“As we discussed earlier, the message must be pointing to the traitor,” my father replied.
“And now you see the importance of us having both the original message and the one in Montclair’s typewriter,” Joanna continued. “It is the difference between the two that is of paramount importance, for it will disclose who the traitor is.”
“We should ask Lieutenant Dunn for the original message in its entirety,” I urged.
“Which may or may not be forthcoming,” Joanna said. “There might well be other sections of the message that are not meant for our eyes. Even our sworn oath to the Official Secrets Act will not prevail if the document was classified as top secret.”
“In which case it would be heavily redacted before being shown to us,” my father noted.
“And thus would be of little use to us,” Joanna agreed.
“But we should still ask for it,” I insisted.
“So we shall, but we should be prepared for disappointment,” Joanna said, reaching for a Turkish cigarette, which she studied at length. “And we face another problem in that obtaining the sheet from Montclair’s typewriter will be no simple matter.”
“Surely Lieutenant Dunn will allow us to examine it,” I said.
“It will not be in his hands, but Lestrade’s,” Joanna reminded us. “Montclair’s death is now a murder case, and Scotland Yard will have complete jurisdiction and consider the sheet prime evidence.”
“Then Lestrade will have no objection to our reviewing the bloodied sheet.”
“But it will in all likelihood have been removed from the typewriter.”
“Is that of such great importance?”
“Any move that alters or distorts the crime scene is important.” Joanna rose to light her cigarette and began pacing the floor. She continued to do so for several minutes, all the while ignoring us. Then she abruptly turned and, with a firm nod, said, “I still believe the word exodus has the most relevance here. Why else would Ainsworth go to such lengths in order to bring it to our attention?”
“Should we again read that particular section of the Old Testament?” I asked.
“The answer is not in a single passage or line,” Joanna replied. “Ainsworth is directing our attention to the word exodus or something closely attached to it. Using that scheme, it would have to be relatively obvious, yet still hidden.”
“Such as?”
“Blood,” Joanna replied. “Therein must lie the answer, for Montclair used his own blood to point to something on the sheet in the typewriter.”
“Perhaps his blood was the only inklike material available,” I suggested.
“That is not the case,” Joanna said. “Remember that among Montclair’s personal possessions was a fountain pen. It would have been far easier for him to use it, rather than reaching to the stab wound in his back for blood. That, my dear John, was done on purpose. Montclair is literally screaming ‘Blood!’ from his grave.”
“Blood is mentioned several times in the book of Exodus,” my father recollected.
“Actually twice,” Joanna said. “It was used in the first and tenth plagues.”
I rapidly turned the pages to the section in the Old Testament that described the ten plagues. “I shall begin with the part that deals with the first plague, and read it word for word.”
Joanna waved away the idea. “It would be best if you simply summarized it for us. The answer is not in a given word, but in the underlying meaning of a particular passage.”
After reading about the first plague that was entitled Blood, I encapsulated the story as follows. “It seems that when Pharaoh refused to set the Israelites free, he was threatened with the plague of blood, in which the waters of the Nile River would turn red with blood and thus be unusable for human consumption. Pharaoh ignored the threat and God polluted the river with blood in full view of the Egyptian leader.”
“Does it speak of how the feat was performed?” Joanna asked.
“It only states that God did it.”
“No subterfuge, eh?”
“None that was mentioned,” I replied. “I suspect there was a reason God performed this mighty act in the presence of Pharaoh. In that fashion, there could be no magic or trickery to explain away the incredible feat.”
“A wise move,” Joanna said, more to herself than to us. “Let us now turn to the second mention of blood. I believe it occurred just prior to God’s threat to kill all Egyptian firstborn.”
