Slocum and the Celestial Bones Read online

  TONG-TIED

  Slocum emptied his Colt Navy into the pack of tong killers charging him. He aimed for their heads and dropped two, causing the others to stumble and fall. He pulled another stick of dynamite out of his belt and struck a lucifer. From the corner of his eye he saw two Sum Yop assassins. Flashing silver cartwheeled past his head. The two men grunted and fell, hatchets in their chests. Slocum turned to Ah Ming’s father and knew that the old man had been a killer in his day.

  “Thanks,” Slocum said, then spun and tossed the dynamite before the short fuse burned down to the blasting cap. He had guessed right where the Sum Yop would attack next. He blew up three of them and caused an avalanche of crates, blocking that route.

  While he had cut off one avenue of attack, he had also cut off a way of escape.

  “Keep ’em busy for a few seconds,” Slocum said. He reloaded his six-shooter, then heard what sounded like a vast army assembling out of sight. Six rounds would not put a dent in it.

  Ah Ming’s father stood with a hatchet in each hand.

  “You got any ideas how to get out of here?” Slocum asked. He sighted and fired, winging a tong man trying to sneak across the tops of the crates. Slocum cursed under his breath. He had hoped to escape. It had not taken the tong killers long to figure out not only how he had gotten through the building so fast but also how to attack him…

  DON’T MISS THESE

  ALL-ACTION WESTERN SERIES

  FROM THE BERKLEY PUBLISHING GROUP

  THE GUNSMITH by J. R. Roberts

  Clint Adams was a legend among lawmen, outlaws, and ladies. They called him…the Gunsmith.

  LONGARM by Tabor Evans

  The popular long-running series about Deputy U.S. Marshal Long—his life, his loves, his fight for justice.

  SLOCUM by Jake Logan

  Today’s longest-running action Western. John Slocum rides a deadly trail of hot blood and cold steel.

  BUSHWHACKERS by B. J. Lanagan

  An action-packed series by the creators of Longarm! The rousing adventures of the most brutal gang of cutthroats ever assembled—Quantrill’s Raiders.

  DIAMONDBACK by Guy Brewer

  Dex Yancey is Diamondback, a Southern gentleman turned con man when his brother cheats him out of the family fortune. Ladies love him. Gamblers hate him. But nobody pulls one over on Dex…

  WILDGUN by Jack Hanson

  The blazing adventures of mountain man Will Barlow—from the creators of Longarm!

  TEXAS TRACKER by Tom Calhoun

  Meet J.T. Law: the most relentless—and dangerous—manhunter in all Texas. Where sheriffs and posses fail, he’s the best man to bring in the most vicious outlaws—for a price.

  JAKE LOGAN

  SLOCUM AND THE CELESTIAL BONES

  THE BERKLEY PUBLISHING GROUP

  Published by the Penguin Group

  Penguin Group (USA) Inc. 375 Hudson Street, New York, New York 10014, USA Penguin Group (Canada), 90 Eglinton Avenue East, Suite 700, Toronto, Ontario M4P 2Y3, Canada (a division of Pearson Penguin Canada Inc.) Penguin Books Ltd., 80 Strand, London WC2R 0RL, England Penguin Group Ireland, 25 St. Stephen’s Green, Dublin 2, Ireland (a division of Penguin Books Ltd.) Penguin Group (Australia), 250 Camberwell Road, Camberwell, Victoria 3124, Australia (a division of Pearson Australia Group Pty. Ltd.) Penguin Books India Pvt. Ltd., 11 Community Centre, Panchsheel Park, New Delhi—110 017, India Penguin Group (NZ), 67 Apollo Drive, Rosedale, North Shore 0632, New Zealand (a division of Pearson New Zealand Ltd.) Penguin Books (South Africa) (Pty.) Ltd., 24 Sturdee Avenue, Rosebank, Johannesburg 2196, South Africa

  Penguin Books Ltd., Registered Offices: 80 Strand, London WC2R 0RL, England

  This is a work of fiction. Names, characters, places, and incidents either are the product of the author’s imagination or are used fictitiously, and any resemblance to actual persons, living or dead, business establishments, events, or locales is entirely coincidental.

