and the devil equally.

Sorrow and hatred, adversity and violence had molded his temperament, however at only twenty he was still very young and this made him at times reckless and very dangerous, as his judgments did not consider his own peril.

He cautiously made his way back north, using the same strategies as he had when he journeyed south the year before. He followed directions given to him by farmers and field workers, but mainly he avoided main tracks, towns, and dubious looking folk when and where possible. He resisted all temptation to seek adventure or the comfort of a strange bed as he travelled alone with the descending sun to his right. 

Along the way, he witnessed regular cruelty beyond imagination. He saw slave masters bullying men, women, boys, and girls of different skin colours as though it was their privilege. Often he stood as a helpless bystander as he saw whippings, beatings, and sickening hangings of escaped slaves and the protestors and resistors of slavery who were unmercifully savaged alongside their brothers and sisters. On other occasions, he struggled hard with his conscience. Deep within, he knew any intervention would leave him swinging and he would just be another nameless corpse. He knew very little of American politics and the causes which gave rise to the bloody rebellion of which he had been drawn and he had witnessed too often how easily human nature can intentionally take away the breath of a fellow human with all too casual death and loose murder.  

He replenished his stocks by paying desperate prices and stealing from country folk and pastoralists who themselves had little to spare as a result of the draining conflict between the north and south. They judged him as a vagrant with secrets, a man with a suspect past, or a man on the run.

Their words when he left them behind described him as a drifter on the run from either the law of the land or the militia. He was either a killer or a coward and, although he was rarely challenged, their questions to him were always aimed in the same defensive inquisitiveness which prised at getting incriminating admissions of guilt or foul play. Although Levi was still young, he had experienced enough savagery from the ways of the unruly wilderness to know how to survive and not trusting the locals he understood he could go a long way to achieving success with a smile, courtesy, and a pleasant tongue, yet when needed and forced he could satisfy his requirements quicker and easier with the display of a gun or knife.

Leaving the crisp brown and sparse vegetation and sunbaked dirt behind him and treading through endless green carpets, Levi made his way north with only the company of his longtime, one eyed companion and trusty mount, Nelson. The once very weak, battled, and blooded stray army horse was rescued from thick foliage by Levi two years earlier and a trust was bonded between the friendly man and the horse when he nurtured the injured veteran back to near full health.

He had travelled most of the route before, so he knew where he had to steal, forage, or buy food and other necessities to complete the six hundred mile trek to the bluegrass town of Danville.

Still mounted under the shade of a large maple, Levi scanned the surroundings of the solitary log cabin, which had been built on the edge of a muddy sloping track that led the short distance into Danville.

Less than a mile in the distance, wisps of grey smoke hung over the small array of mainly single story wooden dwellings. A small stone, but noble church stood proud at a distance from the solitary wide street, as if it had been strategically positioned in a cluster of elms, maples, and oaks to watch over all the town’s evildoers.

There was little movement to be noted, and all seemed peaceful and distinctly still and it lacked any vitality. Uninterested in the town, Levi returned his attention to the small abode. Even at first glance, it appeared the cabin was in a state of some neglect.

A solitary chicken squawked and picked down on a dried out and withered vegetation patch and a boy of waist height was standing in knee length grass trying with difficulty to pump water from a well into a pail.

Across from the dead vegetable garden, a shawl wearing woman was vigorously beating a threadbare floor rug with a cane swatter.

At first, it appeared that no one paid the stranger on the horse any attention, however, the cautious woman broke from her toil and shouted.

Ride on stranger. She braced her arm around the boy and looked at the rider whose face was still shadowed by the cast of the huge tree. We have neither food nor money.

The stranger remained still, casting a stare at the woman, the boy, and her property. So move on.

Strangely, the familiar feeling of menace and trepidation did not creep over the women as it normally would when strangers took an unwelcomed interest. She did not understand why the despairing feeling which normally assailed her did not materialise, it may have been instinctive, but she saw something in the man’s cast as he looked on motionless from the shadows with one hand hooked into his jacket pocket and the other resting on the reins.

There is nothing for you here. She stated again.

I’m looking for Nora Hood. He finally replied, licking his lips, which tasted of sweat and grit. 

You’re looking in the wrong place. She noted his unfamiliar accent and assumed he was another lost scavenger from the south.

That’s not what the farmer beyond that hill back there said. Levi pointed with his thumb over his shoulder to indicate which direction he had just travelled, a rundown cabin on the muddy slope down into Danville.

He motioned Nelson forward a few feet. Fine looking widow with a young boy, the farmer told me. The sun exposed his young, yet weather beaten face. And this is the only cabin on the slope that I can see.

Well, he misinformed you. She replied and remained firm.

Seems like he gave me a darn good account, ma’am. Levi smiled and tilted the brim of his hat back a little as the woman’s face flushed from the double entendre.

He told you wrong. Now you go scat before my husband gets back from town and runs you outta here with a blast of lead.

Levi knew she was lying, he could not see fear in her eyes as he had expected. He sensed her caution, and he knew she would be unwise and naïve to trust and accept a stranger without a forewarning from her sister or a letter of introduction in advance.

He will not stand for no foolery. I’m warning you. She knew from the colour of the man’s weather grimed face and by his ragged clothes, he had travelled far.

Well, alright then. He prompted Nelson to turn slightly. I’ll be on my way to find some food, a hot bath and a comfortable mattress, Nelson snorted as he gaited away from the broken fence. If you know Nora, can you tell her that Levi Clayton he now pointed his thumb towards his chest, has news of her sister, Martha. Levi noticed a line form in her brow and her eyes widened with concern as his words resonated within her. The stranger knew her sister’s name, and this flooded her mind with sinister trepidation.

Levi was not oblivious to the immediate dissolution of her stern resolve. He did not want to impose himself and he would rather ride away and return at a later time when the women had reflected on the meeting and given consideration to his claim.

Good day, ma’am. He nodded and smiled, tipped his hat and heeled Nelson to advance, then without looking back, he reined Nelson towards the slope. 

Stop!

He had travelled less than ten yards when he heard the woman’s call.

Don’t go down there. 

He pulled tight on the reins to halt Nelson and he twisted in the saddle to look back over his shoulder to instinctively answer.

What?

You can’t go into Danville. She noticed his face display a curious frown. It’s not safe. She took a few steps forward toward the gate. The militia is rounding up all men of a fighting age.

I’ve done all my damn fighting. He swivelled back to face Danville in the distance.

They’re also detaining all strangers and anyone who they suspect of being a southern infiltrator.

I’ve nothing to fear. I’m just fulfilling a long time promise. I’ll be on my way out of here come sunup.

He seemed to be ignoring her advice and now she regretted dismissing his approach and she moved nearer to the gatepost to study the traveller.