A Gathering of Widowmakers (The Widowmaker #4) Read online

  "We have different agendas," said Nighthawk. "And he would have come here sooner or later."

  "What makes you think so?"

  "Because I was preparing to come here more than a century ago when I contracted the eplasia."

  "But he's not you," noted Kinoshita. "Not like Newman is."

  "He's the best at what he does," answered Nighthawk. "And that's what the bounty hunter who shows his face here has to be."

  "Then what makes you think you'll be alive five minutes after we enter the District?" demanded Kinoshita. "Don't forget—he's forty years younger than you."

  "Yeah, but I'm forty years smarter." He stopped to light a smokeless Altairian cigar. "It's like sports. A phenom comes up with all the physical gifts imaginable, so he uses them and excels. After a few years he loses half a step, or he gets slowed by some injuries—but along the way he's studied the game and started using his brain and his experience, and even though his skills have started eroding, he's actually better at his job."

  "So you're saying you're better than Jeff?" said Kinoshita dubiously.

  Nighthawk shrugged. "Who knows?" Suddenly he smiled. "But it's a damned good analogy, isn't it?"

  "How can you joke?" snapped Kinoshita. "You're walking into the most dangerous piece of real estate within five thousand light years, and if I know you, you're going to seek out the men whose deaths will make the most news."

  "Have you got a better way to send him word that we're here? When he hears that a Widowmaker is collecting bounties, he'll have to come."

  "It's suicidal!" snapped Kinoshita. "You're an old man, for God's sake!"

  "Keep your voice down," said Nighthawk. "No sense getting us shot at before we even arrive."

  "You fucking Widowmakers are all alike!" muttered Kinoshita. "You're the worst of them. At least they have some excuse—they get it from you."

  "If you're worried, go back to the ship and wait for me. You'll be perfectly safe there."

  "You go to hell."

  "Make up your mind," said Nighthawk. "Do you serve the Widowmaker or just bitch about him?"

  "I serve him," said Kinoshita, lowering his voice. "But there are days I wish I'd never met him."

  "Then why do you serve us?"

  "You know," said Kinoshita, "that's the first time you've ever asked me about myself."

  "It stopped you from yelling."

  Kinoshita ignored the remark. "When I was a young man, I was a police officer on Deluros VIII, and my given name was Jerome Hayakawa. My first two partners were killed in the line of duty, and I took their names—Ito and Kinoshita. It's a damned silly name for anyone of my ancestry; it would be like calling yourself Jones Smith. But I did it so I'd never forget them. I quit the force when the courts insisted on giving lenient sentences to men who should have been put to death for their crimes. I decided to move to the Outer Frontier and become a bounty hunter, so that when I caught up with a killer the courts would never give him a chance to kill again."

  "So how did you get in the clone-training business?" asked Nighthawk.

  "I was recovering back on Deluros from some minor wounds and I had some time to kill, so I took the job of training your first clone." He paused and sighed. "I knew five minutes into it that I was lucky to still be alive, that his abilities were so far beyond mine—or anyone else's I'd ever seen—that for the first time in my life I became aware of my own mortality. I knew that he would be far better at my chosen mission than I could ever be, and so I made up my mind to serve the Widowmaker, as my Samurai ancestors served their feudal lords."

  "Interesting," was Nighthawk's only comment.

  "But that doesn't mean I have to like it when the Widowmaker behaves like an asshole—either the newest one or the original."

  "Do you feel better now?" asked Nighthawk.

  Kinoshita sighed. "Yeah, actually I do." He paused. "As long as I've known you and your clones, I've never known how or why you became the Widowmaker in the first place. They were created to be the Widowmaker; you chose to be. Someday I'd like you to tell me about it."

  "Someday," said Nighthawk. He stopped at a street corner. "This is it. We cross the street, we're in the District."

  "Then what?"

  "Then we find a room."

  "I beg your pardon?"

  "A room," repeated Nighthawk. "Unless you plan to sleep in the street."