I quickly went to the tenth plague. “Here,” I told them, “God sent the Angel of Death to kill the firstborn, with instructions to spare those of the Israelites. In order to assure that the Jewish firstborn were left unharmed, the head of each such household was ordered to paint the sides and tops of their door frames with lamb’s blood. The Angel of Death, on seeing these signs, would pass over the houses of the Israelites, and thus their children would be saved. And this is the origin of the Jewish religious holiday of Passover, which commemorates this miraculous event,” I concluded.
“I can make nothing of it,” my father grumbled. “And lamb’s blood certainly does not equate to human blood.”
“It is not the source of the blood that is important here, but the fact that it was used as a signal,” Joanna said, as she continued to pace. “That is the common denominator. In both the tenth plague and in Montclair’s message, blood was used to reveal identities.”
“Yet it remains a puzzle within a puzzle,” I said unhappily. “And we have only the word blood to go on.”
“The answer is in the tenth plague,” Joanna reaffirmed. “Ainsworth’s message led us to the book of Exodus, and Montclair’s message was signaling us with blood, just as the Israelites signaled the Angel of Death with blood.”
“Are you suggesting we read of the tenth plague yet again?” I asked.
“We have no other recourse.”
My father sighed with fatigue. “Perhaps we should have Miss Hudson prepare an early dinner, for we are certain to be working late into the night.”
“A nice glass of sherry would also offer a most welcome respite,” I added. “Perhaps two glasses would serve that purpose even better.”
Joanna shook her head vigorously. “Every moment we waste brings England closer to disaster. We have no choice but to persevere. Refreshments can wait.”
“Does it not strike you as odd that the messages left by the two dead men, Verner and Montclair, were both written in blood?” I queried. “Could there be a revealing connection?”
“The only connection here is that both men used blood as ink to identify their murderers,” Joanna replied. “With this in mind, we should focus on the last plague, for therein is the answer to Montclair’s coded message.”
I wearily turned my attention to the description of the tenth plague. “Shall I begin with the Angel of Death?”
Before she could answer, the phone rang out and Joanna quickly picked up the receiver.
“Yes?” she said in a most curt manner, then listened and responded more gently. “Of course I recognize your voice.”
Joanna’s brow went up. “You have both?
“Fifteen minutes would be very convenient,” she said, and placed the receiver down.
“The tide of fortune is changing,” Joanna announced. “The caller was Mary Ellington, and she has found her notes on the original document that she helped Ainsworth decode.”
“Hooray!” I shouted.
“Most importantly the message mentions the word exodus,” Joanna went on. “So in essence, Alistair Ainsworth has pointed to the very word twice.”
“Which tells us we are on the correct track,” my father concluded. “Yet we still require Montclair’s bloodied sheet to solve the puzzle.”
“Not to worry,” Joanna said, and gleefully rubbed her hands together. “You see, Mary Ellington has that sheet in hand as well.”
“But it should be in Scotland Yard’s possession, should it not?” my father asked.
“Yes, it should,” Jo
anna said, with a mischievous smile.
“Then how did she come by it?”
“I did not ask, for it is a crime to remove prime evidence from a crime scene,” Joanna said, and hurried over to the large table on the far side of the room. “Let us clear the surface, for Mary Ellington will arrive shortly.”
The long rectangular table was brimming with materials used by Joanna in her investigations. There were bottles of various reagents, a Bunsen burner, glass flasks, test tubes, and the very same microscope that her father, Sherlock Holmes, once peered through. We closed and pushed aside texts and manuals that dealt with the principles of codebreaking. Despite our careful study, the books had proved to be of no help in deciphering the coded message that lay before us.
Time seemed to drag by as we anxiously awaited the arrival of Mary Ellington. My father checked his timepiece every minute or so, but its hands refused to move faster. Joanna began pacing again, no doubt arranging and rearranging the facts surrounding the coded message. Yet even she periodically glanced at the window, anticipating the arrival of a most important visitor. Finally there came a rap on the door. But it was not Mary Ellington.
“There is a lady downstairs carrying a large package who wishes to see you, Mrs. Watson,” Miss Hudson said.
