“Oh,” I said aloud as I reached for it.
Delaney—When you return, remind me to tell you all about the Burgess Tickets. Hope the honeymoon was as perfect as the lovely wedding. Always—Edwin
“Burgess Tickets,” I said. “Sounds good. I can’t wait to hear the details.”
I placed the note back on the books and looked around one more time satisfied there was nothing else out of place or noticeably wrong. I sniffed in the dusty, old smells and wished I hadn’t offered to get the coffee. It was good to be back, and I just wanted to stay right where I was.
Nevertheless …
I flipped off the light, closed and locked the door, and hurried to the kitchenette. Thankfully, the light in there was working too.
* * *
Balancing the tray back on the light side, I veered around a half wall that separated the front of the bookshop from a back corner that held a table. This was where Hamlet did most of his work, and where we had meetings or visited with customers. The walls in the corner were lined with wood file cabinets packed with documents Edwin had purchased or collected, or customers had sold to us. Hamlet did most of the document work, but I did a little.
As I caught Rosie’s eye, I remembered the last time we’d been gathered around that table. It had been at the wedding. We’d had the reception at Tom’s small pub, but we’d exchanged vows and had cake in the bookshop. It had been some back and forth parading along Grassmarket, but it had been fun. And my parents and brother had been in town for the special day. They were now back in the States, and I missed them.
Rosie’s expression garnered my full attention. She was sending me some sort of unspoken communication. Her eyes grew wide with what I thought might be disbelief. She didn’t look at me long enough for me to understand what might be going on, but she spoke up quickly.
“Delaney, Mary here, though she spells her name S-T-E-W-A-R-T, has the same name as a woman she thinks she used tae be.”
I put the tray on the table. “I don’t understand.”
Rosie smiled patiently at Mary as Hector sat on Rosie’s lap. Even the dog’s attention was firmly and curiously aimed toward our guest.
Mary looked at me. “I was just telling Rosie about … well, I’m certain I’ve lived many lives.”
“Oh. That’s interesting,” I said as I sat too.
“Aye, and…” she looked at Rosie and then back at me, “well, I believe that I lived one of my lives as a Scottish queen.”
The facts came together quickly in my mind, once I zeroed in on a few things.
“Mary Stewart,” I muttered. “Sounds just like Mary Stuart. Mary, Queen of Scots!”
Rosie and Mary nodded.
I sat forward and leaned my arms on the table. “You think you were once Mary, Queen of Scots?”
I didn’t know if she was impressed by my apparent knowledge of the once and martyred queen, or if she was just satisfied that I now knew, that she’d shared the part of her that was the most difficult part to share.
“That’s correct,” she said admirably. “In fact, I’m certain of it. No doubt in my mind.”
I meant no disrespect, but my response was not that of a polite Kansas farm girl. It wasn’t polite no matter where I’d come from. Even across land and sea, I could sense my mother’s disapproval when all I did for a good long few moments was laugh.
TWO
“I am so sorry,” I said, horrified by my behavior but unable to rein it in as quickly as I should. “Please consider this embarrassing reaction a nervous laugh, not a laugh-laugh.”
Mary smiled. “It’s okay. I’m fully aware that my circumstances are difficult to believe and understand. Imagine my own surprise when I realized I’d lived more than one life. I didn’t go searching for past lives, but they found me anyway.”
“And how did that happen?” Rosie asked.
I looked at Rosie. She was someone who believed in the Loch Ness Monster, had believed even before … well, before we found things that might convince even the most skeptical of doubters. With Mary, she seemed both surprised and interested in what she had to say, but perhaps disbelieving, doubtful. Maybe I wasn’t reading her correctly.
“Oh, it’s a long story,” Mary said. “But it started with dreams. I dreamt things I knew I’d never heard or read about before, so I started studying. There came a time when I became educated enough about some particulars that I couldn’t trust the dreams anymore, but my beliefs built from there. Dreams and self-education led to things I can only describe as memories.” She put her fist to her chest. “It all became a certainty, but I can’t pinpoint exactly when. I understand how that can be difficult for anyone who hasn’t been through it to believe.”
“Sometimes people can become certain of things that arenae real anyway, sometimes they’ve convinced themselves,” Rosie said.
“Of course.” She looked at Rosie. “I’m one hundred percent certain though, and I can prove it.”
“Aye?” Rosie said.
The bell above the front door jingled.
“Please give me a moment,” Rosie said. She stood, and with Hector in tow, they went to help a couple customers.
It was just us two doppelgängers at the table now. Mary looked at me a long moment. I had questions, plenty of them, but they weren’t organized in my mind.
“Look at us,” she said filling the silence before I could. “I mean, any other day, had I stopped by, you and I might not have met. Your coworkers might have made some comment about how I looked like you, asked me to come back in to meet you, but who knows?”
I sat forward. “Do you think it’s fate that we met today, or maybe something to do with how you’re tuned into your past life? It’s more than one past life?” I said.
