“Slatterly, you’re a brave man to say that anything can’t happen to-morrow night. I thought you’d learned your lesson——”
“I have. Never fear for that. To-morrow night I’m going to watch beside that lagoon with a loaded gun—and I am going to see this thing through.”
CHAPTER XXI
The sheriff had finished his investigations by noon of the following day, and after lunch I was free to work upon the problem that I felt was the key to the whole mystery—the cryptogram beside Florey’s body. Lately I had been thinking that in all probability to procure the script had been the direct motive of the murder; and the fact of its theft from my room seemed to bear me out.
Why wasn’t it reasonable to presume that in the last instant of Florey’s life, just before the attack was made, he had attempted to conceal the script. He had thrown it from him; his death-cry had aroused the household so that the murderer had no time to seek and procure it. Then from a hiding place, or even from among a group of the guests, he had seen me pick it up.
To work out that cryptogram, to read its hidden meaning was the first and the best thing I could do in the way to solve the mystery of Kastle Krags. Written originally on parchment, sixty or seventy years before, it doubtless referred and was in explanation of the secret of the old manor house—the legend of the treasure, supposedly hidden by Godfrey Jason in the long ago. I had just toyed with it before. Perhaps I had had little faith that it was of any real importance. But now, other avenues had failed, and I was resolved to know the truth if it was humanly possible to do so. I copied the script again, with great care:
aned
dqbo
aqcd
trkm
fipj
dqbo
seho
ohuy
wvyn
dljn
dtht
Then I began to make a systematic analysis. I noticed first that the second and the sixth words were identical, indicating—considering the brevity of the entire message—that it must represent a word of most frequent use. Of course the articles “a” and “the” occur most often in any English writing, yet I found it hard to believe that “dqbo” represented either. In the first place, in a message of that length it is reasonable to assume that all articles and words not absolutely necessary to the meaning had been omitted.