“Be good enough to show her in,” Joanna said. “And please see to it we remain undisturbed.”
As the door closed, Joanna again happily rubbed her hands together. “Pray tell, what do you think of the large package Mary has in her possession?”
“It could be anything,” I replied.
“Oh, you can do better than that, John,” Joanna coaxed. “Why would a small lady like Mary Ellington bother to lug around a large package to visit us at this time of evening?”
I had no answer.
“It is the typewriter,” Joanna said joyfully. “This Mary Ellington knows the value of evidence that must be taken as a whole. She would make a fine detective, for she realizes the typewriter itself may provide important clues.”
With a rap on the door, Mary Ellington entered, holding on to a quite large package with both hands. “Where shall I place it?”
Joanna motioned to the large table against the wall. “There will do nicely.”
Mary carefully put the package down next to Sherlock Holmes’s microscope and went about unwrapping it. The typewriter, with the bloodied sheet it contained, appeared exactly as it did in Montclair’s office. “Aren’t you going to ask how I obtained it?”
“I suspect you simply walked out with it,” said Joanna.
“Right you are,” Mary said. “Scotland Yard left the crime scene as it was, so they could return tomorrow and complete their investigation. I, shall we say, ah, borrowed it for now and will return it before the detectives revisit in the morning. Since there is a slim possibility they will come back sooner, we should move along quickly.”
“Let us begin with your notes on the original message, and then compare them to the message in Montclair’s typewriter.”
“Not only do I have the notes, I have a complete copy of the document itself that I had taken home.”
“I thought that was strictly prohibited,” my father remarked. “According to Lieutenant Dunn, that was an absolute rule not to be violated.”
Mary smiled slyly. “It was and is, but we often do so when struggling with a particularly difficult code. Lieutenant Dunn’s mind works eight to six, while ours must remain powered on twenty-four hours a day.”
“Which is much to our benefit at the moment,” I thought aloud.
Mary nodded and reached for a folded sheet in her handbag. Unfolding it, she placed it on the table and stepped back for us to see. It read:
4 U-boats off innermost Orkney Islands
Exodus must be delayed
“What the communiqué in fact states is there are four German submarines close to a major naval installation,” Mary interpreted. “Thus, the plan to send our warships from this port to the Baltic Sea entrance had to be put on hold for the present. You will also note the obvious discrepancy between the two messages. In the original message, four U-boats are mentioned, while the sheet in Montclair’s typewriter speaks of only three. I believe this was Tubby’s method of telling us to concentrate on the original message.”
“Which contains the word exodus, and which he again used in the second message,” Joanna emphasized.
“Precisely my point,” Mary continued. “Tubby is informing us that is the key to the code or some passage contained therein.”
“We reached the very same conclusion and searched through the book of Exodus with diligence, but could uncover no clues,” Joanna said. “We are of the opinion that Montclair used his own blood to signal something of utmost importance in the message, much as the Israelites employed the blood of a lamb to signal the Angel of Death to pass over their homes and thus spare their firstborn.”
“Ah yes,” Mary said, nodding. “The tenth plague, which was inflicted when Pharaoh refused to free the Israelites.”
“The horror of killing the Egyptian firstborn,” Joanna murmured, leaning in to concentrate on the bloodied sheet in the typewriter.
“It is most unwise to upset the Heavenly Father,” Mary remarked.
Joanna carefully removed the sheet from the typewriter and placed it upon the table, which allowed all of us a clear view of the stained message.
3 U-BOATS OFF INNERMOST ORKNEY ISLANDS
“On examining the blood-smeared sheet, I see where the number three is underlined by a streak of blood,” Joanna noted, now using her magnifying glass for a more detailed inspection. “Thus, we can conclude he wanted us to concentrate on the three. Then he left the u intact, but smeared out boats with blood. Since we know the correct number should be four, let us substitute that for the three. This interpretation of the code reveals the number four, followed by a large U, which reads ‘4 U.’”