“I think it’s more than one, but the only one I really remember is the queen’s. To answer your question though, I think me coming here today is an example of how some mysteries aren’t solvable, but happen all the time anyway, forcing us to pay attention to something we might have missed. I do think it was probably destined for the two of us to meet, Delaney. I’ve been thinking about taking the books to a used bookshop for almost two years. What if I’d brought them in before you arrived?”
“I have been here a year.”
“Except for the last two weeks, or when you might have been out briefly for something else.” Mary shrugged. “We ran into each other. Literally. It’s a mystery that we may never quite understand. Consider this too—what if, and this is a doozy so I’m not saying I believe it but since anything is possible—what if my desire to take these books to a bookshop set the cosmos in motion to bring you here a year ago. We really do look alike. Perhaps the universe wanted us to meet, and since I was procrastinating, those universal powers sought you out?”
“Uh, that’s pretty far-fetched.”
“Aye, but don’t you think that the notion of past lives is just as far-fetched?”
“Yes, but in a different way.”
“Have you seen pictures of the queen?” Mary asked.
“Mary, Queen of Scots? I think so, but I’m not sure I’ve paid much attention.”
Mary pulled out her phone and searched. A moment later, she held it up for me to see. “Look at her. Look at me, at you. See the similarities?”
There were similarities. The red hair, the pale skin, though I didn’t notice as many freckles on the portrait Mary held up. The three of us did have somewhat pointy chins.
“Okay,” I said. “But I don’t have any past life memories.”
“I’m not saying you also once lived as the queen, I’m just saying there must be something between the three of us. We might never understand it, but we were destined to meet, Delaney, I’m sure of it. Today, we might not understand why, but I suspect we might someday.”
I smiled, my manners coming back. “Well, I think that’s lovely.”
“What if I could convince you that what I’m saying is real, that there is evidence that I am a reincarnation of Mary,
Queen of Scots, Mary Stuart?”
“The proof you mentioned?”
“Aye.”
I squinted at her. “I’m listening.”
Mary laughed. “Not here. At my house. I’d like to invite you and your new husband for dinner. Rosie too. My husband and I would love to have all of you over. He’s going to be just as surprised as you and I are, more maybe.” She paused. “Your husband isn’t tall and bald is he?”
I laughed. “Dark, curly hair. Blue eyes.”
“Phew, Henry has brown eyes. Would have been even more bizarre if they’d looked alike, huh?”
I didn’t know what to make of Mary. She was delightful. She was weird. But she wasn’t weirdly delightful, which is a description unto itself. I was pretty good at quickly reading people, but I couldn’t get a read on her. I listened for the bookish voices to come back and nudge me the right direction. Nothing. Maybe what they’d said before we’d run into each other was all they meant to tell me.
“That’s very kind,” I said. “I think we would enjoy that.”
Rosie and Hector rejoined us after the other customers left the shop.
“We’ve been invited over to Mary’s for dinner,” I said. “She will show us her proof that she was once Mary, Queen of Scots.”
“Aye? Sounds intriguing.”
“How about tonight?” Mary said.
“Oh,” I said as Rosie shrugged and nodded. “Well, I think that should be fine.”
“Excellent. We’ll continue this tonight. I look forward to meeting your husband.”
Mary wrote down her address and phone number on a scrap piece of paper and gave it to me. In an oddly formal gesture, we shook hands. So did she and Rosie.
“Thanks for taking the books. I hope they sell,” she said.
“I think they will,” Rosie said as we all walked toward the front door.
“Rosie, please feel free to bring a plus one if you’d like.”
Rosie nodded. “Ta, but it will just be me.”
“I’m looking forward to the evening. Thank you again.” Mary pulled open the door, and with one last smile she exited the shop.
Rosie and I looked at each other with equal uncertainty.
“She’s an odd one,” Rosie said.
“Yes. I’m looking forward to dinner.”
“Aye, I think I am too.”
“No Regg tonight?” I asked.
Regg and Rosie were an on-again, off-again couple. They were on again as of the few minutes before Tom and I left for our honeymoon.
“He’ll be busy tonight.” Rosie looked at me. “But, we’re getting along verra well.”
“Good. Okay, Tom and I will pick you up.”
“Ye ken he’s available?”
“If he isn’t, he’ll want to clear his schedule. I don’t think he’ll want to miss this.”
“We might all be chopped up and thrown in her cooker.”
I laughed, but then sobered when I saw Rosie wasn’t smiling. “Really?”
“She’s an odd one.” Rosie repeated, but smiled now. “But I like the odd ones. I used to be one myself, I suppose.”
“How’s that?”
“Ah, maybe I’ll share that story with ye soon.” She reached down and picked up Hector.
I looked at the scrap of paper Mary had written her address on. Rosie slipped on her reading glasses and looked too.
“A lovely neighborhood.” She squinted. “Look at the M in her name.”
Mary had printed the words, all the letters legible and ordinary, except for the M in Mary. The two straight lines had extra lines added at their bottoms, perpendicular dash-like marks. It made the M fancier than the rest of the note.
“Hmm,” Rosie said as she looked again. “321 Leven Court. That’s interesting.”
“Why?”
“Can we call up some internet information on Mary—the real Queen of Scots’ version?”
