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"That’s true," she said froo is"

Hainey’s bright white grin spread so far that the scar on his cheek crinkled up to his ear "It’s a diamond"

"A diamond?" Maria exclaimed "All this trouble for a diae dia called it the ‘cleht they were being funny when they rena And why do you know this?"

"I’ve got a friend back west, a fellow captain and a man of fine character When the Free Croas first boosted out from under us, this friend helped us try to retrieve her"

"That’s a good friend indeed," Maria said

Hainey agreed "I owe him one Or two, or ten And noe him double Down in Taco He sent a telegram to fill me in That’s how I know about the diamond And now I knohy my ship was stolen"

"To transport a diamond?"

"To transport a diamond and a two-thousand-pound corpse There’s an old story that floated around for years, and everyone always thought it was a tall tale--even though every man who ever repeated it swore it was the truth" As he spoke, Hainey gave the throttle a deeper nudge, urging the ship faster, farther, towards the transient docks

He continued, "There was a certain lady of…leisure Her name was Conklin, but everyone called her ‘Damnable’ She was the richest woman west of the Mississippi and maybe east of it too, for all anybody knows She had plenty of reat wad of it on a diao in India She wore it set in a necklace, almost all the time"

Lamar piped up "I heard she shot a dozen men who tried to steal it from her, and one woman too"

The captain said, "It’s possible She was a real piece of work, and when she died, she took the dia the diamond around her neck, and filled her coffin with every drop of ceravediggeras he needed, and once the coffin was lowered down inside, they filled up the hole with cement too, in order to keep out anybody anted what she earing"

"And no one ever bothered her body?"

"Not until my Free Croas stolen Not another ship west of the river could’ve lifted her up, carried her over the rass country--"

Maria said, "No ship except for yours? She must be nearly as powerful as this one, then"

"Nearly," he said "But not quite, and this one wasn’t anywhere handy--so some bastard Union man paid a bastard pirate na up old Madam Damnable, and tote her to Kentucky"

"But I still don’t understand," Maria insisted, "what a scientist needs with a diaer "I have a theory about it, and I’ll explain it to you just as soon as we address what’s…" he sagged "What’s not right over there, at those transient docks Do you see them?"

She craned her neck to see out the windshield, and then said, "Yes, I see them I’ve never seen a set of transient docks before"

"Don’t know nothing about dirigibles, don’t know nothing about docks Where you been all your life?" Simeon asked

"East, mostly The docks there are all pretty perer activity Mostly I’ve been e But it’s quite a crash course I’ve gotten lately"

Laun; she kne to use it"

The captain explained before Maria could do so "It’s just a modified land model I expect she’s seen them in combat"