Clementine

higher we fly. Is your cloak keeping you satisfactorily comfortable?” he asked.

She lied, because telling the truth would neither change nor fix the situation. “It’s fine. It keeps me warm in Illinois, and it’s managing the worst of the wind up here.” But in truth, the dragging rush of the air was a fiendish thing with pointed fingers that wormed between every crease, crevice, and buttonhole to cool her skin with a dreadful determination. She fervently wished for another hat, something that would cover her ears more fully, even if it crushed her hair and looked appalling; but her only other clothing was stashed below, and retrieving it would only slow the mission, which was an unacceptable cost.

So all the way to Kansas City, in the hours over the winter-chilled plains, she held her hat firmly onto her head with one hand and gripped the railway with the other.

They chatted only a little, for the ambient noise was sometimes deafening, and Maria’s entire face felt utterly frozen within the first hour. If she parted her lips her teeth only chattered and stung with the cold air rushing against them, so instead she huddled silently, sometimes leaning against the firm, confident form of Algernon Rice-who appeared to be glad to have her close, though he made no unwelcome advances.

After what felt like eternity and a day, but was surely no more than half a dozen hours, Kansas City sprouted out of the plains. Buildings of various heights were scattered, and even at the Fish’s altitude Maria could tell the blocks apart, guessing which neighborhoods were cleanest and which ones were best avoided by respectable people. The streets split, forked, and ran in a crooked grid, sprawling across the ground in a life-sized map that Maria found more fascinating than when she’d spied Jefferson City from the Cherokee Rose. She was closer to the world this way-even chilled to the bone, with skin pinkly chapped and hands numb with winter.

She looked down past her feet, and the bar around which she’d wrapped her toes. She watched the land draw up close as the Fish drew down low; and she saw the commercial dirigibles lined up, affixed to pipework docks that were embedded in the earth with roots as deep as an oak.

There came a clank and a soft bounce, then a harder one. The Fish settled into a slot beside an enormous craft painted with a freight company’s logo, and a service yard hand stepped up with a length of chain and a lobster clasp-though the young man didn’t know where to affix it.

“I’ll handle that, my boy,” Algernon Rice announced as he turned a crank to cut the engines. He dismounted from the bench and took the claw, fastening it to the exposed mainshaft that ran the length of the undercarriage.

Even though the Fish had settled, Maria felt vibrations in her legs and feet. She stomped them against the bar, then stood and ducked her head in order to escape the frame. Algernon Rice dashed to her side, hand outstretched, but she waved him away this time. She was shaken by the trip, but she would not restore herself to steadiness by leaning on him any further.

“Thank you,” she said. “But I’m fine. Give me…give me just a moment.” She wrung her hands together, squeezing blood back into them and willing them to warm within the too-thin gloves that hadn’t shielded them well enough.

“Very well,” he said, and returned his attention to the yard boy, asking after fuel prices, slot rentals, and the nearest boarding house, hotel, or restaurant where a lady might find some refreshments.

The lady in question was starving, now that she heard him mention it. But there was work to be done and she reached beneath the Fish to untie her bag. Upon retrieving it, she threaded her arm through its wide band of a strap, and held it up under her arm.

Rice returned, the yard worker at his side. He said, “We can leave the Fish here, and I’ve arranged for a refueling and a brief stay. I’m sure you can understand if I’m in no rush to return to the air. It’s a bit unsettling, isn’t it?”

She nodded, and said, “I’ve never had a ride quite like it. And I hope you’ll forgive me for saying so, but I’m in no hurry to repeat it. I think a passenger line will make an easier return trip for me.” She turned her attention to the boy beside him and said, “You work here, young man?”

“Yes ma’am,” he said.

“Perhaps you could answer a question for me, if it isn’t too much trouble. Could you tell me, please, what’s that ship over there?” And she pointed across the way, to a monstrous great craft that was cast in hues of black and silver. It was easily half again as large as the Cherokee Rose, and a thousand times less friendly.

The boy hemmed and hawed before finally saying, “It’s a military ship, ma’am. It’s here for some repair work, or something. I don’t know exactly.”

“And even if you did,” she guessed, “You aren’t supposed to talk about it, anyway?”

He looked relieved, and said, “That’s right. Everybody knows it’s there, but we’re all supposed to pretend it’s not.”

Maria didn’t have to ask which military the behemoth belonged to. She made her assumption even before she walked down the lane between the rows of ships, and spied the blue logo with silver lettering. Seeing the ship unsettled her for no reason she could name, and a thousand she could suggest. But at the core, it only made her unhappy because she was no longer supposed to feel threatened by it.

After making another arrangement or two with the yard boy, Algernon Rice took the larger of Maria’s two bags and walked beside her on the way to the edge of the docks. “We can take an early supper, if you like. There’s a serving house a few blocks away where you can rent a room.”

“But I doubt I shall need a room, Mr. Rice. If Croggon Hainey is still within Kansas City’s limits, it is my fervent hope that I’ll find him and deliver him to the authorities with all haste.”

“Undoubtedly,” he said too casually, as if he had no doubt that she was incorrect. “But it would be worth your while to have a stable base of operations, don’t you think? A room where you can leave your belongings, and a place to which you might retire if you’re compelled to stay in town longer than you expect. Anyway,” he added, “It’s on the Pinkerton dime, so you might as well make yourself comfortable.”

She said, “Nothing will make me more comfortable than concluding this case.” And as the words escaped her mouth, they walked directly beneath the shadow of the enormous military air engine; and on the machine’s side Maria saw the name Valkyrie painted in cruel, sharp letters.

“Valkyrie,” she nearly whispered. “What a dreadful ship. By which I mean, of course, it’s a fearsomely ugly thing.”

Under the dirigible where the bottom hull had been pried open, three men stood arguing over some finer point of which repair ought to be made in which fashion. Two were large white men, and one was a small black man who was holding his own in the fray. He spoke softly but with great confidence about replacement pipes and valve drains until, from the corner of his vision, he spied Maria and Algernon strolling past.

His technical diatribe snagged, and he hesitated as they walked past. He was trying not to stare, but he couldn’t pull his gaze away completely.

His attention snared Maria’s attention in return; she was being looked upon with something like recognition and fear, and she didn’t know what to make of it. Many people knew who she was-she’d become accustomed to notoriety twenty years before. But this was a fretful gaze, and it made her feel fretful in response.

One of the mechanics said, just within her hearing, “Well, I think you might be right. And if it works, we can have her back in the air within an hour or two.”

The black man didn’t respond. He was still looking at Maria, and trying not to.

He was approximately her own height, which is to say, smallish for a man but tallish for a woman. He was maybe ten years her junior and slight in build, but he had an intelligent face and quick hands, and quick eyes that darted back and forth as he made his pretense of looking away.

She wondered if he might be a runaway slave. He was working on a Union warbird, so the odds weren’t so stacked against it. Perhaps he recognized her from some old adventure, or she only made him nervous by virtue of her old alliances.

Maria looked away for good, feeling a weird sort of embarrassment.

Algernon Rice asked, “Is everything all right?”

And she told him, “Yes, everything’s fine. It’s just such an imposing ship,” she misdirected. Then, because it did not seem to be enough to stop him from wondering, she added, “It reminds me of something I’ve seen somewhere before, but I can’t put my finger on it”-which was a lie, but it was enough information to prevent the further asking of questions.