  Kinoshita frowned. "I wasn't planning to spend the night here at all. I figured you'd do what you came to do and then we'll get the hell out of here before everyone starts shooting at us."

  "You haven't been paying attention, have you?" said Nighthawk. "There's no sense drawing Jeff to New Barcelona if I'm not here to meet him."

  "So you're going to kill some butcher or other and then stick around?" demanded Kinoshita.

  "Just killing one won't make enough news."

  "Oh, shit!" muttered Kinoshita. "What are you letting us in for?"

  "Shut up," said Nighthawk.

  "You're a goddamned lunatic!"

  "I said shut up," repeated Nightawk, and as had happened in the past, Kinoshita realized that Jefferson Nighthawk had disappeared completely, to be replaced by the Widowmaker. "I didn't ask for this. You're the one who got me out here. If you don't like the way I operate, then stay the hell away from me. But there will be no more arguing and no more bitching. Do I make myself clear?"

  Kinoshita stared at him, searching futilely for a sign of the Jefferson Nighthawk he had accompanied from the spaceport. Finally he nodded his agreement.

  They crossed the street. It didn't feel any different at first. That changed a block into it, when they had to step around a dead man who lay bleeding on the pavement. There were no sidewalks, no slidewalks, just narrow streets filled with foreboding.

  Three blocks into the District Nighthawk stopped and stood perfectly still.

  "What's the—?" began Kinoshita.

  "Quiet." Then: "We're being followed."

  "What are we going to do about it?" asked Kinoshita nervously.

  "Nothing. At least I know where they are."

  "They?"

  "There are two of them. They're just checking to see if we're slumming. You don't have to be a criminal to enter the District. You can come looking for drugs or women or men or half a dozen other things—and if that's the case, it means you've got money in your pockets."

  "Pardon a foolish question, but how do they know we're not here to spend our money?"

  "They don't."

  "Then why shouldn't they shoot us down?"

  "Bad for business," answered Nighthawk. "Shoot enough civilians and no one will come here to spend their money any more."

  "Why should they care?"

  "Because if they drive business away, what the people who depend on that business will do to them will make a death sentence in a court of law seem infinitely preferable," said Nighthawk. He began walking again, more slowly this time, looking into the windows he passed, while Kinoshita fell into step and spent most of his time trying to spot the men who were trailing them.

  Suddenly the street turned in on itself, a cross between a figure eight and a moebius strip. Buildings met above them, creating narrow passageways on the street level. They could hear music from half a dozen dives, some of it so atonal and discordant that Kinoshita knew it must be coming from taverns that catered to aliens.

  "All right," announced Nighthawk a moment later. "We've come far enough. We should be pretty near the center."

  "All the buildings are dark, and the closest music's a block away," noted Kinoshita.

  "Use your nose."

  "My nose?" repeated Kinoshita. He inhaled deeply, and frowned. "I smell something . . . strange."

  "Someone's smoking mexalite." Nighthawk pointed to a grate at the edge of the street, very near where he was standing. "Three sticks of that stuff will fry your brain for a week." Slight smile. "That makes this as good a place to start as any."

  Start? thought Kinoshita. Are you planning to kill
your way from here to the edge of the Distract?

  "It's got to be in the cellar of this building," said Nighthawk, walking to a door. Kinoshita half-expected a tiny panel to slide back and a voice to demand all kinds of identification, but Nighthawk simply stepped forward and the door dilated to let him pass through.

  Of course, thought Kinoshita. Why do they care who you are? After two centuries, the one thing they know you're not is a lawman or a bounty hunter.

  Kinoshita followed Nighthawk into a dimly-lit foyer, then to an airlift. They stepped onto a cushion of air and gently descended some fifteen feet below ground level, emerging in a large room illuminated only with indirect red and blue lighting. There were tables scattered around the room. A tripodal Hesporite was playing an instrument that was shaped to accommodate him and was made of an alien alloy, but it emitted a sound that was pure alto sax, smooth and sultry. There were some twenty men and women seated at the tables, and an equal number of aliens, composed of half a dozen different races. A few were drinking, a couple were simply concentrating on the Hesporite's music, most were smoking long thin glowing sticks of mexalite. Kinoshita didn't know what effect it had on aliens—a Canphorite seemed totally unaffected, and a pair of Lodinites looked mildly tipsy—but there was no question that it was sending the human contingent off to secret places that only they could see.

