Epilogue - Five weeks later.

Victoria emerged from the tavern's kitchen in time to see Diego enter the tavern with his father and Felipe behind him. She smiled as the three men came up to the bar, "Buenos dias gentlemen, you are looking very pleased with yourselves." she said.

Don Alejandro slapped his son on the shoulders and grinned, "Buenos dias Victoria," he replied, "We have every right to be pleased with ourselves. Diego has finally finished his task at Quintana's hacienda and he is about send a full report to Capitan Olvera," he said proudly, "And we've come to celebrate the great job that he did."

Victoria beamed at her friend, "That's wonderful Diego. I will open my best wine for you." she said.

Don Alejandro clapped his hands together, "Excellent. I'll get us a table." he said as he and Felipe crossed over to a vacant table by the far wall.

Diego smiled and shook his head as Victoria moved through the curtains to get the wine; it wasn't often his father was proud by something that he had done and it felt good to have his father's respect.

"Ah Don Diego, have you finished your task yet?" de Soto asked as he walked up to the bar and placed several coins on the counter, to pay for his meal.

Diego smiled and nodded, "As a matter of fact, I have. Cesar Quintana had a remarkable collection of items from Spain, France, and England and even from Egypt." he replied. He had thoroughly enjoyed inventorying all the items Quintana's former hacienda.

De Soto snorted, "No doubt those items were taken from the French troops, who marched into Egypt under Napoleon."

"No doubt." Diego replied.

De Soto nodded as he gazed around the tavern before turning his attention back to Diego, "So, just what did you do with all the valuable pieces?" he said quietly, "I mean, you didn't leave them in the empty hacienda for anyone to steal."

Diego smiled, "Of course not," he replied, "Zorro is keeping them safe for me, until I hear back from Capitan Olvera."

"Zorro! You can't be serious," de Soto spluttered, "That brigand is not to be trusted with such an important task."

Diego shrugged, "The Capitan trusted him and that is good enough for me," he said as Victoria returned with the bottle of wine and several glasses, "Besides, I have the list of all the items and if anything goes missing, I know who to blame."

De Soto nodded thoughtfully, "Of course. I just would hate to have someone take advantage of you, Don Diego," he replied, "Now if you will excuse me, I have some work to do." he said before he turned and left the tavern.

Diego shook his head before he turned his attention to Victoria.

"So, Zorro helped you then, did he?" she asked with a smile.

He smiled back, "Yes, I couldn't have done it without him," he replied.

She nodded, "It was good of Zorro to help you out."

"It was -" He stopped when he saw his father waving to him, "Please excuse me, Victoria but father seems eager for his wine." he said with a smile as he picked up the bottle and glasses before he headed over to where his father and Felipe were waiting for him.

Victoria watched him go, pleased that everything was back to normal after the scandal of Don Cesar Quintana's arrest just over a month ago, for the murder of Señor Aragón as well as theft of some paintings from Spain. She felt that there was a lot more to the story than the Alcalde was willing to admit and she even believed that Diego, himself, knew much more about it but no matter how hard she tried to get information from him, he never told her what had happened at Quintana's hacienda.

She sighed as she turned her attention back to her patrons; it would end up being one of those mysteries, which she would never know the secret to.

The End

I hope you enjoyed this story. It was a challenge to write a more standard Zorro adventure. I've been wanting to write something different for a long time and this came along at the right time. Sadly the project itself didn't go the way it had been hoped, as this story had been selected but it has been a good, if somewhat frustrating learning experience.

I did some research for this story and most of it is historically accurate:

The Crown and Sceptre can be seen at the Royal Chapel in Granada, Spain, where Queen Isabella I and King Ferdinand are interned.

La Guardia Real (Royal Guard) dates back many centuries and their main function is to protect the Spanish Royal Family and they continue to do so to this day.

Father Jose de Zalvidea, mentioned in the prologue, was a real priest in charge of San Gabriel Mission at the time that this series was set.

The child's drawing I mentioned, is called a "was" an Egyptian hieroglyph character which stands for power of a ruler / god - a sceptre, amongst other things.

And of course the Rosetta Stone discovered in 1799 by French troops, in Egypt, under Napoleon, who took artists, writers with him on his campaign.