  SLOCUM AND THE CELESTIAL BONES

  A Jove Book / published by arrangement with the author

  Copyright © 2007 by The Berkley Publishing Group.

  Cover illustration by Sergio Giovine.

  All rights reserved.

  No part of this book may be reproduced, scanned, or distributed in any printed or electronic form without permission. Please do not participate in or encourage piracy of copyrighted materials in violation of the author’s rights. Purchase only authorized editions.

  For information, address: The Berkley Publishing Group, a division of Penguin Group (USA) Inc.,

  375 Hudson Street, New York, New York 10014.

  ISBN: 978-1-1012-1901-0

  JOVE®

  Jove Books are published by The Berkley Publishing Group, a division of Penguin Group (USA) Inc., 375 Hudson Street, New York, New York 10014.

  JOVE is a registered trademark of Penguin Group (USA) Inc.

  The “J” design is a trademark belonging to Penguin Group (USA) Inc.

  Contents

  Chapter 1

  Chapter 2

  Chapter 3

  Chapter 4

  Chapter 5

  Chapter 6

  Chapter 7

  Chapter 8

  Chapter 9

  Chapter 10

  Chapter 11

  Chapter 12

  Chapter 13

  Chapter 14

  Chapter 15

  Chapter 16

  Chapter 17

  Chapter 18

  Chapter 19

  Chapter 20

  Chapter 21

  Chapter 22

  Chapter 23

  Chapter 24

  Chapter 25

  Chapter 26

  Chapter 27

  1

  John Slocum knew better but did it anyway. He gripped the dirty shot glass, stared at the amber liquid in it and then knocked it back fast. It hit him like a mule’s kick. He was already close to being knee-walking drunk, and some dim, dark part of his almost-sober brain told him drinking in a saloon perched at the edge of San Francisco’s Embarcadero with a crowd of rowdy sailors was worse than stupid.

  It could be deadly.

  He slammed the glass down onto the bar and tried to focus. His vision blurred. As if from a hundred miles away, he heard, “He’s stronger ’n a damned bull. Tell the barkeep to put a stronger Mickey Finn in the next round.”

  “You want another, mister?” The barkeep thrust his ugly face into Slocum’s.

  Slocum blinked and fought hard to chase away the double vision. The man had muttonchop whiskers and was bald on top. His eyes were as bloodshot as Slocum’s probably were, but his came from being in the dense smoke of the First Port Saloon all night long. Slocum had come by his from too much rye whiskey.

  “Another?” the barkeep shouted at him and reached out to shake him.

  Slocum reacted, knocking the man’s hand away and moving to the side quickly enough to avoid the club descending toward his head. The heavy belaying pin crashed into the bar, broke glass and sobered Slocum enough to realize he was in a world of trouble. Shanghaiers. Two men had followed him from the last saloon where he had been drinking. In his alcohol fog he realized what was happening, but the liquor had also dulled his common sense.

  His elbow collided with the shanghaier’s nose and broke it. Blood spurted and caused the bartender to cry out, “Don’t get no blood on my bar! I jist wiped it down!”

  Slocum ducked a clumsy swing from the other sailor who had dogged him. He drove his fist into the man’s belly, but he was weak from too much liquor, and the sailor’s midriff was harder than an oak plank. The sailor grunted, and Slocum felt the pain from the impact all the way up into his shoulder.

  “No
shootin’! Don’t go throwin’ lead in my place!” The barkeep dived under the bar, and Slocum heard him scurrying about like a cockroach as he hunted for his weapon. It might have been a club weighted with lead or anything else deadly. From the corner of his eye, Slocum saw the man’s bald head rise up. Those bloodshot eyes peered down the short length of a sawed-off shotgun.

  Slocum tried to run. His legs betrayed him—and saved him. He fell facedown onto the sawdust-covered floor as both barrels of shot ripped past him. He curled up and thrust his back against the bar until he could sit up. The place had descended almost instantly into one big free-for-all.

