The Loch Ness Papers Read online

  And, as strange as it was to all of us, women joined him for the beers and the company. Wyatt had never been lonely. In fact, he’d never been alone; the flow of women in and out of his life was constant and constantly surprising. None of us even knew there were that many single females in Kansas, let alone in our town—with vast lands and a low population.

  The strangest part of it all was that Wyatt remained friends with most of the women. In fact, he’d “dated” many intelligent, independent women who wanted the same thing he did. Nothing permanent. Whatever floats your paper hat, Dad had said more than once.

  “Our flight got bumped a day. The airport up and moved us. We won’t be there until Sunday now,” Wyatt said.

  “What? Why?”

  I could hear his shrug. “They didn’t tell us. They just said we would be a day later than planned. They didn’t apologize or anything.”

  “Sunday, not Saturday?”

  “That’s right.”

  “Well. I suppose it could be worse. It could have been cancelled altogether, but I want you guys here as soon as possible, and I don’t want any chance you’ll miss the wedding. I was hoping for some good padding in the timetable.”

  “We want to be there. Still plenty of time.”

  I heard both the restrained concern in his voice and grumbles in the background.

  “Is that Mom and Dad?” I asked.

  “Yep. Here’s Mom.”

  “Delaney, we’re sorry!” Mom said, her voice full of distress.

  Tears began to burn behind my eyes. It was only one day, but I missed them all so much.

  “It’s okay, Mom,” I said after I swallowed hard. “You’ll be here soon. Plenty of time for just us. We can work with this. I can’t wait to see you all.”

  “Us either, sweetie.” Mom paused, but only briefly. “And, we will not miss the wedding, I promise. We will swim if we have to.”

  I smiled. “Thanks, Mom.”

  “Are you sure we can’t bring anything?”

  Of course, my family had been surprised by the news, but they’d come to accept that I was old enough to make these sorts of decisions for myself. But all along the way, Mom had continually asked if she needed to send anything or bring something with her.

  She’d been asking me the same question since we’d scheduled the flight. I sensed there was something behind it, but I had no idea what it could be. I wondered if it was just the sense of discombobulation I’d thrown at them. They knew I’d been dating a Scottish pub owner, but they were surprised by the engagement. I’d been surprised by the engagement. The distance made them completely uninvolved in my relationship with the man I was going to marry. I was sure it made them feel disconnected, and I wondered if Mom was just trying to find a way to bring a bit of Kansas to Scotland so I wouldn’t forget where I’d come from.

  After a pause that went on too long, one I could blame on the transatlantic nature of the call if she asked, I said, “Just yourselves. Safe and sound. I can’t wait to see you.”

  “Okay!” Mom said with forced cheer. “See you soon. Can’t wait.”

  In the background I heard my dad and Wyatt chime in with “Can’t wait either”s.

  I placed the handpiece gently back onto the cradle and my fingers lingered.

  “What is it, lass?” Rosie asked.

  I looked at her and smiled. “They’ll be here. A day later is no big deal, right?”

  “Of course not!” Rosie said.

  But it was Hector’s nuzzle into my neck that made me truly feel better.

  “No, of course not,” I said. I took a deep breath and let it out. It would be fine. They would be here. It had been over a year since I’d seen them, and I was looking forward to every minute of their visit. I felt robbed of twenty-four hours, one thousand, four hundred and forty minutes. I would have to suck it up.

  “It will be all right, lass,” Rosie said with a smile.

  “Of course, it will,” I said. “I know.”

  “Did you talk tae the reverend?” Hamlet asked.

  “I did, and she agreed to officiate, but she wants to have a brief meeting with Tom and me first.”

  “Why?” Rosie asked.

  “I think she wants to ask Tom why he doesn’t attend church with his father. I guess she’s curious.” And she wanted to see for herself that he’s ready for this, but I kept that part to myself. It had been the subject of many a discussion over the last year. No need to trudge it up again now.

