“I wrote my master’s thesis on the witches in Macbeth.” She blew on her tea. “Their mystical powers and the role of audience superstition at the Globe Theatre. I spent a summer at King’s College at the London Shakespeare Centre working on it. Total bliss. Plus I practically lived at the Globe, watching every performance I could afford. I was so broke I had to stand in front with the groundlings. Even if it rained, which it did. Often. But it was worth it.”

“How come you never mentioned any of this before?” I asked. The microwave beeped again and I took out the other mug of tea. “I never knew you were an English major.”

“Do you have any idea how many job opportunities there are for someone whose skill set consists of being able to recite Macbeth by heart?”

“I’m guessing not many.”

“You guess right. I didn’t want to teach and my hoped-for career writing the Great American Novel stalled out after the first year.” She shrugged. “So I went into Human Resources instead. But believe it or not, the Folger Shakespeare Library was interested in my Macbeth thesis. It’s in their reference collection.”

“That sounds like quite an honor. Congratulations.”

“Thank you. And I still drag Tom to Shakespeare festivals all over the country,” she said. “Or movie adaptations. I’ve seen his plays performed in more ways that you can imagine. Samurai Shakespeare, Roaring Twenties Shakespeare, sci-fi Shakespeare. You name it, it’s out there.”

I couldn’t wrap my head around sci-fi Shakespeare. “Did you ever come across anything that said he didn’t write his own plays?”

“Sure,” she said. “The Folger has a fabulous research center they make available to anyone who thinks they might have new evidence about the plays or where they originated. Even the Folger admits it’s still one of the great mysteries how one person—especially someone with Shakespeare’s limited education—could have produced such an incredible collection of work. Though in all honesty, the consensus is that Shakespeare did write Shakespeare since no one has ever come up with irrefutable evidence that he didn’t.” She gave me a curious look. “Why are you asking about this?”

When I didn’t answer right away she said, “Lucie? Do you … have … information proving someone else wrote Shakespeare’s plays? Or think you have information?”

“I don’t know,” I said. “I came across something in Leland’s papers recently.” I wasn’t quite ready to tell her about Prescott and the Bruton Vault. Which Josie Wilde had already debunked.