“Perhaps the discrepancy in the numbers is simply a signal to draw our attention to a hidden message within,” Mary suggested.
“I believe otherwise,” Joanna contended, and returned the sheet to its original position in the typewriter. “The discrepancy in numbers must be of greater significance than to simply draw our attention, for the presence of blood alone would accomplish that. There is a deeper reason Montclair went to such obvious lengths to emphasize the number four. He actually underlined it. You must remember he was breathing his last. He had to make every second and every word count. We must therefore concentrate on the number four and what it represents.”
“Perhaps it refers to the fourth word in the message,” Mary surmised, and counted words on the sheet. “Which is innermost, and that is of no help.”
“Or it might represent the fourth letter of the alphabet, which is d,” Joanna said. “That letter placed next to U-boats spells duboats. There is no such word in the German language.”
“Nor in French,” my father noted.
“Nor in Spanish, Italian, or Russian,” Mary said.
Joanna studied the bloodstained sheet once more at length. “Perhaps Ainsworth meant for us to see only the d and the u, which combines to form the German word du, which translates to you. But then, it was followed by boats. Youboats off is nonsensical, as would be the German duboats off.”
“For some reason, I feel we are on the wrong path here,” Mary said. “Tubby would have made it more sophisticated than just moving a few words around. You see, the Germans might have detected that, for their experts no doubt studied Tubby’s decoded message with that in mind.”
“He would not hide it so deeply,” Joanna asserted. “That would take far too long to decipher, and Ainsworth knew time was short.”
“Sometimes the most clever codes are the most obvious ones,” Mary stated. “The answer can be directly in front of your eyes, yet difficult to see.”
Joanna stared at the typewriter and studied its keyboard at length, then the letter itself. Her line of vision went back to the keyboard, upon which was dra
wn the figure of a hand in chalk. “Who drew the outline?”
“Scotland Yard,” Mary replied. “Inspector Lestrade made the drawing just before the body was removed.”
“Well done,” Joanna said, and placed her right hand over the outline, extending her index finger so that it touched the bloodied sheet. “As I recall, Montclair’s index finger was the only one extended. Correct?”
“Correct.”
“And he was right-handed. Correct?”
“Correct.”
“So we can conclude it would be his writing finger that pointed to the word innermost on the sheet.”
“And?” Mary queried.
“Perhaps he purposely stopped there.”
“To what end? The word innermost by itself has no real significance.”
My father said, “Perhaps Montclair’s finger stopped because death came at that moment.”
“Or shortly thereafter,” Joanna agreed. “You will note that the blood smear drops off acutely after the inner in the word innermost.”
Mary leaned in for a closer inspection of the letter. “For some reason Montclair underlined the number three that should be a four, and smeared through boats off. He then died as he reached the word innermost, and at that point the bloodstain stopped and dropped off. So, following this schematic, we have the letters d and u, and the word innermost, which together spell duinnermost. It has no recognizable meaning.”
Joanna’s eyes narrowed noticeably as she read the sheet yet again. Then, using her finger, she began pointing to each individual letter. She performed this act twice before announcing, “All becomes clear.”
“But I see only garbled words,” Mary said.
“To the contrary, it is a complete message,” Joanna asserted.
“Based on what?”
“Passover,” Joanna replied. “How clever! How very clever!”
“Please explain,” Mary requested. “For you see what I do not.”
“Montclair had obviously worked with Ainsworth on the original message and knew it involved the Exodus plan. That was the key Ainsworth was now passing to Montclair and the others in the Admiralty Club, knowing that they alone could decipher the secret message. He did it as follows. First, Ainsworth substituted the number three for the number four, so that the group would be aware that the number four was of critical importance. In this instance, the number four stood for the fourth letter in the alphabet, which is d.”
The Disappearance of Alistair Ainsworth Page 23