  There was no host, no headwaiter, no indication that anyone knew or cared that they had just entered the place. Nigththawk looked around for a moment, then walked off toward an empty table in the far corner of the room.

  "Hard to breathe in here with all the smoke," remarked Kinoshita softly. "Can it affect us?"

  "It might give you lung cancer," said Nighthawk. "It won't disconnect your neural circuits. I don't know what causes the effect, but I know you can only get it direct from the mexalite. Second-hand smoke will leave you stone cold sober."

  "Where are they getting it?"

  "I'm sure someone will be along to tell us."

  And within a minute a slim human woman, provocatively but not scantily clad, approached them and sat down at their table.

  "Hello," she said. "My name is Minx."

  "Hello," replied Nighthawk. "Mine isn't."

  "Is there anything I can get for you?"

  "What did you have in mind?"

  "Mister, you name it and we've got it," she said with a smile.

  "Let's start with a name."

  "I told you. My name is—"

  "Not you. This place."

  "Horatio's."

  "Is Horatio around?"

  "He's been dead almost seventy years." She paused. "Now what can I get you?"

  "Nothing at the moment. I've got some business with some men in the District. I need a place to meet them. This'll do as well as any."

  "You can't stay here if you're not buying something," insisted Minx.

  "Fair enough," said Nighthawk, pulling out a couple of banknotes. "Here's two hundred credits."

  "What do you want for it?"

  "An hour's worth of silence."

  She smiled again. "This will only buy you half an hour."

  "Come back when the time's up," said Nighthawk. "Oh, and one more thing."

  "Yes?"

  "Don't push your luck."

  There was something about the way he said it, something ominous. She looked at him, then nodded a quick assent and made a quicker retreat.

  "Now what?" asked Kinoshita.

  "Now we wait."

  "For what?"

  "For someone to come along."

  "Have you got anyone in mind?"

  "I don't even know who's in the District today."

  "Well, then?"

  "I know who'll be at the top of Jeff's list. Some of them have to be here, and sooner or later one or more of them will walk into Horatio's."

  "So you just plan to sit here until one of them shows up?" asked Kinoshita.

  "It's easier than going out looking for them," answered Nighthawk. "Only a fool wanders aimlessly at night in the District, and if they were fools they wouldn't have lived long enough to make Jeff's list."

  "But we were outside just a few minutes ago."

  "Very briefly," replied Nighthawk. "We had a destination in mind. So will they."

  "You are the least informative son of a bitch I've ever met," complained Kinoshita.

  "You traveled with me from the day I got out of the hospital back on Deluros VIII until the day I sent Jeff out to take my place. You know what I'm like. If it annoys you, you shouldn't have come."

  "Let's not go into that again."

  "Suit yourself."

  It comes back to me now, thought Kinoshita. Jefferson Nighthawk's not exactly loquacious, but he talks to me. The Widowmaker just concentrates on the business at hand. He tolerates my presence, but he feels no obligation to share any thoughts or plans with me.

  "Are you sure you'll recognize one of the men you want if he walks in here?" asked Kinoshita at last.

  "I took the trouble of studying the Wanted lists on the trip here while you were sleeping."

  "Of course," said Kinoshita bitterly. "You might have awakened me so I could help spot them before they recognize you."

  "They won't recognize me," said Nighthawk. "I quit bounty hunting half a century before any of them were born. To them I'm just an old man visiting the District for a last thrill on the way to the grave."

  "I'd forgotten," admitted Kinoshita. "I've seen you in action since they revived you, so I assumed everyone knew you were back."

  "I'm not back. I'm just going to make a few minor adjustments to the man I sent out, and then I'm going back to live out my life on Goldenhue."

  "I never thought you'd stick it out this long," said Kinoshita. "I just don't picture you as a gardener."

