Magnus said, “Aye, she is lookin’ forward tae it, she would love tae hae an audience for her stories. And m’apologies for the trouble with yer window. I will pay tae replace it.”
Finch said, “Good, thank ye.” Finch said to Joe, “Does that make up for the robbery?”
Joe waved his hand “Yes, sure, it’s already forgotten.”
Emma asked, with her phone in her hand, “Do you take Venmo? I’ll go ahead and pay you now.”
Magnus said, “Ye ought tae build better cases and hae a stronger security system, I hear much of what ye hae stored there is priceless. The sword for instance, Fraoch tells me it is worth a great deal.”
Finch Mac chuckled, “Nae need, we hae removed the rest of the artifacts, they are stored somewhere more secure. Daena come lookin’ for them.”
Magnus laughed. “We winna. But if ye need anything stored with me, let me know. Lady Mairead for one has an extensive art collection, she kens how tae keep it safe.”
Joe said, “She is a lovely woman, so knowledgeable about the history of Scotland. I look forward to meeting with her, did you hear what she gave me?”
“Nae, what was it?”
“The lost casket letters! It’s amazing, I have the lost casket letters in my possession!”
Lydia said, “You’ll need to explain what those are, dear.”
“Mary Queen of Scots wrote letters to the Earl of Bothwell that were used to incriminate her, they ultimately led to her beheading. Many assumed they were faked, butthe letters were lost so if they were real or fake, it couldn’t be proven. There were copies that have been passed down through history, but no way to know if the originals were real and—”
Lydia rolled her hand for her husband to hurry.
He finished with, “Lady Mairead gave me the originals! I, Joe Munro, will get to the bottom of it: were they faked, were they real? It’ll be me!” He rubbed his hands together. “It could takeyearsof research!”
Zach called over, “Dinner will be ready really soon!”
Magnus said, “Thank ye Chef Zach.”
Joe said, “She also gave me a book that was…” He shook his head. “Breathtaking, it’s the journal of the Earl of Breadalbane, absolutely fascinating.”
Lydia Munro said, “Ha! You said it was infuriating.”
“It’s both fascinating and infuriating. It opened my eyes to a part of the Earl of Breadalbane’s life I never knew before. It also basically makes my life’s work useless. I’m going to have to go back and revise the whole thing.”
Karrie’s little sister, Tessa said, “Dad, we talked about this, just write a volume two!”
Lydia said, “Better yet, tell the story of his sister, it can dispute the facts of his life, but that’s part of history, right? To tellallsides of the story.”
Magnus chuckled. “Lady Mairead would love tae hae ye tell her side of the — I mean, her ancestor’s side of the story. I am sure she looks forward tae meetin’ with ye on it.”
I said, “She thinks the Earl gets too much credit. She believes Lady Mairead has the better story of the two.”
“Well, I have my gears turning, I was going to write about the king of Scotland, Mag Mòr but—”
Magnus sprayed beer, coughing. “My apologies, I was…”
Fraoch joked, “I had the same reaction.”
Hayley nudged him.
I handed Magnus a wad of paper towels and he dabbed at his shirt.
I asked, “What were ye saying about that king of…?”
Joe Munro said, “I was writing about this man, Mag Mòr. Some sources had him as a king of Scotland, but it’s gone very murky. Some of my research I’m having trouble duplicating. He was a king from the late thirteenth century, but most records have John Balliol as the king at about that same time. It’s very confusing—”