“Sure.” I pulled out my phone and quickly found the Wikipedia site. I handed the phone to Rosie; she scrolled and read.
“I thought I remembered that. The queen once escaped from Loch Leven castle,” Rosie said.
“That’s either a coincidence or she moved there on purpose,” I said. “I can see forcing the similarities to prove a story.”
“Lass, can ye see if there are samples of the queen’s handwriting online?”
“Absolutely.” It took only another second to find several examples.
Together Rosie and I inspected. The handwriting was identical, even down to the extra lines on the Ms. Not all of them, but many of the queen’s Ms had those dash-like lines.
“I can’t find this spooky yet,” I said. “It could all be forced, on purpose. Googled,” I said. “None of this is evidence.”
“No.”
I bit my lip and looked out the front window. There was no sign of Mary, and Grassmarket had become much less busy now that the morning rush had mellowed.
“Should we go or should we cancel?” I asked.
“Och, lass, I’m going. Some of yer adventures are simply too much for me, but I’ll not miss this one. I’m intrigued.”
“Sounds good.” I plunked my hands on my hips. “Okay, I think it’s time to either go get some breakfast or get back to work. Did I miss much? You looked deep in thought when Mary and I first came in.”
“We missed ye, lass, and I’m glad ye’re back. It would be verra unladylike of me tae ask any personal questions, but I do hope ye and Tom had a good time.” She smiled.
“We had a great time.” I winked.
“Oh, tae be young and in love.” Rosie smiled and Hector barked.
Then Rosie’s demeanor transformed, as if she’d lowered a curtain or turned down the lights. “But, aye, ye missed some … drama.”
“I’m listening.”
“I think we should sit down.”
“Rosie?” I put my hand on her arm. “Tell me. What’s up?”
We didn’t sit down, but there’s a chance we should have. I couldn’t have been less prepared for what Rosie had to tell me.
“Lass, it seems as if … as if the bookshop is tae be shut down. We’re going tae close.”
Surely, I hadn’t heard her correctly. I shook my head, once, twice. “Rosie. What?”
“Aye, t’is verra bad news.”
It was almost the worst news possible.
THREE
“I don’t … I don’t understand,” I said after my stomach returned from the plummet it took. “That’s simply not possible. The bookshop can’t close—not permanently. That can’t be what you mean.”
“Lass, that’s preceese what I mean.”
“Precesse?” I asked, hoping it was the Scots word for not even close to.
“Och. Precisely.”
“I was afraid of that. Why?” I said. My muddled and shocked mind searched for a solution and the problem that might go with it. “I mean, if it’s a matter of Edwin not wanting to work anymore, I can do whatever he needs me to do.”
Rosie put her hand on my arm. “Lass, it isnae that t’all. Edwin would never choose to close the bookshop. There are apparently some issues with building codes.”
“Building codes?”
Rosie frowned. “I should have let Edwin tell you. He has the details, and I’m afraid I’ll tell it wrong. I’m sorry, lass, I’ve been thinking about it for a few days now. I should not have just dropped the news so inconsiderately.” She smiled weakly. “At least I asked if you wanted tae sit down first.”
“Oh, Rosie, the bookshop just can’t close.” I grabbed my phone. “I’m calling a meeting.”
That’s exactly what I did. I texted Edwin and Hamlet, requesting their presence as soon as possible—demanding it, actually. I didn’t care if I interrupted important meetings or classes. I needed everyone there. I needed to understand what was going on. They greeted me with hugs and kisses on my cheek, but I didn’t have time for such frivolity. I told everyone to sit at the back table, and I even turned the sign o
n the front door to Closed.
I began by asking what in the world was going on. In bits and pieces, they said the same thing Rosie had said, however, with more detail.
“We have structural issues, problems,” Edwin said.
“Structural issues?” I said to Edwin. “What are the specific problems?”
“I’m still trying to understand,” Edwin said. “I received a phone message a few days ago. It was a strange recording that said we were to be out of the building by the end of next month, that the inspector’s findings regarding our building’s structural integrity issues were ironclad. The final vote will set everything in motion.”
“Final vote?” I asked. “Who’s voting?”
Hamlet sat forward, placing his arms on the table. “The city is governed by a Lord Provost, similar, I believe, to an American mayor. Under that position is the City of Edinburgh Council. Councilors vote and make the sorts of decisions regarding building codes, et cetera. There is also a Parliament, but they are more involved with things like foreign policy and defense. We have done some research regarding specific people and times, but don’t have the answers yet. We are certain it’s a council matter. The vote is scheduled to take place one week from today, next Monday.”
I relaxed a little. “This can’t be real. It’s a scam or something. A phone scam. They happen all the time.”
“We thought so too at first, but I looked online, and there is a final vote scheduled for one week from now,” Hamlet said. “And, the agenda item lists The Cracked Spine specifically.”
“What does it say?” I asked, my panic zipping back up to high alert.
“The Cracked Spine failed its building inspection and is deemed unsafe to continue operating within the city limits of Edinburgh. The vote will finalize the decision, or maybe it was formalize. Well, something like that. I can show you,” Hamlet said as he began to scroll over his phone.
The Stolen Letter Page 2