  "And a birdwatcher. Don't forget the birding." He paused, then amended: "Well, the avians, anyway. Goldenhue doesn't have any true birds."

  Two hard-looking men entered the room, nodded to a couple of others who were already there, and walked to a table.

  "They're carrying a lot of firepower," noted Kinoshita softly. "Pulse gun, burner, even a couple of projectile pistols."

  "I've always liked projectile weapons," said Nighthawk approvingly. "They're pretty accurate at close range, and they make a hell of a bang. The noise usually freezes your opponent for a second or two. He's mostly used to the humming of a burner or a screecher's whistling."

  "So is there paper on these two?"

  "I'd be surprised if there wasn't," said Nighthawk. "But they're minnows. I came here to find some whales."

  "What's a whale?"

  "Big fish. Used to swim in Earth's oceans a few thousand years ago before we killed the last of them. That's what they say, anyway."

  Four men and three aliens left in the next fifteen minutes, and two men and seven more aliens entered. Minx was kept busy supplying them with liquor and sticks of mexalite. One Lodinite slipped her a large bill and walked through a door at the side of the room, doubtless on his way to a sexual encounter elsewhere in the building.

  She cast an occasional glance at Nighthawk, but never returned to ask for more money.

  "So far she's the only person I've seen working the room," noted Kinoshita. "I wonder who runs the place?"

  "Ask her who pays her salary," suggested Nighthawk.

  "It might be someone we're after."

  "We're not after anyone," said Nighthawk. "I am. And Horatio's won't be owned by anyone I want."

  "What makes you so sure?"

  "If he's busy running this place and securing his mexalite supply, he hasn't got time to get the kind of price on his head that would bring him to Jeff's attention."

  "Maybe he's already got it and is hiding out here," said Kinoshita.

  "If he's on that list, he has enough money so he doesn't have to own a dive like this."

  Just then a huge man, well over seven feet tall, heavily-muscled top to bottom, entered Horatio's. He was totally bald, and when
he turned his head Kinoshita saw that he didn't have any eyebrows. His entire face looked smooth as a baby's; there was no indication that he'd ever had to shave. Nevertheless his most striking facial feature wasn't his skin but his eyes—one blue, one brown; obviously he'd been born with one and the other was a replacement.

  There was something curious about his hands. It took Kinoshita a minute to figure out what it was: he had no fingernails, nor did it look like he'd ever had any. What he did have was a ragged row of white bone that had been grafted onto the backs of his fingers on each hand, giving his fists the equivalent of a pair of brass knuckles. He carried neither a burner nor a screecher. A pulse gun rested in a small holster on his right hip, and he had a pair of exotic-looking alien weapons tucked in his belt. It had been a few thousand years since men rode horses, and even longer since they wore spurs, but he clearly had something sharp and formidable sticking out the back of his boots.

  "Interesting guy," whispered Kinoshita.

  "Very," replied Nighthawk.

  "Look at him. He's two and a half men crammed into one package, and armed to the teeth. I sure as hell would never want to face him."

  "You won't have to. You're just here as an observer."

  Kinoshita suddenly had a sinking feeling in the pit of his stomach. He looked questioningly at his companion.

  "He calls himself Hairless Jack Bellamy," continued Nighthawk calmly. "You'd have to hunt far and wide to find a crime he hasn't committed, and he's worth six million credits dead or alive."

  8.

  Kinoshita stared at the bald man, then whispered to Nighthawk. "Are you going to try taking him right now?"

  "No."

  "You want to study him first," said Kinoshita knowingly.

  "I've already studied him," said Nighthawk.

  "Then—?"

  "He's not alone."

  "You're mistaken, Jefferson," said Kinoshita. "He walked in by himself, and no one has entered after him."

  "See that Mollutei sitting all alone across the room?" said Nighthawk. "And the two men drinking beer over there?"

  "What about them?"

  "They're working for Bellamy. I'll take him outside, when he's alone—or at least where I won't have to turn my back to his bodyguards."