  Head spinning from the knockout drops and too much whiskey, Slocum crawled along the bar, avoiding kicking feet and flailing arms until he reached the end. Using the bar to pull himself up, he took two staggering steps outside into the foggy night. The cold breeze blowing off San Francisco Bay did not quite sober him up, but it helped him think more clearly.

  It had been a damn fool thing to do, to go on a drunk like this, but he had needed the release too much pop-skull gave him to help him forget. Getting into San Francisco had been easy enough. Getting over the Sierra Madres had been hell. The sudden autumn storm had taken them by surprise, and he had lost a good friend and a woman he had probably loved. Ulysses Larson had frozen to death on the second night they had been trapped in a cave, and his sister Anne, Slocum’s lover—his love—had died the next morning. Slocum had awakened with his arms around her trim body, which had been wrapped in their horse blankets to keep her warm against the frigid temperatures. She had been cold and unmoving. It had taken Slocum a half hour before he could release her and accept that she, too, had been a victim of the storm.

  Slocum had considered simply dying then and there, but something kept him moving. The blizzard had blown over and left the mountains sharp, crisp and white. The air had cut at his face and lungs, but somehow he had refused to die. One foot had gone in front of the other, their horses having perished, and finally he had been rescued by a Wells Fargo station agent.

  For four days Slocum had been laid up with fever-induced delirium. And then he had taken the stagecoach into San Francisco. That trip had been another five days, giving him plenty of time to regret his decision to press over the mountains. He had been the experienced frontiersman, not Ulysses or Anne. He had convinced them getting to the coast would be easy.

  “The storm,” he muttered, staring into the gray fog. “The damned storm.”

  His hand went to the ebony handle of his Colt Navy. He almost drew it to put to his temple. He had killed a friend and the woman he had loved as surely as if he had shot them with this deadly weapon.

  “Whoa, mister, we don’t mean nuthin’,” came a hoarse voice in the fog.

  Instinctively, Slocum turned toward the speaker. He lifted his six-shooter and aimed it.

  “You want to shanghai me?” Slocum asked. His voice came out in a whiskey-rough whisper.

  “You got the wrong fellas,” the man said.

  Slocum fired. A foot-long tongue of orange flame momentarily illuminated the area around him. Slocum missed the man who was doing all the talking, but he caught sight of two others silently creeping up on him from either side. He might seriously consider killing himself, but he would not be shanghaied. There were things worse than death. Being consigned to a China-bound schooner for long, harsh years was one of them. As Slocum fired again, this time winging one of the men, he reflected that living with the guilt of Anne’s death was no fit way to spend the rest of his days, either.

  But it was better than hauling canvas sail and being the peg boy for a crew of hardened sailors.

  He fired a third time, but the shanghaiers had already faded away, hunting easier game.

  Slocum stood with his six-gun in his hand, staring at the formless fog. He wanted to fade into it and disappear, but that did not seem likely to happen. His head throbbed like hell, and his belly tried to turn itself inside out. He shoved his six-shooter back into the cross-draw holster and spun around to leave. He had to find a place to sleep off the whiskey.

  He turned too fast and stumbled. Strong arms caught him and held him upright.

  “Whoa there, cowboy,” came a drawl. “You look to be three sheets to the wind.”

  Slocum forced himself back and reached for his pistol again. He did not draw.

  “Who’re you?”

  “Looks likely I’m the salt who kept you from falling on your face.”

  Slocum squinted and got a better look at the man. He was smallish but with immense shoulders and forearms that looked more like a man’s thighs. He had caught Slocum and supported his entire weight and had not strained himself at all.

  “Thanks,” Slocum said.

  “You can buy me a drink. I just blowed into port, and I built up a mighty thirst out at sea.”

  Slocum knew the captains rationed their rum to keep the men in line. Too little, though, and the crew was likely to mutiny. Too much and drunken sailors fell overboard and drowned. From the captain’s viewpoint, that was not the real loss. Not having an able-bodied seaman who could climb into the rigging was.

  “I’m about done in,” Slocum said. He still wobbled a mite, and he needed to find himself a place where he was safe enough to sleep for a few hours. He doubted that in San Francisco, along the waterfront, such a place existed.