  “I see. Weel, Tom will answer her direct and it will be fine,” Rosie said, somewhat doubtfully.

  “He’ll be fine,” Hamlet said. He was wiping his hands on an old white rag and I smelled something that reminded me of elementary school.

  “I smell paste,” I said.

  “That’s probably because I’m pasting things,” he said.

  “Into the scrapbook,” Rosie said. “Hamlet wasnae busy and we needed tae add some things I’ve been collecting.”

  “Scrapbook?” I asked.

  “Aye, Rosie’s book,” Hamlet said. He noticed my questioning eyes. “We haven’t told you about the scrapbook? Oh, that is a disgrace. It’s one of our most important things. Rosie has basically written the history of the bookshop, perhaps a history even bigger than the shop but that’s up for argument I suppose, with the scrapbook. Pictures, articles, notes, cards. It’s quite the thing.”

  “I can’t wait to see it. How have I missed it?”

  “I keep it in my office,” Rosie said. “I don’t trust any other place, what with so many things coming and going all the time.”

  “I’d love to see it.” I took a step toward the back table currently hidden by a partial wall but before I could go far, deep, dark shadows filled the bookshop and thunder rumbled from outside. Rain suddenly fell in sheets, rattling the glass in the front window.

  “’Tis wicket oot there again,” Rosie said.

  Diverting our conversation further, the bell above the door jingled in tandem with another thunder rumble. We all, Hector included, turned to greet the customer.

  Clad in a black rain jacket, a black cowboy hat, and with a black satchel over his shoulder, the tall man lowered his red brollie gracefully and pushed the button with a click and a splattering whoosh.

  “Damn. I’m getting your floor wet,” he said, his Southern drawl thick. Southern United States.

  “It’s all right. It sees rain quite aft,” Rosie said.

  The man blinked and I looked at Hamlet. I thought I knew what “aft” meant, but he’d confirm.

  “Frequently, often,” Hamlet translated.

  The customer nodded at Hamlet and smiled at Rosie. “Is it all right if I just leave the umbrella by the door?”

  His accent was so thick I wondered if Rosie and Hamlet felt the way I did about the thicker Scottish accents I’d come across, like Rosie’s. I had to listen a little harder when she or my landlords spoke. Or, I used to have to listen harder. I realized with a bit of pride that I hadn’t done that in some time.

  “Aye, come in from the storm a wee bit. We’ve got coffee,” Rosie said after she seemed to process the man’s words.

  “Well, thank you kindly, but I’m here for more than just an escape from the rain. Is Edwin MacAlister in?”

  “Not at the moment. Can we help you? I’m Delaney,” I said. I put Hector down and walked toward the dripping man, who seemed to want to stay where he was until he stopped dripping. I knew how he felt.

  “Pleasure. Angus Murdoch,” he said as we shook. “I … uh, well, I have something I need to tell him. I need to show Mr. MacAlister something.” He patted his satchel. “I can come back when he’s in.”

  “It’s up tae you,” Rosie said. “Come in from the storm for a few minutes anyway. Look around or have a seat in the back if ye’d prefer.”

  Angus’s eyebrows came together and he surveyed the rest of us. He’d been friendly, but his expression turned serious. “I’d love to, but I might not be all that welcome.”


  We looked at him expectantly. He patted the satchel again and continued.

  “I’m soaked through and…”

  “Och, come on in with ye,” Rosie said when he didn’t continue right away. “We’ve been dripped on afor. We’ll not hang ye in the market or anything. It’s raining hard oot there. Come in.”

  The man looked at me but resumed smiling. “I guess I didn’t know a hanging in the market might be an option.”

  “Well, I suppose it used to be,” I said with a shrug. “But Rosie’s word is good. We won’t hurt you right off. Come on in.”

  He took off his jacket and hung it and the umbrella on the coatrack by the door. He wiped his hands on the stomach of his long-sleeved black T-shirt, and Johnny Cash lyrics came to my mind, even more so when I noticed his black boots and the big silver belt buckle.

