Detective and mystery stories; Stone, Fleming (Fictitious character) -- Fiction
"It may be you've had an inspiration, Fibsy," conceded Stone, "and it
may be the word is not on that receipt after all. But we must use every
effort to get the paper and, also, to find that dime. It may well be a
word is engraved on the coin, in the same microscopic letters as these
on the pinhead. We must try both means of solution. Will you hunt the
dime, Fibs?"
"Sure, but I'll bet the word is on the paper. Else why'd the old lady
say that Mr. Bannard would find that receipt of interest to him? And,
too, as she left the jewels to two heirs, fifty-fifty, it stands to
reason part of the means of finding them should be given to each party."
"That's mere conjecture," Stone said, "but we'll look up both. I've
worked hours over the cipher, and I've proved to my own satisfaction
that it cannot be solved without the knowledge of the one word needed.
It's like the combination of a safe, you have to know the word or you
can never open the door."
"Tell me a little about it, just what you mean by key word," begged
Lucille, "I know nothing of ciphers."
"I make it out that this cryptogram is built on what we call the
Confederacy Cipher," Stone informed her. "It is a well known plan and is
much used by our own government and by others. It is the safest sort of
a cipher if the key word is carefully guarded. To make it clear to you,
I will put on this paper the alphabet block."
Stone took a large sheet of paper, and wrote the alphabet straight
across its top. He then wrote the alphabet straight down the left hand
side. He then filled in the letters in their correct rotation until he
had this result
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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