  “You owe me,” the sailor said. A steely edge came to his voice. “You the kind what welshes on a debt?”

  “I don’t know it’s much of a debt, but I’ll buy you that drink. Just not back there.”

  “But First Port’s supposed to be the best. Other than the Cobweb Palace, of course. Or Meigg’s Wharf. Then there’s—”

  “Come on. I want to find a watering hole away from the bay.”

  “Landlubber,” the sailor said, but there was a joking quality in the seafarer’s insult. He slapped Slocum on the back, then grabbed a handful of cloth and pulled upward to keep him on his feet. “You need to get your sea legs, and you aren’t even on a ship.”

  They wandered through the fog, homing in on another saloon more by sound than sight. The gray shroud surrounding them was damp and chill, and Slocum felt isolated, even with the sailor beside him occasionally breaking out into a sea chanty. Slocum decided he needed a new drinking partner to get away from the guilt and memory of Anne and her brother.

  “There’s a place,” the sailor said. “You got anything against that one?”

  To Slocum it was like all the others, except it was some distance from the waterfront.

  “Looks good to me.”

  “Then buy me a drink or two. I’m so dry I’ll match you two for one. Three!” The sailor laughed and put his arm around Slocum. Slocum did not like the familiarity, especially since the sailor was a good six inches shorter than Slocum’s six-foot height. The muscular arm weighed Slocum down and almost caused his knees to buckle.

  “Charlie, there you are,” called someone at the far side of the large room. “We was wonderin’ when you’d find us the entertainment.”

  Slocum stopped dead in his tracks. The hole in the floor afforded only a small path around it. He looked straight down almost eight feet and wondered why any saloon keeper would allow even the worst drunk to dig such a pit. Then he was no longer wondering anything. The sailor’s strong arm moved behind him and a meaty hand shoved hard. Slocum went flying into space and crashed hard on the dirt at the bottom of the large pit.

  “Way to go, Charlie. Damage him ’fore he kin give us a chuckle or two.”

  Slocum shook his head to clear it. Things, important things, rattled around loose inside. He forced himself to his hands and knees and then managed to get to his feet. He drew his six-shooter and looked around.

  The dirt walls sloped slightly, making scaling them almost impossible. Even sober and with a running start, he would be hard-pressed to get to the lip of the pit. He pointed his six-gun up at the jeering crowd circling above. Slocum twisted about and aimed at the sail
or who had pushed him into the hole.

  “You gonna waste a bullet on poor li’l ole me, or you gonna use it on something worthwhile?”

  “You tell ’im, Charlie.”

  “You’re a dead man, Charlie,” Slocum said, drawing a bead. He froze, his finger halfway toward triggering the round.

  “Aren’t we all, aren’t we all?” Charlie laughed uproariously. “But you’re gonna be in hell a damn sight ’fore me. Save a good spot for me and my mates, will you, cowboy?”

  Slocum saw a small gate lift at the side of the pit directly under the treacherous sailor. Fiery red eyes peered at him and then the huge black body emerged. Long whiskers twitched, and yellowed fangs showed in a grin eerily human in its viciousness. The wharf rat took a few tentative steps, then launched itself at Slocum.

  He fired. His .36-caliber slug hit the rat in midleap. It twisted and fell, half its body blown away.

  “Told you you’d need your ammo, cowboy,” taunted Charlie.

  Slocum turned his pistol back upward. He heard a squeaking sound behind him. A quick glance over his shoulder confirmed his worst fear. Another gate had been pulled up, releasing a pair of the hungry wharf rats. These were the size of large cats. He shot twice more, each bullet killing a rat.

  “Better reload fast, partner,” shouted another sailor from the safety of the pit’s rim.

  “Fifty dollars,” shouted another. “Fifty says he won’t last ten minutes.”

  The betting began in earnest now. Slocum knocked open his Colt Navy and began reloading. He was sorry now that he had wasted three shots earlier in the fog. He had fired at phantasms. Now he had to shoot to save his own life.