  I hadn’t meant to stare, but he caught me nonetheless.

  “I’m here from Dallas, Texas. You’re American?” he said as he moved away from the front door.

  “Wichita, Kansas,” I said. “Other parts of Kansas too, but most recently Wichita.”

  “Great basketball at that university,” he said.

  “My dad’s a fan.”

  “How did you end up here?” Angus asked. “I’m assuming you work here?”

  “I do. For about a year now. I was laid off from a museum in Wichita and I needed an adventure. I answered an online ad.”

  “I’ll be. That sounds … wonderful.”

  “It is. Come on in.”

  When we were all comfortable at the back table, with coffees supplied by Rosie, Angus said, “I heard about this bookshop one time before, a few years back. A friend visited Edinburgh and stopped by. He said it was the most amazing place.” Angus looked around a moment. “He was right. There’s something about it that’s welcoming yet mysterious. Anyway, this place came back into my life recently. I’ll explain.”

  We waited, but when he didn’t continue right away, Hamlet said, “The mysteriousness could be the dark clouds, but we do try tae be welcoming.”

  Angus looked around again. “I bet.” He bit his bottom lip. He was struggling to find either the right words for his story or the right way to tell it. He moved his attention back to the satchel he’d placed on the floor, propped up against the leg of the chair. “Anyway, I brought this.” He pulled out a book and handed it directly to me. “It was in my grandfather’s things. A trunk I’ve had for over twenty years, since right after Gramps died, but I only recently opened it. I was close to him, and it took me that long … It was hard to lose him. He left me many things that are of no value to anyone but me, but this … I’m afraid this is worth something, and I’d already scheduled my trip to Edinburgh. It all seemed fortuitous, actually. I thought about just putting it on my shelf and pulling it down when I wanted to remember some of the reading adventures I had with Gramps, but I think that might be irresponsible if it is as valuable as I think it is. In fact, it might belong in a museum or something.”

  As I looked at the book, my curiosity transformed quickly—into shock, and then slight panic. I shared a look with Hamlet, whose reactions were equal to mine if a step slower.

  “You don’t think?” I said to Hamlet.

  “It can’t be,” Hamlet said a moment later. “Later editions were printed. That must be what this is, a later edition.”

  I didn’t want to touch the book. I put it back on the table, dropping it more than setting it. I didn’t want human hands to ever touch it again. It was that big a deal.

  “Should I get some gloves?” Hamlet asked as he stood and moved toward a shelf with a box of gloves.

  “Yes, please.”

  “Empty.” He held up the box.

  “Here.” I pulled my keys from my pocket and handed them to Hamlet. “I have some. If you wouldn’t mind running over.”

  Angus didn’t miss the hand-off and his eyes grew big when they noticed the old blue skeleton key.

  “What’s going on?” he asked.

  “Hamlet’s going to run over to my office and get some gloves. It’s on the other side of the building.”

  “I got that part, Ms. Nichols. This book is … valuable, then?”

  “I think so.” I nodded. “You know the stories?”

  “Of King Arthur and his knights? Of course. My grandfather and I enjoyed them all. I can’t remember if he read to me directly from that book, but he read the stories to me frequently, written by a fella named Pyle. So, was this book really printed in 1634, like it says in there, or was that just when the stories were first written? I did a little research and found the author’s name, Thomas Malory, but I don’t quite understand how everything works together. Pyle, Malory?”

  I shook my head. I still hadn’t lifted the cover.

  Wherein is declared his Life and Death; with all his glorious Battailes against the Saxons, Saracens, and Pagens, which, for the Honour of his Country, he most worthily achieved.

  The bookish voice was Arthur himself, who spoke in my head, words from that title page. I’d only seen that page a couple of times, but my strange memory quirk piped up with an old, English accent. Tears filled my eyes, as they sometimes did when the voices spoke, and I blinked them away.

