Lockwell and Hart - Milton Hart.
Milton Hart, a bit short, because even wearing tall heel boots he stood tall at five and a half feet tall. Milton Hart, a bit blind, wearing wired-rim spectacles that hung from his large ears and seemed to be carved from the bottoms of whiskey bottles. Milton Hart, orphaned at thirteen when a tragic accident involving a meteor and a picnic in Arkansas removed his parents from this plane of existence, never picked for any side of any sport and was often the butt of many a joke at a rather rough and tumble orphanage. His nickname was "Mole-face" because his face was round and his nose was narrow and long and his eyes were squinty and his mouth was a soft line barely noticed unless he spoke, which was rarely. He was not a terribly attractive child, and other children and sometimes adults can be incredibly cruel.
He left for the west as soon as he was able. Milton became able when, at 16, he inherited his family farm in Arkansas and was told that the meteor that had killed his parents contained a lot of iron ore, and iron ore, he was told, was worth a lot of money, and his families lawyers saw that a trust was set up, payable when he reached that magic age. Oh, and the crater that the meteor created? Full of diamonds. Such is the luck of a child known as Mole-face.
Milton went west because he had heard that there was a lot of open space. Places where nobody lived and Milton was in need of a place where he could just be. Milton was looking for peace and balance before peace and balance was in vogue.
Peace and balance were very important to Milton, as he had had neither since his parents died and he was placed in that god-awful orphanage. Besides having a face that became the target of the mean spirited, Milton was a very bright child, wildly and sometimes dangerously bright, curious about anything and everything and speculating.
His parents, both well educated and from well to do families way to the east, encouraged Milton to experiment and do, within reason, whatever his mind could create. Milton had attempted communication with a number of doctors, scientists and engineers, all of whom he followed through literature when he could. As Milton was very young, none of the distinguished men he attempted to contact responded. His parents had subscribed to many scientific, technical and medical journals to try to satisfy their young son's searching mind.
Enough. You get the idea. Milton Hart was a genius, whose mind would wander and speculate and delve deep into the odd and strange and unusual just because he happened to notice the difference in the surface tension of water in a glass and a soap bubble. He would wander off into the distance and be unreachable for hours at a time, without leaving the comfort of his chair. And so...
Noon time in the desert was like noon time anywhere else. Stomachs grumbled and normal folks ate when they could. Shadows were short, tempers flared, and sometimes people died. Granted, this wasn't true everywhere. It could be argued that it wasn't true anywhere, except where it was. It was true, on a hot summer day in 1899, in a tiny hamlet called Pesante Deserto, that people did indeed die.
Milton Hart had come to town three days previous to the attempted bank robbery of the Pesante Deserto bank. He had checked into the hotel owned by Marco and Antonio Manco and had squirreled away in his room, asking to not be disturbed. As he had payed for a week in advance, in cash, the owners were all to obliging.
Milton had planned to stay a week in a town in the middle of nowhere because he had a lot to think about. He had spent two months in Colorado Springs in conversation with a man named Nikola Tesla about a number of subjects that had been bouncing around Milton's mind for a decade or so.
Tesla had been a convivial host until one night he got the disturbed idea that Milton was wanting to steal his secrets and inventions. Nothing could be further from the truth; indeed, Milton had hoped to share some of his own ideas with the genius Tesla and had hoped the two of them could work on a particular concept Milton had been developing for the mining industry.
Milton had brought a small device, a brass and glass device that looked like a bit like a bizarre pistol. On the handle was two buttons, one red and one green. The barrel was long and slim and had brass rings every few inches. Where a sight would be, on the end of the barrel, were two slim wires that ran the length of the barrel back to where the grip was.
When Milton demonstrated his device by pressing the green button on the handle, there was a loud buzzing and an heavy golden glow emitted from the business end of the barrel.
It was at this point that Tesla threw his suspicious tantrum, casting aspersions that Milton was there to steal Tesla's ideas about something he called "radiant energy".
Milton was not one for confrontation, so when Tesla flew into his suspicious rage and demanded that Milton leave, Milton left, confused and dejected. Feeling that Santa Fe was far to metropolitan for his peace of mind, he traveled just a bit further south and landed in the sad little burb of Pesante Deserto.
When the gunshots echoed outside the hotel and the crowd on the street pulled Milton out of his funk enough to look out the window, he made up his mind to travel back to his old homestead in Arkansas, draw a blanket over his head and live off the money that iron and diamonds and wise investments created.
He stuffed his spare shirt, trousers and extra socks in his bag, a tough leather affair that looked like something a doctor would carry. On top of his clothing, he placed two thick journals that contained his notes and his thoughts of the conceptual project he wanted to share with Tesla. On top of the journals he gently placed a cigar box.
Milton went down stairs to the front desk and noticed that there was nobody there. The noise outside the building gave him the reason. Everybody was outside for whatever it was that happened, so he stepped out to get hold of the management and let them know he was leaving.
What he found was that half of management was no longer living, having been the recipient of a bullet to the heart, and the other half was so grief stricken that there was no talking to the man.
"To hell with this", Milton muttered to nobody listening. He shuffled down the street, bag in hand, towards the train station.