  “I guess the simplest explanation is that there have been a few King Arthur storytellers over the centuries, but it is thought that Sir Thomas Malory was the first. This edition of his work—I believe it’s the Stansby edition—wasn’t the very first. Malory first wrote the stories in the late 1400s. This is a reprint. However, it’s an old, valuable reprint, called the Stansby edition because the printer was named William Stansby. Over the centuries, lots of changes to the stories were made, so it’s not so much author as rewriter who gets the credit, in my opinion. Edwin will know more, but I’m pretty sure Malory was the first recorded writer to put ink to paper about King Arthur. The printer got all the credit with this one and he made some changes to the original story. I’ll need to check the inside to make sure, but you said you saw the date 1634?”

  “Yes, ma’am.”

  “It’s probably what I think it is, then. As I mentioned, other editions have been printed since then, including the collection authored by Pyle in the early 1900s, but if you saw the date … Wow, do you have any idea where your grandfather got this?”

  Angus’s mouth made a straight line as he took a deep breath and let it out. “There’s a parcel more to this story. The truth is the truth and it usually gets out there, and that’s what I came here to do; get the truth set straight. My grandfather left me a note with this book.” Angus cleared his throat. “He said that he stole this book from this bookshop many years ago. He wanted me to return it to Mr. Edwin MacAlister.”

  Rosie, who had been sitting quietly and observing the conversation with Hector on her lap, gasped lightly. Other than that small noise, a swallow of silence filled the bookshop. This was not simple theft, but something more. The book might be considered priceless. I sat back in the chair, feeling like the air had been let out of me.

  “I see,” I finally said a long moment later. I was looking at the book over my steepled fingertips as Hamlet came around the wall with the box of gloves I kept in the warehouse.

  He stopped short when he saw my face. “What?”

  “I think we’d better call Edwin,” I said.

  “Aye?” Hamlet looked at the book on the table, at Angus, and then back at me. “Aye. I’ll ring him right away.”

  SEVEN

  “Twenty years anon?” Rosie said.

  “Yes,” Angus said.

  “It’s no wonder ye cannae remember.” Rosie looked at Edwin.

  Edwin had arrived at the shop fifteen minutes after Hamlet called him. Though he wore his typical outfit of slacks, a nice shirt, and a tie, he seemed to be dressed up a notch or two. I noticed it when he walked into the shop and slipped out of his raincoat. I wondered now if there was some reason for his sharp style.

  “I don’t remember the book,” Edwin said as he lo
oked at Angus. His eyebrows came together and he looked at me. “I’m afraid I was even more disorganized twenty years ago than I was right before you joined us, lass. Who knows what was on my shelves back then.”

  There was no hiding my doubt. “But you know books, Edwin. If this book came into the shop, even twenty years ago, you would have immediately understood its value.”

  He shrugged. “Not if it came in a box and one of my employees at the time didn’t know. Maybe just put it on the shelf.”

  Rosie had worked with Edwin forever, but Hamlet was barely twenty himself.

  “You might have hired people who wouldn’t know this was an important book?” I looked back and forth at Edwin and Rosie.

  They both shrugged, so casually that a simmer of anger blossomed under my skin. I could tell they weren’t being completely transparent, but why? I would think they would want to remember that book.

  But as I looked at them more closely, I wondered if my anger was misplaced. They actually might not remember. I wanted them to know specifically what had happened so much that I didn’t want to accept their memory loss, the passing of twenty years and many more books through their hands. I was too wound up.

  Angus had been concerned but not embarrassed by what his grandfather had done. I sensed he’d probably come to Edinburgh for the singular purpose of returning the book, that anything else he did while in Scotland was just extra fun. I had to give him credit; he could have made a lot of money with the book. He could have put it on his shelf. He could have just thrown it in the mail with a note to Edwin. That option made me sick to my stomach.

  Angus’s grandfather had apparently loved the stories of King Arthur. The ideal world of Camelot and the magical stories of the king, the knights, Guinevere, Merlin, and Lancelot, were universally appealing—at least they should be, the bibliophile in me concluded.